Ten Notable Apocalypses That (Obviously) Didn’t Happen

Apocalyptic predictions are nothing new—they have been around for millennia

  • By Mark Strauss
  • Smithsonian.com, November 12, 2009, Subscribe
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The 2012 doomsday prophecy isn't the first to predict the end of civilization. Such warnings have been around for millenia. (iStockphoto)

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1. The First Warnings From Assyria

An Assyrian clay tablet dating to around 2800 B.C. bears the inscription: “Our Earth is degenerate in these later days; there are signs that the world is speedily coming to an end; bribery and corruption are common; children no longer obey their parents; every man wants to write a book and the end of the world is evidently approaching.”

The world didn’t end (just look around), and despite the plague of corruption and petulant teenagers, four centuries later the Assyrians would establish an empire that eventually encompassed most of the Near East. The Assyrian Empire came to an abrupt end in 612 B.C., when its capital was attacked by the Babylonian army. Still, by the standards of ancient empires, 18 centuries wasn’t such a bad run.

2. Crusaders’ Concerns

Pope Innocent III relied upon apocalyptic theology in his efforts to rally Europe to launch a fifth crusade to capture Jerusalem and the rest of the Holy Land from the Ayyubid Empire. He identified the rise of Islam as the reign of the Antichrist—whose defeat would usher in the Second Coming.

In 1213, Innocent III wrote: “A son of perdition has arisen, the false prophet Muhammed, who has seduced many men from the truth by worldly enticements and the pleasures of the flesh… we nevertheless put our trust in the Lord who has already given us a sign that good is to come, that the end of this beast is approaching, whose number, according to the Revelation of Saint John, will end in 666 years, of which already nearly 600 have passed.”

The predicted date was 1284. Seven years later, the last crusader kingdom fell, when the Sultan Khalil conquered the city of Acre, in present-day Israel. The rest of the world, however, remained intact.

3. Botticelli Paints His Fears

The Renaissance is remembered as a golden age of art and learning, but the era also marked a resurgence in apocalyptic prophecies. The reason? “Advances in time keeping and in astronomy encouraged standardization of the calendar,” writes David Nirenberg, a professor of medieval history at the University of Chicago, “while a string of calamities (from the European point of view], such as the Turkish conquest of Constantinople… fomented a new numerological apocalyptic interest.”

Expectations of the apocalypse found their expression in the art of the period—most famously in The Mystical Nativity, painted by Italian Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli. The lower part of the painting depicts several small devils wedged under rocks or pinned to the ground, while a Greek inscription offers this gloomy prediction: “I, Sandro, painted this picture at the end of the year 1500 in the troubles of Italy in the half time after the time according to the eleventh chapter of St. John in the second woe of the Apocalypse in the loosing of the devil for three and a half years. Then he will be chained in the twelfth chapter and we shall see him trodden down as in this picture.” (That would place the apocalypse at around A.D. 1504.)

Art historians believe that Botticelli was influenced by the sermons of Girolamo Savonarola—a Dominican monk who urged both rich and poor alike to repent for their sins and renounce worldly pleasures. Certain that the apocalypse was near, Savonarola predicted, “the sword of the Lord will come upon the earth swiftly and soon” in the form of war, pestilence and famine.

4. The Germanic Flood That Never Came

In 1499, the German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Stöffler predicted that a vast flood would engulf the world on February 20, 1524. (His calculations foretold 20 planetary conjunctions during this year—16 of which would take place in a “watery sign,” a.k.a. Pisces.)

In Europe, more than 100 different pamphlets were published endorsing Stöffler’s doomsday prophecy. Business boomed for boat-builders, not least for German nobleman Count von Iggleheim, who constructed a three-story ark on the Rhine.

Although 1524 was a drought year in Europe, a light rain did fall on the designated day. Crowds of people—hoping to gain a seat on Iggleheim’s ark—began to riot. Hundreds were killed and the count was stoned to death.

Stöffler later recalculated the actual date to be 1528, but by then his reputation as a soothsayer had been ruined. That’s kind of a shame because, according to a story told in 1558 by German historian Hieronymus Wolf, Stöffler once predicted that his life would be endangered by a “falling body.” He chose to spend that day indoors, where, during a discussion with friends, Stöffler reached to grab a book from a shelf, which came loose and smashed him on the head, seriously injuring him.

5. Black Skies Over New England

At 9 a.m. on May 19, 1780, the sky over New England was enveloped in darkness. An 1881 article in Harper’s Magazine stated that, “Birds went to roost, cocks crowed at mid-day as at midnight, and the animals were plainly terrified.”

The unnatural gloom is believed to have been caused by smoke from forest fires, possibly coupled with heavy fog. But at the time, some feared the worst. “People [came] out wringing their hands and howling, the Day of Judgment is come,” recalled a Revolutionary War fifer.

The “Dark Day” ended at midnight, when the stars once again became visible in the night sky. But lingering concerns about a pending apocalypse prompted some people to seek out an obscure Christian sect—the Shakers—who had recently settled near Albany, New York. A splinter of the Quaker movement, the Shakers preached complete celibacy as the true path to redemption. The Shakers knew an opportunity when they saw one and embarked on a 26-month mission throughout New England, which brought them hundreds of converts.

The most famous individual to emerge from the “Dark Day” was Abraham Davenport, a member of the Connecticut legislature, which was in session when the sky blackened. Members of the legislature, fearing the apocalypse had come, moved for adjournment. Davenport is said to have responded: “The day of judgment is either approaching, or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause of an adjournment; if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish therefore that candles may be brought.” The New England poet John Greenleaf Whittier commemorated Davenport in a poem first published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1866.


1. The First Warnings From Assyria

An Assyrian clay tablet dating to around 2800 B.C. bears the inscription: “Our Earth is degenerate in these later days; there are signs that the world is speedily coming to an end; bribery and corruption are common; children no longer obey their parents; every man wants to write a book and the end of the world is evidently approaching.”

The world didn’t end (just look around), and despite the plague of corruption and petulant teenagers, four centuries later the Assyrians would establish an empire that eventually encompassed most of the Near East. The Assyrian Empire came to an abrupt end in 612 B.C., when its capital was attacked by the Babylonian army. Still, by the standards of ancient empires, 18 centuries wasn’t such a bad run.

2. Crusaders’ Concerns

Pope Innocent III relied upon apocalyptic theology in his efforts to rally Europe to launch a fifth crusade to capture Jerusalem and the rest of the Holy Land from the Ayyubid Empire. He identified the rise of Islam as the reign of the Antichrist—whose defeat would usher in the Second Coming.

In 1213, Innocent III wrote: “A son of perdition has arisen, the false prophet Muhammed, who has seduced many men from the truth by worldly enticements and the pleasures of the flesh… we nevertheless put our trust in the Lord who has already given us a sign that good is to come, that the end of this beast is approaching, whose number, according to the Revelation of Saint John, will end in 666 years, of which already nearly 600 have passed.”

The predicted date was 1284. Seven years later, the last crusader kingdom fell, when the Sultan Khalil conquered the city of Acre, in present-day Israel. The rest of the world, however, remained intact.

3. Botticelli Paints His Fears

The Renaissance is remembered as a golden age of art and learning, but the era also marked a resurgence in apocalyptic prophecies. The reason? “Advances in time keeping and in astronomy encouraged standardization of the calendar,” writes David Nirenberg, a professor of medieval history at the University of Chicago, “while a string of calamities (from the European point of view], such as the Turkish conquest of Constantinople… fomented a new numerological apocalyptic interest.”

Expectations of the apocalypse found their expression in the art of the period—most famously in The Mystical Nativity, painted by Italian Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli. The lower part of the painting depicts several small devils wedged under rocks or pinned to the ground, while a Greek inscription offers this gloomy prediction: “I, Sandro, painted this picture at the end of the year 1500 in the troubles of Italy in the half time after the time according to the eleventh chapter of St. John in the second woe of the Apocalypse in the loosing of the devil for three and a half years. Then he will be chained in the twelfth chapter and we shall see him trodden down as in this picture.” (That would place the apocalypse at around A.D. 1504.)

Art historians believe that Botticelli was influenced by the sermons of Girolamo Savonarola—a Dominican monk who urged both rich and poor alike to repent for their sins and renounce worldly pleasures. Certain that the apocalypse was near, Savonarola predicted, “the sword of the Lord will come upon the earth swiftly and soon” in the form of war, pestilence and famine.

4. The Germanic Flood That Never Came

In 1499, the German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Stöffler predicted that a vast flood would engulf the world on February 20, 1524. (His calculations foretold 20 planetary conjunctions during this year—16 of which would take place in a “watery sign,” a.k.a. Pisces.)

In Europe, more than 100 different pamphlets were published endorsing Stöffler’s doomsday prophecy. Business boomed for boat-builders, not least for German nobleman Count von Iggleheim, who constructed a three-story ark on the Rhine.

Although 1524 was a drought year in Europe, a light rain did fall on the designated day. Crowds of people—hoping to gain a seat on Iggleheim’s ark—began to riot. Hundreds were killed and the count was stoned to death.

Stöffler later recalculated the actual date to be 1528, but by then his reputation as a soothsayer had been ruined. That’s kind of a shame because, according to a story told in 1558 by German historian Hieronymus Wolf, Stöffler once predicted that his life would be endangered by a “falling body.” He chose to spend that day indoors, where, during a discussion with friends, Stöffler reached to grab a book from a shelf, which came loose and smashed him on the head, seriously injuring him.

5. Black Skies Over New England

At 9 a.m. on May 19, 1780, the sky over New England was enveloped in darkness. An 1881 article in Harper’s Magazine stated that, “Birds went to roost, cocks crowed at mid-day as at midnight, and the animals were plainly terrified.”

The unnatural gloom is believed to have been caused by smoke from forest fires, possibly coupled with heavy fog. But at the time, some feared the worst. “People [came] out wringing their hands and howling, the Day of Judgment is come,” recalled a Revolutionary War fifer.

The “Dark Day” ended at midnight, when the stars once again became visible in the night sky. But lingering concerns about a pending apocalypse prompted some people to seek out an obscure Christian sect—the Shakers—who had recently settled near Albany, New York. A splinter of the Quaker movement, the Shakers preached complete celibacy as the true path to redemption. The Shakers knew an opportunity when they saw one and embarked on a 26-month mission throughout New England, which brought them hundreds of converts.

The most famous individual to emerge from the “Dark Day” was Abraham Davenport, a member of the Connecticut legislature, which was in session when the sky blackened. Members of the legislature, fearing the apocalypse had come, moved for adjournment. Davenport is said to have responded: “The day of judgment is either approaching, or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause of an adjournment; if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish therefore that candles may be brought.” The New England poet John Greenleaf Whittier commemorated Davenport in a poem first published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1866.

6. Finding Omens in the Great Pyramid of Giza

A.D. 1881 was a banner year for apocalyptic expectations. For starters, there was the prediction of “Mother Shipton,” a 16th-century British soothsayer whose prophecies were first published in 1641. A later edition, published in 1862, included the prediction: “The world to an end shall come; in eighteen hundred and eighty one.” However, the book’s author, Charles Hindley, admitted that this and other prophecies (including the invention of the telegraph and the steam engine) were added as a hoax in an apparent attempt to boost book sales.

Writing in an 1881 edition of Harper’s Magazine, an unnamed author lamented, “I fear it will be impossible… to deliver the English masses from this unhappy piece of miseducation.” However, on a more hopeful note, the article added: “I am assured by friends of mine employed in the British Museum that for months that institution has been fairly besieged by people anxious to know if there be any such manuscript as that referred to, or if the predictions are genuine.” Nonetheless, the 1911 edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica noted that the 1881 end-of-the-world prophecy was “the cause of the most poignant alarm throughout rural England in that year, the people deserting their houses, and spending the night in prayer in the fields, churches and chapels.”

Supporting “evidence” for an apocalypse in 1881 came from an unlikely source: the Great Pyramid of Giza. Charles Piazzi Smyth, the Astronomer Royal for Scotland, became convinced that the pyramid had been built not by the Egyptians but by an Old Testament patriarch (perhaps Noah) under divine guidance. As such, Smyth saw theological implications in just about every measurement of the Great Pyramid, including a calculation for the End of Days.

Smyth’s research was satirized in a January 5, 1881, column in the New York Times: “In the great gallery of the pyramid… there are precisely eighteen hundred and eighty-one notches… hence if the pyramid is trustworthy and really knows its business, we have arrived at the last year of the earth. There are a vast number of people who believe in this remarkable theory of the pyramid, and they are one and all perfectly sure that the pyramid cannot tell a lie… in case they should happen to be disappointed and to be under the unpleasant necessity of making New Year’s calls in the snow on the First of January 1882, they will probably blaspheme the pyramid and lose all faith in man and stones.”

7. Beware of Halley’s Comet

Comets have long been viewed as portents of doom—and the reappearance of Halley’s comet in 1910 was no exception. Early that year, British and Irish writers opined that the comet was a harbinger of a forthcoming invasion by Germany. Some Parisians blamed the comet for a massive flood of the Seine River that devastated their city.

But full-fledged panic would erupt when Chicago’s Yerkes Observatory announced in February 1910 that it had detected a poisonous gas called cyanogen in Halley’s tail. The New York Times reported that the noted French astronomer, Camille Flammarion believed the gas “would impregnate that atmosphere and possibly snuff out all life on the planet.”

Most scientists sought to reassure the public. The famed astronomer Percival Lowell explained that the gases making up Halley’s tail were “so rarefied as to be thinner than any vacuum.”

But the damage had already been done. People rushed to purchase gas masks and “comet pills.” The New York Times reported that “terror occasioned by the near approach of Halley’s comet has seized hold of a large part of the population of Chicago.” Likewise, the Atlanta Constitution reported that people in Georgia were preparing safe rooms and covering even keyholes with paper. (One man, the paper said, had “armed himself with a gallon of whiskey” and requested that friends lower him to the bottom of a dry well, 40 feet deep.)

After Halley’s passed by the Earth in May, the Chicago Tribune announced (unnecessarily) “We’re Still Here.” Not everyone, however, was caught up in the apocalyptic frenzy. Rooftop “comet parties” were all the rage in cities throughout the United States.

8. Planets Align, Nothing Happens

In 1974, John Gribbin and Stephen Plagemann wrote a best-selling book, The Jupiter Effect, warning that in March 1982, an alignment of the major planets on the same side of the Sun would trigger a series of cosmic events - culminating in an earthquake along the San Andreas fault that would wipe out Los Angeles.

The book had an aura of credibility, since both authors were Cambridge-educated astrophysicists and Gribbin was an editor at the prestigious science magazine Nature. The scientists claimed that the combined gravitational force of the planets (especially dense ones, such as Jupiter and Saturn) would exert tidal forces on the Sun, causing an increase in sunspot activity that would douse the earth with high-speed particles, which, in turn, would cause abrupt changes to our planet’s rotation, leading to earthquakes.

Several scientists criticized The Jupiter Effect, saying its argument was based on a tissue-thin chain of suppositions. (Seismologist Charles Richter of Caltech called the thesis “pure astrology in disguise.”) Still, the book spooked people worldwide—thanks, in part, to the endorsement of other doomsayers such as Hal Lindsey (author of the best-selling 1970s book, The Late Great Planet Earth) who, in 1980, wrote that earthquakes across the planet would trigger meltdowns at nuclear power plants and would smash dams, causing massive floods.

As the dreaded date approached, panicked city residents bombarded Los Angeles’ Griffith Observatory with phone calls. Elsewhere, the San Diego Vista Press reported on March 10, 1982: “We've literally had people ask, ‘Should I sell my house and move away?’ said Kevin Atkins of Gates Planetarium [in Denver, Colorado]… One small Christian sect in the Philippines is building a maze of padded cubicles and trying out padded suits in readiness for disasters.” Even Beijing’s newspaper, The People’s Daily, sought to assure readers that “there is no regular cause-effect relation at all between this astronomical phenomenon and natural disasters like earthquakes.”

One year after the non-doomsday event, Gribbin and Plagemann published The Jupiter Effect Reconsidered. It was also a best-seller.

9. The Y2K Panic

At least during this apocalyptic scare, there was someone to blame: Over the decades, computer programmers had used two, rather than four digits, to represent years. As such, computers would allegedly go haywire on January 1, 2000, since the dumb machines would not be able to make sense of the year “00”—and thus the dreaded “Y2K Bug” was born. Some pundits defended the programmers, noting that their actions had been a logical way to conserve precious computer memory and save money. Others were less flattering. “What led to the Y2K Bug was not arrogant indifference to the future,” wrote Brian Haynes in The Sciences Magazine. “On the contrary, it was an excess of modesty. (‘No way my code will still be running 30 years out.’) The programmers could not envision that their hurried hacks and kludges would become the next generation’s ‘legacy systems.’” A September 1999 poll conducted by the Wall Street Journal found that 9 percent of Americans believed Microsoft was hiding the solution to the problem.

The Independent newspaper warned of possible “nuclear war,” caused by glitches in early-warning systems; the International Monetary Fund predicted economic chaos in developing nations; Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan worried that panic over the Bug would prompt U.S. businesses to stockpile goods, leading to widespread shortages, and CNN reported that the U.S. milk supply would dry up because dairy farm equipment might malfunction.

Still, panic over the Y2K Bug never quite reached the fever pitch that many anticipated. A Gallup Poll reported that by mid-December 1999, only 3 percent of Americans anticipated “major problems,” compared with 34 percent the year before.

Billions of dollars were spent worldwide to fix the Y2K Bug, and debate still rages over how much of that spending was necessary.

10. A Man-Made Black Hole?

Ever since the early 1990s, the media has reported that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) could potentially create a black hole that would swallow the Earth.

The LHC—which was switched on in September 2008—is 17 miles in circumference and buried 570 feet beneath the Alps on the Swiss-French border. The collider has the capacity to smash together proton beams at velocities up to 99.99 percent of the speed of light. In doing so, it can simulate the conditions and energies that existed shortly after the start of the Big Bang—thereby providing insights into critical questions as to how our universe was formed.

Still, some skeptics worry that the high-energy collision of protons could create micro black holes. One reason this doomsday rumor persists is that quantum physicists have a tendency never to say never. As long as certain physical laws are obeyed, potential events are placed in the rather broad category of “non-zero” probability. Or, as Amherst physicist Kannan Jagannathan explains: “If something is not forbidden, it is compulsory… In an infinite universe, even things of low probability must occur (actually infinitely often).” However, by that same standard, Jagannathan adds, quantum physics dictates that it is theoretically possible to turn on your kitchen faucet and have a dragon pop out.

And that explains why physicists (with the possible exception of those who are dragon-phobic) are not terribly worried. “The world is constantly bombarded by energetic cosmic rays from the depths of space, some of them inducing particle collisions thousands of times more powerful than those that will be produced by the LHC,” says Stéphane Coutu, a professor of physics at {Penn State. “If these collisions could create black holes, it would have happened by now.”

Meanwhile, technical difficulties prompted the LHC to be shut down after just nine days. Operations are scheduled to slowly resume in late 2009 and early 2010.

If the world does end, check this Web site for updates.


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Comments (46)

The Assyrian clay tablet quote is more phony than the Book of Abraham; but I got the point anyways.

Posted by MelkerJ on August 30,2012 | 02:59 PM

Reality is an illusion, a persistent one.

The hoax of a Nobel prize for economics, the media in multitude claim exists. Yet there is none.

Science, academic and otherwise, products of imagining.

Posted by Klaas on June 4,2011 | 06:49 PM

Don't forget the riddiculous "population bomb" predictions that said we'd all starve to death by the 1980's. Or, the "global warming " kooks that claimed we would all be consumed by droughts and fires.

Posted by William James on May 31,2011 | 05:20 AM

According to Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations, the Assyrian tablet quote "would seem to be spurious":

http://www.bartleby.com/73/456.html

Posted by Martin on May 29,2011 | 02:23 AM

This is a very short list.
Predictions like this have occupied every culture for as far back as recorded history goes.
The person that commented that only Christians make these end of the world predications really needs to read a little more.
I should also point out that only a small, but quite vocal, minority of Christians believe we are living in the "last days" or that the world is about to end.

Right now in Iran the government is making preparations for the "12th Iman", who will bring world peace. After slaying all the infidels and making Islam the world's only religion.
This a nation's government doing this, not some televangelist or a radio preacher.
This is infinity more scary than what happened (or didn't happen) on May 21st.

Posted by smg45acp on May 29,2011 | 02:06 AM

How many people wanted to "write books" around 2800 BC when clay tables apparently were the medium of the day? That line can't be from that time period.

Posted by _aleph_ on May 27,2011 | 04:53 PM

You know, I'm not convinced that the Assyrian Tablet is real and not a story that gained popular currency. Can you provide a reliable reference for it?

Posted by John K on May 24,2011 | 03:15 AM

There may be as many stories of the origin of the Shakers(United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing)as of assorted ARMAGEDDON. Here is mine:

Anne Lee (Mother Anne), born in the mid 18th century in England, was a divorced mother of two who immigrated, with her small flock which included her former husband, to New York NY and hence to Albany and Niskayuna. Religious revival did award her a large number of followers throughout New England and west to Kentucky and Ohio. This was more than a century after William Penn and George Fox. Anne Lee, soon to be Mother Anne, was 'The Second Coming, this time in female form.' Eventually we would all be converted. The Shakers, you can read their fascinating history elsewhere, prospered for more than a century.

Posted by Carlton Perry on May 22,2011 | 11:19 AM

Its pretty much only the Christians that spout this end of the world garbage. Truth be told, I think they actually WANT the world to end. Sad.

Posted by Sean on May 21,2011 | 07:47 PM

The comet story reminds me of a story Edgar Allen Poe wrote (The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion) in 1839. It was a dialogue between two departed spirits, one explaining how the world was burned up in an explosion of gases when earth collided with the body of a comet.

Posted by LivelyClamor on May 21,2011 | 03:08 AM

Thanks for this overview!

Posted by Rob Randall on March 6,2011 | 09:58 AM

While I don't think global warming is a scam, neither do I think we can reverse it. It is more natural than man made.

Posted by jonaspell on February 26,2011 | 04:58 PM

I was very much taken with Hal Lindsey's dogmatisms back in the 1970s and early 1980s. He has always insisted--and still insists today--that our generation will live to see the Second Coming of Christ. He takes a futurist interpretation of both the Olivet Discourse (Matt. 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21) and the book of Revelation. In at least two of his books, THE TERMINATION GENERATION, (1976) and THE 1980S: COUNTDOWN TO ARMAGEDDON (1980) that the "Jupiter Effect" would trigger not only earthquakes in many place, but also adverse weather conditions from the sunspots. He claimed that this would be a fullfillment of Jesus's words in the Olivet Discourse about "earthquakes in diverse places." But more than thirty years later, I know better! Jesus's Olivet Discourse was meant only for the disciples of his day, and his predictions were fullfilled within 40 years--a "generation"--in 70 A.D when Jerusalem was sacked by the Roman army and the Jewish temple was destroyed.

Posted by Barbara Rainey on January 3,2011 | 08:01 PM

The world will end. Soon. And all these false predictions have served their purpose, to lull humanity into complacency. The plan has worked perfectly. Sleep my babies, sleep. It comes like a thief in the night - remember that.

Posted by Ron on May 23,2010 | 12:19 AM

When, I was around 7 or 8 years of age, I was listening in a conversation that two trusted adults were having, in which they spouted the same christian end of times drible, such cruelty to tell a child that believes anything that comes out of an adults mouth to be the absolute truth! I remember being a nervous wreck for some time afterwards, I did not want my parents to die, my relatives even the family dog, I could not comprehend the joyous tone which they exibited during that conversation, such a cruel religion, THAT WAS ALMOST 40 YEARS AGO, I'M AN ATHEIST NOW!

Posted by jdL on May 4,2010 | 04:47 AM

Reading this article reminds me of all of the precautions the company I worked for put in place as soon as midnight came on 12/31/99 due to the expected computer crashing. Extra national and regional computer support staff, training meetings on what to expect and how to react were all for naught.

Posted by John Downing on January 20,2010 | 05:05 PM

Mr. Strauss, can you give me a citation for where Isabel F. Dodd is mentioned as the translator of the Assyrian tablet in question? Thanks. She sounds like an interesting person.

Posted by Helen on January 12,2010 | 03:09 PM

A great article. It just goes to show the sad fact that people all too often let their emotions take control and ignore the evidence that is standing right in front of them.
(The flood, for example, has been discredited by science over and over, yet people continue to cite it as historically accurate. All attempts to prove flood theory through science fails without incorporating miracles, thus making it unscientific.) If something is going to happen, then scare tactics should be unnecessary. Let the evidence convince people. This goes for global warming, various religious prophecies (if there is even any tangible evidence), and anything else.

Posted by Jonathan on January 12,2010 | 10:59 AM

who knows when then end of the world will happen. if it does who cares? we will all be dead right? pass the point of caring right? anyway, as for global warming... its b.s.! where i live it keeps getting colder every year and winter starts earlier every year. global warming? where? i wanna move there cuz i dont like freezing most of the year only to be treated to even longer periods the next year!

Posted by mike on December 31,2009 | 01:33 PM

Reading through these comments it's become more clear as to what kind of people will believe these ridiculous apocalyptic claims.

Hint: It's the people whose comments mention Al Gore and/or the christian bible.

Posted by bobby on December 25,2009 | 03:19 AM

People who think that global warming is some kind of scam should REALLY follow the money. Al Gore DONATES the money he makes from his lectures, and the majority of rational scientists looking into it believe we have a serious problem. The only scientists who seem to think otherwise are the ones who work for gas, oil, and coal companies. Does that tell you anything? The real money is in the scam being palmed off on the gullible who think we don't have a problem with global warming. Meanwhile, the arctic ocean is open in the summertime for the first time in recorded history, and the world's glaciers (a source of drinking water for many people) are disappearing. A rise in two degrees doesn't sound like much, but a person with a temperature of 101 is not well! The earth won't be well if the overal temp rises that much either!

Posted by Shirley Williams on December 23,2009 | 04:18 PM

Well at least Britain gets the Olympics even if the world does end.

Posted by Brit on December 20,2009 | 09:29 AM

our world started ending the very moment it existed; in just the same way we started dying from the moment we were conceived! Not even Jesus knew when the world will end. It is only God, the Father...Jesus said. Just try to find a reason to enjoy life everyday.

Posted by edi on December 19,2009 | 10:21 PM

Well, personnally I think one day the world will come to an end. Maybe in 1000 years or more, seeing the global warming and degeneration of the earth, this is inevitable. There is also Nostra Damus (Michel de notreDame) who is not listed here. Most of his prophecy is true.

Posted by Lucky on December 19,2009 | 06:51 PM

If the world is supposed to end in 2012 why would the calender be made into a circle? I circle is never ending and always starts again.

Posted by Lily Beth on December 19,2009 | 04:02 PM

there are to many simalaritys for this to be a false prophesy. the myans the hopies and the bible. we should all be ready for the world to right itself meaning polar shifts and massive earthquakes man has no idea what forces are truly at work here and in closing . If god does really exist he has good reason to want to start this planet over. JUST WATCH NEWS (i.e.) fammon,war , natural disasters. THINK ABOUT IT......

Posted by robert crabtree on December 19,2009 | 02:47 PM

FOR THOSE IN THE WORLD AFFRAID OF 2012...MAYAN'S PROPHESY...

I suggest to read Mark Strauss article on such predicted events in the past times...Thank You Mark (Smithsonian.com) Nov 12-2009

Posted by Lucien Alexandre Marion on December 16,2009 | 01:32 PM

Dear Mr. Francis --

To answer your question, the quote from the Assyrian tablet has been published in books and articles for nearly a hundred years. Historians attribute the translation to Isabel F. Dodd, a professor of art and archeology at the American College for Girls in Constantinople (now Istanbul) in the early 20th century. She came across the tablet in one of the city's museums.

Posted by Mark Strauss on December 15,2009 | 09:13 AM

Maybe the Mayans stopped working on the calendar when they got to December 12, 2012 and didn't get back to it.

I like the picture of the guy with the sign that says "the end is near." Near is a relative term to an eternal being.

Posted by Molly on December 10,2009 | 07:47 PM

Why was global warming, the greatest hoax and scam, left off the list? Hmmmm, I wonder why. Probably the same reason Al Gore refuses to debate anyone about his hoax and why he and the global warming scammers never allow media into their conclaves. Probably why the likes of Barbara Boxer wants to put on trial the ones who hacked the fraudulent scam in action emails that will save the American taxpayers billions. Follow the money and you'll find what should have been listed as the greatest number one hoax of all time.

Posted by Julie on December 9,2009 | 02:28 PM

To include Y2K on the list is dubious, considering the fact that most of the computers that weren't fixed failed, while those that were, didn't. In the run-up to 2000, every time-dependent system run forward exhibited problems. I suppose we could have just gambled that nothing would happen, but I prefer to think of the money spent as "insurance" against worse losses.

Posted by Theodore on December 9,2009 | 11:35 AM

You missed one of the biggest of the century. The Jehovah Witnesses said the world would end in 1914. Then 1918, 1925, 1974. Hmmmm there is a pattern here.

Posted by JR on December 8,2009 | 06:41 PM

Although there's nothing wrong with this fun article, a lot of these seem to be cobbled together from sources on the Internet. Does anyone have any extra information on the Assyrian clay tablet? From my limited research I can only find dubious sources such as a Book of Quotations from the later part of the 20th century, etc. Could this potentially just be a joke on contemporary culture or is there a literal translation of this tablet?

Posted by National Francis on December 7,2009 | 12:43 PM

Very intresting article indeed.
Well documented details-clearly states that the up to now there were many theories were considered-went without any concrete results to believe them.
In my view-
The earth & planetary systems,the globe is hardly well understood for their actual effects.
some theories even came to some minor events described.
But the real laws of the physics clearly claim that some global warming effects may cause a incident or two- but certainly our global-universal strengths are far more powerful than we think to recapture its lost elements that are disturbed our so called non eco-friendly behavier.
I myswlf am a witness to global warming effects over the Bhagirathi glaciere in gangatic himalayas which bear the bearnt of the present global warming-which shows that one day the Bhagirathi glaciere was besides the gangotri temple in northern India.Today the mouth snout stands some 18 kilometers upstream.Considering the fact that only it has to travel the another distance upstream around 27 more kilometers before the starting point-
It is more likely some other elements like the carbon dioxide we generate daily and taken in to account for the global warming is actually considered responsible for the birth of most of our living species(considering some scientific narrations from astrologicalarticles)will take some dramatic turns to remake the lost frontiers we lost.
making the planet to live longer than some people think.
This is not a wishfull thinking but as we learn from history of mankind which is written @ known to us, states the things will start afresh.

Posted by sanjay on December 1,2009 | 10:35 AM

Dear Bob, I agree with you that the Biblical account of the flood is true and it was a true apocalypse. The Bible also tells us there will be a final apocalypse. However, relevant to the Smithsonian article, Christ Himself stated in plain words "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." Matthew 24:36, Mark 13:32 (NIV) Therefore, if anyone says they know when this final apocalypse will occur, they are stating "Jesus Christ is a liar". Since most of us (I include myself) do not fully understand what is happening in the present, it is silly to speculate on an exact date, time, or type of apocalypse.

Carolyn, I just noticed your similar post and the great addition of Matthew 24:42. "Be ready"

Posted by Lon on November 30,2009 | 11:02 PM

This is very good reading indeed, but all these examples are cases of manipulation now well documented as "scare-mongering". Many of them were/are perpetrated with financial profit in mind. The latest manifestation, not mentioned here, is AGW. It follows the same pattern where the public are alarmed by predictions of looming disaster to such an extent that governments feel obliged to take action of some sort, and then see the opportunity to jump on board and milk the event for all it is worth (usually by imposing extra taxes to prevent the spread of the problem). This promotes the entire issue into a major scare.
Disaster may be in the offing for the human race but, to date, there is nothing to identify what shape it may take. So let's all enjoy ourselves for the time being (and spread some good will and joy at the same time).

Posted by Les Jones on November 27,2009 | 06:02 PM

To know the time of the end?? Go to Matthew 24 in the Bible Matthew 24:36... No one knows about the day or the hour, not even the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the Father.. Verse Matt 24: 42..Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. Be ready no day is promised to anyone..not even tommorow..

Posted by Carole Newcomb on November 24,2009 | 11:16 AM

The article was very well written and informative. I enjoyed reading it. The Mayans who developed the calendar were incredibly gifted and foresighted. They passed on a vision that mankind would prevail at least until 2012. One might say the gauntlet will pass to us in 2012. The alignment of the stars, planets etc. in 2012 will not foretell the end point for mankind but a new begins point.

Posted by Carolyn Williams on November 23,2009 | 01:38 PM

Mention global warming should be on this list and the liberal agenda oriented screeners will block it. Pretty sad but standard practice among them to censor ideas they do not like.

Posted by Kurt on November 23,2009 | 11:36 AM

Mark is the most upto the mark author!
Very interesting, authentic, credible and in depth account. Enjoyed reading. Probably the best compilation and the most flawless stuffon the net.

Posted by Ashok K Sharma, PhD on November 22,2009 | 11:06 AM

"If the world does end, check this Web site for updates" Good ink right there :)

Posted by D.J. Smith Jr. on November 21,2009 | 11:33 AM

While I don't buy into the 2012 doomsday prediction, these 10 mentioned in the story pale compared to it. The Mayan calendar is very precise and believable, but I believe that all it means is that this calendar will just start a new cycle from its beginning and there is nothing to fret about!

Posted by D.J. Smith Jr. on November 21,2009 | 11:29 AM

Interesting that they left off global warming which should be number one on this list. I guess as long as some people can make millions(Al Gore) or gain control over others this one won't go away.

Posted by Kurt on November 20,2009 | 11:07 AM

Dear Mark
I assume that your worldview is that we may have a peaceful end to civilization as we know it and that an apocalypse is not in order.
Can we be true to history in that there was indeed a worldwidw flood-mentioned in many world cultures-Epic of Gilgamesh in Babylonian tablets also.Indeed one man with his family having preached of a coming deluge while building a boat in a desert did only survive to maintain the race which may have been somewhat inferred from number one myth you pose here.Please dont throw the baby out with the bathwater and consider excellent archeological finds that verify to equisite detail the biblical record is factual and relevant even today.

Posted by Bob on November 19,2009 | 07:38 PM

I must admit that I fell victim to the ridiculous 2012 claim years ago, but now the evidence is piling up in favor of us all seeing 2013. I can safely say that I have been placated.

Posted by Jessica on November 17,2009 | 08:57 AM

Fun to read, but all of this end of the world stuff is nonsense!

Posted by Tina on November 14,2009 | 01:11 AM



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