Book II. commented upon

The Second Book of the “Popol Vuh” is the most interesting of the four from a mythological point of view. That it treats of the dealings of the Kichés with the aboriginal people of the district they afterwards inhabited is not unlikely. Although the opinion of Brasseur that Xibalba was a prehistoric state which had Palenque for its capital is an exaggeration of whatsoever kernel of fact may be contained in the myth, yet it is not unlikely that the Abbé, who so often astonishes without illuminating, has in this instance come near the truth. The cliff-dwellings of Mexico and Colorado have of late years aroused speculation as to the aboriginal or directly prehistoric peoples of these regions. The “Popol Vuh” definitely describes Xibalba as the metropolis of an “Underworld”; and with such examples as that of the Cliff Palace Cañon in Colorado before us, it is difficult to think that allusion is not made to some such semi-underground abode. There the living rock has been excavated to a considerable distance, advantage being taken of a huge natural recess to secure greater depth than could possibly have been attained by human agency, and in this immense alcove the ruins of a veritable city may still be seen, almost as well preserved as in the days of its evacuation, its towers, battlements and houses being as well marked and as plainly discernible as are the ruins of Philæ. It is then not unreasonable to suppose that in a more northerly home the Kichés may have warred with a race which dwelt in some such subterranean locality. A people’s idea of an “otherworld” is often coloured by the configuration of their own country.

“The devil,” says Cogolludo of the Mayas, “is called by them Xibilba, which means he who disappears or vanishes.” The derivation of Xibalba is from a root meaning “to fear” from which comes the name for a ghost or phantom. Xibalba was, then, the Place of Phantoms. But it was not the Place of Torment, the abode of a devil who presided over punishment. The idea of sin is weak in the savage mind; and the idea of punishment for sin in a future state is unknown in pre-Christian American mythology.

“Under the influence of Christian catechising,” says Brinton, “the Quiché legends portray this really as a place of torment, and its rulers as malignant and powerful; but as I have before pointed out they do so protesting that such was not the ancient belief, and they let fall no word that shows that it was regarded as the destination of the morally bad. The original meaning of the name given by Cogolludo points unmistakably to the simple fact of disappearance from among men, and corresponds in harmlessness to the true sense of those words of fear, Scheol, Hades, Hell, all signifying hidden from sight, and only endowed with more grim associations by the imaginations of later generations.”

The idea of consigning elder peoples, who have been displaced in the land to an underworld, is not uncommon in mythology. The Xibalbans, or aborigines, were perhaps cave- or earth-dwellers like the Picts of Scottish folk-lore, gnomeish, and full of elvish tricks, as such folk usually are. Vanished people are, too, often classed with the dead, or as lords of the dead. It is well known, also, that legend speedily crystallises around the name of a dispossessed race, to whom is attributed every description of magic art. This is sometimes accounted for by the fact that the displaced people possessed a higher culture than their invaders, and sometimes, probably, by the dread which all barbarian peoples have of a religion in any way differing from their own. Thus the Norwegians credited the Finns—their predecessors in Norway—with tremendous magical powers, and similar instances of respectful timidity shown by invading races towards the original inhabitants of the country they had conquered could readily be multiplied. To be tricked the barbarian regards as a mortal indignity, as witness the wrath of Thor in Jotunheim, comparable with the sensitiveness of Hun-Ahpu and Xbalanque lest they should be outwitted by the Xibalbans.

The Harrying of Xibalba

It is evident that the divine brothers feared ridicule, and profiting from the disasters of their father and uncle made sure of knowing the names of the chief Xibalbans ere they set out. In like manner they avoided making an obeisance to the dummy figures to which their predecessors had bowed so profoundly. The American savage, grave and reserved, cannot abide ridicule. He shrinks from it in a manner which a less self-regarding or a more self-assured people cannot comprehend. The other tests—the “House of Tigers,” and the “House of Cold,” and the various torments mentioned in the Second Book are much what might be expected from a barbarian idea of death—no more horrible, perhaps, than the European idea of Hell in the Middle Ages, certainly not more fear-compelling than the picture of Dante.

The hero-gods in the myth voluntarily succumb to the power of the Lords of Death, and after being burned their bones are ground in a mill and thrown into the waters. The belief was almost universal in America that the soul resided in the bones. The bones were the basis of the man. Flesh would readily perish, but would return to clothe this more lasting foundation. So in many tribes the bones of the dead were carefully preserved. In all Central American countries the bones of distinguished persons were preserved in temples or council-houses in the small chests made of cane mentioned by the chroniclers of De Soto’s expedition. This, too, may possibly have been the origin of mummification in Peru. In Egypt all the members and intestines must be preserved, in Peru only the bones. The state of comparative desiccation in which most Peruvian mummies are discovered proves that the preservation of the flesh or organs was not regarded as a necessity.