🔄FROM THE ARCHIVE: A mass sacrifice of children and llamas 550 years ago may have been a desperate attempt to appease the gods in the wake of heavy rain and flooding.
After the Chimú children were sacrificed, their remains were arranged in groups of three by chronological age, often resting on their backs or sides with their legs flexed. Children were placed facing northwest, toward the ocean. The llama bodies were placed on top of or next to them, facing east toward the Andes Mountains. The question haunts a seaside burial in northern Peru, where hundreds of remains from the largest-known mass child sacrifice in the Americas were found.
The burial was hidden from sight until 2011, when locals discovered bones poking out of eroding sand. By the time excavations concluded in 2016, archaeologists had unearthed 137 children between the ages of 5 and 14, three adults and 200 animals believed to be young llamas — all sacrificed at about the same time.
Many children’s remains were found with broken ribs and other injuries. Consistent cuts across the chests suggest an experienced hand made them, possibly to remove the hearts while the children were still alive. Cut marks on the llama bodies suggest their hearts were taken, too. Like some other pre-Columbian cultures, the Chimú practiced human and animal sacrifice. But this macabre find still caught archaeologists by surprise.
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