Avunculicide

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Avunculicide is the act of killing an uncle.[1] The word can also refer to someone who commits such an act. The term is derived from the Latin words avunculus meaning "maternal uncle" and caedere meaning "to cut or kill". Edmunds suggests that in mythology avunculicide is a substitute for parricide.[2] The killing of a nephew is a nepoticide.[1][2]

Contents

[edit] Avunculicide in history

[edit] Avunculicide in fiction

[edit] In gaming

  • In God of War III (2010), Kratos brutally murders his uncle Helios by tearing his head off his shoulders.
  • In Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, Huang avenges his father's death by killing his Uncle Kenny Lee, as he killed his father, and tries to kill him.

[edit] In literature

  • Hamlet kills his uncle, King Claudius.
  • In Vladimir Nabokov's 1928 novel King, Queen, Knave, Franz intends to murder his uncle; the narrator tells us that later on he will be "guilty of worse sins than avunculicide".[6]
  • In the Hellsing (1997-2008) manga series, Integra kills her uncle, who wanted the Hellsing organization for his own selfish purposes, in self defense after unintentionally reviving the vampire Alucard with blood from a gunshot wound.

[edit] In music

  • Kill Uncle (1991), Morrissey's second solo album

[edit] Onscreen

[edit] See also

Familial killing terms:
  • Avunculicide, the killing of one's uncle
  • Filicide, the killing of one's child
  • Fratricide, the killing of one's brother
  • Mariticide, the killing of one's husband
  • Matricide, the killing of one's mother
  • Nepoticide, the killing of one's nephew
  • Parricide, the killing of one's parents or another close relative
  • Patricide, the killing of one's father
  • Prolicide, is the killing of one's offspring
  • Sororicide, the killing of one's sister
  • Uxoricide, the killing of one's wife
Non-familial killing terms from the same root:
  • Deicide is the killing of a god
  • Genocide is the killing of a large group of people, usually a specific and entire ethnic, racial, religious or national group
  • Homicide is the killing of any human
  • Infanticide, the killing of an infant from birth to 12 months
  • Regicide is the killing of a monarch (king or ruler)
  • Tyrannicide is the killing of a tyrant

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c Time Magazine: Nepoticide v. Avunculicide Retrieved 2009-06-06
  2. ^ a b Edmunds L. Oedipus: a folklore casebook. Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1995. p. 64. ISBN 0299148548. http://books.google.com/books?id=D3iiJT5avfEC&pg=PA64&lpg=PA64&ots=9lvvb6YkFG&dq=nepoticide&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html. 
  3. ^ Barbara Tuchman (1978). A Distant Mirror. New York: A.A.Knopf. p. 418. 
  4. ^ "1975: Saudi's King Faisal assassinated, BBC On this Day". BBC News. 1975, March 25. http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/25/newsid_4233000/4233595.stm. 
  5. ^ "The Royal Ark". royalark.net. http://www.royalark.net/Nepal/nepal11.htm. 
  6. ^ Leona Toker. Nabokov. The Mystery of Literary Structure. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York, 1989. Page 63. ISBN 0801422116
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