Episode Details

In The Fathers, the book turns back to name the fathers of Hunahpu and Xbalanque: Hunhun-Ahpu and Vucub-Hunahpu, begotten by Xpiyacoc and Xmucané, fathers in turn of the artist-brothers Hunbatz and Hunchouen, and masters of the dice and the ballgame, watched from the sky by the Voc, the messenger of Hurakan. In The Summons of Xibalba, the lords of the underworld hear the game above their heads and send their four owl messengers to fetch the brothers; the fathers take leave of their mother, hang their rubber ball in the roof of the house as a witness, descend the steep road past the rivers and the calabash trees, and are taken at the meeting of the four roads — to greet a mannequin and a man of wood as if they were kings, and to burn upon a seat of glowing stone. These are the K'iche' people's own book, written down by K'iche' authors in the 1550s and preserved in Fr. Ximénez's copy, read here with respect as the sacred and historical book it is.

Chapters:

0:00 Opening

0:04 The Fathers

5:49 The Summons of Xibalba

From the Popol Vuh in the French translation of the Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg (Paris, 1861), from the K'iche' text preserved in the copy of Francisco Ximénez — a fresh in-house English rendering.

Popol Vuh.

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