Bodies made of corn and the stones that grind it. The Museum for National Identity of Honduras as a site of legitimisation of constructed collective memories: inclusion and exclusion, national myths and heritage storytelling through objects in the museum (ENG)

The Popol Vuh is heralded as a literary masterpiece of the ancient Maya, providing a window into their rich mythology as conceived by the 16th-century Quiché Maya of Guatemala. Many Maya books were lost to the fires of Christian missionaries, but the stories in the Popol Vuh survived, hidden until discovered by a Spanish priest in the early 18th century. The book describes the creation of the world by the gods, including the creation of humans by moulding their bodies out of maize paste. This myth, originating from the Quiché Maya, is now considered foundational throughout the entire Mesoamerican region.

In Honduras, the Popol Vuh has been used as an element to the national narrative. At the Museum for National Identity in Honduras, the creation myth of the Popol Vuh is a key part of the storytelling by museum guides. A special part of the museum visit is dedicated to it, including the “story of the first Hondurans”, the “children of Maize,” whose bodies were created from corn ground on a metate.

A metate or Piedra de Moler (grinding stone) is a carved stone bench primarily used for grinding edibles by indigenous peoples in Central America. The user employs their body weight to push a large stone rod over the surface of a curved stone bench, transforming ingredients into a paste. Beyond its use in the kitchen, the metate has historically held significant cultural and ritual importance in Central American societies, symbolizing domestic life, sustenance, and artistic expression. The Museum for National Identity exhibits three metates: two from the eastern part of Honduras, and one from the central region. The daily ritual of women grinding on metates has been a fundamental part of Central American life for centuries, and these ancient artifacts, displayed behind glass in the museum, are still well-known to museum visitors and used in rural areas today. 

The text will analyse how the museum’s exhibition not only highlights the role of metates in ancient and modern contexts, but also serves as a vehicle for identity re-existence, traversing the worldviews of coloniality and modernity through the revival of traditional cosmologies embedded in its objects. It will also illustrate how objects in a museum can connect visitors to national myths through heritage storytelling, validating official discourses.