Tradition: Guatemala Mythology
Alternative names: Enchanted Bull
Category: Cow
The Myth
Toro Encantado is an enchanted bull made entirely of pure gold, once revered by the Kekchi people of Alta Verapaz. The bull was worshipped as a sacred being and honored through festivals, flowers, incense, dancing, and music.
The golden bull was associated with Sactzicuil, a hill in Alta Verapaz. The Kekchi held festivals in its honor and treated the place where it lived as sacred. At appointed times, the people gathered to decorate its home with flowers, fan it with the fragrant smoke of burning copal, and dance around it accompanied by music.
Eventually, the enchanted bull sank down into the hill and disappeared.
After its disappearance, a powerful Kekchi wizard ordered half of the women of the tribe to wear the tupuy as a reminder of the bull’s tail, while the other half were instructed to cut their hair in a particular manner to commemorate its ears.
According to the tradition, this custom continued among the women of the tribe. Some would smooth their hair down to the nape of the neck and wind it repeatedly with a red wool cord until it became thick and long like a bull’s tail. Others would cut a lock of hair on each side of the forehead, allowing the locks to hang down like the bull’s large ears.
Sources
G. B. G. “Guatemala Myths.” The Museum Journal 6, no. 3 (September 1915): 103–115. Accessed August 29, 2026. https://www.penn.museum/sites/journal/416/