Article Outline
Pre-Columbian Religions, religions of the native cultures of Mesoamerica, the Andes, and adjacent regions before they were conquered by Europeans in the 16th century. Most prominent among these cultures were three major civilizations, the Classic-period Maya culture of Mesoamerica (300?-900?), the Aztec Empire (1428-1521) of Mesoamerica, and the Inca Empire (1440?-1532) of the Andes. For more information about Pre-Columbian religions in Native American history, see Native Americans of North America: Spirituality and Religious Practices.
The Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations developed independently of each other. Further, the religious heritage of each was heavily influenced by preceding cultures. Nevertheless, despite their historical uniqueness, the Maya, Aztec, and Inca religions had important features in common.
The Mayas, Aztecs, and Incas all believed that the universe was composed of the heavens, the earth's surface, and an underworld. The earth's surface was divided into four quadrants. As in many other archaic cultures, each of the three peoples claimed to inhabit the center of the universe, where the earthly and supernatural realms came together. Because the boundaries between the worlds of nature, human society, and the supernatural were not sharply defined, pre-Columbian religious leaders were essentially shamans, people who were believed to be capable of moving back and forth between the earthly and supernatural realms. This travel between realms was often associated with hallucinatory trances.
Many Maya, Aztec, and Inca deities were derived from astronomical observations. However, pre-Columbian civilizations identified their deities not only with particular planets and stars, but also with the cyclical movements of the heavens as a whole. Just as the heavenly bodies move and replace each other in specific sectors of the sky, a number of major pre-Columbian deities had shifting, overlapping identities. Consequently, individual gods and goddesses are probably best interpreted not as distinct personages, but as fluid and shifting components of complex supernatural powers.
It is possible that in each of the three major pre-Columbian civilizations the various divine powers were seen as multiple facets of a single supernatural force. Many of the deities incorporated pairs of opposing qualities, such as male/female, day/night, and life/death. If all deities were indeed different expressions of a single divine force, it is likely that the first differentiation in this all-encompassing godhead was that between male and female powers. For example, the Aztecs' highest and most remote deity was Ometeotl (Lord and Lady of Duality). This primeval creator of all things was viewed both as a single being and as a combination of the god Ometecutli and the goddess Omecihuatl.
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