Cizin is a Mayan god of death and earthquakes.
He is the most important
Maya death god in the Mayan culture. Scholars call him God A.
To the Yucatán Mayas he was
Hun-Came
The Maya death gods, (also Ah Puch, Ah Cimih, Ah Cizin, Hun Ahau, Kimi, or Yum Kimil) known by a variety of names, are two basic types of death gods who are respectively represented by the 16th-century Yucatec deities Hunhau and Uacmitun Ahau ment ...
and
Vucub-Came
The Maya death gods, (also Ah Puch, Ah Cimih, Ah Cizin, Hun Ahau, Kimi, or Yum Kimil) known by a variety of names, are two basic types of death gods who are respectively represented by the 16th-century Yucatec deities Hunhau and Uacmitun Ahau ment ...
.
He also has similarities to
Mictlāntēcutli
Mictlāntēcutli () or Mictlantecuhtli (, meaning "Lord of Mictlan"), in Aztec mythology, is a god of the dead and the king of Mictlan (Chicunauhmictlan), the lowest and northernmost section of the underworld. He is one of the principal gods ...
.
Name and etymology
The God Cizin goes by several names like Kisen, Yom Cimil, Kisin, Ah Puch, Xibalba,
Yum Cimil,
Hunhau, Ah Puchah, Au Puch, Cum Hau, Eopuco, Hu Ahau, Tzontemoc, Ahpuch, and Ahal Puch.
He was sometimes called Kimi. Mayans today call him ''Yum Cim'' or ''Yum Cimil''.
The name Cizin probably means ''stench''. Cizin comes from the root "ciz" which means ''flatulence''. His name is said to mean Stinking One.
Yum Cimil means ''lord of death'' while Hun Ahau means ''one ruler''. Ah Puch means to melt.
Mythology
He is considered the brother of Nohochacyum and
Bacabs
Bacab () is the generic Yucatec Maya name for the four prehispanic aged deities of the interior of the earth and its water deposits. The Bacabs have more recent counterparts in the lecherous, drunken old thunder deities of the Gulf Coast regions. ...
.
According to
Lacandon myth when a person dies Cizin burns the soul on his mouth and his anus. When the soul complains Cizin douses the soul in cold water, causing the soul to complain more leading Cizin to burn them until the soul disintegrates into nothing.
In popular culture
Xibalba is referenced in a scene from the movie Road to El Dorado (2000) when the chief and high priest ask the protagonists to make a sacrifice to Xibalba. Later Conquistador Hernan Cortes is mistaken for the deity by the exiled high priest.
Cizin makes an appearance as a playable god in the 2014 free-to-play
multiplayer online battle arena
Multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) is a subgenre of strategy video games in which two teams of players compete against each other on a predefined battlefield. Each player controls a single character with a set of distinctive abilities that ...
video game ''
Smite
''Smite'' is a 2014 free-to-play, third-person multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) video game developed and published by Hi-Rez Studios for Microsoft Windows, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch, and Amazon Luna.[Mayan
Mayan most commonly refers to:
* Maya peoples, various indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica and northern Central America
* Maya civilization, pre-Columbian culture of Mesoamerica and northern Central America
* Mayan languages, language family spoken ...]
pantheon by the name
Ah Puch
Cizin is a Mayan god of death and earthquakes. He is the most important Maya death god in the Mayan culture. Scholars call him God A.
To the Yucatán Mayas he was Hun-Came and Vucub-Came. He also has similarities to Mictlāntēcutli.
Name an ...
.
[ {{Cite web, url=https://www.smitegame.com/gods/ah-puch, access-date=2021-09-11, website=www.smitegame.com ]
The 2013 game "9 Clues: The Secret of Serpent Creek" features Cizin as part of its supernatural mystery plot.
Ah Puch is the main antagonist in the 2018 novel
The Storm Runner
''The Storm Runner'' is a novel written by J. C. Cervantes and published in September 2018. It is the second of many books in the "Rick Riordan Presents" imprint and is about thirteen-year-old Zane Obispo who uses a cane to get around due to a de ...
by J. C. Cervantes.
References
Death gods
Maya deities
Maya mythology and religion
Underworld gods