Aged Creator of the Sky, God of Writing and the Calendar
In the bark-paper codices Itzamna is catalogued as God D: an aged man with a prominent Roman nose, sunken toothless mouth, and a round jewel set on his brow-band, enthroned upon a sky-band as he presides over assemblies of the gods. He has an avian alter ego, the Principal Bird Deity, a bejeweled great bird perched atop the world tree that appears on Classic stelae and in the murals of San Bartolo. As creator and lord of the heavens he stands at the head of the pantheon, yet he stays remarkably clear of warfare and blood sacrifice in the surviving imagery.
Colonial chronicles credit him with humanity's most precious inventions. Diego López de Cogolludo's Historia de Yucatán (1688) records that Itzamna invented letters and books, gave the places of Yucatán their names, and served as the first priest. Landa's Relación describes the feast of the month Zip, when physicians and shamans gathered with their medicine bundles to honor Itzamna and Ix Chel among the gods of healing. Writing, the calendar, medicine, divination: nearly every province of knowledge belongs to him.
The Yucatecan town of Izamal bears his name and was a pilgrimage center from the Classic period onward; the huge pyramid of Kinich Kak Moo still rises above its streets. Inscriptions show the Classic Itzamna closely tied to the sun god Kinich Ahau, whose name is often written together with his.
