Ángela Ochoa1

the Homo religiosus […] believes that life has a sacred origin and that human existence actualizes all its potentialities as long as it is religious, that is, as long as it takes part in reality. The gods have created man and the world, the civilizing heroes have concluded creation, and the history of all these divine and semidivine works is kept in myths.2

We know that the ancient Teenek had a polytheistic religion, that they believed in a couple of supreme creator gods and in a series of deities that were minor to a certain extent, among which we find those related to atmospheric phenomena, to celestial bodies and to the four elements. In the same way, they had other divinities that represented grown plants and their eternal enemies, wild plants. Each of these deities venerated by the Teenek resided in one of the three levels that made up the universe. We know part of this information due to various more or less contemporary written sources,3 however, the most important sources to know the Teenek’s ancient religion is still –even for the works we mentioned as examples– the oral tradition of this group.

We also know that in the study of religions, the notion of sacrifice occupies a very relevant place, because through sacrifice we are in direct contact with deities. Let us remember that, etymologically, the word “sacrifice” means to “make sacred”. Now then, when looking in the Teenek’s oral tradition for possible traces of sacrifice, we found certain mythical narrations that could contain them. So, from the wide corpus I have at reach I have selected three items: M1, “Narration of the Dhipaak”; M2, “The origin of corn” and M3, “The Heart of Corn killed the Great Sparrow Hawk”, although I based my work on certain reliable details found in other texts of the same group, such as: M4, “The old K’oleene”, and another one of the Nahuas from the Huasteca: M5, “Duel between Sintektli and his grandmother”.

I will present now a transcript of the three main narrations,4 so that the reader has the opportunity to know them before he/she access the interpretation I propose.

The narrations

M1, “Narration of the Dhipaak”5

Corn to us, the Teenek, the Huastecos, is the first life of man. Since human life began. Since our Maam and our Muxi’ created us, it started. It started since the beginning, when man was created by god, that is, by Maam and Muxi’, that is when human life started, and with corn.

We call them Miim Tsabaal, which is Mother Earth, and Maamlaab, which means “grandfather”, in Huasteco. “Grandfather”, because grandfather is the “great grandfather”, the “grandfather of grandfathers”, that is, “the main grandfather”. But also that grandfather, who is Muxi’, who is in the sea. It is a family of gods [that] share the same life and get together and talk to… This is how human life started, the creation of the world. They, the gods, talked so that there would be life on Earth.

It is a mystery we still don’t understand, but the thing is that we have to respect Mother Earth, we have to respect the Sun, we have to respect Thunder, Muxi’, who lives in the sea. Thanks to Muxi’ we see green everywhere we turn. That is why leaves fall from plants, because of Muxi’. This is why the orange ripens, the banana. We see everything ripen, thanks to Muxi’. If it wasn’t [for] him, nothing would ripen, everything would remain the same.

Our grandmother said that there should be… Well; there were several men from different creations, but they didn’t work. Then, the one that worked was when grandmother said she had to get corn, she had to make dough. From dough, she made four beings, that is, two men and two women. Human flesh started from them. The bones of man were made of olote. From here started human life, the human being: from corn. Then men cannot live without corn. It is necessary that they go on feeding that same body with corn. Then, our Maam and Muxi’ have to send corn to Earth, men cannot live without corn, because they lived for a while without corn. There was no corn. They ate cotton, they ate thread, that is, cotton, they ate the fruit of cotton; men of the Earth ate [that]. But then Maam said that there had to be something to eat. Then he sent an emissary to Earth. He sent a bird. And that bird brought in its beak a grain of corn. Then the zanate, a black bird, searched to see where it should leave this [grain of corn] it had been entrusted with, from the sea, where Muxi’ lives. [It] was from [there] that came that bird sent by Muxi’ to bring corn to Earth. But the bird said “If I swallow this corn there will be nothing. Then I must sow this one”. And the zanate sowed the grain when it found a woman that was bathing in the stream. And this girl was single. Her grandmother never let her go out, but that day she went out and opened her mouth and the little grain [of corn] fell into her mouth. And then the woman got pregnant. Nine months after that, a child was born. That child was the god of corn, whom we call Dhipaak. Then, it was him who brought corn. That was corn. But the grandmother, that is, the [old woman] mother of the girl got really angry, because her daughter got pregnant. And if she was going to keep her, she wanted the girl to be always a child; she didn’t want anything to happen to her; that is why she didn’t let her out. And she got very angry because the girl got pregnant and because the child was born. Then she got really jealous, and she felt really mad. The grandmother felt really angry at the child and that is why she didn’t like the child. She killed him. She grinded the child with the metate. The child had already been born. That is, first, she had to cut him with a machete, with a knife. And then she chopped him and threw him in the… But that flesh she threw away was reborn. Corn grains grew from it, that is, little corn was born. Then, that child was not dead, he got more… he became many corn plants. And then again she went with her machete to cut it down. And the pieces of corn were left there, but then again it started to grow, and there was more corn, that is, it produced more, and then there was corncob. When there was corncob, the grandmother [said] “no, I cannot exterminate this; I am going to cut it all and grind it. I will grind it with the metate”. And she made atole with it, and little tamale. She intended to eat it all, but she couldn’t finish it. It made her sick. What she did then was that she took the leftovers to the sea. She threw that dough, that atole there. But that dough, well, the fish were there. Then the fish came quickly and they were going to eat the atole that had been thrown there, the Dhipaak [that] is the god of corn. He is the god. That is the life. Then the god told the fish “No, do not eat me, better collect me”. Then the little fish gathered all the dough, they put it all together, and the child was formed again, [he remained] there in the sea for a long time. He grew.

When he was thrown away, before, when he was thrown in pieces, the ant was also going to eat him. And he told the ant “No, don’t eat me. Wait. When I am a lot, then you can eat me. But right now, do not. It is better to wait”. Then the ants didn’t eat him.

Then, that Dhipaak lived in the sea for a long time. He already was a boy, and there he lived [with] his grandfather Muxi’, who owns the sea; he is the life of the sea. And there he lived, but Muxi’ didn’t like [that]. Muxi’ had ordered him to live on Earth, not in the sea. Then Muxi’ said that he should go to the Earth, [that he should go] there. But Dhipaak says “No, I won’t go, because my grandmother threw me here. So, if you want me to come back, [if you want] me to go there, you take me”. So Muxi’ had to look for someone [to] carry the child, that is, the boy, to bring him back here, to the center of the Earth, where men are, who do need him.

So there, where there were several elements they used to carry him, as transport. First, the shrimp was chosen, but it could do nothing. The shrimp was going to bring him to earth, but it couldn’t do it because it comes from the water and can’t get out of it. Then, a big fish was sent to transport the boy to Earth, but it couldn’t do it because it has no feet. And finally the great turtle was chosen, which has a very thick shell. So, while Dhipaak was on top of the great turtle, he scratched the turtle’s shell. That is why we now see the turtle shell scratched, dented, with squares, since the time the boy was on it. Then that turtle managed to come all the way here because it is able to get into this territory. Then that is the return [of Dhipaak] once again to Earth.

Dhipaak brought corn. That is why corn exists now. That is, we will never run out of corn. There will be corn forever, as long as man exists, because man is corn itself, and corn is man, that is, this is life. We only have to pay attention to what happens in a corn plant. It is the same. It is human like life itself. It has its little roots. It has its little leaves, its stem, and all its flowers. We see all this in every little fiber we see in a corncob. Every little fiber is a corncob and from every little fiber some powder must fall down so that there is corn. And if there is not, then there is no corn, so, the little corn cannot grow. Then, it is like that. So, to us corn must be sacred, the most essential thing, and we must respect it. This is why our grandparents told us “Be careful, don’t step over the corn field, that is, where the corncobs are, where corn has lost its grains. Do not step on it. Do not sweep it up. Gather it up with your hands”. To us, in Huasteco, the essential thing we must respect is corn. We do everything for corn.

M2, “The origin of corn (how corn prevailed over ojite) ”6

A long time ago, there was an old woman called K’oleenib who, like the nahuales, could transform herself at will into a wild animal. Because back then the earth was very fertile, the woman grew squashes and vegetable marrows all year long.

When the time for harvesting the vegetable marrows arrived, the woman started to break those that were riper to take their seeds out. She found one that was very big, and when she cracked it, she saw with surprise that there was a child inside it.

The old woman, who was barren, lovingly adopted the child. It was a girl, and she called her Dhakpeenk’aach (the girl from vegetable marrow). The girl grew under the loving care of the old woman, who used to take her to the river for her baths.

One day, while they were taking a bath in the river under the shadow projected by a great tree over the bank, a crow came to stand on its branches. The girl turned her head up curiously and then the crow defecated, and the excrement fell into the girl’s mouth, who swallowed it not knowing what it was.

Some time passed by and the girl kept growing, becoming a woman; but at the same time it became evident that she was pregnant, although the old woman did not realize it. The months went by and the girl got sick; K’oleenib worried a lot and she wondered what was wrong with the girl.

The day of labor arrived and the girl gave birth to a boy, but the old woman did not know how she had conceived him. The boy became the old woman’s grandson, but because he was an illegitimate child, and because she did not know who his father was, she rejected him; so, she called him Pe’no, which means in Huasteco “something that is picked up from the street or road and no one knows what it is”. But in fact this boy was Dhipaak or the god of corn.

The old woman K’oleenib had domestic animals in her house, such as turkeys, turtles, pigs, etcetera, and the boy, who was extremely mischievous, spent his time bothering them. He liked to play with arrows and pierce them, and this is why his grandmother constantly got angry. Finally, she decided to put the boy into an anthill so that the large ants could devour him.

However, the ants did not eat him and after a period of fifteen days, the boy Dhipaak transformed into a huge corn field. The old woman understood that the boy in fact was emerging again as corn, so she decided to cut down the corn field. When she had finished the job, she went home, but then she came back to the corn patch and saw it had sprouted again.

Then, she decided to wait until the corncobs sprouted, in order to exterminate them; and when the plants finally had corncobs, she pulled them up, removed the grains from them and threw them to the river. The corn grains were pulled by the flowing water to the lowlands of the river and there they sprouted again.

The reborn Dhipaak did not come back to his grandmother’s house, but he went to walk the roads. One day he met the Evil one (Kidhaab Inik) or god of the ojite (wild fruit that is eaten instead of corn during food shortage times), and they started arguing because both of them wanted to stay on Earth as food for the human race.

They decided to have a competition to see who would fall to the ground in one piece if thrown from a tree. The one to win would stay as food for men, and the one to lose would go and live in the mounts.

The first to climb the tree was the evil one or ojite, because he had a great desire to become the main food of men, but when he fell, he broke in two pieces (the fruit of the ojite has two grains); then, he went to live in the mount, as food for the evil one. Then corn climbed the tree, and he fell to the ground in one piece, without breaking.

And so Dhipaak was triumphant as the main food of humankind, and that is why we have never stopped liking corn throughout history.

M3, “The Heart of Corn killed the Great Sparrow Hawk (The origin of sparrow hawks)”7

In very ancient times lived a great sparrow hawk. Our ancestors say that when this animal flew, it concealed the sunrays. Can you imagine how big it was? I think it was huge.

Our grandparents also say that this sparrow hawk ate human beings. The authorities of those times, in order to prevent it from exterminating the inhabitants of a single town, gathered ideas so that each community would offer a single human being. Although they did not want to, they necessarily had to offer a partner as gift, so that the animal that came at noon could eat.

And so one day, the small heart of corn, a boy who rambled on in all places, found a girl in the mount and she was crying; the boy approached her and asked her:

-“Why are you crying?”
The girl, with great sadness, answered:
“The great sparrow hawk that comes at noon is going to eat me!”
The small heart of corn, with great joy and a little courage, said to the girl:
“Don’t cry anymore, and don’t be sad!
You’ll see that sparrow hawk won’t eat you. If it is hungry, let it eat me, and let’s see if it can do it. Now you’ll see what we’ll do to it.”
“The girl cheered up a little at the boy’s words.”
The heart of corn said to the girl:
“Now come with me, let’s gather all the inhabitants, so that together we can kill the great sparrow hawk!”
The girl, a little bit afraid, gathered the inhabitants. Once together, the boy told them:
“Now, I want you to help me, so that together we can kill the animal that is annihilating you! I want you to prepare a large pot of corn atole”, to which the inhabitants replied they had no corn to fix the atole.
The boy, really happy, said:
“Don’t worry, I will give you corn!
I would only like to know if you want us to kill the great sparrow hawk”.
They all said they wanted to. The boy replied:
“Well then, let’s get to work!”
The heart of corn put his right hand under his left armpit and took out a small grain of yellow corn.

With the small grain… the inhabitants put the grain inside the nixcón (pot where corn is boiled) and quickly made the atole. But it was not very gladly that they did what the boy told them to do. Great was their surprise when they realized that, when the corn was cooked, the pot was filled up with atole and it was even pouring out.

Then they were happy.

When the atole was ready, the boy told the inhabitants to take him where the girl was, and that they had to put the stick they had used to stir the atole across the top of the pot.

When everything was ready, they all took a stick and hid in the surroundings. The boy also told them:

“I will stand on the mixing stick at the top of the pot and wait for the sparrow hawk there. When it arrives and you see it has fallen into the atole, then you can come closer to hit it with the stick.

When the boy saw noon was coming, suddenly the sky went dark because the sparrow hawk was getting closer; he got ready and when he saw he was about to be captured, he jumped and with his feet caught the mixing stick, then the sparrow hawk fell into the very hot atole and all the inhabitants immediately came closer to hit the animal and kill it.

All the inhabitants hit it because they wanted to leave it really dead, but great was their surprise when they saw that the sparrow hawk was very powerful, because each feather they took away from it with every hit became a small sparrow hawk that went away flying; many small sparrow hawks came out because many feathers were taken from the big one with each hit.

The small sparrow hawks that originated from the big sparrow hawk did not eat human beings anymore. They are the ones we know up to this day, they are the children that the big sparrow hawk left when its feathers were taken out while men killed it. It was a very much feared sparrow hawk, but thanks to the great power of the heart of corn, men managed to kill the great and evil sparrow hawk.

Analysis of the narrations

I will proceed to the analysis of the three narrations beginning with their characters, trying to define what they symbolize in the Teenek’s cosmology and proposing a threesome and several charts of binary oppositions, in which we somehow summarize the interpretation of these myths. As we will immediately be able to see, these charts of oppositions are of various types: biosocial (male/female), generational (grandson/grandmother), spatial (up/down, nature/culture) and of hierarchy (superior/inferior).

First of all, let us see the “Narration of the Dhipaak” (M1) and “The origin of corn” (M2), which are variants of a same myth. A key episode in these two first narrations is the fertilization of the maid by the bird, by the river –with a grain of corn (in M1) or with its excrement (in M2)-. That union between the bird and the maid is evidently a hierogamy between Heaven8 and Earth.

Dhipaak’s mother

The maid that becomes the mother of the corn deity is of terrestrial origin.9 She plays the role of an intermediary, because she is only the vehicle that will give birth to the cultural hero of the Teenek from San Luis Potosí. In spite of being the object of this seduction and fertilization, the maid keeps her virginity, as in many myths of the world.10 This character is a goddess of Earth.11 Although the narration does not explicitly tell us what becomes of Dhipaak’s mother –the character disappears from the story after she gives birth-, thanks to similar narrations of other regions and because of the fact that the newborn is left under his grandmother’s care, we may infer she died during labor.

Dhipaak’s father

Dhipaak’s direct father, the one that provides the generating element for his birth, is a zanate (Quiscalus mexicanus). However, this black bird is only the emissary of a greater deity, Muxi’, the god of rain.

Dhipaak, the boy

Dhipaak has a rather ambiguous personality. He is an ambivalent being par excellence; he condenses some of the attributes of his parents, which are contrasting. He is male and female at the same time;12 and he represents goodness but he can do evil. Dhipaak symbolizes life, but he is also much related to death: he is the dema deity par excellence; he represents the periodical renewal of nature.

The polysemy of the corn deity clearly becomes evident when we try to determine the level of the universe to which this character belongs. Dhipaak is closely related to the three levels of the universe: Dhipaak emerges from Earth, when he is born from his mother (telluric) or when he is reborn as a dema deity after having been dismembered by his grandmother.13 The level that corresponds to Dhipaak is the terrestrial level, where humans live, depending on him for their survival. Dhipaak is more than the corn deity, he is corn itself. Dhipaak also presents a series of solar characteristics, regarding the fact that his mother is still a virgin, that he dies and is reborn, that he rejects sex; he is pure, he is a man-god, he is courageous, he is very smart, he is a nagual, he is a trickster, he performs miracles, he is related to the lower classes,14 he eliminates the primordial monster.15 During the first part of his childhood, he is under the care of his grandmother, in the terrestrial level. After his third death and resurrection, he goes to live with his grandfather, in the sea.16 Because his two grandparents belong to the underworld, Dhipaak also shares close links towards this level of the universe.

Dhipaak’s grandmother

Grandmother K’oleene’ or K’oleenib is old, she is little of a woman, she is androgynous like most of the creator deities. Although she supposedly is at first barren, she is, however a lunar goddess, and as such, is associated to fertility *it is not fortuitous that she grows vegetable marrows,17 fruit that symbolizes the uterus*. She is the typical old goddess-mother who, without the intervention of a male, had a daughter.

Dhipaak’s grandmother is a nocturnal being. Because she is lunar, she is closely related to the generation/death/generation process. K’oleene’s main role (within the set of myths related to the origins of corn) is precisely that of contributing to the performance of said cycle. K’oleene’s lunar characteristics are accentuated by her association to harmful insects (M5), because these animals are related to the heavenly body of the night.18 Her relationship to the Moon is confirmed by the fact that she practices horticulture (M2).

She lives at the foot of a very high hill, and this corresponds to the underworld. She is a nagual (she “could transform herself at will into a wild animal”) (M2). And, in fact, even in her human form, she is equivalent to a wild animal, due to her asocial behavior. She is one of the ancient Teenek’s deities that symbolized the wild, the chaotic.

In the first narration (M1), the grandmother kills the god and eats him as atole and tamale, which may be certainly interpreted as cannibalism, because also in one of the supporting narrations (M4) it is affirmed that this character “fed only on roasted children”.19

The threesome “grandmother/mother/grandson” is found in different cultures in many parts of the world. Let us see in Chart 1 the characteristics presented by these three deities in the Teenek’s mythology. It must be also noted that binary oppositions may be established between the grandmother and the mother, but the most relevant ones are those established between the extremes of the chart, that is, between grandmother and grandson.

Chart 1. The sacred Family20

Apart from the contrasting characteristics between grandmother and grandson we already saw thanks to the extremes of Chart 1, there are other oppositions we can establish between both characters, as we do in the next chart, where opposition is not only sexual, but most of all generational. It is the typical Mesoamerican dyad Sun/Moon.

Chart 2. The not at all candid Dhipaak and his evil grandmother21,22,23

Both characters may be related to abundance. Certainly Dhipaak symbolizes it, whereas as to K’oleene’, the narrations are contradictory: some say she was very rich; others (the greater part) affirm she was very poor and, in general, this mother-grandmother symbolizes need.

Apart from the binary oppositions we just presented, there are other contrasts between the individualities of the characters, which may be established in a first analysis of the narrations. In the following chart, for instance, we present one of the basic distinctions of a biosocial nature, the opposition man/woman.

Chart 3. Hierogamy

These characters from Chart 3 share several features: they are both deities, they are young, fertile. They both play, at a higher or lesser degree, a role of intermediaries.

Dhipaak’sgrandfatherthe rain god

The rain god is one of the most ancient and important gods in Mesoamerica. Among the Teenek, Dhipaak’s grandfather is the highest Maam and his name is Muxi’.24 The same as in other cultures of the world,25 my Teenek informants place the dwelling of this character in the sea; others, at the top of a mountain, or even in the depths of the earth, which are all chthonian spaces.

In the following chart, several oppositions between Dhipaak’s grandmother and grandfather are combined, among which we must emphasize the spatial opposition up/down.

chart 4. Dhipaak’s grandparents26

Together with and apart from the characteristics that oppose Dhipaak’s grandmother and grandfather, these characters share several features: they are both old, none of them is really his grandparent (not even completely in the reality of the myth), they are both sexually active, they are both creatures of the underworld, they both can give life or death. Although they live in opposite levels, they both dwell in the mount.

Ojite

When ojite or browse, ojox (Brosimum alicastrum), is defeated by corn (Zea mays), it goes to the mount, to the wild. The ojite tree and its fruit, which are wild, explicitly represent the devil (M2), in opposition to corn, cultivated plant, which represents god.27

Both corn and ojite are deities of a vegetal nature, which suggests the close relationship between the Teenek and the plant life around them, which provides elements for their survival.

Now we will see a chart in which the antagonism between nature and culture is summarized, symbolized by ojite and corn, respectively. “If anthropology pays a lot of attention to these oppositions, it is because man lives in a space, or rather in two spaces: the one where he dwells and works and the one that, on the contrary, escapes the human transformation of nature, although this does not mean he is a neutral referent”28 The opposition nature/culture is a very important spatial distinction, and it is the base of the following chart.

Chart 5. The wild space and the cultivated space

The heart of Corn killed the Great Sparrow Hawk

Up to this point, we have been commenting on the two first narrations. Let us now consider the third one: “The Heart of Corn killed the Great Sparrow Hawk” (M3), where Dhipaak also appears, but this time interacting with other characters. The main subject of this narration is probably human sacrifice even if, towards the end, we also find ourselves before a dema sacrifice, although different from the one in the first two narrations because in M3 animals are the product of this sacrifice.

The sparrow hawk

The sparrow hawk is a celestial bird par excellence. It is of course equivalent to the eagle in other Mesoamerican myths. It is closely related to the Sun. It is a symbol of war and power. In exchange, the deities of corn “belonged to the common people, to farmers”,29 and maybe this is why myths and rituals related to sowing and harvesting, as well as those related to rain requests are still performed among the farmers of our country.30

The idea that the eagle and the sparrow hawk are dangerous mythical characters to men is widely spread in Mesoamerica. We can find these animals among the Nahuas of the Sierra Norte in Puebla,31 among the Mazatecos32 and among the Mayan.33

The girl

As to the girl that was going to be sacrificed, for the time being we lack information that would allow us to know her identity. Perhaps we speculate too much, but we think she might be Dhipaak’s twin sister (his female alter ego) or the ruler’s daughter.34 However, we can be certain of the fact that the girl’s crying was a sign of rain, because in certain propitiatory rites, tears -maybe universally- draw pluvial waters.35 To this respect, Sahagún says: “When children were took to be sacrificed, if they cried and shed a lot of tears, those who carried them were very happy, because they considered this a forecast of the fact that they were to have many rains that year”.36

Because the sparrow hawk is a celestial animal and because sacrifice was performed at noon, we might think this was a sacrifice to the Sun,37 however, the fact that they sacrificed children might also indicate that these human offerings were devoted to the rain god, by virtue of the close link between corn and this deity.38 This second hypothesis might be confirmed if we take into consideration that in M1 it is explicitly said it was the rain god who sent the bird to fecundate with a grain of corn the maid who would become Dhipaak’s mother.

Let us remember that human sacrifice could be combined with anthropophagy, and consequently, it was necessary to prepare the victims in order to make greater the enjoyment of consuming their flesh. This is confirmed by both the ancient sources,39 and one of the supporting narrations which have served as raw material for this article (M4): “since he saw they were very thin, he thought that first he would feed them very well so that they could soon fatten”.40

Dhipaak, the Small Heart of Corn

On the other hand, we must not discard the possibility that also in the third narration the primordial food, corn, will be given to men: Dhipaak took it out from his left armpit and gave it to them, as part of the strategy to defeat and kill the sparrow hawk. From this narration we can infer that Dhipaak puts an end to the custom (and perhaps to the need?) of sacrifice and at the same time he relieves a lack of food, thus establishing order in the world.

The inhabitants of the town

In the third narration (M3) there is a previous state of need. There is hunger; human beings do not have anything to eat, they do not have corn. Not only do the inhabitants of the town accept sacrifice, but they also organize it. Apparently there is a close relationship between hunger (the gods’ and men) and sacrifice.

In M3 we would evidently find ourselves before a human sacrifice offered by the community, which is the most ancient type of sacrifice41 and whose purpose is to achieve harmony with the cosmos. The children’s parents would be the sacrificers, because they offer the victim and because the benefits of the sacrifice come to them. The sparrow hawk would be the performer of the sacrifice because it directly carries out the action of killing the children.42 The children would obviously be the victims, the sacrificed ones.

The sparrow hawk’s “children”

We can also consider the final episode of M3 as a dema sacrifice, because there is death and resurrection. As a consequence of the death and dismembering of the evil sparrow hawk, the life of other sparrow hawks which are harmless to men is produced. In the words of Marie-Odile Marion: “The Mayan peoples conceive life as the result of a dynamic process […] product of the union of complementary and opposite forces, and of their ulterior disjunction. Life is born from death and, at the same time, life generates death in order to guarantee the alternation process of opposite principles”.43 Once again, in Mesoamerica, death brings about life.

On the other hand, the pot filled with atole where Dhipaak and the inhabitants of the town kill the evil sparrow hawk makes us remember the mouth of the water vat alluded by López Luján as equivalent to the entrance to the Tlalocan, and which symbolizes fertility.44 This may be confirmed by the fact that small sparrow hawks are born from the sparrow hawk’s feathers.

Let us see some binary oppositions product of the third narration (M3), concentrated in the following chart, at the bottom of which we find the concept of inferior / superior hierarchy.

The only aspect in which the two characters of the chart coincide is that they are both naguales,45 both of them are probably deities and they were both victims, at different times, of a dema sacrifice: Dhipaak by means of dismemberment and the great sparrow hawk beaten to death.

chart 6. The powerful also die

Final comments

The first and most important comment we would like to make is that it is not absolutely certain that the slaughters narrated in these myths are sacrifices in the strict sense. Nevertheless, we think they might be at least mythical prototypes of them.46 Let us leave this, for the time being, at the level of a hypothesis.

On the other hand, even if the two first narrations are apparently different from the third one, in the end the three of them coincide, since they all are myths of origin, and of the origins of corn –the first two explicitly and the third one implicitly. Besides, the third narration, in its final part, deals with the origin of sparrow hawks. Although in different ways, these three mythical narrations address the solution to the problem of the lack of food by means of the gain of corn.

In M1 and M2, and perhaps even in M3, we would probably find ourselves before the emergence of farming societies, before the passage from nomadism to sedentarization. Anyway, the gods granting corn to men means the arrival of a new era.

In the first two narrations (M1 and M2) sexuality and fertility imbricate. They are hierogamic myths of death and resurrection. The three myths are of death and resurrection. Besides, both in the third narration (M3) and in one of the supporting narrations (M5), a dema deity produces another dema deity. The myths of the god that dies and resurrects may be considered as exegetical myths of nature.

Finally, we would like to emphasize that these three narrations are not exclusive of the Teenek, but they are only regional variants of well known Mesoamerican myths, such as those of the Aztecs, Mayan or Totonacos; and even many of their characters and elements of their plot prove to be universal. Then, the interesting aspect is to emphasize the specificities with which these mythical narrations manifest among the Teenek and the ethnic groups that live in the Huasteca.

Glossary

Olote: heart of the ear of corn; corncob.
Zanate: Icterid bird of black feathers with blue gleams.
atole: drink prepared with cornmeal gruel.
ojite: Tree from Central America’s Atlantic slope, from the family of the moraceous, of up to 30 m high, with a smooth bark, a general light gray color, white-grayish flowers, and fruits with seeds that, boiled, are edible.
Nahuales: Sorcerer supposedly gifted with magical powers in certain cultures.

Bibliography

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Martínez de Jesús, Francisco and Ma. Luisa Herrera Casasús, “El origen del maíz”, in Leyendas y cuentos huastecos, Ciudad Victoria, Consejo Estatal para la Cultura y las Artes de Tamaulipas, 1998, pp. 29-31.

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1. Department of Linguistics/INAH. English translation by Denisse Piñera Palacios. Dhipaak: In the Teenek or Huasteco writing system, the letter dh –in words such as Dhpaak (the deity of corn) or dhakpeen “sesame seed”– has a phonemic value equivalent to that of the letter 0 in the Greek alphabet or that of the letter z in Spanish from Spain. In the other Mayan tongues, it corresponds to the phoneme and letter s. On the other hand, the vowels we graphically represent here as “double” correspond, in the same way they do in the current writing form of the Mayan tongues, to phonemically long vowels (dhipaak, Maam, k’oleené). [↩]
2. Mircea Eliade, Lo sagrado y lo profano, 1998, pp. 147-148. [↩]
3. Stresser-Péan, Guy, “Montages calcaires et sources vauclusiennes dans la religion des indiens huastéques de la région de Tampico” in Revue de l’Historie des réligions, Annales du Musée Guimet, 1952; Janis Alcorn, Huastec Mayan Ethnobotany, 1984. [↩]
4. In narration M2 I took the liberty of modifying the writing of some letters, those corresponding to long vowels and to letter 0 –in the names of the characters-, in order to uniform them to the writing of narration M1. In the respective publications, these letters are represented differently. [↩]
5. Benigno Robles’ narration contained in the video “Dhipaak, the soul of corn. The origins according to the Teenek”, 1998. [↩]
6. Francisco Martínez de Jesús y María Luisa Herrera Casasús, “El origen del maíz”, in Leyendas y cuentos huastecos, 1998. [↩]
7. Juan Bautista Méndez Rosa, “El corazón del Maíz mató al Gran Gavilán”, in Relatos huastecos, m 1994. [↩]
8. Heaven, the sky, which provides light, solar heat, as well as water necessary for vegetal regeneration. [↩]
9. This character was born from a vegetable marrow (M2). [↩]
10. Claude Lévi Strauss, La vía de las máscaras, 1981, p. 169. [↩]
11. Yolotl González, El sacrificio humano entre los mexicas, 1992, p. 272 and Mircea Eliade, op.cit., 1998, pp.103-105, 121. [↩]
12. This androgynous deity of corn unfolds in twins of different gender in other mythical narrations of the Huasteca (see Yolotl González, “Dioses, diosas y andróginos en la mitología mexica”, in Marie Odile Marion (coord.), Antropología simbólica, 1995, p. 51. Beatriz Barba de Piña Chán, “Madres vírgenes para los dioses solares” in Chalchihuite. Homenaje a Doris Heyden, 1999, p.246). When there are twins of the two genders in Mesoamerica’s mythology, this may be interpreted whereas as twinship or as an only being without a differentiated gender. [↩]
13. Taking into account that all sacrifice must have a recipient, can we consider Dhipaak’s sacrifice as an offering to Earth? (see Yólotl González, El sacrificio…, op.cit.,1992, p.272. [↩]
14. Although he is also related to the higher classes, at certain times. [↩]
15. Beatriz Barba de Piña Chán, “Madres vírgenes para dioses solares”, in María Rodríguez Shadow and Beatriz Barba de Piña Chán (coords,) Chalchihuite. Homenaje a Doris Heyden, 1999, p. 249. [↩]
16. In the sea, in the primordial liquid element that is essential for life, for the rebirth from which he would probably emerge purified in order to return to Earth, to the intermediate level where human beings dwell. [↩]
17. Horticulture, the culture she practices in the domestic field, confirms her lunar character. [↩]
18. Mercedes de la Garza, El universo sagrado de la serpiente entre los mayas, 1984, pp. 58,65-66. [↩]
19. Moelwitz Fernández Esteban, “la vieja K’oleene'” in Relatos huastecos, 1994, p.33. [↩]
20. She was visited by the devil (M4) (see Moelwitz Fernández Esteban, op.cit,.1994, p.33: Quotation from chart number 1, reference to “unrestrained sexuality”). [↩]
21. No one ever knew of him having a sexual partner. (reference of “androgynous (hardly a man) “. [↩]
22. Reference of: “giver of DEATH and LIFE”. The Moon is the symbol of genesis, growth, death and rebirth. [↩]
23. Reference of “giver of LIFE and DEATH”. In M1 and M2, the grandmother tries to murder Dhipaak. However, in M4 and M5, Dhipaak is the one who manages to kill the devouring mother-grandmother to bring order. [↩]
24. The fact that he is Dhipaak’s grandfather does not mean he is his grandmother k’oleene’s husband. Here, the term Maam, “Grandfather”, must be understood rather in its sense of “ancestor”. [↩]
25. Claude Lévi-Strauss, La vía de…, op.cit., 1981, pp.31,39,84. [↩]
26. Reference of: “lives at the foot of the hill”. k’oleene’ lived “at the foot of the mount” (M4) (see Fernández Esteban, op.cit., 1994, p. 33). [↩]
27. Mercedes de la Garza, op.cit., 1984, p. 83. [↩]
28. Michel Izard and Pierre Smith, La función simbólica, 1989, p. 16. [↩]
29. Yolotl González, El sacrificio humano…, op.cit., 1992, p. 148. [↩]
30. Mercedes de la Garza, El universo sagrado…, op.cit., 1984, p.89. [↩]
31. Lourdes Báez, comunicación personal [↩]
32. Eckart Boege, “Vida estatal, mito e historia entre los mazatecos actuales: héroes, águilas y comehombres”, in Investigaciones recientes en el área maya, 1984. [↩]
33. Marie – Odile Marion and Alicia Bazarte, “De fibras y barro: el arte popular de los mayas de hoy”, in Reflexión académica. Revista de la División de Ciencias Sociales y Administrativas, 1988. [↩]
34. Michel Graulich, Ritos aztecas. Las fiestas de las veintenas, 1999, pp. 270, 275. [↩]
35. Pierre Bourdieu, El sentido práctico, 1991, p. 408. [↩]
36. Bernardino de Sahagún, Historia general de las cosas de la Nueva España, vol. I, 1989, p. 81. [↩]
37. Taking into account that “sacrifices devoted to the sun or to the deities associated to it, (…) were performed at noon” (see Yolótl González, El sacrificio humano…, op.cit., 1992, p. 122), can we consider the deity of rain, which is celestial, to be associated to the Sun? [↩]
38. Bernardino de Sahagún, op.cit., 1989, vol. I, p. 71; Michel Graulich, Ritos aztecas…op.cit., 1999, pp. 265 and 269, Ivan Sprajc, Venus, Lluvia y maíz, 1996. [↩]
39. Diego Durán, Historia de las Indias de Nueva España e islas de la Tierra Firme, 1984, p. 188; Bernal Díaz del Castillo, Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva España, 1939, I, pp. 271, 293. [↩]
40. Moelwits Fernández Esteban, “La vieja K’oleene” …, op.cit., 1994, p. 33. [↩]
41. Yolótl González, El sacrificio humano…, op.cit., 1992, p. 188. [↩]
42. Yolótl González, “Las deidades dema y los ritos de desplazamiento en Mesoméica” in Historia de la religión en Mesoamérica y áreas afines, 1990, p. 110. [↩]
43. Marie-Odile Marion, “Vida, cuerpo y cosmos en la filosofía nativa mesoamericana”, in Ludus vitalis, 1994, p. 139. [↩]
44. Leonardo López Luján, “Llover a cántaros: el culto a los dioses de la lluvia y el principio de disyunción de la tradición religiosa mesoamericana”, in Pensar América, 1997, p. 101. [↩]
45. Mercedes de la Garza, El universo sagrado…, op.cit., 1984, p. 117. [↩]
46. These mythical prototypes of sacrifice might find their echo –mostly those reviewed in M1 and M2- in certain rituals related to harvesting that are performed nowadays in the Huasteca of San Luis Potosí. [↩]