S7E2 - Me Oh Maya: The Lords of Xibalba vs The Hero Twins

The stories featured in Greaking Out are usually original adaptations of classic Greek myths.

This week's story features a river of blood, decapitation, resurrections, giant bats, scary scorpion facts, sentient knives, the underworld, and using your inside voice.

Amazing feats.

Listen, and you'll see it's freaking

out.

We are on the move today and traveling to the ancient Maya homeland, which is modern-day Belize, Guatemala, and parts of El Salvador, Honduras, and Mexico, where the Maya civilization once thrived.

People lived in this area since way back, but artifacts from the Maya civilization started showing up around 1200 BCE, and the last independent Maya city fell to Spanish soldiers in 1697 CE.

So that's almost 3,000 years.

It spans from the New Kingdom in ancient Egypt all the way until just after the Salem witch trials in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

And of course, the Maya people still live in the Yucatan to this day.

In fact, there are 32 different Maya languages still spoken.

The ancient Maya had a system of writing and they did write things down, though most of what they wrote in books has been destroyed or lost.

Luckily, we still have a lot of their writing in the form of stone carvings, painted pottery, and other artifacts.

So, the story we're telling you today is from the Popo Vu, which you can think of as the Maya version of the Odyssey.

It tells the story of the hero twins and the adventures they have.

So, let's get to it.

The hero twins, Hunapu and Shibalanke.

Now, this is a long story, so we're going to fast forward to the part where the twins are teenagers.

You see, they don't know their father, who was the corn god, but they know that their father and uncle were killed by the lords of the underworld.

And they know that for some strange reason, their mother forbids them from playing ball.

Now, this probably isn't the ball game you're thinking of, not soccer or football or baseball.

In this game, there are teams of two or more, and you most likely had to hit the ball with your torso, so not your hands and not your feet.

The game was probably similar to volleyball or tennis, except played with solid rubber balls that could weigh up to 15 pounds.

We don't know exactly what version of the game Hunapu and Shibalanke were playing because this was a popular game throughout much of Mesoamerica and there were many different versions.

What we do know is that they were playing it loud.

Like, really loud.

Loud enough to annoy the gods of the underworld.

The Maya underworld was called Shibalba, or the place of fright.

It could be accessed by cenotes, which are special caves only found in this area.

And the lords of Shibalba were so annoyed that they started hatching a plan.

You see, this wasn't the first time this had happened.

In fact, the twins' father, the corn god Hunhunapu, and their uncle had also been noisy ball players, and the lords of Shibalba had conspired to kill them.

Starting to make sense why their mother forbid them to play the game, right?

The lords of Shibalba knew exactly what to do here.

They had a strategy that had been effective before.

They simply sent a lovely message to the twins to invite them down to the underworld for a friendly game of ball.

Well, the twins were definitely suspicious.

I mean, the lords of Shibalba were not known for being kind to people on the surface world.

Obviously, this was some sort of trap.

But was it wise to refuse an invitation from a god?

From all the evidence we've collected so far on this podcast, we can conclude that it would not be wise to refuse a god.

Exactly.

So down they went, down through a cinote, into the world of Shibalba.

Now, it's clear that the ancient Maya thought of the underworld as a real place because the area they lived in was filled with caves and underground rivers that they used for offerings and burials.

You can imagine the great big stalagmites and stalagtites, big pointy rock formations and caves looking like the huge jaw of some gigantic creature.

And like the Greek underworlds, one does not simply walk into Shibalba.

The going is treacherous and there are all sorts of obstacles in place.

First, the twins came upon a river of scorpions.

You heard that right.

A river of scorpions.

Now, I don't know if they were all stacked on top of each other or if they were just a mass of creepy crawlies and ways, to be honest, I don't even want to think too hard about a river of scorpions.

Scorpions are not good swimmers, but can survive up to 48 hours in water, breathing through their exoskeleton.

Great, that's so great.

I'm so glad they can do that.

It really fills my life with adventure.

Researchers have frozen a scorpion overnight and put it in the sun the next morning, only to watch them thaw out and walk away.

Yikes.

Well, somehow, Hunapu and Shibalanke got over this river only to be confronted with another river, a river of blood.

I have no idea where the blood came from.

It's just an unexplained river of blood.

Then there's a river of pus, which is much more gross than a river of blood, but less scary than a river of scorpions.

And finally, they came to a crossroads.

Now, many souls have been lost to to the crossroads, but the twins had a plan.

They had already enlisted a fearsome creature to help them.

In fact, this creature is the number one killer of people across the globe today.

It was a mosquito.

Yeah, okay, thanks for stealing my thunder there.

Yes, it was a mosquito, a terrifying creature that kills up to 1 million people every year.

Mosquitoes can carry a lot of diseases, and in many places, people sleep under mosquito nets to avoid getting bitten.

Yeah, that's true.

But in this story, mosquitoes get some good press because the hero twins ask their mosquito friend to find the right road to take.

The brave mosquito traveled down one road and then the other until she found where the gods sat in their council chamber waiting for the twins.

Once they get here, one of them said, we will test them on our names.

It would be so rude to misname a god.

The lords of Shibalva all cackled evilly.

But the mosquito had an idea.

She flew up to the closest god and did what she does best.

She bit him.

Ow!

The god wailed.

Why would you do that, skull splitter?

Really?

I've done nothing to you, bloody claws.

Ow!

How dare you, bone scepter?

It wasn't me, you won death.

And on and on until the tiny mosquito had learned all of the names of the lords of Shibalba.

She reported back to the hero twins, and they were so grateful that they gave her the ability to feast on human blood.

So, now you know who to thank for that.

Only female mosquitoes drink blood.

True.

Armed with knowledge now, Hunapu and Shiblanke flawlessly navigated the crossroads and found the lords of Shibalba there waiting for them.

They easily addressed each god by name, greeting them calmly and watching their evil smiles sink into looks of astonishment.

Well, said One Death, trying to recover from this setback, we are so glad you could come.

We heard you playing a ball game up there so loudly and thought, well, why not have a tournament down here?

What a splendid idea, said Hunapu cautiously.

But first, One Death said, looking around at his buddies, you must prove yourself worthy.

Now this was not unexpected.

The twins exchanged a look that said, here we go.

First, you must spend the night in the house of the night, said One Death.

It's a room full of darkness, as black as night.

But don't worry, we will let you borrow a torch.

And he handed the twins an unlit torch.

Don't forget, this is not a gift, but a loan.

You must return the torch to us intact in the morning.

Good luck.

And with that, the twins were thrown into the darkness of the house of night.

Now this was a dilemma.

The hero twins had to return the torch unburnt, so that meant spending the night in Shibalba, the place of fright, in the dark.

They knew the lords of Shibalba were watching from just outside, waiting for them to crack in the darkness, but Hunapu and Shiblanke were smarter than they appeared.

They had figured out the test of the crossroads and the names of the gods, so now they set to work on this one.

They fashioned a makeshift fire, not out of flame, but out of macaw feathers and fireflies.

The twins had light.

And outside the house of night, the lords of Shibalba were convinced that Hunapu and Shiblanke had failed the test, and soon the lords would get to kill them.

But in the morning, the twins returned the torch unburnt, just like they promised they would.

The lords of Shibalba were astonished.

How could this be?

They saw the flame.

Now, this might have been what made the lords drop all pretenses.

What happened from there on out was pretty transparent.

The lords of Shibalba were looking for an excuse, any excuse, to kill Hunapu and Shiblanke.

Okay, who's up for a commercial commercial break?

Anybody?

Show, okay.

Yeah, me too.

All right, we're gonna take a short break.

We'll be back on the other side with more Greaking Out.

Hey there.

Do you ever wonder what would happen if Cinderella started her own rock band or if Medusa realized just how cool her hair was?

Well, there's a Webby award-winning show called Girl Tales that takes classic stories and puts a unique twist on them, giving girls the chance to save the day, use their intelligence and bravery, and show that they can be the heroes of their own stories.

If you are ready for an adventure, find girl tales wherever you get your podcasts.

Okay, back to the story.

They next played a round-of-the-ball game.

In the underworld, it was normal to sacrifice the losers of the game to the gods, but the twins beat the gods, so they couldn't be sacrificed.

In fact, the lords of Shibalba had been defeated, which made them really angry.

You must pass another trial to play us again, said one death.

This time, the twins were sent to the house of knives.

This is pretty self-explanatory.

It's a room full of razor-sharp obsidian knives that move by themselves.

Absolutely terrifying.

But instead of trying to dodge the knives all night long, the brothers decided to talk to the knives, and they managed to convince them to be still through the night.

In the morning, the lords of Shibalba were bewildered and enraged once again.

Bewildered is a stronger word for confused and enraged is a stronger word for angry.

Right, because they were both very confused and very angry.

They didn't even want to play another ball game with the twins.

They just sent them directly to the next trial, the rattling house, as in a room so cold it makes your very bones rattle.

To survive, the twins had to start a fire in an old stump for warmth.

Then came the Jaguar House, which, you know, is full of jaguars.

Here they used a handy pile of bones, it was the underworld after all, and distracted the jaguars until they could get out.

The twins were getting exhausted, but the lords had one more trial for them to endure before they played again.

The bat house.

Well, after the house of knives and the jaguar house and the rattling house, the bat House didn't really sound all that terrifying, but these bats were huge and they were relentless.

All night long, the bats tried to swoop down and carry the brothers away.

And all night long, the twins fought off the bats.

Finally, they decided to hide in their blowguns for safety.

Blow guns are weapons used to hunt birds and small animals.

They consist of a long tube, which is where the twins hid, and some sort of dart.

I guess they got really small, but for hours they hid in their blowguns, waiting for dawn while the bats scrabbled their giant claws on the outside, trying to get in.

Finally, there was silence.

The dawn was nearing, and the twins were almost safe.

Hunapu peeked his head out of his blowgun cautiously to see if it was light yet, but the bats were waiting and took his head clean off.

The lords of Shibalba had been waiting for just such a sign of weakness.

Hunapu was headless, though it seemed his body still worked, and Shibalanke was exhausted from the ordeals.

Oh, now, now we can play the ball game again, and I know just what to use as a ball.

Skull Splitter took Hunapu's head from the bats and led the way to the ball court.

Now, Shibalanke was angry that they would disrespect his brother's head like that, but he knew that any outburst would just make the gods even angrier, so he calmly led his brother's headless body to the court.

Along the way, he found a pumpkin and placed it on his brother's shoulders.

Because,

you know, you need a head.

I imagine he drew a little smiley face on it.

Or maybe it was a game face.

Wait,

was that a little joke there, Oracle?

No,

it was an excellent joke it was an excellent joke yes

shibalanke was already hatching a plan as he drew on his brother's game face he would outsmart the lords of shibalba and get his brother's head back and then he would beat them at their own game

so during the game as the ball was flying back and forth shibalanke knocked it out of balance He went after it, and instead of giving them Hunapu's head as the ball, he scooped up a rabbit instead.

No word on if the rabbit volunteered for this, but after being knocked around a bit, the rabbit hit the ground hopping like a skipping ball and ran into the undergrowth.

While the lords of Shibalba searched for the missing ball, Shiblanke was able to quickly replace his brother's gourd head with his real head.

By the time the lords came back to the court empty-handed, Shiblanke had Hunapu's fake gourd head in his hands, ready to play ball.

Now the twins were real contenders in the match.

They had two players with heads instead of one.

The twins played hard, keeping the ball in the air, sending it back to the lords every time it came their way.

But then

disaster happened.

One of the lords of Shibalba hit the ball so hard it split, raining pumpkin seeds down onto the court.

Obviously, the ball swap had been discovered.

Now at this point, the lords of Shibalba dropped all pretense.

They would kill the brothers once and for all and be done with playing these games.

Cheating was enough of a reason.

I would like to point out that the lords of Shibalba also cheated.

Yeah, but they're gods and they can do what they want.

So they threw the two brothers into the fire and they burned up into ashes and washed away in the river.

This story is not ending on a happy note.

Oh, but the story isn't over.

You see, the twin's father was the corn god.

Did I mention that?

I think I did.

And the corn god is also the god of resurrection.

Resurrection is the act of restoring a dead person to life.

Right.

But just like corn dies in the winter and then regrows in the spring, the twins died in the fire but then were resurrected.

The lords of Shibalba were fascinated.

They were great gods of the underworld, but they had never seen anything so amazing.

Forget the ballgame, said one death.

I want to see that again.

And so the hero twins obliged.

Shiblanke killed Hunapu on the spot and then resurrected him.

The lords of Shibalba couldn't get enough.

They asked Shiblanke to do it again and again.

You know what the best part is?

Shiblanke asked as he resurrected his brother for the 10th time.

The best part is being resurrected yourself.

There's no feeling like it.

Well then, of course, the lords of Shibalba rushed to volunteer to be next.

They just had to experience this for themselves.

So the hero twins started killing the lords of Shibalba and then

not resurrecting them.

You probably saw that coming, didn't you?

But it was only after a good amount of the lords of Shibalba were dead that the surviving ones were like, hold on, wait a second.

Actually, you know, never mind.

The remaining lords begged the hero twins to restore their fellow gods, and eventually, after much wheeling and dealing, the twins agreed.

But they had some conditions.

The lords of Shibalba would no longer torment the upper world, the human world, and they would no longer require human sacrifice from the living.

In fact, the lords would give up their power over the living in exchange for the lives of their buddies.

And of course, the remaining lords of Shibalba had to agree.

So that's how Hunapu and Shibalanke triumphed over the lords of Shibalba.

They didn't use their strength, they used their smarts.

The lords of Shibalba, while less powerful now, still had power to torment souls on their way to the afterlife, and they did.

That's right.

See, this one is a lot like the Egyptian story that we told about Usir and Aset, in that it tells the Maya what challenges they may have to face when they go to the underworld.

That's kind of scary, right?

And everyone had to do it, with a few exceptions.

Those who were sacrificed in a religious ritual or died in childbirth were allowed to bypass the process.

So I think the lesson here is smarts wins over muscles every time.

And also, if you're going into the Maya underworld, you better come prepared.

I would definitely bring some anti-scorpion boots.

Yeah, and a flashlight.

They did not have flashlights.

Oh, okay, but did they have anti-scorpion boots?

They could have.

What even are anti-scorpion boots?

Is that, are they high tops?

Are they, you know, low-cut?

What?

I don't even know.

Greaking Out.

That's it for today's episode.

But next week, we're celebrating a very special anniversary.

So get ready for some epic attempts at myth-making.

This episode of National Geographic Kids Greaking Out is written by Emily Everhart and hosted by Kenny Curtis, with Tori Kerr as the Oracle of Wi-Fi.

Audio production and sound design by Scotty Beam, and our theme song was composed by Perry Gripp.

Dr.

William Suturno is our subject matter expert, and Emily Everhart is our producer.