[olde north church]

Actually, a lot of the pre-Columbian Indian tribes had a belief in a light skinned bearded God, Virucocha(?), if I'm not mistaken who came on a ship/from the ocean. It was one of those serendipitous events that allowed a small army to conquer most of a continent.
There is also reason to believe (from the apologists, of course) cannibalism was the result of lack of other food.
I always liked the term "long pig" for humans. If refers to how the fat layer on human is similiar to the fat layer on a pig: fat, then meat, not marbled like beef.
The first time I heard the term I couldn't stop laughing. How rude!

[redgolum]

You are right about the light skinned god. He also had red hair, wore a breast plate, and was supposed to return around the same time Cortes showed up. Cortes used that to his advantage, much to the chagrin of some of the priests he brought along.

[blam]

"There is also reason to believe (from the apologists, of course) cannibalism was the result of lack of other food."

Anthropologist Marvin Harris (bless his soul) says that the whole human sacrifice thing is about food.
There were no large animals and consequently a perpetual protein shortage. The only animals domesticated in the Americas were the Gueinna(sp) pig and the turkey.
The Spanish took the domesticated turkey back to Europe and when the first Pilgrims came to settle here they brought the turkey back with them, they didn't get them from the Indians.
In fact, ever wild turkey in North America has some of the genes from the domesticated turkeys brought back by the Pilgrims.