It's still done in some French cuisine/hunting practices, though much less common nowadays: "Faisandage", where small game can be left to rot in a relatively controlled way for months: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_de_la_viande#Matu...
Bill: In the olden days, a country squire would age his pheasants for weeks before they were deemed fit for consumption.
Lisa Miller : In the olden days, people died of ptomaine poisoning and blamed it on ghosts.