page_title: Xaltocan, Tlaxcala
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Xaltocan, Tlaxcala / History
caption_attribution_description: Español: Ocelotl-Cuauhxicalli (sala mexica del Museo Nacional de Antropología de la Ciudad de México). Deutsch: Ocelotl-Cuauhxicalli (Nationalmuseum für Anthropologie, Mexiko-Stadt). Français&#160;: Ocelotl-Cuauhxicalli (salle mexica du Musée national d'Anthropologie de Mexico). English: Ocelotl-Cuauhxicalli (mexica room of the National Museum of Anthropology of Mexico City).
context_page_description: Xaltocan is in Xaltocan Municipality in the Mexican state of Tlaxcala.
  The name can mean either of two things in the Nahuatl language: either 'sandy ground of spiders' or 'where sand sowing'. Xaltocan is also the name of the municipal seat.
context_section_description: Xaltocan was inhabited in Pre-Columbian times and is still populated today.
  In ancient times, its people who were comparable to the Aztecs of Mesoamerica, were rigorously religious, having temples and sacred sites in which they would worship their native gods, as well as performing occasional rituals that involved an offering of human sacrifice, among other similar ceremonies.
  These human sacrifices often included women from surrounding regions, but men were not excluded from sacrifice to the gods. The human sacrifices were mostly performed in front of a Cuauhxicalli, which was a sacred statue in the shape of a soldier or warrior.
caption: A Cuauhxicalli. The people of Xaltocan were sacrificed before these statues, but the ones in Xaltocan were in the shape of warriors
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