The Book of Mormon makes reference to dogs in a few places (Mosiah 12:2; Alma 16:10; Helaman 7:19; 3 Nephi 7:8; 14:6). Some errant critics have claimed that such is an anachronism in the Book of Mormon. Notwithstanding, ancient Mesoamerica did have various species of dogs (for e.g., the ancient Mayans domesticated dogs as a food source and hunting aide, and played a role in their religion).
Commenting on the sacrifice of dogs in Mesoamerica, one commentator wrote:
Sacrificed dogs also accompanied human burials in Mesoamerica (including at Tlatilco, among the Aztecs, at Teotihuacán, at Kaminaljuyu, Guatemala, at Xexocotlan, Oaxaca, at Uaxactum, and in numerous graves at Chupícuaro (Alfred V. Kidder, Jesse D. Jennings, and Edwin M. Shook, Excavations at Kaminaljuyu, Guatemala [Washington, D.C. Carnegie Institute of Washington, 1946], 155; Coe, Mexico from the Olmecs, 52-3). The Maya sacrificed dogs as burial retainers in the Early and Middle Classic but began to phase out the practice in the Late Classic period (Stephen F. Borhegyi, “Pre-Columbian Contacts—The Dryland Approach: The Impact and Influence of Teotihuacán Culture on the Pre-Columbian Civilizations of Mesoamerica,” Man Across the Sea: Problems of Pre-Columbian Contacts, ed. Carrol L. Riley, J. Charles Kelley, Campbell W. Pennington, and Robert L. Rand [Austin: Univ. of Texas Press, 1971], 101).
The Aztecs considered canine retainer sacrifices essential to the soul’s success in the afterlife. Without one a soul could not cross the underworld river Chicunanhuapan “Nine Waters.” Toward this end they raised dogs specifically to be sacrificed at the funeral and placed in the burial (Sahagún, Florentine Codex, Book 3: The Origin of the Gods, 43-4; Iguaz, “Mortuary Practices among the Aztecs,” 67-69).
Little skeletal matter has survived in the wet, acidic souls of Olman. However, the early pan-Mesoamerican nature of such dog burials suggests that its roots go back to the Olmecs, as does the use of this practice as the heavily Olmec-influenced site of Tlatilco (Kidder, et al., Excavations at Kaminaljuyu, Guatemala, 155).
Dog-God Psychopomp
The skeletal masks and effigies of the modern Mexican Día delos Muertos “Day of the Dead” celebrations derive from Xolotl, the god of the dead. The Aztecs often depicted this god as a dog or a god-headed man (Irene Nicholson, Mexican and Central American Mythology [London: Paul Hamlyn, 1967], 104; Benson and Bunson, Encyclopedia of Ancient Mesoamerica, 281), and Xolotl literally means “dog” (Nicholson, Mexican and Central American Mythology, 91). Similarly, among the Maya, the guardian of the dead was the anthropomorphic dog-god Pek (Ibid., p. 40). (S.C. Compton, Exodus Lost: An Inquiry into the Genesis of Civilization [S.C. Compton, 2006, 2010], 197-98)
The presence of "dogs" in the Book of Mormon is obviously not an anachronism in the text.
