Muerte Book
Human Sacrifice In Aztec CultureThe antecedents of Mesoamerican sacrifice The exercise of humane sacrifice was widespread in the Mesoamerican and in the South American cultures for the duration of the Inca Empire. Like all other known pre-Columbian civilizations of Mesoamerica, the Aztecs practiced humane sacrifice. The extant origins describe how the Aztecs sacrificed humane victims on each of their eighteen festivities, one festivity for each of their 20-day months. It is unknown if the Aztecs engaged in humane sacrifice before they reached the Anahuac valley and started absorbing other cultural influences. The basi humane sacrifice reported in the roots was the sacrifice and skinning of the daughter of the king Cxcox of Culhuacn; this story is a share of the legend of the foundation of Tenochtitlan. Several ethnohistorical roots state that under the guidance of Tlacaelel the importance of humane sacrifice in Aztec history was given extra emphasis. The role of sacrifice in Mesoamerica Human sacrifice as shown in the Codex Magliabechiano. Sacrifice was a mutual theme in Mesoamerican cultures. In the Aztec "Legend of the Five Suns", all the gods sacrificed themselves so that mankind could live. Some years after the Spanish conquest of Mexico, a body of Franciscans confronted the remaining Aztec priesthood and demanded, under threat of death, that they desist from their murderous practice. The Aztec priests defended themselves as follows: Life is because of the gods; with their sacrifice they gave us life [...]. They fabricate our sustenance [...] which nourishes life. What the Aztec priests were referring to was a central Mesoamerican belief: that a great, on-going sacrifice sustains the Universe. Everything is tonacayotl: the "spiritual flesh-hood" or "bodily [sacrificial] presence" of the gods on earth. Everything arth, crops, moon, stars and persons springs from the severed or buried bodies, fingers, blood or the heads of the sacrificed gods. Humanity itself is macehualli, "those deserved and brought back to life through penance". A strong sense of indebtedness was connected with this worldview. Indeed, nextlahualli (debt-payment) was a ordinarily employed metaphor for humane sacrifice, and, as Bernardino de Sahagn reported, it was said that the victim was someone who "gave his service". Human sacrifice was in this sense the most eminent level of an entire panoply of offerings through which the Aztecs sought to repay their debt to the gods. Both Sahagn and Toribio de Benavente (also called "Motolina") observed that the Aztecs gladly parted with everything: burying, smashing, sinking, slaying immense quantities of quail, rabbits, dogs, feathers, flowers, insects, beans, grains, paper, rubber and treasures as sacrifices. Even the "stage" for humane sacrifice, the massive temple-pyramids, was an supplying mound: crammed with treasures, grains, soil and humane and animal sacrifices that were buried as gifts to the deities. Adorned with the land's finest art, treasure and victims, these temples had become buried offerings underneath new structures each half a century. The sacrifice of animals was common, a exercise for which the Aztecs bred dogs, eagles, jaguars and deer. Objects also were sacrificed by being broken and offered to the gods. The cult of Quetzalcatl required the sacrifice of butterflies and hummingbirds. Self-sacrifice was also rather common; humans would offer maguey thorns, tainted with their own blood and, like the Maya kings, would offer blood from their tongue, ear lobes, or genitals. Blood kept a central place in Mesoamerican cultures. The Florentine Codex reports that in one of the creation myths Quetzalcatl offered blood extracted from a wound in his own genital to give life to humanity. There are assorted other myths in which Nahua gods offer their blood to aid humanity. Common persons would offer maguey thorns with their blood. Lloyd deMause has argued that, like present-day self harmers, the Aztecs likewise practiced bloodletting from cuts made with obsidian knives or bone needles on fleshy parts of the body, like earlobes, lips, tongue, chest and calves. This was considered private and a personal act of penitence toward the gods. The thorns were put in a ball of straw called zacatapayoli and later placed in an adoratorium. Much like the role of sacrifice elsewhere in the world, it thence seems that these rites functioned as a type of atonement for Aztec believers. Their sacrificial hymns describe the victim as 'sent (to death) to plead for us,' or 'consecrated to annul all sin. '(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 232). In one such poem, a warrior-victim announces that 'I hug mankind...I give myself to the community.'(MSS Romance de Los ... Folio 27r). Aztec society viewed even the slightest tlatlacolli ('sin' or 'insult') as an exceedingly malevolent supernatural force. For instance, if an adulterer were to enter a house, it was believed that all turkey chicks would perish from tlazomiquiztli ('filth-death')(Sahagun Bk. 5: 29: 191-192). To refrain from such calamities befalling their community, those who had erred punished themselves by extreme measures such as slitting their tongues for vices of speech or their ears for vices of listening, and 'for a slight [sin they] hung themselves, or threw themselves down precipices, or put an end to themselves by abstinence' (Motolinia, History of the Indies, 106-107). In Classic Nahuatl (the Aztec language) the verbal form ni-c-yecoa, 'I sin', is closely related to ni-c-ye.coa, 'I finish it.' It was believed that error of any sort could rather in a literal sense 'finish' or 'ruin' everything (Francisco Clavigero, Historia antiqua de Mxico, 7). This seems to have given Aztec society a heavy dependence on exceedingly violent 'penance,'of which humane sacrifice was considered one form (as already mentioned, humane sacrifice was ofttimes called 'penance'). A great deal of cosmological thought seems to have underlain each of the Aztec sacrificial rites. By far the most mutual form of humane sacrifice was heart-extraction, and this seems to have related to the Aztec faith that the heart(tona) was both the seat of the person and a fragment of the Sun's heat (istli). To this day, the Nahua consider the Sun to be a heart-soul (tona-tiuh) 'round, hot, pulsating'(Alan Sandtrom, Corn is Our Life, 1991, 239-240). It seems that in the Aztec view, humanity's 'divine sun fragments' were considered 'entrapped' by the body and it is desires: Where is your heart? You give your heart to each thing in turn. Carrying, you do not carry it... You demolish your heart on world (Nahua poem in Irene Nicholson, Firefly in the Night, 156 & 203). Heart-extraction was viewed as a means of liberate istli and reunite it with the Sun, as aptly depicted in Codex Magliabechiano, Folio 70 (illustrated in this section), wherein a victim's transformed heart flies Sunward on a trail of blood. Finally, it will have to be cited that according to the Aztec (and Mesoamerican) world-view, the circumstances in which persons passed away determined the type of afterlife they enjoyed. The Aztecs had meticulously organised death into assorted types, which each led to specific 'heavenly' and 'underworld' levels. In the levels Sahagun records, passing away quietly at home was the lowest, as it required the adverse soul to undergo a great deal of torturous tryouts and journeys, only to culminate in a sombre underworld. By contrast, what the Aztecs termed 'a good death' was sacrifice, war (which normally meant sacrifice) or - in the case of women - death whilst giving birth. This kind of end procured for the deceased the second-highest heaven (death in infancy being the highest). Persons who had passed from physical life sacrificially or in war were called 'the God-dead' (Teo-micqui ) and were said to 'go pure... live hard by, nigh unto the Sun... [who] always everlastingly ... rejoice ... [since] the House of the Sun is ... a place of joy (Sahagun Bk 6: 21). The 52-year cycle The cycle of fifty-two years was central to Mesoamerican cultures. The Nahua's religious beliefs were based on a outstanding fear that the universe would collapse after each cycle if the gods were not strong enough. Every fifty-two years a special New Fire ceremony was performed. All fires were extinguished and at midnight a humane sacrifice was made. The Aztecs waited for the dawn. If the Sun appeared it meant that the sacrifices for this cycle had been enough. A fire was ignited on the body of a victim, and this new fire was taken to each house, city and town. Rejoicing was general: a new cycle of fifty-two years was beginning, and the end of the world had been postponed, at least for another 52-year century. (A similar ceremony is still practiced by little indigenous groups, but without humane sacrifice.) The ceremony was older than the Aztecs. While in the first place it was believed it was a matter of luck to survive, the Aztecs thought that continuous sacrifice through the fifty-two year cycle could postpone the end. According to Miguel Len-Portilla, Tlacaelel reformed the initial Nahua religion and the Aztecs viewed themselves as the main representatives for feeding the gods. This gave them a new sense of identity, from "people without face" as they were called by hostile neighbours, to the persons in charge of the existence of the universe. Thus they begun to call themselves "The humans of the sun". Other researchers dispute Len-Portilla's perspective, pointing to the relative lack of necessary sources.[citation needed] Sacrifices to specific gods Huitzilopochtli Huitzilopochtli was the tribal deity of the Mexica and, as such, he represented the reputation of the Mexica people and was often times identified with the sun at the zenith, and with warfare. When the Aztecs sacrificed humans to Huitzilopochtli ( the god with war like distinct elements ) the victim would be placed on a sacrificial stone. Then the priest would cut through the abdomen with an obsidian or flint blade. The heart would be torn out still beating and held towards the sky in honor to the Sun-God; the body would be carried away and either cremated or given to the warrior responsible for the capture of the victim. He would either cut the body in pieces and send them to essential humans as an offering, or use the pieces for ritual cannibalism. The warrior would thence ascend one step in the hierarchy of the Aztec social classes, a scheme that rewarded successful warriors. Victim of sacrificial gladiatorial combat, from Codex Magliabechiano. Note that he is tied to a big stone and his macuahuitl (sword/club) is covered with what appears to be feathers rather of obsidian. Tezcatlipoca Tezcatlipoca was in general considered the most powerful god, the god of night, sorcery and fate (the name tezcatlipoca means "smoking mirror", or "obsidian"). The Aztecs believed that Tezcatlipoca developed war to provide feed and drink to the gods. Tezcatlipoca was known by various epithets including "the Enemy" and "the Enemy of Both Sides", which stress his affinity for discord. Tezcatlipoca had the power to pardon sins and to relieve disease, or to release a man from the fate assigned to him by his date of birth; however, not one thing in Tezcatlipoca's nature compelled him to do so. He was capricious and often brought in regards to reversals of fortune. To the Aztecs, he was an all-knowing, all-seeing almost all-powerful god. One of his names may be translated as "We Who Are His Slaves". Some captives were sacrificed to Tezcatlipoca in ritual gladiatorial combat. The victim was tethered in place and given a mock weapon. He passed away fighting versus up to four to a complete degree armed jaguar knights and eagle warriors. During the 20-day month of Toxcatl, a young impersonator of Tezcatlipoca would be sacrificed. Throughout a year, this youth would be dressed as Tezcatlipoca and treated as a living incarnation of the God. The youth would represent Tezcatlipoca on earth; he would get four beauteous women as his companions until he met his destiny, in the meantime he walked through the streets of Tenochtitlan playing a flute. On the day of the sacrifice a feast would be kept in Tezcatlipoca's honor. The young man would climb the pyramid, break his flute and surrender his body to the priests. Sahagn equated it to the Christian Easter. Huehueteotl To appease Huehueteotl, the fire god and a senior deity, the Aztecs had a ceremony where they prepared a huge feast at the end of which they would burn captives and before they passed from physical life they would be taken from the fire and their hearts would be cut out. Motolina and Sahagn reported that the Aztecs believed that if they did not placate Huehueteotl a plague of fire would strike their city. The sacrifice was considered an supplying to the deity. Tlloc Main article: Child sacrifice in pre-Columbian cultures Tlloc was the god of rain. The Aztecs believed that if sacrifices weren't supplied for Tlloc, rain wouldn't come and their crops wouldn't flourish. Leprosy and rheumatism, diseases caused by Tlloc, would infest the village. Tlloc required the tears of the young as portion of the sacrifice. The priests made the children cry for the duration of their way to immolation: a good omen that Tlloc would wet the world in the raining season. In the Florentine Codex, likewise known as General History of the Things of New Spain, Sahagn wrote: They offered them as sacrifices to [Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue] so that they would give them water. The Flower Wars Main article: Flower war It has oftentimes been claimed by scholars that the Aztecs resorted to a form of ritual warfare, the Flower War, to obtain living humane bodies for the sacrifices in time of peace. This assert notwithstanding has been seriously criticised by scholars such as Ross Hassig and Nigel Davies who assert that the main intention of the Flower Wars was political and not religious and that the number of sacrificial victims received through flower wars was not significant equated to the number of victims received through normal political warfare. According to Diego Durn's History of the Indies of New Spain, and a few other roots that are also based on the Crnica X, the Flower Wars were in the first place a treaty amidst the cities of Aztec Triple Alliance and Tlaxcala and Huexotzingo motivated by a famine in Mesoamerica in 1450. Aztec prisoners were likewise sacrificed in Tlaxcala and Huexotzingo. The capture of prisoners for sacrifices was called nextlaualli ("debt payment to the gods"). These origins notwithstanding are contradicted by other sources, such as the Codex Chimalpahin, which mentions "Flower Wars" much earlier than the famine of 1450 and versus other opponents than the ones brought up in the treaty. Because the goal to be attained of Aztec warfare was to capture victims alive for humane sacrifice, battle tactics were designed mainly to hurt the enemy rather than kill him. After towns were conquered their inhabitants were no longer nominees for humane sacrifice, only liable to regular tribute. Slaves also could be employed for humane sacrifice, but only if the slave was considered lazy and had been resold three times. A ceremonial supplying of Aztec sacrificial knife blades at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City. The sacrifice ritual Most of the sacrificial rituals took more than two persons to perform. In the general procedure of the ritual, the sacrifice would be taken to the top of the temple. The sacrifice would then be laid on a stone slab by four priests, and his/her abdomen would be sliced open by a fifth priest with a ceremonial knife made of flint. The cut was made in the abdomen and went through the diaphragm. The priest would grab the heart and tear it out, still beating. It would be placed in a bowl held by a statue of the honored god, and the body thrown down the temple's stairs. Before and for the duration of the killing, priests and audience (who collected in the plaza below) stabbed, pierced and bled themselves as autosacrifice (Sahagun, Bk. 2: 3: 8, 20: 49, 21: 47). Hymns, whistles, spectacular costumed dances and percussive music marked dissimilar phases of the rite. The body elements would then be disposed of: the viscera fed the animals in the zoo; the bleeding head was placed on display in the tzompantli, meaning 'hairy skulls'. Not all the skulls in the tzompantlis were victims of sacrifice. In the Anales de Tlatelolco it is described that for the duration of the siege of Tlatelolco by the Spaniards, the Tlatelolcas built three tzompantli: two for their own dead and one for the fallen conquerors, including two severed heads of horses. Other kinds of humane sacrifice, which remunerated tribute to respective deities, neared the victims differently. The victim could be shot with arrows (in which the draining blood represented the cool rains of spring); die in unequal fighting (gladiatorial sacrifice) or be sacrificed as a result of the Mesoamerican ballgame; burned (to honor the fire god); flayed after being sacrificed (to honor Xipe Totec, "Our Lord The Flayed One"), or drowned. A tzompantli, or skull rack, as shown in the post-Conquest Ramirez Codex. Estimates of the scope of the sacrifices For the re-consecration of Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan in 1487, the Aztecs reported that they sacrificed in regards to 80,400 prisoners over the course of four days, though there were in all likelihood far less sacrifices. According to Ross Hassig, author of Aztec Warfare, "between 10,000 and 80,400 persons" were sacrificed in the ceremony. The higher estimate would intermediate 14 sacrifices per minute for the duration of the four-day consecration. As a comparison, the Auschwitz concentration camp, working 24 hours a day with modern technology, neared but did not equivalent this pace: it executed with regards to 19,200 a day at it is peak. Four tables were arranged at the top so that the victims could be jettisoned down the sides of the temple. Nonetheless, according to Codex Telleriano-Remensis, old Aztecs who talked with the missionaries told with regards to a much lower figure for the reconsecration of the temple, approximately 4,000 victims in total. Michael Harner, in his 1977 article The Enigma of Aztec Sacrifice, estimates the number of humans sacrificed in central Mexico in the 15th century as high as 250,000 per year. Fernando de Alva Corts Ixtlilxochitl, a Mexica descendant and the author of Codex Ixtlilxochitl, claimed that one in five children of the Mexica subjects was killed annually. Victor Davis Hanson argues that an estimate by Don Carlos Zumrraga of 20,000 per annum is "more plausible." Other scholars believe that, since the Aztecs always tried to intimidate their enemies, it is more likely that they could have inflated the number as a propaganda tool. The same may be said for Bernal Daz's inflated calculations when, in a state of visual shock, he grossly miscalculated the number of skulls at one of the seven Tenochtitlan tzompantlis. According the Florentine Codex, fifty years before the conquest the Aztecs burnt the skulls of the former tzompantli. Mexican archeologist Eduardo Matos Moctezuma has unearthed and studied a great deal of tzompantlis. Sacrifices were made on specific days. Sahagn, Juan Bautista de Pomar and Motolina report that the Aztecs had eighteen festivities each year, one for each Aztec month. They without doubt or question state that in those festivities sacrifices were made. Each god required a dissimilar kind of victim: young women were drowned for Xilonen; children were sacrificed to Tlloc; Nahuatl-speaking prisoners to Huitzilopochtli, and a single nahua would volunteer for Tezcatlipoca. The Ramrez Codex states that for the annual festivity of Huitzilopochtli more than sixty prisoners were sacrificed in the main temple, and prisoners were sacrificed in other huge Aztec cities as well. Not all sacrifices were made at the Tenochtitlan temples; a few were made at "Cerro del Pen", an islet of the Texcoco lake. According to an Aztec source, in the month of Tlacaxipehualiztli (from February 22 to March 13), thirty-four captives were sacrificed in the gladiatorial sacrifice to Xipe Totec. More victims would be sacrificed to Huitzilopochtli in the month Panquetzaliztli (from 9 November to 28 November) according to the Ramrez Codex. This would mean a figure as low as 300 to 600 victims a year. There is little agreement on the actual figure due to the scarcity of archeological evidence. Every Aztec warrior would have to provide at least one prisoner for sacrifice. All the male population was trained to be warriors, but only the few who succeeded in supplying captives could became full-time members of the warrior elite. Those who could not would become macehualli, workers. Accounts likewise state that various young warriors could unite to capture a single prisoner, which proposes that capturing prisoners for sacrifice was challenging. There is still much debate as to what social groups constituted the popular victims of these sacrifices. It is oftentimes assumed that all victims were 'disposable' commoners or foreigners. However, slaves - a major source of victims - were not a permanent class but rather humans from any level of Aztec society who had fallen into debt or devoted some crime (see Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 131, 260). Likewise, most of the earliest accounts talk of prisoners of war of diverse social status, and concur that almost all child sacrifices were locals of noble lineage, offered by their own parents (compare Cortes, Letters 105 with Motolinia, History of the Lindies 118-119 and Duran, Book of the Gods, 223, 242). Likewise, it is doubtful if a good deal of victims came from far afield. In 1454, the Aztec government forbade the slaying of captives from distant lands at the capital's temples (Duran, The Aztecs: History of the Indes, 141). Duran' s informants told him that sacrifices were hence 'nearly always ... friends of the [Royal] House'- meaning warriors from allied states (Duran, The Aztecs: History of the Indies, 141, 198). This probably meant that the intermediate Aztec warrior stood as much chance of procuring a victim as he did of himself getting one - as the Aztec Emperor reportedly told all captives with regards to to be sacrificed: 'today for you, tomorrow for me'(Tezozomoc Vol.2). Discussion of indispensable sources Codex Tudela. Early Spanish accounts mention the sacrificial exercise of the Aztecs as well as other Mesoamerican cultures in the 16th century. There are a great deal of depictions of sacrifices in the Mexica statuary, as well as in codices such as the Ros, Tudela, Telleriano-Remensis, Durn, and Sahagn's Florentine. On the other hand, the pre-Columbian, indigenous codices that depict the rites were not written texts but pictorial and highly symbolic ideographshe Aztecs did not have a unfeigned writing scheme such that of the Mayas. Bishop Zumarraga (1528-48) burned all obtainable texts in his religious zeal. For Mesoamerica as a whole, the gathered archaeological, iconographical and in the case of the Maya written evidence, suggests that humane sacrifice was widespread throughout cultures and periods, dating back to 600 BCE and perhaps much earlier. Osteological analyses have likewise been interpreted as corroborating the texts. Pictorial illustrations of sacrifices on Maya ceramics and stelae have likewise been published. Accounts from the Grijalva expeditions In addition to the accounts provided by Sahagn and Durn, there are other essential texts to be considered. Juan de Grijalva, Hernn Corts, Juan Daz, Bernal Daz, Andrs de Tapia, Francisco de Aguilar, Ruy Gonzlez and the Anonymous Conqueror wrote when it comes to the Conquest of Mexico. Martyr d'Anghiera, Lopez de Gomara, Oviedo y Valdes and Illescas, while not in Mesoamerica, wrote their accounts based on consultations with the participants. Bartolom de Las Casas and Sahagn arrived later to New Spain but had access to direct testimony, peculiarly of the indigenous people. All of these messages that tells the particulars of an act or occurrence or course of events mention and describe the exercise of humane sacrifice. Juan Daz Juan Daz, a participant of the 1518 Grijalva expedition, wrote Itinerario de Grijalva before 1520, in which he describes the aftermath of a sacrifice on an island near Veracruz. Bernal Daz Main article: The Conquest of New Spain Bernal Daz corroborates Juan Daz's history: On these altars were idols with evil looking bodies, and that each night five Indians had been sacrificed before them; their chests had been cut open, and their arms and thighs had been cut off. The walls were covered with blood. We stood mainly astonished and gave the island the name isleta de Sacrificios [Island of the Sacrifices]. In The Conquest of New Spain Daz recounted that, after landing on the coast, they came all over a temple committed to Tezcatlipoca. "That day they had sacrificed two boys, cutting open their chests and supplying their blood and hearts to that accursed idol". Daz narrates assorted more sacrificial descriptions on the later Corts expedition. Arriving at Cholula, they find "cages of stout wooden bars [...] full of men and boys who were being fattened for the sacrifice at which their flesh would be eaten". When the conquistadors reached Tenochtitlan, Daz described the sacrifices at the Great Pyramid: They strike open the wretched Indian's chest with flint knives and hastily tear out the palpitating heart which, with the blood, they present to the idols [...]. They cut off the arms, thighs and head, eating the arms and thighs at ceremonial banquets. The head they hang up on a beam, and the body is [] given to the beasts of prey. According to Bernal Daz, the chiefs of the surrounding towns, for example Cempoala, would complain on galore occasions to Corts regarding the perennial need to supply the Aztecs with victims for humane sacrifice. It is clear from his description of their fear and resentment toward the Mexicas that, in their opinion, it was no honor to surrender their kinsmen to be sacrificed by them. Hernn Corts Corts describes similar events in his Letters: They have a most horrid and abominable habit which veritably ought to be punished and which until now we have seen in no other part, and this is that, whenever they wish to ask something of the idols, in order that their plea may find more acceptance, they take a good deal of girls and boys and even adults, and in the presence of these idols they open their chests while they are still alive and take out their hearts and entrails and burn them before the idols, supplying the smoke as sacrifice. Some of us have seen this, and they say it is the most terrible and frightful thing they have ever witnessed. The Anonymous Conqueror The Anonymous Conqueror's Narrative of Some Things of New Spain and of the Great City of Temestitan details Aztec sacrifices. In Chapter XIV he depicts the temple in which men, women, boys and girls were sacrificed. On Chapter XXIV the Anonymous Conqueror repeatedly claims that the Aztecs were cannibals, sodomites, alcoholics and polygamists. The initial Spanish text is lost. The description of the temple was published in the 1556 Ramusio Italian edition. A jaguar-shaped cuauhxicalli in the National Museum of Anthropology. This altar-like stone vessel was used to hold the hearts of sacrificial victims. See likewise chacmool. Assessment of the exercise of humane sacrifice Human sacrifice was not one thing new when the Aztecs arrived to the Valley of Mexico, nor was it something distinguishable to pre-Columbian Mexico. Other Mesoamerican cultures, such as the Tarascans and Toltecs, performed humane sacrifices as well. Although the extent of humane sacrifice is unknown amid assorted Mesoamerican civilizations, such as Teotihuacn, what distinguished Maya and Aztec humane sacrifice was the importance with which it was embedded in each and everyday life. Diego Durn states that Aztecs made "indifferent or sarcastic remarks" when the Spaniards seriously criticized the rite. In his Book of the Gods and Rites numerous of the Nahuas even ridiculed the Christian sensibilities. Instead, they asked the Spaniards to applaud: The sacrifice of humane beings [], the esteemed oblation of outstanding lords and noblemen. They do not forget these things and tell of them as if they had been outstanding deeds. Although Aztec accounts mention some victims who wept, 'faltered... weakened' or 'lost control of their bowels' when going to be sacrificed (Sahagun Bk 2: 81), this reaction does not seem to have been the norm, as when this occurred, it was viewed as a bad omen (Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 132), and a tetlazolmictiliztli ('insult to the gods')(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 132). Such victims were hurriedly taken apart and slain among the congregation's sarcastic jeers of '(the victim has) rather acquitted himself as a man'(Sahagun Bk 2:21). Contrary to ordinary perceptions of Aztec victims being terrified of their fate, even the Conquistadors Cortes and Alvarado found that those they freed 'indignantly rejected [the] offer of release and demanded to be sacrificed.'(Bernal Diaz, The Conquest of New Spain,159). What we may glean from all this is that the sacrificial role entailed a great deal of social expectation and a sure degree of acquiescence. Sahagun's informants told him that key roles were reserved for persons who were considered 'charming...quick..dances with feeling.. without [moral] defects ... of good understanding ... good mannered'(Sahagun Bk 2: 24: 68-69). For numerous rites, the victim had such a amount of prescribed duties that it is difficult to imagine how the accompanying festival would have innovative without a good deal of degree of compliance on the part of the victim. For instance, victims were expected to bless children, greet and cheer passers-by, listen people's petitions to the gods, visit people in their homes, give discourses and lead sacred songs, processions and dances (Sahagun Bk 5: 8; Bk 2: 5:9; Bk 2:24:68-69). The works of Clendinnen and Brundage infer that only a few select victims had this kind of role, but the Florentine Codex and Duran both make no such distinctions, stating that 'those who had to die performed galore ceremonies... [and] these [pre-sacrificial] rites were performed in the case of all the prisoners, each in turn.'(see Sahagun Bk 2:5:9 and Duran, Book of the Gods...p. 112). It will have to likewise be remembered that these sacrifices were ritualistic and symbolic acts accompanying huge feasts and festivals. Victims commonly passed away in the "center stage" among the splendor of dancing troupes, percussion orchestras, elaborated costumes and decorations, carpets of flowers, crowds of thousands of commoners, and all the assembled elite. This might explain why Aztec texts often refer to humane sacrifice as neteotoquiliztli, 'the desire to be regarded as a god'(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 177 Note 4). For each festival, at least one or more victims took on the paraphernalia, habits and traits of the god or goddess whom they were dying as. Particularly the young man who was indoctrinated for a year to submit himself to Tezcatlipoca's temple was the Aztec equivalent of a celebrity or rock star, being primarily revered and adored to the point of people "kissing the ground" when he passed by, as Sahagn put it. This exercise was known as getting an ixiptla - namely, the god's representative, effigy or idol. Ixiptla was the same term used for wooden, stone and dough images of gods. Interestingly, Aztec texts seldom discern among humane ixiptla and wooden or stone ixiptla. In fact, so elaborately costumed and painted were humane ixiptla that even the congregation was unsure which were humane and which were stone or wood (Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 102). When a victim appeared in full regalia before the congregation, it was said that the divinity had been given 'human form'- that the god now had an ixitli (face)(Duran, Book of the Gods..., 72-73). Duran says such victims were'worshipped... as the deity'(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 42,109,232) or 'as altho they had been gods'(Sahagun, Florentine Codex Bk 2: 226, 238-239) (-the basi Nahuatl term being nienoteoti'tzinea, literally, 'I consider him a god')(Clavigero, 98). Even whilst still alive, these victims were honoured, hallowed and addressed (like gods) as 'Lord' and 'Lady'(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites.., 189) Posthumously, their remains were treated as actual relics of the gods which explains why victims' skulls, bones and skin were ofttimes painted, bleached, stored and displayed, or else applied as ritual masks and oracles. For example, Diego Duran's informants told him that whoever wore the skin of the victim portraying god Xipe considered himself 'divine'(Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites..176). Proposed explanations of Aztec humane sacrifice Aztec or Mixtec sacrificial knife, in all likelihood for ceremonial use only, in the British Museum. The nutritional explanation Main article: Cannibalism in pre-Columbian America Scholars Michael Harner and Marvin Harris have argued that the motivation behind humane sacrifice amidst the Aztecs was actually the cannibalization of the sacrificial victims. While there is universal agreement that the Aztecs practiced humane sacrifice, there is a lack of scholarly consensus as to whether cannibalism was widespread. At one extreme anthropologist Marvin Harris, author of Cannibals and Kings, has passed around the claim, in the first place proposed by Harner, that the flesh of the victims was a part of an aristocratic diet as a reward, since the Aztec diet was missing out in proteins. This assert has been rebutted by Bernard Ortz Montellano who, in his studies of Aztec health, diet, and medicine, demonstrates that while the Aztec diet was low in animal proteins, it was rich in vegetable proteins. The political explanation The high-profile nature of the sacrificial ceremonies suggests that humane sacrifice played an necessary political function. The Mexica used a sophisticated package of psychological weaponry to maintain their empire, purposed at instilling a sense of fear into their neighbours. The Aztecs controlled a huge empire of tribute paying vassal tribes. The population of native Aztecs was very little equated to the population of the area they controlled. The Aztecs were vulnerable - they would have been without apparent effort outnumbered had their vassal tribes formed confederations and rebelled. To sow dissention amongst the vassals the Aztecs demanded humane victims as percentage of the annual tribute. The vassals would raid each other to capture prisoners. This encouraged animosity among the vassals and strengthened Aztec political central rule. This was a method of political control which was innovative and perhaps distinctive in humane history. European empires, in contrast, were distinctively secured through the creation of garrisons and installation of puppet governments in conquered towns or settlements. The Mexica employed humane sacrifice as a weapon of terror even versus the Spanish conquistadors, whose fallen victims were sacrificed and on occasion skinned and their bloody heads placed at the tzompantli. From throughout the empire even the chiefs of enemy towns were invited, or in the case of tributary towns obliged, to attend sacrificial ceremonies in Tenochtitlan. Their refusal would be considered an act of defiance versus the Mexica. The psychological explanation For Lloyd deMause it is significant that the victims were invested of a unfathomed cosmological meaning. According to him and a minority of academics who subscribe to an substitute school of thought, "psychohistory", humane sacrifices, including sacrifices in Mesoamerica, were an unconscious form of response to the traumatogenic modes of childrearing. DeMause in queer considers the Aztecs' exercise of sacrifice as displacement. External links Article "El sacrificio humano en Mesoamrica" by Michel Graulich - in Arqueologa mexicana, vol. XI, nmero 63, pp. 16-21. (Spanish) Notes ^ Matos-Moctezuma, Eduardo (1986). Vida y muerte en el Templo Mayor. Fondo de Cultura Econmica. ^ "Evidence May Back Human Sacrifice Claims" By Mark Stevenson ^ "Grisly Sacrifices Found in Pyramid of the Moon" By LiveScience Staff. ^ a b Harner, Michael (1977). "The Ecological Basis for Aztec Sacrifice". American Ethnologist 4 (1): 117135. doi:10.1525/ae.1977.4.1.02a00070. ^ Leonardo Lpez-Lujn's address in "Nuevas perspectivas sobre el sacrificio humano entre los mexicas", an global seminary of the Instituto Nacional de Antropologa e Historia celebrated in September 2007 in the Museum of the Templo Mayor. ^ Graulich, Michael (2003). "El sacrificio humano en Mesoamrica". Arqueologa mexicana XI (63): 1621. ^ Reinhard, Johan (November 1999). "A 6,700 metros nios incas sacrificados quedaron congelados en el tiempo". National Geographic, Spanish version: 3655. ^ Bernardino de Sahagn, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva Espaa, ed. a cargo de ngel Ma. Garibay (Mxico: Editorial Porra, 2006), chapters XX to XXXVIII ^ Thema, Equipo (2002). Los aztecas. Ediciones Rueda. pp. 3940. ^ Nicholson, Henry B. (1971). (in) Handbook of Middle American Indians. University of Texas Press. p. 402. ^ Len-Portilla (1963, p.111). ^ Museo del Templo Mayor, Hall 2 ^ Cecelia Klein. "The Ideology of Autosacrifice at the Templo Mayor" in E. H. Boone, ed. The Aztec Templo Mayor pp. 293-370. Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks. 1987 ISBN 0-88402-149-1 ^ Soustelle, Jacques (2003). La vida cotidiana de los aztecas. Fondo de Cultura Econmica. p. 102ff. ^ Durn, Fr. Diego (1967). Historia de las Indias de Nueva Espaa. Porra. ^ deMause, Lloyd (2002). The Emotional Life of Nations. Karnac. p. 413. ^ Matos-Moctezuma, Eduardo (2006). Tenochtitlan. Fondo de Cultura Econmica. pp. 17273. ^ Bernardino de Sahagn, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva Espaa (op. cit.), p. 76 ^ Sahagn, Ibid. ^ Duverger, Christian (2005). La flor letal: economa del sacrificio azteca. Fondo de cultura econmica. pp. 8393. ^ Sahagn, Op. cit., p. 79 ^ Bernardino de Sahagn, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva Espaa (op. cit.), p. 83 ^ Sahagn, Fray Bernardino (1950-1959). Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain. 1561-82., trans. Arthur J.O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble. Santa Fe: School of American Research and the University of Utah. III, 5. ^ Hassig, Ross (1988). Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political Control. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-806-12121-1. ^ Hassig, Ross (2003). "El sacrificio y las guerras floridas". Arqueologa mexicana XI: 4651. ^ Davies, Nigel (1968). Los Seorios independientes del Imperio Azteca. Mexico D.F.: Instituto Nacional de Antropologa e Historia (INAH). ^ Duverger, Christian (2005). La flor letal. Fondo de cultura econmica. p. 81. ^ Bernardino de Sahagn, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva Espaa (op. cit.), p. 88 ^ Duverger, Christian (2005). La flor letal. Fondo de cultura econmica. pp. 139140. ^ Duverger, Ibid., 171 ^ Duverger (op. cit.), pages 157-167 ^ Hassig, Ross (2003). "El sacrificio y las guerras floridas". Arqueologa mexicana XI: 47. ^ Victor Davis Hanson (2000), Carnage and Culture, Doubleday, New York, pp. 194-195. Hanson, who accepts the 80,000+ estimate, likewise notes that it exceeded "the each and everyday murder record at either Auschwitz or Dachau." ^ Hanson, p. 195. ^ Duverger (op. cit), 174-77 ^ Matos-Moctezuma, Eduardo (2005). Muerte a filo de obsidiana. Fondo de Cultura Econmica. pp. 111124. ^ George Holtker, "Studies in Comparative Religion", The Religions of Mexico and Peru, Vol 1, CTS ^ - "Ritual Sacrifice and the Feathered Serpent Pyramid at Teotihuacn, Mxico" By George L. Cowgill ^ - "Analysis of Kaqchikel Skeletons: Iximch, Guatemala" By Stephen L. Whittington & Robert H. Tykot ^ Stuart, David (2003). "La ideologa del sacrificio entre los mayas". Arqueologa mexicana XI (63): 2429. ^ Daz, Bernal (2005) . Historia verdadera de la conquista de Nueva Espaa (Introduccin y notas de Joaqun Ramrez Cabaas). Editorial Porra. p. 24. ^ Daz (op. cit.), p. 150 ^ Dinesh D'Souza's article ^ The Conquest of New Spain, chap. XLVI ^ Corts, Hernn (2005) . Cartas de relacin. Mxico: Editorial Porra. p. 26. "Y tienen otra cosa horrid y abominable y digna de ser punida que hasta hoy no habamos visto en ninguna parte, y es que todas las veces que alguna cosa quieren pedir a sus dolos para que ms acepten su peticin, toman muchas nias y nios y aun hombre y mujeres de mayor edad, y en presencia de aquellos dolos los abren vivos por los pechos y les sacan el corazn y las entraas, y queman las dichas entraas y corazones delante de los dolos, y ofrecindolos en sacrificio aquel humo. Esto habemos visto algunos de nosotros, y los que lo han visto dicen que es la ms cruda y espantosa cosa de ver que jams han visto". ^ - Narrative of Some Things of New Spain and of the Great City of Temestitan, Mxico, Chapter XV, written by a Companion of Hernn Corts, The Anonymous Conqueror. ^ Ibid., Chapter XIV ^ Ibid., Chapter XXIV ^ DNA analysis shows that the Teotihuacan civilization brought humane victims from distant towns. ^ Diego Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, p. 227 ^ Sahagn, Historia general, op. cit, p. 104 ^ Website of the British Museum. ^ Ortiz de Montellano, Bernard R. (1990). Aztec Medicine, Health, and Nutrition. Rutgers University Press. ^ Ortiz De Montellano, Bernard R. (1983). "Counting Skulls: Comment on the Aztec Cannibalism Theory of Harner-Harris". American Anthropologist, New Series 85, (2): 403406. ^ Godwin, Robert (2004). One Cosmos underneath God. Omega Books. pp. 142, 154. ^ deMause, Lloyd (2002). The Emotional Life of Nations. Karnac. e.g., pp. 31, 289290, 312, 374, and 410. References Anonymous Conqueror (1917) [ca.1550] (online replica by FAMSI, edited by Alec Christensen). Narrative of Some Things of New Spain and of the Great City of Temestitan, Mxico. Marshall H. Saville (trans. and ed.). New York: The Cortes Society. OCLC 6720413. http://www.famsi.org/research/christensen/anon_con/index.html. Retrieved 2008-01-12. Carrasco, David (1999). City of Sacrifice: The Aztec Empire and the Role of Violence in Civilization. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. ISBN 0-8070-4642-6. OCLC 41368255. Daz del Castillo, Bernal (1963) . The Conquest of New Spain. Penguin Classics. J. M. Cohen (trans.) (6th printing (1973) ed.). Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-044123-9. OCLC 162351797. Durn, Diego (1994) [ca.1581]. The History of the Indies of New Spain. Civilization of the American Indian series, #210. Doris Heyden (trans., annot., and introd.) (English translation of Historia de las Indias de Nueva-Espaa y Islas de Tierra Firme ed.). Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-2649-3. OCLC 29565779. Godwin, Robert W. (2004). One Cosmos beneath God: The Unification of Matter, Life, Mind & Spirit. Saint Paul, MN: Paragon House. ISBN 1-55778-836-7. OCLC 55131504. Hassig, Ross (1988). Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political Control. Civilization of the American Indian series, no. 188. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-2121-1. OCLC 17106411. Len-Portilla, Miguel (1963). Aztec Thought and Culture: A Study of the Ancient Nhuatl Mind. Civilization of the American Indian series, #67. Jack Emory Davis (trans.). Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. OCLC 181727. Matos Moctezuma, Eduardo (1998). Vida y muerte en el Templo Mayor (3rd ed.). Mxico D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Econmica. ISBN 968-16-5712-8. OCLC 40997904. (Spanish) Ortiz De Montellano, Bernard R. (June 1983). "Counting Skulls: Comment on the Aztec Cannibalism Theory of Harner-Harris". American Anthropologist (Arlington, VA: American Anthropological Association) 85 (2): 403406. doi:10.1525/aa.1983.85.2.02a00130. OCLC 1479294. Ortiz De Montellano, Bernard R. (1990). Aztec Medicine, Health, and Nutrition. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0-8135-1562-9. OCLC 20798977. Sahagn, Bernardino de (195082) [ca. 154085]. Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain, 13 vols. in 12. vols. I-XII. Charles E. Dibble and Arthur J.O. Anderson (eds., trans., notes and illus.) (translation of Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva Espaa ed.). Santa Fe, NM and Salt Lake City: School for American Research and the University of Utah Press. ISBN 0-87480-082-X. OCLC 276351. Schele, Linda; and Mary Ellen Miller (1992). Blood of Kings: Dynasty and Ritual in Maya Art. Justin Kerr (photographer) (2nd paperback edn., reprint with corrections ed.). New York: George Braziller. ISBN 0-8076-1278-2. OCLC 41441466. v d e Aztec religion and mythology Aztec religion Human sacrifice in Aztec culture Templo Mayor Aztec mythology Centeotl Chalchiuhtlicue Cihuacoatl Coatlicue Coyolxauhqui Ehecatl Huehuecoyotl Huehueteotl Huitzilopochtli Mictlantecuhtli Mixcoatl Quetzalcoatl Tepoztecatl Tezcatlipoca Tlaloc Tlazolteotl Toci Tonatiuh Xipe Totec Xiuhcoatl Xiuhtecuhtli Xochipilli Xochiquetzal Xolotl Places in Aztec myth Aztln Mictlan Tlalocan Tamoanchan Tlillan-Tlapallan Categories: Aztec society | Aztec mythology and religion | Human sacrificeHidden categories: All articles with unsourced affirmations | Articles with unsourced affirmations from November 2007
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