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Popol Vuh
The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiche Maya
By Adrien Recinos
"During the middle of the sixteenth century a literate Quiché Indian transcribed his folk legends into Latin script in his own language. Late in the seventeenth century Father Francisco Ximénez, parish priest of Santo Tomás Chichicastenango, copied and translated the now lost manuscript. This is the first complete English translation, taken from the Spanish version of the Guatemalan diplomat, linguist, and ethnologist, Adrián Recinos....Its account of their cosmogony, mythology, traditions, and history will prove intensely interesting to students of anthropology, folklore, theology, and history."--American Sociological Review.
"’Popol Vuh,’ meaning "Book of Community,’ is a mixed record of the cosmic beliefs, folklore, semi-historical migrations and genealogies of the Quiché Indians, one of the Maya tribes that lives in the highlands of Guatemala....The book is well worth reading. Here is a narrative of bold mythological adventures combined with the facts of recorded history; a picture of a world mentally and emotionally remote from our own."--New York Herald Tribune.
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