For many years it was believed that the ancient Mayas made sacrifices only of women and that they only chose virgins for this type of ritual; some recent findings reveal that sacrifices were not exclusive to women. The Mayas brought men, women and even children with the aim of communicating with the gods to ask them if the year that was about to begin would be good or bad.
The ways the Mayans made offerings to their gods depended on what they wanted to ask their deities – this implied different types of sacrifice, most of which ended in drowning in the cenotes representative of their culture.
The cenotes were of great importance to the Mayas; they symbolized life, death, rebirth and fertility and they believed that these water deposits possessed mythical beings.
