Math Mayan Calendar Essay

The Mayan calendar is a agreement of calendars in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, in modern communities in highland Gautemala, in Vercruz, Oxaca, and Chiapas, Mexico. The calendar is filled with mathsematics and a huge math brass, but it is not exactly like the math system we use today. The math system unfathomed wrong the Mayan Calendar is c on the wholeed the Vigesimal form. How does the Vigesimal System work? The seconds represent what symbols in the math system? This things have been in the question a long epoch we still ar studying the Mayan Calendar to this day which was made approximately 5,000 old age ago.The Vigesimal System began by the people in the Mayan civilization counting on their fingers and toes. Since we have cristal toes and ten fingers which compeers 20, so instead of having the junior-grade unit as ten, the count was done with a beastly 20 system. The System goes by 20 units for example it goes 1, 20, 400, 8000, 16000, etc. While are Decimal syste m goes by ten units so it goes 1, 10, 100, 1000, 10000, etc. This pith it has twenty posibble digits for a placeholder 0-19, while the ten-fold system we use today only has ten possible digits for a placeholder 0-9.So the numbers 3, 30, and three hundred would be represented as three, then three quantify twenty, then three times twenty times twenty, or simply three times four-hundred, which is twenty squared. So in Mayan math the number 123 doesnt mean you have one 100, two 10s, and three 1s, rather it means you have one 400, two 20s, and three 1s (which in our mathematical system that would be 443). So say we want to set up an equation and we set thirty-one concern to something and we used the Vigesimal System, it would look like this 31=20+11, and this is because this mathematical system goes by twenty units.The Mayan math makes it so instead of positions having a ten-fold, it actually has a twenty-fold. So the positioning system has it so the higher(prenominal)(prenominal) p laces get compute by twentys instead of tens. Even though it seems like twenty is the only number that the Vigesimal System deals with, it is not, the number five also has a big role. This is because eon individually side of our hand and toes we have five fingers and toes. The number five is a multiple of the twenty base unit system, so that adds on to the number fives significance.Located wrong this big mathematical system you only find three symbols for all the numbers. These symbols once again are based on the fact that the Vigesimal System is based on twenty units 0-19. The three symbols are the dot, bar, and the shell. The dot-worth one unit, the bar- worth five units, and the shell- symbolizes the nobody. The zero was actually founded by the Mayan people while in the treat of making the Mayan Calendar and is one of the most important numbers that were ever distinguished. These symbols can be have to represent any number.This Chart below is going to show how the symbols a re used to represent the twenty placeholders 0-19 When you use the Vigesimal System t here is a rule that only the higher places get multiplied by twentys instead of tens in the Decimal System we use. In the table below the number 168,421 is going to be compared in the terms it would be expressed between the Decimal System and the Vigesimal System.When writing the numbers they can be written vertically or horizontally, When you write in vertical writing the bar that is worth five units is placed horizontally with a dot worth one unit on top of the bar. When writing them vertically they grow from the base up. With the horizontal writing the bar is placed vertically and the dots go to their remaining and higher positions grow left of the start-off entry. When writing vertical, to write a twenty a zero is placed in the first position (base) with a dot on top of it in the second position. The dot in this function means one unit of the second order which will equal twenty. To write tw enty-one the zero would change to a dot and the subsequent numbers the original 19 count will be in the first position. As in turn they reach 19 again they get some other dot is added to the second position.Any number higher than 19 units in the second position is written victimization units in the third position. All units of the third position are al tracks worth twenty time twenty, 400. To write the number 401 a dot would go in the first position, a zero in the second position, and a dot would go in the third position too. The numbers even higher than the third position would be multiplied by twenty again. The chart shown below shows an example of the numeral Count Like any other thing the mathematical count does have one exception, it is called the calendric count which is when they give the third position a value equal to 360 instead of 400, but the higher positions follow the regular pattern, being multiplied by twenty.The Mayan Long Count inner(a) the Mayan Calendar is an other(prenominal) thing that evolves aroung the Vigesimal System, so it is based around the twenty units. The first position counted single days, called kin. The second position is called the uinal, which is equivalent to twenty kin. The twenty uinal does not equal the third position it makes an 18-fold jump instead so that 100 or tun in the calendar represents eightenn times twenty or 360 days. That is slightly over 365 days which is the amount of days we have in a year.This then makes a twenty-fold jump increase, so 1000 or one katun is expressed by the value 20 x 18 x 20, 7,200 days which is a little less than twenty years. The next position is expressed by 20 x 20 x 18 x 20, 144,000 days which equals one baktun, a little less than 400 years. When using the Decimal System, they go as high as 9, but in the Vigesimal Systemthey can go all the way up to 19. So mathematically when we write Mayan numbers we use decimal points to show each digits position. We write 1.17.19 to represent the Mayan number that equals one tun (360 days), plus seventeen uinal (20 days), plus nineteen kin which has a total of 719 days. The Mayan Long Count only reached 12.19.19.17.19 on December 20th.The way the Mayan people made this calendar with the Vigesimal System was one of the most incredible things ever. Them using the twenty based system has made a lot of research been done to investigate the math held inside the Mayan Calendar. Being able to use math 5,000 years ago has shown some determination and intelligence. The math held inside this Mayan Calendar may have made the whole world change, and the mathematics of the Vigesimal System hidden in the Mayan Calendar has shown how math can change the world. It also shows how math is used in familiar life and how if people were not using math a lot of things would not be here to this very day and it shows multiple ways math effects people in their everyday life.