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Concept
Popol Vuh
Summary
Popol Vuh (also Popol Wuj or Popul Vuh or Pop Vuj) is a text recounting the mythology and history of the Kʼicheʼ people of Guatemala, one of the Maya peoples who also inhabit the Mexican states of Chiapas, Campeche, Yucatan and Quintana Roo, as well as areas of Belize, Honduras and El Salvador.
The Popol Vuh is a foundational sacred narrative of the Kʼicheʼ people from long before the Spanish conquest of the Maya. It includes the Mayan creation myth, the exploits of the Hero Twins Hunahpú and Xbalanqué, and a chronicle of the Kʼicheʼ people.
The name "Popol Vuh" translates as "Book of the Community" or "Book of Counsel" (literally "Book that pertains to the mat", since a woven mat was used as a royal throne in ancient Kʼicheʼ society and symbolised the unity of the community). It was originally preserved through oral tradition until approximately 1550, when it was recorded in writing. The documentation of the Popol Vuh is credited to the 18th-century Spanish Dominican friar Francisco Ximénez, who prepared a manuscript with a transcription in Kʼicheʼ and parallel columns with translations into Spanish.
Like the Chilam Balam and similar texts, the Popol Vuh is of particular importance given the scarcity of early accounts dealing with Mesoamerican mythologies. After the Spanish conquest, missionaries and colonists destroyed many documents.
In 1701, Father Ximénez came to Santo Tomás Chichicastenango (also known as Santo Tomás Chuilá). This town was in the Quiché territory and is likely where Father Ximénez first recorded the work. Ximénez transcribed and translated the account, setting up parallel Kʼicheʼ and Spanish language columns in his manuscript. (He represented the Kʼicheʼ language phonetically with Latin and Parra characters.) In or around 1714, Ximénez incorporated the Spanish content in book one, chapters 2–21 of his Historia de la provincia de San Vicente de Chiapa y Guatemala de la orden de predicadores. Ximénez's manuscripts were held posthumously by the Dominican Order until General Francisco Morazán expelled the clerics from Guatemala in 1829–30.
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