I shot this photo out of Codex Azcatitlan, page 48, National Library, Paris.
In the center you see a pole circled by winged people. This is said to be an Aztec, Mayan and Incan (the three Empires were really one and the same) ritual called “Dance of the Flyers”.
On a pole about a 100 feet high, the flyers – people dressed in winged costumes – have ropes attached to a rotating frame at the top. They perform a descent in circling motion to the bottom, letting the ropes unwind on their way downwards. There are four flyers and a fifth person stays at the top playing a flute. The pole is circled 13 times.
The pole symbolizes the tree of life or cosmic axis – the connection between Heaven and Earth. ALL religions and ancient traditions taught about this pole or tree. It was believed that the pole moved through the earth and via our north pole (there’s that word pole again) all the way to Heaven. I’ve talked about this in a few of my books.
The 13 rotations represent Heaven plus the 12 realms (which modernists know as the 12 “planets”). The ritual itself re-enacts our descent to Earth, in a spiraling motion.
I believe this ritual is preserved and re-enacted because they knew there would come a time when humans forgot how stuff works.
There’s other amazing stuff to extrapolate from the dance of the flyers and also from the rest of the image, but I won’t spoon feed.