The Creation of People in the Mythology of the Ancient Maya

Abstract

Studying Classic Maya mythology presents the scholars with two major challenges. First, we have no access to long narrative texts that are known from other early civilizations. Second, ancient Maya mythology is still (re)constructed on the basis of Popol Vuh. In our paper, we argue that these challenges may be addressed by using a typology of mythological motifs and plots. In the early 2000s, several epigraphers independently recognized a possible mention of the shaping of the first people in the hieroglyphic texts on the Classic Maya painted vessels. We argue that this motif has strong parallels in the Tzotzil creation myths documented in the 20th century. Comparison of the hieroglyphic texts and iconography on ceramics and the Maya folklore shows that among the Classic Maya there existed three main types of anthropogonic motifs: 1) origin from the deer people, 2) emergence of the first people from a cave, and 3) creation of humans from clay by gods.