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HAPUR

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 934 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HAPUR , a See also:

town of See also:British See also:India in the See also:Meerut See also:district of the See also:United Provinces, 18 m. S. of Meerut. Pop. (1901) 17,796. It is said to have been founded in the loth See also:century, and was granted by Sindhia to his See also:French See also:general See also:Perron at the end of the 18th century. Several See also:fine groves surround the town, but the See also:wall and ditch have fallen out of repair, and only the names of the five See also:gates remain. Considerable See also:trade is carried on in See also:sugar, See also:grain, See also:cotton, See also:timber, bamboos and See also:brass utensils. HARA-KIRI (See also:Japanese hara, belly, and kiri, cutting), self-disembowelment, primarily the method of See also:suicide permitted to offenders of the See also:noble class in feudal See also:Japan, and later the See also:national See also:form of See also:honourable suicide. Hara-kiri has been often translated as " the happy See also:dispatch " in confusion with a native See also:euphemism for the See also:act. More usually the Japanese themselves speak of hara-kiri by its See also:Chinese synonym, Sep puku. Hara-kiri is not an aboriginal Japanese See also:custom. It was a growth of See also:medieval militarism, the act probably at first being prompted by the See also:desire of the noble to See also:escape the humiliation of falling into an enemy's hands.

By the end of the 14th century the custom had become a much valued See also:

privilege, being formally established as such under the Ashi-Kaga See also:dynasty. Hara-kiri was of two kinds, obligatory and. voluntary. The first is the more See also:ancient. An See also:official or noble, who had broken the See also:law or been disloyal, received a See also:message from the See also:emperor, couched always in sympathetic and gracious tones, courteously intimating that he must See also:die. The See also:mikado usually sent a jewelled See also:dagger with which the See also:deed might be done. The suicide had so many days allotted to him by immemorial custbm in which to make dignified preparations for the ceremony, which was attended by the utmost formality. In his own baronial See also:hall or in a See also:temple a days 3 or 4 in. from the ground was constructed. Upon this was laid a See also:rug of red See also:felt. The suicide, clothed in his ceremonial See also:dress as an hereditary noble, and accompanied by his second or " Kaishaku," took his See also:place on the See also:mat, the officials and his See also:friends ranging themselves in a semicircle See also:round the See also:dais. After a See also:minute's See also:prayer the weapon was handed to him with many obeisances by the mikado's representative, and he then made a public See also:confession of his See also:fault. He then stripped to the See also:waist. Every See also:movement in the grim ceremony- was governed by precedent, and he had to tuck his wide sleeves under his knees to prevent himself falling backwards, for a Japanese noble must die falling forward.

A moment later he plunged the dagger into his See also:

stomach below the waist on the See also:left See also:side, See also:drew it across to the right and, turning it, gave a slight cut upward. At the same moment the Kaishaku who crouched at his friend's side, leaping up, brought his See also:sword down on the outstretched See also:neck. At the conclusion of the ceremony the bloodstained dagger was taken-to the mikado as a See also:proof of the consummation of the heroicact. The performance of hara-kiri carried with it - certain privileges. If it was by See also:order of the mikado See also:half only of a traitor's See also:property was forfeited to the See also:state. If the gnawings of See also:conscience drove the disloyal noble to voluntary suicide, his dishonour was wiped out, and his See also:family inherited all his See also:fortune. Voluntary hara-kiri was the See also:refuge of men rendered desperate by private misfortunes, or was committed from See also:loyalty to a dead See also:superior, or as a protest against what was deemed a false national policy. This voluntary suicide still survives, a characteristic See also:case being that of See also:Lieutenant Takeyoshi who in 1891. gave himself the " belly-cut " in front of the See also:graves of his ancestors at See also:Tokyo as a protest against what he considered the criminal lethargy of the See also:government in not taking precautions against possible See also:Russian encroachments to the See also:north of Japan. In the Russo-Japanese See also:War, when faced by defeat at Vladivostock, the officer in command of the troops on the transport " Kinshu Maru " committed hara-kiri. Hara-kiri has not been uncommon among See also:women, but in their case the mode is by cutting the See also:throat. The popularity of this self-immolation is testified to by the fact that for centuries no fewer than 1500 hara-kiris are said to have taken place annually, at least half being entirely voluntary. Stories of amazing heroism are told in connexion with the performance of the act.

One noble, barely out of his teens, not content with giving himself the customary cuts, slashed himself thrice horizontally and twice vertically. Then he stabbed himself in the throat until the See also:

dirk protruded on the other side with the See also:sharp edge to the front, and with a supreme effort drove the See also:knife forward with both hands through his neck. Obligatory hara-kiri was obsolete in the See also:middle of the 19th century, and was actually abolished in 1868. See A. B. See also:Mitford, Tales of Old Japan; See also:Basil Hall See also:Chamberlain, Things Japanese (1898).

End of Article: HAPUR

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