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A wide variety of interpretations of the Aztec practice of human sacrifice have been proposed by modern scholars. Most scholars of Pre-Columbian civilization see human sacrifice among the Aztecs as a part of the long cultural tradition of human sacrifice in Mesoamerica.
==The antecedents of Mesoamerican sacrifice==
The practice of [[human sacrifice]] was widespread in the Mesoamerican and in the [[South America]]n cultures during the [[Inca Empire]].<ref>
{{cite journal
| last = Acosta| first = Valerie
| year = 2003
| title = El sacrificio humano en Mesoamérica
| journal = [[Arqueología mexicana]]
| volume = XI | issue = 63 | pages = 16–21
}}</ref><ref>
{{cite journal
| last = Reinhard | first = Johan
| date=November 1999
| title = A 6,700 metros niños incas sacrificados quedaron congelados en el tiempo
| journal = [[National Geographic (magazine)|National Geographic, Spanish version]]
| pages = 36–55
}}</ref>
Like all other known pre-Columbian civilizations of Mesoamerica, the Aztecs
practiced human sacrifice. The extant sources describe how the Aztecs sacrificed human victims on each of their eighteen festivities, one festivity for each of their 20-day months.<ref>[[Bernardino de Sahagún]], ''Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva España'', ed. a cargo de Ángel Ma. Garibay (México: Editorial Porrúa, 2006), chapters XX to XXXVIII</ref> It is unknown if the Aztecs engaged in human sacrifice before they reached the [[Anahuac Valley|Anahuac]] valley and started absorbing other cultural influences. The first human sacrifice reported in the sources was the sacrifice and skinning of the daughter of the king Cóxcox of Culhuacán; this story is a part of the legend of the foundation of [[Tenochtitlan]].<ref>
{{cite book
| last = Thema | first = Equipo
| year = 2002
| title = Los aztecas
| publisher = [[Ediciones Rueda]]
| pages = 39–40
}}</ref> Several ethnohistorical sources state that under the guidance of [[Tlacaelel]], the importance of human sacrifice in Aztec history grew. The Aztecs would perform a series of rituals on nearby tribesmen, sacrifice them using an obsidian knife, and then donate their blood to the Aztec god [[Acolnahuacatl (deity)|Acolnahuacatl]]. {{citation needed|date=June 2017}}
==The role of sacrifice in Mesoamerica==
Sacrifice was a common theme in [[Mesoamerican]] cultures. In the Aztec "Legend of the Five Suns", all the gods sacrificed themselves so that mankind could live. Some years after the [[Spanish conquest of Mexico]], a body of [[Franciscans]] confronted the remaining Aztec priesthood and demanded, under threat of death, that they desist from this traditional practice. The Aztec priests defended themselves as follows:
Finally, according to the Aztec (and Mesoamerican) world-view, the circumstances in which people died determined the type of afterlife they enjoyed. The Aztecs had meticulously organised death into several types, which each led to specific "heavenly" and "underworld" levels. In the levels Sahagun records, passing away quietly at home was the lowest, as it required the unfortunate soul to undergo numerous torturous trials and journeys, only to culminate in a sombre underworld. By contrast, what the Aztecs termed "a good death" was sacrifice, war (which usually meant sacrifice) or—in the case of women—death whilst giving birth. This kind of end procured for the deceased the second-highest heaven (death in infancy being the highest). Persons who had died sacrificially or in war were called ''Teo-micqui'' ("the God-dead") and were said to "go pure... live hard by, nigh unto the Sun... [who] always forever ... rejoice ... [since] the House of the Sun is ... a place of joy."<ref>Sahagun Bk 6: 21</ref>
===The 52-year cycle===
The cycle of fifty-two years was central to Mesoamerican cultures. The Nahua's religious beliefs were based on a great fear that the universe would collapse after each cycle if the gods were not strong enough. Every fifty-two years a special [[New Fire ceremony]] was performed.<ref>
{{cite book
| last = Matos-Moctezuma | first = Eduardo
| year = 2006
| title = Tenochtitlan
| publisher = [[Fondo de Cultura Económica]]
| pages = 172–73
| isbn = 0-520-05602-7
}}</ref> All fires were extinguished and at midnight a human sacrifice was made. The Aztecs then waited for the dawn. If the [[Sun]] appeared it meant that the sacrifices for this cycle had been enough. A fire was ignited on the body of a victim, and this new fire was taken to every house, city and town. Rejoicing was general: a new cycle of fifty-two years was beginning, and the end of the world had been postponed, at least for another 52-year cycle.
==Sacrifices to specific gods==
God of the east and water, he wore human skin and was a patron for craftsmen. He was a god of [[maize]] and was associated with rain.
The table below shows the festivals of the 18-month year of the [[Aztec calendar]] and the deities with which the festivals were associated. In ''[[Florentine Codex|The Florentine Codex]]'' children were sacrificed during the first month of the year.
{|class="wikitable"
|colspan="2"| Five ominous days at the end of the year, no ritual, general fasting
|}
== The Flower Wars ==
{{Main|Flower war}}
It has often been claimed by scholars that the Aztecs resorted to a form of ritual warfare, the Flower War, to obtain living human bodies for the sacrifices in time of peace. This claim however has been severely criticised by scholars such as Ross Hassig<ref>
{{cite book
|author=Hassig, Ross
|year=1988
|title=Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political Control
|publisher=[[University of Oklahoma Press]]
|location=Norman
|isbn=0-8061-2121-1
}}</ref><ref>
{{cite journal
| last = Hassig | first = Ross
| year= 2003
| title = El sacrificio y las guerras floridas
| journal = [[Arqueología mexicana]]
| volume = XI | pages = 46–51
}}</ref> and Nigel Davies<ref>
{{cite book
|author=Davies, Nigel
|year=1968
|title=Los Señorios independientes del Imperio Azteca
|publisher=[[Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia]] (INAH)
|location=Mexico D.F.
}}</ref> who claim that the main purpose of the Flower Wars was political and not religious and that the number of sacrificial victims obtained through flower wars was insignificant compared to the number of victims obtained through normal political warfare.
According to [[Diego Durán]]'s ''History of the Indies of New Spain'', and a few other sources that are also based on the [[Crónica X]], the Flower Wars were originally a treaty between the cities of [[Aztec Triple Alliance]] and [[Tlaxcala (Nahua state)|Tlaxcala]] and Huexotzingo motivated by a famine in Mesoamerica in 1450. Aztec prisoners were also sacrificed in [[Tlaxcala (Nahua state)|Tlaxcala]] and [[Huexotzingo]]. The capture of prisoners for sacrifices was called ''nextlaualli'' ("debt payment to the gods"). These sources however are contradicted by other sources, such as the Codex Chimalpahin, which mentions "Flower Wars" much earlier than the famine of 1450 and against other opponents than the ones mentioned in the treaty.
Because the objective of Aztec warfare was to capture victims alive for human sacrifice, battle tactics were designed primarily to injure the enemy rather than kill him. After towns were conquered their inhabitants were no longer candidates for human sacrifice, only liable to regular [[tribute]]. Slaves also could be used for human sacrifice, but only if the slave was considered lazy and had been resold three times.<ref>
{{cite book
| last = Duverger | first = Christian
| year = 2005
| title = La flor letal
| publisher = [[Fondo de Cultura Económica]]
| page = 81
}}</ref>
[[File:Aztec sacrificial knives.jpg|thumb|right|300px|A ceremonial offering of Aztec sacrificial knife blades ''tecpatlixquahua'' {{IPA-nah|tekpat͡ɬiʃˈkawa|}}<ref name="dic" >''Nahuatl dictionary.''(1997). Wired humanities project. Retrieved September 2, 2012, from [http://whp.uoregon.edu/dictionaries/nahuatl/index.lasso link].</ref> at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.]]
==The sacrifice ritual==
Most of the sacrificial rituals took more than two people to perform. In the usual procedure of the ritual, the sacrifice would be taken to the top of the temple.<ref>[[Bernardino de Sahagún]], ''Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva España'' (op. cit.), p. 88</ref> The sacrifice would then be laid on a stone slab by four priests, and his/her abdomen would be sliced open by a fifth priest with a ceremonial knife made of [[flint]]. The cut was made in the abdomen and went through the [[Thoracic diaphragm|diaphragm]]. The priest would grab the heart and tear it out, still beating. It would be placed in a bowl held by a statue of the honored god, and the body thrown down the temple's stairs.<ref>
{{cite book
| last = Duverger | first = Christian
| year = 2005
| title = La flor letal
| pages = 139–140
| publisher = [[Fondo de Cultura Económica]]
}}</ref> The body would land on a terrace at the base of the pyramid called an ''apetlatl'' {{IPA-nah|aˈpet͡ɬat͡ɬ|}}.<ref name="dic" />
Before and during the killing, priests and audience (who gathered in the plaza below) stabbed, pierced and bled themselves as autosacrifice (Sahagun, Bk. 2: 3: 8, 20: 49, 21: 47). Hymns, whistles, spectacular costumed dances and percussive music marked different phases of the rite.
The body parts would then be disposed of: the viscera fed the animals in the zoo; the bleeding head was placed on display in the ''[[tzompantli]]'', meaning 'hairy skulls'.<ref>Duverger, Ibid., 171</ref> Not all the skulls in the tzompantlis were victims of sacrifice. In the [[Anales de Tlatelolco]] it is described that during the siege of [[Tlatelolco (altepetl)|Tlatelolco]] by the Spaniards, the Tlatelolcas built three tzompantli: two for their own dead and one for the fallen conquerors, including two severed heads of horses.
Other kinds of human sacrifice, which paid tribute to various deities, approached the victims differently. The victim could be shot with arrows (in which the draining blood represented the cool rains of spring); die in unequal fighting ([[gladiatorial]] sacrifice) or be sacrificed as a result of the [[Mesoamerican ballgame]]; burned (to honor the fire god); [[Flaying|flayed]] after being sacrificed (to honor [[Xipe Totec]], "Our Lord The Flayed One"), or drowned.<ref>Duverger (op. cit.), pages 157-167</ref>
[[File:Tzompantli Tovar.jpeg|left|350px|thumb|A ''[[tzompantli]]'', or skull rack, as shown in the post-Conquest [[Ramirez Codex]].]]
==Estimates of the scope of the sacrifices==
Some post-conquest sources report that at the re-consecration of [[Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan]] in 1487, the Aztecs sacrificed about 80,400 prisoners over the course of four days. This number is considered by Ross Hassig, author of ''Aztec Warfare'', to be an exaggeration. Hassig states "between 10,000 and 80,400 persons" were sacrificed in the ceremony.<ref>
{{cite journal
| last = Hassig | first = Ross
| year = 2003
| title = El sacrificio y las guerras floridas
| journal = [[Arqueología mexicana]]
| volume = XI | page = 47
}}</ref> The higher estimate would average 14 sacrifices per minute during the four-day consecration. Four tables were arranged at the top so that the victims could be jettisoned down the sides of the temple.<ref>Victor Davis Hanson (2000), ''Carnage and Culture,'' Doubleday, New York, pp. 194-195. Hanson, who accepts the 80,000+ estimate, also notes that it exceeded "the daily murder record at either Auschwitz or Dachau."</ref> Nonetheless, according to [[Codex Telleriano-Remensis]], old Aztecs who talked with the missionaries told about a much lower figure for the reconsecration of the temple, approximately 4,000 victims in total.
Michael Harner, in his 1977 article ''The Enigma of Aztec Sacrifice'', estimates the number of persons sacrificed in central Mexico in the 15th century as high as 250,000 per year. [[Fernando de Alva Cortés Ixtlilxochitl]], a Mexica descendant and the author of [[Codex Ixtlilxochitl]], estimated that one in five children of the Mexica subjects was killed annually. [[Victor Davis Hanson]] argues that a claim by Don Carlos Zumárraga of 20,000 per annum is "more plausible."<ref>Hanson, p. 195.</ref> Other scholars believe that, since the Aztecs often tried to intimidate their enemies, it is more likely that they could have inflated the number as a [[propaganda]] tool.<ref>Duverger (op. cit), 174-77</ref> The same can be said for Bernal Díaz's inflated calculations when, in a state of visual shock, he grossly miscalculated the number of skulls at one of the seven Tenochtitlan tzompantlis. The counter argument is that both the Aztecs and Diaz were very precise in the recording of the many other details of Aztec life, and inflation or propaganda would be unlikely. According to the [[Florentine Codex]], fifty years before the conquest the Aztecs burnt the skulls of the former tzompantli. Mexican archeologist Eduardo Matos Moctezuma has unearthed and studied some tzompantlis.<ref>
{{cite book
| last = Matos-Moctezuma | first = Eduardo
| year = 2005
| title = Muerte a filo de obsidiana
| publisher = [[Fondo de Cultura Económica]]
| pages = 111–124
}}</ref>
Sacrifices were made on specific days. Sahagún, [[Juan Bautista de Pomar]] and Motolinía report that the Aztecs had eighteen festivities each year, one for each Aztec month. They clearly state that in those festivities sacrifices were made. Each god required a different kind of victim: young women were drowned for [[Xilonen]]; children were sacrificed to [[Tláloc]]; [[Nahuatl language|Nahuatl-speaking prisoners]] to Huitzilopochtli, and a single nahua would volunteer for Tezcatlipoca. The [[Ramírez Codex]] states that for the annual festivity of Huitzilopochtli more than sixty prisoners were sacrificed in the main temple, and prisoners were sacrificed in other large Aztec cities as well.
Not all sacrifices were made at the Tenochtitlan temples; a few were made at "Cerro del Peñón", an islet of the Texcoco lake. According to an Aztec source, in the month of ''Tlacaxipehualiztli'' (from February 22 to March 13), thirty-four captives were sacrificed in the gladiatorial sacrifice to Xipe Totec.{{citation needed|date=April 2014}} More victims would be sacrificed to Huitzilopochtli in the month ''Panquetzaliztli'' (from 9 November to 28 November) according to the Ramírez Codex. This would mean a figure as low as 300 to 600 victims a year. There is little agreement on the actual figure due to the scarcity of archeological evidence.
Every Aztec warrior would have to provide at least one prisoner for sacrifice. All the male population was trained to be warriors, but only the few who succeeded in providing captives could become full-time members of the warrior elite. Those who could not would become ''macehualli'', workers.{{citation needed|date=April 2014}} Accounts also state that several young warriors could unite to capture a single prisoner, which suggests that capturing prisoners for sacrifice was challenging.
There is still much debate as to what social groups constituted the usual victims of these sacrifices. It is often assumed that all victims were 'disposable' commoners or foreigners. However, slaves - a major source of victims - were not a permanent class but rather persons from any level of Aztec society who had fallen into debt or committed some crime (see Duran, Book of the Gods and Rites, 131, 260). Likewise, most of the earliest accounts talk of prisoners of war of diverse social status, and concur that virtually all child sacrifices were locals of noble lineage, offered by their own parents (compare Cortes, Letters 105 with Motolinia, History of the Indies 118-119 and Duran, Book of the Gods, 223, 242).
Likewise, it is doubtful if many victims came from far afield. In 1454, the Aztec government forbade the slaying of captives from distant lands at the capital's temples (Duran, The Aztecs: History of the Indes, 141). Duran's informants told him that sacrifices were consequently 'nearly always... friends of the [Royal] House' - meaning warriors from allied states (Duran, The Aztecs: History of the Indies, 141, 198). This probably meant that the average Aztec warrior stood as much chance of procuring a victim as he did of himself becoming one - as the Aztec Emperor reportedly told all captives about to be sacrificed: 'today for you, tomorrow for me' (Tezozomoc Vol.2).
==Discussion of primary sources==
=== The Anonymous Conqueror ===
The Anonymous Conqueror's ''[[Narrative of Some Things of New Spain and of the Great City of Temestitan]]'' details Aztec sacrifices.<ref>[http://www.famsi.org/research/christensen/anon_con/section16.htm] - [[Narrative of Some Things of New Spain and of the Great City of Temestitan]], México, Chapter XV, written by a Companion of Hernán Cortés, The Anonymous Conqueror.</ref> In Chapter XIV he depicts the temple in which men, women, boys and girls were sacrificed.<ref>[http://www.famsi.org/research/christensen/anon_con/section15.htm] – Ibid., Chapter XIV</ref> On Chapter XXIV the Anonymous Conqueror repeatedly claims that the Aztecs were cannibals, sodomites, alcoholics and polygamists.<ref>[http://www.famsi.org/research/christensen/anon_con/section25.htm] – Ibid., Chapter XXIV</ref> The original Spanish text is lost. The description of the temple was published in the 1556 Ramusio Italian edition.
[[File:20041229-Ocelotl-Cuauhxicalli (Museo Nacional de Antropología) MQ.jpg|300px|right|thumb|A jaguar-shaped [[cuauhxicalli]] in the [[National Museum of Anthropology]]. This altar-like stone vessel was used to hold the hearts of sacrificial victims. See also [[chacmool]].]]
==Assessment of the practice of human sacrifice==
Human sacrifice and other forms of torture—self-inflicted or otherwise—were common to many parts of the New World. Thus the rite was nothing new to the Aztecs when they arrived to the [[Valley of Mexico]], nor was it something unique to pre-Columbian Mexico. Other Mesoamerican cultures, such as the [[Purépecha culture|Purépecha]]s and [[Toltec]]s, performed human sacrifices as well and from archaeological evidence, it probably existed since the time of the [[Olmecs]] (1200–400 BC), and perhaps even throughout the early farming cultures of the region. Although the extent of human sacrifice is unknown among several Mesoamerican civilizations, such as [[Teotihuacán]],<ref>[http://lta.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=entertainmentNews&storyID=2007-04-11T224854Z_01_N11260646_RTRIDST_0_ESPECTACULOS-MEXICO-PIRAMIDE-SOL.XML] DNA analysis shows that the Teotihuacan civilization brought human victims from distant towns.</ref> what distinguished [[Human sacrifice in Maya culture|Maya]] and Aztec human sacrifice was the importance with which it was embedded in everyday life.
Diego Durán states that Aztecs made "indifferent or sarcastic remarks" when the Spaniards severely criticized the rite. In his ''Book of the Gods and Rites'' some of the Nahuas even ridiculed the Christian sensibilities. Instead, they asked the Spaniards to applaud:
{{quote| The sacrifice of human beings...the honored [[oblation]] of great lords and noblemen. They remember these things and tell of them as if they had been great deeds.<ref>Diego Duran, ''Book of the Gods and Rites'', p. 227</ref>}}
Although Aztec accounts mention some victims who wept, “faltered...weakened” or “lost control of their bowels” when going to be sacrificed,<ref>Sahagun Bk 2: 81</ref> this reaction does not seem to have been the norm, as when this occurred, it was viewed as a bad omen<ref name="ReferenceA">Duran, ''Book of the Gods and Rites'', 132</ref>—a ''tetlazolmictiliztli'' ("insult to the gods")<ref name="ReferenceA"/> that had to be atoned. Such victims were hurriedly taken aside and slain amidst the congregation's sarcastic jeers of “he (the victim has) quite acquitted himself as a man”.<ref>Sahagun Bk 2:21)</ref> The [[conquistadors]] Cortés and Alvarado found that some of the sacrificial victims they freed “indignantly rejected [the] offer of release and demanded to be sacrificed”.<ref>Bernal Diaz, ''The Conquest of New Spain'', p. 159)</ref> Likewise, their slayers, the native priests, were expected to be “kind...never harms anyone” according to Sahagun's informants.
What has been gleaned from all of this is that the sacrificial role entailed a great deal of social expectation and a certain degree of acquiescence. Sahagún's informants told him that key roles were reserved for persons who were considered “charming, quick, dances with feeling…without [moral] defects…of good understanding…good mannered”.<ref>Sahagun Bk 2: 24: 68-69</ref> For many rites, the victim had such a quantity of prescribed duties that it is difficult to imagine how the accompanying festival would have progressed without some degree of compliance on the part of the victim. For instance, victims were expected to bless children, greet and cheer passers-by, hear people's petitions to the gods, visit people in their homes, give discourses and lead sacred songs, processions and dances.<ref>Sahagun Bk 5: 8; Bk 2: 5:9; Bk 2:24:68-69</ref> The works of Clendinnen and Brundage imply that only a few select victims had this kind of role, but the Florentine Codex and Duran both make no such distinctions, stating that “those who had to die performed many ceremonies…[and] these [pre-sacrificial] rites were performed in the case of all the prisoners, each in turn”.<ref>''cf''. Sahagun Bk 2:5:9 and Duran, Book of the Gods...p. 112.</ref>
Sacrifices were ritualistic and symbolic acts accompanying huge feasts and festivals. Victims usually died in the "center stage" amid the splendor of dancing troupes, percussion orchestras, elaborate costumes and decorations, carpets of flowers, crowds of thousands of commoners, and all the assembled elite. Aztec texts frequently refer to human sacrifice as ''neteotoquiliztli'', “the desire to be regarded as a god”.<ref>Duran, ''Book of the Gods and Rites'', p. 177 Note 4</ref> For each festival, at least one of the victims took on the paraphernalia, habits, and attributes of the god or goddess whom they were dying to honor or appease. Particularly the young man who was indoctrinated for a year to submit himself to Tezcatlipoca's temple was the Aztec equivalent of a celebrity, being greatly revered and adored to the point of people “kissing the ground” when he passed by.<ref>Sahagún, ''Historia general'', op. cit, p. 104</ref>
==Proposed explanations of Aztec human sacrifice==
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