Mythology Book

246 THE HERO TWINS

into her household. Xquic gave

birth to Hunahpu and Xbalanque,

who grew up to be the Hero Twins.

Young cunning

The Hero Twins’ older half-brothers,

Hun-Chowen and Hun-Batz,

worried that the new arrivals would

overshadow them, and tried to kill

them. They forced Hunahpu and

Xbalanque to hunt for them, but

the twins used this slight to get

the better of them. They told Hun-

Chowen and Hun-Batz that some

birds they had shot were caught in

high branches and had not fallen

down. When Hun-Chowen and

Hun-Batz climbed up to get them,

the tree grew so tall that they were

unable to descend. Marooned there,

they turned into monkeys, but were

The Hero Twins play against

the lords of the Underworld in a stone

relief from the South Ballcourt in the

ancient city of El Tajin, Mexico.

so embarrassed by their new

appearance that they ran away

from home.

Taming unruly gods

The storm god Huracan asked the

Hero Twins to defeat the boastful

macaw god Vucub-Caquix, who

claimed his metal nose was the

moon and his shiny nest was the

sun. The Hero Twins approached

him while he was feeding in a tree

and shot at him with a blowgun. He

got away, so the Hero Twins turned

to trickery. They persuaded two

elderly gods, Great White Peccary

and Great White Coati, to approach

Vucub-Caquix posing as healers.

The macaw god accepted their

help, but they pulled out his

ornaments and replaced his eyes

with corn kernels. Robbed of his

splendor, he perished.

Huracan then requested that

the Hero Twins dispatch Vucub-

Caquix’s equally boastful sons,

Zipacna, a demon crocodile

monster, and Cabrakan, the

earthquake god. Zipacna had

earlier killed the Four Hundred

Boys, who were the gods of alcohol.

Hunahpu and Xbalanque made a

fake crab out of flowers and a rock

and placed it in a narrow space

Afterward you will come back

to life again ... did

you not bring us here in

order that we should entertain

you, the lords, your sons, and

your vassals?

Popol Vuh

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THE AMERICAS 247

beneath an overhanging mountain.

Zipacana crawled into the crevice.

When he tried to grab it, the Twins

brought the mountain down on

him, turning him into stone.

Zipacna’s brother Cabrakan,

the earthquake god, prided himself

on bringing down mountains. The

Hero Twins told him that they knew

of a perpetually growing mountain.

Cabrakan demanded to be shown

it so he could destroy it. As he

followed the Hero Twins, he grew

hungry. They fed him a roasted

bird they had enchanted. When he

ate it, he grew weak, and the Hero

Twins tied him up and buried him.

Now he held up mountains rather

than destroying them.

Final match

One day, as the Hero Twins

played ball, their noisy playing

once again disturbed the lords of

the Underworld, who summoned

Hunahpu and Xbalanque to

another game in the Underworld.

The lords of the Underworld

won the first match, and the Hero

Twins had to spend a night in

Razor House, which was full of

sharp stone knives that moved of

their own accord. The Hero Twins

survived by persuading the blades

to stop moving. They survived the

drafts and hail of the Cold House,

the beasts of Jaguar House, and

the flames of Fire House. Their final

trial was Bat House. Disaster struck

when a bat swooped down and

beheaded Hunahpu. Xbalanque

made a new head for his brother

using a squash, or gourd, and the

Hero Twins resumed playing, using

Hunahpu’s head as a ball. The Hero

Twins distracted their opponents,

reattached Hunahpu’s head, and

won the match.

Furious at their defeat, the

lords of the Underworld plotted to

kill Hunahpu and Xbalanque by

burning them in a stone pit. The

Hero Twins had been informed

of this plan, and willingly jumped

into the flames. Their bones were

ground down into powder and

dumped into a river. After five days,

they were reborn as catfish and

then took human form. The Hero

Twins wandered the Underworld

as anonymous vagabonds and won

great fame as wizards. The lords of

the Underworld summoned them to

perform, not knowing they were

the Hero Twins.

In their show, Xbalanque

seemed to sacrifice Hunahpu,

rolling his decapitated head along

the floor, removing his heart, and

then bringing him back to life.

When Hun-Came and Vucub-Came

demanded the trick be done on

them, Xbalanque and Hunahpu

promptly sacrificed them. Revealing

their true identity as the Hero

Twins, they refused to resurrect

their victims. From then on, they

declared, there would be no more

human sacrifices to the lords of

the Underworld. The Hero Twins

then ascended into the heavens;

Xbalanque became the sun and

Hunahpu the moon. This brought

the cosmos to its present order. ■

End Wall

Bench

Wall

Goals

The Mesoamerican ballgame was a

ritual sport dating back to the 2nd

millennium bce. Sculptural reliefs at

ballcourts after ca. 800 ce indicate the

sport may have included

human sacrifice. The

courts, which were

around 197 feet (60 m)

long, included two goal

rings through which

players tried to get a

heavy rubber ball.

Interpreting the Hero Twins

Some scholars have challenged

the interpretation of Hunahpu

becoming the moon. This is

because the Maya generally

view the moon as feminine.

As such, it is suggested that

Hunahpu actually became

Venus, the morning star.

Another tradition sees the

Hero Twins as representing

different phases of the sun, with

Hunahpu symbolizing the day

and Xbalanque the night. There

is even a theory that proposes

that Hunahpu only represents

the full moon, and that

his mother Xquic accounts

for its other phases. Other

interpretations paint the

myth as an exploration of the

possibility of rebirth through

the rite of sacrifice.

Many of these uncertainties

stem from the Popol Vuh itself.

Even though it draws on an

ancient myth, the original

Mayan text was composed

decades after the arrival of the

Spanish, which may have led to

inconsistencies in its content.

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Playing

Alley

Goal

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