A Phenomenological Analysis of the Ritual "The King of the Sacrificed Camel" in Qajar Era

The ritual of "The King of the Sacrificed Camel" is one of the rituals about which various reports have been mentioned in the historical sources of Qajar era. In this ritual, a man who looks like the king, gets on a camel in Eid al-Adha. But the camel is sacrificed, the man falls down, and loses his superficial kingdom in severe humiliation. However, the study attempts to seek why the government allowed a man similar to the kind to be humiliated? And why this ritual is held in Eid al-Adha? The assumption is that the rite follows the rites of "Temporary Kingdoms" that were held from the ancient ages to recent eras in different territories. The people of these territories believed that the weakness or illness of the king caused drought, epidemic, and famine. So, they had to kill the king before the indications of weakness unfold and his ghost could be transferred to his successor in full health. However, after a while, killing the king converted to the killing of a man similar to the king, and then killing of this man was converted to his punishment and humiliation, though in some cultures an animal was sacrificed instead of him. The ritual of "The King of the Sacrificed Camel" contains both the humiliation of the temporary king and the sacrifice of an animal. The similarity of animal sacrifice in this ritual and Eid al-Adha helped the organizers to use the legitimacy of Eid al-Adha to continue this ritual. The study employs the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl.