MikeLigalig.com

Co-editor Kelly Dixon, an associate professor in the Department of Anthropology at The University of Montana, told Discovery News that she and her colleagues "are emphasizing the fact that the historical and archaeological sources present a complicated story about humans doing whatever possible, including eating hide and strings as well as consuming their dogs, before making the desperate decision to cannibalize. Thus, the bone remains at the site indicate an avoidance of cannibalism … but not necessarily the absence of it."

Dixon and co-editors Julie Schablitsky and Shannon Novak identified rodent, canine, deer, rabbit, horse and oxen/cattle bones within the over 16,000 bone fragments.

The historical record, consisting of letters and journals kept by members of the Donner Party and rescue groups, as well as the memories of some survivors, supports that the trapped members first ate all of their animals, including captured mice and the family dogs, as well as wild game.

Of the family dog "Cash," emigrant Virginia Reed Murphy wrote, "We ate his head and feet -- hide -- everything about him."

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=72547.0

Johnson continued that, based on the historical record, some members tried to eat "a decayed buffalo robe, but it was too tough and there was no nourishment in it."

The members even tried eating pine bark and twigs, with Solomon Hook later saying that at one point he "went two weeks without food, chewing only pine pitch."

With nothing else left to eat, the historical record indicates some of the snowbound victims resorted to consuming the bodies of others who perished.

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=72547.0

There is little doubt that Donner Party members who resorted to eating human flesh exemplified "survival cannibalism."

Dixon and Schablitsky, in a "Concluding Thoughts" chapter of the book, mention that they did not find any intact skeletons at the excavation site. But they add, "If the Donner families consumed only flesh and organs, as would be expected from comparative cases of survival cannibalism, then only soft tissue would have been cooked over a fire or boiled in a pot."

They conclude, "Beyond the cannibal tale, this hero saga reminds us of our own fragility, mortality, and resilience in the face of unfamiliar circumstances and less-than-predictable futures." -- http://news.discovery.com/






Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=72547.0