Going back by how many millennia? 6, 8 or 10? since urban/agricultural 'civilisation' began? Your examples are all within this era and reveal exploitative, gratuitously cruel and repressive behaviour because patriarchal societies have been around that long.
I am european so have mostly studied 'white race' history. Yet early european pre-christian cultures share truths and compatibilities with known worldwide indigenous cultures including a balancing reverence for feminine and masculine deities/spirits, women and men having different, yet seen as equally valid roles and high priority for care of the sick and young. There are pockets of this matriarchal welfare-oriented belief system within our predominantly patriarchal 'interests of the individual' paradigm. And periods of matriarchal flourishing for e.g. in the hippy movement. The influence of the matrilineal Pictish clan is reflected in Scotland's more egalitarian marital laws. There were neolithic peaceful pagan societies showing care of the vulnerable in their archeology. The Cathars, where men and women lived together without thinking it sinful, before they were brutally eliminated by the Roman Catholic Church. And Minoans of Crete who avoided war for 1,500 years, their grave goods are few, without weapons, their art was naturalistic, their clothes and poetry demonstrate a pleasure in life and sex, and not an attentive reverence for death, exclusivity and condemnation of difference.
That behaviour is found where the Deity (singular) is male; women, the sick and young have low status; the hierarchy requires submission or passive compliance, and there is a marked propensity for indulging in violence, murder and exploitation. It has been this way for so long our memories are entrenched in assumptions that it represents all or a dominant trait of human nature. We are potentially diverse but the cycle that 'belief creates perception, which endorses experience and informs reality' tends to bring out some human traits and suppress others.
Mainstream reporting of our history is embedded in the prevailing belief system and does not often report on matriarchal social behaviour, which may not have a written record and anyway that might disadvantageously highlight some of the oppressive measures practiced by the invasive patriarchal culture, bent on the elimination of all others but its own. People will change their (spots) beliefs and behaviour, or will say they do, to fit in with the current cultural backdrop, especially if the alternative is some form of horribly painful death. Notably, in the history of war, the most successful generals were those who had and took the advice of an intelligent woman. It's a great combination, so long as there is true value and equality.
I don't know if you intended me to take your comment as a platform opportunity, but thank you for reading so far. I trace many of our modern world's problems to this central theme of gender inequality. Feminism is/should not be a men vs women issue. There are patriarchal women like HillaryClinton and MargaretThatcher who hang with those men that practice patriarchal domination (while they use the female-card) without introducing the views and needs of the women they claim to represent. Likewise there are matriarchal men who value the opinion of women and practice matriarchal views like open enquiry, live and let live etc. I know which one I'd like to live in, but we're not there yet. Men and women need to stick together, and not be afraid of the (other) F-word.
Ok, I did a lot of research on ritual sacrifice and abuse of ancient cultures. I am of European heritage myself. So, it appears that pederasty started on the island of Crete it is where the sodatic zone began. We also get the word "creatin" from people that were from Crete. From there is spread to Greece and Rome and around the Equator.
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The Cretan ritual of pederasty that the Greeks adopted is that before his entrance into society as a man, a boy is ritually kidnapped by his approved (from his parents and the boy himself in some cases, courtship) mentor and is taken into the wilderness for two months with hunting and feasting with other pederasty groups."
During the Bronze age (3000 B.C. to 1200 B.C.) the Minoans on the islands of Crete practiced ritual child and human sacrifice and pederasty. The Minoan religion was based off Goddess worship where a younger male figure is always seen with her probably as a consort, son, or worshiper. She was associated with many animals mainly the snake.
The historian and archeologist Rodney Castleden uncovered a sanctuary near Knossos where the remains of a 17-year-old were found sacrificed.
“His ankles had evidently been tied and his legs folded up to make him fit on the table... He had been ritually murdered with the long bronze dagger engraved with a boar's head that lay beside him.”
Analysis of the bones showed the blood had been drained from the upper part of his body, which he probably had his throat cut with the dagger. An earthquake about 1,700 BC destroyed the sanctuary where the boy was found, entombed as well were a priest and priestess and it was likely because of the position of the bodies to the boy, the priestess was who cut his throat to allow the blood to drain. A servant of the sanctuary was also found outside carrying a vessel that likely contained some of the blood.
Cannibalism and child sacrifice might have occurred on the island, during an expedition to Knossos (known as Europe’s oldest city) the British School of Athens, led by Peter Warren excavated a mass grave of sacrifices, particularly children, and unearthed evidence of cannibalism. The mass grave was found in what appeared to be an ordinary ancient Minoan house and became known as “
The House of the Sacrificed Children”
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clear evidence that their flesh was carefully cut away, much in the manner of sacrificed animals. In fact, the bones of slaughtered sheep were found with those of the children... Moreover, as far as the bones are concerned, the children appear to have been in good health. Startling as it may seem, the available evidence so far points to an argument that the children were slaughtered, and their flesh cooked and possibly eaten in a sacrifice ritual made in the service of a nature deity to assure an annual renewal of fertility.”
There is a small possibility that the grave was a second burial. Primitive cultures would bury bodies to rid the skeleton of its flesh first, then they would be dug up and reburied in an actual family grave site. My only caveat to this was that it is not the only reported instance of what appears to be sacrifice and the bones of the children made them appear to be in good health at the time of their death.
In Greek mythology, the first King of Crete was Minos, son of Zeus and Europa. Every nine years, he made King Aegeus pick seven young boys and seven young girls to be sent to Daedalus's creation, the labyrinth, to be eaten by the Minotaur in revenge for the death of his son Androgeus during a riot.
So yes you are correct that Crete was a "goddess" centric culture and well look where it got them. So enlightened.
That being said the wicker man narrative of human sacrifice of the Celts is inaccurate and was spread by the Romans. The Celts used bows and arrows as a weapon very rarely and there are no mass graves found yet.
Interesting about the Cathar's I used to believe what you did as well, until I really did a deep dive and read primary sources around the time. The Cathar's practiced the same as the Sabbateans and as the Frankists did later, you know as Crowley said "do as thou wilt." The Cathar's hated the God of the old testament the demiurge, the Catholic church, and in doing so would commit any sin possible.
So yeah I see now where you come from, thank you.