Maya mythology

Maya mythology is part of Mesoamerican mythology and comprises all of the Mayan tales in which personified forces of nature, deities, and the heroes interacting with these play the main roles. Other parts of Maya oral tradition (such as animal tales and many moralising stories) do not properly belong to the domain of mythology.

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Maya civilization
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Pre-Columbian Music · Writing
History
Classic Maya collapse
Spanish conquest of Yucatán

Contents

Sources

The oldest myths date from the 16th century and are found in historical sources from the Guatemalan Highlands. The most important of these documents is the Popol Vuh or 'Book of the Council', which contains Quichean creation stories and the adventures of the Hero Twins, Hunahpu and Xbalanque.

Yucatan is an equally important region. The Books of Chilam Balam contain mythological passages of great antiquity, and mythological fragments are found scattered among the early-colonial Spanish chronicles and reports, chief among them Diego de Landa's Relación, and in the dictionaries compiled by the early missionaries.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, anthropologists and local folklorists have committed many stories to paper. Even though most Maya tales are the results of an historical process in which Spanish narrative traditions interacted with native ones, some of the tales reach back well into pre-Spanish times. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, the transmission of traditional tales has entered its final stage. Fortunately, however, this is also a time in which the Mayas themselves have begun to salvage and publish the precious tales of their parents and grandparents.

Important Mythical Themes

World Creation and World End

The Popol Vuh describes the creation of the earth by the forces of sea and sky, as well as its sequel. The Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel relates the collapse of the sky and the deluge, followed by the raising of the sky and the erection of the five World Trees.[1] The Lacandons also knew the tale of the creation of the Underworld.[2]

see also: Bacabs, god K, Maya Death Gods

Creation of Mankind

The Popol Vuh gives a sequence of four efforts at creation: First were animals, then wet clay, wood, then last, the creation of the first ancestors from maize dough. To this, the Lacandons add the creation of the main kin groupings and their 'totemic' animals.[3] The creation of humankind is concluded by the Mesoamerican tale of the opening of the Maize (or Sustenance) Mountain by the Lightning deities.[4]

see also: Maya Death Gods, God K, Maya maize god

Actions of the Heroes: Arranging the World

The best-known hero myth is about the defeat of a bird demon and of the deities of disease and death by the Hero Twins, Hunahpu and Xbalanque. Of equal importance is the parallel narrative of a maize hero defeating the deities of Thunder and Lightning and establishing a pact with them.[5] Although its present spread is confined to the Gulf Coast areas, this myth may once have been part of Mayan oral tradition as well. Important mythological fragments about the heroic reduction of the jaguars have been preserved by the Tzotziles.[6]

see also: Hero Twins, Maya maize god

Marriage with the Earth

This mythical type defines the relation between mankind and the game and crops. An ancestral hero - Xbalanque in a Kekchi tradition - woos the daughter of an Earth God; the hero's wife is finally transformed into game, bees, snakes and insects, or the maize. If the hero gets the upper hand, he becomes the Sun, his wife the Moon.[7] A moralistic Tzotzil version has a man rewarded with a daughter of the Rain Deity, only to get divorced and lose her again.[8]

see also: Maya moon goddess, Goddess I

Origin of Sun and Moon

The origin of Sun and Moon is not always the outcome of a Marriage with the Earth. From Chiapas and the western Guatemalan Highlands comes the tale of Younger Brother and his jealous Elder Brethren: Youngest One becomes the Sun, his girlfriend/wife becomes the Moon, and the Elder Brethren are transformed into wild pigs and other forest animals.[9] In a comparable way, the Elder Brethren of the Popol Vuh Twin myth are transformed into monkeys, with their younger brothers becoming Sun and Moon.

see also: Maya moon goddess

A Pleiade of Origins

Within the framework of the above myths, but also in separate tales, the origin of many natural and cultural phenomena is set out, often with the moral aim of defining the ritual relationship between mankind and its environment. In such a way, one finds explanations about the origin of the heavenly bodies (Sun and Moon, but also Venus, the Pleiades, the Milky Way); the mountain landscape; clouds, rain, thunder and lightning; wild and tame animals; the colours of the maize; diseases and their curative herbs; agricultural instruments; the steam bath, etc.

Reconstructing Pre-Spanish Mythology

The three surviving Mayan books are mainly of a ritual and also (in the case of the Paris codex) historical nature, and contain but few mythical scenes. Although a sort of 'strip books' may once have existed, it is very much to be doubted that mythical narratives were ever completely rendered hieroglyphically. As a consequence, depictions on temple walls and movable objects (especially the so-called 'ceramic codex') are used to aid reconstruction of pre-Spanish Mayan mythology.

A main problem with depictions is to define what constitutes a mythological scene, for any given scene might in principle also represent a moment in a ritual sequence, a visual metaphor stemming from oral literature, a scene from real life, or a historical event. At this stage of our understanding, it is, in any case, clear that the Twin myth - albeit it in a version which considerably diverged from the Popol Vuh - already circulated in the Classic Period. In some cases, ancient Mayan myths may only have been preserved by neighbouring peoples; the narrative of the principal Maya maize god, and, to a lesser extent, that of the Bacabs are cases in point. As the process of hieroglyphical decipherment proceeds, the short explanatory captions often included within the scenes will hopefully be restored to their original eloquence, and make ancient narrative come to life more fully.

Notes

  1. ↑ Roys 1967: 98-107; Taube 1993: 69-74
  2. ↑ Boremanse 1986: 39-48
  3. ↑ Boremanse 1986: 30-38
  4. ↑ Thompson 1970: 349-354; Bierhorst 1990: 86-90
  5. ↑ Nicholson 1967: 61-64
  6. ↑ Guiteras Holmes 1961: 182-183, 262
  7. ↑ Thompson 1970: 363-366
  8. ↑ Guiteras Holmes 1961: 191-193
  9. ↑ Bierhorst 1990: 110-111

Bibliography and References

John Bierhorst, The Mythology of Mexico and Central America. Oxford U.P. 2002.
John Bierhorst (ed.), The Monkey's Haircut and Other Stories Told by the Maya. New York: William Morrow 1986.
Didier Boremanse, Contes et mythologie des indiens lacandons. Paris: L'Harmattan. 1986. (Also in Spanish: Cuentos y mitología de los lacandones. Tradición oral maya. Editorial: Academia de Geografia e Historia de Guatemala.)
Gary Gossen, Chamulas in the World of the Sun.
Calixta Guiteras Holmes, Perils of the Soul. The World View of a Tzotzil Indian. New York: The Free Press of Glencoe. 1961.
Robert Laughlin, Of Cabbages and Kings.
Mary Miller; and Simon Martin (2004). Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya. London: Thames and Hudson. ISBN 0-500-05129-1. OCLC 54799516. 
Miller, Mary; and Karl Taube (1993). The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya: An Illustrated Dictionary of Mesoamerican Religion. London: Thames and Hudson. ISBN 0-500-05068-6. OCLC 27667317. 
Irene Nicholson, Mexican and Central American Mythology. London: Paul Hamlyn. 1967.
Kay Almere Read, Jason J. Gonzalez, Mesoamerican Mythology. A guide to the gods, heroes, rituals, and beliefs of Mexico and Central America. Oxford 2002.
Ralph L. Roys, The Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. 1967.
Karl Taube, The Major Gods of Ancient Yucatan. Dumbarton Oaks 1992.
Karl Taube, Aztec and Maya Myths. British Museum 1993.
D. Tedlock, Popol Vuh. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Thompson, J. Eric S. (1970). Maya History and Religion. Civilization of the American Indian Series, No. 99. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-0884-3. OCLC 177832. 

See also

External links