Cumatz, Tuhalhá, Uchabahá, those of Chumilahá, those of Quibahá, of Batenabá, Acul-Vinac, Balamihá, the Canchahel, and Balam-Colob.[258]
These are only the principal tribes, the branches of the people which we mention; only of the principal ones shall we speak. Many others came from each group of the people, but we shall not write their names. They also multiplied there in the East.
Many men were made and in the darkness they multiplied. Neither the sun nor the light had yet been made when they multiplied. All lived together, they existed in great number and walked there in the East.
Nevertheless, they did not sustain nor maintain [their God]; they only raised their faces to the sky, and they did not know why they had come so far as they did.
There they were then, in great number, the black men and the white men, men of many classes, men of many tongues, that it was wonderful to hear them.[259]
There are generations in the world, there are country people, whose faces we do not see, who have no homes, they only wander through the small and large woodlands, like crazy people. So it is said scornfully of the people of the wood. So they said there, where they saw the rising of the sun.
The speech of all was the same. They did not invoke wood nor stone,[260] and they remembered the word of the Creator and the Maker, the Heart of Heaven, the Heart of Earth.
In this manner they spoke, while they thought about the coming of the dawn.[261] And they raised their prayers, those worshipers of the word [of God], loving, obedient. and fearful, raising their faces to the sky when they asked for daughters and sons:
"Oh thou, Tzacol, Bitol![262] Look at us, hear us! Do not leave us, do not forsake us, oh, God, who art in heaven and on earth, Heart of Heaven, Heart of Earth! Give us our descendants, our succession, as long as the sun shall move and there shall be light. Let it dawn; let the day come! Give us many good roads, flat roads! May the people have peace, much peace, and may they be
[258] These thirteen tribes of Tecpán, which the Título de Totonicapán calls Vukamag Tecpam, are the Pocomam and Poconchi tribes, according to Brasseur de Bourbourg. The tribe of Rabinal was established in the interior of the present Republic of Guatemala, and its descendants still form an important center of Quiché population. The Cakchiquel constituted a strong and numerous kingdom, a rival of the Quiché Kingdom, which had as its capital, Iximché (native name of the tree now called bread-nut or ramón in Spanish).The Mexicans called Iximché Tecpán-Quauhtemállan, from which comes the present name of Guatemala. The tribe of Tziquinahá took as its capital the city of Atitlán, and occupied the western part of the territory surrounding the lake of this same name. Zacahá is the present Salcaja, close to the modern city of Quetzaltenango. Lamac, Cumatz, Tuhalhá, and Uchabahá were on the outskirts of Sacapulas, according to Brasseur de Bourbourg. It has not been possible to identify the rest of the tribes. That of Balamihá may be the tribe which established itself in the place now called Balamyá, in the department of Chimaltenango.
[259] In the original this paragraph reads as follows: Ta x-qohe pa qui chiri queca vinac, zaqui vinac, qui vachibal vinac, qui u chabal vinac, cay u xiquin. Brasseur de Bourbourg changed the meaning of qui, "much," for quiy, "sweet," and says in his translation that "sweet was the appearance of those peoples, sweet the language of those peoples." Qui vachibal vinac means literally "men of many forms, aspects, or appearances." Qui u chabal vinac, "many were the tongues of the men." Evidently the author was trying to give the idea of the multitude of different people, strange to each other, blacks and whites, that is, of light skin and of dark skin, and of the many different tongues which were in the East. The Quiché, however, maintained their ethnic unity and their common tongue in the midst of this Babylon, as is seen farther on. Ximénez translates the end of the paragraph saying "there were many languages and of two ears," which lacks meaning. In his second version (Historia ... de Chiapas y Guatemala, I, 36) he tries to explain the sentence and says "that they hear and understand each other through the diversity of languages." Cay, cab, or caíb is the number "2," but the first form, which is the one used in the text also means to see or hear with wonder, and this is probably the idea which it means to express here.
[260] That is, the idols.
[261] "They were only waiting for the sunrise" is Ximénez' interpretation.
[262] Creator and Maker.
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