Hun Hunahpu
Father of the Hero Twins; husband of Xbaquiyalo (first wife, mother of Hun Batz and Hun Chuen) and posthumous lover of Xquic (mother of Hunahpu and Xbalanque). Decapitated by the Xibalba lords; his severed head, placed in a calabash tree at the crossroads, spat saliva into Xquic's palm and impregnated her with the Hero Twins. The genealogical hinge of the Popol Vuh: the Twins' eventual defeat of Xibalba is in direct vengeance for their father's and uncle's execution. Iconographically the Classic-period Maize God Hun Nal Ye ("One Maize Revealed") is the unambiguous reflex; this identification, established by Schellhas's typology (God E) and confirmed through Tikal Burial 116 royal-as-maize-god regalia and the Resurrection Plate K1892, places Hun Hunahpu at the center of Classic Maya royal theology: the king IS the Maize God resurrecting from the underworld each agricultural season. The K'iche' royal lineages (Cawek, Nihaib, Ahau-Quiché) trace dynastic descent through this figure. Tikal Stela 31 (445 CE) shows King Siyaj Chan K'awiil II in maize-god regalia holding the heads of his ancestors; the Pakal sarcophagus lid at Palenque (683 CE) shows the king as Maize God descending into and rising from the World Tree-as-maize-stalk. The Hun Hunahpu / Maize God identification is among the most over-attested theological-iconographic equations in the entire pre-Columbian record.
Parentage
Children
Powers
- Spits from the severed skull
Epithets
- Hun Nal Ye
Relations
- sibling: Vucub Hunahpu
- lover: Xquic
- father of: Hunahpu
- father of: Xbalanque
- twin sibling: Vucub Hunahpu
Sources
- Popol Vuh (Ximénez ms.)
- Resurrection Plate K1892; Tikal Stela 31; Yaxchilan Lintel 25; Codex-style polychrome corpus
- Popol Vuh, Part II opening
- Coe, "The Hero Twins: Myth and Image" (1989) in Kerr Justin, ed., The Maya Vase Book Vol. 1
- Schele & Miller, The Blood of Kings (1986)
- Taube, The Major Gods of Ancient Yucatan (1992)