Huracan, Q'uq'umatz, and Tepeu spoke the world into being over the primordial waters, raising the earth and establishing Yax Che, the great ceiba world tree, as the cosmic axis connecting heavens, earth, and underworld.
The Bacabs stand at the four corners of the world while the Yax Che rises at its center. Together they form the five-point cosmic support structure depicted in Maya art, holding up the sky from periphery and axis.
In Yucatec Maya belief recorded by Landa, Ixtab guides the souls of those who die by hanging to a paradise beneath Yax Che, the great ceiba world tree, where they rest in its shade with abundant food and drink.
In Classic Maya monumental art, the Vision Serpent rises alongside the Yax Che during royal bloodletting rites, the two cosmic axes converging as smoke and sacred ceiba merge to open a channel between the living and the ancestral dead.
In Classic Maya art and the Popol Vuh, Vucub-Caquix perched atop Yax Che as the Principal Bird Deity, claiming the world tree's summit as his throne. The Hero Twins shot him down from this perch with their blowguns.
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