Aztecs and human sacrifice biased account can anyone prove it inaccurate?

Question

is the historical record of religious sacrifice by aztecs biased and can it be rexamined is there any evidence archeological or otherwise to refute it.

Answer 1

The evidence supports the accounts of sacrifice.

Answer 2

The Aztec preformed human sacrifice as did every culture in the world.  History is of course biased , after all it was written by the winners.  It was part of their culture as was their method of planting corn next to roads for travelers to eat.  This practice of human sacrifice somehow managed to appall the Spanish, at they time was preforming their own style of human sacrifice, it was call the Spanish Inquisition.  The American form was called Manifest Destiny.

Answer 3

I'm not sure...But if you look hard enough, there are a lot of cultures doing the same thing, as we speak. I've rear a lot of things about some groups in the U.S. that still do things like that.

Answer 4

of course. But be aware that time erodes many things and thieves are loathe to make their presence known. Forensic anthropology would be where one should go for the answers. Read anyu good bones lately? Have u seen the writing on the wall? etc

Answer 5

I am afraid that your Aztecs DID INDEED practice human sacrifice.  

ARE the accounts biased?  They very probably ARE, but unfortunately that doesn't mean there is not some truth in them.  Certainly, the Spanish at the height of power of their infamous Inquisition were not going to write kindly about people they considered heathens and savages, but they are not the only source of evidence.  As one of the others to post his answer ahead of mine pointed out, the Aztecs, themselves, depicted these activities in their own art and heiroglyphics.

Perhaps you can take some solace in knowing that they were not alone in the practice, however.

As shocking and horrifying as the concept is to us, today, human sacrifice was not uncommon in a lot of ancient cultures.  The Celts and some of the Sumerian cultures practiced similar rites, and I suspect that many others we were not very aware of and did not study very much about did, too.

Even in Christianity's Old Testament there are a couple of incidents of human sacrifice.  Abraham was all set to sacrifice his son, Isaac, untill a better option presented itself.  If it hadn't, though, he WOULD HAVE sacrificed his beloved son and heir, and didn't seem to regard the action as being all that far out of the ordinary.

There is also a story - I don't know what Old Testament book it is in, though (I am thinking maybe "Judges", but don't know for sure) - about a military leader named Jephath or Jephtah who promised his God (yes, that same God of the Israelites) that if he were granted victory in battle he would sacrifice whatsoever first ran forth from his house to greet him when he returned home.  It happened to be his adolescent daughter, and he DID sacrifice her to the Old Testament Hebrew God.

These two stories are in the very Bible that most of our civilized Western culture calls its holy book!  THAT'S how common this frightening practice was!

I read somewhere - no, I don't remember exactly where - that somewhere in the Andes Mountains, TODAY, there is a mountain bridge that the locals are afraid to cross because there is NOT a child sacrifice buried under its supports.  

THAT, to me, is TRULY scary!

Answer 6

Well, the Aztecs drew murals of people being sacrificed, for starters. The account the Spaniards gave was probably biased in a lot of ways, but there's no reason to think there wasn't sacrifice going on.

Answer 7

none

Answer 8

Don't be so upset about human sacrifices of your ancestors.  No ethnic group in the world is 100 percent noble and humanistic.  Every ethnic group has its dirty little secrets.  But it's all in the past.  Forget about it.  Olvidelo, carnal.