This was not peculiar to the tribes under consideration. The heart was very generally looked upon, not only as the seat of life, but as the source of the feelings, intellect and passions, the very soul itself.[[141]] Hence, in sacrificing victims it was torn out and offered to the god as representing the immaterial part of the individual, that which survived the death of the body.

The two names Ah-raxa-lak and Ah-raxa-sel literally mean, “He of the green dish,” “He of the green cup.” Thus Ximenez gives them, and adds that forms of speech with rax signify things of beauty, fit for kings and lords, as are brightly colored cups and dishes.

Rax is the name of the colors blue and green, which it is said by many writers cannot be distinguished apart by these Indians; or at least that they have no word to express the difference. Rax, by extension, means new, strong, rough, violent, etc.[[142]] Coming immediately after the names “Soul of the Lake,” “Soul of the Sea,” it is possible that the “blue plate” is the azure surface of the tropical sea.

In the second paragraph I have quoted, the narrator introduces us to “the ancestress (iyom), the ancestor (mamom), by name Xpiyacoc, Xmucane.” These were prominent figures in Quiche mythology; they were the embodiments of the paternal and maternal powers of organic life; they were invoked elsewhere in the Popol Vuh to favor the germination of seeds, and the creation of mankind; they are addressed as “ancestress of the sun, ancestress of the light.” The old man, Xpiyacoc, is spoken of as the master of divination by the tzite, or sacred beans; the old woman, Xmucane, as she who could forecast days and seasons (ahgih); they were the parents of those mighty ones “whose name was Ahpu,” masters of magic.[[143]] From this ancient couple, Ximenez tells us the native magicians and medicine men of his day claimed to draw their inspiration, and they were especially consulted touching the birth of infants, in which they were still called upon to assist in spite of the efforts of the padres. It is clear throughout that they represented mainly the peculiar functions of the two sexes.

Their names perhaps belonged to an archaic dialect, and the Quiches either could not or would not explain them. All that Ximenez says is that Xmucane means tomb or grave, deriving it from the verb tin muk, I bury.

In most or all of the languages of this stock the root muk or muc means to cover or cover up. In Maya the passive form of the verbal noun is mucaan, of which the Diccionario de Motul[[144]] gives the translation “something covered or buried,” the second meaning arising naturally from the custom of covering the dead body with earth, and indicated that the mortuary rites among them were by means of interment; as, indeed, we are definitely informed by Bishop Landa.[[145]] The feminine prefix and the terminal euphonic e give precisely X-mucaan-e, meaning “She who is covered up,” or buried.

But while etymologically satisfactory, the appropriateness of this derivation is not at once apparent. Can it have reference to the seed covered by the soil, the child buried in the womb, the egg hidden in the nest, etc., and thus typify one of the principles or phases of reproduction? For there is no doubt, but that it is in the category of divinities presiding over reproduction this deity belongs. Not only is she called “primal mother of the sun and the light,”[[146]] but it is she who cooks the pounded maize from which the first of men were formed.

Both names may be interpreted with appropriateness to the sphere and functions of their supposed powers, from radicals common to the Maya and Quiche dialects. Xmucane may be composed of the feminine prefix x (the same in sound and meaning as the English pronominal adjective she in such terms as she-bear, she-cat): and mukanil, vigor, force, power.

Xpiyacoc is not so easy of solution, but I believe it to be a derivative from the root xib, the male, whence xipbil, masculinity,[[147]] and oc or ococ, to enter, to accouple in the act of generation.[[148]]

We can readily see, with these meanings hidden in them, the subtler sense of which the natives had probably lost, that these names would be difficult of satisfactory explanation to the missionaries, and that they would be left by them as of undetermined origin.