Ancient Lightning Rituals: How Inca Child Sacrifices on Volcanoes Unleashed Mysterious Power, New Study Reveals
“I suppose it was then that the girl was taken away from her parents and brought to Cuzco, the capital of the Inca empire, where the girl was being prepared for three years to be sacrificed at the top of the volcano,” Socha hypothesized.
Peruvian Ministry of CultureIn 2016, archaeologists discovered 17 graves of children who had been sacrificed by the Incas in Peru.
Previous research which examined hair samples from the child victims suggests they were chosen many years in advance, and were “fattened up” before their deaths.
The isotope analysis of these hair samples also indicated that the children were drugged with alcohol and coca plants — from which cocaine is derived — before they were killed. Researchers believe it helped sedate them.
One of the mummified child victims, known by researchers as the “Llullaillaco Maiden,” was found with a lump of chewed coca leaves in her mouth.
The Incas believed it to be a great honor for a family to have a child taken as a sacrifice. But how were the children chosen? Archaeologists aren’t entirely sure but, according to Socha, “they certainly had to have some exceptional traits, such as beauty or ancestry.”
Next, the team plans to conduct more analyses on the children’s remains, which are kept in cold storage at the Museo Santuarios Andinos. They plan to study tooth samples so they can determine the victims’ diets and places of origin, which, hopefully, will shed more light on these lost lives.
Now, read the story of Roy Sullivan, the man who got struck by lightning seven times and lived, and learn about the Inca “princess” mummy that was returned to Bolivia after 129 years.
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