Has there been significant progress in our knowledge of the Aztecs and/or Maya since the '60s?
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Any source prior to the 2015 discovery of tzompantli towers in Mexico City will likely understate the scope of ritual execution engaged in by the Aztecs:
Some conquistadors wrote about the tzompantli and its towers, estimating that the rack alone contained 130,000 skulls. But historians and archaeologists knew the conquistadors were prone to exaggerating the horrors of human sacrifice to demonize the Mexica culture. As the centuries passed, scholars began to wonder whether the tzompantli had ever existed.
Archaeologists at the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) here can now say with certainty that it did. ... Beginning in 2015, they discovered and excavated the remains of the skull rack and one of the towers underneath a colonial period house on the street that runs behind Mexico City's cathedral. ... The scale of the rack and tower suggests they held thousands of skulls, testimony to an industry of human sacrifice unlike any other in the world.
In summary: No, the Aztecs were not Noble Savages misunderstood by Spanish conquistadors; but rather industrial scale executioners and murderers terrorizing their neighbours with activities that would definitely be termed genocidal if engaged in today at even a fraction off the scale.
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