Killing the Elderly

[Eric Kinzel]

It should also be noted that the Lusation Serbs you mention (also called Wends), are more properly referred to as Sorbs, and are genetically and linguistically akin to their West Slavic neighbors - the Poles, Kashubians, Czechs, and Slovaks - and not the South Slavic Serbs. So the Sorbs of Eastern Germany have nothing more in common with the Serbs of former Yugoslavia than that they are both members of the larger group, Slavs.
 
Similarities or confusion in names of Slav groups are common; Slovenian, Slovincian, Slovak, Slavonic, all related to the ethnonym "Slav"; the medieval White Croats and White Serbs were probably East or West Slavs, not related to the modern Croats and Serbs.
 
In any case, it is unclear if lapot was an actual practice, or a folkloric motif.
 
Of course, as Edmund points out, this alleged Serbian practice has no relevance to what Germanic tribes of Roman Iron Age Europe did or did not do with their elderly.
 
To: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
From: edmundfairfax at yahoo.ca
Date: Thu, 13 Feb 2014 12:25:55 -0800
Subject: Re: [gothic-l] Killing the Elderly














 

 



  


    
      
      
      
Given that life expectancy in Roman Iron Age Europe was about 45, I doubt that there would have been much occasion for killing off the elderly, if there ever was such a practice among the Germani.

What Serbs did in the 19C is hardly evidence to support the notion that such a practice was known nearly two millennia earlier for a different ethnic group.

Edmund

 
 
     On Thursday, February 13, 2014 6:40:05 AM,
 "asulejma at yahoo.com" <asulejma at yahoo.com> wrote:
    
 



  


    
      
      
      The practice of killing the elderly was still alive among the Serbs in 19. century, practice known as Lapot. Some Serbs lived among the Germans, they are known as Serbs of Luzica (Lausic or Lausitz); this could be a connection.Regards,Amer

    
     

    
    




      


    
     

    
    






   		 	   		  
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