Who’s Throwing Rabbits at the Moon?
Western culture knows of the face on the moon and the man on the moon, but it’s not something I was able to picture. However, when I look at clouds or the spots on my walls or the ceiling, I imagine the weirdest things. There have been plenty of scientific studies into how and the reasons why people see recognizable shapes in random patterns. Even looking back to the 1930s neuroscientists were sceptical about the reliability of Rorschach Ink Blot Tests, along with the issues that could be brought up from assumptions about personalities and mental illnesses (Hertz, 1934; Wood, 2003). Pareidolia is a vague “universal tendency among mankind to conceive all beings like themselves, and to transfer to every object, those qualities, with which they are familiarly acquainted, and of which they are intimately conscious” (Hume, 1957: 29 in Dacey, 2017). In the case of the moon, cultures all over the world have different ideas about what they saw and still see in the shadows of the moon craters, especially variable when looking from the variety of locations depending on the latitude in the North and South hemispheres. Neuroscientist Joel Voss has been studying the purpose of the human brain’s wiring to recognize new images, and the general conclusion he drew was that the brain is “a flexible, all-purpose machine meant to succeed in whatever random environment it inhabits. To triumph in strange places, Voss says, the brain must be able to quickly process unfamiliar visual stimuli—like new shapes and lines—and figure out what's worth paying attention to” (Voss in Drake, 2014).
Various characters on the moon according to Nadia Drake, for Nat Geo in Why do people see faces in the Moon? Photograph by valery hache, afp/getty (Drake, 2014).
I don’t picture the man as Europeans were raised on, looking at the northern hemisphere, or the woman, when I looked from the southern hemisphere (never thought about it). I can see more of a fish, but only if actively trying to see something, and when I asked my mom, she said that she could picture a butterfly in the top left shadow, where I can see the fishtail and where the ears of the rabbit are. So, while I can’t see the face on the moon if pressed, I can picture the rabbit on the moon, and it appears recorded in an interesting mixture of disconnected and connected cultural areas.
Figure 2. Rabbit in the Moon, Adler Planetarium
Figure 3. Full Moon
Figure 4 & 5. Rabbits seen on the Moon, photos from Quora answer by Sean Lynch
But, before getting trapped in a different rabbit hole, diving into the psychology and neuroscience of vision, that rabbit will pop out and guide us through history and mythology instead. But, there’s the question, why a rabbit?
Part 1: Mesoamerica
Maya Region
The Classic “Evil Maya Bunny”
Figure 6. Remaining stucco pillar on The Temple of the Skull at Palenque (Whitehouse 2013).
The temple of the skull was the first incarnation that I had seen of the “evil Maya bunny” as our archaeological study abroad group called it. We also called our group the Adventure Van, so, you can tell that we’re not clever. While in Palenque, we came to the area with the temple pyramids next to the palace, had a lecture and proceeded to climb each open one. The Temple of the Skull, next to the closed Temple of Inscriptions, was where the stucco sculptures of the rabbit skulls were seen by a group of nine archaeology students in 2013, and hundreds of thousands of people after, during, and for hundreds of years before us.
Take a look at Palenque (INAH - The National Institute of Anthropology and History)
While the name ‘Palenque’ is Spanish for palisade, the Spanish didn’t name the city, and instead butchered the Nahuatl word plaa-n-ka meaning ‘decay or putrescence’ (C. Espinosa, 1976: 180). Even this, however, as a Uto-Aztec language name wouldn’t have been what the people living in the Late Preclassic to Early Postclassic Maya periods [~200-900 CE] would have called their city. Tzeltal, the language and the group of people, who still live today in Chiapas, Mexico, are the descendants of those who built and resided in sites like Palenque and Tikal (Schmal, 2004). Further research and discussion with locals from other scientists had determined that the possible original name of the city of Palenque, “Ghochan”, which compared to the roots of the word, either joch ‘empty’, unoccupied, joch’ ‘wood borer, dry rot’, or the cognate of joch’ meaning ‘worm-eaten’, all of which could, maybe in a roundabout way, connect to the Mixtecs’ name of ‘decay’ (Laughlin, 1975; Lhuillier, 1960: 4; Stross, 1982; 1985). In Yucatec Maya, however, the name for Palenque is Bàakʼ meaning ‘bone’ or ‘horn’, but also Lakamha, which means “Great Waters”, which could easily connect with its geographical local of being built right beside a large, permanent waterfall (Stuardo, 2020). Since the city-state of B’aakal is thought to have been abandoned something around 800 CE, after the end of the Late Classic, the thought I had was that some of the “Bone city” usages came up after its peak (but I have zero evidence of this).
One of the waterfalls within a five minute walk from Palenque (Whitehouse 2013).
Figure 7. The symbol on the left is from the Temple of the Inscriptions West Tablet.
The first part looks like drops of valuable liquid, maybe blood, being offered. It is called K’UH and means "divine."
The two circles on top form AJAW, meaning "lord."
The last part varies by kingdom, representing the specific place. In Palenque, it includes a bone or animal skull, read as BAAK, meaning "bone." "Bone" was essential in Palenque's ancient name.
(Skidmore 2008: 13).
Since the Mayan form of writing was in glyphs, their place names were, logically, in that representation. There are four different variants of the name glyph: one being some kind of bird, and the other three depicting bones, two of which are skulls, a brocket deer or a rabbit (Schele, 1977). Some academics have said that the deer and the rabbit alter egos are interchangeable in Mayan folklore and thus both of the emblem glyphs signify Palenque, although the deer are also thought to carry the sun to the hare’s moon (Figure 8) (Codex Borgia: 33; Linda Schele in Kelley, et al., 2002).
Figure 8. Hare and deer carrying the moon and sun respectively in the Codex Borgia.
Whatever the name was, or whether it changed over time, the stucco skull still lies at the top of the Temple of the Skull, otherwise identified as Temple XII or the Temple of the Dead Moon. The stucco is on the lone-remaining front-facing pillar of the Temple of the Skull, which shares the pyramid platform with the Temple of the Red Queen, named for the Queen buried underneath. Both of these temples have been dated to the 700s CE and were built upon hundreds of years of older building layers, with the base being a vault containing elite jade jewelry and some human bone (Bell, 2020). So, with the little information that we have, it’s mainly thought the relief is either a symbol of Palenque itself or that it represents a connection to the moon through the goddesses of the moon, such as Awilix, who are depicted holding rabbits as pets, causing the rabbit’s moon shadow, and a symbolic connection to the lunar cycle rituals ("Rabbit Skull Relief", 2020).
*Nahuatl:
1. the Uto-Aztecan language of the Nahuatl
2. a member of a group of peoples native to southern Mexico and Central America, including the Mexica.
Goddess I, Ix Chel, and More
Within the Maya area, there were multiple stories of different gods and goddesses being the moon or at least part of the moon’s story. The traditional Maya moon goddess during the Classic period was represented in the K’iché/Quiché Popol Vul written in the 16th century and the Dresden Codex, and in some versions, her name was either Goddess I ('White Woman'), Goddess O/ Ixchel (‘Red Woman’) or Awilix, and is sometimes separate from the lunar rabbit, a trickster character in the classic iconography (Carmack 2001:.362-363; Fox 1987 & 2008:.205; Taube 1992: 64-68; Thompson 1960: 240-241).
In some versions within the Maya area Goddess I was the terrestrial version of the water/moon goddess who was, more so, associated with wells, rainfall, and/or the rainy season, the name of whom we don’t know (Taube 1992:145).
Figure 11. Ixchel from Lara Croft Shadow of the Tomb Raider (Eidos-Montréal & Square Enix 2018).
This isn’t Ixchel, and yes, it’s an interesting choice and a pretty cool design in general, I hope that players will know the difference, or that they might look it up. They did incorporate the red part of the “red woman”, but there is more to her name. *I will add that I appreciate that they didn’t try to make her a malicious or evil character. *
The true Ixchel, or Goddess O, also known as the ‘Red Woman’, was a goddess of healing and birthing and was often depicted as an old woman or a midwife. Her name likely came either from the Yucatec Mayan in the northern part of the Yucatán Peninsula or the Poqomchiʼ (part of the Quichean–Poqom language branch of Mayan in many regions of Guatemala, as it was used in both areas (Bricker, 1998; "Demografía". Municipalidad de Chicamán; Gordon, 2005; Miles 1957: 748). Though, her name could’ve also been derived from the Maya phrase meaning "lady rainbow" or "she of the pale face” (Tatomir 2023). Sometimes conflated with the ‘White Woman’ or Goddess I, Ixchel is supposed to represent different aspects of the moon, or the interpretation of the moon in various stages of ‘her feminine cycle’, which is extremely prominent in the mythos. When written about in the codices, the distinction will be made by the appearance of either the glyph for ‘white’ (sak) or ‘red’ (chak) before the glyph for ‘women’ (ixik) (Stone & Zender, 2011: 35).
Figure 12. Name glyph of Ix Chel including the prefix 'red', Dresden Codex
As an extremely short and not at all nuanced summary of why the moon exists in phases from one particular area:
The Q’epchi myth has Po, the Moon Goddess, as the daughter of the Earth God and is “wooed” and captured by the Sun and then they sleep together. Whether consensual or not the pair are discovered by the Moon’s father who punishes her, not the Sun god, by literally destroying her. Braakhuis (2005) states that in the mythos this is likely the origin of female menstruation, it’s a punishment on all women because of one, who may not have even had a choice (but even if she did the sex willingly, it was not a feminist mythological culture). Luckily for the rest of existence the ‘evil blood’ was poured into 13 jars, which ended up transforming into animals, plants, poison, disease, and medicine, with the 13th jar holding the reborn Moon herself (Braakhuis, 2005:175-176; Braakhuis, 2010: 184-214; Thompson, 1930: 126-132, 125-138; Thompson 1939).
In other regions Ixchel is described as a jaguar-decorated Earth and war goddess, connecting more with the Mixtec Tlaltecuhtli, Tocî, and Cihuacoatl, who were called upon to aid midwives. With these sorts of connections, one Verapaz myth connects her with a spouse/her male manifestation, Itzamna, and her thirteen sons, and possibly the sweat bath (Coe, 1977: 329). Another myth, from Oaxaca, has Ixchel as an aged mother of the Sun and the Moon who is imprisoned within the sacred sweatbathes to become their patron deity (Thompson, 1970: 358-359). Neither of these connects to the moon, and the second has Ixchel interchanged with Xkitza, the Oaxacan Old Adoptive Mother, who doesn’t seem to connect to the sweatbathes (Thompson, 1970: 355-356). Suffice it to say, the mythology and general history of the region at large have been sufficiently twisted, especially if the records were written down in the 16th century, so unfortunately, we can’t be sure of the original stories.
Awilix
Figure 13. The Classic period Maya moon goddess may have been a forerunner of Awilix (Unknown Maya artist - Francis Robicsek: The Maya Book of the Dead. The Ceramic Codex, University of Virginia Art Museum (1981)).
Some studies instead refer to Awilix as the general goddess of the moon and the queen of the night, possibly derived from the Chontal Maya moon goddess C’abawil Ix in the Classic [250 CE-900 CE] and/or the K’iché Postclassic [900 CE -1521 CE] periods of Maya history (Carmack, 2001a;.362-363; Fox, 1987; 2008: 205; Orellana, 1981: 160). Awilix, and one of her representations, as a hare, was portrayed in the Maya calendar, as a symbol of the Ajaw (ruler) of the Kʼicheʼ capital Qʼumarkaj, and as the month of Ch’en meaning ‘well’, as in “Moon has gone to her well” (Carmack, 2001a: 362-363; Fox, 1987 [2008]:205; Thompson, 1970: 362). This expression is thought to refer to the New Moon, which could refer to the number of new moons that appear in the month or since she is also associated with one of “the Venus ‘years’” (Milbrath, 1999: 107-109). It could also have to do with the number of eclipses recorded and projected in the Dresden Codex and by the Lunar Series on the Long Count [calendar] with her specific calendar day probably being ik’ meaning “moon” in the 20-day cycle (Carmack, 2001a: 275; Milbrath, 1999: 107-109). Depending on the specific Mayan language, K’iché, Q’eqchi’, and possibly the Nahuatl Uto-Aztecan, the stories vary more based on the totem animals than what the goddess represents; the eagle for the lunar aspect and the jaguar as the aspect of the night, along with her association to the Underworld (Carmack, 2001a: 275, 363). Similarly, the swallow kwilix or wilix in the Q’eqchi’, may have been from where her name, Awilix, was originally derived before her worship spread along with the Popul Vuh (Carmack, 2001a: 363; Christenson, [2003] 2007: 198 n.552; Fox, [1987] 2008; Fox & Cook, 2008: 205).
Common Blood Motif
It seems that a common theme for a blood moon is to connect its concept to the mythology of a goddess. From the K’iché Popol Vuh manuscript, there was also the goddess Xquic, daughter of Cuchumaquic, who’s one of the Lords of Xibalba (Underworld), and she was sometimes referred to as “Blood Moon” or “Blood Girl/Maiden” (Colop, 2009; de Bourbourg, 1861; Read & Gonzalez, 2002; Taube, 1992; Tedlock, 1985). Long story very short, this woman appears in more of a creation/ virgin birth myth rather than any specific ties to the moon or rabbits. These new ties give a more peaceful transfer of power to the newly arrived and conquering Christianity as they can connect virginal birth to the origin myth of the Hero Twins, a staple in many Mesoamerican regions and specific cultures (Tedlock, 1985).
Figure 14. Ixchel (Maya Moon goddess) and her Rabbit, Jaina Island. 600-900 CE. Displayed in Museo del Cantón, Mérida. Late classic period. Jaina Island is characterized by this kind of ceramic.
Figure 15. Goddess O: Ixchel (unknown Maya artist: 1282; Museum of Fine Arts Boston, MA: 1988).
Figure 16. The Maya Moon goddess, as depicted on a drinking vessel excavated at Sacul, Petén, Guatemala. Museo Regional del Sureste de Petén, Dolores, Petén, Guatemala (Simon Burchell derivative work - cropped and lightened).
It’s unclear whether the rabbit in the images above being posed with the gods is supposed to be identified as the mostly unknown Moon Goddess (Figures -). They are thought by archaeologists to connect the Goddess and God shown with a function of the Moon, to specifically identify as a lunar rabbit, and, as mentioned previously is sometimes portrayed in oral stories to be a Trickster archetype (Taube, 1992). This aspect shows up within the mythology from the Maya people of Chiapas and the Northwestern Highlands of Guatemala wherein the Moon is either the Sun’s mother or grandmother and the Lunar Rabbit is either a god or goddess caught and shape-changed by the Moon or is a creature that helped maize regrow in the Sun’s field before being taken back into the sky (Milbrath, 1999: 24; Thompson, 1970: 362).
Uaxaclajuun Ubʼaah Kʼawiil, who ruled likely also known as "Eighteen Rabbit", was the 13th ajaw/ruler ruled from around 695-738 CE of the powerful Maya polity that contains the site of Copán, or in its Classic Mayan - Oxwitik in modern Honduras (Sharer, 2006; Stuart, 1996). Like other rulers there is an animal component to his name, but, so far, archaeologists and historians seemly haven’t made any links from the names to anything else. Though, their names are fun. One possible connection, made by me (so barely accurate), is based on stela A which states that Copán ranks with three other kingdoms, Calakmul, Palenque, and Tikal; the latter two of the three were on the same side and Palenque, which houses the stucco rabbit skull (Martin, 2008; Sharer, 2006). *Just like today there is a ton of political nuance that I am not equipped to get into. I will only wonder out loud, does having the name ‘rabbit’ connect this man to Palenque in away way?
Mexica
Figure 19. Mixtec carving of a rabbit Anthropological Museum of Mexico City. (Elainn / DeviantArt)
Although the Mexica have the goddess of the moon, read the Coyolxuhqui article or listen to the Podcast, as their storytelling moves away from the goddesses that shape mythology, they seem to have stronger connections to the moon itself. Rather than the rabbit loosely symbolizing the gods, appearing as a pet, or otherwise, there are short tales where the rabbit is more or less the hero while mainly being an innocent bystander being thrown at stuff.
Quetzalcoatl (or just a random man) was living on Earth and walked on a long journey, but without food or water, he was sure he would die. Then a rabbit who was grazing nearby offers to share her food with the tired and hungry Quetzalcoatl. He tells the rabbit he doesn’t eat vegetables, so she then offers herself as food. Moved by the rabbit’s altruism, Quetzalcoatl embeds the rabbit’s image on the moon so that the entire world will remember her.
Figure 20. Mētztli (literally "Moon") was a god or goddess of the moon, the night, and farmers. They were likely the same deity as Yohaulticetl or Coyolxauhqui and the male moon god Tecciztecatl; like the latter, who feared the Sun because of its fire. (Codex Borgia).
Another Mexica myth, and its variations, tell a different version of how a rabbit came to be on the moon and the part the god of Tecciztecatl played in the creation of the fifth sun.
Though Tecciztacatl and Nanahuatzin vied to become a new sun after the previous one died, Nanahuatzin jumped into the fire first, before being followed by Tecciztecatl. Angry at Tecciztactl for being too slow, the other Mixtec gods threw a rabbit at him, which left an impression and dimmed Tecciztecatl’s illumination so that he could only be seen in the night sky.
-or-
Nanahuatzin, being extremely humble, sacrificed himself in a fire to become the new sun, but Tecciztacatl was too cowardly to jump right into the fire and thus hesitated four times. Because of this, the other gods thought he shouldn’t shine as brightly as the sun and, like in the previous story, threw a rabbit at his face.
-or even-
[Possibly the nicest version] When sacrificing himself to become the moon Tecciztecatl was in the form of a rabbit and thus he cast his shadow (Smith, 2012).
-or even, again, but with a moral (maybe?)-
Figure 21. The Rabbit in the Moon, illustrated in Book VII of The Florentine Codex, 1577, an encyclopedia of early colonial Mexico compiled by Fray Bernardino de Sahagún (1499–1590)
“The gods were teasing the moon and flung a rabbit in its face. And the rabbit remained marked on the moon’s face. That is what darkened the face of the moon, as though it had been bruised. Upon which the moon went out to light the world.” – Translation of the Florentine Codex (Mursell, 2020).
*Because the rabbit/hare was the Mixtecs’ favored creature for hunting, it was identified with the Chichimeca, the hunter-gatherer peoples to whom the Mixteca (or the Nudzahui) partially trace their ancestry, along with the Totlecs (Newton 2002: 152).
According to Miller and Taub, “In Postclassic Central Mexico, the rabbit was also closely identified with the intoxicating drink pulque. This association is well documented in the day name Tochtli, meaning rabbit in. The patron of Tochtli was Mayahuel, the goddess of maguey [agave plant] and by extension its principal product, pulque” (142). Moreover, the many pulque gods were known collectively as the Ometochtli, a calendar name, with the literal meaning of “2 Rabbit” [a specific date] from the Classic Nahuatl word for pulque (octli) (Miller & Taube, 1993: 136; Smith, 2003: 88). From the Codex Borgia researchers found that Ometochtli is the calendar name of the god Tepoztēcatl/Tēzcatzontēcatl meaning close to “workable metal person” or “mirror 400 pearson” respectively. He is shown as the god of pulque, drunkenness, and fertility (along with his consort Xōchiquetzal, and was one of the Centzon Totochtin, meaning “400 rabbits” (Canto Aguilar 1998; Fernández, [1992] 1996: 146; Miller and Taub, 1993: 142).
Figure 22. This Mixtec-style rabbit sculpture features large round eyes, deeply sculpted ears, and a belt with skulls and crossbones. A bird's head with a human face in relief protrudes from its abdomen. Made of jadeite in the Late Postclassic era by the Mixtec. Located in Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Pre-Columbian Collection, Washington, DC.
Asides:
*Whenever 400 is used, it likely means an incalculable number (Fernández, [1992] 1996: 146).
The base of their math system was 20.
*Pulque: an alcoholic beverage made from the fermented sap of the maguey (agave) plant. [From experience it tastes a bit like Tequila, SO IT’S PRETTY GOOD, and it looks like very pale green snot. My professor loved it.]
Teotihuacán
In the UNESCO World Heritage Site, Teotihuacán evidence of cages for breeding rabbits and hares, or as the academic articles call them, cottontails and jackrabbits, have been examined recently, within the past 10 years (Somerville, et al, 2016; 2017). The large urban metropolis of Teotihuacán that was built in the center of (present-day) Mexico is thought to have been established around 100 BCE with its population height estimated at 125,000 or more from around 1 CE to 500 CE and its collapse approximately 50 years later when monuments and murals were sacked and systematically burnt (Dept. AAOA, “Teotihuacan”, 2001; King, 2004; Millon, 1993:18). To support such a large population, leporids (cottontails and jackrabbits) were bred and managed by humans for food and secondary products such as furs. (Sommerville, et.al., 2016; Sommerville, et.al., 2017). The evidence for this is found in traces of butchering on the leporid bones and within the isotope analysis of carbon and nitrogen of many archaeological specimens. These analyses showed that rather than hunting and butchering wild rabbits, the animals were subsisting on the cultivated food of the humans (Sommerville, et.al., 2016; 2017).
Figure 23. Avenue of the Dead, Teotihuacan. View from temple of the moon. (Whitehouse 2014).
Figure 24. At the same time as Teotihuacan, Veracruz pottery rabbit effigy vessel 300-900 CE, located at the Penn Museum
Figure 25. An illustration of the leporid sculpture from the Oztoyahualco compound of Teotihuacan. Credit: F. Botas; CCAL.
* So far, I haven’t found any connection to the Temple of the Moon, the Northernmost temple of the Avenue of the Dead with the Oztoyahualco, the residential and business compound north of the temple. Hopefully, more fieldwork can continue soon.
Olmec
The oldest cultural group of people in Mesoamerica flourished during the Formative period into the Preclassic, from around 1500 BCE to around 400 BCE with their central location at San Lorenzo Tenochtitlan in southeastern Veracruz, growing the Olmec Heartland (Diehl, 2004; Pool, 2007: 2). With their wide range of food options, one of the animals the Olmecs hunted was rabbits, the evidence of which has been found in midden surveys (Davies, 1982: 39; VanDerwarker, 2006: 141–144).
[map - pics]
[pic of rabbit god]
On display is the Rabbit God, Pre-Columbian Art from Chicayan, Ozuluama, and Veracruz in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City (Figure ) (National Museum of Anthropology Mexico City, 2008).
Similar to the shaping of the pulque vessel from the Mixtecs is a drinking vessel dating to between 1200 BCE and 1000 BCE from the Olmecs, likely also connecting to the later rabbit god of drunkenness and fertility (Figure ) (Heritage Auctions, 2008; Miller, 2019).
Toltec
The Toltecs were a culture who predated the Mexica empire by a few hundred years, being at their height in the Post Classic from 800 to 1100 CE, based in Tula, and possibly extended to the Maya city of Chichén Itzá (Smith, 2007). The Mixtecs would later adopt much of the Toltec culture and glorify “their intellectual and cultural predecessors”, which led scholars to acknowledge the largely mythical narrative of historical events (Berit, 2015; Smith, 2007).
In the Codex Borgia’s illustration of Tepoztēcatl, the rabbit/pulque god is holding a bent stick, rather than the later Mendoza Codex of 1541, in which he is thought to be wielding a copper axe. This seems to make a narrative sense because of the Mixtecs’ mythological view of all things Toltec and shows the roots of their inspiration (Séjourné, 1994).
Flat curved sticks, or Rabbit Sticks, are the Mesoamerican “non-returning boomerangs” found in Chichén Itzá, Tula, etc, and are thought to have been used to hunt animals, rabbits included. But these weapons were not restrained to hunting, believed to have also been wielded by Maya and Toltec warriors, as well as holding a good shield to guard against atlatl darts (Geib, 2018). Their use also extended up into the American Southwest’s (into Texas and New Mexico) cultural groups, such as Puebloans, which have a decent amount of cultural overlap with their southern neighbours (Geib, 2018; Morris, 1931).
Soft, Fluffy, Bone-y Conclusions
In this particular area, not even growing the topic into North or South America, there are multiple gods, goddesses, and creatures in myths who pull together all of the aspects of the moon and rabbits that we can all understand today.
The connections in these mythologies make so much regular, logical sense that it makes me wonder if archaeologists only came to these conclusions BECAUSE they “make sense” from a modern Western perspective. With a general human perspective looking at the entire region, the cultures were interwoven, and later cultures took inspiration from the great kingdoms of the past. Most, if not all cultures in the world saw that the moon has a monthly lunar cycle, just like a woman’s menstruation, so a woman could be the origin of the moon. And, with women’s obvious connection to fertility, in the general sense, the moon would as well. Then, with rabbits’ young age of fertility, along with their short gestation period, and because of their habitat niche as prey animals must keep the population numbers high, are constantly viewed as a fertility symbol and an easily accessible food source, somewhat like the cultivation of maize. When looking at human behaviour it makes sense that rabbits would be connected with the most popular alcoholic beverage of the region at the time, since, generally, alcohol releases inhibitions, ‘sometimes’ leading to more babies. Therefore, the connection between the moon goddess and a rabbit companion is hardly unfounded.
*And if anyone was confused about how there were so many “# Rabbit” it’s their date of birth name, like calling someone Three September. *
Further Listening:
http://www.astronomycast.com/2017/10/ep-463-pareidolia-and-the-moon/
Further Reading:
Figure 30. Book on animals in Pre-Columbian Art by Jeanette Favrot Peterson and Judith Strupp Green (1991)
The Stars: A New Way to See Them: H. A. Rey: 9780395248300: Amazon.com: Books: https://www.amazon.com/Stars-New-Way-See-Them/dp/0395248302
Studying the brain regions activated when a person sees the squiggles by Joel Voss, Kara D Federmeier, and Ken A Paller in 2012.
For an easy synopsis of all these myths: Moon Rabbit Myths from Around the World by DEBEYSKLENAR, 2018
If you want a pet rabbit and want to learn more: http://www.rabbitmatters.com/rabbit-stories.html
‘Aztec’ Creation of the Moon myth – the 2nd part of Ben Traven’s Book. <https://www.mexicolore.co.uk/aztecs/stories/creation-of-the-moon>
Codex Borgia, with follow-up links: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-americas/early-cultures/aztec-mexica/a/codex-borgia
Photos of the Codex Borgia [Digital Library]: https://digi.vatlib.it/view/MSS_Borg.mess.1
Berrin, Kathleen, and Esther Pasztory. Teotihuacan: Art from the City of the Gods. New York: Thames & Hudson, 1993.
Berlo, Janet Catherine. Art, Ideology, and the City of Teotihuacan: A Symposium at Dumbarton Oaks, 8th and 9th October 1988. United States: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1992.
Sugiyama, Saburo, and Ruben Cabrera. Voyage to the Center of the Moon Pyramid: Recent Discoveries in Teotihuacan. Exhibition catalogue. Tempe: Arizona State University, 2004.
Videos:
Holiday Tales: Easter! : OSP - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uV-Hhy-14qw
Citations:
Bell, B. (2020). Palenque - The Temple of the Skull. From https://www.ontheroadin.com/Mexico%20Archeology/Palenque%20Themple%20of%20the%20Skull.htm
Braakhuis, H. E. M. (2005). Xbalanque's Canoe. The origin of poison in Q'eqchi'- Mayan Hummingbird myth. Anthropos, 173-191.
Braakhuis, H. E. M. (2010). Xbalanque's Marriage: A Commentary on the Q'eqchi' Myth of Sun and Moon.
Bricker, Victoria (1998). Dictionary Of The Maya Language: As Spoken in Hocabá, Yucatán. University of Utah Press. p. 181.
Canto Aguilar, Giselle (1998). El Tepozteco, Morelos (Miniguía) (in Spanish). Mexico: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.
Carmack, R. M. (2001). Evolución del Reino K’iche’: Kik’ulmatajem le k’iche’ab’. Guatemala City, Guatemala: Editorial Cholsamaj.
Christenson, Allen J. (2007) [2003]. "Popul Vuh: Sacred Book of the Quiché Maya People" (PDF online publication). Mesoweb articles. Mesoweb: An Exploration of Mesoamerican Cultures.
Coe, Michael (1977). "Supernatural Patrons of Maya Scribes and Artists." In N. Hammond. Social Process in Maya Prehistory. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. pp. 327–347.
Colop, Sam (2009). Popol Wuj, traducción al español y notas de Sam Colop. Cholsamaj.
Corzo Espinosa, C. (1976). Chiapas toponymy or garden of the geographical names of Chiapas (No. C CH / 910.014 C6).
Dacey, M. (2017). Anthropomorphism as cognitive bias. Philosophy of Science, 84(5), 1152-1164.
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