Attack on Titan: Here’s Why Titans Eat Humans

The Titans of Attack on Titan are a very curious lot. They are definitely humanoid and they do stem from humans but they’re not even close to regular human behavior. They act like beasts and they’re quite scary if you ask us. On top of that, Titans actually like to eat humans, which is a very weird form of cannibalism. Why do they eat humans?

Why do Titans eat humans? Fully explained

In order to fully explain why Titans eat humans, we have to go back to how the Titans came to be in the first place, since that origin story is inevitably tied to their eating habits. All Titans were human beings at one point, belonging to a race known to the rest of the world as the People of Ymir or simply as Eldians.

After being injected with a serum made from Titan spinal fluid, said subjects suffer a reaction in which, almost instantly, they become Titans. Those monsters maintain almost the same characteristics that they had when they were human, although in the case of women, they only retain their facial features.

Marley’s country exploits this situation as a resource for wars, in which these Titans are used as low-income weapons, using the Eldians from the internment zones. Marley is also responsible for creating Titans on Paradis Island to keep the inhabitants of the Walls locked up and to prevent them from escaping to the outside.

Eldians who have been accused of serious crimes, such as attempted rebellion, are used for this purpose. The Founding Titan possesses the ability to transform subjects of Ymir into Pure Titans at will and to control them. The 145th King of Eldia, Karl Fritz, used this power to create the Wall Titans and build the walls after they formed into circles and hardened.

Zeke Yaeger can mimic this ability thanks to his real blood, after supplying his spinal fluid to several Ymir subjects, he turns them into titans by giving a loud scream.

Now that we know how the Titans are created, we can actually explain why they eat humans. Namely, the Titans seem to remember their once-human past and at one point, these guys realized that eating humans might return them to their former state. As far as we know, they don’t get any nutrients from humans and they don’t like human meat particularly, but they think that they will revert to their former state.

The reason behind this is actually very sad, almost tragic, and it portrays the Titans as victims rather than monsters.

Why do Titan Shifters attack humans?

The reason for this has little to do with the biology of the Titans; it is, rather, a political question that has to do with the conflict between the Eldians and Marley. More than 2000 years ago, Ymir Fritz obtained the power of the titans, making use of this power, and on the orders of Fritz, the leader of the Eldia tribe, Ymir massacred the then powerful nation of Marley.

Years later, it happened that a group of Marleyan soldiers were subdued before King Fritz, however, surprisingly, one of the soldiers in front of the king took a spear that was buried next to him, and threw it at Fritz in an attempt to assassinate him, but failed when Ymir stepped in to protect her master, dying instead.

After dying, his power would be divided into Nine Titans among his descendants, who would give birth to the Empire of Eldia. With this power, Eldia was able to gain control of Earth, subduing numerous nations.

Over the next 1700 years, Eldia went through a series of civil wars in which these titans were always involved, starting what would be known in the future as the Great War of the Titans, although on many of these occasions the Founding Titan was He was in charge of restoring the balance between the noble families.

When the 145th king of Eldia, Karl Fritz, inherited the power of the Founding Titan, he felt ashamed of the actions of his people and, above all, he pitied the weakened nation of Marley; which was the main victim of the Eldian tyranny for centuries. Therefore, he secretly collaborated with the Tybur family by creating a false Marleyan hero named Helos, who had supposedly defeated him and subsequently condemned him to exile.

This escalated the Eldian civil conflict, causing the Eldian empire to slowly self-destruct, giving Marley the opportunity to attack the now weakened Eldia. After the end of the war and the dissolution of Eldia, Marley seized six of the Nine Titans and used them for more than a century for war purposes, he also took control of the continent and took prisoner the Eldians who could not escape to Paradis Island together with Karl.

This brief history of the conflict between Eldia and Marley says it all – the Titan Shifters attack humans because the Eldians and Marley want to wipe each other out and whoever controls the Titans, sends them after the other group to kill them.

What happens if a Titan Shifter eats a human?

Unlike other species, the Titans did not mate, and their interactions with organisms other than humans were nil; their sole purpose in life was to seek out and devour humans. They also did not really feed on humans, as many of them did not taste human flesh for a century after the walls were built, but this did not affect their activity or reduce their numbers.

This paragraph refers to Pure Titans and not the Nine Titan Shifters. If a Titan Shifter eats a regular human, nothing will happen, just like nothing will happen if a Pure Titan eats a regular human. But, if a Titan Shifter or a Pure Titan eats a human that contains Titan spinal fluid, he will return to normal and inherit the powers of that Titan as well.

Why do Titans eat other Titans?

The reason for this has more to do with the biology of the Titans. Namely, if a Titan eats another Titan, especially a Titan Shifter, they will become more powerful and inherit the powers of that Titan Shifter. Also, they will be able to revert back to human form, which is a benefit and something that each Titan actually desires. This is the principal reason why Titans in Attack on Titan eat other Titans.