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CHAPTER IV.
THE HERO-GODS OF THE MAYAS
CIVILIZATION OF THE MAYAS–WHENCE IT ORIGINATED–DUPLICATE TRADITIONS.
§1. The Culture Hero Itzamna.
ITZAMNA AS RULER, PRIEST AND TEACHER–AS CHIEF GOD AND CREATOR OF THE WORLD–LAS CASAS' SUPPOSED CHRIST MYTH–THE FOUR BACABS–ITZAMNA AS LORD OF THE WINDS AND RAINS–THE SYMBOL OF THE CROSS–AS LORD OF THE LIGHT AND DAY–DERIVATION OF HIS VARIOUS NAMES.
§2. The Culture Hero Kukulcan.
KUKULCAN AS CONNECTED WITH THE CALENDAR–MEANING OF THE NAME–THE MYTH OF THE FOUR BROTHERS–KUKULCAN'S HAPPY RULE AND MIRACULOUS DISAPPEARANCE–RELATION TO QUETZALCOATL–AZTEC AND MAYA MYTHOLOGY–KUKULCAN A MAYA DIVINITY–THE EXPECTED RETURN OF THE HERO-GODS–THE MAYA PROPHECIES–THEIR EXPLANATION.
The high-water mark of ancient American civilization was touched by the Mayas, the race who inhabited the peninsula of Yucatan and vicinity. Its members extended to the Pacific coast and included the tribes of Vera Paz, Guatemala, and parts of Chiapas and Honduras, and had an outlying branch in the hot lowlands watered by the River Panuco, north of Vera Cruz. In all, it has been estimated that they numbered at the time of the Conquest perhaps two million souls. To them are due the vast structures of Copan, Palenque and Uxmal, and they alone possessed a mode of writing which rested distinctly on a phonetic basis.
The zenith of their prosperity had, however, been passed a century before the Spanish conquerors invaded their soil. A large part of the peninsula of Yucatan had been for generations ruled in peace by a confederation of several tribes, whose capital city was Mayapan, ten leagues south of where Mérida now stands, and whose ruins still cover many hundred acres of the plain. Somewhere about the year 1440 there was a general revolt of the eastern provinces; Mayapan itself was assaulted and destroyed, and the Peninsula was divided among a number of petty chieftains.
Such was its political condition at the time of the discovery. There were numerous populous cities, well built of stone and mortar, but their inhabitants were at war with each other and devoid of unity of purpose.[1] Hence they fell a comparatively easy prey to the conquistadors.
Whence came this civilization? Was it an offshoot of that of the Aztecs? Or did it produce the latter?
These interesting questions I cannot discuss in full at this time. All that concerns my present purpose is to treat of them so far as they are connected with the mythology of the race. Incidentally, however, this will throw some light on these obscure points, and at any rate enable us to dismiss certain prevalent assumptions as erroneous.
One of these is the notion that the Toltecs were the originators of Yucatan culture. I hope I have said enough in the previous chapter to exorcise permanently from ancient American history these purely imaginary beings. They have served long enough as the last refuge of ignorance.
Let us rather ask what accounts the Mayas themselves gave of the origin of their arts and their ancestors.
Most unfortunately very meagre sources of information are open to us. We have no Sahagun to report to us the traditions and prayers of this strange people. Only fragments of their legends and hints of their history have been saved, almost by accident, from the general wreck of their civilization. From these, however, it is possible to piece together enough to give us a glimpse of their original form, and we shall find it not unlike those we have already reviewed.
There appear to have been two distinct cycles of myths in Yucatan, the most ancient and general that relating to Itzamná, the second, of later date and different origin, referring to Kukulcan. It is barely possible that these may be different versions of the same; but certainly they were regarded as distinct by the natives at and long before the time of the Conquest.
This is seen in the account they gave of their origin. They did not pretend to be autochthonous, but claimed that their ancestors came from distant regions, in two bands. The largest and most ancient immigration was from the East, across, or rather through, the ocean–for the gods had opened twelve paths through it–and this was conducted by the mythical civilizer Itzamná. The second band, less in number and later in time, came in from the West, and with them was Kukulcan. The former was called the Great Arrival; the latter, the Less Arrival[2].
§1. The Culture Hero, Itzamná.
To this ancient leader, Itzamná, the nation alluded as their guide, instructor and civilizer. It was he who gave names to all the rivers and divisions of land; he was their first priest, and taught them the proper rites wherewith to please the gods and appease their ill-will; he was the patron of the healers and diviners, and had disclosed to them the mysterious virtues of plants; in the month Uo they assembled and made new fire and burned to him incense, and having cleansed their books with water drawn from a fountain from which no woman had ever drunk, the most learned of the sages opened the volumes to forecast the character of the coming year.
It was Itzamná who first invented the characters or letters in which the Mayas wrote their numerous books, and which they carved in such profusion on the stone and wood of their edifices. He also devised their calendar, one more perfect even than that of the Mexicans, though in a general way similar to it[3].
As city-builder and king, his history is intimately associated with the noble edifices of Itzamal, which he laid out and constructed, and over which he ruled, enacting wise laws and extending the power and happiness of his people for an indefinite period.
Thus Itzamna, regarded as ruler, priest and teacher, was, no doubt, spoken of as an historical personage, and is so put down by various historians, even to the most recent[4]. But another form in which he appears proves him to have been an incarnation of deity, and carries his history from earth to heaven. This is shown in the very earliest account we have of the Maya mythology.
For this account we are indebted to the celebrated Las Casas, the "Apostle of the Indians." In 1545 he sent a certain priest, Francisco Hernandez by name, into the peninsula as a missionary. Hernandez had already traversed it as chaplain to Montejo's expedition, in 1528, and was to some degree familiar with the Maya tongue. After nearly a year spent among the natives he forwarded a report to Las Casas, in which, among other matters, he noted a resemblance which seemed to exist between the myths recounted by the Maya priests and the Christian dogmas. They told him that the highest deity they worshiped was Izona, who had made men and all things. To him was born a son, named Bacab or Bacabab, by a virgin, Chibilias, whose mother was Ixchel. Bacab was slain by a certain Eopuco, on the day called hemix, but after three days rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. The Holy Ghost was represented by Echuac, who furnished the world with all things necessary to man's life and comfort. Asked what Bacab meant, they replied, "the Son of the Great Father," and Echuac they translated by "the merchant."[5]
This is the story that a modern writer says, "ought to be repudiated without question."[6] But I think not. It is not difficult to restore these names to their correct forms, and then the fancied resemblance to Christian theology disappears, while the character of the original myth becomes apparent.
Cogolludo long since justly construed Izona as a misreading for Izamna. Bacabab is the plural form of Bacab, and shows that the sons were several. We are well acquainted with the Bacabab. Bishop Landa tells us all about them. They were four in number, four gigantic brothers, who supported the four corners of the heavens, who blew the four winds from the four cardinal points, and who presided over the four Dominical signs of the Calendar. As each year in the Calendar was supposed to be under the influence of one or the other of these brothers, one Bacab was said to die at the close of the year; and after the "nameless" or intercalary days had passed the next Bacab would live; and as each computation of the year began on the day Imix, which was the third before the close of the Maya week, this was said figuratively to be the day of death of the Bacab of that year. And whereas three (or four) days later a new year began, with another Bacab, the one was said to have died and risen again.
The myth further relates that the Bacabs were sons of Ix-chel. She was the Goddess of the Rainbow, which her name signifies. She was likewise believed to be the guardian of women in childbirth, and one of the patrons of the art of medicine. The early historians, Roman and Landa, also associate her with Itzamna[7], thus verifying the legend recorded by Hernandez.
That the Rainbow should be personified as wife of the Light-God and mother of the rain-gods, is an idea strictly in accordance with the course of mythological thought in the red race, and is founded on natural relations too evident to be misconstrued. The rainbow is never seen but during a shower, and while the sun is shining; hence it is always associated with these two meteorological phenomena.
I may quote in comparison the rainbow myth of the Moxos of South America. They held it to be the wife of Arama, their god of light, and her duty was to pour the refreshing rains on the soil parched by the glaring eye of her mighty spouse. Hence they looked upon her as goddess of waters, of trees and plants, and of fertility in general.[8]
Or we may take the Muyscas, a cultivated and interesting nation who dwelt on the lofty plateau where Bogota is situated. They worshiped the Rainbow under the name Cuchaviva and personified it as a goddess, who took particular care of those sick with fevers and of women in childbirth. She was also closely associated in their myth with their culture-hero Bochica, the story being that on one occasion, when an ill-natured divinity had inundated the plain of Bogota, Bochica appeared to the distressed inhabitants in company with Cuchaviva, and cleaving the mountains with a blow of his golden sceptre, opened a passage for the waters into the valley below.[9]
As goddess of the fertilizing showers, of growth and life, it is easily seen how Ixchel came to be the deity both of women in childbirth and of the medical art, a Juno Sospita as well as a Juno Lucina.
The statement is also significant, that the Bacabs were supposed to be the victims of Ah-puchah, the Despoiler or Destroyer,[10] though the precise import of that character in the mythical drama is left uncertain.[11]
The supposed Holy Ghost, Echuac, properly Ah-Kiuic, Master of the Market, was the god of the merchants and the cacao plantations. He formed a triad with two other gods, Chac, one of the rain gods, and Hobnel, also a god of the food supply. To this triad travelers, on stopping for the night, set on end three stones and placed in front of them three flat stones, on which incense was burned. At their festival in the month Muan precisely three cups of native wine (mead) were drained by each person present.[12]
The description of some such rites as these is, no doubt, what led the worthy Hernandez to suppose that the Mayas had Trinitarian doctrines. When they said that the god of the merchants and planters supplied the wants of men and furnished the world with desirable things, it was but a slightly figurative way of stating a simple truth.
The four Bacabs are called by Cogolludo "the gods of the winds." Each was identified with a particular color and a certain cardinal point. The first was that of the South. He was called Hobnil, the Belly; his color was yellow, which, as that of the ripe ears, was regarded as a favorable and promising hue; the augury of his year was propitious, and it was said of him, referring to some myth now lost, that he had never sinned as had his brothers. He answered to the day Kan. which was the first of the Maya week of thirteen days.[13] The remaining Bacabs were the Red, assigned to the East, the White, to the North, and the Black, to the West, and the winds and rains from those directions were believed to be under the charge of these giant caryatides.
Their close relation with Itzamná is evidenced, not only in the fragmentary myth preserved by Hernandez, but quite amply in the descriptions of the rites at the close of each year and in the various festivals during the year, as narrated by Bishop Landa. Thus at the termination of the year, along with the sacrifices to the Bacab of the year were others to Itzamná, either under his surname Canil, which has various meanings,[14] or as Kinich-ahau, Lord of the Eye of the Day,[15] or Yax-coc-ahmut, the first to know and hear of events,[16] or finally as Uac-mètun-ahau, Lord of the Wheel of the Months.[17]
The word bacab means "erected," "set up."[18] It was applied to the Bacabs because they were imagined to be enormous giants, standing like pillars at the four corners of the earth, supporting the heavens. In this sense they were also called chac, the giants, as the rain senders. They were also the gods of fertility and abundance, who watered the crops, and on whose favor depended the return of the harvests. They presided over the streams and wells, and were the divinities whose might is manifested in the thunder and lightning, gods of the storms, as well as of the gentle showers.[19] The festival to these gods of the harvest was in the month Mac, which occurred in the early spring. In this ceremony, Itzamná was also worshiped as the leader of the Bacabs, and an important rite called "the extinction of the fire" was performed. "The object of these sacrifices and this festival," writes Bishop Landa, "was to secure an abundance of water for their crops."[20]
These four Chac or Bacabab were worshiped under the symbol of the cross, the four arms of which represented the four cardinal points. Both in language and religious art, this was regarded as a tree. In the Maya tongue it was called "the tree of bread," or "the tree of life."[21] The celebrated cross of Palenque is one of its representations, as I believe I was the first to point out, and has now been generally acknowledged to be correct.[22] There was another such cross, about eight feet high, in a temple on the island of Cozumel. This was worshiped as "the god of rain," or more correctly, as the symbol of the four rain gods, the Bacabs. In periods of drought offerings were made to it of birds (symbols of the winds) and it was sprinkled with water. "When this had been done," adds the historian, "they felt certain that the rains would promptly fall."[23]
Each of the four Bacabs was also called Acantun, which means "a stone set up," such a stone being erected and painted of the color sacred to the cardinal point that the Bacab represented[24]. Some of these stones are still found among the ruins of Yucatecan cities, and are to this day connected by the natives with reproductive signs[25]. It is probable, however, that actual phallic worship was not customary in Yucatan. The Bacabs and Itzamná were closely related to ideas of fertility and reproduction, indeed, but it appears to have been especially as gods of the rains, the harvests, and the food supply generally. The Spanish writers were eager to discover all the depravity possible in the religion of the natives, and they certainly would not have missed such an opportunity for their tirades, had it existed. As it is, the references to it are not many, and not clear.
From what I have now presented we see that Itzamná came from the distant east, beyond the ocean marge; that he was the teacher of arts and agriculture; that he, moreover, as a divinity, ruled the winds and rains, and sent at his will harvests and prosperity. Can we identify him further with that personification of Light which, as we have already seen, was the dominant figure in other American mythologies?
This seems indicated by his names and titles. They were many, some of which I have already analyzed. That by which he was best known was Itzamná, a word of contested meaning but which contains the same radicals as the words for the morning and the dawn[26], and points to his identification with the grand central fact at the basis of all these mythologies, the welcome advent of the light in the eastern horizon after the gloom of the night.
His next most frequent title was Kin-ich-ahau, which may be translated either, "Lord of the Sun's Face," or, "The Lord, the Eye of the Day."[27] As such he was the deity who presided in the Sun's disk and shot forth his scorching rays. There was a temple at Itzamal consecrated to him as Kin-ich-kak-mo, "the Eye of the Day, the Bird of Fire."[28] In a time of pestilence the people resorted to this temple, and at high noon a sacrifice was spread upon the altar. The moment the sun reached the zenith, a bird of brilliant plumage, but which, in fact, was nothing else than a fiery flame shot from the sun, descended and consumed the offering in the sight of all. At Campeche he had a temple, as Kin-ich-ahau-haban, "the Lord of the Sun's face, the Hunter," where the rites were sanguinary.[29]
Another temple at Itzamal was consecrated to him, under one of his names, Kabil, He of the Lucky Hand,[30] and the sick were brought there, as it was said that he had cured many by merely touching them. This fane was extremely popular, and to it pilgrimages were made from even such remote regions as Tabasco, Guatemala and Chiapas. To accommodate the pilgrims four paved roads had been constructed, to the North, South, East and West, straight toward the quarters of the four winds.
§2. The Culture Hero, Kukulcan.
The second important hero-myth of the Mayas was that about Kukulcan. This is in no way connected with that of Itzamna, and is probably later in date, and less national in character. The first reference to it we also owe to Father Francisco Hernandez, whom I have already quoted, and who reported it to Bishop Las Casas in 1545. His words clearly indicate that we have here to do with a myth relating to the formation of the calendar, an opinion which can likewise be supported from other sources.
The natives affirmed, says Las Casas, that in ancient times there came to that land twenty men, the chief of whom was called "Cocolcan," and him they spoke of as the god of fevers or agues, two of the others as gods of fishing, another two as the gods of farms and fields, another was the thunder god, etc. They wore flowing robes and sandals on their feet, they had long beards, and their heads were bare. They ordered that the people should confess and fast, and some of the natives fasted on Fridays, because on that day the god Bacab died; and the name of that day in their language is himix, which they especially honor and hold in reverence as the day of the death of Bacab.[31]
In the manuscript of Hernandez, which Las Casas had before him when he was writing his Apologetical History, the names of all the twenty were given; but unfortunately for antiquarian research, the good bishop excuses himself from quoting them, on account of their barbarous appearance. I have little doubt, however, that had he done so, we should find them to be the names of the twenty days of the native calendar month. These are the visitors who come, one every morning, with flowing robes, full beard and hair, and bring with them our good or bad luck–whatever the day brings forth. Hernandez made the same mistake as did Father Francisco de Bobadilla, when he inquired of the Nicaraguans the names of their gods, and they gave him those of the twenty days of the month.[32] Each day was, indeed, personified by these nations, and supposed to be at once a deity and a date, favorable or unfavorable to fishing or hunting, planting or fighting, as the case might be.
Kukulcan seems, therefore, to have stood in the same relation in Yucatan to the other divinities of the days as did Votan in Chiapa and Quetzalcoatl Ce Acatl in Cholula.
His name has usually been supposed to be a compound, meaning "a serpent adorned with feathers," but there are no words in the Maya language to justify such a rendering. There is some variation in its orthography, and its original pronunciation may possibly be lost; but if we adopt as correct the spelling which I have given above, of which, however, I have some doubts, then it means, "The God of the Mighty Speech."[33]
The reference probably was to the fame of this divinity as an oracle, as connected with the calendar. But it is true that the name could with equal correctness be translated "The God, the Mighty Serpent," for can is a homonym with these and other meanings, and we are without positive proof which was intended.
To bring Kukulcan into closer relations with other American hero-gods we must turn to the locality where he was especially worshiped, to the traditions of the ancient and opulent city of Chichen Itza, whose ruins still rank among the most imposing on the peninsula. The fragments of its chronicles, as preserved to us in the Books of Chilan Balam and by Bishop Landa, tell us that its site was first settled by four bands who came from the four cardinal points and were ruled over by four brothers. These brothers chose no wives, but lived chastely and ruled righteously, until at a certain time one died or departed, and two began to act unjustly and were put to death. The one remaining was Kukulcan. He appeased the strife which his brothers' acts had aroused, directed the minds of the people to the arts of peace, and caused to be built various important structures. After he had completed his work in Chichen Itza, he founded and named the great city of Mayapan, destined to be the capital of the confederacy of the Mayas. In it was built a temple in his honor, and named for him, as there was one in Chichen Itza. These were unlike others in Yucatan, having circular walls and four doors, directed, presumably, toward the four cardinal points[34].
In gratifying confirmation of the legend, travelers do actually find in Mayapan and Chichen Itza, and nowhere else in Yucatan, the ruins of two circular temples with doors opening toward the cardinal points[35].
Under the beneficent rule of Kukulcan, the nation enjoyed its halcyon days of peace and prosperity. The harvests were abundant and the people turned cheerfully to their daily duties, to their families and their lords. They forgot the use of arms, even for the chase, and contented themselves with snares and traps.
At length the time drew near for Kukulcan to depart. He gathered the chiefs together and expounded to them his laws. From among them he chose as his successor a member of the ancient and wealthy family of the Cocoms. His arrangements completed, he is said, by some, to have journeyed westward, to Mexico, or to some other spot toward the sun-setting. But by the people at large he was confidently believed to have ascended into the heavens, and there, from his lofty house, he was supposed to watch over the interests of his faithful adherents.
Such was the tradition of their mythical hero told by the Itzas. No wonder that the early missionaries, many of whom, like Landa, had lived in Mexico and had become familiar with the story of Quetzalcoatl and his alleged departure toward the east, identified him with Kukulcan, and that, following the notion of this assumed identity, numerous later writers have framed theories to account for the civilization of ancient Yucatan through colonies of "Toltec" immigrants.
It can, indeed, be shown beyond doubt that there were various points of contact between the Aztec and Maya civilizations. The complex and artificial method of reckoning time was one of these; certain architectural devices were others; a small number of words, probably a hundred all told, have been borrowed by the one tongue from the other. Mexican merchants traded with Yucatan, and bands of Aztec warriors with their families, from Tabasco, dwelt in Mayapan by invitation of its rulers, and after its destruction, settled in the province of Canul, on the western coast, where they lived strictly separate from the Maya-speaking population at the time the Spaniards conquered the country.[36]
But all this is very far from showing that at any time a race speaking the Aztec tongue ruled the Peninsula. There are very strong grounds to deny this. The traditions which point to a migration from the west or southwest may well have referred to the depopulation of Palenque, a city which undoubtedly was a product of Maya architects. The language of Yucatan is too absolutely dissimilar from the Nahuatl for it ever to have been moulded by leaders of that race. The details of Maya civilization are markedly its own, and show an evolution peculiar to the people and their surroundings.
How far they borrowed from the fertile mythology of their Nahuatl visitors is not easily answered. That the circular temple in Mayapan, with four doors, specified by Landa as different from any other in Yucatan, was erected to Quetzalcoatl, by or because of the Aztec colony there, may plausibly be supposed when we recall how peculiarly this form was devoted to his worship. Again, one of the Maya chronicles–that translated by Pio Perez and published by Stephens in his Travels in Yucatan--opens with a distinct reference to Tula and Nonoal, names inseparable from the Quetzalcoatl myth. A statue of a sleeping god holding a vase was disinterred by Dr. Le Plongeon at Chichen Itza, and it is too entirely similar to others found at Tlaxcala and near the city of Mexico, for us to doubt but that they represented the same divinity, and that the god of rains, fertility and the harvests.[37]
The version of the tradition which made Kukulcan arrive from the West, and at his disappearance return to the West–a version quoted by Landa, and which evidently originally referred to the westward course of the sun, easily led to an identification of him with the Aztec Quetzalcoatl, by those acquainted with both myths.
The probability seems to be that Kukulcan was an original Maya divinity, one of their hero-gods, whose myth had in it so many similarities to that of Quetzalcoatl that the priests of the two nations came to regard the one as the same as the other. After the destruction of Mayapan, about the middle of the fifteenth century, when the Aztec mercenaries were banished to Canul, and the reigning family (the Xiu) who supported them became reduced in power, the worship of Kukulcan fell, to some extent, into disfavor. Of this we are informed by Landa, in an interesting passage.
He tells us that many of the natives believed that Kukulcan, after his earthly labors, had ascended into Heaven and become one of their gods. Previous to the destruction of Mayapan temples were built to him, and he was worshiped throughout the land, but after that event he was paid such honor only in the province of Mani (governed by the Xiu). Nevertheless, in gratitude for what all recognized they owed to him, the kings of the neighboring provinces sent yearly to Mani, on the occasion of his annual festival, which took place on the 16th of the month Xul (November 8th), either four or five magnificent feather banners. These were placed in his temple, with appropriate ceremonies, such as fasting, the burning of incense, dancing, and with simple offerings of food cooked without salt or pepper, and drink from beans and gourd seeds. This lasted five nights and five days; and, adds Bishop Landa, they said, and held it for certain, that on the last day of the festival Kukulcan himself descended from Heaven and personally received the sacrifices and offerings which were made in his honor. The celebration itself was called the Festival of the Founder[38], with reference, I suppose, to the alleged founding of the cities of Mayapan and Chichen Itza by this hero-god. The five days and five sacred banners again bring to mind the close relation of this with the Quetzalcoatl symbolism.
As Itzamná had disappeared without undergoing the pains of death, as Kukulcan had risen into the heavens and thence returned annually, though but for a moment, on the last day of the festival in his honor, so it was devoutly believed by the Mayas that the time would come when the worship of other gods should be done away with, and these mighty deities alone demand the adoration of their race. None of the American nations seems to have been more given than they to prognostics and prophecies, and of none other have we so large an amount of this kind of literature remaining. Some of it has been preserved by the Spanish missionaries, who used it with good effect for their own purposes of proselyting; but that it was not manufactured by them for this purpose, as some late writers have thought, is proved by the existence of copies of these prophecies, made by native writers themselves, at the time of the Conquest and at dates shortly subsequent.
These prophecies were as obscure and ambiguous as all successful prophets are accustomed to make their predictions; but the one point that is clear in them is, that they distinctly referred to the arrival of white and bearded strangers from the East, who should control the land and alter the prevailing religion.[39]
Even that portion of the Itzas who had separated from the rest of their nation at the time of the destruction of Mayapan (about 1440-50) and wandered off to the far south, to establish a powerful nation around Lake Peten, carried with them a forewarning that at the "eighth age" they should be subjected to a white race and have to embrace their religion; and, sure enough, when that time came, and not till then, that is, at the close of the seventeenth century of our reckoning, they were driven from their island homes by Governor Ursua, and their numerous temples, filled with idols, leveled to the soil.[40]
The ground of all such prophecies was, I have no doubt, the expected return of the hero-gods, whose myths I have been recording. Both of them represented in their original forms the light of day, which disappears at nightfall but returns at dawn with unfailing certainty. When the natural phenomenon had become lost in its personification, this expectation of a return remained and led the priests, who more than others retained the recollection of the ancient forms of the myth, to embrace this expectation in the prognostics which it was their custom and duty to pronounce with reference to the future.
