Ritual Suicides
During feudal Japan (1192-1868) ritual suicides played an important part of the code of bushido and the discipline of the samurai warrior class. Seppuku is the Japanese formal name for ritual suicides and hara-kiri is the common language term.
Hara-kiri, which literally means, "stomach cutting", is a very painful method of self-termination. This was an almost unheard of practice until the emergence of the samurai as a warrior class in Japan. The Japanese, as most people, were more interested in living a good healthy life than a painful self-ritual death. …
