The Mayan civilization is a pretty awesome group of people who lived in Mesoamerica. For archaeological purposes, the civilization is divided into three main time periods: Pre-classical (2000 BCE – 250 CE), Classical (250 CE – 900 CE) and Post-Classical (900 CE – arrival of the Spanish). The size and influence of the population varied quite a bit over time (at one point reaching the most densely populated civilization on Earth at the time). They were a very influential force for many years, suffered through several rises and collapses, but they always managed to survive and rebuild - up until they got their asses kicked by the Spanish and broke apart indefinitely. Direct descendents of the Maya are still around today, however, and various live languages and cultural traditions are derived from the ones used during the height of the Mayan empire, so they haven’t completely vanished.
The Maya are particularly known for coming up with advances in art, a complicated writing system, cool architecture, astronomy and, especially, accurate calendars.
This is an example of a Mayan calendar.
I’ve always had a soft spot for Mayan mythology. They just told really cool stories. It’s not just “poof, everything exists”. There are epic struggles, humans winning contests with gods, humans losing contests with gods, dramtic tournaments, jaguars running about bugging people, cool looking unpronounceable names and feathered serpents everywhere.
The Maya were never a single, unified people. There were different languages, different calendars and presumably, different stories. Human sacrifice was widely practiced – the gods lived off humans. Bloodletting was also important – self-piercing of the tongue or the penis, to release the blood that feeds the hungry gods. Time was seen as cyclical, not linear. Everything was based off cycles – whether they were talking about things happening on Earth or things happening with the gods. Analyses of these cycles were thought to be important and could be used to predict the future.
The jaguar, the plant maize, and the ball court (where a very popular game involving a rubber ball and hoops was played) were sacred and were integral to many of their stories. The Maya had various gods but they were often rather vague characters - not really good, not really evil, mostly just hanging about. Often, they were personifications of things like the living cycle of maize and a lot of the gods are not particularly distinct from other gods, almost interchangeable with each other. Instead, a lot of stories focused around specific heroes, who often managed to cheat or fool the gods and win things for humanity.
This is the first part of a three part series. I will tell the story of the creation of humans. My source is “Aztec & Maya Myths” by Karl Taube.
At first, there was nothing. Zip. Blank. No animals running around, no trees growing, no crabs walking in the ocean, no insects walking on the ground. There was only the sky and it was empty. The rest was just an endless expanse of water and everything was utterly still and silent.
Coiled under this water, surrounded by beautiful blue and green shimmering feathers, was the feathered serpent, Gucumatz.
In the sky, above the water, floated Huracan, who often appears as three forms of lighting.
Within this still silence, Gucumatx and Huracan became rather bored and started chatting to one another. They talked about the awesome creation of the universe, the first dawn, the making of the people and their food.
As they talked, their very words caused mountains and earth to suddenly rise from the waters. Trees and forests instantly popped up from the newly formed ground.
“Sweet!” They said. “That’s totally awesome! But let’s make something to inhabit this kick-ass earth and then they can worship us too!”
So, the creators made birds, deer, jaguars and serpents – all creatures of the forest and mountains. Grinning at the creatures, knowing what an awesome world they have created for them, the creators sat back and waited to bask in praise for their awesomeness. But the praise didn’t come. The animals didn’t seem to be able to talk. They just squaked or howled and ran about.
“Dammit!” said Gucumatx to Huracan, “That’s totally not cool. What’s the point of these creatures if they can’t properly speak and worship us?”
“I know!” said Hurucan. “Let’s try again. We might as well let these things stay and they can become food for people that will worship us.”
So, for the second time, the creators tried to make some people who would worship them. This time, they modeled them out of clay. But again, they couldn’t talk. The words just didn’t make sense and the bodies were pretty badly made anyways and just kept crumbling apart and dissolving in water. Not good.
“Screw that!” said the creators. They broke up the clay creatures and tried again.
Not wanting to fail again, they consulted a couple of diviners, Xpiyacoc and Xmucane. (They were presumably hanging out somewhere nearby, rather quietly). The soothsayers used all their best methods – casting maize grain and red seeds and consulting the sacred calendar. They decided that the humans should be made out of wood. Yes, that would work!
“Yay!” said the creators. And so they made people out of wood.
Fail. Although the men were made of wood and the women were made of rushes, it just didn’t work out. They could look and talk and multiply like people, but they were bloodless and expressionless. They just didn’t have souls or any real understanding about the world. And without understanding, they could not properly worship their creators.
This pissed off the creators, who were rather annoyed by all this work. In anger, they conjured up an enormous flood. Water poured down from the sky and roared through the world. Demons rose up and gouged out the earth and tore apart the wooden people. Even animals and utensils rose up against them. Birds flew at them and their plates and cooking pots and grinding stones and water jars suddenly came to life and attacked them, smashing their expressionless wooden faces.
The wooden people tried to flee this onslaught but there was nowhere to go. Everywhere they ran, there were things attacking them. Eventually, almost all were killed, except for a couple of them who managed to escape the slaughter. The descendents of these wooden beings are the forest monkeys, left as a sign of this thoughtless creation.
After the flood subsides and everyone is dead, the earth is once again empty of all humans. But the gods knew that they needed people to sustain them with prayers and offerings. They needed to find some way to get rid of all the demons now hanging out on earth and they had to find a way to make proper humans.
To be continued…