The Long Count
A calendar that counts days continuously from a fixed point in 3114 BCE.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 250 years
- Known to
- ± 50 years
- Era
- Classical, Holocene
The Mesoamerican Long Count records elapsed days since a mythical creation date corresponding to 11 August 3114 BCE, in a modified base-20 system, allowing any date to be specified absolutely rather than within a repeating cycle. It is used alongside a 260-day ritual calendar and a 365-day solar one. Maya astronomers also tracked Venus with an error of about two hours per century.