Encyclopedia of Early Modern History Online

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Animal fight
(1,019 words)

The term animal fight refers to fights between animals organized as sport or pleasure (sometimes associated with betting). Animal fights in the early modern period were often highly ritualized events, and often took place in connection with Christian or secular festivals[3. 24]. They functioned as symbols of masculine status and sexuality, as an educational tool on what it meant to be human, and as an analogy for the human struggle, contest and social inequality (see below) [4. 111 f.]. Even in the early modern period, the animal fight was attacked for its cruelty, at…

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Boddice, Rob, “Animal fight”, in: Encyclopedia of Early Modern History Online, Editors of the English edition: Graeme Dunphy, Andrew Gow. Original German Edition: Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit. Im Auftrag des Kulturwissenschaftlichen Instituts (Essen) und in Verbindung mit den Fachherausgebern herausgegeben von Friedrich Jaeger. Copyright © J.B. Metzlersche Verlagsbuchhandlung und Carl Ernst Poeschel Verlag GmbH 2005–2012. Consulted online on 19 March 2024 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/2352-0272_emho_SIM_028909>
First published online: 2015
First print edition: 20160321



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