Not About Q

This will not be about Quetzalcoatl, even though Quetzalcoatl (sometimes known as Kukulcan) is one of the best known gods of ancient and classical Mexican mythology. (And, historically, he may have been a ruler of the Toltecs at some point in his career – or he may have been several actual human beings – but nobody seems to know for sure.) Speaking only for ourselves, we would not touch the subject of Quetzalcoatl with a ten-foot pole.

We intend here to concern ourselves with the Legend of the Suns, which was certainly known by the ancient Mayans, possibly due to southerly drift, as elements of it figure in much of their stately religious artwork. It also appears, admittedly with Quetzalcoatl in one of the major roles, in the Popol Vuh and other post-conquest documents. But even before this the Nahua peoples farther to the north, some of whom were the Aztecs and most of whom seemed to have periodically and inscrutably scuttled about the vast reaches of northern Mexico, now and then pausing in their wanderings to 'settle' and erect enormous monuments within ingeniously designed urban settings (the first such urban developments on the American continent), told and broadly expanded on this legend (making this perhaps the first ever North American urban legend?), which ultimately does come to involve Quetzalcoatl – sometimes as a god, sometimes as a man, and sometimes as a figure of legend – but we have yet to unravel all of this, so this is not central to our concern of the moment.

There are not just two or three, but numerous versions of the Mesoamerican Legend of the Suns. After all, wandering storytellers wander not only by foot but also by memory and the embellishments they will offer as they practice their art.

The Nahua legend tells of there having been several epochs before our own – four, in fact, ours being the fifth, or final, "sun." (These folks had no concept of eternity, it is interesting to note.) During each of these previous suns or epochs a human civilization arose and thrived, but was ultimately wiped out by the angry gods for not having continued to improve or perfect themselves nor maintain the proper rituals and observances.

Now here is where matters begin to get murky. In the different versions the order in which the suns appeared changes; so does the method by which the associated god demolished the world and sacrificed the human race; and consequently so varies the symbology involved. As an example, sometimes it is said that the first sun was the Sun of Water, and that it was destroyed by a flood that drowned all the people but in which the fishes remained. Other times the first was the Sun of Earth and animal energy, and when it was destroyed by tremendous quakes and upheavals the people were all eaten by jaguars (or ocelots).

In some tellings the Sun of Water is the fourth. And in at least two versions the destructive godly force is applied not by only one god – as when Quetzalcoatl, god of Air (in this instance ... other times he is the god of Water), stirs up tornadoes and hurricanes which literally blow the people away (they are at the same time turned into monkeys) – but by the combined fury of all the elements and all of the gods. This clears the way for the creation of our present Sun, which brings together all the elements of the previous suns. But we are cautioned to not rest assured that this sun will be any more permanent than were its predecessors. The gods will continue to test us and to make demands, and if we fail to heed their wishes ... well, let us just say that another really big and unpleasant event will be sure to happen.

P.S.  As you can see, the historical Quetzalcoatl is pretty much just as slippery as the historical Aesop, which is why we have preferred to not make him the subject of this narrative ditty.

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