32ND CENTURY BC

Contents

Events

Significant persons

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

Decades and Years

Notes

References

Events

★ Varna Necropolis: what have been claimed to be the earliest-known worked gold artifacts are manufactured.

★ Malta: Construction of the Ħaġar Qim megalithic temples, featuring both solar and lunar alignments. "Tarxien period" of megalithic temple construction reaches its apex.

★ c. 3150 BC — Narmer (First Dynasty) started to rule in Ancient Egypt.

★ Ancient Egypt: Earliest known Egyptian hieroglyphs, beginning of the Early Dynastic Period.

★ c. 3125 BC — Narmer died.

★ Crete: Rise of Minoan civilization.

★ Neolithic settlement built at Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands, Scotland.

★ New Stone Age people in Ireland build the 250,000 ton (226,796.2 tonne) Newgrange solar oriented passage tomb.

Significant persons

★ Enoch, son of Jared, (3138 BC–2873 BC?) according to the Hebrew Calendar

★ Narmer, successor of King Scorpion and founder of the First dynasty of Ancient Egypt

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

★ 3114 BC — According to the most widely-accepted correlations between the Western calendar and the calendar systems of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, the mythical starting point of the current Mesoamerican Long Count calendar cycle occurs in this year.^[1] The Long Count calendar, used and refined most notably by the Maya civilization but also attested in some other (earlier) Mesoamerican cultures, consisted of a series of interlocked cycles or periods of day-counts, which mapped out a linear sequence of days from a notional starting point. The system originated sometime in the Mid– to Late Preclassic period of Mesoamerican chronology, during the latter half of the 1st millennium BC.^[2] The starting point of the most commonly used highest-order cycle^[3] —the ''b'ak'tun''-cycle consisting of thirteen b'ak'tuns of 144,000 days each— was projected back to an earlier, mythical date. This date is equivalent to 11 August 3114 BC in the proleptic Gregorian calendar (or 6 September in the proleptic Julian calendar), using the correlation known as the "Goodman-Martinéz-Thompson (GMT) correlation". The GMT-correlation is worked out with the Long Count starting date equivalent to the Julian Day Number (JDN) equal to 584283, and is accepted by most Mayanist scholars as providing the best fit with the ethnohistorical data.^[4] Two succeeding dates, the 12th and 13th of August (Gregorian) have also been supported, with the 13th (JDN = 584285, the "astronomical" or "Lounsbury" correlation) attracting significant support as according better with astronomical observational data.^[5] Although it is still contended which of these three dates forms the actual starting base of the Long Count, the correlation to one of this triad of dates is definitively accepted by almost all contemporary Mayanists. All other earlier or later correlation proposals are now discounted.^[4]

★ 3102 BC — Year 0 of the Kali Yuga begins.

★ c. 3100 BC the earliest phase of Stonehenge construction begins.

Decades and Years

Notes

1. See Finley (2002), Houston (1989, pp.49–51), Miller and Taube (1993, pp.50–52), Schele and Freidel (1990, pp.430 ''et seq.''), Voss (2006, p.138), Wagner (2006, pp.281–283). Note that Houston 1989 mistakenly writes "3113 BC" (when "-3113" is meant), and Miller and Taube 1993's mention of "2 August" is a (presumed) erratum.
2. Miller and Taube (1993, p.50), Schele and Freidel (1990)
3. Most commonly used in the Classic period Maya inscriptions; some other Maya calendar inscriptions of this period note even longer cycles, while later Postclassic-era inscriptions in Maya cities of northern Yucatán generally used an abbreviated form known as the Short Count. See Miller and Taube (1993, p.50); Voss (2006, p.138).
4. See survey by Finley (2002).
5. After a modified proposal championed by Floyd Lounsbury; sources which have used this 584285 correlation include Houston (1989, p.51), and in particular Schele and Freidel (1990, pp.430 ''et seq.''). See also commentary by Finley (2002), who although making an assessment that the "[584285 correlation] is now more popular with Mayanists", expresses a personal preference for the 584283 correlation.
6. See survey by Finley (2002).

References

★ The Correlation Question Finley, Michael

★ The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya, Miller, Mary, , , Thames and Hudson, 1993,

★ A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient Maya, Schele, Linda, , , William Morrow, 1990,

★ Maya: Divine Kings of the Rain Forest, Voss, Alexander, , , Könemann Press, 2006,

★ Maya: Divine Kings of the Rain Forest, Wagner, Elizabeth, , , Könemann Press, 2006,