Seven Ate Nine Trivia Quiz

Answer: French

Tips for touring deepest, darkest Africa (number one) - make sure your car is in good condition and not likely to break down. Biaka-Boda was on a tour of his electorate in early 1950 to see his constituents who had been complaining for some time (ironically) of food shortages. His car broke at a place called Bouafle' (population of about 1,000 people) where he instructed his chauffer to repair it. Tips for touring deepest, darkest Africa (number two) - do not wander off into the jungle on your own. Victor did and was never seen again. Several months later a set of charred bones were found in the area. These were sent to Paris, examined and identified as those belonging to Biaka-Boda, with the popular belief that he'd found his way onto somebody's menu.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,889084,00.html

Answer: Leopard

The Human Leopard Societies operates in areas such as Sierra Leone, Liberia, the Ivory Coast and Guinea. In areas such as Sierra Leone they have sister groups know as the Alligator Society. Members have been known to dress in animal skins and attack their victims with steel claws. The eating of flesh is supposed to bring special powers to their tribe but it is also used as a method of ensuring secrecy of both the society and the act itself.

http://www.liberiapastandpresent.org/RitualKillings1900_1950b.htm
http://afraf.oxfordjournals.org/content/XIII/L/143.full.pdf

Answer: The flogging of a young tribal chief

Whether the flogging ordered by the Captain of the 'Boyd' was for disciplinary reasons or the result of a false accusation is unclear. However, the reprisal was stunning in its brutality. Five of the crew were separated from the ship when they came to shore to collect timber, were clubbed to death, stripped of their clothing and taken to the village to be eaten. The clothing was then donned by the Maoris which they used as a way to sneak on board the ship where they slaughtered a further sixty people. Only five were spared. Reports surfaced later that the bones of the deceased were strewn upon the beach.
There was great fallout from this incident. Shipping and trade in the area dried up considerably. The establishment of a Catholic mission, the first in New Zealand, was delayed. Additionally, it encouraged the view that New Zealand was a 'cannibal nation' and called into question the claim that the Maoris were 'noble savages'.

http://www.suite101.com/content/attack-on-the-boyd-1809-a188552
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/culture/maori-european-contact-before-1840/the-boyd-incident

Answer: Detection of myoglobin in preserved coprolite (human faeces)

The cannibalism debate between scientists and scholars and the Native Americans from the area has been waged for a long time and borders on being vehement. The signs of chopped bones, the fragmentation of the longer bones (to extract the marrow) and the defleshing are all indications that cannibalism "may" have occurred. In the eyes of Richard Malar, the lead researcher in this project from the University of Colorado, the discovery of the myoglobin protein removes the "if" from the equation and provides positive confirmation. Why? Myoglobin can only be found in the heart and skeletal muscles of human beings. To find its way into the faeces it needed to have been eaten.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/2694813
http://archaeology.about.com/od/caterms/qt/cannibalism.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowboy_Wash
http://www.trussel.com/prehist/news211.htm

Answer: Moby Dick

The "Essex" was a whaler from Nantucket that was struck by a sperm whale and sunk in the Pacific Ocean in 1820. The crew managed to get on board small whale boats and reach an island. When supplies ran low thw twenty remaining men set out to sea in the hope of rescue. Once their food ran out they fed on the deceased sailors to stay alive. After three months adrift, without further food, they drew lots to determine who should be sacrificed for the greater good. Seventeen year old Owen, for want of a better word, won the lottery and was shot. Eight crew members managed to survive the ordeal.

http://www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index.php/2008/11/20/1820-sperm-whal-rams-sinks-nantucket-wha?blog=161
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owen_Coffin

Answer: The wealthy

These men were a bunch of unemployed ex-convicts who really hated the rich. They managed to get hold of a list of credit card users from the Hyundai department store, considered to be one of the most exclusive shopping centres in Seoul, and selected their victims from there. They claimed that eating their victims flesh helped them to renounce their link to humanity and gave them courage. They remained remorseless, even when they were sentenced to death.

http://meta-religion.com/New_religious_groups/crime_religion/Other/chijon_family.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chijon_family

Answer: General Butt Naked

Blahyi claims that when he was eleven years old he was initiated as a tribal priest in a ceremony that involved a human sacrifice. It was here, he says, that he had a vision of the Devil telling him that he would be a great warrior but to maintain his power he had to continue with a course of cannibalism and sacrifice. Blahyi would gain his nom de guerre (nickname) during the Liberian Civil War where he would launch himself into conflicts wearing only his boots and his pistol. He would go on to raise an army of nude fighters called the 'Butt Naked Battalion' who would eat the hearts of children before going into battle.
Milton Blahyi then claimed to have spoken with God who has freed him from his slavery to Satan and saved his life. He (Blahyi) is now a preacher spreading God's word as the President of the End Time Train Evangelistic Ministries Inc. In 2008 he appeared before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia where he confessed to 20,000 killings during the Civil War, however, the veracity of these numbers would be difficult to confirm.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Butt_Naked
http://www.slate.com/id/2086490/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1576088/Gen-Butt-Naked-confesses-to-nude-killings.html

Answer: Borneo

A hatred of the Madurese (Indonesian settlers from the island of Madura), who were emigrating to the Western areas of Borneo turned into an all out ethnic war and saw the Dayak revert to their old ways of headhunting and cannibalism. Headhunting had been a deep part of their culture and had been used as both a means of retaliation and a display of strength. The brutality exhibited in this recent encounter is repugnant and something I'd care not to recite on this site. For those that do wish to research this further the link to the Independent's news article is below.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/carnage-and-cannibalism-in-borneo-as-ethnic-conflict-rages-1082690.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayak_people

Answer: Witches

These tribes also believe that the suangi are soul eaters. The families of the victims could only hope that their loved one could name the suangi that was responsible for the attack. Once named, they would kill the witch and eat them believing that it would release the soul of their loved one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suangi

Answer: Giovanni da Verrazzano

Verrazzano's expeditions were funded by the French and he reportedly became the first European to sight New York and Narragansett Bays as well as Block Island. His journeys took him between the Carolinas and Newfoundland and gave King Francis I (of France) a claim to the 'New World'.
His third expedition took him to the Caribbean where he explored the Lesser Antilles. Verrazzano's own countryman, Christopher Columbus, had visited this area some twenty years prior and had named the people 'caniba', meaning 'people who eat people'. So why would an astute man like Verrazzano then choose to row to the shore of an island (presumed to be Guadeloupe) on his own and remain out of gunshot range of his ships. It was here that he was captured by the natives, killed and eaten.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/626406/Giovanni-da-Verrazzano#
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_da_Verrazzano
http://www.nycroads.com/crossings/verrazano-narrows/
http://www.interestingworldfacts.com/ethnic-group/top-7-most-dangerous-cannibals-in-the-world.html