206
12 The Context of Global Climate Change: Climate-Driven Demography
12.9 Cannibalism in New Zealand
That starvation caused significant population decline in New Zealand during the
Little Ice Age is supported by the appearance there of cannibalism – for the
first time, it is claimed, in the traditions of the tangata whenua (the indigenous
peoples: literally people of the land). In the Little Ice Age, starvation in the
Norse colonies of Iceland and Greenland brought extinction for the population of
Greenland and nearly 500 years of population decline for the Icelanders. Such
starvation, as we have demonstrated, was common to much of northern Europe
at the time. In a global context, the appearance of cannibalism in New Zealand
in the Little Ice Age can be seen to echo evidence of starvation akin to that in
the most severely affected countries in northern Europe and even suggests that
the degree of starvation in New Zealand may have been comparable to that of
Russia. Lamb [16] sees cannibalism in Europe as a measure of the desperation of the
starving:
And in one, two or three years between 1314 and 1319 almost every country in Europe lost
almost the whole harvest: the poor were reduced to eating dogs, cats, and even children. . .It
is from eastern Europe, however, that. . .we have the harshest climatic disasters in the late
Middle Ages reported: winters of such unaccustomed severity and depth of snow that many
people died and a few winters so mild that people were puzzled and anxious about seed
time and harvest.
There were summers with continual rains and others with such prolonged heat and
drought that, in either case, the crops failed. In the ensuing famines people took in desperation to cannibalism or emigrated to the west. The accounts of those seasons in the chronicles
of the monasteries in the areas that are now Poland and on the plains of Russia. . .make terrible reading. The earliest serious case seems to have been in AD 1215, when early frosts
destroyed the harvest throughout the district about Novgorod, people ate pine bark and sold
their children into slavery for bread, ‘many common graves were filled with corpses, but
they could not bury them all. . .those who remained alive hastened to the sea.’ Other bad
years came in 1229 and 1230, and in the latter there were many incidents of cannibalism
‘over the whole district of Russia with the sole exception of Kiev.’ (Reports of a few such
incidents in the Middle Ages in western Europe, including the British Isles, also occur,
though much more rarely.). . .From 1421 to 1423 there was a famine for 3 years in Russia,
again leading to cannibalism and an exodus to the west. In 1436 similar events occurred
about Smolensk, and it was reported that ‘the wild animals ate people and people ate people
and small children’.
Cannibalism is seen by most westerners as savagery associated with primitive
peoples in past times, rather than as a universal response to starvation (although
perhaps cannibalism has not been adopted at any time by a large proportion of a
starving population). Ross Couper-Johnston [17] describes the more recent El Niño
famine of 1877–1878 in which in China between 9 and 13 million people died and
another 70 million were severely affected:
In some counties of the north-east, up to 90 per cent of the population disappeared. . .In
December 1877. . .it had become the norm for people to pull down their houses [to eat
the sorghum stalks from which they were made], sell their wives and daughters, eat roots
and carrion, clay and refuse. . .By the autumn of 1877, the numbers of dying became so
overwhelming that corpses were buried in ‘ten thousand man-holes’. . .By 1878. . .human
flesh appeared on sale in the markets. However, the supply of corpses failed to keep pace
12 The Context of Global Climate Change: Climate-Driven Demography
12.9 Cannibalism in New Zealand
That starvation caused significant population decline in New Zealand during the
Little Ice Age is supported by the appearance there of cannibalism – for the
first time, it is claimed, in the traditions of the tangata whenua (the indigenous
peoples: literally people of the land). In the Little Ice Age, starvation in the
Norse colonies of Iceland and Greenland brought extinction for the population of
Greenland and nearly 500 years of population decline for the Icelanders. Such
starvation, as we have demonstrated, was common to much of northern Europe
at the time. In a global context, the appearance of cannibalism in New Zealand
in the Little Ice Age can be seen to echo evidence of starvation akin to that in
the most severely affected countries in northern Europe and even suggests that
the degree of starvation in New Zealand may have been comparable to that of
Russia. Lamb [16] sees cannibalism in Europe as a measure of the desperation of the
starving:
And in one, two or three years between 1314 and 1319 almost every country in Europe lost
almost the whole harvest: the poor were reduced to eating dogs, cats, and even children. . .It
is from eastern Europe, however, that. . .we have the harshest climatic disasters in the late
Middle Ages reported: winters of such unaccustomed severity and depth of snow that many
people died and a few winters so mild that people were puzzled and anxious about seed
time and harvest.
There were summers with continual rains and others with such prolonged heat and
drought that, in either case, the crops failed. In the ensuing famines people took in desperation to cannibalism or emigrated to the west. The accounts of those seasons in the chronicles
of the monasteries in the areas that are now Poland and on the plains of Russia. . .make terrible reading. The earliest serious case seems to have been in AD 1215, when early frosts
destroyed the harvest throughout the district about Novgorod, people ate pine bark and sold
their children into slavery for bread, ‘many common graves were filled with corpses, but
they could not bury them all. . .those who remained alive hastened to the sea.’ Other bad
years came in 1229 and 1230, and in the latter there were many incidents of cannibalism
‘over the whole district of Russia with the sole exception of Kiev.’ (Reports of a few such
incidents in the Middle Ages in western Europe, including the British Isles, also occur,
though much more rarely.). . .From 1421 to 1423 there was a famine for 3 years in Russia,
again leading to cannibalism and an exodus to the west. In 1436 similar events occurred
about Smolensk, and it was reported that ‘the wild animals ate people and people ate people
and small children’.
Cannibalism is seen by most westerners as savagery associated with primitive
peoples in past times, rather than as a universal response to starvation (although
perhaps cannibalism has not been adopted at any time by a large proportion of a
starving population). Ross Couper-Johnston [17] describes the more recent El Niño
famine of 1877–1878 in which in China between 9 and 13 million people died and
another 70 million were severely affected:
In some counties of the north-east, up to 90 per cent of the population disappeared. . .In
December 1877. . .it had become the norm for people to pull down their houses [to eat
the sorghum stalks from which they were made], sell their wives and daughters, eat roots
and carrion, clay and refuse. . .By the autumn of 1877, the numbers of dying became so
overwhelming that corpses were buried in ‘ten thousand man-holes’. . .By 1878. . .human
flesh appeared on sale in the markets. However, the supply of corpses failed to keep pace