The Maya believed in a cyclical nature of time. Maya priest provided prophetic outlook on the future or past based on the number relations of their calendars and significant past dates such as birth. If the interpretations of the priests spelled bad times to come, offerings and sacrifices would be performed with the intention of satisfying the gods. Offerings were provided to the gods in purified vessels.

Mayan Pottery Chronicles World Creation Story

Creation stories are one of the most usually depicted scenes in Mayan pottery. As in Christianity, the Maya believed in a Holy Trinity as the sovereign creation being. Many of these creation scenes were enacted in religious ceremonies where shamans wore Mayan masks of the creation gods to re-live and honor those gods.

In Maya mythology, Tepeu and Kukulkan (also known as the Aztec's Quetzalcoatl, the Plumed Serpent) are referred to as the Creators, the Makers, and the Forefathers. They were two of the first beings to exist. Jointly with a third god, Huracan, a storm god are personified as a trinity of gods called Heart-of-Sky.

Tepeu and Kukulkan hold a conference and decide that, in order to save their legacy, they must construct a race of beings who can worship them. Huracan does the real creating while Tepeu and Kukulkan guide the process.

The gods begin by saying "Earth", which appears on demand from the sea. This is followed by mountains and trees, and the trinity, Heart-of-Sky proclaims "our work is going well".

Next for creation are the creatures of the forest: birds, deer, jaguars and snakes. They are told to multiply and scatter, and then to speak and "pray to us". But the animals just squawk and howl and were thus banished forever to the forest.

So Heart-of-Sky tries to make more respectful creatures from mud. Thus, man is created first of mud. But the mud creatures just crumbled and dissolved away.

Other gods are summoned for advice and man is next created of wood. But the wooden men have no soul, and they soon forgot their makers. So Heart-of-Sky turned all of their possessions against them and brought a disastrous resinous rain down on their heads. The wooden people escape to the forests and are turned into monkeys.

Heart-of-Sky then makes yet another attempt at creating a suitably respectful race, and finally succeeds by fashioning humans out of maize-corn dough.

As such, the Maya believed that maize was not just the cornerstone of their diet, but they were also made of it. Finally modern man is formed and Heart-of-Sky's work is realised.