NEWS: Early Man Believed to Practice Human Sacrifice... on the Disabled

CULTURE: Early Man Believed to Practice Human Sacrifice... on the Disabled

I saw half of Apocalypto. I distinctly recall heads being lopped off and still-beating hearts torn from the ravaged flesh of unfortunate captives. It wasn’t pretty. Here’s the gore-free version of Mayan-style human sacrifice:



Typically, that’s how we envision human sacrifice: savage ethnic peoples tearing out vital organs, or island-bred cannibals serving up a human feast for their bloodthirsty gods. But anthropologists have long known others practiced similar rituals, including the Druids, who enjoyed burning victims alive, and the Vikings, who buried slaves as part of funeral ceremonies.

And now, Discovery News reports there is new evidence to suggest human sacrifice may have had a role in the culture of Upper Paleolithic Europeans, which until now, has never been apparent. The term Upper Paleolithic roughly refers to the years 26,000 to 8,000 B.C., or the most recent portion of what we usually think of as the Stone Age.

By analyzing three burial sites in Russia, Italy, and the Czech Republic, lead researcher Vincenzo Formicola has suggested that the hunter-gatherer societies of early Europeans partook in elaborate funerals rituals and, quite possibly, had a habit of sacrificing the disabled. But it's ok: the term 'politically correct' had yet to be coined. From Discovery News:

Combined with the findings at the other graves, which both featured skeletons with physical deformities buried alongside non-deformed children of similar ages, Formicola believes that these may have been sacrificial victims chosen by a process of age selection. The “grave goods” found at the Russian site -- which included 5000 ivory beads sewn into clothing -- offer a clue:

Obviously the evidence isn’t conclusive, but it is suggestive. So ancient Europeans were ‘barbaric’, and their possible fear of the disabled makes sense; they didn’t know any better. But surely, surely, their descendants, including civilized white Americans, have progressed in their attitudes toward those who, through no fault of their own are physically different. At least we don't burn them alive anymore, right? But it's not all a tub full of bubbles and love, either.



Aaron_Lariviere doesn't condone the practice of dwarf / midget / little-person tossing, and tends to think those who do are shitty.

"ancestors" should read "descendants"

Yep. Thanks, i'll fix that.

Fair enough. All I'm saying is that that's how a lot of people envision human sacrifice, whether it's accurate or not.

And there are countless pieces of Mayan art that have survived showing similar scenes of human sacrifice, frequently very much like what appeared in Apocalypto.

Hey, look at the good side, at least that little person had a helmet. This is a VAST improvement over the old helmetless midget throwing days of yore.

uhhh...

the gods must be crazy

I've never got the supposed humour element of 'small people'.
Parading them is neither big nor...
Parading them is neither offensive nor funny, just... pointless.
Anybody get the humour?

I don't either. If the appeal is that "they're humans, only smaller" the pricks that laugh so hard should go wild every time they see children.

Hehe. That Bettlejuice is a gamer.

The disabled being killed? How is this news exactly?

Sigh.... This article is crap, and unfortunately provides no logical point. I however did enjoy the information portrayed in it. You should work on reinforcing your points better, oh well.

as a disabled person in the wonderful U.S. of A., I can honestly say being burned alive would be a kindness...

do your research..."Modern Humans" - US - were here and the dominate species by 30,000 years ago...so no...these people we are talking about are our "ANCESTORS"...

"Around 50,000 years ago, there was a sudden explosion of human migration out of Africa, and by about 30,000 years ago, we were the last ones standing." - http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/02/0220_030220_humanorigins2.html

No,no, in my last paragraph I had mistakenly described modern white americans as the ancestors of ancient europeans rather than the descendants. She was pointing out my typo, which has since been fixed.

That's weird that this article was posted today. I just saw Apocalypto for the first time last night.

It's the ending movie and statement I had a problem with, the entire rest of the article was very well done but the ending was completely irrelevant and unsupported by anything else in the article. I guess I have been spoiled by don't fear the reapers articles his are always stellar. I was just giving him some helpful feed back as a fellow writer. Pretty droll insult as well seeing that if someone could write it would make sense that they could read. At least that always made since to me, well there is a small possibility I am wrong on this one.

I don't follow you but oh well, I guess I was a little harsh on the criticism directed towards his article. I suppose I shouldn't do that to the poor guy until I post an article. Well when I do post an article you can all smear it ok.

hey, i'm not offended. my cerebral cortex is too fried right now to tell whether my writing is on or off today, and i don't mind hearing your gut reaction. better than being nice for kindness sake, i think.

Flux: I do appreciate the vote of confidence.

It all makes perfect since to me as well.

From the linked Wikipedia article:

(Emphases are mine.)

Could choosing not to read fall in the realm of functional illiteracy?

And this news article? Excellent, although I don't think I've ever talked to anyone would would have argued that our European ancestors from previous ages were any less "barbaric"* than anyone else at the same point in their cultural timeline.

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*For lack of a better word.

At first glance, I was wondering if the incorrect spelling of aldushuxley's membername was intentional or not. Now I wonder what has happened to writers. So often I find errata that appear to be other than typographical (such as my keyboard omitting letters quite frequently). For example, "giving helpful feed back" implies the return of some edible substance, as oppposed to "giving helpful feedback," which would implie offering constructive criticism on a writing.

Just playing. I know grammatical standards are generally overlooked on the webernet.

Oh yeah; it all makes perfect sense to me, as well.