The Ancient Mayan World Tree

The Mayan World Tree The World Tree, is a very widespread motif in the pre-Columbean Americas. It appears often in Creation myths, in the ancient cosmology and as an important iconographic element in the artwork of varied cultures across America. The use of the tree as a cosmic symbol exists on a wide and diverse scale in cultures from the Viking World Tree (Yggdrasil) - as well as in the Jewish Tree of Sephirot. The Mayan World Tree represents the four directions of the world, where the tree itself is the center -The Mondi axis is the point where earth and sky meet with the perpendicular and horizontal axis of the world. The symbol originates from the world view that aspires towards logical order in the chaotic Universe. This understanding creates an ordered microcosmos where there is a defined center. From the center, we can turn to each of the cardinal directions in search of knowledge, wisdom and new discoveries. However , outside of this world, there is chaos, night and death. The image of the tree represents the symbolic axis that unites the three planes: The sky (branches), the earth (the trunk) and the lower world (the roots). Every object that is hanging on the tree represents the tension between the underworld and the upper world and in this way turns into a very strong symbol of the storehouse of knowledge and wisdom. Often, in Mayan art, there are images of birds sitting on the tree representing an ancient father , while the tree's roots are in the water- a symbol of the underworld. The Image of the Mayan World Tree is an accurate depiction of the Ceiba Tree with it's bottle like trunk covered with thorns which reminded the ancient Mayan people the body of a crocodile. The crocodile tree became a symbol of the cosmos or the Milky way and the reason that I chose this symbol is because it is one of the first human symbols of the cosmos and because we are all eventually Starchildren. Every atom in our body came straight out of the furnaces of long forgotten supernovas in the far regions of space. This is a powerful symbol because it actually depicts pure consciousness - it shows the human being, the starchild looking and trying to understand itself - the universe.