Posted on 08/15/2019 1:01:00 AM PDT by robowombat
ARCHAEOLOGISTS FOUND AN AZTEC SKULL RACK THAT ONCE HELD TENS OF THOUSANDS OF HUMAN HEADS
Archaeologists found an Aztec skull rack that once held tens of thousands of human heads
BY STRANGEREMAINS on AUGUST 23, 2015 • ( 0 )
On Thursday, August 20th archaeologists from Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) announced they unearthed a masonry platform and 35 skulls in the Templo Mayor complex, in what is now Mexico City. They believe the skulls and platform were part of a legendary skull rack known as the Huey Tzompantli.
Tzompantli, an Aztec word that means “skull rack,” were ceremonial structures used by the Aztec people to display the heads of people who were sacrificed. They built skull racks throughout Mesoamerica between the 7th and 16th centuries. To construct a skull rack, the heads of sacrificial victims were severed, holes punctured in their skulls, then wooden poles were pushed through the openings. Rows and rows of these beams were suspended on vertical posts.
The scariest largest tzompantli was known as the Huey Tzompantli, or Great Skull Rack, and it was built in the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. The Huey Tzompantli was seen by the Spanish conquerors in the 16th century. Witnesses described it as a massive structure constructed on a masonry platform and held anywhere between 80,000 and 136,000 heads. Although, in an article published in the American Anthropologist in 1983, Bernard Ortiz De Montellano calculated that the most the Huey Tzompantli could hold was only 60,000 skulls.
Raul Barrera, an archaeologist with INAH, said in a statement released last week (via Discovery News), “So far we have found 35 skulls, but there must be many more in underlying layers (Lorenzi 2015).”
The skulls and the platform were uncovered on the western side of what was once the Templo Mayor complex of Tenochtitlan (Lorenzi 2015). What was unusual about this tzompantli was that rows of skulls were mortared into the platform in circles. The skulls were plastered so that they faced the center of the circle, although no one knows what was once there (Lorenzi 2015 and The Guardian 2015).
Some of the skulls had holes in both sides indicating they belonged to a tzompantli. Most of the skulls belonged to adult men, but some belonged to women and children (Lorenzi 2015 and The Guardian 2015). Archaeologists estimated that the Great Skull Rack was built between 1485 and 1502 was about 112 feet long and 40 feet wide (Lorenzi 2015).
Works Cited
Aztec skull trophy rack discovered at Mexico City’s Templo Mayor ruin site. (2015). Retrieved from: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/aug/21/aztec-skull-trophy-rack-discovered-mexico-citys-templo-mayor-ruin-site
Lorenzi, R. (2015). Massive human skull rack found at Aztec temple. Retrieved from: http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/massive-human-skull-rack-found-at-aztec-temple-150821.htm
Ortiz De Montellano, B.R. (1983). Counting skulls: Comment on the Aztec cannibalism theory of Harner-Harris. American Anthropologist, New Series, 85 (2): 403-406.
Maybe the spaniards knew what was gonna face them if they assimilated into aztec culture. San Diego State better change their mascot fast.
Somebody desperately wanted to get ahead.
Like the coach always says: “Keep your head in the game”. They didn’t.
” to display the heads of people who were sacrificed.”
But the explorers were bad people who put a stop to their natural way of living...
The cartels are still cuttin heads off.
I was vacationing in Santa Fe the day that the article came out proving the Anasazi were cannibals. You’d have thought Someone proved Jesus was the Devil. Horrified disbelief.
So much for advanced Indian cultures.
They were savages.
Wasn’t there a Huey Tzompantli played 3rd base for the Mets?
“All advanced native cultures in Latin America practised ceremonial human sacrifice to one degree or another.”
Mayans also....the culture not the motorcycle gang...well, maybe both
What has been under sustained attack is the culture of Western Civilization, with its Judeo-Christian moral roots and classical system of education. This culture has been responsible for every advance in the human condition since antiquity.
There are other cultures that have flourished in the past, and that influence various manifestations throughout the world, but at root the advances others have made is proportional to the degree to which they have adopted the Western model of thought in relating to the world.
“All advanced native cultures...”
Isn’t that an oxymoron?
Most disturbing: they have a word for “skull rack” as if it weren’t unique.. This is just the *Huey* skull rack.
Bloodthristiness is not genetic. And to suggest it is makes you quite precisely a racist. It is, however, a matter of values and attitudes, which most certainly can be passed down.
Hue’s at first.
Not if you’re Greek or Jewish.
You are buying that “accident of your birth” hoax. Your birth was a very specific event that was the result of an act between two very specific individuals in a very specific place which was very likely provided for by a very specific group of people. No one thing about it was random.
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