Maya maize god

Like other Mesoamerican peoples, the traditional Maya recognize in their staple crop, maize, a vital force with which they strongly identify.

In Maya oral tradition, maize is usually personified as a woman[1] — like rice in Southeast Asia, or wheat in ancient Greece and Rome.

A male maize deity representing the foliated type and labeled God E is present in the three extant Maya hieroglyphic books.

When performing ritually, the latter typically wears a netted jade skirt and a belt with a large spondylus shell covering the loins.

Many classic Maya paintings, particularly those on cacao drink vessels, testify to the existence of a rich mythology centered on the tonsured maize god.

[4][5] Several theories, with varying degrees of ethnographic support, have been formulated to account for episodes such as the maize deity's resurrection from a turtle, his canoe voyage, and his transformation into a cacao tree.

Following Karl Taube, many scholars (such as Michael D. Coe) believe that the resurrected tonsured maize god of the classic period corresponds to the father of the hero twins in the Popol Vuh called Hun-Hunahpu.

Braakhuis pointed out[6] that such an environment also characterizes an important maize myth shared by many ethnic groups (such as Huaxtecs, Totonacs, Nahuas and Zoques) inhabiting Mexico's Gulf Coast.