This provocative scholarly study turns to one of humanity's most unsettling subjects: the ritual, medicinal, magical, and symbolic uses of human and animal excreta across cultures. Framed by authorities such as Max Muller and E. B. Tylor, it argues that even the most repellent customs deserve serious anthropological attention because they can illuminate the development of religion and civilization. Drawing on more than a thousand sources, firsthand observation, correspondence with scholars, and ethnographic reports, the author builds a comparative history that stretches from antiquity to the modern world. The book moves from the Zuni "urine dance" of New Mexico, witnessed in 1881, to broad surveys of purification, courtship, punishment, diagnosis, and mourning. It connects Pueblo rites with ancient Egyptian, Greek, Indian, Roman, Israelite, and European traditions, as well as Native American, African, Eskimo, Australian, and Hottentot practices. Along the way, it explores fungi, onions, mistletoe, cow dung, witchcraft, amulets, phallic symbolism, prostitution, and "filth remedies," showing how taboo substances became embedded in sacred ceremony and healing. The result is an encyclopedic, unsparing work of comparative religion and folklore. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.
