The Precolumbian Cosmos (cf. Heleman 3:8)

  

THE PRECOLUMBIAN COSMOS

 

In Precolumbian Mesoamerica, man conceived of his earth as a horizontal plane oriented to four world directions. This earthly realm was surrounded by water and vividly depicted as a spiny crocodile or a fish-like monster floating on the sea. Although the crocodilian metaphor is no longer found in native American thinking, the four-fold division of the cosmos, with a fifth direction in the center, has persisted. The Popol Vuh records that the world was marked out with “four sides” and “four corners” (Tedlock 1985:72). Of the four world directions, the most important axis was created by the sun’s daily route from east to west. The directions were not always aligned with the cardinal directions, but sometimes determined by the points at which the sun rises and sets at summer solstice (June 21) and winter solstice (December 21). (Jeanette Favrot Peterson, Precolumbian Flora and Fauna: Continuity of Plant and Animal Times in Mesoamerican Art [La Jolla, Calif.: Mingei Intl Museum of World, 1990], 12)

 

Further Reading:

Brant Gardner on Helaman 3:8

Margaret and Stephen Bunson on "Cardinal Points" in Ancient Mesoamerica

Freidel, Schele, and Parker on Mesoamerican peoples symbolically centering themselves in a universe that existed inside the four directions

Brant Gardner, "Where are the Nephite Sea East and Sea West?"