Early in the Popol Vuh, the second chapter in some versions, is the story of 7 Kaqix - which is the story of how the Maya invented and used gunpowder. Its placement shows how important this story was to the Maya, as they ordered the oral history that would become the Popol Vuh. I will re-tell the story by translating key words using Ch'orti' rather than the language the Popol Vuh was recited in, Quiche, when recorded, and I will date the invention of gunpowder from 7724 BCE to 7677 BCE, using the Mars retrograde long-count calendar.
Gunpowder consists of fuels like sulfur and charcoal and an oxidizer like saltpetre (potassium nitrate).
The Maya arrived to El Salvador in about 8700 BCE, were briefly captured by the Xibalbhan hunters and soon found out that the Xibalbhans were afraid of water. They moved to an island - Isla Tigre, Honduras - but soon each of the four lineages needed more space and autonomy and the water level was rising to dangerous levels due to post-Ice Age melting.
The lead lineage, the Ch'orti's, moved to Teotipa at Lago Güija in late 8207 BCE, but about 370 years later, during 7835 BCE, the lake suffered a massive flood and tzuhnami caused by a volcanic eruption. The few survivors moved to Teopan at Lago Coatepeque but they and their offspring desired beyond all else to move back to Lago Güija.
The Ch'orti' survivors felt it was their destiny to be at one of the sources of the Lempa (originally Lumpa) River. The Zapotec ancestors were at the other end of the Lempa, at Tehuacan. Each end of the Lempa needed a lineage and each lineage needed its own island. That was their destiny. And to be safe from their archenemies Xibalbha, who were afraid of water. For the Ch'orti' their destiny was Lago Güija, which means both "source" and "navel".
There was one major problem: it was under water. When the San Diego volcano erupted, likely on Nov. 1, BCE, its lava flow, combined with mudslides, cemented over the egressing
river
that connects the lake to the Lempa. The newly created island of
Igualtepec, left, was mostly underwater. Teotipa was completely covered.
The only way to be able to move to Igualtepec Island would be to clear out the lava, rocks, and dirt from the egress path. But that was not possible with the typical land-moving procedures of 7800 BCE.
This scene is confirmed by the Popol Vuh names Kaqix and his wife Chimalmat.
7 Kaqix
kah - beginning, start
k'ix - heat, warmth
The "beginning of heat," a euphemism I have found for gunpowder explosions. But it has a double meaning of "beginning of the tobacco smoking." This parallel meaning runs throughout the story.
Chimalmat
ch'i' - growth
mar - open space (also lake or ocean in archaic Ch'orti')
rum - earth, soil
at - bath
Or "growth of the lake bathing the earth". This refers to the growing Lago Guija with no egress. The first syllable of Chimalmat's name coincides with the day sign Ch'i' and combined with the 7 in front of Kaqix gives the long-count date of 7 Ch'i', which was 7630 BCE, the likely date of the successful partial draining of Lago Güija.
Further confirmation of the location of this story at Lago Güija and Igualtepec comes from the name Belen Guijat which is the village right around the egressing river (Desagüe) where it was exploded by the Maya:
per - drawing in, collapse (the 'b' and 'p' sounds are similar and the 'l' and 'r' were the same)
ehm - a descent, going down
wit - explosion
hat - a splitting
[Mudslide hill - volcanic fill] "collapsing downward from the splitting explosion"
Right: The egressing river from the lake. This section appears to have been blasted open. [Click to enlarge.] The Popol Vuh story begins with 7 Kaqix, who symbolizes the blocked egress, being noticed by Hunahpu and Xbalanque. The second name here is a date rather than a person - Xbalanque means 1 Balan (B'ahram), which in the Mars long-count calendar corresponds to 7835 to 7630 BCE. The story begins before 7630 but the name 7 Kaqix tells us that it ends after the Mars calendar has clicked down to 7 Chi, which happened in 7630 BCE.
Then we are introduced to the first of 7 Kaqix's two sons, Zipacna:
sip - swollen, bulging
pak - rolled up
nat' - held fast
Zipacna is "swollen, rolled up and held fast" - a cigar. The Mayan ancestors discovered tobacco at Tecapa volcano and then began growing it on Isla Tigre, Gulfo de Fonseca. The cigar - Zipacna - became the model for how to pack the gunpowder. This explains why Zipacna was later portrayed as an alligator in Mayan art.
Zipacna then begins to brag about all the things he was responsible for at the Isla Tigre mountain:
- Chiq'aq' - Chi'i' "growth" + kak "a getting". "Getting growth". Tobacco was the first thing cultivated by the Maya and through its cultivation the Maya learned how to grow corn and many other things.
- Hunahpu. The leadership, wisdom, and identity of the Maya were born on Isla Tigre.
- Pekul Ya - Pehk "greeting" + ur "explanation" + ha' "water". "Explaining the greetings over the water" - bowing to the planets that were aligned out over the water in late October 8207 BCE.
- Xk'anul - Ix (feminine) + k'an "yellow" + ur "an explaining". The "yellow lady who explains", which would be Venus the lead star of the triple star event of 8207 BCE, which occurred on the Mars retrograde date of 2 K'anir. Later in the story Xkik will speak about Xk'anir, events during the Mars retrograde date of 9 K'anir. The explanation in Xk'anul I think was clarity in the manner of how to pray to the planets.
- Macamob - The first half of this doesn't need translation - the macaw, but it helps: mak "enclosure" + kah "beginning" + mo' "parrot". The first animal to be domesticated by the Maya was the parrot on Isla Tigre.
- Huliznab - hur "a closing in" + ix "a going" + nahp "a forgetting". I'm quite sure that closing in refers to the rapidly rising ocean as the ice melted globally after the Ice Age. The Maya left Tiger Island and some tried to forget about it. Well, not Zipacna.
The story describes the Mayan twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque as using a blowgun to shoot at 7 Kaqix. They break his jax. The blowgun is a symbol for a wick and the jaw represents the ground beginning to open up from the gunpowder explosives. 7 Kaqix rips off the arm of Hunahpu. This tells us that the Maya placed
their first explosive into a crack, lit it and it exploded, but blew up
the arm of the person lighting it. Thus they learned to use a wick.
Hunahpu and Xbalanque ask for the advice of two old ones, a grandfather, Saki Nim Ak, and grandmother, Saki Nima Tzi's. The names of the old ones tell us the nature of the advice: Saki "to search" + Nir "cure" + Ahk "rumbling" or search for a cure on (how to harness) the rumbling sound (explosive). And for Saki Nima Tzi's: Saki "to search" + Nir "cure" + Tzir "breaking in two", which refers to a cure (solution) to breaking in two the lava and rock slide across the area of the old river egress. Saki Nim Ak has a double meaning which is to search for a cure to rumbling tobacco cough.
The boys tell the grandparents to tell 7 Kaqix that the boys' parents have died which is why they are following along with the grandparents. This tells us that orphaned persons were among those who worked with the explosives. It was so dangerous they wanted to minimize the risk to those with families.
When 7 Kaqix speaks to the grandparents, he recognizes that they are curers with "Nim" or "Nir" in both of their names. He wants to know if they can fix his broken teeth - the earth starting to be broken up. They say "We only pull worms out of teeth", a reference to the wicks being placed to the explosive charges. Then they say "ubak uwach" which means uh "good" + bak' "a wrapping" + waka' "bark string" or "good wrappings, good bark string", wrappings being the packed charges and bark string being the wicks.
Close-up of the section of the egress river where blasting appears to have taken place
The grandparents convince 7 Kaqix to have all of his teeth out. He does. And he dies, along with his wife, Chimalmat. The lava over the egress is taken out and the bloatedness of the lake, represented by his wife, is gone as well. This happened soon after the Mars long-count date 7 Ch'i', Nov. 21, 7630 BCE. That would be the end of the story, but the Popol Vuh goes back and fills in some of the details.
The next story that is told is that of Omuch' K'ajolab', translated as Four Hundred Boys by Tedlock. Omuch' K'ajolab' was dragging a log, a great tree, over to Zipacna (the cigar).
Ohom - froth, suds
Muk - bury, hide, insert
Kah - start
Hor - head, end
La'b - grease, salve
The key here is to know that the balsam tree is called la'bte' or "salve tree". The meaning is "start of inserting end of (with) balsam resin into the (lake-edge) froth." Perhaps end means end of the wick or it could mean that the end of the balsam tree was used to pack the explosive. Several Maya, represented by Omuch' K'ajolab', were dragging the balsam logs all the way from the Balsam Range to Lago Guija, in order to utilize the balsam resin as a sealant for the underwater wick and explosive. This is a distance of about 70 kilometers over hilly terrain.
The primary chemical components of the Peru Balsam are benzyl cinnamate (to 40%), benzyl benzoate (to 30%), sesquiterpene alcohol nerolidol (to 7%), and phenolic 'peruresinotannol' (20-40%). Balsam resin would be a great substance to seal and waterproof a wick.
Zipacna carries the log to the site. Zipacna as alligator-cigar symbolizes the Maya learning to float the balsam logs over water rather than dragging them. They would have floated the balsam logs down the mountain streams during rain storms to the Rio Sucio which enters the Lempa River about 50 kilometers north of San Salvador. From there the logs would have been poled upstream to within a few hundred meters of Lago Guija, to the far point of the egress river blockage.
Omuch' K'ajolab' next learned about using guano to make potassium nitrate crystals: Kakachak'imah tana:
kah - beginning
kahch - knot, cluster, crystal
chak'in - two days
ha' - water
ta' - animal excrement
nak -front side, wall
"Beginning of (gathering) animal excrement (guano) from a wall (cliff), (soaking) it two days in water (to make) crystals." Guano or other animal excrement is the primary natural raw
material to produce potassium nitrate (saltpetre). It is not clear how the Maya learned of this property of guano but they were the ultimate alchemists, probably testing every material and compound they found over several years. Right: Lake channel leading to the egress. Probably no blasting here.
Omuch' K'ajolab' asks Zipacna to dig a hole for them. Omuch' K'ajolab' planned to kill him in the hole with a balsam tree. But Zipacna digs a second angled hole off from the bottom of the first and hid there. A tree is jammed down the hole but Zipacna is not killed. This is saying that the Maya learned how to angle the explosive holes to direct the charge to create the right effect.
Zipacna then brings down the roof of Omuch' K'ajolab', killing him/them. This is an indication that on at least one occasion the packing tree or the rocks being exploded landed on the explosive workers, killing them.
Next we learn of the death Zipacna, which means that the explosive cigar is complete. This story takes place near a mountain called Meauan. There is a mountain of a similar name in La Libertad between the towns of Jayaque and Tepecoyo. There is a nearby cliff that would be full of guano. Let's look at the meaning of Meauan:
mein - shadow
wa'an - rising, straight
Meauan is in the shadow of the rising, straight (cliff) mountain, which would be a cliff now called Chantekwan (left):
ch'ahn - twine, rope, climbing vine
tech' - expand, spread out
wa'an - rising, straight
"Spread out twine (a net) going straight down (or up)". We'll see that this name matches perfectly the story in the Popol Vuh.
The narrator summarizes the story by Meauan mountain about a crab who jal wachixik:
har - weaving, netting
waka' - bark string
ix - moving
ik' - air, wind
The crab moves along in the wind on bark string netting. The netting was secured on top and dropped over the edge of the cliff. The crab is describing the motion of a cliff climber. The story has all sorts of sexual innuendo and a cliff climber could become intimate with the cliff in a sense.
The crab's arms are said to ukok q'ab:
uh - good, sacred
k'ok - separating
k'ab - excretion
The crab arms separate the good (sacred?) excretion (guano) (from the cliff wall). Zipacna tells Hunahpu and Xbalanque to kib'e ta iwab'a "raise the guano to the stand-place (top)." There must have been someone on top to pull up the full bags or containers of guano.
We are told of the safety precautions as the crab moves around,
jupulik pakalik:
yuh - anything worn around the neck
pur - moving up and down
ik' - air
bak' - a tying up
kar - dizziness
ik' - air
The safety procedures included a halter to move one up and down in the air and tying oneself up if dizzy in the air. It was dangerous work and they discovered ways to enhance the guano workers' safety.
Zipacna wants to eat the crab - the "cigar" wants the guano inside him. Zipacna is fulfilled and dies.
Other places where they may have collected guano might include Las Minas
Cave in Esquipulas, Guatemala, the caves in eastern El Salvador once the
Xibalbha were defeated, rocks along the ocean in La Libertad and La
Union, El Salvador, and a cliff in San Agustin, Usulutan, which has drawings somewhat like Igualtepec's on its higher end.
The second son is then introduced, Kab'rakan, translated as Earthquake by Tedlock, which is not too far off. Kab'rakan:
Kahp - a cutting, an opening up
Rax - summit, surface
Kan - learning
"Learning to open up the surface," referring to gunpowder opening up
the surface. Kab'rakan has a double meaning of "desire for what is
clenched in the teeth" recalling his brother Zipacna, the cigar.
Kab'raqan is introduced together with Juraqan, Ch'ipi Kaqulja and Raxa Kaqulja, translated as Hurricane, Newborn Thunderbolt and Sudden Thunderbolt. It is tempting to simply translate Juraqan as Hurricane but that is not the original meaning:
Huhr - missile, arrow, bullet
Akar - charcoal
Juraqan is "bullet-shaped charcoal". Ground-up charcoal. A typical component of gunpowder.
Kaqulja, in common to the Thunderbolts, is:
K'ahk' - fire, light, heat
Kur - spine, hair
Hahr - a braid
Ha' - water
"Fire braided hair" which tells us perhaps of the how the first wick was made.
Chipi Kaqulja (Newborn Thunderbolt)
Chi' - sugar
bi' - sap, wax, rubber
"Sugar sap fire hair in water" where sugar sap indicates how the wick was lined to place it in water.
Raxa Kaqulja (Sudden Thunderbolt)
Rax - forehead, summit, flat level surface
"Flat level surface fire braided hair" indicated that they found they needed to place the wick on a flat surface.
Juraqan spoke to Hunahpu and Xbalanque and told them that Kab'raqan was getting too big. This means that the packed charges were too large when the only fuel is charcoal. So he tells the Maya to take Kab'raqan to a mountain. They tell Kab'raqan of a mountain growing in the east, rising above the other mountains. This is clearly talking about a newborn volcano rapidly growing.
Along the way they shoot birds with blowguns - a figure of speech for practicing lighting charges with wicks. They treat the birds with a substance translated as plaster or gypsum. Since this is in the context of traveling to a volcano it is likely talking about sulfur, common in new volcanoes.
Juraqan says "b'ochi'j ku'b'ik."
Pochi - peel
Kuk - rolled up
Bi' - sap, wax, rubber
"Peel (the bark), roll it up in sap." Instructions for preparing a wick for under water use.
They roast the birds - practice lighting charges, dripping with fat - balsam resin - and made with various minerals that they experimented with. One that seemed to work was sulfur (or gypsum) that they found at the new mountain in the east. This new mixture worked - it "killed" Kab'raqan.
The newer volcanoes in the east of El Salvador include Usulutan and Chaparrastique (San Miguel). By the name we know that it was Usulutan, left, that is referred to in the Popol Vuh:
Os - a fit, a fitting into
Sur - casting off, shedding
Ut - small opening
Tan - powder, ash
"Powder for a fitting that casts off in a small opening". The Usulutan volcano would be the first place that they found sulfur for the gunpowder.
The next story in the Popol Vuh introduces 1 B'atz' and 1 Chuen, translated as 1 Monkey, 1 Artisan by Tedlock. Batz means monkey in Quiche and Chuen means monkey in Yucatec. It is clear that they are scribes, artists, crafts-workers. But they are introduced here because they represent two classes of persons who worked with the very dangerous gunpowder.
In Ch'orti', B'atz' translates as "sterile" (pax) and Chuen translates as "step-son" (chu'unen). (Note: b' is basically equivalent to p.) Those who didn't have families - those who couldn't because they were sterile and those who were step-children or orphans - were the ones asked to take on the very dangerous task of working with gunpowder. Over time perhaps others also asked to join the B'atz' and Chuen team and voluntarily gave up having a family. This class of Maya became extremely important over the thousands of years. The Popol Vuh describes a number of qualities of B'atz' and Chuen: painters, writers, ajk'ot - molders (shaping charges), and ajxit - splitters (those who crack open). It seems that they also gained the slang of monkey.
Hunahpu, the generic Maya, began the work with explosives but due to injuries and deaths in a short amount of time the task was delegated to a specific group of people within the community - those without families, B'atz and Chuen.
B'atz' is an indicator of the Mars retrograde date when the experiments of the Maya to find an explosive began. The tzolk'in day sign of B'atz' probably was named and designated on that occasion. 11 B'atz' began in 7756 BCE and ended in 7724 BCE. It would seem that the explosive experimentation began sometime between these dates.
The Mayan enemies, the Xibalbha who were located at Corinto cave, noticed the experimenting with explosives and said, "xax kejikik uloq pacawi":
tz'ak' - bundle, joint
k'er - a slicing
ik - air
k'ix - heat
ur - explaining
ok' - dividing in two
pak - a fold, a rolling up
kah - beginning
wis - care, attention
"They explained the dividing in two that slices the air with heat, the beginning of carefully folding up the bundle." A Xibalbha lord then says "What's happening on the face of the earth? They're just stomping and shouting." It is about this time that the Xibalbhans capture two Maya and burn them alive in an oven, presumably as punishment for playing with fire.
A bit later in the Popol Vuh is a story that involves B'atz', Chuen, and Xkik'. Xkik' translates as Rumble Woman. The name originates about 180 years earlier from a girl (a "grandmother" to the present Rumble Woman) who was given that name because she lived near the Torola (Rumble) River. That is, she was Xibalbhan. She was the one who became pregnant from 1 Hunahpu's beheaded corpse outside the Corinto cave. One of her offspring was survivor of the Guija flood. And the woman in this story is an offspring of a flood survivor. This story begins about 50 years after the flood and 130 years after the first Xkik' became pregnant. Now with this story the name Rumble Woman gains a new meaning.
An older woman from the community asks Xkik' to go braid (har), to make a wick. She went out to the garden with B'atz' and Chuen but could not find material to braid. She calls out for help:
ta tul waloq, ta tul tak'aloq
"Trees in a state of sticking up, dry out the condition of the place! Open a fissure to divide in two!"
xtoj, xq'anil
movement (into) Tojmar, movement (into) K'anir (Mars retrograde)
xkakaw, ix tziya
fire forcing wick-movement, going to the fitting
Notes: First line: ta-place, tur-state, wa'ar-erect, ok-sticks, ta-place, tak-dry, k'ar-fissure, ok'-divide in two. Third line: ix-movement, k'ahk'-fire, kaw-force, ix-going, tz'ir-a fitting into.
The first line has a sexual joke, with Xkik' talking of erect sticks when it was her ancestor also symbolically named Xkik' who became pregnant from an erect bone of a cadaver, as it were. The erect sticks refer to Igualtepec which was a giant blob from the mudslide that formed during the Guija eruption and flood where many trees were part of the avalanche and ended up sticking out in all directions.
Right: This part of the egress river from Lago Guija appears to have been channelized. The second line of Xtoj, XK'anil is the closest thing to proof that the Maya were using the Mars retrograde long-count calendar. The x in front denotes movement, in this case of the retrograde movement of Mars. Normally the day Tojmar follows K'anir in the tzolk'in calendar but the days move backward in the Mars long-count calendar. 9 Tojmar started in 7692 BCE, telling us when the women starting collaborating with B'atz' and Chuen. 8 K'anir started in 7677 BCE and ended in 7645 BCE, when 7 Ch'i' started, indicating the approximate date of when the Guija egress (Desague) channel was finally opened up. This would mean that it it took about 100 years from the very first experiments until the channel was re-established.
The Popol Vuh then speaks of the relationship between B'atz' and Chuen and Hunahpu, who represents those not working with explosives. Hunahpu says "kichakimal kikak wachib'al":
k'ix - heat
ch'ahk - anything cut
i- - [locative]
mar - open space, lake
k'ix - light
k'ahk' - fire
waka' - bark string
pahr - shaping
"Cutting with heat at the lake place. Lighting the bark string (wick) to the shaping."
The Popol Vuh then describes a safety precaution used when they went diving, in this case diving to place explosive charges at cracks under water. B'atz' and Chuen say "How can we hold onto a snake? This [ ] looks frightening to us," speaking of when they are underwater. Hunuhpu answers "Undo your pants, tie them around your hips, with the long end trailing like a tail behind you, and then you'll be better able to move." The narrator says they looked like monkeys. And this must be where the name monkey for B'atz' and Chuunen comes from. And how the Quiche and Yutcatec day sign for B'atz' developed into monkey. The divers no doubt had a long tail that stretched from several meters underwater to the surface where someone was monitoring it ready to pull up on the line if it didn't feel right.
B'atz' and Chuen made their grandmother laugh when they wore their diving belts home. They tried to be serious though and said chi xiririk xe kipam, that they were the "person who examines the untamed wind which produces a lever to break apart." Out in the air they hadn't noticed the blast of air that accompanies the explosion but it was quite evident under water. Then they say chi chilita je pu chuchi kik' ux "Hot pellets pull and violently tear away at the growing protrusion." The underwater charges were working.
B'atz' and Chuen explain some of the dangers and sacrifices that the explosive workers had to endure. They mention kaq ruxruj uchi or "drinking while swimming in the froth." They mention tak, which means "deaf" - some of them became deaf from the explosions. Finally they mention mutzumaq which means "their sacrifice - twitching and twisted bodies." They had nerve damage and damaged limbs.
What else did the Maya use gunpowder for over the years? This will be the subject of some of my future writing. But it is highly likely that they used it to quarry and polish the large stones used to make monuments, temples, and pyramids during the pre-Classic and Classic periods.
Another use is evident in the Balsam Range, where balsam logs were harvested to use on log rafts. The logs were sent downstream from streams like the Shutia, left, near Tepecoyo, during heavy rainstorms when the water flow was sufficient. The logs would snag up on these mountain streams so gunpowder was used to straighten out the course of the streams. This comes from the place names in the Balsam Range:
Shutia: (xut' - tear, rip) + (tia - when, where); "where tearing" or place of tearing.
Cashal, stream near Jayaque: (kach - tying, binding) + (ahr - time of): "(first) time of binding" or first time (in Balsam Range) for binding the charges.
Talnique, municipality near top of Balsam Range: (tal - arrival + nihkes - to make something shake): "arrive and make (the ground) shake".
Tepecoyo, municipality in Balsam Range: (tep - hardness + eh - cutting edge of tooth + koror - pellet shaped): "pellet shapes (gunpowder) with cutting edge (cut) hardness."
The invention of gunpowder was one of the greatest accomplishments of the Maya and, given its placement in the Popol Vuh, it held a significant place in their mythology. Gunpowder explains a lot in relation to how they built various stone structures. Without a doubt they shared this technology with their cousins in Peru and Bolivia as they built the finely fitting stone structures as Cuzco and elsewhere. While the Maya may have eventually weaponized the gunpowder it seems that for most of their history this was not the case. The Mayan invention of gunpowder opens many questions for future study.
It was an honor to be part of the B'atz crew. They were the ones who sailed around the world and represented the Maya to other people. In the symbol on the left one can see the ends of two boats as they make their way through a narrow strait. B'atz includes all those who are not part of a conventional family: those who are sterile, those who voluntary decide not to have children, homosexuals, and orphans.
