The World of Cannibalism
One of the most misunderstood subjects that is hardly ever discussed
Historical accounts
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Historical accounts
The Carib tribe acquired a longstanding reputation as cannibals following the recording of their legends by Fr. Breton in the 17th century. There is some controversy[citation needed] about the accuracy of these records and the prevalence of actual cannibalism in the culture. According to a decree by Queen Isabella of Castile and also later under British colonial rule, slavery was considered to be illegal unless the people involved were so depraved that their conditions as slaves would be better than as free men. Demonstrations of cannibalistic tendencies were considered evidence of such depravity, and hence reports of cannibalism became widespread.[3] This legal requirement might have led to conquerors exaggerating the extent of cannibalistic practices, or inventing them altogether. The Korowai tribe of southeastern Papua is one of the last surviving tribes in the world engaging in cannibalism. In many wars in Africa, cannibalism is said to occur commonly, although in peacetime it does not appear to happen except for isolated cases involving traditional medicine. Marvin Harris has analysed cannibalism and other food taboos. He argued that it was common when humans lived in small bands, but disappeared in the transition to states, the Aztecs being an exception. A well known case of mortuary cannibalism is that of the Foré tribe in New Guinea which resulted in the spread of the disease Kuru. It is well documented and not seriously questioned by modern anthropologists, except by those scholars arguing that although post-mortem dismemberment was the practice during funeral rites, cannibalism was not. Marvin Harris theorizes that it happened during a famine period coincident with the arrival of Europeans and was rationalized as a religious rite. In pre-modern medicine, an explanation for cannibalism stated that it came about within a black acrimonious humour, which, being lodged in the linings of the ventricle, produced the voracity for human flesh. [4] [edit] Historical accounts Cannibalism was reported in Mexico, the flower wars of the Aztec Empire being considered as the most massive manifestation of cannibalism, but the Aztec accounts, written after the conquest, reported that human flesh was considered by itself to be of no value, and usually thrown away and replaced with turkey. There are only two Aztec accounts on this subject: one comes from the Ramirez codex, and the most elaborated account on this subject comes from Juan Bautista de Pomar, the grandson of Netzahualcoyotl, tlatoani of Texcoco. The accounts differ little. Juan Bautista wrote that after the sacrifice, the Aztec warriors received the body of the victim, then they boiled it to separate the flesh from the bones, then they would cut the meat in very little pieces, and send them to important people, even from other towns; the recipient would rarely eat the meat, since they considered it an honour, but the meat had no value by itself. In exchange, the warrior would get jewels, decorated blankets, precious feathers and slaves; the purpose was to encourage successful warriors. There were only two ceremonies a year where war captives were sacrificed. Although the Aztec empire has been called "The Cannibal Kingdom", there is no evidence in support of it being a widespread custom. Aztecs believed that there were man-eating tribes in the south of Mexico; the only illustration known showing an act of cannibalism shows an Aztec being eaten by a tribe from the south (Florentine Codex). In the siege of Tenochtitlan, there was a severe hunger in the city; people reportedly ate lizards, grass, insects, and mud from the lake, but there are no reports on cannibalism of the dead bodies. The friar Diego de Landa reported about Yucatán instances, Yucatan before and after the Conquest, translated from Relación de las cosas de Yucatan, 1566 (New York: Dover Publications, 1978: 4), and there have been similar reports by Purchas from Popayan, Colombia, and from the Marquesas Islands of Polynesia, where human flesh was called long-pig (Alanna King, ed., Robert Louis Stevenson in the South Seas, London: Luzac Paragon House, 1987: 45-50). It is recorded about the natives of the captaincy of Sergipe in Brazil, They eat human flesh when they can get it, and if a woman miscarries devour the abortive immediately. If she goes her time out, she herself cuts the navel-string with a shell, which she boils along with the secondine, and eats them both. (See E. Bowen, 1747: 532.) In Germany some experts like Emil Carthaus and Dr. Bruno Bernhard found 1891 signs of cannibalism in the caves at the Hönne (BC 1000 - 700). Cannibalism is reported in the Bible during the siege of Samaria (2 Kings 6:25-30). Two women made a pact to eat their children, but after the first mother cooked her child, the second mother ate it but refused to reciprocate by cooking her own child. Almost exactly the same story is reported by Flavius Josephus during the siege of Jerusalem by Rome in 70AD. Cannibalism was documented in Egypt during a famine caused by the failure of the Nile to flood for eight years (AD 1064-1072). Cannibalism was practiced by the participants of the First Crusade. Some of the crusaders fed on the bodies of their dead opponents after the capture of the Arab town of Ma'arrat al-Numan. [1] . Amin Malouf also discusses further cannibalism incidents on the march to Jerusalem, and to the efforts made to delete mention of these from western history. (Amin Maalouf, The Crusades through Arab Eyes. Schocken, 1989, ISBN 0805208984) In Europe during the Great Famine of 1315–1317, at a time when Dante was writing one of the most significant pieces of literature in western history and the Renaissance was just beginning, there were widespread reports of cannibalism throughout Europe. However, many historians have since denied these reports as fanciful and ambiguous. The earliest reliable account of cannibalism in North America was in the early 1600's, in Jamestown, VA. One man killed and salted his wife. In the Dutch rampjaar (disaster year) of 1672, when France and England during the Franco-Dutch War / Third Anglo-Dutch War attacked the Republic, Johan de Witt (a significant Dutch political figure) was killed by a shot in the neck; his naked body was hanged and mutilated and the heart was carved out to be exhibited. His brother was shot, stabbed, eviscerated alive, hanged naked, brained and partly eaten. An event occurring in the western New York territory ("Seneca Country") U.S.A., during 1687 was later described in this letter sent to France: “On the 13th (of July) about four o’clock in the afternoon, having passed through two dangerous defiles (narrow gorges), we arrived at the third where we were vigorously attacked by 800 Senecas, 200 of whom fired, wishing to attack our rear whilst the remainder of their force would attack our front, but the resistance they met produced such a great consternation that they soon resolved to fly. All our troops were so overpowered by the extreme heat and the long journey we had made that we were obliged to bivouac (camp) on the field until the morrow. We witnessed the painful Sight of the usual cruelties of the savages who cut the dead into quarters, as in slaughter houses, in order to put them into the pot (dinner); the greater number were opened while still warm that their blood might be drank. our rascally otaous (Ottawa Indians) distinguished themselves particularly by these barbarities and by their poltroonery (cowardice), for they withdrew from the combat;..." -- Canadian Governor, the Marquis de Denonville. Captain James Cook, the famous navigator, was killed in Hawai'i in 1779; it is strongly alleged that his body was ritually consumed. The survivors of the sinking of the French ship Medusa in 1816 resorted to cannibalism after four days adrift on a raft. After the sinking of the Whaleship Essex of Nantucket by a whale, on November 20, 1820, (an important source event for Herman Melville's Moby Dick) the survivors, in three small boats, resorted, by common consent, to cannibalism in order for some to survive [2]. See The Custom of the Sea. Sir John Franklin's lost polar expedition and the Donner Party are other examples of human cannibalism from the 1840s. In the 1870s, in the U.S. state of Colorado, a man named Alferd Packer was accused of killing and eating his travelling companions. He was later released due to a legal technicality, and maintained that he was innocent of the murders throughout his life. However, modern forensic evidence, unavailable during Packer's lifetime, indicates that he did indeed murder and/or eat several of his companions. The story of Alfred Packer was satirically told in the Trey Parker comedy/horror/musical film, Cannibal! The Musical, released in 1996 by Troma Studios. The case of R v. Dudley and Stephens (1884) 14 QBD 273 (QB) is an English case which is said to be one of the origins of the defense of necessity in modern common law. The case dealt with four crewmembers of an English yacht which were cast away in a storm some 1600 miles from the Cape of Good Hope. After several days one of the crew fell unconscious due to a combination of the famine and drinking sea-water. The others (one objecting) decided then to kill him and eat him. They were picked up four days later. The fact that not everyone had agreed to draw lots contravened The Custom of the Sea and was held to be murder. At the trial was the first recorded use of the defence of necessity. References to cannibalizing the enemy has also been seen in poetry written when China was repressed in the Song Dynasty. (See Man Jiang Hong) The Chinese hate-cannibalism was reported during WWII also.(Key Ray Chong:Cannibalism in China, 1990) Cannibalism was reported by at least one reliable witness, the journalist Neil Davis during the South East Asian wars of the 1960s and 1970s. Davis reported that Khmer (Cambodian) troops ritually ate portions of the slain enemy, typically the liver. However he, and many refugees, also report that cannibalism was practised non-ritually when there was no food to be found. This usually occurred when towns and villages were under Khmer Rouge control, and food was strictly rationed, leading to widespread starvation. Any civilian caught participating in cannibalism would have been immediately executed. [5] Cannibalism has been reported in several recent African conflicts, including the Second Congo War, and the civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Typically, this is apparently done in desperation, as during peacetime cannibalism is much less frequent. Even so, it is sometimes directed at certain groups believed to be relatively helpless, such as Congo Pygmies. It is also reported by some that African traditional healers sometimes use the body parts of children in their medicine. During the 1930s anecdotal accounts of cannibalism were reported from the Ukraine during the Holodomor. [3] On October 13, 1972, a Uruguayan rugby team flew across the Andes to play a game in Chile. The plane crashed near the border between Chile and Argentina. After several weeks of starvation and struggle for survival, the numerous survivors decided to eat the frozen bodies of the deceased in order to survive. They were rescued over two months later. See Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571. The 1993 film Alive tells the story of this ordeal. It has been reported by defectors and refugees that, at the height of the famine in the 1990's, cannibalism was sometimes practiced in North Korea. Médecins Sans Frontières, the international medical charity, supplied photographic and other documentary evidence of ritualised cannibal feasts among the participants in Liberia's internecine strife in the 1980s to representatives of Amnesty International who were on a fact-finding mission to the neighbouring state of Guinea. However, Amnesty International declined to publicise this material, the Secretary-General of the organization, Pierre Sane, stating at the time in an internal communication that "what they do with the bodies after human rights violations are committed is not part of our mandate or concern". The existence of cannibalism on a wide scale in Liberia and Sierra Leone was subsequently verified in video documentaries by Journeyman Pictures of London. In September 2006, Australian television crews from 60 Minutes and Today Tonight attempted to rescue a 6 year old boy who they believed would be ritually cannibalised by his tribe, the Korowai, from Papua, Indonesia.
Cannibalism by necessity
Cannibalism is also sometimes practiced as a last resort by people suffering from famine. In the US, it is commonly believed that the group of settlers known as the Donner party resorted to cannibalism while snowbound in the mountains for the winter. There are disputed claims that cannibalism was widespread during the famine in Ukraine in the 1930s, during the Siege of Leningrad in World War II, and during the Chinese Civil War and the Great Leap Forward in the People's Republic of China. It has been claimed that cannibalism was practiced by Japanese troops as recently as WWII in the Pacific theater.[6] A more recent example is of leaked stories from North Korean refugees of cannibalism practiced during and after a famine that occurred sometime between 1995 and 1997. [4] Some people claim cannibalism took place during the WWII siege of Leningrad. [5] [6] [7] Lowell Thomas records the cannibalisation of some of the surviving crew members of the Dumaru after the ship exploded and sank during the First World War in his book, The Wreck of the Dumaru (1930). Documentary and forensic evidence supports eyewitness accounts of cannibalism by Japanese troops during World War II. This practice was resorted to when food ran out, with Japanese soldiers killing and eating each other when enemy civilians were not available. In other cases, enemy soldiers were executed and then dissected. A well-documented case occurred in Chichi Jima in 1945, when Japanese soldiers killed and ate eight downed American airmen. This case was investigated in 1947 in a war-crimes trial, and of 30 Japanese soldiers prosecuted, five (Maj. Matoba, Gen. Tachibana, Adm. Mori, Capt. Yoshii and Dr. Teraki) were found guilty and hanged. When Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 crashed into the Andes on October 13, 1972, the survivors resorted to eating the deceased during their 72 days in the mountains. Their story was later recounted in the books Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors and Miracle in the Andes as well as the film Alive by Frank Marshall and the documentary Alive: 20 Years Later.
"Cannibalism" as cultural libel
Unsubstantiated reports of cannibalism disproportionately relate cases of cannibalism among cultures that are already otherwise despised, feared, or are little known. In antiquity, Greek reports of anthropophagy were related to distant, non-Hellenic barbarians, or else relegated in myth to the 'primitive' chthonic world that preceded the coming of the Olympian gods: see the explicit rejection of human sacrifice in the cannibal feast prepared for the Olympians by Tantalus of his son Pelops. In 1994, printed booklets reported that in a Yugoslavian concentration camp of Manjaca the Bosnian refugees were forced to eat each other's bodies. The reports were false. William Arens, author of The Man-Eating Myth: Anthropology and Anthropophagy (New York : Oxford University Press, 1979; ISBN 0-19-502793-0), questions the credibility of reports of cannibalism and argues that the description by one group of people of another people as cannibals is a consistent and demonstrable ideological and rhetorical device to establish perceived cultural superiority. Arens bases his thesis on a detailed analysis of numerous "classic" cases of cultural cannibalism cited by explorers, missionaries, and anthropologists. His findings were that many were steeped in racism, unsubstantiated, or based on second-hand or hearsay evidence. In combing the literature he could not find a single credible eye-witness account. And, as he points out, the hallmark of ethnography is the observation of a practice prior to description. In the end he concluded that cannibalism was not the widespread prehistoric practice it was claimed to be; that anthropologists were too quick to pin the cannibal label on a group based not on responsible research but on our own culturally-determined pre-conceived notions, often motivated by a need to exoticize. He wrote: "Anthropologists have made no serious attempt to disabuse the public of the widespread notion of the ubiquity of anthropophagists. … in the deft hands and fertile imaginations of anthropologists, former or contemporary anthropophagists have multiplied with the advance of civilization and fieldwork in formerly unstudied culture areas. …The existence of man-eating peoples just beyond the pale of civilization is a common ethnographic suggestion." Aren's findings are controversial, and his argument is often mischaracterized as "cannibals don't and never did exist," when in the end the book is actually a call for a more responsible and reflexive approach to anthropological research. At any rate, the book ushered in an era of rigorous combing of the cannibalism literature. By Aren's later admission, some cannibalism claims came up short, others were reinforced. Conversely, Michel de Montaigne's essay "Of cannibals" introduced a new multicultural note in European civilization. Montaigne wrote that "one calls 'barbarism' whatever he is not accustomed to." By using a title like that and describing a fair indigean society, Montaigne may wished to provoke a surprise in the reader of his Essays. Similarly, Japanese scholars (e.g. Kuwabara Jitsuzo) branded the Chinese culture as cannibalistic in certain propagandistic works — which served as ideological justification for the assumed superiority of the Japanese during World War II.
Sexually motivated cannibalism
The wide use of the Internet has highlighted that thousands of people harbor sexualized cannibalistic fantasies. Discussion forums and user groups exist for the exchange of pictures and stories of such fantasies. A good example of such fantasies is provided by the works of Dolcett. Typically, people in such forums fantasize about eating or being eaten by members of their sexually preferred gender. As such, the cannibalism fetish or paraphilia is one of the most extreme sexual fetishes. Very rarely do such fetishes leave the realm of fantasies, most being satisfied with pornographic stories, fetish art or photo modification (or completely computer generated images), with some enacting their fantasies in sexual roleplaying. There have however been extreme cases of real life sexualized cannibalism, such as those of the serial killers Albert Fish, Ed Gein, Jeffrey Dahmer, Sascha Spesiwtsew, Fritz Haarmann ("the Butcher of Hannover"), Andrei Chikatilo, "The Soviet Hannibal Lecter" and Armin Meiwes. Another well-known case involved a Japanese student of English literature, Issei Sagawa, who grew fond of Renée Hartevelt, a 25-year-old Dutch woman he met while studying at the Sorbonne Academy in Paris in 1981. He eventually murdered and ate her, writing a graphic yet poignant description of the act. Declared unfit to stand trial in France, his wealthy father had him extradited back to Japan where he eventually regained his freedom. The way he reveled in what he did made him a national celebrity, and he has written several bestselling novels and continues to write a nationally syndicated column. The story inspired the 1981 Stranglers song "La Folie" and the 1983 Rolling Stones song "Too Much Blood". In December 2002, a highly unusual case was uncovered in the town of Rotenburg in Hesse, Germany. In 2001 Armin Meiwes, a 41-year-old computer administrator, had posted messages like his more recent ones (see messages) in Internet newsgroups on the subject of cannibalism, repeatedly looking for "a young Boy, between 18 and 25 y/o" to butcher. At least one of his requests was successful: Jürgen Brandes, another computer administrator, offered himself to be slaughtered. The two men agreed on a meeting. Jürgen Brandes was, with his consent, killed and partially eaten by Meiwes, who, as a result, was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in jail for manslaughter (Totschlag, second-degree murder). In April 2005, the German Federal Court of Justice ordered a retrial upon appeal of the prosecution, and in May 2006 Meiwes was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. The band Rammstein took up this case in the song Mein Teil. This was not the first consensual killing mediated through the Internet (see Sharon Lopatka), but it is the first such known case of consensual cannibalism. The online environment Second Life features several user-created areas dedicated to sexual cannibalism. [edit] Cannibal themes in mythology and religion Cannibalism features prominently in many mythologies; cannibal ogresses appear in folklore around the world, the witch in Hansel and Gretel being a popular example. A number of stories in Greek mythology involve cannibalism, in particular cannibalism of close family members, for example the stories of Thyestes, Tereus and especially Cronus. The story of Tantalus also parallels this. These mythologies inspired Shakespeare's cannibalism scene in Titus Andronicus. The opening of Hell, the Zoroastrian contribution to Western religious thought, is a mouth. According to Catholic dogma, bread and wine are transubstantiated into the real flesh and blood of Jesus, which are then distributed by the priest to the faithful. The accusations of cannibalism made against ancient Christians may reflect earlier versions of such beliefs but should also be understood as a form of libel (see above), expressing anxiety and concern about a new and somewhat secretive religious group. Christians in turn accused their opponents, such as the Gnostic sect of the Borborites, of cannibalism and ritual abuse. In the Qur'an Backbiters are stigmatized as those who eat the flesh of the dead body of the person they backbited.
Cannibalism as "sympathetic magic"
This is a subset of the general idea of eating a totem to absorb its distinctive power, much as a tiger penis might be eaten to promote virility. By eating our enemy, we take his power into ourselves. Some also consider this idea to be at the root of the Catholic dogma of transubstantiation: to acquire divinity (immortality, sinlessnes) by absorption, by eating the flesh of God. (However, the more likely Biblical theological and historical roots of this are pertaining to the sacrificial offering of Christ and its reference to the representations in the Jewish Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which was being celebrated during the Last Supper.)
Non-cannibalistic consumption of human-derived substances
It is interesting to note that currently the cheapest source of material from which food grade L-cysteine may be purified in high yield is human hair. Its use in food products is widespread worldwide. Some debate that consuming L-cysteine derived from human hair is not actually cannibalism. Some believe cannibalism occurs any time any human body part is intentionally harvested, prepared, and consumed as a food. Few people identify the compulsion to gnaw and bite nails or pieces of skin from fingers as cannibalism, because it is not the intentional harvest of a food item. Similarly, intentionally consuming one's own flesh or body parts, such as sucking blood from wounds, is generally not seen to be cannibalism; ingesting one's own blood from an unintentional lesion such as a nose-bleed or an ulcer is clearly not intentional harvesting and consequently not cannibalistic. It is possible for some mothers to gain possession of their afterbirth or placenta once their child is born. Some people eat this placenta material as a delicacy. See placentophagy. There are many accounts of drinking urine and coprophagia. These may be toward fetishistic, allegedly homeopathic, or survival-based ends. Aboard space flights and the International Space Station, urine is regularly filtered for drinking water.
Non-human cannibalism
Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded for more than 1500 species (this estimate is from 1981, and likely a gross underestimation). In sexual cannibalism as recorded for example for the female red-back spider, black widow spider, praying mantis, and scorpion the female eats the male after mating (though the frequency of this is often overstated). The more common form of cannibalism is size structured cannibalism, in which large individuals consume smaller ones. In such size-structured populations, cannibalism can be responsible for 8% (Belding Ground Squirrel) to 95% (dragonfly larvae) of the total mortality, making it a significant and important factor for population and community dynamics. Such size structured cannibalism has commonly been observed in the wild for a variety of taxa, including octopus, bats, toads, fish, monitor lizards, red-backed salamanders and several stream salamanders, crocodiles, spiders, crustaceans, birds (crows, barred owls), mammals, and a vast number of insects, such as dragonflies, diving beetles, back swimmers, water striders, flour beetles, caddisflies and many more. Unlike previously believed, cannibalism is not just a result of extreme food shortage or artificial conditions, but commonly occurs under natural conditions in a variety of species. In fact, scientists have acknowledged that it is ubiquitous in natural communities. Cannibalism seems to be especially prevalent in aquatic communities, in which up to ~90% of the organisms engage in cannibalism at some point of the life cycle. Cannibalism is also not restricted to carnivorous species, but is commonly found in herbivores and detritivores. Another common form of cannibalism is infanticide. Classical examples include the chimpanzees where groups of adult males have been observed to attack and consume their infants, and lions, where adult males commonly kill infants when they take over a new harem after replacing the previous dominant males.
Cannibalism in popular culture
Cannibalism is a recurring theme in literature and film. Well-known examples include Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus; Hannibal Lecter, a fictional character created by Thomas Harris in the 1983 novel Red Dragon who also appeared in Harris's 1988 The Silence of the Lambs and 1999 Hannibal; the Texas Chainsaw Massacre series, which features cannibalistic killer Leatherface and his murderous family; and Delicatessen, a 1993 black comedy film written and directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro. Famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera claimed in his autobiography that during a period in 1904, he and his companions ate "nothing but cadavers" purchased from the local morgue. Rivera was fully aware of the shock value of this tale. Rivera claims that he thought cannibalism a way of the future, remarking "I believe that when man evolves a civilization higher than the mechanized but still primitive one he has now, the eating of human flesh will be sanctioned. For then man will have thrown off all of his superstitions and irrational taboos." Readers may be reminded of the savage satire of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal. Oswald de Andrade's Cannibal Manifesto was an influential work of Brazilian modernism, comparing literal cannibalism to the postcolonial reappropriation of European culture, art, and ideas.
Historical accounts
The Carib tribe acquired a longstanding reputation as cannibals following the recording of their legends by Fr. Breton in the 17th century. There is some controversy[citation needed] about the accuracy of these records and the prevalence of actual cannibalism in the culture. According to a decree by Queen Isabella of Castile and also later under British colonial rule, slavery was considered to be illegal unless the people involved were so depraved that their conditions as slaves would be better than as free men. Demonstrations of cannibalistic tendencies were considered evidence of such depravity, and hence reports of cannibalism became widespread.[3] This legal requirement might have led to conquerors exaggerating the extent of cannibalistic practices, or inventing them altogether. The Korowai tribe of southeastern Papua is one of the last surviving tribes in the world engaging in cannibalism. In many wars in Africa, cannibalism is said to occur commonly, although in peacetime it does not appear to happen except for isolated cases involving traditional medicine. Marvin Harris has analysed cannibalism and other food taboos. He argued that it was common when humans lived in small bands, but disappeared in the transition to states, the Aztecs being an exception. A well known case of mortuary cannibalism is that of the Foré tribe in New Guinea which resulted in the spread of the disease Kuru. It is well documented and not seriously questioned by modern anthropologists, except by those scholars arguing that although post-mortem dismemberment was the practice during funeral rites, cannibalism was not. Marvin Harris theorizes that it happened during a famine period coincident with the arrival of Europeans and was rationalized as a religious rite. In pre-modern medicine, an explanation for cannibalism stated that it came about within a black acrimonious humour, which, being lodged in the linings of the ventricle, produced the voracity for human flesh. [4] [edit] Historical accounts Cannibalism was reported in Mexico, the flower wars of the Aztec Empire being considered as the most massive manifestation of cannibalism, but the Aztec accounts, written after the conquest, reported that human flesh was considered by itself to be of no value, and usually thrown away and replaced with turkey. There are only two Aztec accounts on this subject: one comes from the Ramirez codex, and the most elaborated account on this subject comes from Juan Bautista de Pomar, the grandson of Netzahualcoyotl, tlatoani of Texcoco. The accounts differ little. Juan Bautista wrote that after the sacrifice, the Aztec warriors received the body of the victim, then they boiled it to separate the flesh from the bones, then they would cut the meat in very little pieces, and send them to important people, even from other towns; the recipient would rarely eat the meat, since they considered it an honour, but the meat had no value by itself. In exchange, the warrior would get jewels, decorated blankets, precious feathers and slaves; the purpose was to encourage successful warriors. There were only two ceremonies a year where war captives were sacrificed. Although the Aztec empire has been called "The Cannibal Kingdom", there is no evidence in support of it being a widespread custom. Aztecs believed that there were man-eating tribes in the south of Mexico; the only illustration known showing an act of cannibalism shows an Aztec being eaten by a tribe from the south (Florentine Codex). In the siege of Tenochtitlan, there was a severe hunger in the city; people reportedly ate lizards, grass, insects, and mud from the lake, but there are no reports on cannibalism of the dead bodies. The friar Diego de Landa reported about Yucatán instances, Yucatan before and after the Conquest, translated from Relación de las cosas de Yucatan, 1566 (New York: Dover Publications, 1978: 4), and there have been similar reports by Purchas from Popayan, Colombia, and from the Marquesas Islands of Polynesia, where human flesh was called long-pig (Alanna King, ed., Robert Louis Stevenson in the South Seas, London: Luzac Paragon House, 1987: 45-50). It is recorded about the natives of the captaincy of Sergipe in Brazil, They eat human flesh when they can get it, and if a woman miscarries devour the abortive immediately. If she goes her time out, she herself cuts the navel-string with a shell, which she boils along with the secondine, and eats them both. (See E. Bowen, 1747: 532.) In Germany some experts like Emil Carthaus and Dr. Bruno Bernhard found 1891 signs of cannibalism in the caves at the Hönne (BC 1000 - 700). Cannibalism is reported in the Bible during the siege of Samaria (2 Kings 6:25-30). Two women made a pact to eat their children, but after the first mother cooked her child, the second mother ate it but refused to reciprocate by cooking her own child. Almost exactly the same story is reported by Flavius Josephus during the siege of Jerusalem by Rome in 70AD. Cannibalism was documented in Egypt during a famine caused by the failure of the Nile to flood for eight years (AD 1064-1072). Cannibalism was practiced by the participants of the First Crusade. Some of the crusaders fed on the bodies of their dead opponents after the capture of the Arab town of Ma'arrat al-Numan. [1] . Amin Malouf also discusses further cannibalism incidents on the march to Jerusalem, and to the efforts made to delete mention of these from western history. (Amin Maalouf, The Crusades through Arab Eyes. Schocken, 1989, ISBN 0805208984) In Europe during the Great Famine of 1315–1317, at a time when Dante was writing one of the most significant pieces of literature in western history and the Renaissance was just beginning, there were widespread reports of cannibalism throughout Europe. However, many historians have since denied these reports as fanciful and ambiguous. The earliest reliable account of cannibalism in North America was in the early 1600's, in Jamestown, VA. One man killed and salted his wife. In the Dutch rampjaar (disaster year) of 1672, when France and England during the Franco-Dutch War / Third Anglo-Dutch War attacked the Republic, Johan de Witt (a significant Dutch political figure) was killed by a shot in the neck; his naked body was hanged and mutilated and the heart was carved out to be exhibited. His brother was shot, stabbed, eviscerated alive, hanged naked, brained and partly eaten. An event occurring in the western New York territory ("Seneca Country") U.S.A., during 1687 was later described in this letter sent to France: “On the 13th (of July) about four o’clock in the afternoon, having passed through two dangerous defiles (narrow gorges), we arrived at the third where we were vigorously attacked by 800 Senecas, 200 of whom fired, wishing to attack our rear whilst the remainder of their force would attack our front, but the resistance they met produced such a great consternation that they soon resolved to fly. All our troops were so overpowered by the extreme heat and the long journey we had made that we were obliged to bivouac (camp) on the field until the morrow. We witnessed the painful Sight of the usual cruelties of the savages who cut the dead into quarters, as in slaughter houses, in order to put them into the pot (dinner); the greater number were opened while still warm that their blood might be drank. our rascally otaous (Ottawa Indians) distinguished themselves particularly by these barbarities and by their poltroonery (cowardice), for they withdrew from the combat;..." -- Canadian Governor, the Marquis de Denonville. Captain James Cook, the famous navigator, was killed in Hawai'i in 1779; it is strongly alleged that his body was ritually consumed. The survivors of the sinking of the French ship Medusa in 1816 resorted to cannibalism after four days adrift on a raft. After the sinking of the Whaleship Essex of Nantucket by a whale, on November 20, 1820, (an important source event for Herman Melville's Moby Dick) the survivors, in three small boats, resorted, by common consent, to cannibalism in order for some to survive [2]. See The Custom of the Sea. Sir John Franklin's lost polar expedition and the Donner Party are other examples of human cannibalism from the 1840s. In the 1870s, in the U.S. state of Colorado, a man named Alferd Packer was accused of killing and eating his travelling companions. He was later released due to a legal technicality, and maintained that he was innocent of the murders throughout his life. However, modern forensic evidence, unavailable during Packer's lifetime, indicates that he did indeed murder and/or eat several of his companions. The story of Alfred Packer was satirically told in the Trey Parker comedy/horror/musical film, Cannibal! The Musical, released in 1996 by Troma Studios. The case of R v. Dudley and Stephens (1884) 14 QBD 273 (QB) is an English case which is said to be one of the origins of the defense of necessity in modern common law. The case dealt with four crewmembers of an English yacht which were cast away in a storm some 1600 miles from the Cape of Good Hope. After several days one of the crew fell unconscious due to a combination of the famine and drinking sea-water. The others (one objecting) decided then to kill him and eat him. They were picked up four days later. The fact that not everyone had agreed to draw lots contravened The Custom of the Sea and was held to be murder. At the trial was the first recorded use of the defence of necessity. References to cannibalizing the enemy has also been seen in poetry written when China was repressed in the Song Dynasty. (See Man Jiang Hong) The Chinese hate-cannibalism was reported during WWII also.(Key Ray Chong:Cannibalism in China, 1990) Cannibalism was reported by at least one reliable witness, the journalist Neil Davis during the South East Asian wars of the 1960s and 1970s. Davis reported that Khmer (Cambodian) troops ritually ate portions of the slain enemy, typically the liver. However he, and many refugees, also report that cannibalism was practised non-ritually when there was no food to be found. This usually occurred when towns and villages were under Khmer Rouge control, and food was strictly rationed, leading to widespread starvation. Any civilian caught participating in cannibalism would have been immediately executed. [5] Cannibalism has been reported in several recent African conflicts, including the Second Congo War, and the civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Typically, this is apparently done in desperation, as during peacetime cannibalism is much less frequent. Even so, it is sometimes directed at certain groups believed to be relatively helpless, such as Congo Pygmies. It is also reported by some that African traditional healers sometimes use the body parts of children in their medicine. During the 1930s anecdotal accounts of cannibalism were reported from the Ukraine during the Holodomor. [3] On October 13, 1972, a Uruguayan rugby team flew across the Andes to play a game in Chile. The plane crashed near the border between Chile and Argentina. After several weeks of starvation and struggle for survival, the numerous survivors decided to eat the frozen bodies of the deceased in order to survive. They were rescued over two months later. See Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571. The 1993 film Alive tells the story of this ordeal. It has been reported by defectors and refugees that, at the height of the famine in the 1990's, cannibalism was sometimes practiced in North Korea. Médecins Sans Frontières, the international medical charity, supplied photographic and other documentary evidence of ritualised cannibal feasts among the participants in Liberia's internecine strife in the 1980s to representatives of Amnesty International who were on a fact-finding mission to the neighbouring state of Guinea. However, Amnesty International declined to publicise this material, the Secretary-General of the organization, Pierre Sane, stating at the time in an internal communication that "what they do with the bodies after human rights violations are committed is not part of our mandate or concern". The existence of cannibalism on a wide scale in Liberia and Sierra Leone was subsequently verified in video documentaries by Journeyman Pictures of London. In September 2006, Australian television crews from 60 Minutes and Today Tonight attempted to rescue a 6 year old boy who they believed would be ritually cannibalised by his tribe, the Korowai, from Papua, Indonesia.
Cannibalism by necessity
Cannibalism is also sometimes practiced as a last resort by people suffering from famine. In the US, it is commonly believed that the group of settlers known as the Donner party resorted to cannibalism while snowbound in the mountains for the winter. There are disputed claims that cannibalism was widespread during the famine in Ukraine in the 1930s, during the Siege of Leningrad in World War II, and during the Chinese Civil War and the Great Leap Forward in the People's Republic of China. It has been claimed that cannibalism was practiced by Japanese troops as recently as WWII in the Pacific theater.[6] A more recent example is of leaked stories from North Korean refugees of cannibalism practiced during and after a famine that occurred sometime between 1995 and 1997. [4] Some people claim cannibalism took place during the WWII siege of Leningrad. [5] [6] [7] Lowell Thomas records the cannibalisation of some of the surviving crew members of the Dumaru after the ship exploded and sank during the First World War in his book, The Wreck of the Dumaru (1930). Documentary and forensic evidence supports eyewitness accounts of cannibalism by Japanese troops during World War II. This practice was resorted to when food ran out, with Japanese soldiers killing and eating each other when enemy civilians were not available. In other cases, enemy soldiers were executed and then dissected. A well-documented case occurred in Chichi Jima in 1945, when Japanese soldiers killed and ate eight downed American airmen. This case was investigated in 1947 in a war-crimes trial, and of 30 Japanese soldiers prosecuted, five (Maj. Matoba, Gen. Tachibana, Adm. Mori, Capt. Yoshii and Dr. Teraki) were found guilty and hanged. When Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 crashed into the Andes on October 13, 1972, the survivors resorted to eating the deceased during their 72 days in the mountains. Their story was later recounted in the books Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors and Miracle in the Andes as well as the film Alive by Frank Marshall and the documentary Alive: 20 Years Later.
"Cannibalism" as cultural libel
Unsubstantiated reports of cannibalism disproportionately relate cases of cannibalism among cultures that are already otherwise despised, feared, or are little known. In antiquity, Greek reports of anthropophagy were related to distant, non-Hellenic barbarians, or else relegated in myth to the 'primitive' chthonic world that preceded the coming of the Olympian gods: see the explicit rejection of human sacrifice in the cannibal feast prepared for the Olympians by Tantalus of his son Pelops. In 1994, printed booklets reported that in a Yugoslavian concentration camp of Manjaca the Bosnian refugees were forced to eat each other's bodies. The reports were false. William Arens, author of The Man-Eating Myth: Anthropology and Anthropophagy (New York : Oxford University Press, 1979; ISBN 0-19-502793-0), questions the credibility of reports of cannibalism and argues that the description by one group of people of another people as cannibals is a consistent and demonstrable ideological and rhetorical device to establish perceived cultural superiority. Arens bases his thesis on a detailed analysis of numerous "classic" cases of cultural cannibalism cited by explorers, missionaries, and anthropologists. His findings were that many were steeped in racism, unsubstantiated, or based on second-hand or hearsay evidence. In combing the literature he could not find a single credible eye-witness account. And, as he points out, the hallmark of ethnography is the observation of a practice prior to description. In the end he concluded that cannibalism was not the widespread prehistoric practice it was claimed to be; that anthropologists were too quick to pin the cannibal label on a group based not on responsible research but on our own culturally-determined pre-conceived notions, often motivated by a need to exoticize. He wrote: "Anthropologists have made no serious attempt to disabuse the public of the widespread notion of the ubiquity of anthropophagists. … in the deft hands and fertile imaginations of anthropologists, former or contemporary anthropophagists have multiplied with the advance of civilization and fieldwork in formerly unstudied culture areas. …The existence of man-eating peoples just beyond the pale of civilization is a common ethnographic suggestion." Aren's findings are controversial, and his argument is often mischaracterized as "cannibals don't and never did exist," when in the end the book is actually a call for a more responsible and reflexive approach to anthropological research. At any rate, the book ushered in an era of rigorous combing of the cannibalism literature. By Aren's later admission, some cannibalism claims came up short, others were reinforced. Conversely, Michel de Montaigne's essay "Of cannibals" introduced a new multicultural note in European civilization. Montaigne wrote that "one calls 'barbarism' whatever he is not accustomed to." By using a title like that and describing a fair indigean society, Montaigne may wished to provoke a surprise in the reader of his Essays. Similarly, Japanese scholars (e.g. Kuwabara Jitsuzo) branded the Chinese culture as cannibalistic in certain propagandistic works — which served as ideological justification for the assumed superiority of the Japanese during World War II.
Sexually motivated cannibalism
The wide use of the Internet has highlighted that thousands of people harbor sexualized cannibalistic fantasies. Discussion forums and user groups exist for the exchange of pictures and stories of such fantasies. A good example of such fantasies is provided by the works of Dolcett. Typically, people in such forums fantasize about eating or being eaten by members of their sexually preferred gender. As such, the cannibalism fetish or paraphilia is one of the most extreme sexual fetishes. Very rarely do such fetishes leave the realm of fantasies, most being satisfied with pornographic stories, fetish art or photo modification (or completely computer generated images), with some enacting their fantasies in sexual roleplaying. There have however been extreme cases of real life sexualized cannibalism, such as those of the serial killers Albert Fish, Ed Gein, Jeffrey Dahmer, Sascha Spesiwtsew, Fritz Haarmann ("the Butcher of Hannover"), Andrei Chikatilo, "The Soviet Hannibal Lecter" and Armin Meiwes. Another well-known case involved a Japanese student of English literature, Issei Sagawa, who grew fond of Renée Hartevelt, a 25-year-old Dutch woman he met while studying at the Sorbonne Academy in Paris in 1981. He eventually murdered and ate her, writing a graphic yet poignant description of the act. Declared unfit to stand trial in France, his wealthy father had him extradited back to Japan where he eventually regained his freedom. The way he reveled in what he did made him a national celebrity, and he has written several bestselling novels and continues to write a nationally syndicated column. The story inspired the 1981 Stranglers song "La Folie" and the 1983 Rolling Stones song "Too Much Blood". In December 2002, a highly unusual case was uncovered in the town of Rotenburg in Hesse, Germany. In 2001 Armin Meiwes, a 41-year-old computer administrator, had posted messages like his more recent ones (see messages) in Internet newsgroups on the subject of cannibalism, repeatedly looking for "a young Boy, between 18 and 25 y/o" to butcher. At least one of his requests was successful: Jürgen Brandes, another computer administrator, offered himself to be slaughtered. The two men agreed on a meeting. Jürgen Brandes was, with his consent, killed and partially eaten by Meiwes, who, as a result, was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in jail for manslaughter (Totschlag, second-degree murder). In April 2005, the German Federal Court of Justice ordered a retrial upon appeal of the prosecution, and in May 2006 Meiwes was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. The band Rammstein took up this case in the song Mein Teil. This was not the first consensual killing mediated through the Internet (see Sharon Lopatka), but it is the first such known case of consensual cannibalism. The online environment Second Life features several user-created areas dedicated to sexual cannibalism. [edit] Cannibal themes in mythology and religion Cannibalism features prominently in many mythologies; cannibal ogresses appear in folklore around the world, the witch in Hansel and Gretel being a popular example. A number of stories in Greek mythology involve cannibalism, in particular cannibalism of close family members, for example the stories of Thyestes, Tereus and especially Cronus. The story of Tantalus also parallels this. These mythologies inspired Shakespeare's cannibalism scene in Titus Andronicus. The opening of Hell, the Zoroastrian contribution to Western religious thought, is a mouth. According to Catholic dogma, bread and wine are transubstantiated into the real flesh and blood of Jesus, which are then distributed by the priest to the faithful. The accusations of cannibalism made against ancient Christians may reflect earlier versions of such beliefs but should also be understood as a form of libel (see above), expressing anxiety and concern about a new and somewhat secretive religious group. Christians in turn accused their opponents, such as the Gnostic sect of the Borborites, of cannibalism and ritual abuse. In the Qur'an Backbiters are stigmatized as those who eat the flesh of the dead body of the person they backbited.
Cannibalism as "sympathetic magic"
This is a subset of the general idea of eating a totem to absorb its distinctive power, much as a tiger penis might be eaten to promote virility. By eating our enemy, we take his power into ourselves. Some also consider this idea to be at the root of the Catholic dogma of transubstantiation: to acquire divinity (immortality, sinlessnes) by absorption, by eating the flesh of God. (However, the more likely Biblical theological and historical roots of this are pertaining to the sacrificial offering of Christ and its reference to the representations in the Jewish Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which was being celebrated during the Last Supper.)
Non-cannibalistic consumption of human-derived substances
It is interesting to note that currently the cheapest source of material from which food grade L-cysteine may be purified in high yield is human hair. Its use in food products is widespread worldwide. Some debate that consuming L-cysteine derived from human hair is not actually cannibalism. Some believe cannibalism occurs any time any human body part is intentionally harvested, prepared, and consumed as a food. Few people identify the compulsion to gnaw and bite nails or pieces of skin from fingers as cannibalism, because it is not the intentional harvest of a food item. Similarly, intentionally consuming one's own flesh or body parts, such as sucking blood from wounds, is generally not seen to be cannibalism; ingesting one's own blood from an unintentional lesion such as a nose-bleed or an ulcer is clearly not intentional harvesting and consequently not cannibalistic. It is possible for some mothers to gain possession of their afterbirth or placenta once their child is born. Some people eat this placenta material as a delicacy. See placentophagy. There are many accounts of drinking urine and coprophagia. These may be toward fetishistic, allegedly homeopathic, or survival-based ends. Aboard space flights and the International Space Station, urine is regularly filtered for drinking water.
Non-human cannibalism
Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded for more than 1500 species (this estimate is from 1981, and likely a gross underestimation). In sexual cannibalism as recorded for example for the female red-back spider, black widow spider, praying mantis, and scorpion the female eats the male after mating (though the frequency of this is often overstated). The more common form of cannibalism is size structured cannibalism, in which large individuals consume smaller ones. In such size-structured populations, cannibalism can be responsible for 8% (Belding Ground Squirrel) to 95% (dragonfly larvae) of the total mortality, making it a significant and important factor for population and community dynamics. Such size structured cannibalism has commonly been observed in the wild for a variety of taxa, including octopus, bats, toads, fish, monitor lizards, red-backed salamanders and several stream salamanders, crocodiles, spiders, crustaceans, birds (crows, barred owls), mammals, and a vast number of insects, such as dragonflies, diving beetles, back swimmers, water striders, flour beetles, caddisflies and many more. Unlike previously believed, cannibalism is not just a result of extreme food shortage or artificial conditions, but commonly occurs under natural conditions in a variety of species. In fact, scientists have acknowledged that it is ubiquitous in natural communities. Cannibalism seems to be especially prevalent in aquatic communities, in which up to ~90% of the organisms engage in cannibalism at some point of the life cycle. Cannibalism is also not restricted to carnivorous species, but is commonly found in herbivores and detritivores. Another common form of cannibalism is infanticide. Classical examples include the chimpanzees where groups of adult males have been observed to attack and consume their infants, and lions, where adult males commonly kill infants when they take over a new harem after replacing the previous dominant males.
Cannibalism in popular culture
Cannibalism is a recurring theme in literature and film. Well-known examples include Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus; Hannibal Lecter, a fictional character created by Thomas Harris in the 1983 novel Red Dragon who also appeared in Harris's 1988 The Silence of the Lambs and 1999 Hannibal; the Texas Chainsaw Massacre series, which features cannibalistic killer Leatherface and his murderous family; and Delicatessen, a 1993 black comedy film written and directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro. Famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera claimed in his autobiography that during a period in 1904, he and his companions ate "nothing but cadavers" purchased from the local morgue. Rivera was fully aware of the shock value of this tale. Rivera claims that he thought cannibalism a way of the future, remarking "I believe that when man evolves a civilization higher than the mechanized but still primitive one he has now, the eating of human flesh will be sanctioned. For then man will have thrown off all of his superstitions and irrational taboos." Readers may be reminded of the savage satire of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal. Oswald de Andrade's Cannibal Manifesto was an influential work of Brazilian modernism, comparing literal cannibalism to the postcolonial reappropriation of European culture, art, and ideas.
From the American Chronicle Sunday Nov 12 2006Sam Vaknin (samvak.tripod.com) is the author of Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and other books.He served as a columnist for online publications such as Central Europe Review, Global Politician, PopMatters, United Press International (UPI) (as Senior Business Correspondent), editor in The Open Directory and Suite101 and, until recently, the Economic Advisor to the Government of Macedonia.
Cannibalism and Human Sacrifice
Sam Vaknin October 9, 2006 "I believe that when man evolves a civilization higher than the mechanized but still primitive one he has now, the eating of human flesh will be sanctioned. For then man will have thrown off all of his superstitions and irrational taboos." (Diego Rivera) "One calls 'barbarism' whatever he is not accustomed to." (Montaigne, On Cannibalism) "Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed." (New Testament, John 6:53-55) Cannibalism (more precisely, anthropophagy) is an age-old tradition that, judging by a constant stream of flabbergasted news reports, is far from extinct. Much-debated indications exist that our Neanderthal, Proto-Neolithic, and Neolithic (Stone Age) predecessors were cannibals. Similarly contested claims were made with regards to the 12th century advanced Anasazi culture in the southwestern United States and the Minoans in Crete (today's Greece). The Britannica Encyclopedia (2005 edition) recounts how the "Binderwurs of central India ate their sick and aged in the belief that the act was pleasing to their goddess, Kali." Cannibalism may also have been common among followers of the Shaktism cults in India. Other sources attribute cannibalism to the 16th century Imbangala in today's Angola and Congo, the Fang in Cameroon, the Mangbetu in Central Africa, the Ache in Paraguay, the Tonkawa in today's Texas, the Calusa in current day Florida, the Caddo and Iroquois confederacies of Indians in North America, the Cree in Canada, the Witoto, natives of Colombia and Peru, the Carib in the Lesser Antilles (whose distorted name - Canib - gave rise to the word "cannibalism"), to Maori tribes in today's New Zealand, and to various peoples in Sumatra (like the Batak). The Wikipedia numbers among the practitioners of cannibalism the ancient Chinese, the Korowai tribe of southeastern Papua, the Fore tribe in New Guinea (and many other tribes in Melanesia), the Aztecs, the people of Yucatan, the Purchas from Popayan, Colombia, the denizens of the Marquesas Islands of Polynesia, and the natives of the captaincy of Sergipe in Brazil. From Congo and Central Africa to Germany and from Mexico to New Zealand, cannibalism is enjoying a morbid revival of interest, if not of practice. A veritable torrent of sensational tomes and movies adds to our ambivalent fascination with man-eaters. Cannibalism is not a monolithic affair. It can be divided thus: I. Non-consensual consumption of human flesh post-mortem For example, when the corpses of prisoners of war are devoured by their captors. This used to be a common exercise among island tribes (e.g., in Fiji, the Andaman and Cook islands) and is still the case in godforsaken battle zones such as Congo (formerly Zaire), or among the defeated Japanese soldiers in World War II. Similarly, human organs and fetuses as well as mummies are still being gobbled up - mainly in Africa and Asia - for remedial and medicinal purposes and in order to enhance one's libido and vigor. On numerous occasions the organs of dead companions, colleagues, family, or neighbors were reluctantly ingested by isolated survivors of horrid accidents (the Uruguay rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes, the boat people fleeing Asia), denizens of besieged cities (e.g., during the siege of Leningrad), members of exploratory expeditions gone astray (the Donner Party in Sierra Nevada, California and John Franklin's Polar expedition), famine-stricken populations (Ukraine in the 1930s, China in the 1960s), and the like. Finally, in various pre-nation-state and tribal societies, members of the family were encouraged to eat specific parts of their dead relatives as a sign of respect or in order to partake of the deceased's wisdom, courage, or other positive traits (endocannibalism). II. Non-consensual consumption of human flesh from a live source For example, when prisoners of war are butchered for the express purpose of being eaten by their victorious enemies. A notorious and rare representative of this category of cannibalism is the punitive ritual of being eaten alive. The kings of the tribes of the Cook Islands were thought to embody the gods. They punished dissent by dissecting their screaming and conscious adversaries and consuming their flesh piecemeal, eyeballs first. The Sawney Bean family in Scotland, during the reign of King James I, survived for decades on the remains (and personal belongings) of victims of their murderous sprees. Real-life serial killers, like Jeffrey Dahmer, Albert Fish, Sascha Spesiwtsew, Fritz Haarmann, Issei Sagawa, and Ed Gein, lured, abducted, and massacred countless people and then consumed their flesh and preserved the inedible parts as trophies. These lurid deeds inspired a slew of books and films, most notably The Silence of the Lambs with Hannibal (Lecter) the Cannibal as its protagonist. III. Consensual consumption of human flesh from live and dead human bodies Armin Meiwes, the "Master Butcher (Der Metzgermeister)", arranged over the Internet to meet Bernd Jurgen Brandes on March 2001. Meiwes amputated the penis of his guest and they both ate it. He then proceeded to kill Brandes (with the latter's consent recorded on video), and snack on what remained of him. Sexual cannibalism is a paraphilia and an extreme - and thankfully, rare - form of fetishism. The Aztecs willingly volunteered to serve as human sacrifices (and to be tucked into afterwards). They firmly believed that they were offerings, chosen by the gods themselves, thus being rendered immortal. Dutiful sons and daughters in China made their amputated organs and sliced tissues (mainly the liver) available to their sick parents (practices known as Ko Ku and Ko Kan). Such donation were considered remedial. Princess Miao Chuang who surrendered her severed hands to her ailing father was henceforth deified. Non-consensual cannibalism is murder, pure and simple. The attendant act of cannibalism, though aesthetically and ethically reprehensible, cannot aggravate this supreme assault on all that we hold sacred. But consensual cannibalism is a lot trickier. Modern medicine, for instance, has blurred the already thin line between right and wrong. What is the ethical difference between consensual, post-mortem, organ harvesting and consensual, post-mortem cannibalism? Why is stem cell harvesting (from aborted fetuses) morally superior to consensual post-mortem cannibalism? When members of a plane-wrecked rugby team, stranded on an inaccessible, snow-piled, mountain range resort to eating each other in order to survive, we turn a blind eye to their repeated acts of cannibalism - but we condemn the very same deed in the harshest terms if it takes place between two consenting, and even eager adults in Germany. Surely, we don't treat murder, pedophilia, and incest the same way! As the Auxiliary Bishop of Montevideo said after the crash: "... Eating someone who has died in order to survive is incorporating their substance, and it is quite possible to compare this with a graft. Flesh survives when assimilated by someone in extreme need, just as it does when an eye or heart of a dead man is grafted onto a living man..." (Read, P.P. 1974. Alive. Avon, New York) Complex ethical issues are involved in the apparently straightforward practice of consensual cannibalism. Consensual, in vivo, cannibalism (a-la Messrs. Meiwes and Brandes) resembles suicide. The cannibal is merely the instrument of voluntary self-destruction. Why would we treat it different to the way we treat any other form of suicide pact?
Consensual cannibalism is not the equivalent of drug abuse because it has no social costs. Unlike junkies, the cannibal and his meal are unlikely to harm others. What gives society the right to intervene, therefore? If we own our bodies and, thus, have the right to smoke, drink, have an abortion, commit suicide, and will our organs to science after we die - why don't we possess the inalienable right to will our delectable tissues to a discerning cannibal post-mortem (or to victims of famine in Africa)? When does our right to dispose of our organs in any way we see fit crystallize? Is it when we die? Or after we are dead? If so, what is the meaning and legal validity of a living will? And why can't we make a living will and bequeath our cadaverous selves to the nearest cannibal? Do dead people have rights and can they claim and invoke them while they are still alive? Is the live person the same as his dead body, does he "own" it, does the state have any rights in it? Does the corpse still retain its previous occupant's "personhood"? Are cadavers still human, in any sense of the word? We find all three culinary variants abhorrent. Yet, this instinctive repulsion is a curious matter. The onerous demands of survival should have encouraged cannibalism rather than make it a taboo. Human flesh is protein-rich. Most societies, past and present (with the exception of the industrialized West), need to make efficient use of rare protein-intensive resources. If cannibalism enhances the chances of survival - why is it universally prohibited? For many a reason. I. The Sanctity of Life Historically, cannibalism preceded, followed, or precipitated an act of murder or extreme deprivation (such as torture). It habitually clashed with the principle of the sanctity of life. Once allowed, even under the strictest guidelines, cannibalism tended to debase and devalue human life and foster homicide, propelling its practitioners down a slippery ethical slope towards bloodlust and orgiastic massacres. II. The Afterlife Moreover, in life, the human body and form are considered by most religions (and philosophers) to be the abode of the soul, the divine spark that animates us all. The post-mortem integrity of this shrine is widely thought to guarantee a faster, unhindered access to the afterlife, to immortality, and eventual reincarnation (or karmic cycle in eastern religions). For this reason, to this very day, orthodox Jews refuse to subject their relatives to a post-mortem autopsy and organ harvesting. Fijians and Cook Islanders used to consume their enemies' carcasses in order to prevent their souls from joining hostile ancestors in heaven. III. Chastening Reminders Cannibalism is a chilling reminder of our humble origins in the animal kingdom. To the cannibal, we are no better and no more than cattle or sheep. Cannibalism confronts us with the irreversibility of our death and its finality. Surely, we cannot survive our demise with our cadaver mutilated and gutted and our skeletal bones scattered, gnawed, and chewed on? IV. Medical Reasons Infrequently, cannibalism results in prion diseases of the nervous system, such as kuru. The same paternalism that gave rise to the banning of drug abuse, the outlawing of suicide, and the Prohibition of alcoholic drinks in the 1920s - seeks to shelter us from the pernicious medical outcomes of cannibalism and to protect others who might become our victims. V. The Fear of Being Objectified Being treated as an object (being objectified) is the most torturous form of abuse. People go to great lengths to seek empathy and to be perceived by others as three dimensional entities with emotions, needs, priorities, wishes, and preferences. The cannibal reduces others by treating them as so much meat. Many cannibal serial killers transformed the organs of their victims into trophies. The Cook Islanders sought to humiliate their enemies by eating, digesting, and then defecating them - having absorbed their mana (prowess, life force) in the process. VI. The Argument from Nature Cannibalism is often castigated as "unnatural". Animals, goes the myth, don't prey on their own kind. Alas, like so many other romantic lores, this is untrue. Most species - including our closest relatives, the chimpanzees - do cannibalize. Cannibalism in nature is widespread and serves diverse purposes such as population control (chickens, salamanders, toads), food and protein security in conditions of scarcity (hippopotamuses, scorpions, certain types of dinosaurs), threat avoidance (rabbits, mice, rats, and hamsters), and the propagation of genetic material through exclusive mating (Red-back spider and many mantids). Moreover, humans are a part of nature. Our deeds and misdeeds are natural by definition. Seeking to tame nature is a natural act. Seeking to establish hierarchies and subdue or relinquish our enemies are natural propensities. By avoiding cannibalism we seek to transcend nature. Refraining from cannibalism is the unnatural act. VIII. The Argument from Progress It is a circular syllogism involving a tautology and goes like this: Cannibalism is barbaric. Cannibals are, therefore, barbarians. Progress entails the abolition of this practice. The premises - both explicit and implicit - are axiomatic and, therefore, shaky. What makes cannibalism barbarian? And why is progress a desirable outcome? There is a prescriptive fallacy involved, as well: Because we do not eat the bodies of dead people - we ought not to eat them. VIII. Arguments from Religious Ethics The major monotheistic religions are curiously mute when it comes to cannibalism. Human sacrifice is denounced numerous times in the Old Testament - but man-eating goes virtually unmentioned. The Eucharist in Christianity - when the believers consume the actual body and blood of Jesus - is an act of undisguised cannibalism: "That the consequence of Transubstantiation, as a conversion of the total substance, is the transition of the entire substance of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ, is the express doctrine of the Church ...." (Catholic Encyclopedia) "CANON lI.-If any one saith, that, in the sacred and holy sacrament of the Eucharist, the substance of the bread and wine remains conjointly with the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and denieth that wonderful and singular conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of the wine into the Blood-the species Only of the bread and wine remaining-which conversion indeed the Catholic Church most aptly calls Transubstantiation; let him be anathema. CANON VIII.-lf any one saith, that Christ, given in the Eucharist, is eaten spiritually only, and not also sacramentally and really; let him be anathema." (The Council of Trent, The Thirteenth Session - The canons and decrees of the sacred and oecumenical Council of Trent, Ed. and trans. J. Waterworth (London: Dolman, 1848), 75-91.) Still, most systems of morality and ethics impute to Man a privileged position in the scheme of things (having been created in the "image of God"). Men and women are supposed to transcend their animal roots and inhibit their baser instincts (an idea incorporated into Freud's tripartite model of the human psyche). The anthropocentric chauvinistic view is that it is permissible to kill all other animals in order to consume their flesh. Man, in this respect, is sui generis. Yet, it is impossible to rigorously derive a prohibition to eat human flesh from any known moral system. As Richard Routley-Silvan observes in his essay "In Defence of Cannibalism", that something is innately repugnant does not make it morally prohibited. Moreover, that we find cannibalism nauseating is probably the outcome of upbringing and conditioning rather than anything innate. According to Greek mythology, Man was created from the ashes of the Titans, the children of Uranus and Gaea, whom Zeus struck with thunderbolts for murdering his son, Zagreus, and then devouring his body. Mankind, therefore, is directly descendant from the Titans, who may well have been the first cannibals.