Ancient Mayan civilization that disappeared left a large number of mysteries and secrets for descendants. These tribes, who had extensive knowledge in astronomy, mathematics and cosmology, were among the most developed on the entire South American continent. But at the same time, they actively practiced human sacrifices, and the Mayan gods still seem to scientists to be an extremely intricate system of beliefs and ideas about the universe. Unfortunately, many written sources of that time were ruthlessly destroyed by the conquistadors. Therefore, the names of the Mayan gods reached the researchers in an incomplete form, many of them over the long decades have undergone major changes by Catholic priests. And others have sunk into oblivion, never revealing their secret to scientists. Despite this, the gods of the Aztecs and Mayans, as well as the cults of their praise, continue to be carefully studied and surprise researchers with their versatility.
The world as seen by South American Indians
Before proceeding to consider the pantheon of these peoples, it is necessary to understand how their ideas about the world around them developed. After all, the gods of the Aztecs and the Mayans were a direct consequence of cosmologyIndians.
A great difficulty for scientists who study the life of the Maya is the huge number of gods and their relationship with their own kind and ordinary people. The Maya endowed with divine power not only natural phenomena, but also heavenly bodies, various crops and animals.
South American Indians imagined the world as a quadrangular plane, along the edges of which stood trees, symbolizing the cardinal points. Each of them had its own color, and in the center was the most important green tree. It penetrated all the worlds and connected them with each other. The Maya claimed that heaven consisted of thirteen different worlds, each of which was inhabited by its own deities and had a supreme god. Underground spheres, too, according to representatives of the ancient civilization, had several levels. The nine worlds were inhabited by the gods of death, who arranged the most terrible trials for the souls of the dead. Far from all souls could pass them, in the saddest case they remained forever in the realm of darkness and sadness.
It is interesting that the origin of the world, as well as its device, the Maya had several interpretations. For example, some peoples believed that in the corners of the world there are not trees, but buckabs - four deities holding the heavenly worlds on their shoulders. They also had different colors. For example, bakaba in the east was colored red, and in the south - yellow. The center of the earth has always been green.
The Maya had a very peculiar attitude towards death. It was considered a natural extension of life and was considered in great detail in alltheir hypostases. Surprisingly, where a person ends up after the end of the earthly path directly depended on how he died. For example, women who died in childbirth and warriors always ended up in a kind of paradise. But natural death from old age doomed the soul to wandering in the kingdom of darkness. There, great trials awaited her, after which she could forever remain within the gloomy gods of death. Suicide was not considered by the South American Indians as a weakness and something forbidden. Rather, on the contrary - the one who put himself in his hands, fell to the gods of the Sun, and forever rejoiced in his new afterlife.
Features of the Mayan pantheon of gods
Mayan gods amaze scientists with their multiplicity. According to some reports, there are more than two hundred of them. Moreover, each of them has several incarnations and can appear in at least four different guises. Many of them have a wife who is also one of the incarnations. This dualism can be traced among the gods of Hinduism and Buddhism. It is not known which of the religions was primary and influenced the other, but scientists know that some of their Maya gods were taken from an even more ancient culture, about which almost nothing is known today.
It is surprising when you first meet the pantheon of deities and the fact that most of them are mortal. This is evidenced by the stories and images of deities that have survived to this day. It was quite common to depict them in different periods of maturity, and old age symbolized not decrepitude and weakness, but wisdom. It was necessary to feed the gods with sacrifices, because the bloodvictims gave them longevity and energy.
The gods of heavenly bodies died more often than others, and before reappearing in the sky, they had to roam the realm of the dead in their new incarnation. Then they would revert back to their original appearance and return to their designated place.
The gods of the Mayan peoples, depicted on the bas-reliefs of temples and pyramids, frightened scientists with their appearance and complexity of perception at first glance. The fact is that symbolism was adopted in the culture of the South American Indians, and a special meaning was invested in each image. Often the gods looked like creatures with bestial claws, coiled coils of snakes instead of eyes, and oblong skulls. But their appearance did not frighten the Mayans, they saw a special meaning in this, and every object in the hands of a deity or on his costume was designed to consolidate his power over people.
Mayan calendar
Almost every modern person knows the Mayan calendar, predicting the end of the world in 2012. It caused a lot of scientific disputes and hypotheses, but in fact it was just another version of the chronology, which the Mayans, as told in the legends, learned from the gods. The Maya gods taught them to count the epochs as a time interval equal to approximately five thousand two hundred years. Moreover, representatives of the mysterious civilization were sure that the world had already lived and died before. The Mayan gods told the priests that the world is now experiencing its fourth incarnation. Previously, it has already been created and died. The first time human civilization died from the sun,the second and third times - from wind and water. For the fourth time, death threatens the world from the god Jaguar, who will break out of the realm of the dead and destroy all life on the planet. But on the site of the destroyed, a new world will be reborn, rejecting everything evil and mercantile. The Maya considered this order of things to be natural and did not even think about how to prevent the death of mankind.
Sacrifices in honor of the gods
The gods of the ancient Maya required constant sacrifices, and quite often they were human. Historians believe that almost every service to the deity was accompanied by a sea of blood. Depending on its quantity, the deities blessed or punished the people. Moreover, the sacrificial rituals were worked out by the priests to automatism, sometimes they were extremely cruel and could hit a European.
The most beautiful young girls every year were appointed brides of the god of fertility - Yum Kasha. After a certain ritual, they were thrown alive into a deep stone well along with gold and jade, where they died long and painfully.
According to another ritual, a person was tied to a sculpture of a deity, and the priest cut open his stomach with a special knife. The whole idol was covered with blood, and then the body of the victim was painted in a bright blue color. White was applied to the heart area, where the members of the tribe shot from the bow. No less bloody is the rite of tearing out the heart from a still living person. At the top of the pyramid, the priest tied the victim to the altar and put her into a trance state. With one deft movement, the priest ripped open the chest andripped the still-beating heart out of his body with his hands. Then the body was thrown down to the roaring crowd in ecstasy.
Another way to honor the gods was the ritual ball game. At the end of the game, the Mayan gods were sure to receive their long-awaited sacrifice. Usually the sites where two teams fought were located in a quadrangle closed on all sides. The walls were the sides of the temple pyramids. All members of the losing team were cut off their heads and impaled on spears at a special site of the Skulls.
To feed their gods between major ritual sacrifices, the Mayan priests constantly bled themselves, irrigating the altar with it. Several times a day they pierced their ears, tongues and other parts of the body. Such respect for the gods was supposed to win over the latter to the tribe and grant them well-being.
The main god of the Maya, the creator of all life
The god Itzamna was the most important deity in the Mayan pantheon. He was usually depicted as an old man with a large nose and one tooth in his mouth. He was associated with a lizard or an iguana and was often depicted surrounded by these creatures.
The cult of Itzamna is one of the most ancient, most likely, it appeared when the Mayans still revered totem animals. Lizards in the culture of the South American Indians were considered sacred creatures, which, even before the advent of the gods, held the sky with their tails. Maya claimed that Itzamna created the earth, people, gods and all worlds. He taught the people to count, cultivate the land and showed important stars in the night sky. Almost everything that people could do, broughtthem the chief god of the Mayan Indians. He was simultaneously the deity of rain, harvest and earth.
Itzamna's Companion
No less revered by the Maya was the wife of Itzamna - the goddess Ish-Chel. She was at the same time the goddess of the moon, the rainbow and the mother of all the other deities of the Mayan pantheon. It is believed that all the gods came from this couple, so Ish-Chel simultaneously patronizes women, girls, children and expectant mothers. She can assist in childbirth, but sometimes she takes newborn babies as sacrifices. The Maya had such a custom, according to which for the first time pregnant girls went alone to the island of Cosmel. There they had to appease the goddess with various sacrifices so that the birth would go smoothly, and the baby would be born he althy and strong.
There are legends that young virgins and babies were often sacrificed on the island. Surprisingly, even the patroness of women, who was supposed to be quivering and gentle, recognized human sacrifice and ate fresh blood, like all other Mayan deities.
Kukulkan, Mayan god
One of the most famous and revered Mayan gods was Kukulkan. His cult was widespread throughout the Yucatan. The very name of the god is translated as "feathered serpent" and he often appeared before his people in various incarnations. Most often, he was depicted as a creature similar to a winged serpent and with a human head. In other bas-reliefs, he looked like a god with a bird's head and a snake's body. Kukulkan ruled fourelements and often symbolized fire.
In fact, the most important Mayan god was not associated with any of the elements, but he skillfully controlled them, using them as a special gift. The priests of the cult were considered the main exponents of the will of Kukulkan, they could communicate directly with the god and knew his will. Moreover, he defended the royal dynasties and always advocated their strengthening.
The most majestic pyramid in the Yucatan was built in honor of Kukulkan. It is executed so amazingly that on the day of the summer solstice the shadow from the structure takes the form of a winged serpent. This symbolizes the coming of God to his people. Many note that the pyramid has very special acoustics - even in complete silence it seems that birds are screaming somewhere nearby.
The most terrible of the pantheon of Mayan gods
The Mayan god of death, Ah-Puch, was the lord of the lowest tier of the underworld. He invented monstrous bloody trials for lost souls and often liked to watch the ritual game of a match between the souls of the Indians and the gods of the kingdom of the dead. Most often, he was depicted as a skeleton or a creature covered with cadaverous black spots.
In order to get out of the realm of the dead, it was necessary to outwit the deity, but the Maya claimed that only a few daredevils succeeded in the entire existence of the worlds.
Light deity of the firmament
The Maya were excellent astronomers, they paid a lot of attention to the Sun and the Moon. From the daylight depended on how fruitful it would beyear. But observations of the moon and stars allowed the Indians to keep a calendar and mark the days of rituals, sacrifices and sowing. Therefore, it is not surprising that the gods of these heavenly bodies were among the most revered.
The Maya Sun God was named Kinich Ahau. He was also the patron saint of warriors who, dying, fed the god with their blood. The Maya believed that Kinich Ahau should gain strength at night, so it is necessary to feed him with blood daily. Otherwise, he will not be able to rise from the darkness and light up a new day.
Most often God appeared in the form of a young boy with red skin. He was depicted sitting with a solar disk in his hands. According to the Mayan calendar, it was his era that began after 2012. After all, the fifth era belongs entirely to Kinich Ahau.
Rain God Chuck
Since the Maya were mainly engaged in agriculture, it is not surprising that the gods of the sun and rain belonged to the supreme pantheon of deities. God Chuck was feared and revered. After all, he could bestow good and timely watering of crops, or he could punish with drought. In such years, he received sacrifices amounting to hundreds of human lives. The altars did not have time to dry out from the sea of spilled blood.
Chuck was most often depicted in a lazy, reclining pose with a large sacrificial bowl on his lap. Sometimes he looked like a formidable creature with an axe, which could cause downpour and lightning, considered the companions of a good harvest.
God of fertility
Yum-Kash was both the god of fertility and corn. Since this culture was the mainin the life of the Indians, the fate of the whole city depended on its productivity. God has always been depicted as a young man with an elongated head, which turned into an ear. Sometimes his headdress resembled corn. According to legend, the Mayan gods gave corn, they brought seeds from heaven and taught how to cultivate corn fields. Surprisingly, so far, scientists have not found a wild ancestor of corn, from which modern cultivated varieties of this popular species should have occurred.
Be that as it may, the culture of the Mayan people and their religious beliefs have not yet been fully studied by modern scientists. They believe that the knowledge gained with great difficulty about the life of the South American Indians is just the tip of the iceberg, but the real achievements of this civilization, which will lead to an understanding of its way of life, were irrevocably destroyed by the conquistadors.
