Just curious, because in Hinduisn, maya means unreal and I was just wondering how can a civilization that was totally disconnected from ours, share the word "maya". Or is it just a coincidence?
Four answers:
Sunny
2013-01-18 08:08:35 UTC
earlier also people used to visit all over the world but very few were able to return and tell the truth. So some information must have passed on in these civilizations.
?
2013-01-18 07:53:13 UTC
mayans has a different meanings in different languages
1. a member of an American Indian people of Yucatan and Belize and Guatemala who had a culture (which reached its peak between AD 300 and 900) characterized by outstanding architecture and pottery and astronomy
2. a family of American Indian languages spoken by Maya
Maya is a word that has several meanings, so I will describe a number of those meanings below. Maya is the name of an ancient civilisation which was based around South and Central America. Archaeologists and ancient historians suggest, that the age of the Mayans may have begun around the year 2000 BC, and ended around three thousand years later, in about 1000 AD. The Mayans were a very progressive race of people, known for the fact that they had the first written language of South America and their magnificent ceremonial platforms, pyramids and temples, including the pyramid El Castillo at Chichen Itza which was named one of the Seven New Wonders of the World. Maya is also defined by the Google dictionary as 'The supernatural power wielded by spirits and demons to produce illusions'. Another definition is 'The power by which the universe becomes manifest' and a third definition provided by the Google dictionary is, 'The illusion or appearance of the phenomenal world'. So I think, that we can deduce from the definitions that have been provided that Maya is a world that is heavily spiritual in nature. It is a word that is related to spirit, the spiritual world and other worldly elements. Two of the definitions also relate to illusions, showing the Maya also is a word, that describes things that are not really as they seem, possibly things that are not really there.
?
2013-01-18 07:43:24 UTC
It is just a coincidence, in that two diverse languages share a homonym
Maya is also a popular girls name in the US
Muhtashim
2013-01-18 07:44:52 UTC
It is not a coincidence. They got their name from the Books of Chilam Balam (CHB), Lacandon ethnography (LAC), Landa (L), and Popol Vuh (PV).
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