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Posts Tagged ‘Mayan Civilization’

Mayan Civilization Math

Mayan numbers and math

Mayan numbers and math

The Mayan civilization’s mathematics were one of the most advanced of the ancient Americas. Rather than using a base 10 system as we use (1, 10, 100, 1,000, etc.) they used a base 20 system (1, 20, 400, 8,000, etc.) One of the most fascinating facts about their mathematical system was that their counting system used only 3 symbols – a “shell”, dot, and line. The shell represented 0, the dot represented 1, and the line represented 5.
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Mayan Inventions

Mayan Temple

Amazing architecture of a Mayan Temple

The Mayans were one of the major civilizations (along with the Aztecs) originating in Central America around 1500 BC. They were an isolated civilization in that they had no contact with the other early people in China or the Middle East.

Mayan inventions include a calander and a complex heiroglyphics system. While it cannot be said that they were the sole inventors of such advancements, they did invent them independently in the Western Hemisphere, and their calendar and wrintings differed from that of the Egyptions and Chinese.
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