[Aztlan] on the rightness or wrongness of human sacrifice-

[Steven Zoraster]

> On Thu, 5 Feb 2009 11:35:24 +0000, Dodds Pennock, Dr C.E. wrote:
>
> The evidence on the 'willingness' of individuals to go to sacrifice
> suggests a wide variety of responses. I will leave aside  for the
> moment the death of individual warriors through events such as the
> 'gladiatorial' sacrifice (which seem significantly more likely to
> have been implicated in ideals of honour and ideal afterlife -
> making the parallels with seppuku and martyrdom more helpful).
> Looking at the mass sacrifice of captives, what little evidence we
> do have suggests a whole range of attitudes.

Torture of captives by North American Indians east of the Mississippi was normal.  Captured warriors were "honored" - if that is the right word - when they displayed indifference to both pain and their ultimate fate during torture.  If some of them could do it, we might expect many Aztec captives to "consent" to a less painful death.  (Or am I depending too much on novels for information about North American Indian customs?)

Steven Zoraster