+590+. _Taboos connected with death._ The danger to the living arising from a death is of a twofold nature: the corpse, as a strange, uncanny thing, is a source of peril; and there are possible external enemies--the spirit that produced the death, and the ghost of the departed. Against these dangerous things avoidance of the corpse is the common precaution--a dead body must not be touched, or, if it is touched, he who touches must undergo purification.[946] Perhaps the various modes of disposing of corpses (exposure, inhumation, cremation) were originally attempts to get rid of their dangerous qualities; later other motives came in. The body of a suicide was especially feared, and was staked down on a public way to prevent its reappearance; it was perhaps the abnormal and desperate character of the death that produced this special fear. The dread of a corpse is, however, not universal among savages--in many cases it is eaten, simply as food or to acquire the qualities of the deceased, or for other reasons. It is feared as having hurtful power, it is eaten as being sacred or helpful.
+591+. The house in which a death occurs shares the evil power of the dead body, and sometimes must be destroyed, together with all its furniture, or abandoned or purified.[947] Death diffuses its baleful influence through the atmosphere, making it unfavorable for ordinary work, which, accordingly, is often then suspended for a time.[948] Seclusion is sometimes enjoined on widower or widow,[949] and mention of the name of the deceased is forbidden--the identity of spouse or name with the dead effects the transmission of what is dangerous in him. In another direction the earthly dwelling of a dead person is protected--a curse is pronounced on one who violates it.[950]
+592+. _Taboos connected with woman and the relations between the sexes._ Among many peoples there is dread of the presence of women and of their belongings under certain circumstances.[951] The ground of this fear may lie in those physiological peculiarities of woman which are regarded as mysterious and dangerous, and the antagonism of feeling may have been increased by the separation between the sexes consequent on the differences in their social functions and their daily pursuits. Woman seems to move in a sphere different from that of man; she acts in ways that are strange to him. Whatever its ground, the feeling of dread is a real one: a case is reported of a man who, on learning that he had lain down on his wife's blanket, became violently ill.