![]() The four directions are colored by his body parts, and these colors can be seen in flowers or in the visions induced by eating his flesh -the sacred peyote plant. Pilgrims learn at Wirik úta that all paradoxes and contradictions -even the distinctions between deer, maize, and peyote -arise from the division of K áuyumarie's body (Myerhoff, 1974). He guides pilgrims to Wirik úta, where the Huichol believe the beginning of time and the center of space are located, and where, as the Sacred Deer, he was dismembered. Irreverent, clever, and amusing, K áuyumarie brought about the first sexual intercourse between man and woman. K áuyumarie is the animal sidekick of the supreme Huichol deity, Tatewari ("our grandfather fire"). The contemporary Huichol, who live in the Sierra Madre Occidental, in north-central Mexico, consider K áuy úumaari ("one who does not know himself" or "one who makes others crazy") one of their principal deities (Myerhoff, 1974). Tricksters are usually animals that have bodies riddled with passages, or they may have excessively large orifices, any of which may be cut open or penetrated. The trickster's scheming prefigures human intelligence, which is based, ironically, on the realm of the senses. They stir up such a riot of the senses with their playful conduct, that sex, food, and song become sacred emblems of incarnate life. For instance, they steal fire, which is deemed the center of social and physical life, and their clever bungling frequently introduces death. Although tricksters are ludicrous rather than solemn beings, they cannot be discounted as trivial because their activities and transformations touch on religious issues. The peoples of Mesoamerica and South America maintain lively traditions concerning a cunning and deceitful mythic figure, the trickster. ![]() TRICKSTERS: MESOAMERICAN AND SOUTH AMERICAN TRICKSTERS ![]()
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