Harvey Wallbanger Report This Comment Date: January 12, 2010 01:07PM
Natives of the Erromango section of the Pacific island Vanuatu recently held a
formal "conciliation" with the great-great-grandson of the British
missionary whom the islanders' ancestors ate when he came ashore in 1839.
Charles Milner-Williams' forebear, Rev. John Williams, was regarded as the most
famous Christian missionary of the era. Vanuatan legislator Ralph Regenvanu told
BBC News that cannibalism was traditionally a sacred warrior practice for
"vanquishing a threat (and) absorbing the power of the enemy."
Nonetheless, he said, the island has long felt "guilt," and even a
"complex," from killing and eating Rev. Williams. In penitence,
Vanuatu symbolically gave the Williams family a 7-year-old girl, who will not be
eaten but whose education Milner-Williams promised to underwrite. [BBC News,
12-7-09]