Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,
We are leaving Down Under and are sailing to the East were we will arrive at the Middle- and South American continent. here we will discover the ancient stories, myths, legends and saga of e.g. the Mayan culture. Our first prompt of this part of May is Popol-Vuh.
Every ancient culture has its own Creation-story as we saw e.g. in the Aboriginal culture last days and at the start of this month in Europe. In this part of the world, were we are the coming days, there are also Creation stories and we start with the Creation story of the Mayan culture.
|Credits: Mayan Culture|
The Maya civilization shares many features with other Mesoamerican civilizations due to the high degree of interaction and cultural diffusion that characterized the region. Advances such as writing, epigraphy, and the calendar did not originate with the Maya; however, their civilization fully developed them. Maya influence can be detected in Honduras, Belize, Guatemala, and western El Salvador to as far away as central Mexico, more than 1,000 km (620 mi) from the central Maya area. The many outside influences found in Maya art and architecture are thought to have resulted from trade and cultural exchange rather than direct external conquest.
The Maya peoples survived the Classic period collapse and the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores and sixteenth-century Spanish colonization of the Americas. Today, the Maya and their descendants form sizable populations throughout the Maya area; they maintain a distinctive set of traditions and beliefs resulting from the merger of pre-Columbian and post-Conquest ideas and cultures. Millions of people speak Mayan languages today.
|Credits: Popol-Vuh (1)|
|Credits: Popol-Vuh (2)|
Together, gods attempted to create living beings so that they may be praised and venerated by their creation. Their first attempts (animals, mud man, and wooden man) proved unsuccessful because they lacked speech, souls, and intellect.
|Credits: Popol Vuh (3)|
creating a world to rule over -
sunflowers reach for the sky