Taboos regarding rulers includes both
taboos
A taboo is a social group's ban, prohibition or avoidance of something (usually an utterance or behavior) based on the group's sense that it is excessively repulsive, offensive, sacred or allowed only for certain people.''Encyclopædia Britannica ...
on people coming into contact with a
ruler
A ruler, sometimes called a rule, scale, line gauge, or metre/meter stick, is an instrument used to make length measurements, whereby a length is read from a series of markings called "rules" along an edge of the device. Usually, the instr ...
and the taboos regarding the ruler themselves.
Examples
* The
Nubas of
East Africa
East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the Africa, African continent, distinguished by its unique geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the regi ...
believe that they would die if they entered the house of their priestly king; however, they can evade the penalty of their intrusion by baring the left shoulder and getting the king to lay his hands on it.
* In
West Africa
West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations geoscheme for Africa#Western Africa, United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Gha ...
, at Shark Point near Cape Padron, in
Lower Guinea Lower Guinea may refer to:
* Maritime Guinea, the coastal region of the republic of Guinea.
* in biogeography, a region of coastal tropical forests stretching along the Gulf of Guinea, from Ghana through Benin, Togo, Nigeria, and Cameroon. It is sep ...
, lives the priestly king Kukulu, alone in a wood. He may not touch a woman or leave his house; indeed he may not even quit his chair, which he is obliged to sleep sitting, for if he lay down no wind would rise and navigation would be stopped.
* The ancient kings of
Ireland
Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...
were subject to a number of restrictions as listed in
The Book of Rights. The king, for instance, may not stay in a certain town on a particular day of the week; he may not cross a river on a particular hour of the day; he may not encamp for nine days on a certain plain, and so on.
Analysis
Freud
Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies seen as originating from conflicts in t ...
attributes the existence of such taboos to an unconscious current of hostility toward the king/ruler. In the following example the hostility toward the ruler is more obviously shown:
:''The savage Timmes of Sierra Leone, who elect their king, reserve to themselves the right of beating him on the eve of his coronation; and they avail themselves of this constitutional privilege with such hearty goodwill that sometimes the unhappy monarch does not long survive his elevation to the throne. Hence when the leading chiefs have a spite at a man and wish to rid themselves of him, they elect him king.''
But even in such glaring instances, however, the hostility is not admitted as such, but masquerades as a ceremonial.
See also
*
Naming taboo
A naming taboo is a cultural taboo against speaking or writing the given names of exalted persons, notably in China and within the Chinese cultural sphere. It was enforced by several laws throughout Imperial China, but its cultural and possibly ...
Notes
References
*
* {{cite book , last=Freud , first=Sigmund , title=Totem and Taboo: Resemblances between the psychic lives of savages and neurotics , location=New York , year=1919 , publisher=Moffat, Yard and Company , url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Totem_and_Taboo
rulers
A ruler, sometimes called a rule, scale, line gauge, or metre/meter stick, is an instrument used to make length measurements, whereby a length is read from a series of markings called "rules" along an edge of the device. Usually, the inst ...