CANNIBALISM, the act or practice of eating human flesh by mankind. In his acci dental discovery of the West Indies Columbus heard of, if he did not himself see, the Carib Islands, the inhabitants of which were spoken of as Caribales, or, owing to the customary dialectical interchange of 1, n and r, Canibales. These Canibales or Caribales were reported to be man-eaters. This terrible association of Canibales with the practice of eating human flesh naturally enough led straightway to the transfer of the name of the people to their horrid custom. The Greek word, anthro coming down from pre-Christian times, indicates that the practice, though unknown to Columbus, was ancient and well enough known to be in the literature of the older peoples. The story of Polyphemus devouring human flesh as told in the 'Odyssey) and other legends of semi-divine man-eaters is evidence enough that the ancient authors knew, by hearsay at least, of this practice. It is a well-established fact that all races of men have at some time, in a greater or less degree, been guilty of the practice of eating human flesh for one purpose or another. It is very generally believed, and with a good show of reason, that there never has been a time, since man first appeared, down to and including our own, when the world has been free from canni balism. It is nearer being free from it now than it has been perhaps in all past time. To-day it exists among isolated South American tribes; in West Equatorial and Central Africa; in the Malay Archipelago, some of the South Sea Islands (mainly in Melanesia) and in parts of Australia. Excluding Australia cannibalism may be said to be confined to a belt of land extending to a little more than 10 degrees north and south of the equator.
How far back the practice goes it is not possible to tell. So far as is known there is nothing to warrant the belief that the ancestors of the human species or the first of the human species ate one another. There is little if any evidence to indicate that down to as late a period as the close of the Old Stone Age the several races of men which had successively inhabited Euro-Asia and northern Africa prac tised cannibalism. Cannibalism is not univer sally characteristic of the savage state. A few charred and broken and scraped human bones from the cave-dwelling period are substantially all that has been found which can by any stretch of the imagination be supposed to hint at this practice. Tylor goes as far as the facts seem to warrant when he says that this evidence may "perhaps be taken to show that prehistoric savages were in this respect like those of modern times neither free from cannibalism nor universally practising it..) Cannibalism originates in and is carried on from widely different motives, ranging all the way from eating human flesh as a regular part of daily subsistence to the eating of it for purely magical or ritualistic reasons. It is not possible to draw a dividing line between the several kinds because all or nearly all forms are more or less interrelated. This may arise
from the fact that usually the practice does not begin in a single motive., As a Means of Subsistence.— The most repulsive and degrading form of cannibalism is that of eating human flesh as a part, the main part, of the regular diet. The negro tribes along the Guinea Coast southwards into the Kongo and for some distance eastward eat human flesh as food. It is treated just as other races treat animal flesh. Raids are made to capture prisoners and they are herded and kept till wanted. Sometimes they are fattened just as other races fatten animals for the slaughter. Under great stress of hunger occasioned by shipwrecks, sieges and famines civilized persons have been driven to the eating of human flesh. The siege of Samaria about the middle of the 8th century B.C. (II Kings vi, 24ff); the siege of Paris in 1590; and the famine in Algiers in 1868 furnish instances of this. What civ ilized people are driven to do by the pressure of hunger it is not surprising that the savage should do with even greater readiness under similar circumstances. Many savage races have resorted to cannibalism onlyin times of famine. The Mungerra tribe in Queensland in times of severe famine *kill an eat some of their female children.) The natives of Tierra del Fuego, when starving in winter, *throttle and devour the oldest woman of the party. When asked why they did not kill and eat the dogs, they reply 'Dogs catch otters.' ° As Manifestation of Affection.— In credible as it may seem cannibalism in some instances seems to be prompted by affection. The Binderwurs of Central India killed and ate the sick and aged, °thinking this an act of kindness and acceptable to the goddess Kali.* The aborigines of southwest Victoria practise eating human flesh in a solemn service of mourning for the dead, particularly for those killed by accident. °The Tangara carry their dead about with them, and whenever they feel sorry for their death, they eat some of the flesh till nothing remains but the bones.) Among still other peoples parents partake of the flesh of their dead children las a token of grief and affection for the The practice of eating flesh for the purpose of honoring dead kinsmen is of a similar charac ter. Herodotus, writing of the Massagetie, a Scythian people living in the northeast of the Caspian, relates that when a man has attained a great age among these people it is the custom for his kinsmen to sacrifice him, boil his flesh with the flesh of cattle and eat it. This is accounted an exceedingly happy ending. Lyden describes a cannibalistic custom which has the appearance of a very pious ceremony. The aged and infirm invite their descendants to eat them. The victim ascends a tree around which the others assemble singing a funeral dirge: °The season is come, the fruit is ripe, and it must descend.) He then descends, and is put to death and eaten in a solemn banquet.