Political Memes

Myth 8 – Captain Cook was eaten by cannibals

The Hawaiian Islanders who killed Captain Cook (on Valentines’ day in 1779) were not cannibals. They believed the power of a great man lived in his bones, so they cooked parts of Cook’s body to easily remove them.

https://www.sea.museum/2019/12/12/mythbusting-cook-fact-fiction-and-total-fallacy#:~:text=Myth%208%20%E2%80%93%20Captain%20Cook%20was,in%201779)%20were%20not%20cannibals.

The esteem which the islanders nevertheless held for Cook caused them to retain his body. Following their practice of the time, they prepared his body with funerary rituals usually reserved for the chiefs and highest elders of the society. The body was disembowelled and baked to facilitate removal of the flesh, and the bones were carefully cleaned for preservation as religious icons in a fashion somewhat reminiscent of the treatment of European saints in the Middle Ages. Some of Cook's remains, thus preserved, were eventually returned to his crew for a formal burial at sea.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Cook