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Honduran White Bat

Ectophylla alba

Status: Near Threatened due to habitat loss and deforestation for agriculture and urban development, and no official conservation programs yet aimed at them. Populations are declining.

Bats serve as pollinators, and as they disperse the seeds of the fruits they ate, bats also are linked to new growth that comes from the earth and from the old. For many of the ancient Mesoamerica civilizations, bats were associated with the underworld and with death. As flying creatures, bats were associated with the ancient Maya gods of the sky; but also as nocturnal, cave-dwelling creatures who found roosts in the hollows of tangled tree branches, they entered the domain of the Underworld and the spirits. The outpouring of bats from a cave was visually similar to the appearance of smoke from a burning paper used in blood rituals, and so they were linked to sacred sacred rites as well.

Flying along waterways, which are paths out from the Underworld, bats were seen as messengers between the living and spirit realm, and when they slumbered in the daytime, it was thought that they hid among the roots of the sacred tree of life, called Yaxche.

 

References:
Miller, Mary; Karl Taube (1993). The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya. London: Thames and Hudson.

Werness, H. B. (2006). The Continuum Encyclopedia of Animal Symbolism in Art. United Kingdom: Continuum. 29-33.

Read, K. A., Gonzalez, J. J. (2002). Mesoamerican Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs of Mexico and Central America. United Kingdom: OUP USA. 132-133.

Heger, F. (1968). Verhandlungen Des XVI. Internationalen Amerikanistenkongresses, Wien, 9. Bis 14. September 1908. Liechtenstein: Kraus Reprint. 293.

"Ceiba Tree". Maya-archeology.org., May 2010. https://www.maya-archaeology.org/pre-Columbian_Mesoamerican_Mayan_ethnobotany_Mayan_iconography_archaeology_anthropology_research/sacred_ceiba_tree_flowers_kapok_spines_yaxche_incense_burners.php