![[Pasted image 20250201164713.png]] Some historians have stressed the sometimes disturbingly violent nature of [[Aztec]] society, and indeed the Spanish justified their conquest partly on accounts of human sacrifice and even rumors of cannibalism. Although Aztec society included many other elements such as the building of the city itself, and creation of its agriculture and its wide network of trade, evidence suggests the culture had a dark side as well. A ruling class of warrior nobles and priests performed ritual human sacrifice daily to sustain the sun on its long journey across the sky, to appease or feed the gods, and to stimulate agricultural production. The sacrificial ceremony included cutting open the chest of a victim (usually but now always a criminal or captured warrior) with an obsidian knife and removing the still-beating heart. The Aztecs taught their children that the best fate a boy could hope for was to die in battle or as a sacrifice to the gods. Women and children were also sometimes sacrificed in elaborate seasonal ceremonies to insure fertility and good harvests. **FOR MORE INFO:** Explore [Aztec-History.com](http://openstax.org/l/azteccreation) to learn more about the Aztec creation story. --- Next: [[1.12 The Inca]] Back: [[1.10 Chinampas]]