The Myths of the Popol Vuh in Cosmology, Art, and Ritual
edited by Holley Moyes, Allen J. Christenson and Frauke Sachse
University Press of Colorado, 2021 Paper: 978-1-64642-198-5 | Cloth: 978-1-60732-338-9 | eISBN: 978-1-64642-199-2 Library of Congress Classification F1465.P83 Dewey Decimal Classification 299.78423
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK This volume offers an integrated and comparative approach to the Popol Vuh, analyzing its myths to elucidate the ancient Maya past while using multiple lines of evidence to shed light on the text. Combining interpretations of the myths with analyses of archaeological, iconographic, epigraphic, ethnohistoric, ethnographic, and literary resources, the work demonstrates how Popol Vuh mythologies contribute to the analysis and interpretation of the ancient Maya past.
The chapters are grouped into four sections. The first section interprets the Highland Maya worldview through examination of the text, analyzing interdependence between deities and human beings as well as the textual and cosmological coherence of the Popol Vuh as a source. The second section analyzes the Precolumbian Maya archaeological record as it relates to the myths of the Popol Vuh, providing new interpretations of the use of space, architecture, burials, artifacts, and human remains found in Classic Maya caves. The third explores ancient Maya iconographic motifs, including those found in Classic Maya ceramic art; the nature of predatory birds; and the Hero Twins’ deeds in the Popol Vuh. The final chapters address mythological continuities and change, reexamining past methodological approaches using the Popol Vuh as a resource for the interpretation of Classic Maya iconography and ancient Maya religion and mythology, connecting the myths of the Popol Vuh to iconography from Preclassic Izapa, and demonstrating how narratives from the Popol Vuh can illuminate mythologies from other parts of Mesoamerica.
The Myths of the Popol Vuh in Cosmology, Art, and Ritual is the first volume to bring together multiple perspectives and original interpretations of the Popol Vuh myths. It will be of interest not only to Mesoamericanists but also to art historians, archaeologists, ethnohistorians, iconographers, linguists, anthropologists, and scholars working in ritual studies, the history of religion, historic and Precolumbian literature and historic linguistics.
Contributors: Jaime J. Awe, Karen Bassie-Sweet, Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos, Michael D. Coe, Iyaxel Cojtí Ren, Héctor Escobedo, Thomas H. Guderjan, Julia Guernsey, Christophe Helmke, Nicholas A. Hopkins, Barbara MacLeod, Jesper Nielsen, Colin Snider, Karl A. Taube
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Holley Moyes is professor of anthropology at the University of California, Merced, and author of Sacred Darkness: A Global Perspective on the Ritual Use of Caves, a Choice Outstanding Academic Title selection.
Allen J. Christenson is professor of Pre-Columbian studies at Brigham Young University and the author of Art and Society in a Highland Maya Community, a two-volume critical edition of the Popol Vuh, and The Burden of the Ancients.
Frauke Sachse is program director of Pre-Columbian Studies at the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection and coauthor of Maya Daykeeping: Three Calendars from Highland Guatemala.
REVIEWS
“This book brings together some of the very best scholars who have been working on the subject of Maya religion, all of whom are deeply familiar with the Popol Vuh. Their perspectives on this, a great Indigenous American scripture, vary in interesting and worthwhile ways. The transcendent ideas narrated in the Popol Vuh, these authors collectively show, stand not only with those of their compatriots in Mesoamerica but with religious experience as human sustenance and moral ground.” —David Freidel, Washington University in St. Louis
"This volume brings together stimulating and critical studies of the continuity of Popol Vuh mythology from very different perspectives and raises key questions about the significance and interpretation of colonial-era original sources for the interpretation of pre-Hispanic religion and cosmology." —Journal of Anthropological Research
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
List of Figures
Preface: Maya Archaeology and the Popol Vuh: An Intellectual History | Michael D. Coe
1. Introduction: The Popol Vuh as a Window into the Mind of the Ancient Maya | Allen J. Christenson and Frauke Sachse
Part 1: Understanding Highland Maya Worldviews through the Mythologies of the Popol Vuh
2. “For It Is with Words That We Are Sustained”: The Popol Vuh and the Creation of the First People | Allen J. Christenson
3. Metaphors of Maize: Otherworld Conceptualizations and the Cultural Logic of Human Existence in the Popol Vuh | Frauke Sachse
4. The Saqirik (Dawn) and Foundation Rituals among the Ancient K’iche’an Peoples | Iyaxel Cojtí Ren
Part 2: The Popol Vuh in Understanding the Archaeological Record
5. Archaeological Evidence for the Preclassic Origins of the Maya Creation Story and the Resurrection of the Maize God at Cahal Pech, Belize | Jaime J. Awe
6. The Dynamics of Dynasty, Power, and Creation Myths Embedded in Architecture: A Case Study from Blue Creek, Belize | Thomas H. Guderjan and Colin Snider
7. Sacrifice of the Maize God: Re-creating Creation in the Main Chamber of Actun Tunichil Muknal, Belize | Holley Moyes and Jaime J. Awe
Part 3: Comprehending Classic Maya Art and Writing through the Myths of the Popol Vuh
8. The Transmutation of Sustenance: A Narrative of Perennial Reciprocity on Classic Maya Codex-Style Ceramics | Barbara MacLeod
9. Predatory Birds of the Popol Vuh | Karen Bassie-Sweet and Nicholas A. Hopkins
Part 4: Mythological Continuities and Change
10. The Solar and Lunar Heroes in Classic Maya Art | Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos
11. Beyond the “Myth or Politics” Debate: Reconsidering Late Preclassic Sculpture, the Principal Bird Deity, and the Popol Vuh | Julia Guernsey
12. Blowgunners and the Great Bird at Teotihuacan: Mesoamerican Myths in a Comparative Perspective | Jesper Nielsen, Karl A. Taube, Christophe Helmke, and Héctor Escobedo
Index
List of Contributors
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
The Myths of the Popol Vuh in Cosmology, Art, and Ritual
edited by Holley Moyes, Allen J. Christenson and Frauke Sachse
University Press of Colorado, 2021 Paper: 978-1-64642-198-5 Cloth: 978-1-60732-338-9 eISBN: 978-1-64642-199-2
This volume offers an integrated and comparative approach to the Popol Vuh, analyzing its myths to elucidate the ancient Maya past while using multiple lines of evidence to shed light on the text. Combining interpretations of the myths with analyses of archaeological, iconographic, epigraphic, ethnohistoric, ethnographic, and literary resources, the work demonstrates how Popol Vuh mythologies contribute to the analysis and interpretation of the ancient Maya past.
The chapters are grouped into four sections. The first section interprets the Highland Maya worldview through examination of the text, analyzing interdependence between deities and human beings as well as the textual and cosmological coherence of the Popol Vuh as a source. The second section analyzes the Precolumbian Maya archaeological record as it relates to the myths of the Popol Vuh, providing new interpretations of the use of space, architecture, burials, artifacts, and human remains found in Classic Maya caves. The third explores ancient Maya iconographic motifs, including those found in Classic Maya ceramic art; the nature of predatory birds; and the Hero Twins’ deeds in the Popol Vuh. The final chapters address mythological continuities and change, reexamining past methodological approaches using the Popol Vuh as a resource for the interpretation of Classic Maya iconography and ancient Maya religion and mythology, connecting the myths of the Popol Vuh to iconography from Preclassic Izapa, and demonstrating how narratives from the Popol Vuh can illuminate mythologies from other parts of Mesoamerica.
The Myths of the Popol Vuh in Cosmology, Art, and Ritual is the first volume to bring together multiple perspectives and original interpretations of the Popol Vuh myths. It will be of interest not only to Mesoamericanists but also to art historians, archaeologists, ethnohistorians, iconographers, linguists, anthropologists, and scholars working in ritual studies, the history of religion, historic and Precolumbian literature and historic linguistics.
Contributors: Jaime J. Awe, Karen Bassie-Sweet, Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos, Michael D. Coe, Iyaxel Cojtí Ren, Héctor Escobedo, Thomas H. Guderjan, Julia Guernsey, Christophe Helmke, Nicholas A. Hopkins, Barbara MacLeod, Jesper Nielsen, Colin Snider, Karl A. Taube
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Holley Moyes is professor of anthropology at the University of California, Merced, and author of Sacred Darkness: A Global Perspective on the Ritual Use of Caves, a Choice Outstanding Academic Title selection.
Allen J. Christenson is professor of Pre-Columbian studies at Brigham Young University and the author of Art and Society in a Highland Maya Community, a two-volume critical edition of the Popol Vuh, and The Burden of the Ancients.
Frauke Sachse is program director of Pre-Columbian Studies at the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection and coauthor of Maya Daykeeping: Three Calendars from Highland Guatemala.
REVIEWS
“This book brings together some of the very best scholars who have been working on the subject of Maya religion, all of whom are deeply familiar with the Popol Vuh. Their perspectives on this, a great Indigenous American scripture, vary in interesting and worthwhile ways. The transcendent ideas narrated in the Popol Vuh, these authors collectively show, stand not only with those of their compatriots in Mesoamerica but with religious experience as human sustenance and moral ground.” —David Freidel, Washington University in St. Louis
"This volume brings together stimulating and critical studies of the continuity of Popol Vuh mythology from very different perspectives and raises key questions about the significance and interpretation of colonial-era original sources for the interpretation of pre-Hispanic religion and cosmology." —Journal of Anthropological Research
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
List of Figures
Preface: Maya Archaeology and the Popol Vuh: An Intellectual History | Michael D. Coe
1. Introduction: The Popol Vuh as a Window into the Mind of the Ancient Maya | Allen J. Christenson and Frauke Sachse
Part 1: Understanding Highland Maya Worldviews through the Mythologies of the Popol Vuh
2. “For It Is with Words That We Are Sustained”: The Popol Vuh and the Creation of the First People | Allen J. Christenson
3. Metaphors of Maize: Otherworld Conceptualizations and the Cultural Logic of Human Existence in the Popol Vuh | Frauke Sachse
4. The Saqirik (Dawn) and Foundation Rituals among the Ancient K’iche’an Peoples | Iyaxel Cojtí Ren
Part 2: The Popol Vuh in Understanding the Archaeological Record
5. Archaeological Evidence for the Preclassic Origins of the Maya Creation Story and the Resurrection of the Maize God at Cahal Pech, Belize | Jaime J. Awe
6. The Dynamics of Dynasty, Power, and Creation Myths Embedded in Architecture: A Case Study from Blue Creek, Belize | Thomas H. Guderjan and Colin Snider
7. Sacrifice of the Maize God: Re-creating Creation in the Main Chamber of Actun Tunichil Muknal, Belize | Holley Moyes and Jaime J. Awe
Part 3: Comprehending Classic Maya Art and Writing through the Myths of the Popol Vuh
8. The Transmutation of Sustenance: A Narrative of Perennial Reciprocity on Classic Maya Codex-Style Ceramics | Barbara MacLeod
9. Predatory Birds of the Popol Vuh | Karen Bassie-Sweet and Nicholas A. Hopkins
Part 4: Mythological Continuities and Change
10. The Solar and Lunar Heroes in Classic Maya Art | Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos
11. Beyond the “Myth or Politics” Debate: Reconsidering Late Preclassic Sculpture, the Principal Bird Deity, and the Popol Vuh | Julia Guernsey
12. Blowgunners and the Great Bird at Teotihuacan: Mesoamerican Myths in a Comparative Perspective | Jesper Nielsen, Karl A. Taube, Christophe Helmke, and Héctor Escobedo
Index
List of Contributors
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE