"In modern times, the Maya culture extends from the Yucatan peninsula, in southern Mexico, to Belize, Guatemala and the jungles of Nicaragua. Thousands of years ago, however, the Maya carried their message throughout the world.
In
India, they were known as the "Naga Mayas," in Greece as the "Cara
Mayas" and in Egypt the "Mayax". (Parallels exist between the
Mayan and Egyptian hieroglyphic systems. To this day speakers of Ancient Maya
retain a profound knowledge of the roots of major world languages. "
-Hunbatz
Men from
Secrets of Mayan Science/Religion
"To evoke the Maya of Central America is at the same time to evoke a curious resonance from the East, from India. After all, Maya is a key Hindu philosophical term meaning 'origin of the world' and 'world of illusion.' The word Maya in Sanskrit is further related to concepts meaning 'great,' 'measure,' 'mind,' 'magic,' and 'mother.' Not suprisingly, we find that Maya is the name of the mother of the Buddha. And the Vedic classic, The Mahabharata, we read that Maya was the name of a noted astrologer-astronomer, magician, and architect, as well as the name of a great wandering tribe of navigators.
Not only in ancient India, home of high metaphysics and spiritual adventure, do we find the name Maya, but also farther to the west. The treasurer of the renowned boy-king of Egypt, Tutankhamen, was named Maya,while in Egyptian philosophy we find the term Mayet, meaning universal world order. In Greek mythology, the seven Pleiades, daughters of Atlas and Pleione and sisters ofthe Hyades, number among them one called Maia, also known as the brightest star of the constellation Pleiades. And finally, we know that our month of May is derived from the name of the Roman goddess, Maia, "the great one," the goddess of spring, daughter of Faunus and wife of Vulcan.
Returning
to the Maya of Central America, we find that their name is derived from the
word Mayab, the term given to describe the Yucatan Peninsula, key area of the
Mayan bio-regional home base."
-Dr. Jose Arguelles, PhD., from The
Mayan Factor