Mayan People There are many historical mysteries which have fascinated human and encouraged investigation. Among the most often examined and theorized over are the potential reasons for why the Mayan civilization suddenly disappeared from the face of the Earth. Scholars, conspiracy theorists, and all manner of investigators have looked into the culture, the people, and the environment in the vain effort to finally determine exactly what happened to this large population.

Culture, Continuity and Change The Mayan people In 800 A.D there existed the Maya Empire that comprised of many powerful city-states that spread south to Mexico and North to Honduras. The Maya culture was at its peak with massive temples lined up However a hundred yeas later the cities were in remains, unrestricted and just left alone for the jungle to reign. It still remains a great mystery of how the Mayan

Whether this is in fact the case will be explored in the next section. The Case for Mayan Culture Researchers that do not agree with Haug and others argue that the Mayan culture has continued throughout history and has been passed down to individuals that are still alive today within areas of Central America. There is some agreement regarding this between various researchers that have studied Mayan culture, rituals, and architecture.

Important ceremonies required that the sacrifice be held down at top of a pyramid or raised altar "while a priest made an incision below the rib cage and ripped out the heart with his hands. The heart was then burned in order to nourish the gods" ("Mayan Religion"). Though only captives were sacrificed to the gods, bloodletting was also common practice among the Mayan aristocracy. Blood was drawn from

This drought was explicated as a "[s]olar activity -- including varying sunspot numbers and the brightness of the sun -- is recorded in the abundance of cosmic ray -- produced radioactive carbon-14 preserved in tree rings. Solar activity also varies in a "bicentennial oscillation" with a period variously reported to be between 206 and 208 years." This extraordinary occurrence also led to extreme ramifications, such as the sudden scarcity

Mayan calendar has fascinated not only scholars and archaeologists, but also others interested in its mystical and esoteric dimensions. Because the Mayan calendar and associated hieroglyphic texts refer to an "end date" corresponding to 2012 in the Gregorian system, many people believed that the Mayans had predicted the end of the world (Lorenzi, 2012, p. 1). Yet recent archaeological evidence shows that the Mayan concept of an "end date" did