The gods and goddesses of the ancient Maya.

This new section of the Maya archaeology web site introduces the gods and goddesses of the ancient Maya using their actual portraits by Maya artists of the 4th-9th centuries A.D.

Jaguar God of the Underworld, the Night Sun, one of the major characters of the Maya pantheon.For more information on this deity, and the rest of the pantheon, we recommend looking among the 727 illustrations of deities and cosmological locations in Nicholas Hellmuth's colorful book, Monster and Men in Maya Art, bi-lingual (German-English), ADEVA, Graz, Austria.

Lid handle of a giant Quiche urn, Highland Guatemala. Photographed in the Museo Popol Vuh, Universidad Francisco Marroquin.

Maya Religion and Cosmogony

A cosmogonist order and a close relation between the natural and supernatural ruled the world of the ancient Maya.  Most information that is known about Maya religion comes from the innumerable and meticulous investigations done in murals, monuments, prehispanic documents, colonial documents, and valuable ethnographic sources, where you can observe that the contemporary Maya still carry out several religious practices that their ancestors practice long time ago.

From the point of view of the ancient Maya, the world was a sacred and magical place, with living beings full of divine energy that unite the terrestrial world with the divine world.  They continuously made ritual representations where men could transform in different deities and supernatural beings that symbolized the divine energy.  Everything that was part of nature was filled with life, like in the trees, in rocks, rivers, lakes, etc. (Shele; 2001).

Mayas believed that several deities created the world in diverse occasions.  The sacred book of the Mayas, the Popol Vuh, narrates the creation of the world and men, even to the point where it is considered the most complete of the Maya creation.  The murals of San Bartolo, represents one of the earliest versions, to this day know, about the myth of creation, dated for the Preclassic period, were you can appreciate the participation of several characters that are represented in diverse scenes of codex style vessels from the Classic period of all the Maya region.

In the Maya cosmogony there is the concept of duality between life and death.  The death was considered a complement of life and was represented in Xibalba, the underworld.  In several vessels of the Classic period, they had diverse elements that had been identified as part of the underworld.  Water is an element associated with the underworld and several times its been represented in diverse ways.  Dr. Hellmuth has made a wide study of the iconographic elements of the underworld; this can be seen in “Monsters and Men in Maya Art” (1987).

Maya believed that the earth was divided in three spheres, heaven or celestial world, the terrestrial world and the underworld.  The earth was represented by the back of a big reptile (sometimes by a turtle or by a caiman).  In the center of the world or axis mundi, there was a big sacred tree or cosmos tree, a big Ceiba which communicates the three levels of the universe, since the big roots of the Ceiba went all the way down to the underworld (Schele & Freidel; 2001).

All the universe’s spheres where in closed connection by visible and invisible energies, with supernatural powers.  Every sphere was divided in different levels, and each level of the universe has its own deities. 

This image of the Maya cosmos has been represented in its style and architectonic disposition, since the early settlements of peasant groups, where the analogy between cosmos elements and the spatial distribution of their living areas and everyday activities was emerged there; though the bigger cities, ruled by big elite groups.

 In the Maya there where practically two types or system of worship.  There was the “official religion”, managed by a hierarchy with political purposes; and there is the “popular religion”, which was practiced by the major part of the population, since it was related with everyday beliefs and needs, and also they perform several simple ceremonies for their crops in far away town (Valdes; 1994).

Some religious concepts expressed in the Maya culture are of Olmec origin and continue in use thousands of years later by the Maya, examples of these are the double headed serpent, jester god, Jaguar god, the concept of Cave-Underworld, and the celestial bird).

Now a days, its interesting to see how many Maya groups continue their tradition and still make several ritual that their ancestors used to do.  Even though, one can appreciate that since time has pass, since the Spanish invasion though our time, there has emerged a strong syncretism between the Maya religion and the catholic religion, creating this way an interesting mixture that is almost unique in several countries of America.  This syncretism can be observed in the respect that is given to holly saints that keep certain relation with some old Mesoamerican deities; and the celebration of festivities for the patron saints, where the dates of the festivities are related with some important activities that where taken place in the past; etc.

REFERENCES:

EGGEBRECHT, Eva; Arne EGGEBRECHT; Wilfried SELPEL; Nikolai GRUBE; & Estella KREJCI
2001  “Maya amaq’”.  Roemer- und Pelizaeus-Museum Edition: Illustrated.  Published by Cholsamaj Foundation.

HELLMUTH, Nicholas  
1987  “Monsters and Men in Maya Art/ Monster und Menschen in der Maya-Kunst”.  Akademische Druck und Verlagsanstalt.

SCHEELE, Linda & David FREIDEL
1999  “Una sleva de reyes, la asombrosa historia de los aniguos Mayas”.  Fondo de Cultura Economica, Mexico D.F.

VALDES, Juan Antonio
1992  “Algunas relflexiones sobre la religion de los Mayas Preclasicos”.  IV Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueological en Guatemala; 1990.  Editado por Juan Pedro Laporte, Hector Escobedo y S. Brady. Pp: 223-235.  Museo Nacional de Arqueologia y Etnologia, Guatemala.

Updated July 7, 2009