Survey of Talking Cross Shrines in Yucatán and Quintana Roo

The Maya Cross as Axis Mundi

The claim has been made that during the "Caste War of Yucatán" Maya rebels founded a new society and religion dedicated to a Talking Cross (Nelson Reed 1997:63). However, how "new" this religion was is debatable since the cross icon, and other "oracular" objects have been known to be present in the Mesoamerican region since pre-Columbian times (Roys 1972:15), and are thought to have symbolically represented cosmological centrality (Freidel, Schele, and Parker 1993). Clearly the best known representation of an ancient Maya "cross" is depicted at the ancient city of Palenque on the sarcophagus lid of Lord Pacal (Figure 3). This quadripartite motif demonstrates how the symbol was conceptualized by the ancient Maya to depict the axis mundi or world tree; the axis is believed to have been traversed by souls of those deceased, and by religious specialists through ritual. Other "cross" representations from the ancient site of Palenque depict the same theme of the world tree (Figure 4) which is sometimes represented as an anthropomorphic maize plant (Figure 5).

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According to Holland (1964:14), the Tzotzil-Maya still venerate the ancient Maya axis mundi/sacred world tree which ascends from the center of the earth and connects the upperworld to the earth and the underworld. Not surprisingly, this same idea is expressed by Macehuales in the Yucatán.

Other pan-Maya symbolism, expressed at various communicating cross shrines I have surveyed, is that Maya Crosses often have an overhead semi-circle of flowers similar to those documented in Chiapas (Figure 6) by Vogt (1969:405). Holland (1964:15) has explained the significance of the Tzotzil flower arches as follows, "the sun ascends the thirteen layers of the heavens, which form a path ornamented with flowers. (and) in the afternoon it descends." Indeed, Vogt (1969:601) has documented that in Chiapas this semi-circle of flowers, when placed directly overhead the cross, forms the arch of the sun as it traverses the sky and thus marks this as a point of centrality and the cross as the world tree (Figure 7) which is used to communicate with ancestral entities. Unfortunately, during my survey, not one of my consultants seemed to fully comprehend the symbolic meaning of the flower arch--it is simply explained as a custom of their grandfathers.

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My survey data indicates that there are two basic cross shapes in Santa Cruz Maya shrines: the common Latin cross form (Figure 8), and another that is more like a tree branch with two up-tilted arms (Figure 9) (see Sosa 1989:137). In either case my consultants address both types of crosses as a "santo." Significantly, by "santo," my consultants refer to an ’entity’ or ’spirit’ rather than a Catholic saint; indeed, saints are usually referred to as "imágenes," images, due to the idol representing an actual person who once lived.

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Regardless, both types of Maya crosses are often painted a blue-green hue, which signifies centrality, and are referred to as "ya’ as che’ "--’green tree’. The crosses are painted blue-green because the Yucatec Maya conceive of the crosses as being "kuxa’an" -alive. Sosa (1989:137) has elaborated on the theme of green crosses as trees, "included in the cross symbol is the meaning of the tree, and the term sáantoh de che’, ’cross of wood’, refers to these crosses. These meanings of tree and wood are actually inseparable in Maya, since the word che’ is used for both. (to the) Maya the distinction is not necessary. So the crosses being made of wood also allows them to share the ’tree’ meaning."

I therefore hypothesize that the many facets of the cross lend it a polysemic quality which have allowed the Maya, to utilize what on the surface appears to be a completely Christian symbol, for their own purposes throughout the colonial period to the present day. The purpose here is not to disallow Catholic influence, which in of itself is undeniable, but to illuminate how the Maya took a colonial religious symbol which was to supplant their own ideology, consciously integrated the Crucifix with the world tree, and thereby retained a central theme in their ancestors ideology--albeit in a transformed state. In studying these transformations, I emphasize that the cultural agency of my consultants is quite powerful and can be best understood through observant participation. It is therefore my opinion that the agency of cultural brokers is more important than is usually acknowledged in current postmodern oriented anthropological analyses. I suggest that in many ways the postmodern approach does not explore the meaningful personal experience gained by Maya ritual, for in the postmodern world of simulacra all cultural and symbolic meaning attached to the cross would be exterminated. To claim that Maya spirituality is a pastiche of revivalistic construction with no coherent structure undervalues the beliefs of my consultants and overlooks the agency of the Maya.

I conceptualize Maya culture as a historically determined product of both societal structure, individual agency, and the interaction thereof. In my analysis, of the Communicating Cross, I emphasize that conscious human agency and practice is responsible for the survival of Maya culture. The very fact that Maya culture survives, and that their language survives, is key to the argument that the colonial and the living Maya have chosen to keep it alive. I argue that the conservative actions of my consultants and their ancestors are in play with, rather than reduced to cultural logic, political economy, and by-products of colonialism. However, I concede that for some Maya, cross entities may be construed as meaningless and perhaps fake; nevertheless for many of my consultants these supernatural entities appear to be truly spiritual and meaningful.

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