Ancient civilization : Aztec's human sacrifice

BEHIND THIS AWESOME BUILDING ... THERE'S A HORROR STORY

In Mesoamerica, the most obvious practice of human sacrifice was found in the Aztec Culture. Under the leadership of Montezuma and others before him, sacrifice became a key element in their ritual and worship to many gods. The Aztecs were constantly at "war" with neighboring tribes and groups. The goal of this constant warfare was to collect live prisoners for sacrifice. The Flowery Wars began with a mutual agreement between the Aztecs and the Tlaxcalans to capture live men for future sacrifice (Meyers & Sherman:65).

The Aztecs worshipped a war god called Huitzilopochtli, who took on the likeness of the sun over time. It was thought that in order to insure the sun's arrival each day, a steady supply of human hearts had to be offered in holy sacrifice (Hogg:43). They believed that the sun and earth had already been destroyed four times, and in their time of the 5th sun, final destruction would soon be upon them. In order to delay this dreadful fate, the practice of human sacrifice became a major element in Aztec society and livelihood (Meyer & Sherman:67).

The most common form of sacrifice was performed outside, on the top of a great pyramid. The victim was spread-eagled on a round stone, with his back arched. His limbs were held, while a priest used an obsidian knife to cut under the rib cage and remove his heart. This method was used when honoring the sun god, Huitzilopochtli. Each god apparently preferred a different form of sacrifice. For the fertility aztec_dagger.jpg (4731 bytes)god Xipe Totec, the person was tied to a post and shot full of arrows. His blood flowing out represented the cool spring rains (Meyer & Sherman:69). The fire god required a newly wed couple. They were thrown into the god's altars and allowed to burn and at the last minute they were taken out and had their hearts removed as a second offering (Hogg :48). The earth mother goddess, Teteoinnan, was extremely important. At harvest time, a female victim was flayed and her skin was carried ceremoniously to one of the temples. Her skin was worn by an officiating priest who then symbolized the goddess herself (Meyer & Sherman:44 Human sacrifices were seen in many different cultures in Latin American, such as Olmecs, Mayans and the Moche.

taken from : Meyer, Michael C. and William L. Sherman. The Course of Mexican History. Oxford University Press, 5th ed. 1995