A revealing incident hints at the problem of mnemonic retention of complex ceremonies in the case of decentralized and illegal groups: "When the police raided a Triad initiation ceremony recently they discovered that celebrants were conducting the ritual by reference to a description in the police manual: (Observer, March 5, 1989). This amusing story may have a purely practical explanation: the participants had simply forgotten the ritual, and police records represented the best available source.

XREF: Relates to mnemonic retention and how marginalization from literacy affects cultural memory — parallels oral tradition scholarship and literacy studies. QUESTION: How do other decentralized groups preserve ritual knowledge across generations? What mechanisms substitute for written records when group knowledge is lost?

Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Busi…, loc. 394