Lost Civilization Maya 5 of 6

commemorated the entire reigns of kings

and queens

the deciphered glyphs revealed the names

of maya royalty

18 rabbit smoke jaguar

stormy sky and lady shellstar

the lives of these rulers their

ancestors and their conquests

all the stories locked within the glyphs

could finally be told

fifteen years after discovering the

skeleton with the jade mask

alberto roos would now learn his

identity

he was lord pacal king of the city-state

palenque

the tenth in a line of rulers that

stretched back

three centuries he ruled for almost 70

years

lord pakal was one of the most powerful

kings in the history of the americas

these were monarchs who commanded

complex cities

large populations and vast areas of land

they ruled over their citizens with

arrogance and disdain

but what was the source of their

authority

why did their subjects submit to such

tyrannical rule

we keep looking for the underlying

source of the power of the kings

searching for

economic and political and military

power on a fairly grand scale

but the power isn't based in controlling

resources or manipulating the economy

or mounting large armies it's based upon

belief

that is the power of the maya kings and

it was a great one

and it achieved great things

the power of the maya kings

to understand it we must follow a trail

of blood

a knife made from a stingray's spine

a rope of thorns

these are the keys to comprehending the

maya and the sacred power of their kings

every portal of every maya temple

is a doorway to the underworld

inside this temple it is the duty of

both king and queen

to reenact the mythical moment of maya

creation

in myth it was the blood of gods that

gave life to man

this was the original act of sacrifice

on earth the king is as a god

and blood is the price of power

the debt to the gods that must be repaid

myths and symbols will not suffice

blood must be shed

and royal blood drawn from the tongue

and from the genitals

from his queen and from himself

forever bound that sacrifice of the gods

to the life of man

um

as his subjects watch the bloody

sacrament of the king

spirals upwards to the gods in return

for the sacrifice of royal blood the

crowd believes

the gods will cause the sun to rise the

rains to fall

the corn to grow

for art historian linda shealy these

macabre bloodletting rituals provide the

final key to understanding the maya

in the new world people believe

that your soul the most potent part of

you the part that's indestructible the

part that you will pass on to your

grandchildren and to your

great-grandchildren

just the the thing that is eternal

resides in your blood so

if you wish to give an offering that is

the most precious and powerful thing on

earth

you give your blood

when the king gives his blood he's first

of all giving the most powerful

substance on earth

because his blood because of his

ancestry

because of where he comes from because

of the amount of times that he travels

to the other world and comes back

his blood is more potent than an

ordinary person

remember that the kings had to do

rituals of genital bloodletting and

self-laceration on a regular basis

so that kind of keeps you honest you

know if i think if we had some genital

blood letting in modern politics it

would

thin out the herd and might be a good

good approach to finding the honest

politicians

in fact all maya gave offerings of their

blood

the difference between them and

us is we have it easy

we say you can tithe you can get money

out of your pocket

you can give something that doesn't hurt

something that really doesn't cost you

anything

nehemiah don't let you make that sort of

surrogate

sacrifice you really have to give the

blood

and there were other even bloodier

offerings

skull racks commemorate war captives

sacrificed to ensure the continuity of

the maya world

even the ball game served a deadly

purpose

the contest in fact is not a game at all