Archaeologists Find Remains Of Hundreds Of Children Who Were Sacrificed To Stop Bad Weather

Archaeologists unearthed the remains of 227 children in the biggest child sacrificial site ever found. The bodies were discovered in a mass grave in Huanchaco, which is a beachside tourist town north of Peru’s capital Lima.

The kids, who were between 4 and 14 years of age, were killed around 1,400 years ago as part of a ritual that honored the Chimú culture’s gods in order to help stop the bad weather in Trujillo, Peru. The Chimú culture, who thrived between the years 1200 and 1400, often sacrificed children as part of their spiritual rituals. They established their civilization along the Peruvian coast all the way up to Ecuador until they were conquered by the Inca empire in 1475.

“We are the largest place where remains of sacrificed children have been found. There is no other,” stated archaeologist Feren Castillo. He went on to explain, “They were sacrificed to appease the El Niño phenomenon; we have found more evidence of rainfall in the findings.” That indicates that the children were probably killed during wet weather. Castillo continued on by saying, “It’s uncontrollable, this thing with the children. Wherever you dig, there’s another one.” He also mentioned that there still may be even more remains of children to be found.

While sacrificing children is bad enough, the manner in which they were found is even more disturbing. They were buried facing the sea and some of the skeletons still had skin, hair, and were wearing silver earmuffs. Additionally, the children’s breastbones were “cut with the aim of possibly opening the rib cage and extracting their hearts,” said archaeologist Gabriel Prieto. Pictures of the remains can be seen here.

Archaeologists first discovered 56 skeletal remains of children at a site in the town’s Pampa la Cruz neighborhood in June of 2018. Pampa la Cruz is near Hunchaquito where the remains of children and llamas were unearthed. Prieto explained what they had found at the Hunchaquito site which has been excavated since 2011, “From 2014 to 2016, we found a total of 140 children and approximately 200 llamas at this sacrificial site.”

I don’t know what that culture was thinking to make them sacrifice innocent children in order to avoid bad weather, but needless to say, this is one massively disturbing discovery.