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CARIBBEAN PEOPLES

#9 from La Historia General de las Indias
(Francisco López de Gómara, 1552)

Suicide, Smallpox, and the Arrival of the Spaniards

Of all their laws, this is the most notable, that for whatever theft they impaled the thief, they also abhorred the avaricious a lot. They bury with the men, especially with the gentlemen, some of their most beloved women, or the most beautiful, for that is a great honor and favor. Other women want to be buried with them for love. The burial of these is ostentatious, they seat them on the tomb, and they put around them bread, water, salt, fruit, and arms.

…[Prediction of the coming of the long beards, who will conquer the people with their shining swords.] …

All these things happened exactly as those priests related and sang, for the Spaniards opened many Indians with knife thrusts in the wars, and even in the mines and struck down the idols on their altars without leaving one. They forbade all the rites and ceremonies that they found. They made them slaves through the actions where they divided them up, as a result of which they worked more than they used to, and in the case of others, they died and all killed themselves. Of the 15 times 100 thousand and more persons that there were on that single island, now there are only 500. Some died of hunger, others from work, and many from poxes. Some killed themselves with yucca juice, and others with poisonous herbs, others hanged themselves from the trees. The women acted like their husbands, they hanged themselves alongside them [their husbands], and aborted their children with art and drink, so as not to bear children who would serve strangers. It must have been a punishment that God gave them for their sins, but the first [the Spaniards] were greatly at fault for treating them very badly, inflamed with desire for gold more than [for the welfare] of their fellow [human beings].

[#9] “Suicide, Smallpox, and the Arrival of the Spaniards,” from Francisco Lopez de Gomara, La Historia General de las Indias (En Anvers: Casa de Juan Steelsio, 1554, pp. 35-36, 40), tr. Carolyn Morrow.

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#9 from La Historia General de las Indias
(Francisco López de Gómara, 1552)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

CARIBBEAN PEOPLES

#8 from Natural History of the West Indies
(Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, 1526)

Suicide on the Death of the Chief

This species of poisonous yuca grows in great abundance on the islands of San Juan [Puerto Rico], Cuba, Jamaica, and Hispaniola.

In some of the islands where the poisonous yuca is found, occasionally there has been some Indian chief or leader and many of his subjects who have committed suicide. The chief, through the exhortations of the devil, would tell all those who wanted to die with him the reason that he thought would draw them to their diabolical end. Then each one would take swallows of the water or juice of the yuca and suddenly they would all die without any help whatsoever.

In many places of Tierra Firme when a cacique or some lord dies, all the retainers of his household, both men and women, kill themselves. The devil has led them to believe that those who commit suicide when the chief dies will go with him to heaven and there serve him food and drink or continue the same work they have done in the home or the cacique on earth.

Those who do not do this, they believe, when they die of some other cause, or naturally, their spirits die with the body. And all the other Indians and vassals of the chief, when they die, as has been said, their spirits die with the body. And so they die and are converted into air or into nothingness, as would happen to a pig, a bird, a fish, or any other animal. They believe that only the servants and vassals who serve the master in the house or in some particular service have and enjoy that right and pre-eminence.

From that false belief it results that even those who are engaged in the cultivation of corn kill themselves in order to enjoy this blessing, and have themselves buried with a little corn and a small wooden sword. The Indians say that it is carried with them so that if in heaven there is a lack of seed, they will have enough to begin their trade, until the devil, who informs them of everything, provides them with a larger quantity of seed.

In the highlands of Guaturo I was able to observe this very well. There I held prisoner the cacique of that province who had rebelled against the service of your Majesty. I asked him to explain to me the meaning of a number of graves that were in his house. He said that were the graves of Indians who had killed themselves when his father died. Since often they are buried with great quantities of wrought gold, I had two of the graves opened. There I found the corn and knives that I mentioned above. When I asked the reason, the cacique and some of his Indians said that those who had been buried there were farmers, men who knew well how to plant and harvest corn, and they were his and his father’s servants. And so that their souls would not die with their bodies, they had killed themselves upon the death of his father, and had the corn and knives for use in heaven.

I replied that the cacique should observe that the devil had deceived him, and that everything he told them was false, for those servants had been dead a long time and still had not carried away the corn and the knives. I also pointed out that now the seed was rotten and worthless, and that the dead had not planted anything in heaven. To this the cacique replied that if they had not carried those things away, it was because they had found plenty in heaven and those were not needed. They were told many things about this error of theirs, from which they profit little, to remove them from their way of error, especially when they are grown men and the devil already has them ensnared.

[#8] “Suicide at the Death of the Chief,” from Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, Natural History of the West Indies, trans. and ed. Sterling A. Stoudemire (Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1959, pp. 17, 35-37).

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#8 from Natural History of the West Indies
(Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, 1526)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

MAYA

#7 from Account of the Affairs of Yucatán
(Diego de Landa, c. 1570)

Ixtab: Goddess of the Gallows

The Maya have always believed in the immortality of the soul more than many other peoples―even though they may not be so civilized―for they believed that there was a more excellent life after death which the soul enjoyed on departure from the body. They said that this future life was divided into a good and a bad life, into a painful one and one full of peace. They said that the bad and the painful one was for the wicked and the good and delightful one for those who had lived well according to their beliefs. The easy life, which they said they would achieve if they were good, was to go to a very pleasant place where nothing would give them pain, and where they would have an abundance of food and drink of great sweetness and a tree which is there called yaxche, which is very cool and shady (and is a cotton tree), beneath whose branches and shade they would all rest and take pleasure for eternity.

The punishment for a bad life, which they said that the wrongdoers would have to suffer, was to go to a lower place than the others, which they call Mitnal, meaning Hell, and there to be tormented by devils and by great extremes of hunger, cold, fatigue, and misery. There was also in this place a devil and prince of all the devils whom all obeyed, and they called him in their tongue Hunhau: They claimed that these good and evil lives had no end, because the soul had none. They also said, and held it to be absolutely true, that those who hanged themselves went to this heaven of theirs. Thus there were many who for slight reasons of sadness, troubles, or sickness hanged themselves in order to escape and to go and rest in their heaven where they said the goddess of the gallows, whom they called Ixtab, came to take them. They had no concept of the resurrection of the body and had no record of the person from whom they had heard about this heaven and hell of theirs.

[#7] “Ixtab: Goddess of the Gallows,” from A. R. Pagden, ed. and tr., The Maya: Diego de Landa’s Account of the Affairs of Yucatán (Chicago: J. Philip O’Hara, 1975, p. 95; quotation in introduction, p. 16).

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#7 from Account of the Affairs of Yucatán
(Diego de Landa, c. 1570)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

MAYA

#6 from Popol Vuh
(dictated in K’iche̍, c. 1554-1558; Francisco Ximénez, c. 1701)

How the People Obtained Fire

And they did not have fire. Only the people of Tohil had it. He was the god of the tribes which first created fire. It is not known how it was made, because it was already burning when Balam-Quitzé and Balam-Acab saw it.

“Ah, we have no fire yet! We shall die of cold,” they said. Then Tohil said to them: “Do not worry! Yours shall be the lost fire which is talked of. Yours shall be what is spoken of as lost fire,” Tohil said to them.

“Really? Oh, God, our support, our maintenance, thou, our God!” they said, returning thanks.

And Tohil answered: “Very well, certainly I am your God; so shall it be! I am your Lord; so let it be!” Thus it was told to the priests and sacrificers by Tohil. And in this manner the tribes received fire and they were joyful because of it.

Instantly a great shower began to fall when the fire of the tribes was burning. Much hail fell on all the tribes and the fire was put out because of it, and again the fire was extinguished.

Then Balam-Quitzé and Balam-Acab again asked Tohil for fire. “Oh, Tohil, we are truly dying of cold!” they said to Tohil.

“Very well, do not worry,” Tohil answered, and instantly he made fire, turning about in his shoe.

Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam were at once happy and immediately they became warm.

Now, the fire of the peoples [of Vucamag] had also gone out and they were dying of cold. immediately they came to ask Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam for fire. They could no longer bear the cold nor the ice; they were shivering and their teeth were chattering; they were numb; their legs and hands shook and they could not hold anything in them, when they came.

“We are not ashamed to come before you, to beg for a little of your fire,” they said. But they were not well received. And then the tribes were very sad.

“The speech of Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam is different! Oh! We have given up our speech! What have we done? We are lost. How were we deceived? We had only one speech when we arrived there at Tulán; we were created and educated in the same way. It is not good what we have done,” said all the tribes under the trees, under the vines.

Then a man came before Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam and [this man], who was a messenger of Xibalba, spoke thus: “This is, in truth, your God; this is your support; this is, furthermore, the representation, the memory of your Creator and Maker. Do not give your fire to the tribes until they present offerings to Tohil. It is not necessary that they give anything to you. Ask Tohil what they should give when they come to receive fire,” said the man from Xibalba. He had wings like the wings of a bat. “I am sent by your Creator, your Maker,” said the man of Xibalba.

They were filled with joy then, and Tohil, Avilix, and Hacavitz were also gladdened when the man from Xibalba spoke, who disappeared instantly from their presence.

But the tribes did not perish when they came, although they were dying of cold. There was much hail, black rain and mist, and indescribable cold.

All the tribes were trembling and shivering with cold when they came where Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam were. Their hearts were greatly troubled and their mouths and eyes were sad.

In a moment the beggars came before Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui- Balam and said: “Will you not have pity on us, we only ask a little of your fire? Perchance, were we not [once] together and reunited? Did we not have the same home and one country when we were created, when we were made? Have mercy, then, on us!” they said.

“What will you give us so that we shall have mercy on you?” they were asked. “Well, then, we shall give you money,” the tribes answered. “We do not want money,” said Balam-Quitzé and Balam-Acab. “And what do you want?” [asked the tribes].

“We shall ask now” [said Balam-Quitzé].

“Very well, “said the tribes.

“We shall ask Tohil and then we shall tell you,” they answered.

“What must the tribes give, oh, Tohil! who have come to ask for your fire?” said Balam- Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam.

“Well! Are they willing to give their waist and their armpits? Do they want me to embrace them? For if they do not want to do that, neither shall I give them fire,” answered Tohil.

“Tell them that this shall come later, that they do not have to come now to give me their waist and their armpits. This is what Tohil orders us to tell you, you will say.” This was the answer to Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam.

Then they took Tohil’s message. “Very well, we shall join you and we shall embrace him,” they [the people] said when they heard and were told the message from Tohil. And they did not delay in acting. “Good,” they said, “but may it be soon!” And immediately they received the fire. Then they became warm….

The Cakchiquel did not ask for the fire, because they did not want to give themselves up to be overcome, the way that the other tribes had been overcome when they offered their breasts and their armpits so that they would be opened. And this was the opening [of the breasts] about which Tohil had spoken; that they should sacrifice all the tribes before him, that they should tear out their hearts from their breasts.…

[#6] The Book of the People: Popul Vuh tr. Delia Goetz and Sylvanus Griswold Morley, and Adrián Recino. (Los Angeles: Plantin Press, 1954), Part II chapters 12, 13, 14; Part III, chapters 5, 6. Available online at sacred-texts.org.

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#6 from Popol Vuh
(dictated in K’iche̍, c. 1554-1558; Francisco Ximénez, c. 1701)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

AZTEC

#5 from In Defense of the Indians
(Bartolome de Las Casas, 1548-1550)

The Significance of Human Sacrifice

By nature, all nations know that God surpasses anything that can be imagined and that they have life and every possession from him. And by nature they understand that they owe God the greatest reverence and worship because of his incomparable excellence and majesty, and all agree that the principal act of lalria, which is owed to God alone, is sacrifice. It follows, then, that they are obliged by the natural law to offer sacrifice, by which men show, more than by any other external act, that they are grateful and subject to God. And so there has never been a nation so barbarous as not to judge by a natural impulse that sacrifice is owed to the true God or to him whom they mistakenly thought is the true God.

The second proof of the first statement is what Saint Thomas says: At all times and among all nations there has always been some offering of sacrifices. And the reason for this is that natural reason tells man that he is subject to a higher being, on account of the defects which he perceives in himself, and in which he needs help and direction from someone above him, and whatever this superior being may be, it is known to all under the name of God, and consequently the offering of sacrifice is a matter of the natural law.

 . . .On the basis of these principles one can arrive at what we taught previously: within the limits of the natural light of reason (in other words, at the point at which divine or human positive law ceases and, one may add, where grace and doctrine are lacking), men should sacrifice human victims to the true God or the reputed god, if the latter is taken for the true God. We draw this conclusion: Just as men naturally know that God exists and think that there is nothing better or greater than he, since whatever we own, are, or are capable of is given to us by his boundless goodness, we do not adequately repay him even if we offer him all that is ours, even our life.

The greatest way to worship God is to offer him sacrifice. This is the unique act by which we show him to whom we offer the sacrifice that we are subject to him and grateful to him. Furthermore, nature teaches that it is just to offer God, whose debtors we admit we are for so many reasons, those things that are precious and excellent because of the surpassing excellence of his majesty. But, according to human judgment and truth, nothing in nature is greater or more valuable than the life of man or man himself. Therefore nature itself dictates and teaches those who do not have faith, grace, or doctrine, who live within the limitations of the light of nature, that in spite of every contrary positive law, they ought to sacrifice human victims to the true God or to the false god who is thought to be true, so that by offering a supremely precious thing they might be more grateful for the many favors they have received. For the natural law teaches gratitude in such a way that we not only do good to our benefactor but also try to repay him in an abundant manner for the benefits we have received, giving due consideration to the benefits, the benefactor, and the motive for which he confers the benefits on us.

The kindness by which the Lord created us, endowed us with so many gifts, and enriched us with so many good things comes from his immense charity and boundless goodness and gives birth in us to innumerable good things, and even life itself, and finally, whatever we are. However, since we cannot give adequate thanks for so many favors, we are obliged to present what seems to us to be the greatest and most valuable good, that is human life, and especially when the offering is made for the welfare of the state. For the pagans thought that through sacrifices of this type they could divert evils from their state and gain good will and prosperity for their kingdoms. Therefore whoever sacrifices men to God can be drawn to this action by natural reason, especially if he lacks Christian faith and instruction….

Possibly the idea of human sacrifice spread from here through the whole world. Yet someone will loudly protest that this idea must not be admitted, since innocent persons are sacrificed against their will. But I shall answer this objection as I have previously: Every man, no matter how innocent he may be, owes God more than his life; and so, although these persons do not will it by an explicit act, yet they perform an act that is owed, since all men are obliged to give their blood and their life whenever God’s honor demands it. We Christians, like all those who knew God during the early centuries, are obliged by divine law to do this. Now apparently there was a case in which God’s honor was involved when those upon whom the lot fell were offered as sacrifice by reason of a law in force in some kingdom. Therefore, even if they were otherwise innocent, no harm was done to them, at least in the judgment of those who did not have grace and doctrine. And this is bolstered by the fact that, according to the Philosopher, any outstanding citizen is obliged to give his life for the welfare of the state (this welfare, according to the erroneous opinion of the pagans, was thought to consist of the worship of the gods). Those who do not have the faith, then, have probable error concerning human sacrifice.

. . . But if the need of the state demands that a man do or undergo all that he is capable of, that is, that he expose his life to the danger of death for the welfare of the state, undoubtedly the legislator, by his command, can lawfully obliged by the natural law to obey the mandate. This is proved from what was established just a short while ago concerning the whole and the part. For, since the citizen is a part of the whole state and his happiness or welfare depends on the welfare and good of the state, he is obliged to love the common welfare and good more than his private welfare, and therefore, in order to preserve that common welfare, he is obliged by the natural law to do and suffer all he can, even by sacrificing his life.

Since, then, the pagans believe that the universal good and welfare of the whole state consists in sacrifices and immolations, that is, human victims, as we have proved elsewhere from Augustine, Chrysostom, and Valerius, it is not surprising that, when afflicted by needs, they sacrifice what in the judgment of all is most precious and pleasing to God, that is, men. This is evident from the previously cited examples. This is evident also from what Titus Livy writes: “When their city was in very great danger, the Romans placated Mars by sacrificing a man and woman of Gaul and a Greek man and woman.” Moreover, on the supposition that the error of the pagans is probable, a legislator can and should bind some of the people by his command when there is a great need involving the whole state, so that a sacrifice should be offered by killing them. And they can be obliged to will this by an explicit act, as is clear from what has been concluded.

You see, then, dear reader, that there is some probable natural reason by which men can be led to sacrifice human beings to God and, as a result, that it is not easy to persuade the Indians, within a short period or by a few words, to refrain from their traditional practice of human sacrifice…

. . .All of the preceding conclusions seem to be established, and therefore it can be persuasively argued, from the fact that God commanded Abraham to sacrifice to him his only son Isaac, that it is not altogether detestable to sacrifice human beings to God. . . .

. . .Thus it is clear that it is not possible, quickly and in a few words, to make clear to unbelievers, especially ours, that sacrificing men to God is unnatural. On that account, we are left with the evident conclusion that knowledge that the natives sacrifice men to their gods, or even eat human flesh, is not a just cause for waging war on any kingdom. And again, this long-standing practice of theirs cannot be suddenly uprooted. And so these entirely guiltless Indians are not to be blamed because they do not come to their senses at the first words of a preacher of the gospel. For they do not understand the preacher. Nor are they bound to abandon at once their ancestral religion, for they do not understand that it is better to do so. Nor is human sacrifice—even of the innocent, when it is done for the welfare of the entire state—so contrary to natural reason that it must be immediately detested as contrary to the dictates of nature. For this error can owe its origin to a plausible proof developed by human reasoning.

The preceding arguments prove that those who willingly allow themselves to be sacrificed, and all the common people in general, and the ministers who sacrifice them to the gods by command of their rulers and priests labor under an excusable, invincible ignorance and that their error should be judged leniently, even if we were to suppose that there is some judge with authority to punish these sins. If they offend God by these sacrifices, he alone will punish this sin of human sacrifice. . . .

[#5] “The Significance of Human Sacrifice.” Bartolomé de Las Casas, In Defense of the Indians. The Defense of the Most Reverend Lord, Don Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, of the Order of Preachers, Late Bishop of Chiapa, Against the Persecutors and Slanderers of the Peoples of the New World Discovered Across the Seas. Chapter 37. Ed. and Trans. Stafford Poole. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1974, pp. 239-243.

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#5 from In Defense of the Indians
(Bartolome de Las Casas, 1548-1550)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

AZTEC

#4 from Monarchia Indiana
(Juan de Torquemada, 1609-1615)

Chimalpopoca’s Victory in Death

With this decision he called some Mexicans and told them his intention, and declared to them the insult that it would cause to them, if perhaps he should die at the hand of King Maxtla, for the case of Tayatzin, because they would baptize this deed with the name of treachery, and that it was not reasonable that this be said of a Mexican King. And although they ought to “make a sentiment,” that is, be sad about it, the Mexicans came to the will of Chimalpopoca, and it seems to be thus true and then the King put in execution the plan that he had, for which (pointing out the Day) he dressed in the clothes of his god Huitzilopuchtli, and with him many Principal Gentleman and Ladies who were to die along with him, and they began to dance, and at the determined hour, when they began similar dances of sacrifices, to sacrifice their offering to the Devil, the Minister began to kill those who were dancing by his order. But as the event was public, there did not fail to be someone who went to Maxtla with the news. He quickly sent people to arrive on time so they could take Chimalpopoca, before the Priests killed him and offered him in sacrifice, and by luck it ought to be, so that he wouldn’t take that glory of having killed himself and offered [himself] in offering and holocaust to his false God.   And it is clear this is his intention; because if it were other, not only would his death not give him (Maxtla) pain, but rather he would rejoice on knowing that he (Chimalpopoca) was dead; since he already thought him an enemy of his kingdom. Maxtla’s people arrived at the place and area where the sacrifice was being carried out at the moment when there were only two more to be sacrificed, after which, as the final conclusion of the sacrifice, Chimalpopoca would die. And arriving suddenly without being heard, they caught him and carried (him) with his clothes in which he was dressed and put him in a very strong cage, that served him as a jail. The Mexicans wanted to take up arms in defense of their King; but as the Tepenecas were many, and they came ready for war, and they (the Mexicans) were having a fiesta, and unworried, their anger that this deed caused them had no effect, and the Tepanecas went away with their King Chimalpopoca very contentedly. King Chimalpopoca [was] imprisoned.

In this cage, they had Chimalpopoca imprisoned and sad, giving him ounces to eat, and seeing himself there and knowing that they had to take him from the cage to give him a cruel and rigorous death, he arranged to kill himself; and so he hanged himself in that jail where he was; considering a better death the one that his hands could give him than the one that he might receive from his enemies, as it was he triumphing over himself rather than his enemy triumphing over him, as Cleopatra and other valiant and strong pagan captains did, who because of being strong, carried out similar deeds in order not to see themselves in foreign hands, with shame and diminished valor and greatness.

And this is the death and the end of this unfortunate King, the third of Mexico, and this death, here related, I have seen it painted in two different histories . . .and when I was doing part of these investigations in Mexico City, with old and wise people, there was among them a man more than sixty years old, and the one who was explaining to me the paintings in the book that we were examining said to me: Father, have this old man speak because he knows this story better than I, for he had understanding of it; and turning toward him, he said, why do you not speak? Since you are the a limb from that trunk, and asking the old man about the event, the old man told me he was a descendant of King Chimalpopoca, and that it was true, that he had died hanged, and had given himself that death, in order not die at the hands of Maxtla, who would have achieved glory and dishonored the Mexican people.

[#4] “Chimalpopoca’s Victory in Death,” from Juan de Torquemada, Monarquia Indiana, 3rd edition, vol. 1 (Mexico: Editorial Salvador Chavez Hayhoe, 1943, pp. 123-26), tr. Carolyn Morrow.

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#4 from Monarchia Indiana
(Juan de Torquemada, 1609-1615)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

AZTEC

#3 from General History of the Things of New Spain
(The Florentine Codex)
(Bernardino de Sahagun, c. 1565)

The Festival in the Month of Tóxcatl

This festival was the most important of all the festivals. It was like Easter, and it occurred near the feast of Resurrection, a few days later. This young man, raised as has been said [with all luxuries, for a year], had a very good appearance [with no flaw on his body] and was chosen from among many. He had long hair down to his waist. When in this festival they killed the young man who had been prepared for this, then they set another apart, who would die within a year. He would go through all the town adorned with flowers in his hand and with persons who accompanied him. He would greet all of those whom he met graciously. All knew that that one was the image of Tezcatlipoca and they prostrated themselves before him and worshipped him wherever they encountered him. Twenty days before this festival, they would give this young man four very attractive young women, who had been raised for this, with whom he would have carnal intercourse for all the twenty days. They would change his dress when they gave him these girls. They would cut his hair like a captain, and they would give him other more beautiful garments. Five days before he died, they would give him festivals and banquets in fresh and delightful places. Many important people would accompany him. When the day arrived on which he would die, they would take him to a cu, or a place of prayer, that they called Tlacochcalco, and before they arrived there, in a place that they called Tlapitzoayan, the women separated themselves from him and left him. When they arrived at the place where they would kill him, he himself went up the steps and on each one of them, tore into pieces one of the flutes he had been playing all year. When he arrived at the top, they threw him on the block. They took out his heart and they took the body down in palms. Below, they cut off his head and attached it to a pole that they called Tzompantli. Many other ceremonies took place during this festival….

 

The Sun, the Moon, and the Binding of the Years

 . . .It is told that when yet [all] was in darkness, when yet no sun had shone and no dawn had broken—it is said—the gods gathered themselves together and took counsel among themselves there at Teotihuacan. They spoke; they said among themselves:

“Come hither, O gods! Who will carry the burden? Who will take it upon himself to be the sun, to bring the dawn?”

And upon this, one of them who was there spoke: Tecuciztecatl presented himself. He said: “O gods, I shall be the one.”

And again the gods spoke: “[And] who else?”
Thereupon they looked around at one another. They pondered the matter. They said to one another: “How may this be? How may we decide?”

None dared; no one else came forward. Everyone was afraid; they [all] drew back.
And not present was one man, Nanauatzin; he stood there listening among the others to that which was discussed. Then the gods called to this one. They said to him: “Thou shalt be the one, O Nanauatzin.”

He then eagerly accepted the decision; he took it gladly. He said: “It is well. O gods; you have been good to me.”

Then they began now to do penance. They fasted four days—both Tecuciztecatl [and Nanauatzin]. And then, also, at this time, the fire was laid. Now it burned, there in the hearth. They named the hearth teotexcalli.

And this Tecuciztecatl: that with which he did penance was all costly. His fir branches [were] quetzal feathers, and his grass balls [were] of gold; his maguey spines [were] of green stone; the reddened, bloodied spines [were] of coral. And his incense was very good incense. And [as for] Nanauatzin, his fir branches were made only of green water rushes—green reeds bound in threes, all [making], together, nine bundles. And his grass balls [were] only aromatic weeds. And his maguey spines were these same maguey spines. And the blood with which they were covered [was] his own blood. And [for] his incense, he used only the scabs from his sores, [which] he lifted up. For these two, for each one singly, a hill was made. There they remained, performing penances for four nights. They are now called pyramids—the pyramid of the sun and the pyramid of the moon.

And when they ended their four nights of penitence, then they went to throw down and cast away, each one, their fir branches, and, indeed, all with which they had been performing penances. This was done at the time of the lifting [of the penance]; when, well into the night, they were to do their labor; they were to become gods.

And when midnight had come, thereupon [the gods] gave them their adornment; they arrayed them and readied them. To Tecuciztecatl they gave his round, forked heron feather headdress and his sleeveless jacket. But [as for] Nanauatzin, they bound on his headdress of mere paper and tied on his hair, called his paper hair. And [they gave him] his paper stole and his paper breech clout.

And when this was done, when midnight had come, all the gods proceeded to encircle the hearth, which was called teotexcalli, where for four days had burned the fire. On both sides [the gods] arranged themselves in line, and in the middle they set up, standing, these two, named Tecuciztecatl and Nanauatzin. They stood facing and looking toward the hearth.

And thereupon the gods spoke: They said to Tecuciztecatl: “Take courage, O Tecuciztecatl; fall—cast thyself—into the fire!”

Upon this, he went [forward] to cast himself into the flames. And when the heat came to reach him, it was insufferable, intolerable, and unbearable; for the hearth had blazed up exceedingly, a great heap of coals burned, and the flames flared up high. Thus he went terrified, stopped in fear, turned about, and went back. Then once more he set out, in order to try to do it. He exerted himself to the full, that he might cast and give himself to the flames. And he could in no way dare to do it. When again the heat reached him, he could only turn and leap back. He could not bear it. Four times indeed—four times in all—he was thus to act and try; then no more could he could cast himself into the fire. For then [he might try] only four times.

And when he had ended [trying] four times, thereupon they cried out to Nanauatzin. The gods said to him: “Onward, thou, O Nanauatzin! Take heart!”

And Nanauatzin, daring all at once, determined—resolved—hardened his heart, and shut firmly his eyes. He had no fear; he did not stop short; he did not falter in fright; he did not turn back. All at once he quickly threw and cast himself into the fire; once and for all he went. Thereupon he burned; his body crackled and sizzled.

And when Tecaciztecatl saw that already he burned, then, afterwards, he cast himself upon [the fire]. Thereupon he also burned.. . .

. . .And after this, when both had cast themselves into the flames, when they had already burned, then the gods sat waiting [to see] where Nanauatzin would come to rise—he who first fell into the fire—in order that he might shine [as the sun]; in order that dawn might break.

When the gods had sat and been waiting for a long time, thereupon began the reddening [of the dawn]; in all directions, all around, the dawn and light extended. And so, they say, thereupon the gods fell upon their knees in order to await where he who had become the sun would come to rise. . . .

. . .And when the sun came to rise, when he burst forth, he appeared to be red; he kept swaying from side to side. It was impossible to look into his face; he blinded one with his light. Intensely did he shine. He issued rays of light from himself; his rays reached in all directions; his brilliant rays penetrated everywhere.

And afterwards Tecuciztecatl came to rise, following behind him from the same place—the east.—near where the sun had come bursting forth. In the same manner that they had fallen into the fire, just so they came forth. They came following each other.

And so they tell it; [so] they relate the story and repeat the legend: Exactly equal had they become in their appearance, as they shone. When the gods saw them, [thus] exactly the same in their aspect, then once more there was deliberation. They said: “How may this be, O gods? Will they perchance both together follow the same path? Will they both shine together?”

And the gods all issued a judgment. They said: “Thus will this be; thus will this be done.”

Then one of the gods came our running. With a rabbit he came to wound in the face this Tecucizetecatl; with is he darkened his face; he killed its brilliance. Thus doth it [the moon] appear today.

And when this was done, when both appeared [over the earth] together, they could, on the other hand, not move nor follow their paths. They could only remain still and motionless. So once again the gods spoke: “How shall we live? The sun cannot move. Shall we perchance live among common folk? [Let] this be, that through us the sun may be revived. Let all of us die.”

[#3] Bernardino de Sahagún, Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva España, “The Festival in the Month of Tóxcatl,” vol. 1 (Mexico, DF: Editorial Pedro Robredo, 1938, pp. 990-91), tr. Carolyn Morrow; “Book 7: The Sun, Moon, and Stars, and the Binding of the Years,” Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain, tr. Arthur J. O .Anderson and Charles E. Dibble. Part VIII. (Santa Fe, NM: The School of American Research and The University of Utah, 1953), pp. 3-9.


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#3 from General History of the Things of New Spain
(The Florentine Codex)
(Bernardino de Sahagun, c. 1565)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures

AZTEC

#2 from Letters from Mexico
(Hernan Cortes, 1519-20)

The First Letter

 …and rooms for slaves and servants of which they have many. Each of these chieftains [at Tenochtitlan] has in front of the entrance to his house a very large courtyard and some two or three or four of them raised very high with steps up to them and all very well built. Likewise they have their shrines and temples with raised walks which run all around the outside and are very wide; there they keep the idols which they worship, some of stone, some of clay and some of wood, which they honor and serve with such customs and so many ceremonies that many sheets of paper would not suffice to give Your Royal Highnesses a true and detailed account of them all. And the temples where they are kept are the largest and the best and the finest built of all the buildings found in the towns; and they are much adorned with rich hanging cloths and featherwork and other fineries.

Each day before beginning any sort of work they burn incense in these temples and sometimes sacrifice their own persons, some cutting their tongues, others their ears, while there are some who stab their bodies with knives. All the blood which flows from them they offer to those idols, sprinkling it in all parts of the temple, or sometimes throwing it into the air or performing many other ceremonies, so that nothing is begun without sacrifice having first been made. They have a most horrid and abominable custom which truly ought to be punished and which until now we have seen in no other part, and this is that, whenever they wish to ask something of the idols, in order that their plea may find more acceptance, they take many girls and boys and even adults, and in the presence of the idols they open their chests while they are still alive and take out their hearts and entrails and burn them before the idols, offering the smoke as sacrifice. Some of us have seen this, and they say it is the most terrible and frightful thing they have ever witnessed.

This these Indians do so frequently that, as we have been informed, and, in part, have seen from our own experience during the short while we have been here, not one year passes in which they do not kill and sacrifice some fifty persons in each temple; and this is done and held as customary from the island of Cozumel to this land where we now have settled. Your Majesties may be most certain that, as this land seems to us to be very large, and to have many temples in it, not one year has passed, as far as we have been able to discover, in which three or four thousand souls have nor been sacrificed in this manner. Let Your Royal Highnesses consider, therefore, whether they should not put an end to such evil practices, for certainly Our Lord God would be well pleased if by the hand of Your Royal Highnesses these people were initiated and instructed in our Holy Catholic Faith, and the devotion, trust and hope which they have in these their idols were transferred to the divine power of God; for it is certain that if they were to worship the true God with such fervor, faith and diligence, they would perform many miracles. And we believe that it is not without cause that Our Lord God has been pleased that these parts be discovered in the name of Your Royal Highnesses so that Your Majesties may gain much merit and reward in the sight of God by commanding that these barbarous people be instructed and by Your hands be brought to the True Faith. For, as far as we have been able to learn, we believe that had we interpreters and other people to explain to them the error of their ways and the nature of the True Faith, many of them, and perhaps even all, would soon renounce their false beliefs and come to the true knowledge of God; for they live in a more civilized and reasonable manner than any other people we have seen in these parts up to the present…

The Second Letter

…All these towers are burial places of chiefs, and the chapels therein are each dedicated to the idol which he venerated…

…The most important of these idols, and the ones in whom they have most faith, I had taken from their places and thrown down the steps; and I had those chapels where they were cleaned, for they were full of the blood of sacrifices; and I had images of Our Lady and of other saints put there, which caused Mutezuma and the other natives some sorrow. …Mutezuma and many of the chieftains of the city were with me until the idols were removed, the chapel cleaned and the images set up, and I urged them not to sacrifice living creatures to the idols, as they were accustomed, for, as well as being most abhorrent to God, Your Sacred Majesty’s laws forbade it and ordered that he who kills shall be killed. And from then on they ceased to do it, and in all the time I stayed in that city I did not see a living creature killed or sacrificed.

The figures of the idols in which these people believe are very much larger than the body of a big man. They are made of dough from all the seeds and vegetables which they eat, ground and mixed together, and bound with the blood of human hearts which those priests tear out while still beating. And also after they are made they offer them more hearts and anoint their faces with the blood. Everything has an idol dedicated to it, in the same manner as the pagans who in antiquity honored their gods.…

[#2] Hernan Cortes, Letters from Mexico. Trans. and ed. Anthony Pagden. New York: Grossman Publishing, 1971; New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1986, pp. 35-37, 106-107.

 

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#2 from Letters from Mexico
(Hernan Cortes, 1519-20)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Indigenous Cultures, Selections

AZTEC

#1 from Codex Chimalpopoca (1570)

The Death of Quetzalcoatl

According to what they tell and what they say, this was when Quetzalcoatl was born, called Topiltzin Priest Ce Acatl Quetzalcoatl, and his mother they say was named Chimalman. And from what they say about him, Quetzalcoatl was placed in his mother’s belly when they say about him, Quetzalcoatl was placed in his mother’s belly when she swallowed a piece of jade.

It was in 2 Reed that Topiltzin, or Ce Acatl Quetzalcoatl, built his house of fasting, his place of penance, his place of prayer. Four in number were the houses that he built: his turquoise house of beams, his house of redshell, his house of whiteshell, his house of quetzal plumes. There he prayed, did penance, and kept his fast.

And just at midnight he would go to the water, to the place called Water Shrine, or At-the-Water-Weed.

And he punctured himself with thorns on top of Xicocotl and Huitzco and Tzincoc and Mount Nonoalco. And he made his thorns of jade and his needles of quetzal plumes. And for incense he burned turquoise, jade, and redshell. And the blood offering that he sacrificed were snakes, birds, and butterflies.

Now, it is told and related that it was to heaven that he prayed, that he worshipped. And the ones he called out to were Citlalinicue, Citlalatonac, Tonacacihuatl, Tonacateuctli, Tecolliquenqui, Eztlaquenqui, Tlallamanac, Tlalichcatl.

Well, it is told and related that many times during the life of Quetzalcoatl, sorcerers tried to ridicule him into making the human payment, into taking human lives. But he always refused. He did not consent, because he greatly loved his subjects, who were Toltecs. Snakes, birds, and butterflies that he killed were what his sacrifices always were.

And it is told and related that with this he wore out the sorcerers’ patience. So it was then that they started to ridicule him and make fun of him, the sorcerers saying they wanted to torment Quetzalcoatl and make him run away.

And it became true. It happened.

I Reed [895] was the year Quetzalcoatl died. And it is said that he went to Tlillan Tlapallan in order to die there.

Afterward, a certain Matlacxchitl was inaugurated as ruler, became ruler of Tollan.

Then they tell how Quetzalcoatl departed. It was when he refused to obey the sorcerers about making the human payment, about sacrificing humans. Then the sorcerers deliberated among themselves, they whose name were Tezcatlipoca, Ihuimacatl, and Toltecatl. They said, “He must leave his city. We shall live there.”

“Let us brew pulque,” they said. “We’ll have him drink it and make him lose his judgment, so that he no longer performs his sacraments.”

Then Tezcatlipoca said, “Myself, I say we should give him a way to see his flesh.”

They agreed that they would do it.

Then Tezcatlipoca went first. He took a two-sided mirror, a span wide, wrapped it up. And when he had come to where Quetzalcoatl was, he said to the pages who were guarding him, “Announce to the priest: A young man has come to show you, come to present you, your flesh.”

The pages went inside and repeated it to Quetzalcoatl, who said, “What’s that, grandfather page? What’s my ‘flesh’?” Take a look at what he’s brought, and then he may come in.”

But he refused to let him see it. “I must show it to the priest myself,” he said. “Go tell him that.”

They went and told him: “He refuses, and he very much wants to show it to you.”

“Let him come grandfather,” said Quetzalcoatl.

They went and called Tezcatlipoca. He entered, greeting him. He said, “My child, Priest Ce Acatl, Quetzalcoatl, I greet you. And I’ve come to show you your flesh.”

“You’ve wearied yourself, grandfather,” said Quetzalcoatl. “Where do you come from? What is this ‘flesh’ of mine? Let me see it.”

“My child, O priest, I, your servant, have come from the foot of Mount Nonoalco. May it please you to see your flesh.”

Then he gave him the mirror and said, “Know yourself, see yourself, my child, for you will appear in the mirror.”

Then Quetzalcoatl looked and was terrified. “If my subjects saw me,” he said, “they might run away.” For his eyelids were bulging, his eye sockets deeply sunken, his face pouchy all over―he was monstrous.

When he had looked in the mirror, he said, “My subjects are never to see me. I must stay right here.”

Then Tezcatlipoca left him and came away. And in order to make fun of him he consulted with Ihuimecatl.

Ihuimecatl said, “Let the featherworker Coyotlinahual be the one to go.”

They repeated it to him, that he was to go. “Very well,” said the featherworker Coyotlinahual, “I’ll go see Quetzalcoatl.” And so he went.

He said to Quetzalcoatl, My child, I say you must go out. Let your subjects see you. And for them to see you, let me dress you up.”

He said, “Grandfather, do it! I’d like to see it.”

And so he did it, this featherworker, this Coyotlinahual. First he made Quetzalcoatl’s head fan. Then he fashioned his turquoise mask, taking yellow to make the front, red to color the bill. Then he gave him his serpent teeth and made him his beard, covering him below with cotinga and roseate spoonbill feathers.

When he had prepared it―the way the attire of Quetzalcoatl used to be―he gave him the mirror.

Seeing himself, Quetzalcoatl was well pleased. At that very moment he went out from the place where he was being guarded.

Then Coyotlinahual, the featherworker, went to Ihuimecatl and said, “I have brought Quetzalcoatl out. Now go!”

“Very well,” he said. Then he befriended a certain Toltecatl, and when they were ready to go, they set off together.

Then they came to Xonacapacoyan and lodged with the man who worked the fields there, Maxtlaton, the keeper of Toltecatepec. Then they also stewed greens, tomatoes, chilis, fresh corn, and beans. And it was all done in just a few days.

There were also magueys there, which they requested from maxtla. In just four days they made them into pulque, then they decanted it. They were the ones who discovered the little hives of tree honey, and it was with this that they decanted the pulque.

Then they went to Tollan, to the house of Quetzalcoatl, bringing all their greens, their chilis, and so forth. Also the pulque. When they got there, they tried to enter, but Quetzalcoatl’s guards would not let them. Twice, three times they turned them away. They were not admitted. Finally they were asked where their home was.

“Over at Tlamacazcatepec, at Toltecatepec,” they replied.

Hearing them, Quetzalcoatl said, “Let them come in.”

They went in.

Well, they greeted him, and at last they gave him the greens, etc. And when he had eaten of it, they urged him once again, giving him the pulque.

But he said, “No I mustn’t drink it. I’m fasting. Is it intoxicating? Or fatal?”

“Taste it with your finger,” they told him. “It’s piquant.”

Quetzalcoatl tasted it with his finger. Finding it good, he said, “Let me drink grandfather.” And when he had drunk one draught, the sorcerers said to him, “You’ll drink four.” And so they gave him a fifth draught, saying, “This is your portion.”

Well, when he had drunk it, then they served all his pages, and they drank five draughts apiece.

When the sorcerers had gotten them completely drunk, they said to Quetzalcoatl, “My child, may it please you to sing, and here’s a song for you to recite.” Then Ihuimecatl recited it for him:

I must leave my house of quetzal, of quetzal, my house of troupial, my house of redshell.

When he had gotten into a happy mood, he said, “Go get my sister Quetzalpetlatl. Let the two of us be drunk together.”

His pages went to Mount Nonoalco, where she was doing penance, and said, “My child, lady, Quetzalpetlatl, O fasting one, we’ve come to get you. Priest Quetzalcoatl is waiting for you. You’re to go be with him.”

She said, “All right, let’s go, grandfather page.” And when she got there, she sat down beside Quetzalcoatl. Then they served her the pulque. Four draughts and one more, a fifth, were poured for her.

And when Yhuimecatl and Toltecatl had made everyone drunk, they presented a song to Quetzalcoatl’s sister. They recited it for her:

My sister, where are you? Q Quetzalpetlatl, lets be drunk, aýya ýya ynye an.

Having made themselves drunk, they no longer said, “Let us do penance.” No longer did they go down to the water. From then on they did nothing at daybreak.

Well, when dawn came, they were filled with sadness, their hearts were troubled. And Quetzalcoatl said, “Alas for me!” And then he sang a lament, composing a song about how he would have to go away. Then he sang it aloud:

Never a portion counted in my house. Let it be here, ah, let it be here, here. Alas. May the realm endure. Alas. There’s only misery and servitude. Never will I recover.

He sang aloud the second stanza of his song:

Ah, she used to carry me, alas, my mother, ah, Coacueye, the goddess, the noble one. I am weeping, ah.

When Quetzalcoatl had sung, then all his pages were saddened. They wept. And they, too, sang, saying:

They made us rich, our lords, and he, Quetzalcoatl, who shinedlike a jade. Broken are the timbers, his house of penance. Wouldthat we might see him. Let us weep.

And when Quetzalcoatl’s pages had sung, he said to them, “Grandfather page, enough! I must leave this city. I must go away. Give the command. Have them make a stone chest.”

Then quickly a stone chest was carved. And when they had carved it and it was finished, they laid Quetzalcoatl in it.

But he lay only for four days in the stone chest. When he felt discomfort, he said to his pages, “Enough, grandfather page! Let’s go. Everywhere conceal and hide what we once discovered, the joy, the riches, all our property, our possessions. And his pages did so. They hid it where Quetzalcoatl’s bathing place was, at the place called water shrine, At-the-Water-Weed.

Then Quetzalcoatl departed. He got up, called together his pages, and wept over them. Then they set out, heading for Tlillan, Tlapallan, Tlatlayan.

And he went looking everywhere, exploring. Nowhere was he satisfied. And when he reached the place he had been heading for, again he wept and was sad.

Now, this year, 1 Reed, is when he got to the ocean, the seashore, so it is told and related. Then he halted and wept and gathered up his attire, putting on his head fan, his turquoise mask, and so forth. And as soon as he was dressed, he set himself on fire and cremated himself. And so the place where Quetzalcoatl was cremated is named Tlatlayan (land of burning).

And they say as he burned, his ashes arose. And what appeared and what they saw were all the precious birds, rising into the sky. They saw roseate spoonbills, cotingas, trogons, herons, green parrots, scarlet macaws, white-fronted parrots, and all the other precious birds.

And as soon as his ashes had been consumed, they saw the heart of a Quetzal rising upward. And so they knew he had gone to the sky, had entered the sky.

The old people said he was changed into the star that appears at dawn. Therefore they say it came forth when Quetzalcoatl died, and the called him Lord of the Dawn.

What they said is that when he died he disappeared for four days. They said he went to the dead land then. And he spent four more days making darts for himself. So it was after eight days that the morning star came our, which they said was Quetzalcoatl. It was then that he became lord, they said.

And so, when he goes forth, they know on what day sign he casts light on certain people, venting his anger against them, shooting them with darts. If he goes on 1 alligator, he shoots old men and old women, all alike.

If on 1 Jaguar or 1 Deer or 1 Flower, he shoots little children. And if on 1 Reed, he shoots nobles. The same with everybody, if on 1 Death

And if on 1 Rain, he shoots the rain. No rain will fall.
And if on 1 movement, he shoots youths and maidens.
And if on 1 Water, there is drought, etc.
So these [day signs] was venerated by the old men and the old women of former times.

As for the one called Quetzalcoatl, his entire lifetime was such that he was born in 1 Reed and also died in 1 Reed, so that his life was counted altogether as fifty-two years.

So, it is finished in the year 1 Reed [895]. 

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#1 from Codex Chimalpopoca (1570)

Filed under Americas, Central and South American Native Cultures, Selections

CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICAN INDIGENOUS CULTURES
(documented 1519-1621)

CENTRAL AMERICA

AZTEC

  1. Codex Chimalpopoca (1570)
    The Death of Quetzalcoatl
  2. Letters from Mexico
         (Hernán Cortés, 1519-20)
  3. General History of the Things of New Spain (The Florentine Codex)
    The Festival in the Month of Tóxcatl
    The Sun, Moon, and Stars, and the Binding of the Years
    (Bernardino de Sahagún, c. 1565)
  4. Monarchia Indiana
    Chimalpopoca’s Victory in Death
          (Juan de Torquemada, 1609-15)
  5. In Defense of the Indians
    The Significance of Human Sacrifice
    (Bartolomé de Las Casas, 1548-1550)

MAYA

  1. Popol Vuh
    History of the Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque
    How the People Obtained Fire
    (dictated in K’iche’, c. 1554-1558; Francisco Ximénez, c. 1701)
  2. An Account of the Affairs of Yucatán
    Ixtab: Goddess of the Gallows
    (Diego de Landa, c. 1570)

CARIBBEAN PEOPLES

  1. Natural History of the West Indies
    Suicide on the Death of the Chief
    (Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, 1526)
  2. La Historia General de las Indias
    Suicide, Smallpox, and the Arrival of the Spaniards
    (Francisco López de Gómara, 1552)
  3. History of the New World
    Suffering at the Hands of the Spaniards
    (Girolamo Benzoni, 1565)

SOUTH AMERICA

INCA

  1. The Incas
    The Burial of Wives
    (Pedro de Cieza de León, 1553)
  2. Natural & Moral History of the Indies
    Of Superstitions They Used to the Dead
    (José de Acosta, 1589)
  3. The Extirpation of Idolatry in Peru
    What Those Who Hang Themselves Really Are
    (Pablo José de Arriaga, 1621)

The Mesoamerican cultures, including the Aztec and Maya, the peoples of the Caribbean Islands, and the Inca of South America, were among the many cultural groups inhabiting the western hemisphere at the time contact was established between the Americas and Europe; there are still some 170 indigenous tribes speaking distinctive languages in Mexico alone, and 31 different Mayan languages and groups. Some groups among those who had migrated across Beringia into North America had continued to move south into Central and South America, eventually establishing large and sophisticated cities and empires. Among the major sites were Tenochtitlan (the Aztec, or Mexica, capital in the location now known as Mexico City), Palenque (one of many major Mayan city and temple complexes), and Machu Picchu, now believed to have been the summer capital of the Inca empire. About a fifth of the global population lived in the Americas at the time of contact with Europeans, and although estimates vary widely, the Aztec, Mayan, and Inca populations all clearly numbered in the millions at the height of these civilizations.

Europeans arrived in the Americas in 1492. Despite popular assumptions that the native inhabitants of the New World were conquered by the sword and the cross, especially by Spanish conquistadores interested in gold and in military domination and Jesuits engaged in religious conversion, most of the indigenous populations were killed by European disease—smallpox, measles, typhus, plague, influenza, malaria, and yellow fever—diseases to which New World populations had never been exposed and had no immunity. Entire peoples in the Americas were virtually wiped out, like the Caribbean group known as the Taino living on Hispaniola, where Columbus had landed in December of 1492. Most other indigenous populations were reduced to remnants of their original numbers, in many places an 80–90% decline. The so-called Black Legend blames Spanish cruelty and injustice for the decimation of the Indians and, in doing so, identifies a major factor in the catastrophic population decline in the New World and the destruction of once-powerful pre-contact civilizations. Other factors, including famine, collapse of the ruling class, intergroup warfare, and other forms of social upheaval, are still under debate as contributors to these societies’ eventual collapse even before the arrival of the Spanish, but it was disease that took the greatest toll.

Whether practices of human sacrifice contributed to the collapse or were practices of these societies that marked their zeniths, the archeological remains of the Mesoamerican cultures provide extensive records of practices related to suicide, including bloodletting and autosacrifice, self-immolation, live burial of wives and retainers, decapitation, and—especially among the Aztecs—heart sacrifice. The art and architecture of the Formative, Classic, and Post-classic periods of these cultures, including those like the Maya with highly developed iconographic systems, show that death-producing practices were a central part of pre-contact life.

What accounts for these practices is still a subject of dispute. Michael Harner’s thesis, promulgated in the late 1970s, that human sacrifice and the associated institutionalized cannibalism among the Aztecs were a product of protein scarcity—caused by seasonal crop failures, the depletion of wild game, and the lack of domestic animal food sources in a region that, though itself fertile, was surrounded by poor farmland—has not been supported by the evidence. Human sacrifice in this and other cultures, according to a more recent examination of the evidence by Michael Windelman, is associated with high population density, population pressure, and war for land and resources; human sacrifice may also play a role in ideological integration. Nevertheless, whatever the background ecological and social explanation of human sacrifice, the degree to which these practices should be understood as suicide or suicide-like actions depends in part on the motivation with which they were undertaken and the way they were understood by those involved in and subject to these practices—that is, the degree to which they were perceived as self-initiated, and whether they were involuntary, socially required but not desired, or elective. It is also a function of the extent to which the religious violence of human sacrifice was, as David Carrasco modifies René Girard’s claim, the “public heart and soul of the sacred.” Determining this is a considerable challenge in these cultures, since easily interpretable primary narratives do not survive.

Although extensive archeological and anthropological research has expanded contemporary knowledge of indigenous cultures, most of the textual sources about pre-Columbian life come from the accounts of the European conquerors, missionaries, and explorers who first came into contact with these societies. These early accounts, a number of which are presented here, are clearly influenced by the assumptions and biases the Europeans brought to their observations, yet they do provide some idea of indigenous cultural beliefs and practices concerning suicide before these societies succumbed to conquest and disease. It is the records of Spanish conquistadores and priests like Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo (selection #8), Hernán Cortés (selection #2), Bartolomé de Las Casas (selection #5), and Bernardino de Sahagún (selection #3), often reporting oral testimony from native informants, that constitute the vast majority of extant eyewitness accounts. Of course, it can hardly be supposed that these texts give a fully accurate account of native beliefs and practices about suicide unaffected by cultural influences from Europe; they have clearly been filtered through European eyes, especially as influenced by the Spanish Inquisition. Some—like the distortion of the indigenous understanding of the various parts of the body as having different energies into the concept of a unified soul—were comparatively modest, and some—like Diego de Landa’s account of the “goddess of the gallows,” Ixtab, who especially favored suicides by hanging (selection #10)—were, it is claimed, an outright fabrication. Yet because these accounts were filtered through a set of European religious and cultural assumptions that were quite different from those of contemporary assumptions—at that time, Western thought saw suicide primarily as crime and sin, rather than, as in modern times, the consequence of mental illness and psychopathology—it may be easier to arrive at an informative view about these cultures than modern ethnopsychology permits. Furthermore, stark reductions in the populations of the New World meant severe cultural disruption brought about by both the destruction of records and the interruption of oral traditions. The early accounts presented here, although often strongly biased and grossly exaggerated, provide in some ways the closest available access to pre-contact views, since after contact and exposure to a newly dominant group, a population will adopt new forms of explanation. Thus, these early sources provide our closest look at these cultures’ views of suicide and related practices in sacrifice. Much of what we might now describe as suicide in these cultures was not apparently viewed as problematic then, and certainly not conceptualized in the same ways.

Most of these early accounts, colored by assumptions about the superiority of the Europeans and the inferiority or savagery of the native inhabitants of the Americas, as well as about the truth of the Catholic faith and the idolatrous nature of native religion, emphasize the bizarre character of the religious and cultural practices of the peoples described, especially when those involve bloodletting, suicide, human sacrifice, and cannibalism. In contrast, a few early observers, notably Bartolomé de Las Casas, the Dominican friar and then bishop known as the “Protector of the Indians,” emphasized the cruelty of the Spanish and other European invaders. In his sympathetic Defense of the Indians (selection #5), directed against “the persecutors and slanderers of the peoples of the new world discovered across the seas,” Las Casas viewed indigenous practices like bloodletting and human sacrifice as evidence, in theological terms, of probable error resulting from genuine but misguided religiosity on the part of indigenous peoples.

The Selections

Aztec

The Aztecs, or Mexica, invaded the valley of Mexico around the 13th century a.d. after the 12th- century decline of the resident Toltecs, eventually settling on an island in the western part of Lake Texcoco and establishing the twin (and often rival) cities of Tenochtitlán and Tlatelolco around 1325. The name Aztec refers to their traditional place of origin at Aztlán. The Aztecs, one of the last waves of Nahua migration from the north, like many other groups in the region, spoke a dialect of Nahuatl; Nahuatl languages are still spoken in central Mexico by about 1.5 million people. Aztec society was both militaristic and agricultural, emphasizing cycles of birth and death; their cities were built around immense ceremonial complexes of temples.

Human sacrifice, for which the Aztecs are known, predated the rise of the Aztecs and had religious importance throughout Mesoamerica. The murals of Teotihuacán, the great metropolis of the pre-Aztec Classic period, show that sacrifice of the heart was a particularly important ritual. Heart sacrifice is depicted explicitly in one Teotihuacán mural in which two coyotes are shown extracting the still-beating heart of a deer; these animal figures represent human capacities. Aztec sacrifices corresponded to important dates in the cycle of the sun calendar or to astronomical events like eclipses. Architectural structures at the Templo Mayor (now excavated and visible in Mexico City) display banks of skulls of sacrificial captives, and in one offering cache can be seen the skeletal remains of 42 children sacrificed to the rain gods. Noble women and slaves were also sacrificed, and the “flower wars” with neighboring groups were conducted for the purpose of obtaining captive warriors for sacrifice.

The Spaniard Hernán Cortés landed on the coast of Mexico on April 22, 1519. Two years later, Cortés, having won over the Tlaxcala–who were engaged in a flower war with the—as allies, stormed Tenochtitlán and Tlatelolco. Although the Aztecs did keep pictorial codices, the extant records were burned twice, once by the ruling elite of Tenochtitlán and once by the Spanish missionaries eager to eliminate references to a pre-Christian past. Each time these records were destroyed, new histories arose to take their place.

Selection #1 is taken from one of these new histories, the Codex Chimalpopoca. It recounts Aztec mythology about the earlier Toltecs, the historic inhabitants of Tula whom the Aztecs revered as the ancestors of their rulers. Tolpiltzin Ce Acatl Quetzalcoatl, whose lifetime is dated in the Codex with a year count employing four names, Flint, House, Rabbit, Reed, and 13 numbers, at 817–895 a.d., is said to have been conceived when his mother Chimalman swallowed a piece of jade. The narrative describes Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl’s life, how he abolished human sacrifice, and was driven into exile by his rivals, including the god-sorcerer Tezcatlipoca. Quetzalcoatl is deceived by the sorcerer into drunkenness and then incest with his sister; in remorse and political weakness, still pursued by the sorcerer, Quetzalcoatl immolates himself in a sacred bonfire, his soul rising to the heavens to become Venus, the morning star.

In addition to Quetzalcoatl, Aztec religion recognized two other major deities, Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc; human sacrifice was often performed to these and lesser gods. Among the Aztecs, human blood was believed necessary to sustain and renew the world and often involved heart sacrifice. Hernán Cortes, in his first and second letters, dated July 10, 1519, and October 13, 1520, respectively (selection #2), in which he described the culture of the indigenous people whom his forces had conquered, portrays the Aztec practices of human sacrifice vividly, arguing that the repugnance of these practices justifies the imposition of Christianity, if necessary by force. Bernardino de Sahagún (1499–1590), a Franciscan friar who had arrived in the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán in 1529, describes ceremonies of human sacrifice prepared for in a particularly elaborate way. Sahagún’s General History of the Things of New Spain, also called The Florentine Codex (selection #3), is regarded as a reliable source of information about Aztec culture in part because he learned the Aztec language, Nahuatl, and could interview native speakers who knew no Spanish and nothing of Spanish culture. Sahagún’s informants also replied to his questions in hieroglyphic paintings, some of which are still extant. In addition, Sahagún painstakingly cross-checked his accounts among multiple sources. In the second part of selection #3, from Book 7 of The Florentine Codex, Sahagún relates the Aztec myth of the creation of the sun and moon. Two deities, Tecuciztecatl, the privileged god, and Nanauatzin, who is poor, attempt to sacrifice themselves on a pyre so that they can become the sun of our world. Tecuciztecatl, who goes first, shrinks back from the fire four times and thus becomes only the moon; Nanauatzin lets himself burn without hesitation and instead becomes the sun. When the new sun and moon have not moved in the sky, the other gods, except one who must be forced, decide to sacrifice themselves too in order to give the sun power. However, the gods’ sacrifices are not enough, and Ecatl, the wind god, having sacrificed the other gods, must still drive the sun and moon across the sky. In the other part of selection #2, also from The Florentine Codex, Sahagún describes how youths were chosen to be sacrificed to the god Tezcatlipoca in annual festivities occurring in the spring month Tóxcatl: a young man with an unblemished body was prepared for sacrifice for a year before the festival and worshipped as the image of the god before his ultimate death, climaxing in removal of the heart and subsequent decapitation at the summit of the temple steps.

Human sacrifice did not always involve individual attention: in some ceremonies, war prisoners were ritually sacrificed, singly or by the thousands; it is claimed that somewhere between 10,000 and 80,400 persons were sacrificed at the inauguration of the great temple, the Templo Mayor in Tenochtitlán, now Mexico City, in the year 1487 a.d., only a few decades before the arrival of the Spanish.

To varying degrees, victims of the various forms of sacrifice were unwilling, willing, or eager to play this role. Central to Aztec belief was the notion of indebtedness, the belief that because the gods had sacrificed themselves in creating the earth and the human beings who inhabited it, human beings were obligated to repay the debt by sacrificing themselves in return. Offerings of incense, food, flowers, animals, tobacco, and so on were made to the gods, but it was human blood that nourished them—especially the sun—and would enable the sun, rain, processes of growth, and other natural forces to continue to support human beings. Self-sacrifice, thus, was a sort of exchange, the repayment of the created being’s great debt, and was rewarded by going to live with the Sun, the Moon, or other deities in their diurnal courses or other natural processes. Thus, to sacrifice oneself or be sacrificed was a privilege, not a penalty. Many of those sacrificed are said to have gone to their deaths without fear, knowing they would live again with these gods—but others had to be dragged to the places of sacrifice.

Suicide could also be seen as preferable to being killed. In his Monarchia Indiana (selection #4), Juan de Torquemada (c. 1557–1624), a friar and respected recorder of Aztec history, reports that the third king of Tenochtitlan, Chimalpopoca, having been defeated by his relative, the Emperor Maxtla, first attempted to sacrifice himself and finally hanged himself to escape the indignity of death by starvation in a cage, thus achieving victory in death.

Of particular interest is Bartolomé de Las Casas’s Defense of the Indians (selection #5), in that he attempts to employ Catholic theology with its emphasis on the centrality of sacrifice to God to examine human sacrifice as evidence of the religious devotion, rather than depravity, of the indigenous peoples. “The greatest way to worship God is to offer him sacrifice,” he writes, “every man owes God more than his life.” Las Casas says he understands indigenous practices in this way, even if they are misguided in the gods to whom they are addressed. They are not grounds for waging war against these peoples.

Maya

The religious overtones present in most Mesoamerican accounts of suicide are even more explicit in the European depictions of Maya civilization. The Preclassic or Formative Period of Maya civilization began in the third millennium b.c. and lasted to approximately 300 a.d., eventually giving way to the Maya Classic Period, c. 320–909 a.d., a time characterized by the formation of distinctive scientific and cultural achievements, including an extraordinarily sophisticated calendar and system of astronomical prediction. At its height, the domain of the Mayan groups extended throughout southern Mexico, the Yucatan, Belize, Guatemala, and western portions of El Salvador and Honduras. As among the Aztec, death-producing practices were numerous. Mayan stelae at ritual centers like Toniná, for instance, show the sacrifice of defeated kings and war captives; glyphs at Yaxchilán depict decapitation and autosacrifice; and murals at Bonampak show the capture and torture of captives for sacrifice. Reliefs of the ball court at Chichen Itza show players being sacrificed; it is thought that these were the defeated players, although some sources claim they were the winning players. Vase paintings at Palenque also illustrate human sacrifice. Ritual objects for sacrifice recovered in excavations include highly decorated knives and special bowls for holding just-extracted human hearts. As Linda Schele and Mary Ellen Miller have argued, while in recent history, the Maya were assumed to be nonviolent in comparison to the Aztecs, in fact, war and human sacrifice were central to Mayan religion and culture throughout the Classic period.

Mayan religion identified its gods with the natural world, especially forces that affected agriculture. According to the Popol Vuh creation myth (selection #6), dictated in K’iche’ Mayan to Dominican friars in Guatemala between 1554 and 1558, and later rediscovered and translated into Spanish by Francisco Ximénez, the gods fashioned human beings from maize dough so that humans could worship and sustain them. The Mayan universe was divided into several parts: the heavens, containing 14 layers, of which the earth was the lowest, and the underworld, which consisted of nine layers. The Maya were also said to believe in the immortality of the human soul, though this may not have been a unified concept but rather one shaped by European interpreters. As among the Aztecs, the sacrifice of human blood was seen by the Maya as necessary for the sustenance of cosmic order; indeed, as Schele and Miller put it, “the very existence of the universe depended upon the willingness of human beings to sustain the gods with their blood offerings.” Human blood, the nourishment of the gods, was essential to keep the sun in its course and to prevent it from sinking below the world forever. Bloodletting rituals also formed an important part of Mayan culture, involving piercing of the tongue, earlobes, and genitals, as a public institution and means of gaining public merit and respect. The bloodletting ritual “was basic to the institution of rulership.”

The sun and moon are sacrifices themselves in Mayan mythology. The second part of the Popol Vuh (selection #6) tells the story of how, before the successful creation of humans, the hero twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque became the sun and moon of our world. Having willingly sacrificed themselves in Xibalba, the Mayan underworld, the twins come back to life with the ability to kill and resurrect themselves and others. Returning to Xibalba, the twins demonstrate their powers and convince the Xibalban lords to kill themselves, but they do not bring them back to life. With Xibalba defeated, the twins rise into the sky where they appear as the sun and moon. In another passage from the third part of the Popol Vuh, the god of fire demands that human sacrifice, including heart sacrifice, must be paid to him in exchange for the gift of fire to the community.

Diego de Landa (1524–79), a zealous Catholic Spaniard who spent most of his life in the Yucatan, claimed that Mayan belief held that wrongdoers would suffer intensely in the lowest hell, called Mitnal, while those who committed suicide by hanging, along with other good people—warriors killed in battle and women dying in childbirth—would enjoy a heavenly bliss. Suicides would be watched over by the goddess Ixtab, who, among her other roles, served as the goddess of suicide and the gallows. De Landa’s Relación de las cosas de Yucatán, from which this text is taken (selection #7), provides the fullest account of the ancient Maya to have survived the early colonial period and may provide particularly direct evidence of pre-contact Yucatec beliefs, though whether it is reliable is not clear: De Landa was known for his use of torture in interrogating native subjects (“nothing can be extracted from an Indian without torture,” he said), and some scholars suggest that the Relación was written to form part of his defense in an investigation of his inquisitorial activities—hence its purpose of describing idolatrous practices among the Indians. Indeed, some contemporary scholars argue that his account of Ixtab is a fabrication designed to serve his own zealous agenda.

A figure said to be the goddess Ixtab is shown in the eclipse tables of the Dresden Codex hanging from the sky with a noose around her neck; her eyes are closed, and black circles, a sign of decomposition, appear on her cheeks. If Mayan belief recognized a goddess of suicide favorable to those who killed themselves by hanging, it might in part explain the frequency of suicidal behavior observed by the Spanish invaders. Diego López de Cogolludo (1613–65), for example, said of a man who had committed suicide that “. . . the arrogance of this Indian was such, that being so badly wounded, to avoid its being said he died at the hands of that Spaniard, he went away and in the presence of his own people he hanged himself with a liana. . . .”

Caribbean Peoples

According to early chronicles presented in the next three selections, suicide was also practiced in individual and group forms in the islands of the Caribbean, especially those now known as Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Haiti/Dominican Republic. Gonzalo Fernándo de Oviedo (1478–1557), whom some commentators have called a “man of balanced judgment,” includes examples of suicide in his Natural Historia de las Indias (1526), the first official history of the western hemisphere (selection #8). Oviedo writes that “in some of the islands” where poisonous yucca grows (“San Juan [Puerto Rico], Cuba, Jamaica and Hispaniola”), it was said that group suicide often occurred at the death of a chief or principal lord by means of yucca juice. According to Oviedo, those who had served the chief believed that dying with him would provide a passage to serving the master in a heavenly afterlife; if, however, the servants chose to die naturally or by some other cause, their spirits would not be granted any sort of afterlife at all.

The native inhabitants of Hispaniola were said not only to commit suicide to gain rewards in the afterlife, but also to kill themselves in order to avoid suffering in this life. López de Gómara (1511–66), a chaplain to Hernán Cortés and early historian (who never himself visited the New World), reports in La Historia General de las Indias (1552), that the native American population resorted to suicide to escape Spanish domination (selection #9). In selection #10, Girolamo Benzoni (1519–70), an Italian who combined the reports of Martire de D’Anghiera, Oviedo, and others with his own observations in the Caribbean, Central America, and Peru, insists that the native inhabitants aborted their children and killed themselves in various ways—including hanging themselves by their own hair—to avoid Spanish religion and government. Benzoni’s account has been widely repeated by those emphasizing the cruelty of the Spanish.

Inca

The Incas were originally a tribe of primarily Quechua-speaking native Americans who lived in the central Andean highlands, an area near and around modern-day Peru. In the 15th century a.d., the Incas moved into social and cultural prominence by assimilating or conquering the inhabitants of Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, western Argentina, southern Columbia, and northern Chile, thus assuming control over an estimated 10 million indigenous people. Just a few decades later, they themselves succumbed to a tiny Spanish force led by the ruthless Spaniard Francisco Pizarro and to the ravages of European-introduced disease. At the height of the Inca empire, officials used a decimal system of reckoning to make census counts, keeping their records on quipus, knotted strings (a system still used by indigenous peoples in the highlands in keeping counts of their sheep and llamas), and exercised rigid control over both male and female commoners in agricultural, laboring, and military service. Although most women were allowed to marry and lead ordinary domestic lives, some—those of particular beauty and health—were chosen as young girls to undergo special training and were either assigned to the temple of the sun, given to nobles as secondary wives, or sacrificed on ritual occasions.

Several early accounts of Inca practices involve ritual funeral suicide. In the first of these selections (selection #11), Pedro de Cieza de León (1520–54) describes the manner in which, when a man was entombed, his favorite wives, his servants, his property, and a “great quantity” of food and drink were also buried with him. While it is not clear whether the deaths of the wives and servants are to be described as voluntary—they were clearly heavily socially controlled—Cieza de León also reports that some women, fearing they would not find a place in the tomb with the wives who were buried alive, hanged themselves by their own hair. In selection #12, Joseph de Acosta describes the funeral of the great Inca emperor Huyana Capac, the father of Atahualpa, at the time the Spaniards conquered the Incas: at this funeral, more than a thousand people were put to death in order to be buried with the dead ruler. “. . . [T]‌hese that were appointed to death,” says de Acosta, “held themselves happy.” As with the Aztec and Maya, this description suggests a death-producing practice short of self-initiated suicide, but involving willing subjection to death. In the final selection, #13, yet another Jesuit, Joseph de Arriaga, describes a case of suicide in a way that reveals the tensions between Inca and Spanish culture: the Incas, he says, hold those who hang themselves as “more than human,” for which reason, he speculates, they commit suicide so easily; but the Spanish regard suicide as a shameful act and attempt to discourage it by burning the corpse of a victim as an example.

It can hardly be supposed that accounts of pre-contact native beliefs and practices in Central and South America made by European soldiers and missionaries are not shaped by these invaders’ antecedent views about suicide, but these accounts do suggest that Europeans encountered strikingly different attitudes about suicide in the New World.

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(documented 1519-1621)

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