| One of the more visible attempts to rationalize Aztec human sacrifice has argued that there were inadequate protein sources, other than human bodies, in the Valley of Mexico to support the Aztec period population. In part, this reflects a real historical condition: Central American peoples domesticated no large animals: dogs, and relatively late and only in the more northerly regions, turkeys were the primary farm animals. By the time Tenochtitlan had grown to cover the central Valley of Mexico, forest clearing had destroyed the local habitat for large game animals, such as deer and wild pigs. And the absence of draught animals of any kind meant that such foods could not be imported from long distances except as cargo on human backs, leading to a dilemma: the bearers had to be able to carry their own food as well as any products they sought to provide for others, in fact increasing the need for introduced protein by the margin of energy expended by the bearers. Nonetheless, these arguments can be severely overstated, and proponents have rarely felt the need to discuss the unintended consequences of the models they advocate. For example, by suggesting that sacrifice of male warriors at a high rate to provide meat was part of Aztec society, such models would have changed the sex ratio of the population as a whole, leaving larger numbers of women than men. Where, critics ask, is the evidence for these 'surplus' women-- unmarried adult daughters in households, multiple wives or concubines, orders of religious women with high membership: none of these were evident in Aztec society. And of course there were other sources of protein available: fish and birds from the lake (the objection is offered that these resources must have been minimal given pollution and salting-up caused by human settlements around the lake); perhaps most telling, the ability to provide sufficient protein entirely from vegetable sources, mixing beans and corn, the basic foods of the region for thousands of years before the Aztec state took form.
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