It is known that ordinary ancient Maya had very few personal possessions. They cultivated the land with simple tools and lived in huts similar to the ones still used by their descendants. The ruling class, kings, nobility, priests, lived rather extravagantly in palaces. The kings claimed to be gods or representatives of gods, and had complete control of whatever was written on monuments and possibly in many of the bark paper books, a virtual monopoly of the only medium of mass-communication. Kings and priests supervised the scribes when they wrote, and, since writing was limited to a small percentage of the population, it was rather risky for scribes to write anything having to do with dissent as they could be exposed. Nevertheless, if they ever did choose to risk death, their uncensored works are now lost.
The claim of divinely anointed dynasties legitimized and perpetuated the power of the ruling classes. Commoners everywhere were led to believe that in exchange for yanking the beating hearts of captured enemies, the gods advised only their legitimate kings on anything essential to the well-being and survival of the polities, from matters of rain and agriculture to issues of war and peace. This myth was gradually exposed at the end of the late classical period, when a devastating drought lasting two-hundred years occurred. The deeply religious Cholan-speaking Maya in the Petén jungle depended on abundant, predictable rain not just for drinking and agriculture, but for transportation as well. The great river systems draining this vast area, principally the Usumacita and Motagua, were the easiest, most effective means of conducting commerce among the many polities located along or near their banks as well as with foreign, distant lands that supplied critical commodities not locally available. In their eyes, a disaster of this length and magnitude meant either that the kings were no longer able to intercede with the gods, or that they never could; either way, they lost their legitimacy.
The trail of cinnabar is undeniable evidence that, because of their location and geography, both Yucatecs and Cholans were maritime traders. Recent intense excavations in Cholan ruins, such as Copán, Palenque, Yaxchilán, and others, reveal its widespread availability. Cinnabar was used in many ways, including pottery, writing, textile dying, and most importantly, burials. This fixation -one can almost call obsession- with cinnabar was not because people were particularly fond of its color, or because they necessarily were unaware of alternate materials to produce the same shades of red. As with other distant and unrelated cultures such as China and Egypt, the Maya thought that cinnabar had mystical properties.
The Maya believed that after burial, bodies could resurrect and search for its immortal soul that had departed at death. Left untreated, they would roam the countryside at night, and, unsuccessful in their search, would forcibly wrench a soul from the living to replace their own. Terrified with the undead, people stayed home after dark, hoping that the measures they had undertaken to prevent this nightmare would suffice. They would place a heavy rock, lid, or boulder to seal a tomb, which, it was hoped, would stop the undead from emerging. They would also apply a heavy coat of cinnabar to the body. When it inevitably resurrected, the cinnabar would make the deceased accept the fact that it was dead and that its soul was gone forever. The corpse would have peace and leave the living alone. Cinnabar, therefore, implicitly invoked the protection of the Benefactor in whatever use it was involved with, and explains its heavy and widespread geographic and demographic use. When one wrote hieroglyphs about the gods, cinnabar reverently formalized the serious, faithful nature of what was said. When one wore garments with cinnabar one identified with the gods, preempting any possibility that evil spirits from Xibalbá (the underworld) might attempt any harm. Cinnabar, therefore, was fundamental, essential, vital. The king said so; the priests concurred.
The absence of local cinnabar mines combined with its widespread availability implies that an efficient, elaborate distribution network must have existed. Lacking beasts of burden, rivers were the freeways of the day. Slaves powered the ships on whose backs merchants and entrepreneurs traded furiously to generate the income with which to pay for the cinnabar.
It is known that there were –and still are- substantial deposits of cinnabar and obsidian at Pinal de Amoles and Sierra Gorda, north of modern Quéretaro City, in central Mexico. The Olmecs conducted intense mining operations and supplied Teotihuacán and El Tajín del Totonacapan. However, the most intense mining took place toward the Terminal Classic period and the beginning of the post-classic, a period which coincided with the highest degree of activity in the Cholan areas to the south. Teotihuacán, a great cultural, military, and commercial node northwest of today’s Mexico City, supplied central Mexico and the Maya-speaking Teenek (Huastecs) living along the Gulf Coast in modern day Tamaulipas and Veracruz States with cinnabar. It was here that the great ocean-going pirogues –
galley-sized canoes used by coastal dwelling peoples in the Caribbean- owned and supervised by Cholan merchants but powered by captured slaves, came to pick up vast amounts of cinnabar and rare types of obsidian bound for the rest of the Mayan realm, and to deliver much prized tropical goods such as quetzal and macaw feathers, skins, seashells, and medicines heading for the Mexican plateau. The trade was vital to the economies of both areas. Entire urban centers were devoted to the mining of cinnabar and obsidian in Querétaro State, such as Ranas of San Joaquín and Toluquilla of Caderyta de Montes. And in Maya polities, cinnabar helped the ruling class maintain and perpetuate its legitimacy. In both areas the powerful wealthy upper classes benefited the most because only they could afford to hoard the goods that defined and perpetuated a growing wealth inequality.
The evidence of this connection between Teotihuacán and Copán in today’s western Honduras, distant as they are from each other, is confirmed by the archeological and epigraphic record. Glyphs related to the founder of the Copán dynasty, K’imich Yax K’uk’ Mo’ (Great Sun, Green Quetzal Macaw) make reference to his association with Teotihuacán at the time of his accession to the throne on September 6, 426 AD, and there are reasons to believe his attire resembled that of contemporary Teotihuacán (Stuart, 2004). Except for a brief period, this association was maintained unbroken throughout the Classical Period of the Copán Dynasty. In conclusion, as previously stated, the physical presence of cinnabar inside the Copan tombs on the one hand, and the existence of mines in Queretaro at the other end of Mesoamerica on the other, conclusively prove that this commerce did in fact take place.
Cinnabar is not holy water, and it certainly is not an innocuous, harmless compound. Its mercury content is in fact highly toxic, the degree to which is only now beginning to be fully understood. A growing number of studies document the human toll: children exposed to mercury are slower to walk and talk and may be more susceptible to autism and attention deficit disorders. Adults can suffer memory loss, nerve damage and fatigue.