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    • Researchers have discovered that Aztec “death whistles” do strange things to listeners
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    Researchers have discovered that Aztec “death whistles” do strange things to listeners

    Online Niel Posted on

    Recent research into the sounds of ancient Aztec skull-shaped whistles has revealed their profound psychoacoustic effects on modern listeners. For the first time, scientists examined the impact of these disturbing whistles on the brains of modern European volunteers, including two separate experiments with different samples of participants. The study was published in the journal Communications Psychology.

    Skull-shaped whistles were designed to produce a high-pitched, piercing, scream-like sound resulting from the collision of different air currents. They are commonly known as “death whistles”.

    Numerous Aztec skull whistles have been found in tombs dating from AD 1250 to 1521, with many preserved in archaeological collections around the world. The ancient Aztecs supposedly used death whistles in warfare to terrorize enemies on the battlefield. Death whistles are regularly found alongside the skeletons of sacrificial victims. The frequent presence of death whistles near the bones of sacrificed victims has led to the hypothesis that they may have had a ceremonial function, particularly in sacrificial rites and ceremonies related to the dead.

    Some scholars believe that the death whistles were meant to mimic the sharp winds of Mictlan, the Aztec underworld where the souls of sacrifices were believed to have descended. Other scholars hypothesize that the sound of the whistles may represent Ehecatl, the Aztec god of the wind, who, according to legend, created humanity from the bones of the deceased. It is hypothesized that skull-shaped whistles could have been used to frighten participants in human sacrifices or ritual ceremonies, as they could have been used to frighten human sacrifice or ceremonial audiences.

    The researchers recorded the participants’ neural and psychological responses to hearing the death scream produced by these whistles. By using different neuroimaging techniques, they identified specific brain activity in low-level cortical auditory regions. The sound of skull whistles puts the auditory cortex on high alert.

    Participants defined the sounds of skull-shaped whistles primarily as extremely negative, frightening, and aversive. Researchers have noticed that sounds can interfere with ongoing mental processes. Researchers have detected a difficulty in the brain to categorize sound, which fires the imagination as the brain struggles to identify its symbolic meaning.

    Skull-shaped whistle sounds have been shown to attract mental attention, affectively mimicking other aversive and startling sounds produced by nature and technology. The sound was perceived as “having a natural-artificial hybrid origin”.

    The authors of the study conclude that the use of whistles in ritual contexts, especially in sacrificial rites and funeral ceremonies, is very likely.

    This article was written in collaboration with generative AI company Alchemiq



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