From Maya Cosmos by David Freidel, Linda Schele, and Joy Parker, pages 386-391, 1990
On my last day in the field in the summer of 1992, I took seventeen Maya men from Yaxuna village on a tour of the site of Chich'en Itza. It was Sunday, the only day when my friends could get in free. David Johnston, who works on the project, drove our friends up the bumpy road in the back of our big truck. I expected a pretty good group of young workers from the project, but I was surprised and delighted to see Don Emetario, Don Bernardino, and other elders of the community pile out along with the younger men. My shaman friend, Don Pablo, was presiding over a Ch'a-Chak that day, out in the western part of Yaxuna's land, so he couldn't come. Most of the men hadn't been to Chich'en since the new tourist facility at the gate went up a few years ago. They don't usually have the time to go or the money to pay the entry fees. Chich'en has become a place for foreign tourists rather than Maya pilgrimage.
As we passed through the gleaming metal turnstiles, Don Emet told me he hadn't been here for thirty years. It was gently drizzling as we moved briskly off toward the Great Ballcourt, but we didn't mind because the weather was keeping the crowds of tourists small. We must have made quite a sight, a parade of Maya men in American gimme caps; a smaller group of American Spanish teachers and their Yukatekan companions; and Phil Hofstetter, friend and filmmaker, recording it all on videotape.
By the time we got into the Ballcourt I was waking up to the challenge I faced. With the writing of this book, my perceptions of this Ballcourt had changed dramatically. I only hoped that, as I explained its meaning to my Maya friends, I could do it justice. I began by telling them the Maya name for ballcourt, the Three-Conquest-Stair. As I wondered how best to explain that name, I suddenly realized that I had to start by relating the Classic story of the Creation. I had mentioned parts of this story before while working in the ruins of Yaxuna, but now I had to encompass the whole to make sense of the Ballcourt. Sweating with effort and the summer heat, I marshaled my somewhat halting Spanish to the task. I told them about the Milky Way as it cycled through the night sky on Creation Eve. I talked about the First-Three-Stone place, and linked it to the way they lay out new fields and the hearthstones of their kitchens. As the story tumbled out of me, I began to use Maya words where I could, reaching to build a bridge between the world of their ancestors and their modern world by way of mine.
As I spoke, gesturing where words failed, they watched me carefully. Over the years I had talked to some of them about these things, especially Don Emet, but now I was trying to tell the story of this book. They could tell that I felt strongly about what I was saying. They knew I was talking about Maya beliefs because I was using Maya words. But I think it must have been hard for them to grasp that I was talking about their traditions, that this was a story of their ancestors. It was, after all, tumbling from the lips of a too-tall, light-haired foreigner who spoke imperfect Spanish earnestly and Yukatek Maya not at all. Perplexed or not, they concentrated and listened and tried to make sense of it. Surrounded by American, European, and Japanese onlookers, I tried to breach the chasm between their world and mine, and between all of us and the world of their ancient ancestors.
We stopped for a time at one of the large panels showing the decapitation sacrifice of a ballplayer. Pointing out the bloody snakes and flowering vines flowing from the neck, I explained that this place was not just for playing ball, but for remembering and re-creating the death and rebirth of First Father, whose name was Hun-Nal-Ye. We spent some time going over just who this ancestor was and the metaphor maize played in their thinking today. As they nodded their heads, agreeing with me that maize was indeed the grace of life, I felt that some of them had grasped the central ideas of what I was trying to say.
We wandered up the court to the North Temple, where I pointed out the Tree of the World carved in shallow relief on the balustrades flanking the small stairway into the temple. There is a grotesque head nestled in the roots, and flowers and birds adorn its branches. I explained to them that the skull represented First Father's, which the Lords of Xibalba had hung in the tree, and that the white flowers were symbols of the soul. Then we moved on to the Lower Temple of the Jaguars where I told them the story of the aged ancestors who hold up the doorways. On his back, the old male god bears a turtle shell, the starry place of First Father's rebirth. The side of the doorway presents an image of First Father emerging out of a cracked mountain monster.
The gentle drizzle that had been accompanying our progress turned into a hard rain, and we hastily bunched into the temple to look at the processional rituals carved inside. These figures ringed the room much like their own circling of the altar during Ch'a-Chak ceremonies. They nodded in recognition. When it stopped raining, we went back outside and passed the grinning stacked heads of the great skull rack, another remembrance of the miraculous tree of First Father and the necessity of sacrifice.
Stopping at the Venus platform, I described the dances of war and sacrifice that would have occurred here and talked about the great War Serpent depicted on the platform, the Waxaklahun-Ubah-Kan. I also explained the meaning that the star Venus had to the ancients. When we got to the cenote of sacrifice, I described the portals to the Otherworld. Don Emet said, "That's the way to hell" He pointed down into the cenote. "Unhappy young girls still kill themselves by jumping into cenotes," he said, "and they go right to hell."
We ended up finally at the summit of the Temple of the Warriors, where I tried to explain the concept of Itzam-Yeh, as we stood before the great screaming battle-bird images that decorate the building. "You know what itz is," I said and I started to list some meanings. One of the young men lit up with recognition. "Yes, Itz,, It's sap, nectar." He did know what I was talking about. We spoke of the rain, the itz of the sky, and looked about us hopefully in this year of drought. I felt that the path of understanding I was trying to build was shaky but promising.
We went inside the sanctum and up to the table-throne in the back of the temple. In the twenty years I had been visiting this site, I had never seen Maya men standing next to it. Suddenly, in a flash of insight, I understood its function. The table top came up to the middle of their chests, the same height as the altars these men build for Ch'a-Chak ceremonies in their own villages; and the top is just about the same size. Of course, I thought, that's why the throne top is held up by small dwarf figures with their arms in the air. Just as the Ch'a Chak table makes a model of the sky, so does the altar inside the temple. And like the sky monster inside Temple 22 at Copan, it is held up by sky-bearers÷this time dwarves instead of Pawahtunob.
By now I was pretty exhausted, talking and listening nonstop for more than an hour. I looked out over the restored grandeur of this famous urban center and thought about the odd twist of destiny that had brought me here trying to teach the descendants of its makers about it. I realized how much it mattered to me. Even though my first attempts were clumsy, at least I was on my way. The fates of Maya people, of poverty and marginality, of genocide and exile in a vast and indifferent world, loomed like the ancient gods of death on this gray afternoon.
My friends wandered out to the front of the temple and one of the American Spanish teachers with us called them all over for a group photo. With a boyish whoop Don Emet jumped over to the famous statue of chak mul and sat down majestically with a grin, blissfully ignoring the large sign forbidding anyone to touch the statue. The others gathered around and I yelled, "I want that picture!" For just a moment, Chich'en Itza was theirs again. Not mine to explain, not for the tourist strangers wandering in droves across its broad expanse, but theirs to enjoy. Don Emet holds the hope of the kings and Hero Twins in his heart. He and all our Maya friends who have shared their world with us stand prepared to defy the fate that tried to reduce their people to obscurity, and we will stand with them.
The Maya cosmos is a place that is still alive today. The Maya still play ballgames; still dance; still stand prepared to battle for their cultural autonomy; and still nurture their gods with holy objects, food, and the places they make. Their reenactment of Creation occurs in their fields, their homes, and in their places of worship, as it has been done from the beginning. Looking up into the sky, we showed you how the Maya book of Creation is inscribed in its stars. Bey ti' ka 'an, bey ti' lu'um, "As is the sky, so is the earth," says John Sosa's shaman teacher in Yalkoba. And so it is: the book of the sky reflects the daily creation and renewal of the earth. The Maya people who have befriended us, who teach us even as we try to teach them, want to be part of the modern world around them. They want their children to live better lives, with good health care, good education, and opportunities for gainful employment. But they also want to speak their languages, to practice the ways of their parents and grandparents, and to bring to the world, openly and proudly, their insight into its workings. We think the people who want to know about the ancient Maya should know their descendants. Theirs is a great tradition, a gift for us as we look forward to a future in which we too face a changing world that we must make anew.