The Popol Vuh is written in progressive tense, suggesting the narrator sees it before him as he writes. This is consistent with the way stories are told in contemporary Quiche households. The storyteller invites the listener to imagine the setting of his tale, and nearly always tells the story as if it were happening right then, even if it happened in the distant or mythic past.
Joshua J. Mark
1554-1558 CE
The Popol Vuh is the story of creation according to the Quiche Maya of the region known today as Guatemala. Translated as `The Council Book’, The Book of the People’ or, literally, `The Book of the Mat’, the work has been referred to as “The Mayan Bible” although this comparison is imprecise. The Popol Vuh is not regarded by the Maya as `the word of God’ nor as sacred scripture but rather as an account of “the ancient word” and the understanding the Quiche had of cosmology and creation before the coming of Christianity. The Quiche referred to the book as an Ilb’al – an instrument of sight – and it was known as “The Book of the Mat” because of the woven mats the people would sit on to hear the work recited at the council house. One such building, at Copan, features stone lintels `woven’ to look like such matting.
