Probably the most revolting of all the perverted tastes is that
for human flesh. This is called anthropophagy or cannibalism, and
is a time-honored custom among some of the tribes of Africa. This
custom is often practised more in the spirit of vengeance than of
real desire for food. Prisoners of war were killed and eaten,
sometimes cooked, and among some tribes raw. In their religious
frenzy the Aztecs ate the remains of the human beings who were
sacrificed to their idols. At other times cannibalism has been a
necessity. In a famine in Egypt, as pictured by the Arab
Abdullatif, the putrefying debris of animals, as well as their
excrement, was used as food, and finally the human dead were
used; then infants were killed and devoured, so great was the
distress. In many sieges, shipwrecks, etc., cannibalism has been
practiced as a last resort for sustaining life. When supplies
have given out several Arctic explorers have had to resort to
eating the bodies of their comrades. In the famous Wiertz Museum
in Brussels is a painting by this eccentric artist in which he
has graphically portrayed a woman driven to insanity by hunger,
who has actually destroyed her child with a view to cannibalism.
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