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Ancient Maya sacrificed boys not virgin girls: study
Reuters ^ | Wednesday, January 23, 2008 | edited by Todd Eastham

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 ...


TOPICS: History; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: godsgravesglyphs; humansacrifice; maya; mayan; mayans; mayas
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To: muawiyah

The tour guides in Costa Maya say the Spanish Priests singlehandedly destroyed the Maya culture. Everywhere. Also that stories of human sacrifice and cannabalism were all fabrications. Guess they’ll have to revise that.


21 posted on 01/23/2008 4:28:23 PM PST by Jaded ("I have a mustard- seed; and I am not afraid to use it."- Joseph Ratzinger)
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To: blam

“How is it possible to worship such a god?”

They make you an offering; you can’t refuse.

[sorry].....;]


22 posted on 01/23/2008 4:28:34 PM PST by Salamander (And don't forget my Dog; fixed and consequent.......)
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To: CholeraJoe
The Spanish served to repopulate a depopulated land. The oppression grew up in later centuries.

In fact, over in Venezuela they're trying to invent a brand new type ~ Coca-mocha we might call it. That's where your Presidente issues crazy orders, steals people's stuff, and chews coca leaf all the time.

23 posted on 01/23/2008 4:32:09 PM PST by muawiyah
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To: Unassuaged
Look, I had a close relative (as such matters go) who was the last Conquistidore under Pizarro who was drawn, quartered and thrown to the dogs ~ mostly because he was a really bad dude, but also because he refused the orders of the new governor to "get out of town" and at the end refused the ministrations of a Roman Catholic priest.

Blaming the Spanish, in general, for the deeds of the Conquistidores is not only wrong, it's an insult to the Conquistidores. They did their own stuff and with little guidance from Madrid.

I think any of them would be willing to own up to his own deeds.

24 posted on 01/23/2008 4:35:35 PM PST by muawiyah
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To: muawiyah

“That’s where your Presidente issues crazy orders, steals people’s stuff, and chews coca leaf all the time.”

Clinton?


25 posted on 01/23/2008 4:36:18 PM PST by Salamander (And don't forget my Dog; fixed and consequent.......)
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To: Jaded
The Spanish priests did burn a number of "books" leftover from the Mayan civilization. Apparantly there was no one around to explain the writing and we've only recovered that knowledge in the last 20 years.

The Mayans the Spanish met were but a shadow of their ancesters and their civilization.

26 posted on 01/23/2008 4:38:09 PM PST by muawiyah
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To: Salamander

I think he cut out the “middle man” part ~ the leaf, and went straight for the powder.


27 posted on 01/23/2008 4:39:12 PM PST by muawiyah
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To: muawiyah; Bubba Ho-Tep; blam
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."

The Mayan civilization crashed, burned and depopulated long before the Conquistidores showed up.

A persistent Bermuda High off the coast served to stop rainfall in the Yucatan for a couple of hundred years.

Guess that "ritual mutilation" didn't do much good then.

I can think of lotsa better things to do with my genitals; all including my wife ;-)

28 posted on 01/23/2008 4:59:35 PM PST by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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To: grey_whiskers

The rituals failed. Their civilization failed. In the end they owe their biological survival and any memory of their former glory to the arrival of the Spanish.


29 posted on 01/23/2008 5:15:36 PM PST by muawiyah
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To: Jaded
The tour guides in Costa Maya say the Spanish Priests singlehandedly destroyed the Maya culture.

Partially true. The Spanish priests burned all of the Mayan books--thousands of them--only three survived. But no credible scholar disputes the blood sacrifice stuff. There are too many images of it painted on the walls to deny. Only the details can be quibbled about.

30 posted on 01/23/2008 5:29:33 PM PST by Bubba Ho-Tep ("More weight!"--Giles Corey)
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To: muawiyah

*rimshot*.....;]


31 posted on 01/23/2008 6:03:41 PM PST by Salamander (And don't forget my Dog; fixed and consequent.......)
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To: investigateworld

:’)


32 posted on 01/23/2008 10:00:27 PM PST by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/__________________Profile updated Wednesday, January 16, 2008)
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To: Bernard Marx

“Do you have an “approved” bibliography to suggest?”

Oh, tee hee hee, let’s use the word “approved” in quotation marks, as a clever way to call dsc a liar.

“I suppose the inquisitors used diplomacy and reasoned with their captors?”

I’m still grateful to the Blood Trail thread for tipping me off about Hep C and probably saving my life, but supposing that the inquisitors used diplomacy and reasoned with their prisoners is a hell of a lot closer to the truth than what you actually suppose.

The both of you can start with a simple Google search on “The Black Legend.” Then, you can read the pertinent sections of “Iberia” by Michener.

Then, you might look here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1829676/posts

“PBS will not air a movie that its officials say paints Muslims in a bad light, ‘Islam vs. Islamists,’ but it has no qualms about showing a flick that Catholics have every right to question. This film is advertised on PBS’s website with an eerie black background depicting all the ‘T’s’ as crosses. All that is missing is Dracula’s voiceover. ‘For over half a millennium a system of mass terror reigned,’ it says, and ‘Thousands were subject to secret courts, torture and punishment.’ This is plainly dishonest.

“As British historian Henry Kamen has shown in his magisterial work, The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision, almost all the conventional wisdom about the Inquisition is wrong. By comparison with secular courts at the time, the Inquisition’s methods were more humane, e.g., defendants could be represented by an attorney. Edward Peters, another student of the period, says, ‘Modern historiography has completely blown the old Inquisition propaganda out of the water. No one seriously contends that hundreds of thousands or millions were killed, or that the Protestant countries were any more humane than Spain was.’ Indeed, scholars today refer to the old school mythology as ‘the Black Legend,’ a tale of lies spun by Elizabethan England. No wonder that in 1994, BBC/A&E aired ‘The Myth of the Spanish Inquisition.’

“Here’s what we know. Of the approximately 125,000 cases tried by the Spanish Inquisition, 1 percent resulted in the death penalty. Of the so-called witch hunts, where women were burned at the stake, secular courts executed 50,000 (not all of whom were women); less than 100 were killed by the Inquisition. Solzhenitsyn once compared the killings that took place in the Soviet Union in 1937 and 1938 to the killings that took place during the Spanish Inquisition and found that 20,000 were killed per month in the U.S.S.R. and 10 were killed per month during the Inquisition. But don’t look for such comparisons on PBS. To do so might get in the way of the truth.”

That should get you started.


33 posted on 01/24/2008 12:39:27 AM PST by dsc
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To: Bernard Marx

Better than having your heart torn our, being skinned and/or roasted alive.
Besides, you could always convert without the “encouragement,” whereas the wonderful pre-Columbian civilizations were happy to sacrifice you no matter what your beliefs.

Killing off the Aztec, Inca and Maya “civilizations” was a GOOD thing...


34 posted on 01/24/2008 5:58:29 AM PST by Little Ray (Rudy Guiliani: If his wives can't trust him, why should we?)
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To: SunkenCiv
I guess they took Captain Renault’s advice. Don’t throw away virgins because someday they may be scarce.
35 posted on 01/24/2008 9:54:56 AM PST by colorado tanker
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To: Unassuaged
"It all depends on who gets to be defined as human!"

That is a very perceptive comment. The Spanish Conquistadors had just completed the 750+ year long Reconquista in which the Iberian peninsula was retaken by various Christian kingdoms from the Muslims. The prevailing belief at the time was that the one thing that differentiated human beings from animals was the existence of a soul. The thing that justified the armed struggle against Muslims and pagans was that they had forfeited their souls rendering them not human and beyond salvation and protection by God.

Further, the practices they discovered in the New World were so extreme, even in comparison to Muslims, lead to the conclusion that the practitioners were so far beyond non-human as to be Satanic.

36 posted on 01/24/2008 12:12:09 PM PST by Natural Law
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To: SunkenCiv

re: sacrificing boys instead of virgins

Older alpha males of most animal families do something similar to keep down their competition. No fools they.


37 posted on 01/25/2008 8:19:22 AM PST by wildbill
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To: SunkenCiv

RE: “Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to force you into transvestism, then skin or dismember you, then drown you.”

But all sacrificial lambs in every culture are sold the sizzle, not the frying pan. I imagine the follow-up to be something like:

“Then you’ll go to Chac heaven and live forever with 72 virgins we’ve either missed or elected not to deflower.”

Lamb: “Praise Chac from whom all blessings flow”


38 posted on 01/25/2008 8:26:08 AM PST by wildbill
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To: wildbill

:’)


39 posted on 01/25/2008 10:23:34 AM PST by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/__________________Profile updated Wednesday, January 16, 2008)
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To: Natural Law

“Further, the practices they discovered in the New World were so extreme, even in comparison to Muslims, lead to the conclusion that the practitioners were so far beyond non-human as to be Satanic.”

Do you have a source for that?


40 posted on 01/25/2008 11:04:21 AM PST by dsc
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