Comparison

Persistent elite dominance

  • Among the non-human great apes, power hierarchies (some hereditary) have been observed.
  • kazoku and samurai in Japan - TW1.
  • Communist china - TW.
  • “Son also rises” by Gregory Clark - YT-TED, C2020 documents the inheritability of social status.
    • In fact, prior to 1800-s in England, rich had higher fertility than the poor; reverse in Qubec.
  • Oxbridge attendence in England - TW1.

Occupational impurity and separation

  • Burukumin in Japan, Cagots in France, “dishonorable people” (unehrliche Leute) in early modern Germany, similar groups in Arabia, Yemen and Korea, practicing muslims and christians in India [A]

Ritual purity

  • “najasat” in Islamic socieites (spiritual pollution, separate from “kesafat”, physical uncleanliness).
  • A 3rd-century CE account of the Egyptian Priesthood and the lives of its priests by Porphyry in his Abstinence, Book 4 illustrating:
    • much admired, exclusive, mostly-isolated state [TW1, TW2]
    • self-restriction in diet, attire, countenance, travel [TW]
    • regular engagement in rituals
    • engagement in geometry etc.. in leisure TW3