Aztec rituals of sacrifice. Aztec human sacrifice

During the reign of Emperor Tlakeelel in the Aztec Empire, Huitzilopochtli was proclaimed the supreme deity, revered as the god of the sun and the god of war. Rituals with human sacrifice became widespread, and numerous bloody rites claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. Modern scholars know how some of these terrible rituals took place.

1. Aztec Wars to Capture Captives

The insatiable gods needed more and more sacrifices, and there were already not enough captives to sacrifice. Then the Aztecs agreed with the rulers of the neighboring city-state of Tlaxcala that they would wage wars among themselves only in order to capture captives. Now, when the battle was over, the soldiers of the defeated army understood what fate awaited them, but, nevertheless, meekly submitted to the enemy.

2. Voluntary self-sacrifice

The Aztecs considered it an honor to be sacrificed to the gods. Captives, criminals and debtors voluntarily offered their lives to the sacrificial altar. The captive Aztecs, whom the Spaniards once were about to release, were furious because they were deprived of the opportunity to die with dignity. Prostitutes also sacrificed themselves in honor of the Goddess of Love. During periods of long drought, many were forced to sell their children into slavery, receiving 400 corncobs for them. Children who did not work well, the owners had the right to resell. A twice resold slave could already be sent to the sacrificial altar.

3. Feast of Toxcatl

Toxcatl (from the word toxcahuia - drought) in honor of the god Tezcatlipoca was held in the fifth month of the Aztec calendar in honor of the harvest and was intended to ensure a good harvest in the future. A year before the holiday, a young handsome young man was chosen, usually from among the captured warriors, who was to be revered almost like a god for the whole next year. The chosen one lived in the palace, studied singing, playing the flute, and oratory. And on the day of the holiday, a ritual ceremony was performed at the top of the pyramid - on a long sacrificial stone, the priests opened the unfortunate chest, pulled out a beating heart, and threw the body down to the crowd, where he was beheaded. And the festival began, accompanied by eating the meat of the victim and dancing.

4. Sacrifices on the stone

Usually this ceremony was performed on a long sacrificial stone at the top of the pyramid. The victim was laid on a stone, the priest opened the chest and pulled out the still beating heart from it. Then the heart was torn into pieces and placed on the altar, later it was eaten by the priests. The body itself was thrown down from the pyramid, where it was beheaded, dismembered, and dishes were prepared from the meat for the upcoming feast.

5. Ritual Cannibalism

The meat of the victims was used to prepare various dishes for the priests and the nobility. Most often cooked meat baked with corn. The bones were used to make tools, weapons, and household utensils. The recipe for one of these dishes - pozole soup, which was prepared for the emperor from the victim's thigh, has survived to this day, only now pork is used for its preparation. Christians forced the Aztecs to replace human meat with pork.

6 Mass Sacrifice In Tenochtitlan

During the reign of the Aztecs in Mexico, about 250 thousand people were sacrificed every year. But the largest known sacrifice took place at the celebration of the completion of the Great Pyramid in Tenochtitlan. This sacred temple was built for many years, and in 1487 it was erected. Over 4 days of celebration, an incredibly large number of people were killed - 84 thousand.

7. The feast of flaying people

Tlacaxipeualiztli is one of the most feared Aztec festivals held in honor of the god Xipe Totec, “the lord without skin.” 40 days before the start of the holiday, several captured warriors and slaves were chosen, dressed in expensive clothes, and after that they lived in luxury, but only for 40 days. And on the first day of the holiday, which lasted 20 days, there was a mass sacrifice, during which they were skinned alive. The first day was completely occupied with the removal of the skin, and the second with the dismemberment of the bodies. The bodies were later eaten, and the priests wore the skin for 20 days, after which it was given to them for safekeeping, and the priests used it during their ritual dances.

8. Gladiator fights

During the feast of the Flaying, some victims were given a chance to escape. To do this, they had to defeat the famous Aztec warriors, armed to the teeth, with only a wooden sword in their hands, which, of course, did not give them the slightest chance of victory. The battles took place on the round sacrificial stone Temalacatl. But according to legend, one of the captives still managed to win this battle by killing 8 warriors. The Aztecs were so amazed at this outcome that the winner was offered command of the army as a reward. But he did not accept their offer, considering it offensive to himself, and preferred to die with dignity, being sacrificed to the gods.

9. The attitude of the Aztecs to the twins

The Aztecs were very ambivalent about twins. In some myths, they are presented as heroes or even deities, while in others they are presented as terrible killers. However, in real life, the twins were unequivocally treated with disgust, considering them freaks. The patron god of the twins was the god Xolotl, the god of thunder and death, who, having a very unpleasant appearance, was himself one of the two twin gods. It was believed that the birth of twins was a life threat to their parents. Therefore, often only one of the twins was left alive, and the second was given as a sacrifice to the gods.

10. Child sacrifice

The Aztecs, for the sake of their religion, did not spare even children. In one of the temples in honor of the god Tlaloc, who controls the forces of rain, thunder and lightning, the most terrible ritual was performed during a drought. In order to beg God for rain, children were brought to the temple as victims and killed there. Many of the children did not want to go and wept loudly as they climbed the stairs to the top of the temple. Those who did not cry themselves were forced to do so, as their crying was a necessary part of the ritual. At the top of the pyramid, the children's heads were cut off, and their bodies were taken out of the city and stored in a special pit in the open. This was done so that blessed rain could also fall on them.

The practice of sacrificing to higher powers was known to many ancient cultures from the Babylonians to the Greeks: in addition to slaughtered animals, human blood also irrigated their altars. However, nowhere did such cruel rituals reach such a scale as among the Indians of Mexico. The first witnesses of their bloody actions were the Spaniards-conquistadors, who depicted local customs with horror. The theme begun in the Spanish chronicles was developed by the authors of adventure novels, who created images of “bloodthirsty Indians”, who, out of natural malice, gladly sacrificed both neighbors and innocent white strangers. One can, of course, doubt the veracity of such descriptions - they were too much in the hands of the conquerors: since the Indians are savages and cannibals, then, of course, they should be exterminated or civilized, appropriating their wealth as a reward for their efforts. However, many of the stories of the Spaniards are confirmed by ethnographers, and the evidence found makes the unprepared modern European shudder.
What is behind the mass human sacrifices of the Aztecs and Mayans?

The high priest ascended the great pyramid. His four assistants were already firmly holding the girl lying on the high platform. They kept her not so that she would not break out, on the contrary, the messenger to the gods was proud of her mission, but so that at the time of opening the sternum, her body would not twitch from the sharp jagged knife of the priest. The heart had to be removed quickly, surgically accurate and brought to the statue of the deity still alive, until the "soul flew off", otherwise the gods would reject the message. Another second and the priest raises the pulsating source of human life to the heavens. And the lifeless body of the messenger rolls down the steps of the pyramid. Here, the servants, with a habitual movement, rip off almost all the skin from him, leaving only the hands and feet intact. Throwing off the ritual robes, the priest pulls on the girl's skin to lead the dance, in which old women in special outfits echo his movements. Another sacrifice has been made. The gods will again receive a messenger who will tell them about the needs of the Aztecs.

In ancient Mexico, people sincerely believed that the soul of the deceased went to the highest patrons. So, she could convey to them the requests of people. In other words, among the ancient tribes, sacrifice was a kind of letter sent to the "heavenly office." Messengers could be either “regular” (they were sent on ordinary calendar holidays) or “emergency” some special reason was required to send them to the gods: crop failure, drought, disaster, epidemic, war, etc. According to the descriptions Franciscan missionary Diego de Landa (XVI century) in the first case, the Maya Indians offered animals to the gods as "regular" envoys. And in the "case of misfortune or danger" they went to human sacrifices. Usually virgin boys and girls were chosen for the ritual. Devoutly religious parents voluntarily prepared their children for the sacred act: they not only protected, but also in every way pleased them, so that they would not be tempted to run away or “be defiled by carnal sin.” Having matured a little, the children were transferred to the training of the priests and helped them in the rituals. On the eve of the sacrifice, accompanied by special processions, they were solemnly taken through the villages. A person who went to the gods was not considered a sufferer, but a hero capable of giving up personal happiness for the sake of the public good.

Soul, cob, ball

One of the most archaic ways of sacrificing throughout Mesoamerica was the cutting off of the head. It arose long before the appearance of the Mayans or the Aztecs and always had a special, symbolic meaning. The hieroglyphic sign pointing to the eye (read ich in the Mayan language) also denoted the concepts of “head”, “soul”, “fruit”, which became, as it were, identical. Therefore, in ancient Mexican images, one can often see the head separated from the body, for example, growing from an ear of maize or lying on a folded book. In these cases, we are not talking about sacrifice, but only about the ideas of the endless rebirth of the soul, embodied in the depicted head.

But if in the picture there is a field for playing a ball, and in the middle of it lies a head, then there really is a ritual sacrifice behind it. Moreover, often near such quite real! fields, archaeologists sometimes discover ritual burials of heads. Later Aztecs simply installed tzompantli near their stadiums, head stands resembling terrible abacus, where skulls were strung on poles instead of bones. True, sometimes they were limited to architectural analogues of zompantli: small stone platforms, in which skulls were present only in the form of an anthropological relief.

A rope dropped from the moon

In 1561, in Mani (Yucatan Peninsula), the Maya, unexpectedly for the authorities, committed collective suicide by hanging. In the most extreme situations, in search of the salvation of their people, the Maya were not content with sending a worthy messenger, but arranged "self-sacrifice" (sacrifice by suicide). In these cases, self-hanging was considered the shortest path to the gods: in this way, the deceased went straight to the goddess of the rainbow Ish-Chel, one of the later incarnations of the ancient goddess of the Moon, associated with death and birth. The goddess sat on the World Tree ceiba, from the branches of which fibers-ropes descended for the souls of the dead. In addition, the rope was identified with the Milky Way and the umbilical cord. In fairness, it should be noted that violent hanging, so popular in contemporary Europe, was not practiced by the Indians and was considered forbidden. In this case, it was only an attempt to solve complex social problems in the traditional way: the Indians sought to attract the help of the gods in order to escape from the Spaniards.

The sun demands sacrifice
On November 8, 1519, a Spanish detachment led by Hernan Cortes arrived in the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. The guests were greeted by the local nobility, located on the outskirts of a place called Malcuitlapilco, which means "the end of the string of captives." In 1487, when the Aztecs consecrated the great temple at Tenochtitlan, the line of people destined for the sacrificial altar reached this point. The line reached four kilometers, stretched to the great temple, and the prisoners stood in it in four rows.

Mass sacrifices were a rather late tradition. It was formed in Central Mexico under the influence of a new ideology that came along with the invasion of northern tribes, among which were the Toltecs and Aztecs. The Aztecs were especially famous for this ritual, who even waged special wars to capture captives in order to sacrifice them.

The imperial strategy of political unity, achieved for the first time in the region by the Aztecs, required a general state order in the field of ideology as well. However, the official religion inevitably continued to be a mixture of local beliefs and cults in complete theological chaos. It is no coincidence that the ruler of Texcoco, Nezahualcoyotl (14021472), expressing his attitude to this religious confusion, ordered the erection of a temple in the form of a high tower, where there was not a single statue or image. He dedicated this temple to the "Unknown God, the Creator of all things." A deity without an image and without an explanatory myth was called Ipalnemouani "He because of whom we live." At the same time, Nezahualcoyotl did not even count on the understanding of his contemporaries.

In Tenochtitlan, which claimed universal hegemony, under Motekus I the Elder (14401469), theologians attempted to systematize religious teaching, giving it some kind of rational logic and structure. The basis of this ideology was sacrifice, which turned into an end in itself. The new religious concept served as a rationale for the so-called “military-mystical” idea, according to which the Sun was the supreme deity of the Aztecs, and they, being his allies, had to support the luminary (and, consequently, the whole world) with the blood of the sacrificed captives.

So human sacrifice turned from an exclusive means of communication with the gods into the basis of the religious practice of the Aztecs: it began to be considered a direct way to deliver food to the deity, propitiate or thank him for his help.

Bathing in the water of the universe

In order to deliver a message to the arbiters of their destinies, the messengers could go not only "up", but also "down": to the sacred well - for example, to the "Well of Sacrifices" in Chichen Itza. This method was practiced on the territory of the Yucatan Peninsula. Its terrain is a limestone platform with many round karst sinkholes filled with water. The water accumulating in these karst wells (cenote) was considered the sacred water of the universe. The fact is that the ancient Mayan astronomers represented the constellation Ursa Major in the form of an old woman goddess pouring virgin water from an inverted jug. Two stars of the Ursa bucket pointed to the North Star that is, to the north, and the city of Chichen Itza, according to the sacred Mayan geography, was at the northernmost point of the earth's projection of the Milky Way ("Heavenly Rope"). So the local wells were quite suitable for the role of containers of sacred water. The warring tribes even entered into agreements on the right of passage to the territory of the well for sacrifices. True, the latest finds of archaeologists who descended to the bottom of the "cenote" indicate that people were by no means always sacrificed: few human remains were found in the well.

Climbing into the permafrost

Here is a well-built boy with regular features, accompanied by priests, making an “ascent to the heavenly permafrost”. The path is hard and, despite the many woolen clothes on the child, his fingers get frostbite along the way. Having reached the high-altitude sanctuary, those who came perform preparatory rites, and then leave the victim in eternal cold. This time he is not killed by a blow to the back of the head, as is often done with others, but is placed in a crypt alive while he is still under the influence of drugs. He would die of the cold before he even awoke from the dope, naturally curled up for warmth in the fetal position so characteristic of Peruvian mummies.

In this case, the action takes place in the Andes. The fact that the Incas also practiced human sacrifice is evidenced by various images of naked victims with their hands tied behind their backs and figures with a knife in one hand and a severed head in the other. Most often, captives captured during wars and raids were sacrificed. However, only specially selected, beautiful children, devoid of physical defects and not yet puberty, could become especially trusted messengers to the gods-ancestors. The above practice to leave the sacrifice in the sanctuaries of the highlands at an altitude of about 6 thousand meters was of general imperial significance and was timed to coincide with the December solstice. But sometimes such children were also sent as a gift to the Inca (ruler), for the ritual kapak hucha (great sacrifice) in the royal sanctuary. If the Inca wanted to thank the sender, he sent the child back to his parents to be sacrificed in his native village.

One of the leaders of the Inca village near Ayacucho, who built a complex irrigation canal, sent his daughter to Cuzco to sacrifice to the sun. The envoy was received with great honors and, as a reward for the success of her father, was sent back. Flattered by the attention of the Incas, the inhabitants of the village dug a crypt on the top of the mountain, placed the girl alive there and walled up the entrance. A copper tube came out of the burial chamber, through which the chosen one of the sun was symbolically given water to drink. Soon she began to be considered a local deity. The happy father received a promotion, and the brothers of the victim and even their children, having taken the positions of oracles, transmitted instructions in a thin voice on behalf of the girl.

Aztec surgery
The items with which the bloodletting ceremony was performed were minimal: paper made from the bark, a vessel for collecting blood and a rope. The paper, lying in a special dish, absorbed the spilled blood. Apparently, then it was burned, and in the form of smoke, the soul-blood fell to the gods, "pinching their eyes." Several types of instruments for extracting blood are known: fish bones (stingray), flint and obsidian knives, jade piercings, thorns and leaves of plants, sections of sea shells. I must say that the serrated ritual knives for extracting blood were extremely elegant and were real works of art. In their form, they resembled those same "snakes of dreams" that appeared in visions to practitioners of bloodletting. At the same time, they are quite comparable in shape and size to surgical instruments. The priests who performed the sacrifices were, by the way, excellent experts in anatomy. So, the task of tearing out the heart included: accurately and exceptionally quickly open the chest, deftly remove the still trembling heart, remove the thinnest layer of skin without violating its integrity, separate the head, hands and feet, as well as the lower jaw from the skull, remove from skeletal tibia. The solemn course of the ritual should not have been interrupted.

ritual cannibalism

In cases where the victim was deified, the rite (including the tearing out of the heart described at the beginning) could be supplemented by ritual cannibalism. If in such a case a prisoner was sacrificed, then he must have been distinguished by exceptional courage and courage - it was believed that the qualities of the “eaten” could be transmitted through his flesh. Participation in the ritual on both sides were worthy of only the elite. The bones of the skull were removed from the head of the slain captive, then it was dried, after which the greatly reduced head of the enemy was hung from the belt of the winner. Jaws and tibia bones were left from the captives, which were covered with victory inscriptions with the aim of "extracting them during dances as a trophy as a sign of victory."

Cases of cannibalism are also confirmed by the findings of anthropologists. The largest of them were made in the central region of Mexico, the cities of Tlatelcomila, Tetelpan and Tlatelolco, where such feasts took place long before the beginning of our era. A few years ago, Mexican archaeologists unearthed a tenth-century settlement in the middle of a mountain valley, not far from the ceremonial center. Here, human bones were found interspersed with a large amount of broken pottery, animal bones (mostly rabbits), coal and ashes. Damaged and whole bones were stacked without any anatomical order. Among them there were few vertebrae, ribs, feet, and there were no hands at all, but several skulls and jaws were preserved. Anthropologists had difficulty getting an idea of ​​the total number of skeletons. On 90% of all discovered bones there were traces of intentional impact (blows, cuts and fractures). An analysis of their damage showed that the body had been dismembered before burial. First, the muscle mass was cut and separated, and then the ligaments were cut in order to dismember the skeleton. The type of fracture resulting from twisting indicates that the bones were still fresh, not dry. Apparently, such fractures were carried out to extract the bone marrow. Traces on the skulls made it possible to reconstruct the pattern of skin and hair removal. In addition, the obvious nature of the thermal effect does not indicate the direct presence of the body on fire, but, most likely, its boiling. The image of the Indians performing a ritual dance around the fire is not at all as ridiculous as it might seem.

There are also descriptions of ritual cannibalism among the Andean Indians. Representatives of the nobility took part in them. A worthy chosen one of his kind or a prisoner of noble birth was tied naked to a pole. Then “with stone daggers and knives they cut it into pieces, not dismembering it, but cutting off the meat from those places where it is most: from the calves, thighs, buttocks and the fleshy part of the hands, irrigating themselves with blood; men, women, and children ate the meat together with great haste, swallowing it in pieces. As a result, the unfortunate sufferer saw how others ate him alive, burying him in their wombs. Whatever the lifetime merits of the eaten, in themselves they did not guarantee him eternal memory. He still had to pass the last test: not to show his suffering during the ritual, only then his bones were placed in crevices, on mountain tops and in hollows of trees, in order to worship them as a shrine. If the unfortunate person “let out a groan or a sigh”, then his bones were broken with contempt and thrown away.

Blood smoking

Here is a man tied to a post, who is wounded with a spear or arrows. Smoking, blood flows from the body of another envoy. This way of addressing God belonged to the category of bloodletting. In order to save the victim from physical torment, narcotic drinking and even hypnosis were used, and the rite itself, accompanied by special chants and rhythmic dances, produced a bewitching (fascinating) effect on all participants. The Spaniards, who arrived in America in the 16th century, banned the practice as "barbarian". Under the pressure of the Catholic Church, the rite was gradually transformed into a kind of ritual action, which the Mayans called the “dance with the cobs”, where well-aimed archers no longer shot at a person, but at a tossed ear of corn.

It is curious, however, that under the Spaniards, Sebastian, depicted as pierced with arrows and covered in blood, became the beloved saint of the Indians. Having figured out this "pagan" subtext, the Catholic censors forbade the involvement of Indian masters in the artistic creation of canonical Christian images.

Bloodletting did not necessarily imply the death of the victim. The most exotic version of non-lethal bloodletting among the Mayan Indians was the “stringing” ritual. The rite consisted in the fact that all the men of the same clan, having gathered in the temple, pierced “male members across and sideways” with a sharp spike, then dragged a long cord through the holes and thus found themselves “strung” on a single rope soaked in common blood the symbol of the umbilical cord of the universal mother , as well as the Milky Way. The first images of such ropes appear on the Olmec altars in the 1st millennium BC. e., denoting the relationship of rulers with their divine ancestors. The Maya Indians, who came to the historical arena in the first centuries of our era, not only preserved the ancient ideas about the umbilical cord, but also left many images and texts with bloodletting rites. It is curious that in the classical period of the Maya (VIIX century), the rite was practiced mainly by women: the Mayan rulers passed a rather fleecy cord through the tongue, after piercing it with a thick spike.

The male rite of "stringing" was so important for maintaining the unity of the clan that it was practiced for a long time even under the Spaniards, since it embodied a permanent family relationship within the clan between living men and distant ancestors. As the chronicler wrote, “he who did this more times was considered the most courageous. Their sons began to do this from childhood, but the most terrible thing is that they were inclined to this.

Part of the mass addiction to strange entertainment is due to the possibility of entering an altered state of consciousness. With the loss of blood during the ritual, the brain produces substances that stimulate the appearance of hallucinatory visions. Ancient Mexican shamans "seers" achieved this effect intentionally.

Sacrifices in the practices of the peoples of the world

Ancient Babylon (IIIII millennium BC): Once a year, a criminal was dressed in royal clothes and put to death. The pseudo-king drank and ate at the royal table, cohabited with the royal concubines. Five days later he was impaled or hanged.

Ancient Egypt (IV millennium BC to the beginning of AD): starting from the 17th day of the month of Atira, a four-day commemoration of the sacrificially killed and dismembered Osiris was held (now the end of October the beginning of November). The custom of dismembering the body of a ruler or priest and burying it in different parts of the country to ensure productivity and fertility was widespread.

Ancient India (III millennium BC): in the instructions for making sacrifices in the Yajurveda The Book of Sacrificial Sayings, it was explained: "The gods live by what is sacrificed to them here below." To gain power, it was necessary to offer the gods a sacrifice of eleven people and eleven cows. To get rich, it was necessary to send a herd of horses to the gods, accompanied by a shepherd. In South India (Malabar), at the end of the term of service, the ruler was cut off his head and thrown over the crowd, the man who caught it ruled for the next five years.

Ancient Greece (III millennium BC): during the mysteries of Dionysus, a baby was sacrificed, the boiled flesh of which was eaten. Later, the child was replaced by a kid.

Ancient Rome (VIIIII century BC): Phoenician origin "ritual of Adonis" came to Rome from Greece. At the beginning, the personification of God was a sacrificed person, later, on the first day of the spring equinox, they cut down a pine tree and tied a doll to it, and on the third, “bloody”, day, to rhythmic music, the high priest-archigallus opened the veins on his arm and entered an altered state of consciousness. The rest of the priests in ecstasy inflicted wounds on themselves and castrated themselves, scattering the severed reproductive organs.

Thailand (XIIIXIV century): when laying the city, the first four pedestrians were chosen and buried alive under the gate posts on each side of the world.

East Prussia (until the 13th century): the aged ruler of the tribe performed the rite of self-immolation. Sometimes the power was taken by the person who killed the ruler.

West Africa (IVV century): on the day of the equinox, a man was beaten with hoes, and his body was buried in a freshly plowed field. In Guinea and Benin, a young girl was impaled. Celtic world (before the 4th century): Druids killed with arrows, impaled or burned alive prisoners of war or criminals, who were placed in an effigy of branches and straw.

Ancient Slavs (until the 10th century): offered human sacrifices at the foot of the sacred oaks dedicated to Perun. Back in 980, Prince Vladimir ordered that a wooden idol of the Thunderer Perun with a silver head and a golden mustache be erected in Kyiv and instituted human sacrifices in his honor. The practice lasted only eight years until Vladimir converted to Christianity.

papier mache zompantli

A truly indelible impression on the Spaniards was also made by the tradition of ritual cleansing and exposing the bones. It appeared in Central Mexico with the arrival of certain tribes from the north, where these practices existed in the period before our era and in the first centuries of ours. Then, at the end of the classical period, this tradition spread throughout Central Mexico and already in the postclassical period acquired an exceptional scope in most of the region.

By the end of the first millennium in Mexico, human skulls and tibias were even specially exhibited in temples. But this practice reached its culmination a little later in the mountainous regions in the form of collective burials of dismembered skeletons and in the display of bones in temples. These installations are called the already mentioned tzompantli.

It would seem that thanks to the efforts of the missionaries, the grim practice should have become a thing of the past. However, this did not happen. And to this day in Mexico, the Day of the Dead (November 2) remains the largest national holiday, into which the Christian holiday preceding it, All Saints' Day, flows. It goes back to the ancient Indian holiday of the exit of the souls of the dead from the underworld. In early November, human skulls are displayed everywhere: in shops, restaurants, government offices, and in homes. True, these are no longer authentic skulls of the dead, but only their copies made of papier-mâché, ceramics, dough or sugar. Each family arranges their own altar with skulls and lit candles. And looking into the office of some large company the day before, you can see how the secretary decorates a similar structure with flowers and garlands of burning light bulbs and thin paper lace in the colors of the national flag. Everyone is sure to bring gifts to the dead ancestors tacos, sweets, sweets, cigarettes, money and even a glass of tequila. And this date is traditionally celebrated as a day of universal joy.

Blood stats
It is impossible to count the number of people sacrificed. In ancient Mexico, no one kept such statistics, and archaeological excavations do not allow us to evaluate these data. According to the reports of the Mexican archaeologist A. Rus, out of all the burials of 72 Mayan settlements in the territory of Mexico and Guatemala, only 14 were found to have the remains of people sacrificed.

On Maya polychrome ceramics, there are more than fifty images of only acts of ritual beheading, and scenes of tearing out the heart are no less common. About throwing into the well is known only from the texts there are no images left. Mayan dictionaries of the 16th century preserved seven names for different types of sacrifices, some of them accompanied by the comment: "Indescribable, but something absolutely terrible." It can be said that the number of people sacrificed from the beginning of the new era until the advent of the Spaniards increased dynamically, which is primarily due to the influx of traditions of the northern barbarians Toltecs and other Nahua-speaking tribes. Under the Spaniards, sacrifices were forbidden.

Soul Receptacle

The ancient tradition of ritual sacrifice appeared in Mesoamerica at the turn of our era, then, in the middle of the 2nd millennium AD, it acquired an exceptional scope, constituting the very essence of the Aztec religious cult and fertilizing all further Mexican culture. Ethnographers are well aware that offerings of living blood, slaughtered animals, and plentiful food have been practiced throughout history by virtually all peoples, but the Aztecs made the idea of ​​sacrifice a key idea in their cult. Behind all ritual actions lie very ancient and universal ideas that the main receptacles of the human soul were blood and breath. The body was mortal, but the soul was not. The newborn acquired it along with the breath. While the soul was in the blood pulsating through the body or warm breath, the person was considered alive. Life left the wounded man along with blood, while the wound “smoked” “the soul flew away”, left its temporary shelter. And, being immortal, she went to the rest of the souls who lived in the eternal world of divine ancestors and gods. If the blood coagulated, the soul of the deceased was locked up. A natural conclusion followed from this: released, it can serve as a liaison between people and gods. The Indians represented her in the form of a fluttering butterfly. And the one that just left the deceased, a large green fly, called "the eyes of the dead." Conversely, for rebirth in an infant, the soul returned from heaven in the form of a shooting star. Therefore, Indian women, expecting a child, climbed the pyramids during meteor showers and “caught” the stars

Galina Ershova, Doctor of Historical Sciences

If the people of the past had known that there would come a time when the major religions would become monolithic, they probably would not have seen the need for meaningless human sacrifice. However, human sacrifice was common throughout the world, and varied in scope. And the manner in which they were carried out is horrific.

1. Thugs from India

Bandits in India are usually called the word "tugi", this word is a synonym for the Indian word "swindler". This group was spread all over India and ranged in number from a few to hundreds. The thugs tended to pose as tourists and offered the travelers company and protection. They then carefully monitored their victims for several days or even weeks, waiting for the moment when the victim would be vulnerable to a blow.

They performed their sacrifices according to the latest "ritual fashion". They believed that blood should not be shed, so they either strangled their victims or poisoned them. It is estimated that more than a million people died at the hands of Indian thugs, between 1740 and 1840, several mass graves were also discovered, in which, it is believed, the "thugs" made ritual sacrifices to their goddess Kali.

2. Victims of the Wicker Man

This type of ritual sacrifice was invented by the Celts, according to Julius Caesar, and it consisted in the mass burning of people and animals in a structure that had the shape of a giant man. Sacrifices were made by the Celts to their pagan gods in order to ensure that the year would be fertile, or to secure victory in a war or some other endeavor.

First of all, the Celts placed animals in the "wicker man". If there were not enough animals, they put captured enemies, or even innocent people there, surrounded the entire structure with wood and straw, and set it on fire.

Some people believe that the "wicker man" was invented by Caesar in order to portray his enemies as complete barbarians, and gain political support. But in any case, the "wicker man" was, and remains, an incredibly frightening form of sacrifice.

3. Mayan sacrifices in sinkholes

The Maya are well known for all sorts of ritual sacrifices. Offering living people to the gods was an important part of their religious practice. One of these practices was the sacrifice of people in sinkholes where the Maya jumped. The Maya believed that such funnels were the gates to the underworld, and that by offering sacrifices to local spirits, they would be able to propitiate them. They believed that if the spirits of the dead did not calm down, then they could bring misfortunes to the Maya, such as drought, as well as disease or war. For these reasons, they often forced people to jump into sinkholes, and some of them did it out of their own free will. The researchers found in South America many sinkholes, literally littered with human bones, which clearly indicated the extent to which the Mayans practiced religious human sacrifice.

4. Victims in buildings

One of the most terrible practices of mankind is the custom of burying people in the foundations of buildings in order to strengthen them. This practice has been adopted in parts of Asia, Europe, and North and South America. It was assumed that the larger the house, the more victims there must be. These victims ranged from small animals to hundreds of people. For example, Crown Prince Tsai in China was sacrificed in order to strengthen the dam more reliably.

5 Aztec Human Sacrifice

The Aztecs believed that human sacrifice was necessary to keep the Sun moving across the sky. This means that thousands of people were sacrificed every year. The Aztecs had huge pyramidal structures, with steps leading to the top, on which there was a sacrificial table. There, people were killed, and their hearts were torn out of their chests and raised to the Sun. The bodies of the people were then tossed down the steps to the enthusiastic crowd. Many of the bodies were fed to animals, others were hung from trees, and cases of cannibalism were also known. In addition to sacrificing at the pyramids, the Aztecs also burned people, shot them with bows, or forced them to kill each other, just as gladiators did.

6 African Albino Sacrifices

The most terrible thing about the sacrifice of African albinos is that they are widely practiced in Africa today. Some Africans still believe that albino body parts are powerful occult items that can be useful in witchcraft. They hunt for various body parts and collect them for their high occult value. For example, it is believed that the hands of an albino can bring financial success, the tongue is believed to bring good luck, and the genitals can cure impotence. Belief in the magical potential of albino body parts has led to the murder of thousands of people, both adults and children. Many albinos are forced into hiding because they fear for their lives.

7Inca Child Sacrifices

The Incas were a tribe in South America. Their culture was strongly influenced by their religious rites, which actively used human sacrifice. Unlike other tribes and cultures that allowed the sacrifice of slaves, captives or enemies, the Incas believed that the sacrifices should be valuable. For this reason, the Incas sacrificed the children of high-ranking officials, the children of priests, leaders, healers. Children began to prepare in advance, several months in advance. They were fattened, washed daily, they were provided with workers who were obliged to fulfill all their whims and desires. When the children were ready, they headed for the Andes. At the top of the mountain was a temple where children were beheaded and sacrificed.

8 Lafkenche Tribe

In 1960, the strongest earthquake in history hit Chile. As a result, a devastating tsunami arose off the Chilean coast, killing thousands of people and destroying a huge number of homes and property. This is known today as the Great Chilean Earthquake. It caused widespread fear and various speculations among the Chilean people. The Chileans came to the conclusion that the god of the sea was angry with them, and therefore they decided to sacrifice to him. They chose a five-year-old child, and killed him in the most terrible way: they cut off his arms and legs, and put it all on poles, on the beach, overlooking the sea, so that the god of the sea would calm down.

9 Child Sacrifices At Carthage

Child sacrifice was very popular in ancient cultures, probably because people believed that children had innocent souls and were therefore the most acceptable victims for the gods. The Carthaginians had a sacrificial fire pit into which they threw their children and their parents. This practice angered the parents of Carthage, who were tired of killing their children. As a result, they decided to buy children from neighboring tribes. In times of great calamity, such as drought, famine, or war, the priests demanded that even the youth be sacrificed. At such times, it happened that up to 500 people were sacrificed. The ritual was performed on a moonlit night, the victims were killed quickly, and their bodies were thrown into a fiery pit, and all this was accompanied by loud singing and dancing.

10 Joshua Milton Blahy: The Naked Liberian Cannibal Warlord

Liberia is a country in Africa that has survived decades of civil wars. The civil war in the country began due to a number of political reasons, and we have witnessed the emergence of several groups of rebels fighting for their interests. Very often their guerrilla struggle was surrounded by superstition and witchcraft.

One interesting case was that of Joshua Milton Blahy, a field commander who believed that fighting naked could somehow make him immune to bullets.

This is not the end of his madness.

He practiced many forms of human sacrifice. He was well known as a cannibal, and ate prisoners of war by slowly roasting them over an open fire, or by boiling their flesh. Moreover, he believed that eating children's hearts would make him a braver fighter, so when his army raided villages, he stole children from there in order to harvest their hearts.

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Vitaly Kolomin

question:

Hello, very often the extermination of the Indians of Mexico is justified by the cruel sacrifices of the Aztecs of the captured opponents. How fair is this point of view? Did the Aztecs really execute 20,000 people at a time?

Sincerely, Vitaly Kolomin

response dated 03/22/2017:

First, about the number of victims. The figure of 20,000, and not at once, but in a year, is cited by popularizers Zenon Kosidovsky in the book “When the sun was a god”, there the chapter is appropriately titled “The End of the Eaters of Human Hearts” and the Czech Marek, better known as Keram in his bestseller “ Gods, tombs, scientists” (chapter “The Book of Steps”). Naturally, they do not give any references to sources or at least scientific works, so I myself wonder where they got these numbers from. The followers of the Californian demographic school of the middle of the last century, Cook and Boraja, estimate the population of Central Mexico before the arrival of the Spaniards at 25 million (?!), and the annual number of victims brought throughout Central Mexico (including, for example, Oaxaca) at 250,000. Thus Thus, on Tenochtitlan with a population of 300,000 people, according to their extremely doubtful estimates (we do not have pre-Spanish censuses of the population, especially censuses of victims), they accounted for 15,000 deaths per year. These figures could only come from Borah and Cook with their peculiar method of counting, "multiplying by 5" the population figures in the colonial period (see Cook S.F. and W.Borah "Indian food production and consumption in population history (1500-1650) / Essays on population history: Mexico and California vol.3, Los Angeles, University of California Press.1979) Meanwhile, even the conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo in the 208th chapter of his famous "True History of the Conquest of New Spain" according to the words of the first missionaries the Franciscans (sic!) claims “that in Mexico City [i.e. Tenochtitlan] and some lake settlements [of the dried-up Lake Texcoco] more than 2,500 people were sacrificed.” That is, according to him, according to third parties, the Aztecs (and this term applies only to the inhabitants of Tenochtitlan and some settlements on the shores of Lake Texcoco) brought a little more than 2,500 people a year (see B. Dias del Castillo Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva Espana. Barcelona: Bibliotea Sopena, 1975, c.8 06). But even this figure raises doubts, because Sahagun's descriptions of the annual rites refer either to single specially chosen victims, or to several men and women. At the same time, the exact number of inhabitants of Tenochtitlan is unknown to us.

True, we still have terrible stories about the consecration of the main temple of Tenochtitlan, when, according to the words of the Dominican Diego Duran, who wrote in the 70-80s of the 16th century, ... 84,000 ... people were sacrificed in 4 days. If we take into account that the sacrifices lasted only 4 days and took place in 20 places of worship and without stopping, we get that 47 people were killed in one hour ... with flint knives for 96 hours. For reference, even a modern mechanized device with saws and knives cannot afford such a pace. I am afraid that a significant role in the number of victims was played by the system of counting by twenty that existed in Mesoamerica, thanks to which the number of victims could be greatly increased if desired. Another question is why was it necessary? It remains open.

In addition, whether or not the Aztecs brought 20,000 victims at a time, for the conquistadors, the war against them was in any case "fair" as a crusade against the pagans. This is how Hernan Cortes himself represented his expedition, placing a cross and the motto “Sim win!” on his banner along with the Madonna. Let me remind you that the Reconquista, i.e. wars against infidel Muslims, who did not sacrifice people, ended only in 1492, when Columbus made his first voyage.

Sincerely, Anastasia Kalyuta

Talakh Viktor Nikolaevich is an independent researcher, specialist in the field of culture, languages ​​and scripts of the peoples of Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, translator from Spanish and Maya of primary sources on ancient American history.

response dated 03/25/2017:

Talented popularizers Kosidovsky and Keram did not come up with a figure of 20 thousand people who were annually sacrificed by the Aztecs in the late 15th - early 16th centuries. It is cited by a number of researchers, in particular, Michael Garner (1977), Marvin Harris (1986), Victor Davis Hanson (2001). In turn, for them, it is not the fruit of speculation, but the result of the interpretation of one original source - an excerpt from the Mexican hand-drawn historical chronicle describing the dedication of the main temple of Tenochtitlan in the year 8-Reed (1487). The corresponding fragment is known in two versions: on page 39r of the Telleriano-Remensis Codex and on page 83r of the Vatican Codex 3738 (also known as the Rios Codex).

In both cases, under the date 8-ACATL (“8-Reed”), a pyramid is depicted crowned with a double temple, under it is an altar, even lower is a pictographic record of the toponym TETL-NOCHTLI (Tenochtitlan), i.e., “sacrifice at the main temple in Tenochtitlan." On the left - the ruler on the throne under the pictogram ATL-HUITZOTL, "Ahuitzotl", i.e. the then Aztec tlatoani Ahuizotl. Around the altar are three figures of warriors dressed as captives prepared for sacrifice. Near them are pictograms: on the top right - TZAPOTE, "zapotek", on the bottom right - CUEXTECA, "kueshtek / huastek", on the bottom left - MAZATL-TECUHTLI TZIUH-COATL, "Mazatecuhtli from Ciucoac". Finally, in the lower right corner are the numbers (they just differ in two versions): 8000 + 8000 +400 x 10, i.e., 20,000 (“Telleriano-Remensis Code”) or 8000 + 8000 +400 x 9, t .e., 19600 ("Code Rios"). However, the difference is obviously the result of a mistake by the copyist of the Codex Rios, who missed one "herringbone" denoting the number "400". It is customary to interpret this figure as the number of captives sacrificed either at the consecration of the Great Teocalli, or during the year 8-Reed. The first interpretation is contradicted by a commentary written in Spanish on the image in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis: “1487. 8-Acatl. The year ''Eight Reeds'' and 1487 according to our account, finished making and perfecting the great Ku in Mexico City. The old people say that this year they sacrificed four thousand people brought from the regions that were subject to war. The figure of 4,000 killed during the four days of the “festivity” seems close to reality, although it should be borne in mind that the massacre organized by the Aztec rulers during the consecration of the Great Teocalli was an exceptional event. As for the interpretation of the figure of 20 thousand as the annual number of sacrificed, such an understanding does not necessarily follow from the figure: it may be the number of not sacrificed, but captured enemies, which is not the same thing, moreover, not necessarily for a year, and for a number of years ending in 1487. Objective archaeological materials seem to testify in favor of a moderate scale of human sacrifice: the zompantli (stores for the skulls of the sacrificed) in Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco are designed for hundreds, at most thousands of skulls, moreover, they must have accumulated there over a sufficiently long period of time. With this in mind, a number of historians (such as Christian Duverger, Bernard Ortiz de Montellano, Leonardo Lopez Lujan) believe that 300-600 ritual murders were committed in Tenochtitlan per year. The Mexicans Maria del Carmen Nieva Lopez and Pablo Moctezuma Barragán generally deny the practice of human sacrifice among the Nahua, but this seems to be an exaggeration on the other hand.

Does ending the practice of human sacrifice justify Conquista? The famous Mexican historian Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl believed that the Spaniards were an instrument of retribution for the murders of thousands of innocents. Joseph Brodsky also believed that he was justifying, remember his “To Eugene”:

No, better syphilis, better the mouths of the Unicorns of Cortez than this victim. If the eye is destined to Be pecked out by crows, It is better if the killer is a killer, And not an astronomer.

On the other hand, let's turn to what is commonly called the "dry language of numbers." In the territory that after the establishment of the rule of the Castile Crown began to be called New Spain, by 1519, of course, not 25 million people lived, as Woodrow Borah and Sherburne Cook assumed, but no less than 7-8 million people lived there. In 1595, 1.37 million people remained in the same territory (including European settlers and their descendants). Imagine that out of every five of your relatives, acquaintances, neighbors, just passers-by on the street, only one remained ... No, most of the dead were not killed by conquistadors, and did not even die from overwork on plantations and mines - they turned out to be victims of diseases brought from Europe and drunkenness. Can this be justified in any way? Let everyone judge this for himself.

Kalyuta Anastasia Valerievna - Ph.D., researcher of the highest category, Russian Ethnographic Museum.

response dated 03/26/2017:

First of all, I would like to thank our Ukrainian colleague Viktor Talakh for valuable additions to my answer to the question and such a lively reaction.

True, from my point of view, the "talent" of Kosidovsky and Keram lies precisely in the use of unverified and unconfirmed, but sensational facts in their writings for a wide range of readers. This "talent" is characteristic of a large number of journalists who popularize scientific knowledge, and I think that it does much more harm than good. In this case, they didn't even bother to look into the original sources to check the reports of such idiosyncratic authors as Michael Harner and Marvin Harris, the creators of a very bold theory about the background of human sacrifice among the Aztecs. However, priority here must be given, after all, to Harner as the first author to publish a work on the "true" reason for human sacrifice.

I deliberately did not mention them, so as not to deviate from the purely arithmetical side of the issue, but now I see that their "cultural materialism" cannot be dispensed with. In 1977 Michael Harner in American Ethnologist vol.4, N.1, pp. 117-135 published a relatively short article "Economic Basis for Aztec Sacrifice", in which he argued that the lack of protein food due to the lack of livestock among the ancient population of Mexico, combined with frequent droughts and crop failures, prompted the Aztecs ... to cannibalism disguised as human sacrifice. The fact is that some of the remains of the victims were actually eaten as a repository of sacred energy. In his statements, Harner relied on the notorious 25 million population of Central Mexico on the eve of the Conquista and 250,000 victims per year, "counted" by Cook and Borach. A year later, in 1978, his conclusions were "confirmed" and "supplemented" for a wide range of readers by Marvin Harris in an article with the loud title "Cannibal Kingdom", which was included in the infamous collection "Cannibals and Kings" Cannibals and Kings. New York, Random House, 1978, pp. 147-166. Harris argued that the Triple Alliance was a unique case in history of a cannibal empire, where the perpetually starving population could, thanks to human sacrifice, occasionally taste meat. In addition, this situation stimulated the expansionist policy of the Triple Alliance, since the victims were mainly from prisoners of war, and the morale of young soldiers, because the captive and relatives received the coveted meat. I note that neither Harner nor Harris were experts in pre-Columbian civilizations and, as we see from Talakh's explanation, they very freely interpreted the messages of the so-called colonial codes. the Huitzilopochtli group.

In 1990, Bernardo Ortiz de Montellano, an American researcher of Mexican origin, published in English the book "Aztec Medicine, Health and Nutrition", in which, based on his knowledge of the flora and fauna of Central Mexico, as well as a closer study of colonial sources and careful calculations blew Harner's and Harris' conclusions to smithereens. However, such is the persistence of the myth that the figures of 20,000 victims per year and 80,000 victims at the consecration of the main temple of Tenochtitlan have passed into the work of popularizers like Kosidovsky, and in our digital age have spread on the Internet.

As for the drawing and commentary in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, there is still one variant of its interpretation. At the consecration of the temple, 20,000 believers were present, who, as was customary, "sacrifice" themselves, bleeding from the tongue, limbs and genitals (see Gonzalez Torres Yolotl El sacrifcio humano entre los mexicas Mexico: FCE, INAH 1985 .p.252).

As for the ethical evaluation of human sacrifice, this has nothing to do with anthropology at all.

A hundred years before its fall, the Aztec empire experienced incredible changes. The emperor's son, Tlacaelel, announced that the god of war, Huitzilopochtli, should be considered the highest of all gods.

Since then, the Aztecs began to worship the god of war. Human sacrifice became a widespread phenomenon in the life of the Aztec society. Every year, for the glory of the gods, they killed hundreds of thousands of people.

1. Wars were only fought to get prisoners to be sacrificed.

To satisfy the insatiable appetites of the gods, the Aztecs accompanied all their religious rituals with numerous human sacrifices. As a rule, the Aztecs used enemies captured in the war as victims. Many wars were unleashed with one single goal - to make war and get as many prisoners as possible. The Aztecs needed a lot of sacrifices.

The Aztecs reached an agreement with the neighboring city-state of Tlaxcala that they would only fight each other in order to gain humans to be sacrificed to the gods.

This was done by mutual agreement of both parties. The defeated army did not beg for mercy, and its warriors did not complain about their fate. They understood that this was part of the deal, and dutifully went to their deaths.

2. Some people willingly allowed themselves to be sacrificed.

It was considered an honor to be sacrificed to the gods. In fact, when the Spanish tried to free the Aztec prisoners, some of them became furious at being denied the opportunity to die a dignified death.

Not only enemy soldiers fell under the ceremonial knife. Criminals and debtors were also sent to the altar. There were also volunteers who considered it an honor to die in the name of their gods. According to tradition, entire groups of prostitutes willingly agreed to sacrifice themselves to the goddess of love.

During a drought, some Aztecs sold their children into slavery for 400 ears of corn. If the children did not work well, they could be resold. And if a slave was sold twice, then he was sacrificed to the gods.

3. Feast of Toxcatl

When the month of Toxcatl came, the Aztecs chose one of the men and revered him as a god for a year. When choosing, they were guided by the appearance of the candidate - he had to have smooth, thin skin and long, straight hair.

The chosen man was dressed as the god Tezcatlipoca. His skin was dyed black. On his head was a wreath of flowers, and on his body was a breastplate made of seashells and many ornaments.

A man was given four beautiful wives with whom he could do whatever he wanted. It was his duty to walk around the city, playing the flute and fragrant with the flowers, so that the people could pay homage to him.

After twelve months, the chosen one ascended the steps to the top of the pyramid, continuing to play his flute. An enthusiastic crowd watched as the clergyman helped him lie down on a long stone altar. Then he tore out his heart from his body.

After that, the Aztecs found a new Tezcatlipoc, and everything started all over again.

4. Sacrifice ritual

As a rule, sacrifice ceremonies were held at the top of a large pyramid, on a sacrificial stone. The priest stood over the lying victim, holding in his hand a knife with a blade of volcanic glass. Then this blade fell on the chest of the victim and ripped open her chest. After that, the priest tore out the beating heart from the body.

The hand with the heart was raised so that everyone could see it. Then the priest tore the organ into pieces, which he laid out on the sacrificial stone. The lifeless body was thrown down the steps of the pyramid, at the foot of which the executioners were already waiting for him. The body was dismembered. The skull was separated and impaled on a spear, and dishes were prepared from the flesh for the nobility.

5 Body Eating

The bodies of the victims were often baked with corn and treated to this dish by the clergy. Sometimes there were so many killed that they prepared a treat for all the inhabitants of the city, and each of those present took part in an act of joint ritual cannibalism. The bones were used to make tools, musical instruments and weapons.

At least one of the ceremonial dishes still exists today: pozole soup. In Aztec times, it was prepared from the thigh of a sacrificed prisoner and served to the emperor.

Today, this dish is made from pork rather than human flesh, but the taste has largely remained the same. When Christians forced the Aztecs to switch to pig meat, they reported that it tasted the same as human meat.

6. Inauguration of the Great Pyramid

Not all sacrifices were made in the same way. There were exceptional cases when the ceremony was carried out in a completely different way. Sometimes he differed in the method of killing, and sometimes in the number of victims.

The most massive sacrifice took place during the opening of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan. The Aztecs spent many years building a temple in their capital, and when the Great Pyramid was finally completed in 1487, they held a massive celebration. In honor of the opening of their greatest temple, the Aztecs killed an incredible number of people.

The Aztecs claimed to have sacrificed 84,000 people in four days. In total, during the reign of the Aztecs, according to experts, an average of about 250,000 people were killed throughout Mexico per year.

7. The flaying of people

One of the most significant Aztec festivals was called Tlacaxipehualiztli ("Feast of Skinning People"). It was a ceremony dedicated to the Aztec god Xipe Totec, whose name means "The Skinned One".

Forty days before the holiday, one of the men was honored to dress as if he had been skinned. His body was covered with red feathers and adorned with golden jewels, after which he was revered as a god for forty days. On the day of the feast, he and eight other performers of the role of the gods were taken to the top of the temple and killed.

The priests skinned the dead men, which symbolized the shedding of the husks by ripe fruits. It was then dyed yellow to make it look like gold. Some "golden skins" were given to priests who danced in them, others to young men who begged for the next twenty days, wrapped in rotting human flesh.

8. Sacrifices in the form of gladiator fights

During the Flaying Festival, some men were given the opportunity to defend themselves. But in order to survive, they had to defeat the greatest Aztec warriors in armed combat, which they had no chance of doing.

The warriors destined for sacrifice stood on a stone circle called "temalakatl". They were allowed to defend themselves with wooden weapons, which were little different from toys. Armed with a stick in the shape of a sword, these people watched helplessly as the best Aztec warriors, armed to the teeth, approached them.

According to the Aztec legend, only one person managed to survive in such an unequal battle - his name was Tlajuicol. With nothing but a wooden sword, he single-handedly killed eight heavily armed Aztec warriors. The Aztecs were delighted with his abilities and offered him to lead their army.

Tlahuicol replied to them that this proposal was insulting, since a greater fate awaited him - to be sacrificed to the gods.

9. Death of the twins

The Aztecs had strange and in many ways conflicting ideas about twins. Their myths often feature twins, who are generally regarded as deities and worthy of worship. The twins in their legends are both brutal killers and heroes, and even the creators of the world.

But the Aztecs treated real twins with complete contempt. Handicapped children and twins had a single patron god, Xolotl, because the Aztecs considered twins to be deformed.

They thought the twins were a deadly threat to their parents. If you allow them to live, then it will mean the end of your life. For this reason, most parents chose one of the twins and sent him back to the gods.

10. Child sacrifice

In the center of the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan, there were twin temples. On top of one of them, dedicated to the god Tlaloc, the Aztecs performed their most terrible and heinous ritual.

Tlaloc was the god of rain and lightning, and he demanded that children be sacrificed to him. At the end of the winter month called Atlcahualo, the Aztecs would bring children to the temple of Tlaloc and force them up the stairs. The children were not ready for voluntary death, they sobbed bitter tears when they went upstairs. If children cried, the Aztecs believed that Tlaloc would bless them with rain. Therefore, if the children did not cry themselves, adults forced them to do so.

After the sacrifice, the bodies of the children were placed in a pit outside the city. There they were laid out in the shape of a circle and left out in the open so that the rain they helped to bring would wet their bodies.