2005 in archaeology
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The year 2005 in archaeology
Contents |
Explorations
Excavations
- Rare child sacrifice to war god at Tenochtitlan
Archaeologists excavating the Templo Mayor site in Tenochtitlan (modern-day Mexico City) announced on July 22 the discovery of a rare child sacrifice to Huitzilopochtli, the war god of the Aztecs. The find was unusual because Huitzilopochtli was usually honored with hearts or skulls from adult warrior sacrifices, and child sacrifices were usually to Tlaloc, the rain god. The find was especially valuable because the remains of the child were found whole, and with whistles, collars, ankle bracelets of shell and copper bells, items usually found at ceremonial burials.
Archaeologists believe that the sacrifice took place around 1450 in a cornerstone-laying ceremony to mark the building a new layer of the temple (new layers were added about once every 52 years). An Associated Press article remarked that:
"Priests propped the child in a sitting position, his legs splayed out in front of him, and workers packed sand and clay around his body, which was then covered beneath a flight of stone temple steps...the find came almost by accident last month, as archaeologists dug a test trench at the edge of a temple on the crossroads of two major thoroughfares in the ancient city of Tenochtitlan, the name the Aztecs gave to the city they founded in 1325. About a yard below the surface, they saw the top of a tiny skull." [1]
Publications
Finds
Awards
Miscellaneous
- On April 18, the bodies of 30 British Royal Navy officers and sailors discovered in 2000 on Nelson's Island are buried in a naval ceremony in Alexandria, Egypt. Dating from the 1798 Battle of the Nile and another battle three years later, only one body, that of Commander James Russell, can be positively identified.
