Evidence of a grisly human sacrifice and a complex military infrastructure has emerged from an excavation of the ruins of a pyramid in the 2000-year-old city of Teotihuacan in Mexico.
A vault containing 12 bodies, ten of which had been decapitated, along with the remains of pumas, wolves and eagles were discovered at the city鈥檚 central structure, the Pyramid of the Moon.
鈥淲hat we have found in this excavation suggests that a certain kind of mortuary ritual took place inside the tomb before it was filled in,鈥� says Saburo Sugiyama of the University of Japan, in Aichi, who coordinated the archaeological dig with Ruben Cabrera of Mexico鈥檚 National Institute of Anthropology and History.
Advertisement
鈥淚t is hard to believe that the ritual consisted of clean symbolic performances,鈥� Sugiyama adds. 鈥淚t is most likely that the ceremony created a horrible scene of bloodshed with sacrificed people and animals.鈥�
Birthplace of gods
Teotihuacan is located 25 miles north of Mexico City and predates the Aztec civilisation by around 700 years. The city鈥檚 name, meaning 鈥淐ity of the Gods鈥�, was given by the Aztecs, who believed their gods to have been born there.
The tomb is the fifth chamber to be discovered within the pyramid 鈥� and is buried within the fifth of seven construction layers added onto the original pyramid as the city expanded. Shell pendants, blades and the points of projectile weapons such as arrows and spears were also found alongside the bodies.
Sugiyama suggests that the weaponry and remains of powerful animals linked with the headless bodies are 鈥渉ighly symbolic objects [which] suggest that the government wanted to symbolise expanding sacred political power and perhaps the importance of military institutions with the new monument鈥�.
Peaceful people
Mike Smith at State University of New York in Albany, US, says the find is particularly significant because relatively little is known about high-level political organisation in Teotihuacan. It also firmly contradicts earlier theories that Mexican civilisations were relatively peaceful and theocratic during this period.
鈥淭his is the second significant find of sacrifice at Teotihuacan,鈥� Smith told New 杏吧原创. 鈥淣obody can say that this was just a one off.鈥�
But another artefact discovered in the mausoleum presents a puzzle. The mosaic of a human figure 鈥� possibly a Mayan 鈥� was found at the centre of several large knives. It has artistic features not seen elsewhere in Mesoamerica and has political relevance, as some of the knives included the form of a feathered serpent 鈥� known to be associated with political authority.
Another tomb containing the remains of four men was found within the same layer of the pyramid in 2002. Isotopic analysis suggests two of the men buried there were Teotihuacans, while two were foreigners.