More from the Popol Vuh:
Four human men were created by the gods from corn. Soon they were thrilled to each receive a beautiful wife. And so civilization began. Each of the first humans was given a god to carry in his backpack and eventually hide on a mountain or in a rock cleft or on a temple. Different languages developed. Tribes began to be at odds with each other because the first four humans had forced the other tribes to agree to be "suckled" by the gods. Those tribes had been freezing. To get fire they would agree to anything. The god Tohil insisted they agree to be suckled in the future (to have their hearts cut out). Those first human men were named (in Dennis Tedlock's translation of the Popol Vuh) Jaguar Quitze, Jaguar Night, Not Right Now, and Dark Jaguar. Not Right Now? That name does not seem to fit, but anyway ...
Those four had instigated the killing of tribesmen as they travelled. They had to be stopped. The tribes formed a large army against them. It was "thirty times eight hundred people" against the four families. But, when the gods are with you being outnumbered is not an insurmountable problem. The armies fell asleep and were stripped of their metal and their eyebrows on the eve of the attack.
The four families had a stockade, many mannequins that looked like soldiers, and four gourds full of wasps. They weren't worried. They actually sat on the parapet and enjoyed the view as the hoards of wasps overcame the whole army.
Bees and wasps play a big part in many Popol Vuh stories.
Related posts:
Dennis Tedlock's Popol Vuh.
Killing travellers.
The latest MY2K article.
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