Giant Megalodon Shark Teeth May Have Inspired Mayan Monster Myths

Big fossilized enamel from extinct megalodon sharks might have impressed portrayals of a primordial sea monster in Mesoamerican creation myths, in line with a brand new examine of the ideas of sharks in historical Mayan society.

The examine checked out how the Maya mixed a sensible, prescientific information of sharks with their conventional understanding of the world round them because the creation of gods and monsters.

Within the analysis paper, titled "Sharks within the Jungle: actual and imagined sea monsters of the Maya," revealed on-line Nov. 21 within the journal Antiquity, Sarah Newman, an archaeologist at James Madison College in Harrisonburg, Virginia, wrote that fossilized enamel from the extinct shark species Carcharodon megalodon had been utilized in sacred choices at a number of historical Mayan websites, similar to Palenque in southern Mexico, the place archaeologists have discovered 13 megalodon enamel. [See Photos of Megalodon Sharks and How They Inspired Mayan Myths]

Big megalodon sharks had been apex predators of the world's oceans from round 23 million years in the past till 2.6 million years in the past. Their enamel, jaws and vertebrae have been discovered at many websites in Central America.

Newman stated historical Mayan depictions of a sea monster named "Sipak" — also called Cipactli(which interprets to "Spiny One")to the Aztecs of central Mexico — have a single big tooth that bears a robust resemblance to the fossilized megalodon enamel from sacred choices discovered at Mayan websites.

"Mayan iconography is notoriously tough to piece out, however you possibly can see [the monster] is a reasonably sensible illustration of a shark with a bifurcated tail, and it has jagged jaws — nevertheless it does have that one central tooth," Newman instructed Dwell Science. "And the tooth has the identical mark on it that the Maya used to point supplies like jade — so it is telling you that it is onerous and glossy, the best way fossil could be additionally."

Sea monster myths

In some Mayan creation myths, the shark-like sea monster Sipak is killed by a god or legendary hero who kinds the land from its carcass, Newman stated. The motif of a single big tooth additionally seems in portrayals of different Mayan gods, together with an outline of the solar god at El Zotz, within the Mayan heartlands of the Petén Basin, now in northern Guatemala.

The Mayan phrase for sharks and different fearsome sea monsters, "xook," was additionally adopted by a number of Mayan kings and queens — for instance, Yax Ehb Xook ("First Step Shark"), the first-century founding father of the town of Tikal in Petén, and Ix Ok'abal Xook ("Girl Shark Fin"), an eighth-century queen of Yaxchilan, now in Mexico's Chiapas state, Newman stated.

Newman began her examine of the Mayan ideas of sharks after analyzing a cache of sacred objects, together with 47 enamel from a requiem shark (a household that features spinner and blacktip sharks) that had been buried inside two "lip-to-lip" ceramic bowls used as an providing at a Mayan pyramid at El Zotz between A.D. 725 and 800.

Marine objects similar to shark enamel, seashells, stingray spines and coral had been typically used to symbolize the oceans of the world in a ceremonial mannequin of the Mayan cosmos throughout the providing bowls, Newman stated.

"There's an understanding form of microcosm is recreated in these enclosed areas, in order that they're typically put in alongside the middle strains of temples and homes, to imbue these areas with vitality," she stated.

After noticing that the cache contained solely the serrated higher enamel of what was most likely a single requiem shark, Newman began to surprise how and why the shark stays had been transported or traded from the coast into inland Mayan cities similar to El Zotz. "After which I began fascinated about how these individuals within the inside would have made sense of these items which are coming in from the coast, which they may not have seen themselves," she stated. [Image Gallery: Ancient Monsters of the Sea]

Historic shark science

For the traditional Maya of the Yucatan Peninsula, with oceans on three sides, "the ocean marked the boundaries of the land in all instructions, a fabled residence to supernatural deities and energies," Newman wrote within the examine. "Sharks had been related to blood, ache and hazard worthy of consideration and depiction, however from a secure distance."

The Mayan idea of the "xook" sea monster was the results of prescientific efforts to elucidate their sensible information about sharks when it comes to their established cultural understandings of the world round them, Newman stated.

"The argument within the paper is that the Maya are doing a model of our personal concepts about pure historical past, the place they're combining bodily proof that they discover with myths that additionally they [regard as] true, and making sense of the world that manner," she stated.

Newman's analysis additionally examines the extent to which shark stays and cultural ideas about sharks had been shared over a big space of historical Mesoamerica for a lot of centuries.

"One of many issues that this examine and different current research present is that they are buying and selling issues forwards and backwards, and that there is a number of interplay occurring throughout lengthy distances," she stated. "So now we're getting a very good image of simply how related individuals had been — way more cell and related than I believe we are likely to assume."

Unique article on Dwell Science.

Tweet