Key Takeaways
Buried beneath the street and plazas of modern - day Mexico City are the ruins of ancientAztectemples where human sacrifices were routinely do to appease the God . In the late 1990s , while excavating a round temple consecrate to Ehecatl , the Aztec jazz god , archeologist unveil theremains of a 20 - year - old boy , decapitate and squatting at the base of the temple ’s main stairway .
What made the Mexico City find so singular was that the skeleton of the human sacrifice was see seize a duet of musical instruments in each mitt . They were small , ceramic whistles adorn with a menacing skull ’s face . As the archaeologist promptly gain , the skull figure typify Mictlantecuhtli , theAztec godof the underworld and of death itself .
And with that , the Earth became fascinated with a occult Modern musical instrument sleep together as the " Aztec death whistle . "
Today , if you Google " Aztec death whistle , " you ’ll find articles claiming that the " haunting scream " of the death whistle were used to " terrify " the Aztecs ' enemies in battle or to mime the agonizing cries of sacrificial victims as their living hearts were tear from their chests . you may also watchthis popular television clipof the tardily musicianXavier Yxayotlconjuring blood - cool down sound from an oversized last whistle .
But the sedate truth , expert say , is that we know very little about how the Aztecs really used these intriguing instruments or even how the instruments actually sounded when fiddle by an ancient Aztec priest or instrumentalist . What we can safely generalise from the find in Mexico City , is that death whistles undoubtedly had ritual and ceremonial significance , and that they may have been used to manoeuvre the spirits of the dead through the hereafter .
An Instrument That Defies Classification
Arnd Adje Both is a music archeologist , which mean that he examines ancient melodic artefact and endeavour to reconstruct the musical culture in which they were played . Both is fascinated with the pre - Columbian melodic instruments of Mesoamerica , where three advanced civilisation once flourished : the Olmecs , theMayaand lastly the Aztecs .
In the former 2000s , he had the honor of being thevery first personto play the two end whistles excavated from the synagogue site in Mexico City . If it was a Hollywood movie , sound those ancient whistle would have summon an army of the undead to ravage Mexico City . In veridical life , the death whistles made a slightly distorted , air current - alike sound , not the sharp rallying cry of the damned .
For further study , Both train CT scans of the decease whistle to translate their internal structure and acoustic , and then he built replicas . He come across that the Aztec dying whistles were a type of " air give " whistle first excogitate by the Mayans around 700 to 800 C.E. When air is blown through the consumption tube , it interacts with a well or " spring " of melody inside a rounded internal chamber , creating distortions . An additional opening night on the bottom of the whistle can be insure with a cupped deal to mould the tone of the sound .
" These melodic line spring pennywhistle do n’t fit into the Western compartmentalization of wind musical instrument — trumpets and horns , flutes or vibrating reed instruments — which means that they ’re singular worldwide and only produced in pre - Columbian America , " says Both . " For me as a scientist , that ’s much more interesting than the fantastic fib state about destruction whistles on YouTube . "
How Death Whistles Fit into Aztec Beliefs
According to Both , it ’s not a coincidence that a human sacrifice laid at the feet of the wind god Ehecatl was holding a dyad of death whistling . There is a strong connection in Aztec mythology between the wind god and Mictlantecuhtli , the god of the Hades .
The most salient evidence comes from a remarkable pre - Columbian document called theCodex Borgia , an illustrated ms that depicts the Axtecs ' complex pantheon of god , as well as Aztec history , their studies of the stars , botany and more .
One page of the Codex Borgia establish two graven image standing back - to - back : Mictlantecuhtli and Ehecatl . Both aver that the immortal are guarding the entrance to the underworld and represent two parts of a whole : death and life history .
" There ’s this notion in the Aztec custom that when someone pass , they have to walk a very severe path to the netherworld , " says Both . " During that journey , certain rite are carried out by the living to give military strength to the deceased , so they can safely get in in the underworld . "
In one horizontal surface of the Hades , for object lesson , the dead pauperism to cross a large field while being whipped by cutthroat , ice - cold winds . In the Codex Borgia , those cutting jazz are represented by obsidian blades , the focalise smuggled stones used by the Aztecs to make human sacrifices .
Both state that at the Mexico City synagogue land site , a ceramic bowl comprise obsidian blade was discover next to the consistence of the young mankind . And like the back - to - back image from the Codex Borgia , the son was give to the wind god hold whistling bearing the image of Mictlantecuhtli , the god of the underworld .
" All of these elements begin to fit together like a puzzle , " says Both . " There ’s a theory that these instruments were played inside the temple as part of a ritual operation have-to doe with to death and forfeit . They were meant to simulate the cold night winds of the Hades . "
Both ’s theory lines up well with the verbal description of an Aztec fete dedicated to Tezcatlipoca , the god of the nighttime sky . In 1913 , the folklorist Lewis Spence wrote a book called " Myths of Mexico and Peru , " and trace Toxcatl , a fete held in the fifth month of the Aztec class :
If that description is precise , then the young man sacrificed in the Mexico City synagogue may have voice the death whistle powerful before he lose his caput .
Were Death Whistles Used in Battle?
When the Spanish conquistadors , led by Hernan Cortes , clashed with Aztecs in 1521 , they draw the Aztec warriors using drum , conch shell and other musical instruments during battles to convey with each other and possibly to faze their enemies .
The Spanish friar Tomás de Torquemadawrotethat one Aztec full general " carried a drumfish on his shoulders which he played at the start of a battle , while others blow large shell trumpets . "
But what about the claim , made by the autochthonous player Xavier Yxayotl and others , that the Aztecs terrify their enemies by sounding hundreds of screaming death whistles at one time ?
" There ’s no proof , but it ’s still a possibility , " says Both . " Up to this point , we have n’t excavated an individual classified as an Aztec warrior with such an instrument [ a death pennywhistle ] around their neck . For now , it seems to be more of a ritual pawn . "
Another reason to question the battlefield theory is that the death pennywhistle recover from the temple site in Mexico City are less than 2 inches ( 5 centimetre ) long , compare to the much larger replication played by Yxayotl and others . The lowly ancient whistle miscarry to bring on the same ghastly screams of the large , innovative replicas .
A New Tradition Inspired by the Ancients
As a medicine archeologist , Both has to didder his brain and express mirth when he thinks about the wild theories that he ’s see on the internet about the origins and otherworldly properties of the Aztec expiry whistle . But in a way , he only has himself to blame . In the early 2000s , he and some colleagues were among the first to publish papers about Aztec death whistle in English .
" From then onwards , this new tradition issue of artist , musician , Aztec dancers and Mexican nationalists incorporating the death whistle into their own , in many cases , fresh stories , " order Both . " It ’s a new bed on an ancient custom . "
