We Are Called : Maya and Aztec

Megan
World Religion

17 Jan 2013

1. Locations: Many Maya and Aztec cultures are still alive and flourishing today, located in territories like: "Honduras and El Salvador through to Guatemala and Belize and north to Yucatán and southern Mexico. Maya regions are ecologically divided into three types of areas. These are the southern lowlands, the northern lowlands, and the highlands/Pacific slope region. " Maya inhabit 2 different parts of Mexico, the lowlands and the high lands.
2.Cosmology of Maya: "Mother Earth was created and destroyed three times before this world was made. It contains the mythological version of the creation of the world intertwined with historical facts, creation stories, cosmology, and the adventures of Hunahpu' and X'balanque, the Maya hero twins. According to the Popol Vuh, man was created with the help of Ixpiyakok and Ixmukane. Human beings were created and destroyed several times until, finally, the Creator made them from maize. After consulting with each other, the creator gods, decided to limit the vision and scope of human creatures." So I guess the Cosmology is the fact that the earth was created and destroyed three times and the Popol Vuh basically talks about what happened with this creation story.

3. Symbols:
<--- earth (according to Maya); symbolized that there are larger forces at work and the transition involves patience.

<--- Rabbit (according to Aztec); Tochtli was a symbol for fertility. It was meant to represent the goddess of fertility: Mayahuel

<--- storytelling and dance (According to Aztec); This image was a representation of Huehuecoyotl, who is the god of story telling and dance.

4. Aztec: "Coatepec, or Serpent Mountain, was one of the most sacred places of Aztec mythology and religion. Coatepec was the birthplace of the god Huitzilopochtli, and the place where the newly born god, fully armed, managed to kill his sister Coyolxauhqui when she attempted to kill their mother Coatlicue, with the help of her brothers, the Four Hundred Southerners" (Maestri).

Maya: Sacred Cenotes and the Chicxulub meteorite; (----->)
5.Maya gods:
good: Hunab Ku is the supreme diety or the creator god. The words actually mean "Only God," or "One God" which goes against the idea of polytheism because they do have more then one god, this one just seems to be of a superior stance.
Ah Punh- Maya god Of death
Trickster- the Maya trickster was the figure of a rabbit who bagged gravel and sold it as hard yellow maize
Aztec gods:
Trickster: Tezcatlicopa who tried to convince people that canabalism was right I think?
Good: the sun god was most important, and its name was Huitzilopochtli. He was also the god of war.
Bad: Xolotl had backwards feetand caused man to fall into the underworld.
6.
7.Shaman are held very highly in both the Mayan and Aztec culture; they are healers by using the plant life that surrounded them, but also they were the only people who could communicate with the divine.
8. Ritual feasts were given in honor of the gods in Mayan culture. Aztec sacrifices were an important aspect of the Aztec religion. At the root of these Aztec rituals was the belief that the gods needed to be nourished by human beings. This was accomplished throughhuman blood. A part of the Aztec religion, therefore, was to participate in bloodletting, which is intentionally harming and drawing blood from the body.
9. Aztec Calender