CANNIBALISM
Posted by anthonynorth on March 5, 2008
The Wild West provided many horror stories. But few can beat the fate of George Donner’s wagon train, taking new settlers to California. In August 1846 it took a wrong turn and got lost in the Sierra Nevada.
Starving, the 26 men, 14 women and 44 children decided on a new method of staying alive. They ate each other. The settlers became cannibals – and they are not alone.
CASES OF CANNIBALISM
During Napoleon’s retreat from Russia in 1812 some 12,000 men perished at Vilna in December. Over three days the cold and starvation got so much that many began to eat parts of the already dead.
Some four years later – in July 1816 – the French frigate Medusa ran aground off Senegal. Some 151 men built a raft and attempted to escape. Starvation, drowning and eventually murder led to ten surviving. Many of them had been eaten.
One of the worst modern cases concerned a Uruguayan plane en route to Chile in the winter of 1972, with 45 people onboard. It crashed in the Andes. Slowly they began to die of cold and starvation. After ten days it was decided to eat the recently dead in order to survive. Although eight died in an avalanche, only 19 of the original 45 survived.
CANNIBALS OF THE PAST
In the above cases we can see people turning to cannibalism in order to survive. But there is much more to cannibalism than this. The practice seems to be ancient indeed. Engravings of early Native Americans depict them eating limbs. Many African tribes were cannibal, bringing us the stereotypical image of placing the missionary in the pot.
Remains of Peking Man, discovered in 1972 near Choukoutein in China, and possibly half a million years old, show evidence of human skulls split open and their brains extracted.
The Christian St Jerome wrote of cannibalism in Scotland in the 4th century AD. Greek historian Strabo said that tribes in Ireland practised it. As a normal tribal practice, it survived longest in Borneo and the Amazon basin – areas where Christian missionaries were wary of going.
WHAT EATS US?
So fascinated have we been of the practice that writers such as Jean Jacques Rousseau and Jules Verne used cannibals as fictional heroes; and to this day we like a good fictional cannibal, Hannibal Lecter being an obvious example.
When survival isn’t an obvious reason for cannibalism, why did so many people indulge? The Missionary James Chambers decided, after studying people in New Guinea in the 1940s, that it was all down to taste. Human flesh simply tasted the best.
This agreed with 19th century explorer Alfred St Johnston, who argued the Fijians ate human flesh for its own sake. Studies of modern western cannibals offer another dimension.
FLESH EATING KILLERS
When Wisconsin necrophile Ed Gein was arrested in 1957 he was found to be sexually frustrated, and had been digging up new female corpses for years. As well as satisfying himself sexually, he devoured parts of them.
Wayne Boden, arrested in Calgary, Canada, in 1971, was dubbed as the ‘Vampire Rapist’. This is misleading. Raping and killing four women, most of whom he had already dated, he would bite deeply into breasts and neck. This is as close to cannibalism as you can get.
Many sexual assaults – usually caused by being ‘too rough’ with a sexual partner – can go as far as biting off nipples and swallowing them. At the lower end of the scale we have the love bite.
SEX AND SPIRITUALITY
Many researchers argue that this is a sexual form of absolute possession, and extremely sexually charged. It seems that many of us are closer to being cannibals than we dare to admit.
Cannibalism tended to die out in tribal societies when Christian missionaries arrived. Some researchers argue this is because these tribes suddernly understood the concept of the soul. However, this does not stand up to scrutiny. The Christian Eucharist involves symbolic cannibalism with bread and wine being symbolic of the body and blood of Christ.
A further problem is that virtually all tribal societies understood a form of soul. Indeed, ritualised cannibalism of this sort can be seen as ‘soul’ driven. In eating dead enemies, cannibalism can be seen as controlling the spirits of their enemies.
When eating relatives – especially older ones – it is as if the cannibal is imbibing the attributes of wisdom or courage of the ‘victim’. For instance, some Amazon tribes ate the bone ash of their kin – this is certainly not taste driven, but far more fundamental.
ENHANCING THE HUMAN
As late as 1654 a Silesian bandit was recorded eating an unborn baby’s heart to make himself stronger. Again, we have the hint that cannibalism is an enabling practice.
Hungarian anthropologist Oscar Maerth went so far as to argue that cannibalism was responsible for the birth in intelligent thought. Half a million years ago we became human through eating the brains of other humans, thus increasing our intelligence.
This idea seems absurd, yet an experiment with planarian worms is worrying. Taught to navigate a maze, the worm is killed and fed to another. This other worm is able to negotiate the maze immediately.
Even more interesting is the fact that some tadpoles eat adult members of their own species so that they grow to adulthood faster.
IT’S DEADLY, YOU KNOW
Cannibalism is a far more interesting subject than the horror of it suggests. The word itself is derived from the Caribs of South America and the Caribbean, who were said to eat people by their Spaniard conquerers.
Yet, with recent knowledge of Kuru – a spongiform brain disease exhibited by cannibals in the South Pacific in the 1950s – we are beginning to see that cannibalism is deadly.
This presents a paradox. If cannibalism was so widespread, how did tribal societies survive? If they all indulged, why did they not all die of a spongiform disease? Perhaps because only a select few may have become cannibals in any one tribe.
RITUAL PRACTICES
Most tribal ritual throughout the world was orchestrated by a hysteric known as a shaman. He has many other names such as witchdoctor or medicine man. These special people were chosen at an early age and brought up differently to other tribesmen. Usually natural schizophrenics, they could go into trances and speak with spirits.
Another essential practice of many tribal societies was sacrifice. In this way, they appeased the spirits. Yet could it be that early tribal societies realised that eating certain parts of the same species – brains, for instance – caused a strange affliction many years down the road, which we could identify as a spongyform?
If so, a stage of delerium would come where many of the attributes of shamanism would be seen. And with the end result being sacrifice, perhaps cannibalism was a real route through which a tribe communed with their gods.
(c) Anthony North, March 2008
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Nick Heard said
I commend you for writing this article, as it is a subject that interests me. However, you make several peculiar assumptions and broad claims which are either factually incorrect or untested generalisations.
First, I would like to refute your claim that Shamans are “…Usually natural schizophrenics”. I can only assume this is a leap on your part. Shamans tend to use some kind of psychoactive substance (ayahuasca in the Amazon, peyote in South Western USA and Northern Mexico etc.) as well as ritualised music to enter a trance. Not all Shamanistic practice involves the use of psychoactives, and it is probably better aligned to meditation than mental illness.
However, it is interesting to note that there is a psycho-spiritual crisis known as Shamanic illness (shamanistic initiatory crisis) in the west, which occurs in Shamanic cultures among boys becoming shamans. The boys will often sing and dance in an unconventional way or appear to be bothered by spirits. Rather than a sign of mental illness, these symptoms are taken as a sign that the boy should take the “office” of Shaman (Lukoff, 1992). Much as stigmata occurs almost exclusively in Catholic communities, shamanistic initiatory crisis occurs exclusively in shamanic cultures and should be viewed as a cultural idiosyncrasy (probably psychosomatic or heavily ritualised conditioning) rather than a psychological disorder.
In the section “Cannibals of the Past”, you mention cannibalism in Africa, where there is very little evidence of it ever having been ritualised or occurring to any significant degree in the last thousand years. You go on to associate this with the late 19th/early 20th century Western image of “the missionary in the pot”. This has far more to do with New Guinea and Melanesia than Africa. You state that as a “normal tribal practice” it survived longest in Borneo and the Amazon basin. There are two problems with this.
(1)While it is true that for some groups cannibalism was a normal part of life (among the Fore of New Guinea the women and children ritually ate the bodies of their dead) most cultures who engaged in cannibalism did so only in unusual circumstances (Aztec human sacrifice and cannibalism as a ritualised response to ecological and agricultural problems resulting from over-population [Harner 1977:119]).
(2)Ritualised cannibalism with specific cultural significance has, without any doubt, survived longest in New Guinea (comprising of the independent nation of Papua New Guinea and the Indonesian province/state of Irian Jaya). The degenerative disease of the nervous system, Kuru (which I was pleased to see you mention elsewhere) is only transmissible through the consumption of infected human brain tissue and was documented well into the 20th century. New Guinea is a mountainous, inaccessible place with few roads and thousands of isolated valleys. There are large tracts of the island still unexplored by Westerners or Asians. It is possible that in the more remote areas of the island, cannibalism in some form or another is still practiced by some groups (for example, the Korowai/Kolufo people).
I think it is very important to point out that archaeological evidence points to cannibalism having been ritually practiced at one point or another all over the world, from the Ancient Britons to Germanic tribes to Melanesians of New Guinea to Tierra Del Fuego in southern Patagonia. It is also important to mention that allegations of cannibalism have been used throughout history as slander or propaganda. European claims of cannibalism during the colonial period were often exaggerated or simply invented as a justification for oppression and cultural genocide (the Christianisation of the previously non-Christian world by state-sponsored missionaries).
Finally, I think it is very important when discussing cannibalism (particularly ritualised cannibalism with apparent cultural significance) to mention the reasons for cannibalism emerging as a ritual practice.
As I mentioned earlier, Aztec human sacrifice and attendant cannibalism were a ritualised consequence of overpopulation and agricultural disaster manifested in an extreme form of cultural materialism. As a result of the huge population in the Valley of Mexico, the decrease in wild game and the absence of a domesticated herbivore as a source of animal protein “…this made the ecological situation of the Aztecs and their neighbours unique among the worlds major civilisations…. Large scale cannibalism, disguised as sacrifice, was a natural consequence of this situation.” (Harner 1977). Over 250,000 people were sacrificed each year. The hearts were offered to the Sun God, but the arms and legs were eaten by the upper classes (commoners were forbidden to partake of human flesh). The contribution of this meat protein to the upper classes would have been significant. It also sustained the priests, keeping the status quo intact.
Harris has suggested that the rise of cannibalism in New Guinea and the rest of Melanesia was the culturally materialistic ritualisation of food shortage coincidental with European arrival. This is, however just an idea.
Cannibalism as a ritual practice always has a practical, cultural or religious significance. However, we can separate ritual cannibalism from Shamanism. Ritual cannibalism is the actualisation of the spiritual. Eating ones dead relatives among the Fore women and children may have been an attempt at self-regeneration (Lindenbaum 1972:251). This has little to do with the spirit world dealt with by the Shamans in shamanistic cultures, which is invisible to non-shamans.
I know I may seem like I’m nit picking, but it is very easy to get the wrong idea about cannibalism. Groups who engage(d) in cannibalism should not be looked upon as “savage” or “brutal” and certainly not as “primitive”. It can be argued that every superstition, every myth, every taboo, every ritual possessed by a culture is a cultural response to the pressures of their surrounding environment. It is important that youngsters reading articles about cannibalism should not be given any excuse to form negative views on indigenous cultures.
Keweno said
Just a small correction needed. The Donner party was lost in the Sierra Nevada, near what is now known as Donner Summit in Northern California. There is a monument and have been archeological digs at the site. I live approximately 90 miles from this site and have seen it and driven by it numerous times in my 30+ years living in Northern California.
anthonynorth said
Hi Nick,
Many thanks for this input. The man in the pot image was, as I pointed out, ‘stereotypical’, usually based on Hollywood interpretations, and should be taken in this way.
My reference to shamans as ‘schizophrenic’ is, in prehistoric tribal cultures, a possibility. Yes, many used hallucinogens, etc, but we can read too much into this, making it the only reason for shamanism.
Rather, anthropological studies suggest shamans were often picked as children after exhibiting natural ‘shamanistic’ abilities – i.e. communing with spirits, hysterical behaviour, etc. The parallel with schizophrenia is, I think, a possibility. As to it being a ‘mental illness’, in our society, yes, but in theirs? Probably not. More a gift.
You point out that I make ‘assumptions’. You then write, at one point:
‘Aztec human sacrifice and attendant cannibalism were a ritualised consequence of overpopulation and agricultural disaster manifested in an extreme form of cultural materialism.’
There are many other theories to account for this. To give this theory absolute validity is little more than an assumption in itself.
This said, you mention some valid points which add to the dscussion. Many thanks.
Hi Keweno,
Sloppy geographical research on my part, there. I have corrected that error. Many thanks for bringing it to my attention.
red pill junkie said
“…Although eight died in an avalanche, only 19 of the original 45 survived.”
This is true, but it has to be pointed out that the survivors never killed anyone to stay alive. The others that died after the crash fell victim of avalanches and because of the injures that could not be treated properly.
The comment made by Nick was inteesting, although I also have doubts that the cannibalistic habits of the Aztecs should be atributed to starvation and agricultural problems. Although I’m aware that some studies seem to indicate the general population had nutritional problems based on chemical analisis of bones, I’m also aware that the aztecs managed to make aazing things to exploit the surface of the Texcoco lake, by building artificial islands called “chinampas”, which are a form of rafts with several layers of organic top soil that can be used to grow produce. The chinampas were EXTREMELY productive, and not only tha, but the lake had also ample resources in birds like ducks and herons.
So overall, I believe there was a more ritualistic and POLITICAL reasons for canibalism among the aztecs. All the sacrifices they made were seeing as a means to sustain the Sun. And I believe the wars where warriors were taken captive to be sacrificed was instaured by a very important political figure called Tlacaelel during the reign of Moctezuma Xocoyotzin, so they were a (fairly) recent thing by the time the spaniards came.
Incidentally, there is a traditional dish in mexican cuisine called Pozole, made out of pork, which is said to be an aztec recipe that was made of human flesh back in those days. I don’t know if that’s true, but I sure LOVE pozole! 😉
anthonynorth said
Hi Red,
The reasons for Aztec ritual, sacrifice, cannibalism, etc, trouble me deeply in terms of their psychology. They produced such beautiful art, they were almost pragmatists in some of their social and engineering techniques, so why so barbaric, to the absolute extreme, in their rituals?
It is almost certain that their rituals were not theirs, but remembered from previous cultures. And there is a theory that they misunderstood such things as ‘cutting away the world’ in terms of meditation and spirituality, and took it literally, cutting away the body.
Could their sacrifice and cannibalism be due to a misunderstanding? I just can’t get it out of my mind that it could be. It’s the only thing that would take away this extreme contradiction.
red pill junkie said
That troubling contradiction is the very thing that makes us human Anthony. I believe that the cultures who display the greatest signs of affection and family bonds, are also the ones capable of the most brutal and bloody acts. This is certainly true from tribes in the Amazon forest to Sicilian mafias.
If you read aztec poetry, or the way they referred to their children (my little flower bud, my most precious jade stone) you could sense they have great love for their sons and daughters. However, the aztecs parents had also extremely brutal ways to punish disobedient children, like forcing them to inhale the fumes of burning chili peppers (water-boarding is nothing compare to that!).
Remember the movie Apocalypse now: “The horror… the horror…”
Larry Johnson said
I find that relating the “Christina Eucharist” in terms of cannibalism to be offensive. As a Christian, I have always been taught to think of it as the same way that a fetus receives nourishment from it’s mother or the way a baby receives nourishment from it’s mother. The Eucharist is nourishment to be given which in no way subtracts from the body like losing an arm or a leg would be.
Either I am right or we all started as cannibals from the time we were conceived. YUM YUM!!! What a thought!!!
Ciao,
Larry Johnson
anthonynorth said
Hi Red,
Very true. You’d think with my oft used words on contradiction and moderation, I’d know that 🙂
Still, an intriguing idea, what?
Hi Larry,
I play around with ideas, nothing more. It is how we’ve learnt things down the centuries.
Unfortunately, it sometimes comes out as offensive to some people. But that’s free speech for you.
Nick Heard said
Anthony, thanks for the reply. I take your point aboput Aztec human sacrifice.
Thank you for your clarification on what you meant concerning “schizophrenic” shamans, and apologies for my initial misunderstanding of it. It seems I very much agree with you on this. Part of what I was trying to say in my previous very much concerns the dangers of analysing other cultures based on western criteria, as was the norm in the colonial period. I rather like the idea that what is viewed as mental illness in our own culture is viewed as a gift in others. Indeed, it has been suggested that many medieval European visionaries would, today, be diagnosed with various psychological disorders.
It’s all terribly interesting.
Keep up the good work!
Nick Heard said
Red Phil Junkie makes a valid point. As Anthony mentioned, there are other scenarios that could have resulted in the huge levels of human sacrifice and cannibalism reported. Some have suggested that the claims were hugely exaggerated by the Spaniards in order to gain support for the conquest. Sahlins (1979) suggests that sacrifice was the communion of priest and victim, thus endowing the victim with a far greater spiritual significance than “ordinary” citizens. Ortiz de Montellano, one of the most notale critics of the cultural materialism argument suggests that only sacrificial victims and battle casualties could go to a heaven of the Sun God, to be reborn as hummingbirds and butterflies.
One fellow, Arens, makes the bold claim that cannibalism has never existed anywhere in the world as ritual practice. He states that it was only ever a fantasy which groups attributed to their neighbours. This, of course, disregards not only the global archaeological evidence but also the numerous people who have sat in amongst Fijian tribes, or the Kwaio people, or the Fore and countless other groups and watched them engage in various kinds of ritualised cannibalism. Perhaps some of this was colonial fabrication, but surely not all.
I accept that I presented the cultural materialistic view of Aztec sacrifice and cannibalism as fact, which was probably a little blinkered of me. It is, however, an explanation that I lean towards, even though I except that there are other possibilities.
anthonynorth said
Hi Nick,
Many thanks for your replies. Again, you’ve added to the duscussion. That is always appreciated.
lisa said
response to Nick Herd.
It would seem that any matter disscussed in an objective manner in the context of history will demand respect.
Dont forgat that a lot of us could not care less and just want to say eeer or feel better than others and lastly cement our similarities to feel better about our selves and our social group.
On the other hand some ill educated individuals may take the article to be authoritive…how do you feel about cannibalism?
Jay Stevens said
it as all just meat. eat up.
Carol_Noble said
A very very interesting discussion. Thanks to you all.
One thing I have learned through my research into the historical past of humans is that in ancient days, especially amongst groups which did not have dictators who tried to conquer their known world their lives were based on the practicalities of survival. Even when they developed great artistry, and wisdom, they still viewed it in a practical way, and the spiritual/religious aspect was properly integrated into their way of living.
For some people, it is necessary to accept that sacrifice has its place within the world. Today we may be too materialistic, and lack much spiritual and even practical attitudes to living which often results in a limited one-sided view of life. Over the past 2000 years we have tried to compartmentalise everything including spirituality!
In my view, in the past, people were concerned about getting enough food. They were also concerned about giving up something in return for the resources they needed to survive. I think they felt this was important. So many ancient groups believed in giving up a life, pouring the blood onto the land, drinking the blood of sacrificed people to pass on the goodness their blood held, etc. Ritualistic yes, but also practical. They, like many today, did not believe in getting something for nothing. “There is no such thing as a free lunch” is a very modern statement. This attitude is based on the idea of sacrifice, and often we “eat” the fruit of our negotiated endeavours. Perhaps these people in the past believed that if they ate the blood/meat of their human sacrifices they would be filled with a greater goodness?
I also find the idea of the Eucharist being a sacrifice, something that I was taught to believe when I was a young girl. So often I was told that the bread was Christ’s body, and the wine was Christ’s blood. It may be symbolic, but in essence what the Eucharist is about is a form of sacrifice, and by eating/drinking of Christ’s symbolic body we also, symbolically, become one with Christ. The fact that a more modern Christian believes it should be viewed as taking the food from a mother figure, is enlightening, and I certainly don’t mean to cause offense when I suggest that this, along with other aspects of Christianity, has changed its emphasis, not only over 2000 which is always a great possibility, but even during my almost sixty years of life. Certainly, when I was younger at Easter it was the sacrifice that Jesus gave, willingly, for all our souls, that was important. The resurrection was secondary to that. But then I was born soon after WWII so the idea of sacrifice was still prevalent in people’s minds.
The blood of many innocent people was spilled all over the world then, and the soil of this planet would have been nourished by it. Ås we have gained “mother’s nourishment” over the centuries from our planet, so “sacrifice” and blood being spilled, can be seen as a return of the life giving favour.
For those who eat the flesh as in what we call cannibalism it is often due to a need to survive and it may feel as if fate/the planet/god has left those who are desperate a means to survive.
I remember hearing about a group of tribesmen somewhere who when they buried one of their family would do so in a set family area, and as part of the ritual would take the skull of an ancestor and drink the blood of the newer dead person from the skull. I can’t verify it, but it was definitely reiterated on a documentary once so the whole idea stuck in my memory. I can’t say how accurate this statement is, but it has become a part of my knowledge base and made me realise how important it is to view what people did in ancient times as part of a very practical view of the world around them.
anthonynorth said
Hi Carol,
Yes, whatever belief system a society has, it is never seen as delusional, but vitally important and part of the practicalities of life.
So many today are often very smug that we know different to such delusions. Hopefully, in a thousand years time, when people look back on our present delusions, they will have learnt not to be so smug as us.
Carol_Noble said
Oh so true Anthony. I agree wholeheartedly.
Deepali M said
Cannibalism was and is still a norm in Africa – there are ample documents available online of it being widespread, and there shouldn’t be any justification or defense for it…slavery existed in Africa before any outsiders got there- children, women whoever was weaker had potential to be sold into slavery and or food. There is plenty of food in Africa minus the need for human flesh!! I’m disgusted by the fact that blacks today are cannibalists in US but in another form: they could careless about their children! Two out of Four black children grow up with one parent by 18 (Census 2002) Justice Dept: children born or raised by one parent are nine times more likely to end up in poverty or criminal justice system…US system is bled by these people, slavery ended over hundred years ago, it is in their genes to have total disregard for human life..I know there are good black people here in US, but hundreds of million $$ get spent on welfare programs –
anthonynorth said
Hi Deepali M,
Cannibalism and slavery have happened in all societies in the past, regardless of colour. Poverty and single-parenthood is not a black issue. It occurs anywhere where a segment of a population is without cultural meaning or is disenfranchised.
Welfare programs are the least a society owes such people, of any race or colour. Your use of ‘genes’ as justification is disgusting.
The impression of this being a mass problem is a gross exageration. It is like taking all the thousands of great comments I get on this blog, and classing your bile as the norm.
Deepali M said
Look in Yahoo and type Cannibalism Africa you’ll find thousands of articles, type Cannibalism India 15 (as many links just as there are Cannibalism America) except DIFFERENCE is the articles are endless in Africa, every tribe, every corner of Africa…from Liberia to Guinea….DON’T GIVE ME YOUR BILE HOG WASH that cannibalism was A NORM IN ANY OTHER SOCIETY as IT IS IN AFRICA…….Welfare programs r the least it owes? So the US system should be bled forever? Chilren raised by one parent are also 10x more likely to perpetuate the system so everyone has to pay for this???????forever????? are you sick??? Didn’t thousands die over slavery in Civil War, and now my tax dollars have to pay welfare moms forever and their criminal sons or fathers? It’s sick and you have nothing to say to defend but immature name calling, AND LOOK UP THE WORD NORM WHILE YOU ARE AT IT. CANNIBALISM HAS NEVER BEEN A “NORM” ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE WORLD NOR PREVALENT TO SUCH AN EXTENT AS IT IS IN AFRICA!
anthonynorth said
Hi Deepali M,
You load the dice straight away by comparing Africa to America and India. The latter two are countries, the former is a continent of dozens of countries with dozens of different cultures. No comparison.
As for search engine results, anyone can write an article on the net, and with scarestories arising from Africa, it is inevitable that there would be far more written about African cannibalism.
If you really want to research a subject, net searches are only a part. Books, my friend, where subjects are covered in the proper depth and backed up with research.
Chrissy said
I have been reading a lot about cannibalism and human sacrifice. I learned a lot from the book, “Cannibalism, Headhunting and Human Sacrifice in North America: A History Forgotten.”
The research is impeccable, the writing sparkling, and the evidence incontrovertible: headhunting and cannibalism were practiced by many of the native peoples of North America.
I learned a lot from George Feldman.
Josephine Shaffer said
My comment is this is how can a person knows he or is going to be consumed by another human?
Josephine Shaffer said
How can tell if i’m going to be the next meal of the day? Ok i know that i will have to strip naked in order to cooked.