Group Presentation Main Points

Anthony Iniguez

Tess Wanket

Leilani Vazquez

Incan Sacrifices

The Inca people were a group that practiced ritual sacrifice. The way they did things was a little different, because they would use children instead of adults. Children were seen as pure souls. One side of our group believes that these sacrifices of children were performed in order to please the Gods; in return they would get protection of the people, rain, and good harvest. The opposing idea is that the children chosen were the children of local leaders, so that these officials could have stronger ties with the emperor. It was a political thing that they had to do in order to try and move up the social hierarchy. When talking about sacrifices to gain ties within the highest authority of the land, we thought of a donation to a particular political party as the same type of idea behind offering ones son and giving money to a campaign.

In 1996, archaeologist Steve Borget began to look further into the Moche site where he believed that he would definitely find evidence of human sacrifices. He found remains of over 70 dismembered people. It was concluded, by Borget, that these people were sacrificed in a ritual to try and control the weather. In a place were heavy rain would be a problem; they used sacrifices in order to try and help the weather. This shows evidence of sacrifices and a possible reason for the rituals to begin with. An alternate reason for these Aztec Sacrifices

There is no doubt that the Aztec people performed human sacrifices, but their primary motive for the sacrifices is still up for debate. The Aztecs had 18 months in one cycle and would perform a sacrifice every cycle. The victims would be laid on a slab, have their heart cut out of them and held up to the sun. These victims were also painted during this ritual. There were other methods the Aztec people would perform these sacrifices, like shooting victims with arrows, drowned, burned, or brutally mutilated. The reasons for these brutal sacrifices are where our group is split.

There is a debate about the reason being that there was a great religious reason behind the ritual having to do with pleasing the Gods to have order in the universe and help with droughts and conquering of neighboring villages and people. The other side of our groups believes that these sacrifices were used, as a scare tactic for those were did not belong to the empire and for those who were also part of the empire. It was a religious practice used to keep order in society.

Sort of the role religion plays on society today.

Aztec Sacrifices:

The Aztec which flourished in Mesoamerica between 1345 and 1521 CE has gained an infamous reputation for bloodthirsty human sacrifice with lurid tales of the beating heart being ripped from the still-conscious victim, decapitation, skinning and dismemberment. All of these things did happen but it is important to remember that for the Aztecs the act of sacrifice - of which human sacrifice was only a part - was a strictly ritualised process which gave the highest possible honour to the gods and was regarded as a necessity to ensure mankind’s continued prosperity.

. Though the human sacrifice is the most talked about, there were actually many types of

sacrifices in the empire. The people believed that they owed a blood-debt to the gods.

They wanted to avert disaster by paying the endless debt. Blood was a common theme -

the sacrifice that the gods required

. So, animals would be sacrificed, as well as humans. Also, there was ritual blood-letting,

where people would cut themselves to offer their blood to the gods.

. The Aztecs had 18 months in one cycle (year), and for each of the 18 months there was

ritual sacrifice. The victim would be painted as a part of the ritual, they would be placed

on a slab where their heart would be removed and held up to the sun. The body would be

thrown down the stairs of the temple/pyramid.

. it is thought that hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of victims were sacrificed each year

at the great Aztec religious sites and it cannot be denied that there would also have been a

useful secondary effect of intimidation on visiting ambassadors and the populace in

general

. SIDE ONE: In Mesoamerican culture human sacrifices were viewed as a repayment for

the sacrifices the gods had themselves made in creating the world and the sun. This idea

of repayment was especially true regarding the myth of the reptilian monster Cipactli (or

Tlaltecuhtli). The great Gods, Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca ripped the creature into

pieces to create the earth and sky and all other things such as mountains, rivers and springs came from her various body parts. To console the spirit of Cipactli the gods

promised her human hearts and blood in appeasement

. SIDE TWO: From another point of view, sacrifices were compensation to the Gods for

the crime, which brought about mankind in Aztec mythology. In the story Ehecatl-

Quetzalcóatl stole bones from the Underworld and with them made the first humans so

that sacrifices were a necessary apology to the Gods. Gods then were ‘fed’ and

‘nourished’ with the sacrificed blood and flesh which ensured the continued balance and

prosperity of Aztec society.

Another source of sacrificial victims was the ritual ball games where the losing captain or

even the entire team paid the ultimate price for defeat. Children too could be sacrificed, in

particular, to honour the rain god Tlaloc in ceremonies held on sacred mountains. It was

believed that the very tears of the child victims would propitiate rain. Slaves were another

social group from which sacrificial victims were chosen, they could accompany their ruler in

death or be given in offering by tradesmen to ensure prosperity in business.

Amongst the most honored sacrificial victims were the god impersonators. Specially chosen individuals were dressed as a particular god before the sacrifice. In the case of the Tezcatlipoca impersonator in the ritual during Tóxcatl (the 6th or 5th month of the Aztec solar year) the victim was treated like royalty for one year prior to the sacrificial ceremony. Tutored by priests, given a female entourage and honored with dances and flowers, the victim was the god’s manifestation on earth until that final brutal moment when he met his maker. Perhaps even worse off was the impersonator of Xipe Totec who, at the climax of the festival of Tlacaxipehualiztli, was skinned to honour the god who was himself known as the ‘Flayed One’. CEREMONIES:

 Conducted at specially dedicated temples on the top of large pyramids such as at

Tenochtitlan, Texcoco and Tlacopan, sacrifices were most often carried out by stretching

the victim over a special stone, cutting open the chest and removing the heart using an

obsidian or flint knife. The heart was then placed in a stone vessel (cuauhxicalli) or in a

chacmool (a stone figure carved with a recipient on their midriff) and burnt in offering to

the god being sacrificed to.

 Victims could also be sacrificed in a more elaborate process where a single victim was

made to fight a gladiatorial contest against a squad of hand-picked warriors. Naturally,

the victim had no possibility to survive this ordeal or even inflict any injury on his

opponents as not only was he tied to a stone platform (temalacatl) but his weapon was

usually a feathered club while his opponents had vicious razor-sharp obsidian swords

(macuauhuitl). In another method, victims could be tied to a frame and shot with arrows

or darts and in perhaps the worst method of all, the victim was repeatedly thrown into a

fire and then had his heart removed.

 After the sacrifice, the heads of victims could be displayed in racks (tzompantli),

depictions of which survive in stone architectural decoration, notably at Tenochtitlán.

The flesh of those sacrificed was also, on occasion, eaten by the priests conducting the

sacrifice and by members of the ruling elite or warriors who had themselves captured the

victims. http://www.aztec-history.com/ancient-aztec-religion.html http://www.ancient.eu/Aztec_Sacrifice/

CANABALISM:

 Argument One: In summary, Harner said that the “typical anthropological

explanation is that the religion of the Aztecs required human sacrifices,” but that

“this explanation fails to suggest why that particular form of religion should have

evolved when and where it did” (Harner). Instead, he said that the Aztec’s

environment–specifically, their increasing population and decreasing amount of

wild game and lack of domesticable herbivores (for protein). While there were

fish and water flow, Harner believed the poor did not have access to these, and

instead had to rely on scant insects and rodents. He also said the while maize and

beans can provide all eight of the essential amino acids, they must be eaten in

great quantity and at the same time to gain the reward, which was not always

possible. The human body, then, which craves what it lacked, turned toward

human meat.

o In seeming contrast, Harner said that cannibalism was, for the most part,

reserved for the elite classes, which also generally had the most access to

other forms of protein. However, he stated “even nobles could suffer from

famines and sometimes had to sell their children into slavery in order to

survive.”

 Second Argument: Much more likely, Montellano believed, was that the

ideology of the Aztecs prompted them to cannibalize their victims. “The acquiescence of the sacrificed victims to their fate [of sacrifice] … is also

explainable in terms of their religious ideology” (Montellano). Just as Aztec

ideology said that whether a man received rewards in the afterlife depended on his

being either sacrificed to the Gods or killed in battle, it said that sacrificial victims

were sacred. Thus, “eating their flesh was the act of eating the God itself”

(Montellano). That they desired to achieve this union with God through

consumption is also promulgated in their consumption of psychotropic plants.

 An Aztec sacrificial stone, upon which human offerings to the gods were often made.

Aztec Ceremonial Knife. Incan Sacrifice notes

HUMAN SACRIFICE:

 He has delicate fingers and hugs his knees, one foot over the other, as if to keep warm.

His hair is plaited in more than 200 braids, and miniature idols and keepsakes accompany

him in his frozen tomb. Dead for 500 years, this Inca sacrificial mummy found on Chile's

El Plomo Peak has opened the door to further inquiry into the strange and mysterious

ritual life of the Inca

 The Incas worshipped the high peaks that pierce the South American skies. These rugged

summits represented a means of approaching the Sun God, Inti, the center of their

religion, and many sacrifices were made atop these cold and unpredictable pinnacles.

Mountain deities were seen as lords of the forces of nature who presided over crops and

livestock. In essence they were the protectors of the Inca people, the keepers of life who

reached up toward the skies where the sacred condor soared.

 Theories include: human sacrifices, at elevations approaching 23,000 feet,

Most scholars agree that the purpose of the sacrifice, known as "capacocha," was to

appease the mountain gods and to assure rain, abundant crops, protection, and order for

the Inca people.

. Sacrifices often coincided with remarkable occasions: earthquakes, eclipses, and droughts.

On these occasions the Incas were required to offer valuables from the highest regions

they could reach—the ice-clad summits of Andean peaks. Truly auspicious events, such as

the death of an emperor, prompted human sacrifices, perhaps to provide an escort for the

emperor on his journey to the Other World. . The Incas chose high peaks, climbed them, built their platforms, and made sacrifices,

sometimes human, to assure safe continued passage and to bless the roads.

. Borders: The Inca Empire extended 3000 miles across South America, from the Andes

Mountain in the north to central Chile in the south. The Empire occupied large parts of

present-day Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Chile.

The Boy of Llullaillaco. From his elaborate clothing, scientists inferred that the 7-year-old was born to Incan nobility. Children sacrificed to the mountain Gods are now revealing details of a type of ancient Inca practice.