Humans have lived alongside animals for all of history. Dogs are man’s best friend. Horses carry our stuff. Cats are our overlords. Many people have a pet today, and everybody loves a cute baby animal.
Our ancestors loved animals too…. most of the time. Sometimes things got a little weird. Other times, everything was horrifying.
Irish kings had a symbolic marriage, with a horse
In ancient times, Ireland wasn’t just one country – it was split into many different kingdoms ruled over by different kings. The different regions had their own traditional coronation ceremonies, and some of them were quite odd.
The mediaeval scholar Gerald of Wales wrote that one tribe in the north of Ulster would, when crowning a new king, prepare a white mare. Everybody in the kingdom would gather for the show, popcorn in hand. The king-to-be would then perform a ceremonial mating with the horse, to symbolically become the Lord of Horses. Immediately afterwards, the mare would be killed and boiled in a huge cauldron, bit by bit. When the water cooled, the king would then bathe in the horse soup and eat the horse flesh, while his people would crowd around the tub and share it with him. The king wasn’t allowed to use cutlery either: he would have to drink his bathwater straight from the tub.
I’m not sure what the most horrifying part of this story is, but poor horse.
Giving birth to rabbits
In the year 1726, in England, a woman named Mary Toft claimed to have given birth to a rabbit. At the time, it was believed that what a pregnant woman saw could influence the development of the child, so the doctors were not as skeptical as one would imagine. Several doctors examined her, and to their astonishment, she began to produce various body parts of rabbits and cats.
At this point, a few of the doctors were completely convinced, and rushed off to publish reports about her. Some were more sensible, and investigated further.
Of course, it turned out that Toft was obtaining the corpses of various small animals, and shoving them up her vagina. You may recognize this as a horrible idea, and an excellent way to get massive infections and injuries. However, regarding the state of medical science at the time, note the above paragraph.
Toft eventually admitted to her fraud, and was arrested for being a complete lunatic, or, in the legal terminology of the day, being a “vile cheat and impostor.” She proceeded to blame her mother-in-law, and was eventually released from prison (after being searched very, very thoroughly).
Ancient Roman execution methods
Everyone is familiar with the gladiators of ancient Rome, but the shows were much more varied and… interesting. You won’t see all of the variety acts in movies, though.
Public execution of criminals was a very, very popular form of entertainment. Being killed by wild beasts was always amusing to the crowd, and for maximum entertainment, why don’t we watch a female prisoner get “sentenced” to death by Zeus himself, represented by a bull?
The Roman beastmasters had specially trained animals to attack prisoners in – let’s just say different ways. Sometimes, when the animals were carnivores, they would be permitted to eat them afterwards.
If this had happened to the baddie at the end of Gladiator… well, seeing Commodus getting felt up by a porcupine would have been highly satisfying, but would probably have obliterated the film’s gravitas.
Egyptians made animal mummies
Egypt’s mummies are famous, but they didn’t just mummify people. Millions of animals were mummified, either as pets buried with their owners or as offerings to the gods. It seems that originally bronze statues were the preferred offering, but animals were cheaper.
As time went on, a huge breeding program started, wherein animals such as cats were bred specifically to be strangled and mummified. It seems that the Egyptians weren’t afraid of curses at all.
As the demand for cat mummies grew, Egyptian priests didn’t have time to make good quality mummies any more and started filling the cases with random cat body parts. More expensive mummies were very elaborate: for example, a rich person could fill a hollow statue of a cat with kitten fetuses to please the gods.
However, there is a plot twist – recent scans show that about a third of animal mummies don’t contain any animal. There are three possibilities: the priests were defrauding their customers; the ancient Egyptians thought that their gods weren’t very bright; or, the mummies have escaped their wrappings and are currently right behind you.
Animal Gods and their eccentricities
Most ancient cultures (and by “most,” I mean “every, and that includes your great-….-great grandma”) venerated animal gods. Some of these were fairly quirky, which says a great deal more about their human subjects that about the animals themselves.
For example, the ancient Egyptians venerated the Apis bull, which was an actual bull. Supposedly, it gained power by being flashed.
The Romans constantly mocked Egyptians for these silly beliefs. Much more sensibly, they believed in satyrs and fauns (half-man, half-goat), who were constantly chasing human women. During the Lupercalia, or wolf-festival, Roman youths would run about, nude except for goatskins, whipping everybody in sight. Women would line up purposely to get whipped, not for Fifty Shades-related reasons, but because they believed that this would prevent them from experiencing a difficult childbirth.
The ancient Finns believed that they were descended from a human woman and a bear, and as a result, women should avoid associating with bear hunters after a kill, because that would be sad! When bears were killed, their mortal remains would be worshipped, and be the star guests at a dinner party. The diners would sing songs, attempting to convince the bear that the death was an accident. Then, they would hang the skull on a tree, and save the teeth and the windpipe for good luck.
Whoever you are, and whatever your pet is, you come from a long line of people who had complex relationships with animals.
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