Earthy primeval goat roast

source www.jeffcook.info

Kathy in comments here reminisces about roast-lamb-on-a-spit, noting that “there is something just so earthy and primeval about it”. The above image will answer her query about roast-goat-on-a-spit.

The satisfaction many of us derive from the ritual slaughter and roasting of the odd goat almost certainly harkens back to ancient, dormant racial memories. For somewhere in the recesses of the medulla of our human brains reside ghostly vestiges of the good old days, when the enemy of our enemy, the tribe on other-side-of-hill, would be invited over for a post-genocide feast of roast goat, perhaps with the heart of a defeated chieftain as a side-dish.

In this age of microwave ovens and KFC, the art of reviving anachronisms can often become a compelling quest. It may manifest itself in the compulsion to restore ‘historical’ railways, the more trivial impulse to take a horse-drawn carriage down the street instead of the tram, or the urge to make obeisance to a political leader at a rally by emitting pant-hoots.

All this and more attests to the ingenuity of the modern time-traveller in reviving anew the old ways. In many cases, the more costly, unseemly or inefficient the anachronism, the more attractive it becomes.