Aztecs 远古的回响 -- Aztecs帝国 10

Victims were tethered to the center and provided only with dummy¹ weapons. Warriors² fought them to the death. Both Aztecs and their enemies were sacrificed. For the Aztecs it was an honor. But sacrifice was a powerful tool for intimidating³ enemies. Rulers were expected to prove their worth by capturing live victims for sacrifice to the sun god.

And their blood then ritually makes the land fruitful. It fertilizes the land. So that in that way the blood of the slain⁵ will contribute towards the rebirth of vegetation in the rainy season and the flowers that go all with that. So the blood and flowers is a way of referring to this great cycle of life and the rhythm of human activities that unfolds within the changing seasons.

Looking at these bloody⁶ rituals from a present-day perspective, it’s difficult to understand the people who performed them and easy to condemn⁷ them as a brutal⁸ alien race. Perhaps from the context of their age, the Aztecs have been judged harshly. Ross Hassig has scrutinize⁹d the historical records.

But at the same time they were sacrificing people. Of course, we have the Inquisition going on in Spain in which people were being killed for heresy¹¹. We have criminals and political enemies, having their heads placed on stakes, on the tower of London. And so there’re, there’s plenty of barbarity at this time to go around for almost all people. It’s easier for people to see another group as being strange and different and look how quaint¹², look how bizarre, look how weird¹³ they are, rather than go through the actual difficult research of trying to make them explicable, trying to make them human and understandable on our own terms.

Making the Aztecs human and understandable is the challenge for David Carrasco.

Many of our descriptions of ancient societies are so simple. But in fact the Aztecs show us that human beings are complex. To take the simple notion that they are bloody people and show that they are both people after the blood and after the flower, is to bring us to a wonderful image of understanding and asking about the nature of complexity¹⁴.

Aside from the violence, it seems, there was a much gentler side to Aztec life. An extraordinary love of beauty emerges in the most popular of their arts, poetry. Poets were loved and highly revered¹⁵. One of the most famous was also a great architect of the empire.

It’s not true that we come to this earth to live. We come only to sleep, only to dream.

It’s an extremely beautiful poetry which essentially¹⁶ sings about the fleetingness of life, the brevity of life, the inevitability¹⁷ of death, the price we'll spend to be on Earth, the beauty of the things that’s around us, flowers, love, women and children. All these things are celebrated¹⁸ by the Aztecs and speak of the human spirit, which I think, is not only similar but superior to ours

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tether: v. （用绳或链）拴（牲口）
fertilize: v. 使肥沃
scrutinize: v. 细察；细阅；仔细审查
barbarity: n. 残暴的行为, 残忍
quaint: adj. 奇怪的
explicable: adj. 可解释的
gentler: adj. 温和的,优雅的
fleetingness: n. 短暂

1 dummy   

n.假的东西；(哄婴儿的)橡皮奶头

参考例句：

• The police suspect that the device is not a real bomb but a dummy.警方怀疑那个装置不是真炸弹，只是一个假货。
• The boys played soldier with dummy swords made of wood.男孩们用木头做的假木剑玩打仗游戏。

2 warriors   

武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• I like reading the stories ofancient warriors. 我喜欢读有关古代武士的故事。
• The warriors speared the man to death. 武士们把那个男子戳死了。

3 intimidating   

vt.恐吓，威胁( intimidate的现在分词)

参考例句：

• They were accused of intimidating people into voting for them. 他们被控胁迫选民投他们的票。
• This kind of questioning can be very intimidating to children. 这种问话的方式可能让孩子们非常害怕。

4 fertilizes   

n.施肥( fertilize的名词复数 )v.施肥( fertilize的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The male sperm fertilizes the female egg. 雄性的精子使雌性的卵子受精。 来自辞典例句
• When the male reproductive cell fertilizes the female reproductive cell a zygote is formed. 当男性生殖细胞与女性生殖细胞发生受精时，就形成了一个合子。 来自辞典例句

5 slain   

杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的过去分词 )； (slay的过去分词)

参考例句：

• The soldiers slain in the battle were burried that night. 在那天夜晚埋葬了在战斗中牺牲了的战士。
• His boy was dead, slain by the hand of the false Amulius. 他的儿子被奸诈的阿缪利乌斯杀死了。

6 bloody   

adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染

参考例句：

• He got a bloody nose in the fight.他在打斗中被打得鼻子流血。
• He is a bloody fool.他是一个十足的笨蛋。

7 condemn   

vt.谴责，指责；宣判(罪犯)，判刑

参考例句：

• Some praise him,whereas others condemn him.有些人赞扬他，而有些人谴责他。
• We mustn't condemn him on mere suppositions.我们不可全凭臆测来指责他。

8 brutal   

adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的

参考例句：

• She has to face the brutal reality.她不得不去面对冷酷的现实。
• They're brutal people behind their civilised veneer.他们表面上温文有礼，骨子里却是野蛮残忍。

9 scrutinize   

n.详细检查，细读

参考例句：

• Her purpose was to scrutinize his features to see if he was an honest man.她的目的是通过仔细观察他的相貌以判断他是否诚实。
• She leaned forward to scrutinize their faces.她探身向前，端详他们的面容。

10 scrutinized   

v.仔细检查，详审( scrutinize的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The jeweler scrutinized the diamond for flaws. 宝石商人仔细察看钻石有无瑕庇 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Together we scrutinized the twelve lemon cakes from the delicatessen shop. 我们一起把甜食店里买来的十二块柠檬蛋糕细细打量了一番。 来自英汉文学 - 盖茨比

11 heresy   

n.异端邪说；异教

参考例句：

• We should denounce a heresy.我们应该公开指责异端邪说。
• It might be considered heresy to suggest such a notion.提出这样一个观点可能会被视为异端邪说。

12 quaint   

adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的

参考例句：

• There were many small lanes in the quaint village.在这古香古色的村庄里，有很多小巷。
• They still keep some quaint old customs.他们仍然保留着一些稀奇古怪的旧风俗。

13 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

14 complexity   

n.复杂(性)，复杂的事物

参考例句：

• Only now did he understand the full complexity of the problem.直到现在他才明白这一问题的全部复杂性。
• The complexity of the road map puzzled me.错综复杂的公路图把我搞糊涂了。

15 revered   

v.崇敬，尊崇，敬畏( revere的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• A number of institutions revered and respected in earlier times have become Aunt Sally for the present generation. 一些早年受到尊崇的惯例，现在已经成了这代人嘲弄的对象了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The Chinese revered corn as a gift from heaven. 中国人将谷物奉为上天的恩赐。 来自辞典例句

16 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

17 inevitability   

n.必然性

参考例句：

• Evolutionism is normally associated with a belief in the inevitability of progress. 进化主义通常和一种相信进步不可避免的看法相联系。
• It is the tide of the times, an inevitability of history. 这是时代的潮流，历史的必然。

18 celebrated   

adj.有名的，声誉卓著的

参考例句：

• He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
• The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。