The origin and development of the moral ideas

Habitual cannibalism, permitted or in some cases enjoined by custom, has been met with in a large number of savage tribes and, as a religious or magical rite, among several peoples of culture. It is, or has been, particularly prevalent in the South Sea Islands, Australia, Central Africa, and South and Central America. But it has also been found among various North American Indians, in certain tribes of the Malay Archipelago, and among a few peoples on the Asiatic continent. And it is proved to have occurred in many parts of Europe.1

Sometimes the whole body is eaten, with the exception of the bones, sometimes only a part of it, as the liver or the heart. Frequently the victim is an enemy or a member of a foreign tribe, but he may also be a relative or fellow tribesman. Among various savages exo- and endo-anthropophagy prevail simultaneously; but many cannibals restrict themselves to eating strangers, slain enemies, or captives taken in war, whereas others eat their own people in preference to strangers, or are exclusively endo-anthropophagous. Thus the Birhors of the Central Provinces of India are said to eat their aged relatives, but to abhor any other form of cannibalism;2 and in certain Australian tribes it is not the dead bodies of slain enemies that are eaten, but the bodies of friends, the former being left where they fell.3 Sometimes people feed on the corpses of such kinsmen as have happened to die, sometimes they kill and eat their old folks, sometimes parents eat their children, sometimes criminals are eaten by the other members of their own community. The Australian Dieyerie have a fixed order in which they partake of their dead relatives:—“The mother eats of her children. The children eat of their mother. Brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law eat of each other. Uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, grandchildren, grandfathers, and grandmothers eat of each other.

But the father does not eat of his offspring, or the offspring of the sire.”4 Among some peoples cannibalism is an exclusively masculine custom, the women being forbidden to eat human flesh, except perhaps in quite exceptional circumstances.5

The practice of cannibalism may be traced to many different sources. It often springs from scarcity or lack of animal food.6 In the South Sea Islands, according to Ellis, “the cravings of nature, and the pangs of famine, often led to this unnatural crime.”7 The Nukahivans, who were in the habit of eating their enemies slain in battle, also killed and ate their wives and children in times of scarcity, but not unless forced to it by the utmost necessity.8 Hunger has been represented as the motive for cannibalism in some North and West Australian tribes, parents sometimes consuming even their own children when food is scarce.9 The Indians north of Lake Superior often resorted to the eating of human flesh when hard pressed by their enemies or during a famine.10 Among the Hudson Bay Eskimo “instances are reported where, in times of great scarcity, families have been driven to cannibalism after eating their dogs and the clothing and other articles made of skins.”11

But whilst among some peoples starvation is the only inducement to cannibalism, there are others who can plead no such motive for their anthropophagous habits. The Fijians, until lately some of the greatest man-eaters on earth, inhabit a country where food of every kind abounds.12 The Brazilian cannibals generally have a great plenty of game or fish.13 In Africa cannibalism prevails in many countries which are well supplied with food.14 Thus the Bangala of the Upper Congo have been known to make frequent warlike expeditions against adjoining tribes seemingly for the sole object of obtaining human flesh to eat, although their land is well provided with a variety of vegetable food and domestic animals, to say nothing of the incredible abundance of fish in its lakes and rivers.15 Of the cave-cannibals in the Trans-Gariep Country, in South Africa, a traveller remarks with some surprise:—“They were inhabiting a fine agricultural tract of country, which also abounded in game.

Notwithstanding this, they were not contented with hunting and feeding upon their enemies, but preyed much upon each other also, for many of their captures were made from amongst the people of their own tribe.”16 Far from being an article of food resorted to in emergency only, human flesh is not seldom sought for as a delicacy.17 The highest praise which the Fijians could bestow on a dainty was to say that it was “tender as a dead man.”18 In various other islands of the South Seas human flesh is spoken of as a delicious food, far superior to pork.19 The Australian Kurnai said that it tasted better than beef.20 In some tribes in Australia a plump child is considered “a sweet mouthful, and, in the absence of the mother, clubs in the hands of a few wilful men will soon lay it low.”21 Of certain natives of Northern Queensland we are told that the greatest incentive to taking life is their appetite for human flesh, as they know no greater luxury than the flesh of a black man.22

However, bodily appetites, whether hunger or gourmandise, are by no means the sole motives for cannibalism. Very frequently it is described as an act of revenge.23 The Typees of the Marquesas Islands, according to Melville, are cannibals only when they seek to gratify the passion of revenge upon their foes.24 The cannibalism of the Solomon Islanders seems mainly to have been an expression of the deepest humiliation to which they could make a person subject.25 The Samoans affirmed that, when in some of their wars a body was occasionally cooked, “it was always some one of the enemy who had been notorious for provocation or cruelty, and that eating a part of his body was considered the climax of hatred and revenge, and was not occasioned by the mere relish for human flesh.” To speak of roasting him is the very worst language that can be addressed to a Samoan, and if applied to a chief of importance, he may raise war to avenge the insult.26 Among the Maoris human flesh was frequently eaten from motives of revenge and hatred, to cast disgrace on the person eaten, and to strike terror. “It was such a disgrace for a New Zealander to have his body eaten, that if crews of Englishmen and New Zealanders, all friends, were dying of starvation in separate ships, the English might resort to cannibalism, but the New Zealanders never would.”27 Even in Fiji, where cannibalism was largely indulged in for the mere pleasure of eating human flesh as food, revenge is said to have been the chief motive for it.28 Thus, “in any transaction where the national honour had to be avenged, it was

The practice of eating criminals, which is quite a common form of cannibalism, seems to be largely due to revenge or indignation.30 In Lepers’ Island, in the New Hebrides, the victims of it were not generally enemies who had been killed in fighting, but “it was a murderer or particularly detested enemy who was eaten, in anger and to treat him ill.”31 Among the Bataks of Sumatra offenders condemned for certain capital crimes, such as atrocious murder, treason, and adultery, were usually eaten by the injured persons and their friends with all the signs of angry passion.32 But this form of cannibalism may also have another foundation.33 If for any reason there is a desire to eat human flesh, an unsympathetic being like a criminal is apt to be chosen as a victim. It is said that some of the Line Islanders in the South Seas began their cannibalism by eating thieves and slaves.34 In Melanesia, where human sacrifices were combined with the eating of bits of the victim, “advantage was taken of a crime, or imputed crime, to take a life and offer the man to some tindalo.”35