Among many peoples custom prescribes fasting after a death. Lucian says that at the funeral feast the parents of the deceased are prevailed upon by their relatives to take food, being almost prostrated by a three days’ fast.[49] We are told that among the Hindus children fast three days after the death of a parent, and a wife the same period after the death of her husband;[50] but according to a more recent statement, to be quoted presently, they do not altogether abstain from food. In one of the sacred books of India it is said that mourners shall fast during three days, and that, if they are unable to do so, they shall subsist on food bought in the market or given unasked.[51] Among the Nayādis of Malabar “from the time of death until the funeral is over, all the relations must fast.”[52] Among the Irulas of the Neilgherries “the relatives of the deceased fast during the first day, that is, if … the death occur after the morning meal, they refrain from the evening one, and eat nothing till the next morning. If it occur during the night, or before the morning meal, they refrain from all food till the evening. Similar fasting is observed on every return of the same day of the week, till the obsequies take place.”[53] Among the Bogos of Eastern Africa a son must fast three days after the death of his father.[54] On the Gold Coast it is the custom for the near relatives of the deceased to perform a long and painful fast, and sometimes they can only with difficulty be induced to have recourse to food again.[55] So also in Dahomey they must fast during the “corpse time,” or mourning.[56] Among the Brazilian Paressí the relatives of a dead person remain for six days at his grave, carefully refraining from taking food.[57] Among the aborigines of the Antilles children used to fast after the death of a parent, a husband after the death of his wife, and a wife after the death of her husband.[58] In some Indian tribes of North America it is the custom for the relatives of the deceased to fast till the funeral is over.[59] Among the Snanaimuq, a tribe of the Coast Salish, after the death of a husband or wife the surviving partner must not eat anything for three or four days.[60] In one of the interior divisions of the Salish of British Columbia, the Stlatlumh, the next four days after a funeral feast are spent by the members of the household of the deceased person in fasting, lamenting and ceremonial ablutions.[61] Among the Upper Thompson Indians in British Columbia, again, those who handled the dead body and who dug the grave had to fast until the corpse was buried.[62]
[49] Lucian, De luctu, 24.
[50] Ward, View of the History, &c. of the Hindoos, ii. 76 sq.
[51] Vasishtha, iv. 14 sq. Cf. Institutes of Vishnu, xix. 14.
[52] Thurston, in the Madras Government Museum’s Bulletin, iv. 76.
[53] Harkness, Description of a Singular Race inhabiting the Neilgherry Hills, p. 97.
[54] Munzinger, Die Sitten und das Recht der Bogos, p. 29.
[55] Cruickshank, Eighteen Years on the Gold Coast, ii. 218.
[56] Burton, Mission to Gelele, ii. 163.
[57] von den Steinen, Unter den Naturvölkern Zentral-Brasiliens, p. 435. Cf. ibid. p. 339 (Bakaïri).