A Brief Note on Human Sacrifice in Classical Mayan Culture

Tue, 02 Jun 2015 22:27:59 +0000

Mayan Moon Goddess with rabbit, Museum of Fine Arts Boston MA

In my previous post “Human Sacrifice during Shang Dynasty”, I examined the historical background of renji (人祭 / ritual human sacrifice) practiced during Shang dynasty China (c. 1600 BC to 1046 BC). It is important to note that the kind of large-scale human sacrifice practiced by Shang rulers, though extraordinary, is not historically idiosyncratic. Human sacrifice rituals similar to that of renji were also found pre-Colombian Mesoamerica, most notably in Mayan and Aztec societies. [1] As scholars have already performed excellent analyses on the political economy of ritual human killings in Aztec empire (see, The Accursed Share by Georges Bataille), this post will focus only on large-scale human sacrifices as practiced in pre-Colombian Mayan society.

Mayans on Keren Wang

A Brief Note on Human Sacrifice in Classical Mayan Culture