The World's Strangest Customs Arnott, Stephen creator author text cb New York Random House 2004 First published in 2004 monographic eng

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175 pages : illustrations ; 16 cm . Crossing continents and centuries Stephen Arnott brings us invaluable information about all kinds of bizarre regional customs - from sexual practices to the received wisdom on cannibalism - that could save you from embarrassing local faux pas while travelling.- Amongst the Tartars the relations of the bride and bridegroom would traditionally divide into two groups and fight each other until some had suffered bleeding wounds. It was thought that causing blood to flow in this way would ensure the couple had strong sons.- In Hungary a cure for infertility was to beat a barren women with a stick, the stick having previously been used to separate mating dogs.- In some Aboriginal tribes of New South Wales it was believed that men who had any contact with their mothers-in-law would suffer terrible hard luck. The threat was so great that married men even avoided looking in their mother-in-law's general direction. S 790 Lexile estimate S Raz-Plus by Stephen Arnott cultural studies non-fiction 390 97800091892418 FISKH 240927 20240927101528.0 4744 eng