Ancient Tomb Found In Mexico Reveals Mass Child Sacrifice

[Amerist]

Today, I discovered this macabre article on National Geographic Online that archaeologists have discovered an ancient Toltec tomb containing remains believed to be from a mass child sacrifice.

Apparently, while knocking around with shovels in the city of Tula—the ancient capital of the Toltec empire—a bunch of construction workers (shortly followed then by archaeologists) disinterred a clutch of skeletons all staring in an eastward direction, towards the rising sun. These skeletons were small, immature, and surrounded by elaborate burial adornments. They were children, believed to have been sacrificed to the god Tlaloc as a gesture asking for rain.

Construction crews unearthed the burial chamber this spring near the town of Tula, the ancient Toltec capital, 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Mexico City (see Mexico map).

The chamber contained 24 skeletons of children believed to have been sacrificed between A.D. 950 and 1150, according to Luis Gamboa, an archaeologist at Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History.

All but one of the children were between 5 to 15 years of age, and they were likely killed as an offering to the Toltec rain god Tlaloc, Gamboa said.

The Toltec, a pre-Aztec civilization that thrived from the 10th to 12th centuries, had not been previously thought to have sacrificed children.

This came as something of a surprise to me, mostly because I have been stacking up books on the Aztecs and Toltecs while trying to develop an interesting plot that revolves around their ancient customs. A lot of things that I write take settings in Arizona--which, directly bordering Mexico, tends to dredge up societies of Mexican descendants who relate strongly to Aztec ancestors like the Chicano azteca. Tlaloc is a deity also in the Aztec mythology (rain and fertility.)

A bit grisly, but still interesting.

[Troy Spiral (13)]

Yeah the rain god of the Aztecs needed dead children to be happy, the idea usually is that the younger, more likely to be productive ones are better sacrifices than the "old" people that will die soon (read that as 25-30 year olds). The Tol-Tecs were pre-Aztecs. When i was reading this i was a bit confused as to what the fuss was about as this was (i thought) already well know.

I guess the idea here is that it was assumed that it was the Aztecs that were the hardcore bloodthirsty ones not their older and less advanced precursors. Meaning the Toltecs just killed adults for god, the Aztecs killed kids and adults for god. I guess the Aztecs weren't the innovators we had originally thought.