Most North Americans experience mythology by way of translations of classical texts; and surprisingly few of us are familiar with Coyote; Spider Woman; Water Jar boy; Falling Sky Woman; or the epic of the Blessingway - to name just a few of the stories retold in this collection of significant myths of Native North America.David Leeming and Jake Page; building on the success of their Goddess: Myths of the Female Divine and God: Myths of the Male Divine; have provided an introduction and commentary on seventy-two myths drawn from a variety of cultures and language groups. They honor the Native pantheons; cosmologies; heroes; and heroines first as cultural expressions; then as variations on other mythic narratives to which they may be related; and ultimately as expressions of the larger human experience of mythmaking.
#2547045 in Books 1965-10-15 1965-10-15Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.00 x .56 x 6.00l; .75 #File Name: 0806111216234 pages
Review
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Five StarsBy Dorothy Bartoschit is excellent thank you2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. Hard to Read; but FascinatingBy NeodoeringThe Ritual of the Bacabs is a book of Mayan medicine and contains magical incantations; prayers and invocations that are used; along with various herbs and medicinal plants; to treat all sorts of illnesses both of body and spirit. No bones about it; this book is hard to read. It's pretty well organized; but there isn't a lot of explanation of what's going on; and what's going on is deep into the shamanic experience of the Maya Indians. If you have a fairly extensive understanding of Mayan thought and culture and have read a LOT of Mayan sources; such as the Books of Chilam Balam; you should have an interesting time with this work and be able to get enough out of it to be worth the effort it will take to read it. The prayers and incantations are sometimes a bit silly; sometimes breathtaking in their raw power and their point of view; which is that various evil spirits get together and bring about illness and disease through their illicit fornication; their hatred and their black magic.Through these spells you get a real sense that Mayan shamans do not see their kind of medicine as mere pharmaceutical "treatments" but as a brutal power struggle between shamans on one side and potent malevolent spirits on the other; in which the winner walks away with the flesh and the soul of the sick person and the loser is in peril of being destroyed by the winner. No doubt about it; these spells were meant to be performed; not merely spoken; and they were accompanied by changes of masks; the blowing of tobacco smoke; blasts of heavy drinking and alcohol-spraying; ritual dancing; shouting and cursing; bellowed prayers; invocations to powerful good spirits; and high drama; all in the flickering gleam of hearth fires and beeswax candles. When you picture these spells in such a light they take on the fiery glow of a full-fledged war and give you a sense of how shamans convinced their patients that the shaman really was looking out for them; was fighting for them; and ultimately would make them well. Difficult material to read; but powerful; if you have a little imagination and enough reading behind you to picture how this book was meant to be used by the Maya.2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. An interesting; if difficult; documentBy Roger CopelandThe Ritual of the Bacabs is an 18th Century text written in Yucatec Mayan that collects various shamanistic incantations together. The incantations are used for various physical ailments; in some areas such folk beliefs may still be prevalent in Central and South America. The language used is very cryptic and often difficult to understand. The text was given its name by William Gates in reference to the Bacabs; four Mayan gods mentioned throughout.Mayanist Ralph L. Roys translated the work shortly before his death in 1965. It has been out of print for a while now is thus not easy to come by these days. The document is interesting more as a curiosity than as something one can really get something out of. The obscure references to mythology and syncretic inclusion of Christian concepts(one incantation uses "Jesus Mary" as a mystical exclamation) make it worth looking into if you're really into Maya culture and mythos. If you're looking for something more accessible; seek out the Popol Vuh; and for a real trip; read the Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel; also translated by Ralph L. Roys.
