Editing Chaac (section)

== Rain deities and rain makers ==
[[File:EsculturaMaya.jpg|thumb|Chaac sculpture at the [[Maya Sculpture Museum]], [[Honduras]].]]

Like other Maya gods, Chaac is both one and manifold. Four Chaacs are based in the cardinal directions and wear the directional colors. East, where the sunrise is, is red, North, mid-day zenith, is represented by white, West is represented by black for the sunset, and South is represented by yellow. There is a fifth color which is associated with the center point, and that is green.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Hopkins |first1=Nicholas |title=Directions and Partitions in Maya World View |url=http://www.famsi.org/research/hopkins/DirectionalPartitions.pdf}}</ref> In 16th-century Yucatán, the directional Chaac of the east was called ''Chac Xib Chaac'' 'Red Man Chaac', only the colors being varied for the three other ones.<ref>Landa, in Tozzer 1941: 137–138</ref>

Contemporary Yucatec Maya farmers distinguish many more aspects of the rainfall and the clouds and personify them as different, hierarchically-ordered rain deities. The Chorti Maya have preserved important folklore regarding the process of rain-making, which involved rain deities striking rain-carrying snakes with their axes.

The [[List of rain deities|rain deities]] had their human counterparts. In the traditional Maya (and Mesoamerican) community, one of the most important functions was that of rainmaker, which presupposed an intimate acquaintance with (and thus, initiation by) the rain deities, and a knowledge of their places and movements.<ref>Braakhuis and Hull 2014</ref> According to a Late-Postclassic Yucatec tradition, ''Chac Xib Chaac'' (the rain deity of the east) was the title of a king of [[Chichen Itza]],<ref>Roys 1967: 67–68</ref> and similar titles were bestowed upon Classic rulers as well (see below).