Posted on 01/23/2008 11:00:57 AM PST by SunkenCiv
The victims of human sacrifice by Mexico's ancient Mayans, who threw children into water-filled caverns, were likely boys and young men not virgin girls as previously believed, archeologists said on Tuesday... Maya priests in the city of Chichen Itza in the Yucatan peninsula sacrificed children to petition the gods for rain and fertile fields by throwing them into sacred sinkhole caves, known as "cenotes." The caves served as a source of water for the Mayans and were also thought to be an entrance to the underworld. Archeologist Guillermo de Anda from the University of Yucatan pieced together the bones of 127 bodies discovered at the bottom of one of Chichen Itza's sacred caves and found over 80 percent were likely boys between the ages of 3 and 11. The other 20 percent were mostly adult men said de Anda, who scuba dives to uncover Mayan jewels and bones. He said children were often thrown alive to their watery graves to please the Mayan rain god Chaac. Some of the children were ritually skinned or dismembered before being offered to the gods, he said... Archeologists previously believed young female virgins were sacrificed because the remains, which span from around 850 AD until the Spanish colonization, were often found adorned with jade jewelry.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
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Thanks DaveLoneRanger for the MSN link. |
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Let’s hear it for those Conquistadors!
Because, as all archaeologists know, only virgins could wear jade. I believe non-virgins preferred onyx. Those in neither category are found with mother-of-pearl.
Revisionist history to make the Spanish look less like oppressive conquerors and more like liberators. Kinda like Janet Reno commenting on the Branch Davidians. “We burned them alive because children were being abused in the compound.”
Oh yes! The rack and strappado used by the Inquisition were such 'civilized' ways of enforcing religious belief!
It’s not revisionism, because the Spanish didn’t flay the kiddies alive and then drown them.
How is it possible to worship such a god?
‘Cause if you don’t, you wind up drowned in a cenote. Some of the remains were of adults.
“Oh yes! The rack and strappado used by the Inquisition were such ‘civilized’ ways of enforcing religious belief!”
Try to find some accurate history of the Inquisition.
Sorry. A sad and sick reality in this world and modern culture.
“It’s not revisionism, because the Spanish didn’t flay the kiddies alive and then drown them.”
But they did throw babies to their dogs, according to one friar’s report.
Oh, in that case, it’s better to just forget about the earlier slaughter. ;’)
As today’s abortion debate illistrates:
It all depends on who gets to be defined as human!
I suppose the inquisitors used diplomacy and reasoned with their captors?
When you feel that your life depends on it, probably. "If Chaac doesn't get his sacrifice, it won't rain and we'll all die."
From a Wikipedia article:
At its core, sacrifice symbolized the renewal of divine energy and, in doing so, the continuation of life. Its ability of bloodletting to do this is based on two intertwined concepts that are prevalent in the Maya belief system. The first is the notion that the gods had given life to humankind by sacrificing parts of their own bodies. The second is the central focus of their mythology on human blood, which signified life among the Maya. Within their belief system, human blood was partially made up of the blood of the gods, who sacrificed their own divine blood in creating life in humans. Thus, in order to continually maintain the order of their universe, the Maya believed that blood had to be given back to the gods.And spilling your own blood played an important part in Mayan religion.
Autosacrifice was typically performed with obsidian prismatic blades or stingray spines. Blood was drawn from piercing or cutting the tongue, earlobes, and/or the genitals, among other locations. Another technique was to draw a rope with attached thorns through the tongue or earlobes. The blood produced was then collected on paper held in a bowl and often burned. The act of burning the sacrificed blood symbolized the transferal of the offering to the gods via its transformation into smoke that would rise.Generally, the location of the bloodletting on the body correlated with an intended result or a corresponding symbolic representation. For example, drawing blood from the genitals, especially the male sex organs, would be done with the intent of increasing or representing human fertility.
It’s like Islam. Women are for having babies.
Everything else is about sex, including young boys.
Do you have an "approved" bibliography to suggest?
All cultures are equally valid bump ;^)
A persistent Bermuda High off the coast served to stop rainfall in the Yucatan for a couple of hundred years.
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