This study examines the rules and effects of taboo as applied to sacred persons and social life, focusing on royal and priestly restrictions and the vulnerabilities that attend the human soul. It surveys beliefs about the soul’s absence, return, and representations as a miniature being, shadow, or reflection, and catalogs prohibitions on acts, foods, movement, hair and personal names, and objects such as iron and weapons. Ethnographic examples illustrate ritual practices surrounding mourning, childbirth, kingship, and name avoidance, and the chapter links these prohibitions to wider moral, political, and religious functions.