Lunar Blood

In my recent constructions of fantasy worlds I keep running into the same questions concerning how to handle subject matter that is taboo in my own culture, or that I do not find particularly tasteful, but has been of major importance in different cultures throughout history. While this often raises relatively simple questions concerning sexuality and nudity. While these pose all sorts of interesting possibilities in and of themselves, I am currently grapplin with possible cultural ramifications and treatments of menstration, which, to me, is a far more delicate matter.
Partly, this is because, as a male who has never taken hormones, I have scarcely an inkling of what menstration is actually.
Partly, this is tied heavily into maturation and coming of age. Indeed, it is treated as such in a great many very different terrestrial cultures and I doubt many cultures would simply dismiss it. Even today the notion that it is something not to be talked about is often a shaming of the female body, and of adulthood. Fitting for a culture that so excessively and irrationally idealizes, and idolizes, childhood.
Another important, but often over looked, factor is that the bleeding that accomponies menstration is something that distinguishes humans from most animals (a few apes bleed similarly, and dogs bleed while in heat, which occurs alt the same time). The significance of this would not be lost on a suitably animistic society, or any rural group of people living in close contact with animals.
Then there is this whole concept of filth that accomponies it. The Old Testament, which is generally obsessed with what is pure and what isn't, seems to hold the rags used to collect the blood among the most filthy of objects, and often a reference to rags will mean exactly that. To an extend this makes sense, especially in any time or locale before antibacteria and, well, soap.
On the other hand the association with blood might lead to all kinds of strange rituals, including offering it as a symbolic sacrifice, using it in magic rituals, or even drinking it to gain power, or perhaps to bond the woman to the man drinking it. Disgusting, perhaps, but it's an intriguing prospect, especially since it implies that the marriage disolves when the woman hits menopause, and is no longer of use. In fact, might be said to dissolve as long as she is pregnent, effectively seperating the man from fatherhood.
And one must also consider the vast plethora of other superstitions, both magical and mundane, that might accompony menstration. Here and today, for instance, there is a fairly persistent consensus, even among many women, that menstration significantly alters mood and sometimes personality, usually for the worst, and a woman's temperment will often be excused by her "condition." Interestingly, psychology studies have shown us that this is not the case and that mood in fact changes little, but people tend to draw their own conclusions from personal experience, and possibly even change how they act to fit the idea of how they're expected to (and get mad if any of this is pointed out to them, because, you know, the scientific method is a load of crap).
At any rate, here are some of the basic possibilities (there is some overlap in them and many are not mutually exclusive but could be combined together in more intricate systems):

1) Taboo.
Everything about the subject is supressed. Taken to the extreme this means no one tells the young girl anything other than "Don't you ever say things like that again, do you hear?" leaving her in a state of constant fear and confusion over what's going on. Although, to be fair, she probably hands her daughter a rag, too, so nobody will see it. More realistically the Mother is at least likely to talk to her daughter about it, and even if she doesn't young girls are going to pick up on it and talk amongst themselves anyways. Young boys are likely to be left further out of the loop, getting either the muddled male version of the explanation from their fathers, or just told to avoid women at certain times (given that in rural areas menstration tends to synch up for the whole village, it was traditional in many cultures for women to go off together to a special building or isolated hut large enough for the period of their periods, and for younger girls to bring them food and supplies).

2) No big deal.
I see this as the least likely. Blood (I know it's not just blood, but I suspect the distinction won't be made by your average illiterate farmer) running down your leg and all over your clothes that is also a sure sign of hitting puberty and reaching fertility is very, very, very unlikely to be overlooked without any sort of cultural ramifications. Cultures tend to believe sleep and dreams are important, and they aren't half as symbollically loaded.
That, and this brings us back to not mentioning it since it is irrelevant to the characters in the story, which means we might as well stick to (1).

3) Celebration.
Happens in Japan to this day. The first period is a significant event in a young woman's life, the crossing of the threshold between girl and woman. As a result the first period is a cause for celebration. I can easily imagine rural communities where (again) all the women's menstral cycles are synchronized that there might well be a minor monthly celebration, similar to how some cultures would have rituals for phases of the moon. The logical extreme, of course, is to have massive kingdom wide celeberations whenever the Queen is bleeding.
Interestingly, this poses odd ramifications for pregnancy and menopause. If menstration is a source of joy, celebration and pride rather than shame its stopping could well be a source of shame. Likely this precludes the idea of wise, powerful or magically gifted old crones in favor of those who still bleed. The issue of pregnancy ismore complicated, because the coming of a child will likely result in great joy and at least a familiar, if not communal, celebration, but the nine months in between are likely to make the mother to be uncomfortable and out of place at best.
Exactly what these celebrations would entail is also up for grabs. Menstral blood might be clearly displayed, and bloodied clothing worn with pride. It might go a step further and get into the offering or consumption of menstral blood in rituals. Perhaps young women and crones past menopause would consume the blood to gain or regain life force (whether taken symbolically or literally to actually do that. Seems strange and disgusting, but consider that, in many ways, menstral blood is analogous to ejaculations as a sign of strength, fertility, and life force, and some tribes have been known to have prepubescent boys perform oral sex on the adult males to gain the tribe's life force, usually starting and ending with puberty, it doesn't seem so far fetched, and would actually be a legitimate way of strengthening community bonds... if somewhat unhygenic by most modern cultural standards).
Another oddball ramification of this would be that women who bleed more might get more respect, and who knows how many young girls or old women or pregnate women, or even unpregnant women of the correct age who want to display a greater life force, would cut themselves down there just to show some blood. From a social standpoint the blood might also become considered attractive to the point where men would perfer sex while their partners were menstrating, making child birth awkward again. It might also be considered a blessing of sorts to be caused to bleed during sex, which would promote all kinds of unhealthy behavior, I'm sure (not to mention a potential for pedarasty, with men sleeping with girls so that they bleed, which is considered a sign of the girl's strong life force rather than a horrible act against her, significantly shifting how society treats these relationships).

4) Bonding
As noted the consumption of menstral fluids and the synchronization of the cycles could lead to a greater sense of community, or individual connectedness. In a marriage couples in a culture might be expected to take in each others' vital fluids, the man's semen and the woman's menstral blood. Or perhaps the blood is fed to an animal to bind it closer to the woman (a bad idea, I'm sure, but plenty of traditions are).
And, in a culture that keeps women largely seperated from one another, particularly in a more urban, or dispersed (rather than communal) rural area, the syncrhonization of women's cycles could be seen as a very powerful bond (by virtue of time spent together alone). Of course, societies might try to keep them apart to prevent just such an occurance for superstitions concerning it (perhaps fearing an overabundance of excess life force being released at the same time causing problems).

5) Sacrifice
Whether private or public menstral blood seems like a rather obvious and cheap sacrifice that might be offered to a god, or gods. A particularly interesting version, in my mind, is to have an animistic culture that actually leaves menstral blood on an alter in a wild area, as an offering to the predators there. I love the irony that this would inspire the very agressive behavior the offerings were meant to appease.
Again, a whole village being synchronized means significant offerings even if it might seem like little for one.

6) Freedom
A culture might well consider a menstrating woman as useless, as sex at this time will beget no offspring. As such the reigns might be loosened and society might actually not care what she does or who she does it with, so long as she doesn't somehow jeapordize her life or her potential for future offspring.
Yeah, this is highly unlikely, though I can imagine a culture that has no problem using the same premise to explain why women have less freedom while menstrating, being open to rape with little consequence delivered upon the rapist, and perhaps even "rented out" by their husbands while no chance of bearing a child is on the table.
This might even extend on to pregnant women, though a culture coming to that conclusion seems unlikely.

7) Magic
In a fantasy world this might literally be the case, but even if it isn't thingslike menstral fluid, being both blood and a sign of fertility, are a great starting point for magic, or at least what people will believe is magic.

Hmm... that's all for now. I'm sure I'll come up with more though.