This calendar was kept on a 365-day solar count. This ritual calendar was registered in the tonalamatl (book of days), a green-fold bark paper or deerskin codex from which a priest (called tonalpouque) cast horoscopes and predicated favorable and unfavorable days of the cycle. If a day is, for example, "4 Ahau 8 Cumku," the next day falling on "4 Ahau 8 Cumku" would be 18,980 days or about 52 years later. They are also credited for having developed a calendar system that was preexisting, but refined by them. The almanac year comprised of 260 days, each of which was assigned a date by intermeshing one of 20 day-signs, represented graphically with a gylph, and a number from 1 to13, represented by dots so that no two days in the cycle could be confused. The 13 represents the numbers and 20 represents the sun/glyphs. AZTEC VS. MAYAN CALEDARS. This sacred calendar is still being used for divination by the traditional Maya all over the Yucatan, Guatemala, and Belize, and Honduras.The Tzolkin calendar was meshed with a 365-day solar cycle called the "Haab".
It is thus akin to the Julian Day Number.Although they are not part of the Long Count, the Mayas had names for larger time spans. This cycle of the moon is broken down into 4 smaller cycles, of 7 day each. In comparison, the Mayan calendar has an average length of about 365.2420 days and a variation of .0002. This was a time of festivals. The Aztec Calendar was basically similar to that of the Maya. Every one of these centuries was marked by xiuhmolpilli - Binding Up of the Years or the New Fire Ceremony.This was a festival that lasted 12 days and included fasting as a symbol of penitence. This left five days that were not represented. Each trecena is also thought to have a god or deity presiding over each of the trecena. Mayan calendar and Aztec calendar are two of the ancient calendars of the world that arouse much interest among people because of the dooms day prophecies being made on the basis of these calendars. As the result they could control the daily activities of the populace. "God created the world, but the Dutch created the Netherlands Once it did, the priest would remove the heart of this man, and replace it with a piece of wood, that was laid on a piece of turquoise. * The Tzolk'in is the Sacred calendar of the Maya and is based on the cycles of the Pleiadies. Most of us are familiar with its features such as it being a solar calendar consisting of 365 days with the calendar divided into 12 months of 30 and 31 days with February being the shortest having just 28 days.When Gregory took over as Pope, there was too much of confusion regarding the dates in the western world though the earlier Julian calendar was still serving the purpose. By tracking the movements of the Moon, Venus, and other heavenly bodies, the Mayans realized that there were cycles in the Cosmos. The Long Count was used to calculate astronomical periods. A god or goddess was believed to preside over each day-sign.The Classic Mayan civilization was unique and left us a way to incorporate higher dimensional knowledge of time and creation. Anyone born on those days was "doomed to a miserable life. The ritual day cycle was called Tonalpohualli and was formed, as was the Mayan Tzolkin, by the concurrence of a cycle of numerals 1 through 13 with a cycle of 20 day names, many of them similar to the day names of the Maya. People used to know of the propitious times to plant crops with the help of the calendar while they also knew when to appease Gods to have their blessings.