The Review of Michel de Montaigne's 'Of Cannibals'

'Of Cannibals' is a collection of essays written by Michel de Montaigne. He was an important philosopher of the French Renaissance, known for popularizing essays. In ‘Of Cannibals’ summary paper his work is briefly review. 

He was born to a rich family in France. 'Of Cannibals' is a primary source and was written around 1580. In French, it is named, “Des Cannibales.” It revolves around the theme of human nature. It is part of more than a hundred essays written by Montaigne in his book titled, “Essays.”

The essay is about what Montaigne has been told about a tribe from Brazil by an explorer named Villegaignon who encountered a tribe of cannibals and lived with them for 'ten or twelve years.' The text he has written includes information on their system of government, culture, religion and how they live their everyday life. Though most Europeans would consider them to be uncivilized, Montaigne likes the lifestyle of the Brazillian tribe and considers Europeans to be callous and heartless. This is evident as he states that Europeans 'will one day cost their happiness and repose.'

It was written to recount the experience of the explorer he met because he found the lifestyle of the Brazilian tribe to be fascinating and, despite not condoning their cannibalism, better than the Europeans’. The tribe may be cannibals and eat the bodies of their enemies but Montaigne was also aware of the numerous methods of torture that was commonly used on living people in Europe at the time. This is evident in the way Montaigne transforms the typical idea that a 'primitive' tribe have a society inferior to Europeans who are considered to be civilized when instead, it shows that Montaigne prefers the tribe’s lifestyle over that the purity and innocence that Europeans have lost.

Montaigne is not biased in his essay, he compares and contrasts the features of European societies with the Brazillian tribe. “Of Cannibals” is an essay written to inform people on the lifestyle of the Brazillian tribe and compare them to Europeans. The intended audience of the essay at the time it was written was the people of France and its surrounding areas but today it is an important historical record. The importance of it being an accurate historical record can be argued as he didn’t directly observe the tribe.

Montaigne states that people shouldn’t name a particular group as “barbarians” or “savages” just because what that society does is not an occurence in their own society. A quote to support this is “I find that there is nothing barbarous and savage in this nation, by anything that I can gather, excepting, that every one gives the title of barbarism to everything that is not in use in his own country.” This was relevant to the audience of the time and it is still relevant today as racism is still prevalent in today’s society.

“Of Cannibals” is an essay in which Michel de Montaigne compares European societies to a tribe of cannibals in Brazil. He speaks in favour of the tribe and negatively about the Europeans, saying things such as that Europeans have lost their kindness and their actions 'will one day cost their happiness and repose.'

In conclusion, one of Montaigne’s main purposes for writing this series of essays was partly to harden himself against the evil and coldness of the French religious and domestic war going in during the time of his writing. He also wrote the essays to cope with the loss of his best friend, Étienne de La Boétie from dysentery.