The Turtle with Lamat Glyph as the Great Star [Venus?]

A Turtle and  Lamat Inflated

        After searching for the Turtle constellation in Richard Allen's 1963 book called Star Lore and Their Names, I turned up practically nothing. I knew that the Ring Nebula, next to Vega in the Lyra constellation, had been a nova, hence the Great Star, but could find little to substantiate it as "turtle."

         I had continued to read through the Lyra pages and discovered what I had missed. The languages older than Medieval Latin, had a great variety of names that actually led back to the Latin terms, but never the English. It was as if the Hermes myth of the music of the stars that was invented from a turtle carapace only existed in Middle eastern sky charts of long ago—and in Maya codex and ceramic art  Many times, the power of the Turtle and the Lamat glyph was used for a certain group of warriors.

         Aratos the ancient Greek astronomer who named many constellations, called Lyra: Chelos Alige, Little Tortoise. Other words in Latin, are Lutaria = Mud-inhabiting; Marina  and Testudo; Galapago, Mus and Musculus; Testa referred to the Upper Shell but Pupilla was strangely switched over ot Aquila. In fact, more than one reference claimed to be from other distant constellations even though they were originally the Testa, or Testudo variety.[Allen, 1963, 287]

Twins with a Turtle and an emerging God
NOT the Corn God.

      Nevertheless, the Eagle and jaguar soon overrode the power-image of the Turtle with the Lamat on its back. But not before some ceramic images were introduced to show that the turtle was indeed a very powerful figure when it was associated with the Twins, Hunahpú and Xbalenqué in their role as the “double sun” [as a double comet].

      Two Great fiery eyes on the Turtle carapace indicate that this emerging god may be or may not be the Corn God. while  the spots on both Hunahpú and Xbalenqué show that they were the double comet of the Aztecs, Quetzalcoatl and Xolotl. The fact that the Twins are holding the hands of the "god" may infer their sky birth as a double comet that passed through the mouth of a nebula called NCG 7000 which has the semblance of a cinnabar covered skull. Again, this nebula infers by its shape that it is the skull of their father. The hand-holding of the god emerging from the carapace of a turtle, could well be the father of the [comet] twins, since they reached their mother-to-be through the mouth of that skull.

     Yet, the “holding of the hands’ of the central figure, who is supposed to be the corn god could also be correct because the “corn god” produced food when the land was destroyed by the waters that carried fish and other marine elements to the mountain tops, an item mentioned in INAH’s explanations about the Aztec Sun Disk, noted below:

Atonatuih (Sun of Water) (676 years) (Translation) A = No entiendo, or “I do not understand.”  At = aço = In the future, or above, high up  Tonatuih = Sun “This means the fourth epoch, represented by the head of Chalchiuhtlicue, goddess of water, feminine aspect of Tlaloc, at the end of which everything perished in the terrific storms and torrential rains that covered the earth. Reaching the peaks of the highest mountains the gods changed men into fishes to save them from this universal deluge…” “The discovery of different fossilized species of marine fauna on the top of the mountains, created the basis for this belief. ” 

   Since no one actually knows the age of the “corn god” or when he first appeared in the pantheon of the Maya gods, "fossilized species of marine fauna on the top of the mountains” should not be a surprise to anyone. The Popol Vuh does tell us that the flood came after the “caves slammed shut in the faces of the second creation of humans [and animals probably] who ran to the mountains for the safety of such caves.

       This was a time when Seven Macaw identified himself. He described himself when:

“This was when there was just a trace of early dawn on the face of the earth there was no sun. . .The sky-earth was already there, but the face of the sun-moon was clouded over. (Tedlock, 1996, 73)

     In Tedlock’s Note  regarding Seven Macaw, he does not comment on the lack of sunshine, only on the fact that Seven Macaw was named k’inich k’ak mo or the “Sun-eyed Fire-macaw.” by the Yucatec Maya mostly for its coloring. (Ibid, 237) When this author did not understand the context as related to reality, he wisely did not comment on it, since it was all part of what he considered to be a fanciful myth.

       Earlier, I inserted the information about Sahagun’s identification of the Great Star, which was not Venus Planet, but a nova that appeared in Lyra, next to the brightest star, Vega. This nova exploded, as all novas do, and became the branch of the Milky Way, called the Quetzalveixochitl, the beatutiful rose tree and the other branch was rightfully called the Tree of the Warrior, implying Orion. [Christensen, Alec,  (1883, p.35, note 21)]

The “rose tree” nova actually became a flower in the sky as a nebula called the Ring Nebula.

Quetzalveixochitl, the beatutiful rose tree

 Greenwich Royal Observatory, The Night Sky for November ,

http://www.nmm.ac.uk/rog/2007/11/the_night_sky_for_november.html, 2007.

                  Eric Thompson stated:

There was also a Maya constellation called the Turtle. which according to an informant,is the suare of Orion.  Even though the Motul dictionary has "ak ek" 'the stars that are in the sign of Gemini. which with others form a turtle.'

              Richard Allen gives us the information that the Ring Nebula IS VISIBLE [as a flower form] only with the largest telescopes. (Allen, 1963, 287.) This is true today but with the Hubble and those large telescopes it has been seen and recorded.  as is another Southern constellation the Compass that contains a nebula called the “Hand of God.”

                 To ignore such information that the Old Fire God gave us, and that which Sahagún had set out in Book Seven, Chapters III and IV of his translation of the Florentine Codex translation is ignoring the fact that the Maya, Aztecs and all of Meso-America may only be describing a “myth,” and that Eric Thompson, Dennis Tedlock, Alec Christensen, Allen Christenson, Recinos and Goetz and Morley, and those who attempted to translate the Popol Vuh made it all up in their collective imaginations.

I doubt very much if the informants gave out only fairy tales to each and every translator of the Popol Vuh. It would seem unlikely that they all (over many years of research) said the same thing, with only one change by Tedlock with grave reservations about replacing the Turtle with the Squash for Hunahpú’s head and repeated by Allen Christenson in his version.

____________

Chandra Observatory, Harvard University.for the “Hand of God” designation  through the NASA web pictures of Nebulae. This nebula is located in a southern constellation near the south pole, called the Compass.

Christensen, Alec,  [excerpts from Phillips, Jr, Henry, (1883, p.35, note 21) [The Codex Ramirez] The History of the Mexicans as told by Their Paintings. 

Christenson, Allen J.  (2007) Popol Vuh: Sacred Book of the Quiché Maya People. Electronic version of original 2003 publication. Mesoweb: www.mesoweb.com/publications/Christenson/PopolVuh.pdf.

INAH [Spanish-English].  Cuauhxicalli (Eagles Bowl)  The Aztec Calendar Stone. 

Goetz, D. & Morley, 'S. (1957)  Popol Vuh:  The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiché Maya, Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press  

(1954) Popul Vuh “The Book of the People” Translated into English by Delia Goetz and Sylvanus Griswold Morley, from Adrián Recino's translation from Quiché into Spanish  Plantin Press, Los Angeles [1954, copyright not registered or renewed] .

Sahagún, Bernardo de (1956). Historia General de Las Cosas de Nueva España. México, DF, México: Editorial Porrua, SA.       

Tedlock, Dennis (1996) Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Thompson, Eric (1971,116,) Maya Hieroglyphic Writing, [Fifth Edition] Norman, Oklahoma.