Yax Che- Maya LocationLocation · Landmark"First Tree"

The Axis of All Worlds

The ceiba tree grows buttressed roots like the walls of a temple, a trunk that can reach forty meters, and branches that spread horizontally at great height to form a canopy that looks, from below, like it holds up the sky. The Maya placed this tree at the center of everything. Its roots plunged into the nine levels of Xibalba. Its trunk passed through the middle world of humans. Its branches supported the thirteen layers of heaven.

In Maya cities, the central plaza often contained a living ceiba or a stone monument carved to represent one. The Temple of the Foliated Cross at Palenque shows Yax Che as a cruciform tree heavy with maize, its branches thick with offerings, its roots gripping the underworld. Four directional trees stood at the corners of the world, each assigned a color: red in the east, white in the north. The great green ceiba held the center.

Between the Realms

Itzam-Ye, the celestial bird, perched in the highest branches. The Popol Vuh identifies him with Vucub Caquix, Seven Macaw, the false sun of the previous world age who claimed to be the light before the true sun existed. His seat atop the World Tree placed him above the gods until the Hero Twins shot him down with their blowguns.

The sarcophagus lid of K'inich Janaab Pakal at Palenque shows the king falling along the trunk of the World Tree into the open jaws of the earth. Itzam-Ye perches above. The roots of the tree reach below. Pakal descends between them, following the same route the sun takes each night into Xibalba. The carving turns the tree into a map: heaven at the top, the underworld at the bottom, and the dead king in transit between them.