Archaeologists carrying out excavations in Mexico City have unearthed more than a hundred starfish deposited as an offering to the Aztec god of war Huītzilōpōchtli around 700 years ago.
A one-of-a-kind offering
Dedicated to Huītzilōpōchtli and Tlalocgod of rain and agriculture, the Templo Mayor was built in the heart of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan circa 1325 and remodeled in the late 1480s. Upon arriving on Mexican soil in 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes had ordered the burial of the structure, the remains of which were only rediscovered in the 20th century.
Constituting the largest deposit of starfish ever identified in Templo Mayorthe offering was discovered within a circular structure located in a section of the temple associated with Huītzilōpōchtli. It included 164 representatives of the species Nidorellia armatacoral fragments, shells, a puffer fish, a resin figurine, animal bones and the skeleton of a female jaguar holding a spear in her paw.
” The patterns of these starfish are very similar to those of the coat of jaguars “explains the archaeologist Miguel Baez Perezlead author of the new study published in the journal Review of Biologia Tropical. ” This is probably why they were chosen, although further examination is needed to confirm that this was the only species present.. »
Marine organisms considered true relics
According to the team, the closest sources of starfish and corals were about 300 kilometers away. Tenochtitlanemphasizing their importance for Aztecs who, like most Mesoamerican peoples, believed that the origin of the world was intimately linked to the sea and therefore considered the organisms that emerged from it as true relics.
At the time of the offering, the remote regions from which the starfish and corals originated had just been conquered by Ahuitzotl. In power from 1486 to 1502, the man was the eighth ruler of theAztec Empire and the last to rule before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors. Cortes had his son executed Cuauhtemocthe last Aztec emperor, in 1522.
During his reign, Ahuitzotl focused on expanding the empire and renovating much of Tenochtitlan. Around 1500, he had launched a sixth phase of expansion of the Templo Mayorinvolving the construction of an additional wing where the recently described offering was discovered.
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