Encyclopedia of Taboos

I am not sure than an encyclopaedia of taboos is very high on my list of priorities, but if, as the author says, the last general survey dates back to 1956, then maybe it should move up! Another prod in the upward direction is that this book is more than just about taboos. Taboos there are, indeed: pornography, pigs, necrophilia, menstruation, the left hand, incest, certain foods and suchlike, but this encyclopaedia has a wider focus. As the compiler says, the “taboo” originally had a meaning wider than things that were forbidden. The word, which came to us from Polynesia...