Ok so one of my nerdier friends
was over and we decided to watch a movie.. the only movie we compromised on was
The Eagle.. She agreed because she thought it would be historic.. I agreed ‘cause
I was too curious to see Channing Tatum in a skirt!
So we watched the whole movie.. I
was seriously disappointed cause the acting wasn’t too good .. I hated the fact
the American actors kept their accents and of course the storyline was a flop
too in my opinion.. but let’s not go there...
My friend on the other hand who
is studying anthropology or some shit seemed to get obsessed about the blue
“Seal People” in the movie.. she had never heard of them and she is obsessed
about studying about cannibals and they seemed cannibalistic in her opinion the
she immediately wanted to go online and search more information about them.. I
was too tired and refused to let her use my laptop... (Hey don’t blame me.. I had a long day and just wanted to sleep – yeah I
admit I get a bit cranky when that happens) so she went home still ranting
about writing her thesis or research paper or whatever on these blue skinned
seal people.
The next morning she called me
all huffed-up saying that she couldn’t find anything online and was afraid that
this was all fiction.. I kinda felt bad for her... she had even decided the
title of her thesis-research paper shit on it so I told her that I will try
searching for them online too to help her out.
So after much searching, this is
the article I found:
Ancient
Cannibalistic Beach-Cave Dwellers of Scotland:
In more ways than one did we receive
a cultural shock when we discovered the patronage dress belonging to the
Ancient Beach Cave Dwellers of Scotland. This discovery that turned heads on
first onslaught was a rare find indeed as it confirmed much of the guesswork
upon which we had deduced the customs of this ancient tribe. Though most
historic data we know that these tribesmen had very little hair and a general
tan skin color which they covered up with an aqua blue color provided by
special ash to represent their closeness and connection to the sea. These beach
cave dwellers fed mostly on fish on normal days except when the time of
sacrifice came and their religious leaders insisted that they feast on a human
sacrifice which usually consisted of an outsider who was either a prisoner of
war or an innocent victim of any nearby village from a different tribe. This
did cause most people from other tribes to try their best to move away from
them, yet others had no choice as their livelihood was limited to the land upon
which they stood, hence could not move.
The cannibal beach cave dwellers
preferred to feast upon women as their meat was considered to be tenderer but
they also gloried when feasting on the meat of their prisoners of war. The
women and men of their own tribe that were sacrificed were not fed upon. They
were thrown off the highest cliff which they considered sacred following their
traditional drum beating and prayers by the priest.
Mastung was the name that they gave
to the whales that would die and wash up on shore. The name means cow of the
sea. The meat was considered of high value and almost sacred and would be
covered in ashes to preserve it to be kept for longer time periods. The skin
was used to make the warrior’s loincloth, shoes and the robe of the chieftain,
cheiftainess and high priest. The ordinary tribesmen and women wore clothes
made from ordinary animal hide – such as that of horses and deer etc.
The whale bones were used to make
weapons such as clubs and spears and the staff of senior chieftains and
priests. All the huts were made using wood but for good luck or religious
purposes one piece of whale bone was also added each time – usually in the
center. The hut of the chieftain and head priest was made entirely from whale
bone to honor them.
Another strange tradition that these
beach cave dwellers had was to give all the spoils of war to the priests – most
said that this was to keep them happy and allow good prayers for future
prosperity but other said this was due to the fact that the chieftains were
just figure heads and the actual rulers were the priests and liked to horde all
the best stuff in the name of priesthood and only the things they did not want were
distributed amongst the warriors – the prelists claimed that the items they
returned to the warriors had been cleansed to their other worldly bad juju and
safe for use by everyone else now.
One of the few rare customs that
match with today are the beach-cave dwellers’ idea of birthdays. They would
mark the date of birth and follow the seasons to identify it and celebrate by
spreading sweet scented perfume made from pressed flowers for celebrations.
There would be a small feast followed by a sitting with the priest. This
sitting involved some serious soul searching and the priest made predictions
about the future and instructed the person on what he needed to do in order to
keep a good fortune. The rituals to keep good fortune usually meant a sacrifice
to the priest of some of valuable possession – such as a sharp dagger, more
whale meal or bone, good shoes, a woman from his family etc. However we must
note that these kinds of celebrations were only limited to men, women on the
other hand were only considered as mere possessions and treated as such. They
were selected by the men for marriage and could be sold or sacrificed. Sale of
wives was only allowed if she offended her male partner in some way. However,
the sale of daughters was a very common practice; daughters would be sold to
each other in exchange for goods, weapons, good fortune prayers from the
priests etc. The wedding ceremony was the only time the women got any importance
at all.
The wedding ceremony was a different
matter entirely. Any tribesman could select a young woman he liked – if
conflict arose then a duel would ensue and the winner got the prize. However a
class system did prevail. The high status warriors could choose any young woman
they wanted but the lower lever warriors or tribesmen with other trades such as
weapon sharpeners; fishermen etc could not select a woman from a higher level
warrior’s family without their explicit permission or blessing. Similarly the
chieftain’s daughter could only be given to a high level warrior. The priest
did not have any real wife but he had the power to take any woman – married or
unmarried – for the night. Even the chieftain’s wife was accessible to him but
usually not taken out of respect. It is to note that the beach cave dwellers
only married one woman at a time. He could only remarry if his wife died or was
sold or sacrificed. The chieftain had the capability to take more than one wife
at a time but only if the first one was unable to produce a decent sized son.
Other tribesmen were not allowed this but they always had the option of selling
or sacrificing their wife for this same purpose and then taking a new one.
Another point to note is that even
though the beach cave dwellers preferred to have at least one healthy son they
did not kill their female child as they did contain value for them – it was
considered an honor for a family if the chieftain or a high level warrior chose
their daughter to be their wife. The daughters also had good barter value hence
female infanticide did not exist for them. As to what happened to the sold
women; they became slaves for a family and helped with their chores and the
tribesman who bought her could sleep with her too if he wanted. Though the wife
could take offence and kill her if she wanted. The daughter given up for
sacrifice also brought honor to the family and many families that were of low
class sometimes made a habit of producing as many daughters as possible just so
that they could sacrifice one every year as they grew older (Children were
never sacrificed) to try and increase their status.
The sons were considered the pride
of every family and they started competing against each other from an early
age. They had different competitions to test their skills in fighting, archery,
rock throwing, horse riding, whale boning, fishing etc. In these competitions
all the sons from different families of different classes competed against each
other as equals. The winners in any field brought glory to their family. Thus
it was a great opportunity for the tribesmen to raise their status and worked
really hard to train their sons with much gusto. For example if the son of a
fisherman won the competition and became the best fighter he would be given
warrior status immediately, thus bringing great honor to his family.
Ok that’s enough crap I can dish
out for now... my brain has stopped working.. Yes I was kidding! This is not an
article I just typed out this crap in under 10 minutes to fool my poor cannibal
obsessed friend! She is now insisting on throwing things at me! She actually
believed that this would make a good topic for her research thesis or whatever
she is working on currently – something I am too lazy to figure out.
So this leads me to wonder.. am I
the only one out there who is too lazy to find out what other people are doing?
I don’t even know my own brothers’ full qualifications or what they are doing
exactly.. I mean I know where they studied and where they work.. but does this
make me a bad person for not knowing their exact current designations and what
EXACTLY they do? I’m not self obsessed… I just tend find this too boring and
tend to doze off when they start talking about work on the dinner table.. if it
wasn’t so boring maybe I would have paid better attention! So it’s basically their fault for choosing such boring professions!
... would you all judge me over this?
I just hope I’m not alone .. and yes I do need to grow up!
Thankyouverymuch!
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