>>5495792>>5496099cont:
So, with that out of the way, I can talk about sacrifice as a cultural practice.
To begin with, it needs to be stated that, contrary to what
>>5472957 states, human sacrifice and a ritual importance on blood was universal: Like the construction of pyramids, ball courts, an emphasis on communal and outdoor focused urban design and lifestyles, and a high importance on sanitation (see my posts in
>>5446429 → →
for more info on that), it's a cultural element that was present from the very start of complex civilization in the region dating back to 1400 BC.
Obviously, the underlying views on WHY it was important and what the practices are varied from culture to culture and time period to time period. Among the classical maya, for example, blood letting (which was more common, iin general, human sacrifice, despite it's importance, was never the primary form of ritual offering) was mostly partaken by nobility or royalty, often in association with trying to bring rain. I'll admit I'm less informs on the maya then i'd like to be (other cultures even less so), so I can't go into specifics on the philosophy here, but they'd basically pierce themselves with hooks or stringray barbs and run barbed rope through the wound (pic related) Full on human sacrifice was rare, but was also, AFAIK, done by nobility, or to captured nobility in battles or if a city was conquered. I've also read that in droughts and such the king might tb sacrificed in an uprising for failing to guarantee rain for the populace
Again, though, I don't know a ton about the Maya, maybe Kamazotz is lurking and he can chime in
3/?
Also I had found like a 5000 pixel tall version of the image in
>>5495792 (You) but I lost it and couldn't post it, rip
>>5495857>>5495874Yeah, a lot of archeology in Mesoamerica was done by mormons, check out
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/01/how-mormon-lawyer-transformed-archaeology-mexico-and-ended-losing-his-faith 
