And people still laugh as much as they ever did, despite their shrunken brains. If a bunch of them are lying around on a beach, and one of them farts, everybody laughs and laughs, just as people would have done a million years ago.
The art of farting was also practiced in the Far East, as is evident from a story dating to the Japanese Kamakura period (1185–1333), set forth in an illustrated scroll, tells of a professional performer of fart dances called Oribe, who tricked his rival into soiling and thus disgracing himself in an attempt to mimick him.*it is lightly sourced, as were — undoubtedly — many practitioners
. . .
In the Innu mythology of Canada, Matshishkapeu (literally the "Fart Man") is the most powerful spirit, a legendary shaman capable of inflicting gastrointestinal pain or relief.
. . .
[T]he 13th century English Liber Feodorum (Book of Fees), list[s] one Roland the Farter, who held Hemingstone manor in the county of Suffolk, for which he was obliged to perform "Unum saltum et siffletum et unum bumbulum" (one jump, one whistle, and one fart) annually at King Henry II's court every Christmas.
I soon learned that the very worst breach of Minyanmin etiquette is to break wind in public. So great is their abhorrence of such a breach that the only equivalent taboo I can think of in our own society is masturbating in public. One evening Don, who had been suffering a stomach complaint, did let one fly. Our Miyanmin hosts hung their heads in shame and covered their eyes with their hands. Finally, our translator Kegesep saved the day. 'Well', he said in Miyanmin, breaking the tension, 'everyone does have an arsehole, after all.'Tim Flannery, in "Throwim way leg"
posted by champthom at 6:26 PM on April 29, 2007