Ancient Lunar Myths

According to Maya mythology, before becoming the celestial objects that we see today, the Moon and the Sun were terrestrial creatures. The Moon was a young lady, while the Sun a brave hunter.
They fell in love. After some events, they fled away together.
The young lady's grandfather got mad at her and he had her killed. The dragonflys collected her body and her blood, and they put them in thirteen hollow stumps.
Meanwhile, the Sun had been looking for his lover for thirteen days. On the thirteenth day, he found the stumps. Twelve of them gave life to harmful insects and snakes. They started filling in the entire world with their offsprings. From the thirteenth one, the Moon came out: she had come back to life.

[ The myth of the breaking of the
Lunar Divinity's body in Tenochitla'n ]

According to the Egyptian mythology, the Celestial Divinity Nut married secretly the God of the Earth, Geb. The God of the Sun, Re, put a spell on the Goddess Nut, according to which she could not have children in any of the twelve months.
All the days used to belong to the Sun; but after a game of dice, the mighty Divinity Thoth gained five of the Sun's days. These days were not included in any of the five months anymore.

Egyptian papyrus

[ Egyptian Moon - The Goddess Nut ]

Re's spell was broken, so Nut gave life to five children.
One of them, Osiris, the God of the Moon, married his sister Isis. In this way, he could take his father's terrestrial throne. .
Osiris had another brother, Seth, who eventually killed him. Seth tore his brother's body to fourteen pieces.
Isis was able to find thirteen of the fourteen pieces. She prayed Re to let Osiris come back to life.
The fourteenth piece remained in the Nile river and it gave to the river its fertilizing power.

These two myths, briefly summarized, have some analogies and some differences.
Both of them talk about the breaking of the body of the Moon (into thirteen pieces in the Maya myth and into fourteen pieces in the Egyptian one). This fact is referred to the progressive disappearance of the Moon during its waning phase.
Moreover, both of them focus on the relationship between the Moon and the power, which has the female body, of giving life.
From them, we can understand how important the Moon, its regular crossing of the sky and the alternation of its phases have always been to mankind.

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