Quotes / Human Sacrifice

Films - Live Action

"Mighty Kulkukan, whose fury could scorch this earth to oblivion, let us appease you with this sacrifice! To exalt you in your glory. To make our people prosper. To prepare for your return. Warrior, unafraid and willing! With your blood, you renew the world from age to age! Thanks be to you!" (stab)

— The High Priest, Apocalypto

"Now, if you're sitting comfortably, I shall tell you why you must not be afraid to die. To die so that the god may live is a privilege, Kevin, and if you know anything at all about history, you will know that human sacrifice is as old as Dionin himself, whose every death is a rebirth into a god ever mightier!"

—Lady Sylvia Marsh, The Lair of the White Worm

"Through darkness eternal... Dionin. Dionin, who came forth from the darkness, Dionin, who dwelt in peace in the Garden of Eden, his return... as pain renews bliss, as unsullied flesh is purified, as noble death nourishes divine life. Great Dionin, accept this... your sacrifice."

—Lady Sylvia Marsh, The Lair of the White Worm

"From them! The blood of human sacrifice must come from them! The blood of expiation..."

—Mrs. Carmody, The Mist

Sergeant Howie: I know your crops failed. I saw the harvest photograph.
Lord Summerisle: Oh, yes. They failed, all right. Disastrously so. For the first time since my grandfather came here. The blossom came, but the fruit withered and died on the bough. That must not happen again this year. It is our most earnest belief that the best way of preventing this is to offer to our god of the sun and to the goddess of our orchards the most acceptable sacrifice that lies in our power.

—The Wicker Man (1973)

"My friends, enough now. We shall all reassemble outside the town hall at 3:00 sharp, and then process through the village and the countryside, down to the beach, below the stones, by the route which has become sacred to our rite. This year, at the procession's end, as has already been proclaimed, a holy sacrifice will be offered up jointly to Nuada, our most sacred god of the sun, and to Avellenau, the beloved goddess to our orchards, in order that we may furnish them with renewed power to quicken the growth of our crops. Hail the queen of the May!"

—Lord Summerisle, The Wicker Man (1973)

Literature

"It is all about the Sun. White Snow and Red Blood. And the Sun. Always has been."

— Albert, Hogfather, regarding the true meaning of Christmas

"By now, at least half of our people had turned to worship Quetzacthulhu as a god, and many sought to punish those of us who did not follow this dark new religion. Never before have I seen such a time, when man could sink so low. Fear, hate and hysteria reached unimaginable levels - to say nothing of despair. Fathers turned on sons, daughters turned on mothers. The old turned on the sick, the sick turned on the deformed, and the deformed turned on children. All would be taken to the top of the temples and feel the hot sting of the knife."

— Quetzacthulhu, by Set Sytes

"By this ritual of the bones, we are bonded together, all complicit, all united in the great family that is our class. Generations of men have learned their most valuable lesson from this little creature. The blood of the lower classes is also our life blood: without it, we cannot be great and, if we cannot be great, our country cannot be great. Now, three cheers for the Montague School."

— The Headmaster, The Ritual Of The Bones

Live Action TV

To win at war, make crops grow more,
To cure our kids when ill,
The sun to shine, this song to rhyme,
More victims we must kill!

— Horrible Histories, "Discaztec"

Music

Down through the ages, on down through the years
At springtime the Crow Man will always appear
To feed the earth with the blood of the chosen
To ensure life's circle for the following season
To replenish the earth by the taking of life
In the Crow Man's ritual blood sacrifice

— Pagan Altar, "The Crow Man"

He got away with murder for eight years with his noble position
Rais dabbled in occult while he eliminated local children
Rais sacrificed kids and the Black Magic summoning demons from hell
Gilles De Rais spent most of his money and used magicians to replenish his wealth

— Macabre, "The Black Knight"

"The chapel of ritual
Smells of dead human sacrifices from the altar bed
On this night of ritual, invoking our master
To procreate the unholy bastard"

—Ghost (Band), "Ritual"

Tabletop Games

Over the centuries, the cult of Ashur made constant sacrifice into the great well: when Ashur made war on other cities, they sacrificed prisoners and slaves; when Ashur was at peace, they stole livestock and children with which to make offerings. Victims were eviscerated and their blood collected in stone jars; organs were carefully removed, read for augury and tossed in the well to rest on top of previous victims' corpses. When no augury was needed, cultists tore sacrifices limb from limb with their hands and teeth, then threw the broken bodies into the well. Come nightfall, the collected blood would be poured over the still-warm corpses, brewing a draught of corruption and rotting flesh in which great swarms of flies buzzed and bred.

— Vampire: The Masquerade - Clanbook: Baali

Within two weeks, the Sleeper's powerful Presence enthralls tens of thousands of the city's mortal residents. They complete the excavation and repair of pre-Columbian pyramid-temples, then round up thousands of other capitalistas. Soon, the temples once more run red with the blood of sacrifice, night and day, never stopping. Mexico City is no more: Aztec Tenochtitlan has returned.

— Vampire: The Masquerade - Gehenna

Video Games

"He truly thought of himself as a Sun God. His mind was... broken. He believed that blood sacrifice would solve... well, everything."

— 14th Sun-King Avad, speaking of the 13th Sun-King Jiran, Horizon Zero Dawn

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