K'ulku Siwan

El lingüista k'iche' Sam Colop (2008: 67n95) mantiene que el lugar por donde pasaron Hun Hunahpu y Vucub Hunahpu para llegar a Xib'alb'a estaba "lleno de estacas puntiagudas," y "espinas grandes," para hacer muy difícil el viaje. Los dos barrancos (el barranco agitado y el ruidoso) probablemente representaban obstáculos de acuerdo con sus nombres: Nu' Siwan y K'ulku Siwan.

Anthropologist Dennis Tedlock (1996: 355) suggests that the canyons through which Jun Junajpu and Wuqub Junajpu pass on the way to Xib'alb'a could map on to K'iche' topography. According to Tedlock, the site "could be east of San Pedro Carchá, where the Río Cahabón disappears into a system of caves and then emerges again.

For his part, Dominican friar Francisco de Ximénez seems to have believed that the two canyons were merely two names of the same canyon, as he translates the K'iche' passage "nuzivan cul, cu zivan vbi" (or "Nu' Siwan, K'ulk'u Siwan ub'i'" in Christenson's modern transcription) as "una varranca muy angosta q' se llamaba fuerte varranca." Despite their differences in interpretation, all of the translators' choices suggest that this was difficult and trecherous territory to pass through.