THE FALL OF LYOBAA, AUGUST 1410
After
the crushing Tiho victory at Yagüi, the high priest of Lyobaa ultimately surrendered to Mahpilxocoyōtl in August 1410, allowing the Little Finger to inch closer to Cholōllān.
[A ceiba is a tall tree that grows in Maya country, such as in Tiho; an ahuehuete is a tall tree of Central Mexico, such as in Cholōllān.]
It felt bizarre to have someone look him in the face.
No commoner dared face the
huìa tào, the high priest of Lyobaa. Who would, when he was the greatest of all Zapotec priests, oracle of the god of the Underworld? They always looked down, fear on their eyes that fled his gaze, their skin pale and dotted with goosebumps. But not Lord Mahpilxocoyōtl. The Maya met his eyes with the pride of a conqueror, and the priest had not seen another man’s eyes for so long that he had almost forgotten what eyes looked like and the experience unnerved him.
The priest fidgeted with his fine cotton chasuble, letting his fingers trail over the cloth pumas and eagles and hummingbirds embroidered in red and blue. Then his hand dropped to the jaguar skin that coated his feather-stuffed cushion throne, rubbed the coarse hair, rose back to his chin. His fingers sank into his beard and tugged on the strands. But he was too fidgety, and the general was smiling—he saw his anxiety and was mocking him, and this would not stand—he let his hand fall back to the cushioned jaguar pelt and reminded it to stay there.
Mahpilxocoyōtl sat on a smaller jaguar-pelted feather-cushioned throne, the one normally reserved for the most powerful Zapotec monarch, the king of Zaachila. The general’s hands toyed with the jaguar’s paws. It was mildly comforting, mused the priest, to see that his own throne was still the largest in the room. It told him that even captured by the Maya, Lyobaa remained his city, the beating heart of the Zapotec priesthood. For how long he did not know, and perhaps tomorrow Mahpilxocoyōtl would cross his legs on the priestly throne where he was seated now. But tomorrow had not come yet, today was still today, may every day still be today.
“Your city fought well, Your Holiness.” said the Maya. His Isatian was colored with an accent that was hard to understand, but the priest’s was too, so they could hardly begrudge the other.
“Your men too, my lord.”
“Mictlān [Place of Death] was aptly named.”
The priest had nothing to say to this.
“Your Holiness’s mitre is crooked.”
The priest rearranged the cotton mitre on his head, and he thought his heart might burst. He caught himself evading the general’s eye (as if
he was the priest and the priest the commoner!) and mentally slapped himself.
“No need to be nervous, Your Holiness.”
“I am not,” the priest growled back, briefly paused before adding, “
my lord.”
“No need to be aggressive either.”
The
huìa tào said nothing in response but only glared at the general in the faint hope that if he glared strongly enough his eyes might bore holes in the other’s face and finally shut him up for good.
“And there’s no need to stare either, Your Holiness.”
The priest shook his head imperceptibly.
“Your Holiness, I come here to propose a deal.”
“I listen, lord.”
“There were once two ceiba trees growing side-by-side. Then the two trees began to compete. Each would strive to be the taller and to beat down the other with its branches. Eventually the ceibas had grown so tall that their trunks could no longer support them, and they toppled to the ground, both on the same day. And the whole earth trembled when the two trees fell. What happened then, Your Holiness?”
“I suppose that once the ceiba trees no longer blocked out the sunlight, all the little bushes would thrive.”
“
Precisely. Another analogy, Your Holiness, if you will excuse me. Two turkey cocks fight each other on a sandy field. Then the fight is indecisive, and they leave. Who won the fray?”
“The turkeys will no longer bother the sand on the ground; the sand won the fray.”
“Indeed, Your Holiness. When ceiba trees fall, the little shrubs rejoice; when turkey cocks leave, it is the sand’s day to reign.”
“And, my lord, if it is not two ceiba trees that fall, but a ceiba and an ahuehuete?”
“It is much the same, Your Holiness.”
“I understand. But, my lord, how certain are you that both trees will fall, that the cocks will wear each other out?”
“I am a man of swords, Your Holiness, as much as Your Holiness is a man of gods. I know such things of shields and arrows, and I am sure that both sides will lose this war.”
“You doubt your god, then, my lord?”
“Your Holiness, I doubt he is a god.”
The
huìa tào nodded, felt his mitre slip out of his head, and reshuffled it. He thought Mahpilxocoyōtl was smiling and told himself that that was paranoia.
“Feel free to take off the mitre, Your Holiness, it encumbers you—”
“No.”
And now it was Mahpilxocoyōtl’s turn to be silent.
“So what is your plan, my lord?”
Lord Mahpilxocoyōtl’s hand went to a bag that hung on his robes, and out came a layer of dry and crumpled skin.
“A caul?” The priest could not conceal his surprise. “Is it yours?”
“My grandson’s, Your Holiness. He is five years old now.”
“If I were not a priest and could marry, how much I would envy you, my lord! Children born with the caul are always favored by luck.”
“Indeed, Your Holiness. And my grandson was fated for kingship, the horoscopers say.”
There was a pause, an impasse where the lord expected the priest to speak but the priest did not want to speak, and at last Mahpilxocoyōtl said:
“What does Your Holiness say?”
What was best for the gods, best for the people of Lyobaa, best for himself (but no, he ought not to think of himself, a priest was but a servant)? What would spare the people from becoming extensions to Tiho skull racks, the images of the gods from exile far away?
Compliance would.
And when Ah Ek Lemba died and Mahpilxocoyōtl died, the child could be disposed of.
“The horoscopers read the stars, and the stars are the gods, and the gods are whom I serve. My lord—” here the priest grasped for words—“My lord, I hear what you ask and obey. I will train the child in the science of kingship. When the Cholōllān ahuehuete and the Tiho ceiba fall, when Nahuas and the Maya tear each other apart, I will help the boy establish a new kingdom here, here in Oaxaca. Your grandson will become a ruler unlike all others. I will make sure of that.”
“Your Holiness, swear an oath by your gods.”
The
huìa tào hesitated.
“Why the hesitation, Your Holiness?”
Hesitation.
“Your Holiness, if not for me, you were already a head on a pole, a skull on a rack. Grant me this favor due one by whom you lived.”
The priest reflected, swallowed, and said,
“Then let us swear.”
The two left the priestly quarters they called the Hall of the Columns and walked to the nearby shrine. Before the effigy of the death god Coquebila, they burned incense and offered the pea-tiny hearts of hummingbirds in sacrifice. Then the
huìa tào knelt to the ground and kissed the earth and swore:
“I will watch over and guard your grandson as long as I am here on this earth, and I will see to it that he becomes a lord, a king, a master of men. This I swear before the ever-watching eyes of the gods of the days and the gods of the nights, of Coquebila Lord of Death and Xonaxi Quecuya Lady of Death. The gods know that I will keep my word; now I kiss the earth in token of it. And whenever I look at the earth I will remember this vow.”
And Mahpilxocoyōtl and the
huìa tào shed their own blood for the gods.
Night fell, and the priest of Lyobaa wondered of the day. He had sworn an oath. It was not an oath he had wanted, but he had sworn an oath, and to the gods to boot. Blood had been spilt. And an oath to the gods was an oath to the gods, above all for a priest.
The child was in his care, the child with the caul, and he was bound to make him king.
The
huìa tào ordered the servants to prepare the boy’s quarters and retired to his cushioned mat, to troubled dreams.
* * *
The description of the habits of the
huìa tào (lit. “great watcher”) or high priest of Lyobaa—including the cushioned throne with jaguar skin and feather stuffing that was the largest seat in the priestly palace, their strict celibacy, their cotton gown and chasuble decorated with beasts and birds, pointy white mitre, and sandals of colored thread—comes directly from the ethnohistorical source
Geográfica Descripción de la parte septentrional del Polo Ártico de la América by Francisco de Burgoa in 1674.