Gerontocide - the killing of old people who have reached a certain age. An old, decrepit person who is difficult to move around with his relatives, aggravated by illnesses, was a heavy burden for people whose whole life depended on random prey, on quick transitions and roaming with the herd, or on the agility and strength of each individual. To save themselves from the heavy burden and the elderly themselves from unnecessary and long suffering, they were killed or taken to a secluded place and left to their fate.
This custom was practiced in the Mesolithic tribes, as well as in modern tribes of the primitive periphery. The danger of overpopulation of the territory by the tribe and the exploitation of limited natural resources forced the tribe to kill old people who were not able to benefit the tribe. Subsequently, in a number of cultures this practice took the form of custom [1] .
History Examples
In some societies, this custom was used on the widest scale, such as on the islands of Fiji , where in many places it was impossible to meet a person over 40 years old, because everyone who passed this age was killed. Most often, this custom was found among Australian Aborigines , in which the bodies of the slain were even eaten, it also existed among the North American Indians , the Hottentots , the Koryaks , Kamchadals , the Chukchi , the Sami , the ancient Germans, and a number of other nationalities. The Chukchi or Koryak, sensing the approach of death, himself asked for his release from the burdens of slow, painful dying, and his son decided to fulfill his request only after much hesitation and torment.
According to eyewitnesses, in the 1880s, in the village of Zemlyanka, Poltava province , old people who did not show hope for life were taken to a dead place in the winter and lowered into a deep ravine, so that when they were lowered they would not break or stop on a slope, they they planted it on the forehead , on which they, as in a sleigh, reached the bottom of the ravine. From here there were expressions: "put on the popcorn", "it's time to poppies." When this custom was banned, they began to resort to isolating the elderly in an empty hut, where they were dying of hunger and cold.
In Georgian and Tajik folklore, the name of Alexander the Great is associated with the abolition of this ancient custom [2] .
Notes
- ↑ Manuil Alekseevich Khan. About the tribes of the globe. - St. Petersburg: Printing House of Dr. M. Khan, 1863. - S. 68.
- ↑ Evgeny Alekseevich Kostyukhin. Alexander the Great in literary and folklore tradition. - Moscow: Nauka, 1972. - S. 145-146. - 189 p.
Links
- The murder of children and the elderly // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.