Scientists from the U.S. and Mexico led a large-scale study in the capital of the ancient Aztecs.
Archaeologists from the United States and Mexico identified the most likely origin of human sacrifice at the pyramid of Huitzilopochtli is a religious building of the ancient Empire of the Aztecs.
A study published in the journal Current Anthropology.
Archaeologists have studied skulls of human victims 38 times Emperor Axayacatl, of which eight belonged to adult males, ranging in age from 30 to 45 years old and have been modified. In ancient times, before the ritual murder at the faces of people wearing masks. By their nature, scientists tried to determine the origin of the victims of the atrocities of the Aztec people. Scientists presented an analysis of eight such masks.
Archaeologists compared these with those of the mask on the face of the other 127 people dead in Tenochtitlan, most of whom were warriors. Scientists have identified gender, age, disease and the social identity of these people, and also identified the ways in which masks were made victims.
As shown by research scientists, most of the victims were either strangers of the elite warriors, or representatives of the local nobility, who were on the side of the enemy. Skulls and masks were discovered about 30 years ago, but only now became clear where they originate.
The Huitzilopochtli pyramid (Templo Mayor) is a complex of Church buildings in the Aztec capital of tenochtitlán. The height of the pyramid reached 60 meters, on its top was a temple of the God of sun and war Huitzilopochtli, and the God of rain and fertility Tlaloc.
The pyramid is built around 1325 and in two hundred years has become a cult centre of the Aztec state. A large part of the Templo Mayor complex was looted and destroyed by Spanish conquerors in 1521. To date, the remains of the bottom part of the Huitzilopochtli, the excavations by archaeologists.
