Palenque: Temples XIX - XXI - XXII

Sailors with a Slave Carrying a Hawser [Rope]

       A few years ago, I attended the Maya Meetings when the major discussion was about Temple XIX.

The murals on that temple appeared to be a group of men with moustaches, club fingers and one-leg, who seemed to be sailors askpetitioning aid from the ruler of Palenque. As proof of their needs, the slave at the end of the mural wore a hawser rope around his shoulders and chest; a much easier way to carry such a rope, than attemptin to carry a coil of such.

     Since one-legged sailors were very common in the days of galleons with many sails, it ds to reason that fingers could have been removed with the aid of the sail sheets (ropes, quite a bit finer than the hawser that is not as thick as those 6"circumference ropes we use now for the big ships, but thick enough for a middle sized sailing or rowing vessel). It is possible to leave this particular view of the Maya to other sailor/scholars to work on.

Temple XIX - XXI - XXII

     During the lecture, Three temples were mentioned as being areas of sacrifice. A single bowl; one was found in each of these three temples. It was reported that all three bowls were exactly the same. It was also reported that each bowl once contained a heart of a "sacrificed" human. The bowl was not displayed within the workbook, so my interest was even more curious, than if it had been. I attempted to find a copy of one of the bowls, but the web did not have any access to such a bowl either.

       From the single slide shown, the decoration inside the bowl did indicate that it held hearts. but the outer rim was decorated with cloud scrolls. Clouds indicate sky and sky indicates, in turn, astronomy.  But, at that time, I could not understand why it was a sacrifical offering. If the main temples that gave the history of Pacal, [minus the areas had been removed from the beginning of the east panel], how would one know these bowls were used for human hearts?

     The odd element was of such hearts, that the strangers were petitioning assistance. They were not prisoners who had been captured and were being judged for their beauty (lopped off fingers, one-leg equaled "beauty"?) nor did they appear to be religious, as one willing to be sacrificed? They were not prisoners.  They were asking for help and were confident that it would be given.

     This year, the workbook was on a table, in the living room and I had nothing better to do (that I wanted to do} so i browsed the workbook.and discovered I had forgotten that the Temples of the Cross, Foliated Cross and the three temple mentioned in the title, were also part of the discussion at the Meeting.

        I had beensso involved and disappointed at not being able to find a picture of the cup, that I had completely ignored the map os Palenque that included the Temples XIX, XXI and XXII. This time the three temples were noted immediately. . . . they were skewed and a bit out of order. . . .  SKEWED? Why were they skewed?

      The Summer

<    Triangle of

      North America

<  Peru

        The Three 

        Temples at  Palenque         >

      The Three Temples of Palenque create a triangle that, if the top red line were placed directly on the temple to the left of it instead of on its platform, it would approximate the Northern Cross, Cygnus and the Summer Triangle, all of which are different names for the same constellation [and its main star Deneb]. Lyra's star is Vega, and Aquila's is Altair.  The only difference between the north of the Equator views and Peru, is that here in North America, Peru has a 90° "to-the-left" position common to constellations seen south of the Equator.  However, in different world locations, it can vary from a 90° to a 180° difference as in Hawaii, north of the Equator.

      This is due to the location of earth as its north and south latitudes spin seasonally between the Tropic of Cancer to the Tropic of Capricorn, as the earth follows its orbit around the sun.

      So what is so important about the Summer Triangle? Nothing per se, but the main star in Lyra located in the Upper Register of the Milky Way was called Vega, was once the bowl tnext to a disintegrating nova, now called the Ring Nebula. The Aztecs called that star, also located in the Milky Way, The Beautiful Rose [in the] Tree, called the Milky Way. The lower register of the Milky Way had also just acquired a new bright star, Sirius, that complemented the exapnded Orion constellation that was then called The Tree of the Warrior.

     So if we assume that the three temples in Palenque are honoring the Summer Triangle, aka Northern Cross, aka Cygnus, could it be so important that it was also honoring the Three Hearthstones that contained the great fire stars [comets] during the turmoil in the heavens.

     Well, when the star disintegrated, meteors, meteorites and fire dust fell to earth.  And that was when the sky gods laughed so hard, they fell out of their seats [positions] in the sky.  Thus, to further honor the Summer Triangle, [aka the Three Hearthstones, aka Cygnus [Seven Macaw], and aka the Northern Cross], the priests searched for an found small meteorites, [that were discovered to be "magic' except that that magic we now call "magnetic."]  These magical stones were placed within the cups of the three temples and they were honored as the "Hearts of the Sky," not human hearts at all. When the Friars learned about the stones, they insisted that they were of the "devil" and asked all temple priests in Mesoamerica to turn them into the Churches.

     The event was such when the sky gods laughed so hard, they fell out of their seats [positions] in the sky. It is here that we first find the sky netting. But the Maya version only says it was a net bag used by Blood Moon to carry maize [corn cobs] to her new mother-in-law.

     It is in the Greek and Roman myths that the sky net was first appreciated for what it does. Basically Aphrodite and Aries were involved in a very serious meeting in the Greek version; and Venus with the same planet called Mars were just as involved in the Roman version, Hephaestus [or Vulcan] got angry, went to his forge and created a golden net in Greek; or a brass net in the Roman tale. 

     Hephaestus [Vulcan] then waited until Aphrodite and Aries were together again and threw the net over them and pulled the netting tight about them. It was then that the sky gods laughed so hard, they fell off their thrones. When they stopped laughing and rolling on the floor, they each returned to the seats, but after a bit, realized that they had each gone and sat in their neighbor's seat, not their own.

Once the sky net was seen and it was recognized by many as a great way to keep track of the stars,  the sky nets became very useful for astronomers and for any shaman who read horoscopes. The net clothing decorations were specifically designed for the sky gods apparel. Temple priests of astronomy also were given special permission to wear netted decorations over their regular temple attire. It became a great honor to wear such netting because it indicated that the priest was an astronomer of long standing. A man to be revered because upon his death he would join those stars which he had honored in his lifetime.

Conclusion

     The story is mixed up with too many outside sources . . . No it is not. The disaster was noted in many lands around the world. I only chose the lands that were contained in the unknown Americas. But the net capture scene had to be remembered and not deleted from history. So the obvious thing to do was to incorporate it into a "sexy tryst" between a wandering goddess and an orbiting planet  Such a text would be safe even in the monasteries. No one would even guess that it was an actual astronomy event. It would only indicate that even the gods, when cuckolded react in real anger. Some day when we are wiser, the world will understand that the stars are universal and, even with the lop-sided spin that we acquired, most sky events, [very serious ones], were also universally seen.

    

       The net in the sky was very real, It enclosed two star entities in the sky for a time and then, when the other entities rolled around in the sky and switched their locations accidentally, it disappeared from sight. but not from the memories of the Aztec and Maya people. The death toll was horrible to even consider. The tribes that disappeared were noted at the end of the Popol Vuh and their main god Tohil also permanently left the scene. The new sky gods were taken by the Twins into the northern sky in a canoe that was able to travel on the Milky Way, the River of [sparkling] Salt.

      We know the Ocean-sea is full of salt, it is our sole scientific reference, but how often has mankind wasted salt just to view a trail of that once precious commodity, salt, only to admire its brilliance in the sunshine or in the moonlight? To waste salt would probably have been a crime because it was so valuable. Who got sacrificed as a political enemy when they used salt to demonstrate the shimmer of the Milky Way at night?