Popol Vuh makes reference to "projectiles" and bows and arrows among the Quiché Maya.

Date
1985
Type
Book
Source
Popol Vuh
Non-LDS
Hearsay
Direct
Translation
Reference

Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings (trans. Dennis Tedlock; New York: Touchstone, 1985), 188–89

Scribe/Publisher
Touchstone
People
Popol Vuh
Audience
Reading Public
PDF
Transcription

Projectiles alone were the means for breaking the citadels. All at once the earth itself would crack open; it was as if a lightning bolt had shattered the stones. In fear, the members of one tribe after another went before the gum tree, carrying in their hands the signs of the citadels, with the result that a mountain of stones is there today. Only a few of these aren’t cut stones; the rest look as though they had been split with an axe. The result is there on the plain named Petatayub; it is obvious to this day.

. . .

Then they went off, those who are called the Point of the Arrow, Angel of the Bowstring. Their grandfathers and fathers split up then; they were on each of the mountains. They went just as guards of the mountains, and as arrowhead and bowstring guards, and as guards against the makers of war as well. None of them had been there at the dawning nor did any of them have his own god; they just blocked the way to the citadel. They all went out:

BHR Staff Commentary

On ibid., 325, we read:

Projectiles alone were the means for breaking the citadels: The weapon here is ch’a (something ch’ab’), “arrow” and (judging from FV) the spear thrown by an atlatl (spear-thrower). Ch’a or ch’ab’ is distinct from cha or cha’, which is the term for any lithic projectile point or cutting instrument and (today) for glass . . .

On ibid., 326, we read:

Point of the Arrow, Angle of the bowstring: This is unchi’ ch’a, uchi k’a’m [uchi 4ha, uchi cam], “its mouth arrow, its mouth cord.” Andrés Xiloj pointed out that in Quiché the “mouth” of an arrow is its tip, while the “mouth” of a bowstring is the point at which the butt end of the arrow is pulled back against it.

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