Human sacrifice

funerary women sacrifice

offering of a human being to a god or goddess in tribute, as an act of repentance, to ask forgiveness, or in exchange for a favor

thumb|Thích Quảng Đức protesting the persecution of Buddhists in South Vietnam by self-immolation on 11 June 1963.

corpse conserved in a bog

Álmos (), also Almos or Almus ( 820 – 895), was—according to the uniform account of Hungarian chronicles—the first head of the "loose federation" of the Hungarian tribes from around 850. Whether he was the sacred ruler (kende) of the Hungarians or their military leader (gyula) is subject to scholarly debate. According to Constantine Porphyrogenitus, he accepted the Khazar khagan's suzerainty in the first decade of his reign, but the Hungarians acted independently of the Khazars from around 860. The 14th-century Illuminated Chronicle narrates that he was murdered in Transylvania at the beginnin

Stele set up around 840 BCE by King Mesha of Moab

luna

method of execution

thumb|alt=Altar to Taranis|Altar from Orgon, France with a [[Gaulish inscription recording an offering to Taranis.]] Taranis (sometimes Taranus or Tanarus) is a Celtic thunder god attested in literary and epigraphic sources.

objects placed intentionally in a grave

thumb|A large man lowers a warrior, headfirst, into a container. This scene from the Gundestrup cauldron may represent a sacrifice to Teutates.

In Mesoamerican culture, Tonatiuh ( "Movement of the Sun") is an Aztec sun deity of the daytime sky who rules the cardinal direction of east. According to Aztec mythology, Tonatiuh was known as "The Fifth Sun" and was given a calendar name of , which means "4 Movement". Represented as a fierce and warlike god, he is first seen in Early Postclassic art of the Pre-Columbian civilization known as the Toltec. Tonatiuh's symbolic association with the eagle alludes to the Aztec belief of his journey as the present sun, travelling across the sky each day, where he descended in the west and ascended i

Indian indigenous (Scheduled) tribe inhabiting in the state of Odisha

mountain in Megalopoli municipality, Greece

minor Purana of Hinduism

thumb|Esus as depicted on the Pillar of the Boatmen

ritual war fought intermittently between the Aztec Triple Alliance and its enemies from 1450s to the arrival of the Spaniards in 1519

King Mesha (Moabite: , vocalized as: ; Hebrew: מֵישַׁע Mēšaʿ) was a king of Moab in the 9th century BC, known most famously for having the Mesha Stele inscribed and erected at Dibon, Jordan. In this inscription he calls himself "Mesha, son of Kemosh-[...], the king of Moab, the Dibonite."

status in Roman law

water-filled sinkhole at the Maya archaeological site of Chichen Itza,

aztec rite

In the Hebrew Bible, Tophet or Topheth (; ; ) is a location in Jerusalem in the Valley of Hinnom (Gehenna), where worshipers engaged in a ritual involving "passing a child through the fire", most likely child sacrifice. Traditionally, the sacrifices have been ascribed to a god named Moloch. The Bible condemns and forbids these sacrifices, and the tophet is eventually destroyed by king Josiah, although mentions by the prophets Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Isaiah suggest that the practices associated with the tophet may have persisted.

Tanzanian et al Albianism

, also known in Chinese as da sheng zhuang (), is a cultural practice of human sacrifice of premature burial before the construction of buildings. Hitobashira was practiced formerly in Japan as a form of human sacrifice. A person was buried alive under or near large-scale buildings like dams, bridges and castles, as a prayer to kami (indigenous divinities). It was believed that these builders' rites would protect the building from destruction by natural disasters, such as floods, or by enemy attacks. Hitobashira can also refer to the workers who were buried alive under inhumane conditions.

Ritualistic killing of children in pre-Columbian cultures

1897 punitive expedition by British troops

ancient Roman politician and military commander

The rituals of the Argei were archaic religious observances in ancient Rome that took place on March 16 and March 17, and again on May 14 or May 15. By the time of Augustus, the meaning of these rituals had become obscure even to those who practiced them. For the May rites, a procession of pontiffs, Vestals, and praetors made its way around a circuit of 27 stations (sacella or sacraria), where at each they retrieved a figure fashioned into human form from rush, reed, and straw, resembling men tied hand and foot. After all the stations were visited, the procession, accompanied by the Flaminica

Purushamedha (or Naramedha) is a Śrauta ritual of mock human sacrifice. The Vajasaneyi Samhita-Sataphatha Brahmana-Katyayana Srauta Sutra sequence of Shukla Yajur Veda texts contains the most details.

Burial customs of ancient North Germanic Norsemen

Monarch with a religious significance

6th-century Christian saint

Aztec religious ceremony of renewal held every 52 years

250px|right|thumb|The Aztec "Sun stone" presenting elements of the Aztec calendar.

religious activity in Maya culture