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"Formidable"?

Posted by R. Berg on March 31, 2002

In Reply to: Ho Hum posted by TheFallen on March 31, 2002

: : : : : : : : Thank you very much, everyone who posted a reply. I am more than pleastanly surprised and the speed at which you all did so. Thanks again :)

: : : : : : : Just a cheery tale I thought I'd share with you that's vaguely related. A friend of mine who's a historian and usually a credible source, assures me that the Druids used occasionally sacrifice unfortunate victims by making a small incision in their lower abdomen, reaching inside and severing the large intestine as low as they could reach. They then festively pulled out the cut end, nailed it to the treetrunk and forced the victim to run round and round the tree - presumably at sickle-point. Enjoy your Easter lunches, all :)

: : : : : :
: : : : : : I believe your little 'story' about the activities of the Druids is completely without foundation but if your 'friend' - the notable historian - has any credible evidence then I'm sure we would all be interested and you will doubtless hasten to deliver it - won't you?

: : : : : I doubt that a person with such a wound would be able to run at all. I also doubt that the intestine would unroll like film coming off a reel; isn't it attached to other structures in the abdomen, not simply piled in there? Let's await the judgment of someone with more medical knowledge.

: : : : I think it's entirely plausible. I have heard of this practice before, and while I can not speak about the druids with much authority, my uncle is has written several books about the Indian Wars here in the US.

: : : : According to him, accounts of things that went at that time make it clear that doing nasty things with intestines while a victim was still alive was widely practiced. Possibilities included feeding them to the dogs or simply yanking them out. I'm not sure they could run around but I bet they could stagger.

: : : : On the guts for garters theme, it was also popular to take the sinews of people one had killed in battle. Apparently the sinews made very tough but flexible cords that came in handy for all sorts of things.

: : : : It doesn't seem a great leap to imagine similar things going on in Europe.

: : : As requested, I'm endeavouring to find web-based sources referring to those nasty Druids. So far, I'm delighted to report that the practice is clearly not one born solely out of my twisted imagination, since it's clearly alluded to here:-

: : : www.osirisani.com/ neo-futurists/fool.html

: : : (As far as I can tell, that url gives lines of dialogue from some play, but clearly not one I'd go and watch. It's hardly definitive in any way, but someone else at least shares the nightmare.)

: : : I trust this will at least temporarily keep the corgis at bay. I do idly wonder, if I'd claimed that the druids had disembowelled people by winding their entrails round a proto-flyball governor, whether my credibility would have been so vilely impugned... *grin*

: : I'm afraid that after this performance you have no credibility, other than as a contributor of fabricated, opportunist dribble.

: Fabricated? Possibly, I grant you, but not fabricated by me, as the previously posted link demonstrates. I think that "currently apocryphal" might be more accurate. When I run into my apparently imaginary friend again, I'll attempt to beat indisputable sources out of him. It's more than possible, I suppose, that he was pulling my leg at the time, since I enjoy people with a sense of humour - one of the things shown in such good measure by most posters here.

: I feel duty bound here to take issue wickedly with the formidable R. Berg, who coined the word "curmudgeonhood" in an earlier post to describe a state of mind and/or emotion in those younger in years. I'd respectfully suggest that no such coinage is necessary. A perfectly suitable word already exists, and as most here will by now be painfully or chucklingly aware, that word is petulance.

: Happy Easter, all.

Just a minute, now. I haven't been formidabling anybody. I respond to the messagements of others with the utmost reasonability. In fact, in my humiliately opination, all my postlets demonstrate politessence in the extremeness. With some trepidancy, I ask: Are you guyish sorts inable to exercise your literatitude for anything more civilated than competitional insultory and squabblism?

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