Camazotz
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In Maya mythology, Camazotz (alternate spellings Cama-Zotz, Sotz, Zotz) was a bat god.
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[edit] Origins
The cult of Camazotz began around 100 B.C. among the Zapotec Indians of Oaxaca, Mexico. The cult of Camazotz worshiped an anthropomorphic monster with the body of a human, head of a bat (though the exact proportioning varies with account). The bat was associated with night, death, and sacrifice. This god soon found its way into the pantheon of the Quiché, a tribe of Maya who made their home in the jungles of what is now Guatemala. The Quiché identified the bat-deity with their god Zotzilaha Chamalcan, the god of fire.
There is some evidence to support that the Camazotz myth may have sprung from actual large, blood-drinking bats of the Mexico, Guatemala, and Brazil areas.
Evidence is in the form of fossils of Desmodus draculae, the giant vampire bat. There have also been skeletons of D. draculae found which were sub-fossil, of very recent age. These sub-fossils suggest that the species were still common when the Mayans civilisation existed, and may still be in existence today, though it is doubtful.
[edit] Mythology
In the Popol Vuh the common noun refers to bat-like monsters encountered by the Maya Hero Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque during their trials in the underworld of Xibalba. Forced to spend the night in Bat House, the boys are able to keep the creatures at bay until Hunahpu loses his head while trying to watch for the coming of dawn. The grieving Xbalanque calls all the animals, instructing each to bring back its favorite food. When the coati returns with a squash, Xbalanque carves it into a new head for his brother, and they continue their adventures, bringing about the eventual defeat of the Xibalbans.
[edit] Camazotz in popular culture
The animated film Hellboy: Sword of Storms opens with main charecters Hellboy, Abe and Liz combating Camazotz and his legions of zombie priests in South America.
The bat god is an antagonist in Kenneth Oppel's Silverwing trilogy--especially Firewing, which tells the story of a young bat in the underworld. (The name there is spelled Cama Zotz.)
In Madeleine L'Engle's novel A Wrinkle in Time, winner of the 1963 Newbery Medal for children's literature, Camazotz is the name of a planet enslaved by the evil power of IT, from whom the protagonists Meg and Charles Wallace must rescue their physicist father.
In the World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game, Camazotz (also known as "Zotz" or "Zotzilaha") is a deity of the Olman people. Camazotz/Zotzilaha and the Olman figure prominently in the Savage Tide Adventure Path in Dungeon magazine.
In the roleplaying game Werewolf: The Apocalypse, the Camazotz are extinct werebats.
In the children's series Vampire Plagues by Sebastian Rook (published by Scholastic), Camazotz is promoted into a vampire demon god who brought down the Mayan empire, through his own greed and meglomania, before finally being banished by the rain god, Chac. He is reawakened in the year 1850 by English archaeologists, and seeks to re-establish his power, but this time in Europe.
The trilogy is named after the location of the books, London, Paris, and Mexico, however it has recently expanded into a series, the following titles Outbreak, Epidemic, and Extermination. These later books are not, however, based on the Mayan Camazotz, or Mayan vampires.
In the video game series Digital Devil Saga, one of the recurring villains who stalks the main characters is a man named "Bat," and who can transform into the demon Camazotz, who is depicted as a human-like bat with its head attached to its groin.
