The Mayan civilization flourished in Mesoamerica—an area roughly corresponding to Central America—from around 300 bce until the Spanish conquest of the early 1500s CE. The mythology of the Maya had many elements in common with those ofother civilizations ofthe region, but the Maya developed their own unique pantheon, or collection of gods and goddesses. They also created their own stories about these deities, the image of the universe, and the place of humans in it.
The earliest known images ofMesoamerican gods were created by the Olmec civilization of Mexico. Emerging sometime after 1400 BCE, the Olmecs lived along the southern coast of the Gulf of Mexico for roughly a thousand years. They built pyramids that were sacred places where the Human realm touched the realm of the gods. They also carved enormous stone heads as images of their leaders and created a long-distance trade network across Mesoamerica to obtain valued items, such as jade.
The Olmec pantheon probably included gods of rain, corn, and fire, as well as a feathered serpent god. These figures reappeared in the myths of later Mesoamerican peoples. Olmec art included images ofjaguars and of creatures that were part jaguar, part human. People of the region believed that magicians could turn themselves into jaguars.
The Zapotecs, Toltecs, and Aztecs were among the Mesoamericans who inherited and built upon Olmec traditions. So did the Maya, who were concentrated in the lowlands of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula and in a highland region that extends from the present-day states of Tabasco and Chiapas into Guatemala. The Maya enjoyed their greatest wealth, power, and success from around 300 to 900 ce. Historians call this the Classic period. During this time, the Maya built vast stone cities and the ceremonial centers of Tikal and Palenque. After the Classic period, Toltecs from central Mexico arrived in the Yucatan and eventually merged with the Maya. Their influence shaped late Mayan civilization at Chichen Itza (pronounced chee-CHEN EET-suh) and Mayapan (pronounced mah-yuh-PAHN).
The Maya shared in a common Mesoamerican culture. The peoples of the region believed in the same gods and myths, built temples in the form of pyramids, and had an interest in astronomy. They also had a ball game in which teams competed to pass a ball of solid rubber through a stone ring or hoop. Only certain men and gods could play this game. Sometimes it was simple sport, sometimes a sacred ritual. Scholars do not know the full meaning of the Mesoamerican ball game, but it may have represented the movement of the heavenly bodies or a symbolic kind of warfare that ended in human sacrifice.
The Maya also shared the elaborate calendar system used across much of Mesoamerica. One part, called Haab by the Maya, was a 365-day calendar based on the sun’s annual cycle. The other, called Tzolkin (pronounced zol-KEEN), was a 260-day sacred calendar. The two calendars meshed in a cycle known as the Calendar Round, which repeated every fifty-two years. The Maya used the calendar both for measuring worldly time and for sacred purposes, such as divination. Each day in the Calendar Round came under the influence of a unique combination of deities. According to the Maya, the combination that occurred on a person’s date of birth would influence that person’s fate.
Like other Mesoamerican cultures, the Maya used a writing system based on symbols called glyphs that represented individual syllables. They recorded their mythology and history in volumes known as codices. Although the Spanish destroyed most Mayan documents, a few codices have survived. Other written sources of Mayan mythology include the Popol Vuh, the sacred book of the Quiche Maya of Guatemala, and the Chilam Balam (Secrets of the Soothsayers), writings by Yucatecan Maya from the 1600s and 1700s that contain much traditional lore. Accounts by Spanish explorers and missionaries—such as Diego de Landa’s description of Mayan life and religion in the Yucatan with the first key to the written language (ca. 1566)—provide useful information. Inscriptions found at archeological sites are also helpful.
Like many peoples, the Maya pictured a universe consisting of heavens above and underworlds below, with the human world sandwiched between. The heavens consisted of thirteen layers stacked above the earth, and the earth rested on the back of a turtle or reptile floating in the ocean. Four brothers called the Bacabs (pronounced bah-KAHBZ), possibly the sons of Itzamna, supported the heavens. Below the earth lay a realm called Xibalba, an underworld in nine layers. Linking the three realms was a giant tree whose roots reached into the
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