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The primary means of recording time over long periods of time was the
"long count". In the above simulation, the first three glyphs
are a straight forward base 20 number counting a number of 'approximate'
years of 360 days apiece. The fourth and fifth glyphs are a base 20 number
indicating the number of days into that 'approximate' year.
The six glyph is the "Vague Year" or "Haab". Here
the symbol represented the month and the number the day with in the month
of this vague year. There were 18 of these months each of twenty days and
one special month of 5 days which, totaling only 365 days, strayed conspicuously
from the tropical year.
The final glyph was the "Sacred Round" or "Tzolkin"
and consisted of a cycle of 20 symbols and 13 numbers both of which were
incremented each day producing a cycle of 260 days. The Haab and Tzolkin
taken together formed a period of 52 years called the "Calendar round".
This concept formed the basis of the later Aztec calendar, the long count
apparently having lost favor.
Although this means of record keeping does not reflect it, the Mayans
held the year to be of 365.242 days in length (far more accurate than any
contemporary people) and could accurately track Venus and apparently predict
eclipses. Tracking these values was done by using still other cycles of
9 days and 819 days etc. (Also, beyond the long count, the Mayans occasionally
used dating systems which recorded time in periods of 142x1030 years!)
Because the long count had fallen into disuse before the arrival of
Europeans, correlating the calendars posses a special challenge but the
accepted correlation has the long count starting on 13 Aug. 3113 BC
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is
seven and 
is
140. Zero was represented by 