Robert Hertz, Anthropophagic Practices and Traditional South Fore Mortuary Rites in Papua New Guinea.

In this paper we examine the traditional mortuary rites of the South Fore people of Papua New Guinea using Robert Hertz's theory of secondary burial and the three mechanisms of mourning identified by Daniel Lagache. The ethnographic data that we obtained on South Fore interpretations of their own mortuary rites showed that all forms of corpse handling achieved the same end results through the process of secondary burial. Furthermore, the three mechanisms of mourning applied equally to all forms of corpse disposal and we found no evidence to support psychosexual interpretations of mortuary anthropophagy which emphasise aggression. South Fore interpretations of mortuary anthropophagy show that the dead were eaten out of love, and to protect the mourners from the painful emotion of witnessing the decomposition of the corpse. These findings affirm the relevance of the concepts of Hertz and Lagache to the universal human experiences of death and mourning.

Mortuary rites of the South Fore and kuru.

This paper is part of a wider study to explain the historical spread and changing epidemiological patterns of kuru by analysing factors that affect the transmission of kuru. Part of the study has been to look at the mortuary feasts that were the means of transmission of the kuru agent. This paper shows the complexity of Fore eschatology, and the variations and contradictions of human behaviour in relation to mortuary rites and the transmission of kuru. It also confirms that oral ingestion was the primary route of inoculation though some cases of parenteral inoculation may have occurred. The exclusion of alternative routes of transmission is of importance owing to the dietary exposure of the UK and other populations to bovine spongiform encephalopathy prions.