A BOOK OF THE BEGINNINGS
NOTES TO SECTION 3
[1] [Source.]
[2]
[Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, note, p. 511. 'To this kind
of writing Taliesin alludes, when he says "I know every reed, or twig, in the
cave the chief diviner."
Ibid., p. 557. 'Then let the giver of the mead feast cause to be
proclaimed, "I am the cell; I am the opening chasm; I am the bull Beer; I
am the repository of the mystery; I am the place of reanimation. I love the tops
of trees, with the points well connected, and the Bard who composes without
meriting a repulse: but him I love not, who delights in contention."']
[3] [Cadmus (said to have lived 2000 BC) is a Grecian myth used to explain the origin of the Phoenician alphabet into Greece, the Greeks adapting it to form their own alphabet. It was from this that the rest of the alphabets of Europe were supposedly derived. The story is related by Herodotus. See his Histories.]
[4] [Preiddew Annwn, 5, in Skene, Four Ancient Books of Wales, 'Book of Taliessin VII.' See p. 526.]
[5] [Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids. See p. 454.]
[6] [Skene, Four Ancient Books of Wales, vol. 2, p. 154.]
[7] [Skene, ibid., vol. 2, p. 324.]
[8] [See The Barrdas, p. 49.]
[10] [It was Levi who proposed that the Tarot could be aligned to the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, with the trump cards of the Major Arcana attributed to the paths between the Sephiroth, and the numbered cards to the Sephiroth themselves. This was later adopted, and elaborated upon, by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in the latter part of the nineteenth century as a working model, which, to this day, still persists amongst occultists.]
[11] [Brand, Observations of
Popular Antiquities, vol. 1, pp. 230-1, the 5th ed.
'May-Day Customs.' 'The Hitchin Mayers have a
song, much in the style of a Christmas Carol, which Mr. Hone has also given:
"Remember us, poor Mayers all,
And thus do we begin
To lead our lives in righteousness,
Or else we die in sin.
We have been rambling all this night,
And almost all this day;
And now returned back again,
We have brought you a branch of May.
A branch of May we have brought you,
And at your door it stands;
It is but a sprout,
But it's well budded out
By the work of our Lord's hands.
The hedges and trees they are so green,
As green as any leek;
Our heavenly Father he watered them
With his heavenly dew so sweet.
The heavenly gates are open wide,
Our paths are beaten plain,
And if a man be not too far gone,
He may return again.
The life of man is but a span,
It flourishes like a flower;
We are here to-day and gone to-morrow
And we are dead in an hour.
The moon shines bright, and the stars give a light,
A little before it is day;
So God bless you all, both great and small,
And send you a joyful May!"']
[12] [Dyer, British Popular Customs, p. 133. 'In Yorkshire and the northern counties Palm Sunday is a day of great diversion, young and old amusing themselves with sprigs of willow, or in manufacturing palm-crosses, which are stuck up or suspended in houses. In the afternoon and evening a number of impudent girls and young men sally forth and assault all unprotected females whom they meet out of doors, seizing their shoes, and compelling them to redeem them with money. These disgraceful scenes are continued until Monday morning, when the girls extort money from the men by the same means; these depredations were formerly prolonged till Tuesday noon.—Times Telescope, 1825, p. 68.']
[13] [Natural History, bk. 15. See s. 95.]
[14] [Ibid., bk. 24. See 62-3. See also Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 280.]
[15] [Bleeck, Avesta. For example, in his notes to Fargard XX, vol. 1, p. 146, he explains: '"Gaokerena" is expressly explained in the Huz. Tr. as the "white Homa," respecting which there are many passages in the later Parsi writings. Thus in the Bundahish (fol. 119, vso. 1. 1): "Near by this tree (namely Jat-bes) grows the white Hom in the sourse of Ardvisur, whosoever eats of it becomes immortal; it is called the tree Gokarn."']
[17] [Scott, Tales and Traditions of Tenby, p. 19.]
[18] [NQ, Second Series, 1856, 1, 471. 'Heybridge—Whitsunday Custom. Heybridge Church, near Maldon, Essex, was on Whitsunday strewn with rushes, and round the pews, in holes made apparently for the purpose, were placed small twigs just budding. What is the origin or meaning of this? and does the practice exist elsewhere? F. N.']
[19] [Natural History, bk. XXIX. See s. 12. See also Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 210.]
[20] [See Davies, ibid., in note above.]
[21] [Brugsch, History of Egypt Under the Pharaohs, vol. 2. See p. 104.]
[22] [Of Isis and Osiris, ch. 62. The word here is 'smu', not 'smy.' ]
[23] [Nomenclature. See BB 1:74.]
[24] [Elyot. I am unable to trace any such title as above to this authority. Poss. M. is referring to his Dictionary. 'The Dictionary of Syr T. E., Knyght,' pub. in London, 1538, of which I have no access.]
[25] [Lower, The Curiosities of Heraldry, p. 104. ]
[26] [Dictionnaire Égyptien en Écriture Hieroglyphique, p. 115, no 72.]
[27] [Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids,
p. 95. 'To this I subjoined a tradition, taken from the same
documents, of the Master-works, or great achievements of the Island of Britain.
The first of these was. Building the ship of Nevydd Nav Neivion, which
carried in it a male and a female of every animal species, when the Lake of
Llion, burst forth: and the second was, The drawing of the Avanc to land,
out of the lake, by the oxen of Hu Gadam, so that the lake burst no more.'
Ibid., Davies' note: 'See Celt. Res. p. 157, from
Archaiology of Wales, V. II, p. 59, and 71.']
[28] [Fergusson, Rude Stone Monuments. The illustration is given better in Farrer's work, Notice on the Runic Inscriptions during Recent Excavations in the Orkneys, 1862, pl. VII. As Massey could not be bothered to note the full ref., I have to assume he is referring to No. 4.]
[29] [Early Man in Britain and his Place in the Tertiary Period, p. 281. 'This kind of traffic is proved to have extended over enormous distances in the Neolithic age, by the distribution of the axes made of nephrite or jade, a material as yet unknown in its native state in Britain or on the Continent. The only places where it is known to exist in the old world are Turkestan and China, where from time immemorial it has furnished supplies to the Chinese and Tartars.']
[30] ['The Stone Age in Japan: With Notes on Recent Geological Changes Which Have Taken Place,' JAI, 10, 397. 'Axes.—These are chiefly polished and rounded in outline. The material of which they are formed is a greenish stone, which in the specimens I have examined appears to be a partly decomposed trachytic porphyry or andesite. From this decomposition hornblende or augite has been partially converted into chlorite, and thus the greenish characteristic colour.']
[31] [HL, pp. 94-99. 'The old Egyptian word nutar
had already in the popular pronunciation suffered from phonetic decay, and lost
its final consonant as early as the nineteenth dynasty, as we see by the
inscriptions in the royal tombs at Biban-el-moluk, and it appears in Coptic
under the forms nuti, nute. It is remarkable that the translators
of the Bible into Coptic, who generally abstained from the use of old Egyptian
words connected with religion, and used Greek words instead, nevertheless
adopted this one as expressive of their notion of God.
There is another word, nutra, very frequently used either as verb or
adjective, which is closely allied to nutar. The sense of "renovation"
was first attached to it by M. E. de Rouge, on the strength of its final sign,
which he considered as a determinative of signification. But this conjecture,
which has been very generally accepted, is really without any solid foundation;
the sign in question is here expressive of nothing more than the sound tra,
and it will be found to all words so ending, whatever be their meaning; as
hetra, whether signifying "join," "horse," or "tribute;" petra,
"behold;" tra, "season." Another more obvious sense, "sacred," "divine,"
may be justified by the Greek text of the tablet of Canopus, where nutra
is translated [Greek], as applied to the sacred animals. But this meaning,
though a certain one, occurs but seldom in the Egyptian texts, and when it so
occurs is, after all, only a derived meaning, as is in fact the case with the
Greek [Greek], the first sense of which is "strong," "vigorous." The notion
expressed by nutar as a noun, and nutra as an adjective and verb,
must be sought in the Coptic nomti, which in the translation of the Bible
corresponds to the Greek words [Greek], "power," "force," "strong," "fortify,"
"protect."
The reason why the identification of the old form nutar with the more
recent nomti as well as nuti has hitherto escaped observation is,
that the connecting link nuntar has either been unknown to scholars or
disregarded by them. In nuntar, a process as well known to Egyptian as to
Indo-European scholars has taken place. The vowel of the first syllable has been
strengthened by the addition of a nasal consonant. The old Egyptian word
heket (beer) has by this process become henke in the Thebaic, and
hemki in the Memphitic dialect.
The following examples will illustrate the usage of the word.
Large stones are often said to be nutru. This does not mean that they
grow or that they are divine, but that they are mighty. In one of those
paraphrases
which are so common on the walls of Dendera, the unequivocal word uru,
"great, mighty," is substituted for nutru. Sauit nutrit is a
"strong wall." A crypt is aat nutrit, a "strong-hold." Three of the
chambers of the temple of Dendera are said to be nutru. "Qu est ce qu
une salle divine?" very pertinently asks M. Marietta. Sat nutrit is a
"potent talisman." Seti I. in his titles is the "potent image," sekhem nutra,
of Chepera. Nutra is constantly brought into parallelism with words
implying "might." "Great (ura) is the Eye of Horus, Mighty (aa) is
the Eye of Horus, Strong (nutra) is the Eye of Horus, the Giver of
Strength (senutra) is the Eye of Horus." "A mighty wall to Egypt,
protecting their limbs; his force (pehti) is like Ptah in prostrating the
barbarians, a child of might (sif nutra) in his coming forth like
Harmachis." "He is strong (ten-re) in performing his duties to Amon-Ra,
he is vigorous (nutra) in performing his duties to the sovereign, his
lord." In the Demotic text of the tablet of Canopus, nutra is translated
by khu, which signifies, "strengthen, fortify, protect, invigorate." It
has constantly this meaning in the hieroglyphic texts. "Thy body is fortified (nutri-ta)
protected (khu-ta), restored (seput-ta)." "Thy limbs are fortified (nutri-ta)
by the Power (sekhem) which is in heaven." Nutra men ma pet,
"strong and durable as heaven." Nutra-f nut-ek er neken, "He fortifies
thy city against destruction." Nutra-f Nutrit erneftt, "He strengthens
Nutrit against harm." Nutrit, the name of a town (in this place
equivalent to Dendera), has exactly the same meaning as Samaria, Ashdod, Gaza,
Yalentia, and many other names significant of strength. Religious purifications
were supposed to give strength, and the verb nutra is therefore often
found in parallelism with ab and tur, both of which have the sense
of religious purification.
I will add one more illustration, which by itself might not be of much weight,
but is really important when taken in conjunction with other evidence. The
goddess Isis is distinguished among other divinities by the frequent epithet
nutrit. When the inscriptions in her honour are written in Greek, she is
most frequently called [Greek] or [Greek].
There is yet another Egyptian word cognate to those we have been studying.
Nutrit signifies "eye-ball." The notion here is of something fortified,
protected, guarded. "Custodi me ut pupillam oculi:" "Keep me as the apple
of the eye." The Arabic word hadaqat, which means the same thing, has an
exactly similar etymology. And several other parallel instances might be cited.
The Egyptian nutar, I argue therefore, means Power, which is also the
meaning of the Hebrew El. The extremely common Egyptian expression
nutar nutra exactly corresponds in sense to the Hebrew El Shaddai,
the very title by which God tells Moses that He was known to Abraham and Isaac
and Jacob. "And God spake unto Moses, and said unto him, I am Jahve: and I
appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac and unto Jacob by the name of El Shaddai, but
by my name Jahve was I not known to them." Nutar nutra amtu heret is "the
Almighty Power which is in heaven."']
[32] [Source.]
[33] [Commentary on the Gallic Wars, bk. 5. 15. 'The horse and charioteers of the enemy contended vigorously in a skirmish with our cavalry on the march; yet so that our men were conquerors in all parts, and drove them to their woods and hills; but, having slain a great many, they pursued too eagerly, and lost some of their men. But the enemy, after some time had elapsed, when our men were off their guard, and occupied in the fortification of the camp, rushed out of the woods, and making an attack upon those who were placed on duty before the camp, fought in a determined manner; and two cohorts being sent by Caesar to their relief, and these severally the first of two legions, when these had taken up their position at a very small distance from each other, as our men were disconcerted by the unusual mode of battle, the enemy broke through the middle of them most courageously, and retreated thence in safety. That day, Q. Laberius Durus, a tribune of the soldiers, was slain. The enemy, since more cohorts were sent against them, were repulsed.']
[34] [Simpson, Archaic Sculpturings of Cups, Circles &c., p. 183.]
[35] [Turner, Nineteen Years in Polynesia,
p. 245. 'THE RAISING OF THE HEAVENS.
The Samoans have no consecutive tales of these early times; but we give the
disjointed fragments as we find them. They say, that of old the heavens fell
down, and that people had to crawl about like the lower animals. After a time,
the arrow-root and another similar plant pushed up the heavens. The place where
these plants grew is still pointed out, and called the Te'enga-langi, or
heaven-pushing place. But the heads of the people continued to knock on the
skies. One day, a woman was passing along who had been drawing water. A man came
up to her, and said, that he would push up the heavens, if she would give him
some water to drink. "Push them up first," she replied. He pushed them up. "Will
that do?" said he. "No; a little further." He sent them up higher still, and
then she handed him her cocoa-nut shell water-bottle. Another account says, that
a person named Tiitii pushed up the heavens; and the hollow places in a rock,
nearly six feet long, are pointed out as his footprints.' From Tylor, Early
Researches, p. 115.]
[36] [Rit. ch. 125. 'I have crossed by the Northern fields of the palm tree. Explain what thou hast seen there. It is the footstep and the sole. Explain thou to them what I have seen, or what thou hast seen, hailed in the Region of the Captured.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf's.]
[37] [Rit. ch. 154. '... the foot and the sole of the foot of the Lion-Gods.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf's.]
[38] [Rit. ch. 130. 'Hail to ye, Feet! The God has grown hard with the mysteries of his hand, the God dissipates the extremities [?] of Seb by light.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf's.]
[39] [Histories, bk. 2:91.'The Egyptians are averse to adopt Greek customs, or, in
a word, those of any other nation. This feeling is almost universal among them.
At Chemmis, however, which is a large city in the Thebaic canton, near Neapolis,
there is a square enclosure sacred to Perseus, son of Danaë. Palm trees grow all
round the place, which has a stone gateway of an unusual size, surmounted by two
colossal statues, also in stone. Inside this precinct is a temple, and in the
temple an image of Perseus. The people of Chemmis say that Perseus often appears
to them, sometimes within the sacred enclosure, sometimes in the open country:
one of the sandals which he has worn is frequently found-two cubits in length,
as they affirm—and then all Egypt flourishes
greatly.' Tr., Rawlinson.
'Hellenic usages they will by no means follow, and to speak generally
they follow those of no other men whatever. This rule is observed by most of the
Egyptians; but there is a large city named Chemmis in the Theban district near
Neapolis, and in this city there is a temple of Perseus the son of Danae which
is of a square shape, and round it grow date-palms: the gateway of the temple is
built of stone and of very great size, and at the entrance of it stand two great
statues of stone. Within this enclosure is a temple-house and in it stands an
image of Perseus. These people of Chemmis say that Perseus is wont often to
appear in their land and often within the temple, and that a sandal which has
been worn by him is found sometimes, being in length two cubits, and whenever
this appears all Egypt prospers.' Tr., Macauley.]
[40] [Ibid., bk. 4:82. 'The country has no marvels except its rivers, which are
larger and more numerous than those of any other land. These, and the vastness
of the great plain, are worthy of note, and one thing besides, which I am about
to mention. They show a foot-mark of Hercules, impressed on a rock, in shape
like the print of a man's foot, but two cubits in length.' Tr., Rawlinson.
'This is what I heard about the number of the Scythians. Now this land
has no marvellous things except that it has rivers which are by far larger and
more numerous than those of any other land. One thing however shall be mentioned
which it has to show, and which is worthy of wonder even besides the rivers and
the greatness of the plain, that is to say, they point out a footprint of
Heracles in the rock by the bank of the river Tyras, which in shape is like the
mark of a man's foot but in size is two cubits long.' Tr.,
Macauley.]
[41] [Rit. ch. 42. Cf. Renouf.]
[42] [Gibson, Camden, tab. 1, from Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, plate.]
[43] [Perth, K.S., 22-26, May 1623.]
[44] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 3, p. 277, the 5th ed. 'Physical Charms.' 'In the Life of Nicholas Mooney, a notorious highwayman, executed at Bristol, April 24th, 1752, with other malefactors, we read, p. 30: "After the cart drew away, the hangman very deservedly had his head broke for endeavouring to pull off Mooney's shoes; and a fellow had like to have been killed in mounting the gallows, to take away the ropes that were left after the malefactors were cut down. A young woman came fifteen miles for the sake of the rope from Mooney's neck, which was given to her; it being by many apprehended that the halter of an executed person will charm away the ague, and perform many other cures."']
[45] [Ibid., vol. 2, pp. 20-1, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'At Werington, in Devonshire, the clergyman of the parish informed me that when a farmer finishes his reaping, a small quantity of the ears of the last corn are twisted or tied together into a curious kind of figure, which is brought home with great acclamations, hung up over the table, and kept till the next year. The owner would think it extremely unlucky to part with this, which is called "a knack." The whoop and halloo "A knack! a knack! well cut! well bound! well shocked!" and in some places, in a sort of mockery, it is added, "Well scattered on the ground." A countryman gave me a somewhat different account, as follows: "When they have cut the corn, the reapers assemble together: a knack is made, which one placed in the middle of the company holds up, crying thrice, 'A knack!' which all the rest repeat: the person in the middle then says: 'Well cut! well bound! Well shocked! well saved from the ground!' He afterwards cries 'Whoop!' and his companions hollow as loud as they can." I have not the most distant idea of the etymology of the "knacks" used on this occasion. I applied for one of them. No farmer would part with that which hung over his table; but one was made on purpose for me. I should suppose that Moresin alludes to something like this when he says: "Et spiceas papatus (habet) coronas, quas videre est in domibus," &c. Papatus, p. 163, v. SPICLE.']
[46] [Ibid., vol. 2, p. 25, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'In the Statistical Account of Scotland, 1797, xix. 550, Parish of Longforgan, Perth, we read: "It was, till very lately, the custom to give what was called a Maiden Feast, upon the finishing of the harvest; and to prepare for which, the last handful of corn reaped in the field was called the Maiden. This was generally contrived to fall into the hands of one of the finest girls in the field, was dressed up with ribands, and brought home in triumph, with the music of fiddles or bagpipes. A good dinner was given to the whole band, and the evening spent in joviality and dancing, while the fortunate lass who took the Maiden was the queen of the feast; after which this handful of corn was dressed out, generally in the form of a cross, and hung up with the date of the year, in some conspicuous part of the house. This custom is now entirely done away, and in its room each shearer is given 6d. and a loaf of bread. However, some farmers, when all their corns are brought in, give their servants a dinner and a jovial evening, by way of Harvest Home."']
[47] [Ibid., vol. 2, p. 24, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'Different places adopt different ceremonies. There is a sport on this occasion in Hertfordshire, called Crying the Mare, (it is the same in Shropshire,) when the reapers tie together the tops of the last blades of corn, which is Mare, and standing at some distance, throw their sickles at it, and he who cuts the knot has the prize, with acclamations and good cheer.']
[48] [Ibid., vol. 2. p. 24, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'See Blount; who tells us further, that "After the knot is cut, then they cry with a loud voice, three times, 'I have her!' Others answer, as many times, 'What have you?' 'A mare! a mare! a mare!' 'Whose is she?' thrice also. J. B. (naming the owner three times.) 'Whither will you send her?' 'To J. a Nicks' (naming some neighbour who has not all his corn reaped); then they all shout three times, and so the ceremony ends with good cheer.']
[49] [Ibid., vol. 2, p. 22, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'This Peruvian Pirva, says my learned and ingenious friend Mr. Walter, Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge, bears a strong resemblance to what is called in Kent an Ivy Girl, which is a figure composed of some of the best corn the field produces, and made as well as they can into a human shape; this is afterwards curiously dressed by the women, and adorned with paper trimmings, cut to resemble a cap, ruffles, handkerchief, &c. of the finest lace. It is brought home with the last load of corn from the field upon the waggon, and they suppose entitles them to a supper at the expense of their employers.']
[50]
[Canterbury Tales, Prologue, lines 311-32.
'A SERGEANT OF THE LAWE ware and wise,
That often hadde yben at the paruis,
Ther was also, ful riche of excellence.
Discrete he was, and of gret reverence:
He semed swiche, his wordes were so wise.
Justice he was fol often in assise,
By patent, and by pleine commissioun;
For his science, and for his high renoun,
Of fees and robes had he many on.
So grete a pourchasour was no wher non.
All was fee simple to him in effect,
His pourchasing might not ben in suspect.
No wher so besy a man as he ther n'as,
And yet he semed besier than he was.
In termes hadde he cas and domes alle,
That fro the the time of king Will, weren falle.
Therto he coude endite, and make a thing,
Ther coude no wight pinche at his writing.
And every statute coude he plaine by rote.
He rode but homely in a medlee cote,
Girt with a seint of silk, with barres smale;
Of his array tell I no lenger tale.' Vol. 1, pp. 175-6, of the 1822 ed., ed. by
T. Tyrwhitt.]
[51] [Academy of Armory. See note 53 below.]
[52] [See note below.]
[53] [Brewer, Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, p. 291. 'Feathers.' 'The tradition is, that the Black Prince, having slain John of Luxemburg, King of Bohemia, in the Battle of Cressy, assumed his crest and motto. The crest consisted of three ostrich feathers, and the motto was "Ich dien" (I serve). John of Arden discovered a contemporary MS., in which it is expressly said that this was the case; but much controversy has arisen on the question. Dr. Bell affirms that the crest is a rebus of Queen Philippa's hereditary title—viz. Countess of Ostrevant (ostrich-feather). Randall Holmes claims an old British origin; and the Rev. H. Longueville asserts that the arms of Roderick Mawe, prior to the division of Wales into principalities, was thus blazoned:—"Argent, three lions passant regardant, with their tails passing between their legs and curling over their backs in a feathery form."' And see note 55 below.]
[54] [Pierret, Vocabulaire Hieroglyphique, p. 754.]
[55] [Poste, Celtic Inscriptions on Gaulish and British Coins, p. 130. 'A coin in the British Museum, inscribed C'vno, and representing a horse galloping to the left, appears to display, as an accessory symbol, a diadem with a plume of ostrich feathers; at least, the delineation would seem to show itself as such, as far as, from its small size, an identification of it can be made. There is no impossibility, certainly, that a similar device may have been originally a British ornament. Though the ostrich plumes of Wales, with the motto, "Ich dien," are recorded to have been adopted in the reign of Edward the Third, from John, king of Bohemia, on the faith of our English history.']
[56] [Sewell, 'Early Buddhist Symbolism,' JRAS, 18, n.s., p. 391. Although this may be the correct page number, I am unable to trace any such ref. to feathers, etc.]
[57] [Hieroglyphica, bk. 1:21. 'To signify the rising of the Nile, which they call in the Egyptian language NOUN, and which, when interpreted, signifies New, they sometimes pourtray a LION, and sometimes THREE LARGE WATERPOTS, and at other times HEAVEN AND EARTH GUSHING FORTH WITH WATER. And they depict a LION, because when the sun is in Leo it augments the rising of the Nile, so that oftentimes while the sun remains in that sign of the zodiac, half of the new water [Noun, the entire inundation?] is supplied; and hence it is, that those who anciently presided over the sacred works, have made the spouts [?] and passages of the sacred fountains in the form of lions.' See note to BB 1:32 for other refs to this verse.]
[58] [Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids. See p. 47.]
[59] [Williams, Barddas. See p. 381.]
[60] [Description of the Western Islands of Scotland, p. 109. 'It was an antient Custom among the Islanders, to hang a He-Goat to the Boat's-Mast, hoping thereby to procure a favourable Wind: but this is not practis'd at present; tho I am told it hath been done once by some of the the Vulgar within these 15 Years last past.']
[61] [Williams, Barddas. See also Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 105.]
[62] [Aneirin, Gododin, song 15, from Davies, Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 114.]
[63] [Tennent, 'Stone-Pillar Worship still existing in Ireland,' NQ, 1852, 5, 121. See full text here.]
[64] [Source.]
[65] [The Times, 3/9/1863.]
[66] [Grimm, Deutsch Mythologie, p. 1222. 'When the cuckoo has eaten his fill of cherries three times, he leaves off singing. As the cuckoo's song falls silent at Midsummer, vulgar opinion holds that from that time he turns into a hawk. Reusch, N. pr. prov. bl. 5, 338-9.' Eng. tr. vol. 2, p. 679.]
[67]
[Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 3, p. 359. 'In the north of England,
children used to run round a cherry tree, singing,
Cuckoo, cherry tree,
Come down and tell me
How many years I have to live,
each on shaking the tree successively, and obtaining the divination of the
length of his life by counting the number of cherries which fall.']
[68] [Hieroglyphica, bk. 2:40. 'When they would symbolise a man living in intercourse with his own wife, they depict TWO CROWS; for these birds cohabit with one another in the same manner as does a man by nature.']
[69] [Ibid., bk. 1:9. 'To denote marriage, they again depict TWO CROWS, on account of what has been mentioned.']
[70] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol.
3, p. 215, the 5th ed. 'Magpie.' 'On which Steevens observes: "In Cotgrave's Dictionary a
magpie is called magatapie." So in the Night Raven, a Satirical Collection,
&c.: "I neither tattle with jackdaw Or maggot-pye on thatch'd house straw."
Magot-pie is the original name of the bird; magot being the familiar appellation
given to pies, as we say Robin to a redbreast, Tom to a tit-mouse, Philip to a
sparrow, &c. The modern mag is the abbreviation of the ancient magot, a word
which we had from the French. See Halliwell, p. 536.
In the Supplement to Johnson and Steevens's Shakespeare, 8vo. Lond. 1780,
ii. 706, it is said that the magpie is called, in the west, to this hour, a
magatipie, and the import of the augury is determined by the number of the birds
that are seen together: "One for sorrow; two for mirth; three for a wedding;
four for death."']
[71] [Plutarch, Of Isis and Osiris, ch. 75.]
[72] [The Natural History and Antiquities of Selbourne, (1822 ed.) vol. 2, p. 234. 'Fern-owls have attachment to oaks, no doubt on account of food; for the next evening we paw one again several times among the boughs of the same tree; but it did not skim round its stem over the grass, as on the evening before. In May these birds find the Scarabaeus melolontha on the oak, and the Scarabaeus solstitialis at midsummer. These peculiar birds can only be watched and observed for two hours in the twenty-four; and then in dubious twilight an hour after sun-set and an hour before sun-rise.']
[73] [Hieroglyphica, bk. 1:53. 'When they would denote a son, they delineate a CHENALOPEX (a species of goose). For this animal is excessively fond of its offspring, and if ever it is pursued so as to be in danger of being taken with its young, both the father and mother voluntarily give themselves up to the pursuers, that their offspring may be saved; and for this reason the Egyptians have thought fit to consecrate this animal.']
[74] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 33, the 5th ed. 'Harvest Home.' 'In the Statistical Account of Scotland, 1793, vii. 303, Parish of Mouswald, co. Dumfries, we read: "The inhabitants can now laugh at the superstition and credulity of their ancestors, who, it is said, could swallow down the absurd nonsense of 'a boon of shearers,' i.e. reapers being turned into large grey stones on account of their kemping, i.e. striving. These stones, about twenty years ago, after being blasted with gunpowder, were used in building the farmhouses then erecting near the spot, which had formerly been part of a common."']
[75] [Thorpe, Northern Mythology, vol. 2, p. 53. 'Thor was worshiped in Gothland above and more than the other gods. The Thorbagge (scarabaeus stercorarius) was sacred to him. Relative to this beetle a superstition still exists, which has been transmitted from father to son, that if any one in his path finds a Thorbagge lying help less on its back, and turns it on its feet, he expiates seven sins; because Thor in the time of heathenism was regarded as a mediator with a higher power, or All-father. On the introduction of Christianity, the priests strove to terrify the people from the worship of their old divinities, pronouncing both them and their adherents to be evil spirits and belonging to hell. On the poor Thorbagge the name was now bestowed of Thordjefvul or Thordyfvel (Thor-devil), by which it is still known in Sweden Proper. No one now thinks of Thor, when he finds the helpless creature lying on its back; but the good-natured countryman seldom passes it without setting it on its feet, and thinking of his sins atonement.']
[76] [Chapter 30 has two parts, A & B. 'Said over a scarabaeus of hard stone. Cause it to be washed with gold, and placed within the heart of a person. Make a phylactery anointed with oil, say over it with magic: My heart is my mother, my heart in my transformations.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf.]
[77] [Inman, Ancient Faiths Embodied in Ancient Names, vol. 2, p. 648, fig. 47 & 48.]
[78] [Rit. ch. 32. Cf. Renouf.]
[79] [Insectorum sive minimorum animalium Theatrum,
p. 149. 'The Dynastes Goliathus, Moufet says, "like to beetles (Afeuchus
sacer), hath no female, but it shapes its own form itself. It produceth its
young one from the ground by itself, which Joach. Camerarius did elegantly
express, when he sent to Pennius the shape of this insect out of the storehouse
of natural things of the Duke of Saxony; with these verses:
A bee begat me not, nor yet did I proceed
From any female, but myself I breed.
For it dies once in a year," continues Moufet, "and from its own corruption,
like a Phoenix, it lives again (as Moninus witnesseth) by heat of the sun.'
From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of Insects, p. 47.]
[80] [As above.]
[81] [Insectorum sive minimorum animalium Theatrum, p. 152. As note 79 above.]
[82] [Valeriano Bolzani, Hieroglyphica, pp. 93-5. 'The World—According to P. Valerianus, the Scarab was symbolical of the world, on account of the globular form of its pellets of dung, and from an odd notion that they were rolled from sunrise to sunset.' From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of Insects, p. 30.]
[83] [Tennent, Sketches of the Natural History of
Ceylon, p. 407. 'Immediately after mentioning the above fact,
Tennent records the following interesting superstition respecting a beetle when
found in a house after sunset:
"Among the superstitions of the Singhalese arising out of their belief in
demonology, one remarkable one is connected with the appearance of a beetle when
observed on the floor of a dwelling-house after nightfall. The popular belief is
that in obedience to a certain form of incantation (called cooroominiya-pilli)
a demon in shape of a beetle is sent to the house of some person or family whose
destruction it is intended to compass, and who presently falls sick and dies.
The only means of averting this catastrophy is, that some one, himself an adept
in necromancy, should perform a counter-charm, the effect of which is to send
back the disguised beetle to destroy his original employer; for in such a
conjuncture the death of one or the other is essential to appease the demon
whose intervention has been invoked. Hence the discomfort of a Singhalese on
finding a beetle in his house after sunset, and his anxiety to expel but not
kill it.'" From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of
Insects, p. 47.]
[84] ['Plut. Of Isis and Osiris, p. 220. The
translation of this passage as given by Philemon Holland is as follows: "The Fly
called the Beetill they (the Egyptians) reverence, because they observe in them
I wot not what little slender Images (like as in drops of water we see the
resemblance of the Sun) of the Divine power.
As for the Beetills, they hold, that throughout all their kinds there is no
female, but all the males do blow or cast their seed into a certain globus or
round matter in the form of balls, which they drive from them and roll to and
fro contrariwise, like as the Sun, when he moveth himself from the West to the
East, seemeth to turn about the Heaven clean contrary."—p.
1071, ed. of 1657.' From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of
Insects, p. 30.]
[85] [Works, vol. 2, p. 375. 'The common
name of Death-watch, given to the Anohium tesselatum, sufficiently
announces the popular prejudice against this insect; and so great is this
prejudice, that, as says an editor of Cuvier's works, the fate of many a nervous
and superstitious patient has been accelerated by listening, in the silence and
solitude of night, to this imagined knell of his approaching dissolution. The
learned Sir Thomas Browne considered the superstition connected with the
Death-watch of great importance, and remarks that "the man who could eradicate
this error from the minds of the people would save from many a cold sweat the
meticulous heads of nurses and grandmothers," for such persons are firm in the
belief, that—
The solemn Death-watch clicks the hour of death.'
From Cowan,
Curious Facts in the History of Insects, p. 30.]
[86] [Rit. ch. 93. 'Or that he should cut or take the horns of Khepera ... let him not hurt the horns of Khepera.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf.]
[87] ['Baxter, in his World of Spirits, p. 203, most sensibly observes that: "There are many things that ignorance causeth multitudes to take for prodigies. I have had many discreet friends that have been affrighted with the noise called a death-watch, whereas I have since, near three years ago, oft found by trial, that it is a noise made upon paper, by a little, nimble, running worm, just like a louse, but whiter, and quicker; and it is most usually behind a paper pasted to a wall, especially to wainscot; and it is rarely if ever heard but in the heat of summer." Our author, however, relapses immediately into his honest credulity, adding: 'But he who can deny it to be a prodigy, which is recorded by Melchior Adamus, of a great and good man, who had a clock-watch that had layen in a chest many years unused; and when he lay dying, at eleven o'clock, of itself, in that chest, it struck eleven in the hearing of many."' From Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 3, p. 226.]
[88] [Gough, Sepulchral Monuments in Great Britain, vol. 1, p. 12. 'In one of the stone coffins exhumed from the tumuli in the links of Skail, were found several small bags, which seemed to have been made of rushes. They all contained bones, with the exception of one, which is said to have been full of beetles belonging to the genus Dermestes. Both the bag and beetles were black and rotten.' From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of Insects, p. 24.]
[89] [Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, Second Series, vol. 2, p. 261. 'Four species of Dermestes were found in the head of one of the mummies brought by Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson from Thebes—the D. vulpinus of Fabricius, and the pollinctus, roei, and elongatus of Hope.' From Cowan, Curious Facts in the History of Insects, p. 24.]
[90] [Shakespeare, 2 Henry, 6, act 4, sc. 2. 'Be brave, then; for your captain is brave, and vows reformation. There shall be in England seven halfpenny loaves sold for a penny: the three-hooped pot; shall have ten hoops and I will make it felony to drink small beer: all the realm shall be in common; and in Cheapside shall my palfrey go to grass: and when I am king, as king I will be.']
[91] [Faerie Queene? Unable to trace.]
[92] [Hieroglyphica, bk. 2:2. 'An EAGLET symbolizes something prolific of males, or of a circular form, or the seed of man.']
[93] [See the occult works of Kenneth Grant, H. P. Blavatsky, etc., on this.]
[94] ['AMONG the Anglo-Saxons the nuptial benediction
was performed under a veil, or square piece of cloth, held at each corner by a
tall man over the bridegroom and bride, to conceal her virgin blushes; but if
the bride was a widow, the veil was esteemed useless. According to the use of
the church of Sarum, when there was a marriage before mass, the parties kneeled
together and had a fine linen cloth (called the care cloth) laid over their
heads during the time of mass, till they received the benediction, and then were
dismissed.'
Footnote 1: 'In the Hereford Missal it is directed that at a particular prayer
the married couple shall prostrate themselves, while four clerks hold the pall,
i.e. the care cloth over them. See the Appendix to Hearne's Glastonbury, p. 309
et seq. The Rubric in the Sarum Manual is somewhat different: "Prosternat se
sponsus et sponsa in oratione ad gradum altaris, extenso super eos pallio, quod
teneant quatuor clerici per quatuor cornua in superpelliciis." The York Manual
also differs here: "Missa dein celehratur, illis genuflectentibus sub pallio
super eos extento, quod teneant duo clerici in superpelliceis."' From Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 142.]
[95] [See note 94 above.]
[96] [Source.]
[97] ['Camden, in his Ancient and Modern Manners of the Irish, says, that "they are observed to present their lovers with bracelets of women's hair, whether in reference to Venus' cestus or not, I know not." Gough's Camden, iii. 658. See also Memorable Things noted in the Description of the World, p. 113.' From Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 91.]
[98] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 127, the 5th ed. 'Gloves at Weddings.' 'The late Rev. Dr. Lort says in a MS. note: "At Wrexham, in Flintshire, on occasion of the marriage of the surgeon and apothecary of the place, August 1785, I saw at the doors of his own and neighbours' houses, throughout the street where he lived, large boughs and posts of trees, that had been cut down and fixed there, filled with white paper, cut in the shape of women's gloves and of white ribbons."']
[99] [Hos. 10:11. 'And Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn; but I passed over upon her fair neck: I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods.']
[100] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 194, the 5th ed. 'Cornutes.' 'Grose mentions a fair called Horn-Fair, held at Charlton, in Kent, on St. Luke's day, the 18th of October. It consists of a riotous mob, who, after a printed summons dispersed through the adjacent towns, meet at Cuckold's Point, near Deptford, and march from thence in procession through that town and Greenwich to Charlton, with horns of different kinds upon their heads; and at the fair there are sold ram's-horns, and every sort of toy made of horn; even the ginger-bread figures have horns. A sermon is preached at Charlton church on the fair day. Tradition attributes the origin of this licentious fair to King John, who, it is said, being detected in an adulterous amour, compounded for his crime by granting to the injured husband all the land from Charlton to Cuckold's Point, and established the fair as a tenure.']
[101] [Hieroglyphica, bk. 2:18. 'A cow's HORN when depicted signifies punishment.']
[102] ['Greene, in his Conceipt, 1598, p. 33, uses this expression of a cornute: "But certainely beleeved that Giraldo his master was as soundly armde for the heade, as either Capricorne, or the stoutest horned signe in the Zodiacke."' From Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 183. Correct author and title is: Dickenson, Greene in Conceipt.]
[103] [Mayne, The Amorous Warre, act 2, sc. 3.]
[104] [Hudibras, pt. 1. 'Nor shall it e'er be said, that wight, With gantlet blue, and bases white.' The editor adds the following note to this line, 'Alluding, I suppose, to the butcher's blue frock and white apron.' P. 80 of the 1887 ed., ed. by Z. Grey.]
[105] [Gayton, Festivous Notes on the History and Adventures of the Renowned Don Quixote, p. 218. Unable to trace in the 1771 ed.]
[106] [Chabas, 'Magic Papyrus,' RP, 10, 135. See p. 141.]
[107] [Gerald of Wales, 'Description of Wales,' ch. 2, in The Historical Works of Giraldus Cambriensis, (1863 ed.) p. 480. 'Although it is the opinion of most writers, that Roderic the Great was the first person who divided the kingdom of Wales into three provinces, which he distributed to his three sons, I shall prove, from ancient authorities, that long before the destruction of Britain it was so divided. There is extant a very old treatise on the British laws, which testifies that after the death of Vortipor the inhabitants of Venedotia, Powys, and Demetia assembled together, for the purpose of electing a new king, and that they elected Maelgwn, king of North Wales, to be their sovereign. And the British histories also testify that Morgan, king of Demetia, or West Wales, Cadvan, king of Venedotia, or North Wales, Mervin, Anarawt, and Cadelh, amongst whom he partitioned the whole principality. North Wales fell to the lot of Mervin; Powys to Anarawt; and Cadelh received the portion of South Wales, together with the general good wishes of his brothers and the people; for although this district greatly exceeded the others in quantity, it was the least desirable from the number of noble chiefs, or Uchelwyr, men of a superior rank, who inhabited it, and were often rebellious to their lords, and impatient of control. But Cadelh, on the death of his brothers, obtained the entire dominion of Wales, as did his successors till the time of Theodor, whose descendants, Rhys, son of Theodor, Gruffydh, son of Rhys, and Rhys, son of Gruffydh, the ruling prince in our time, enjoyed only (like the father) the sovereignty over South Wales.']
[108] [Birch, Select Papyri in the Hieratic Character, 46.4.]
[109]
[Canterbury Tales, 'The Pardoner's Tale,' vol. 3, p. 26 (1822 ed.),
lines 1258-61. 'By Goddes armes if thou falsly pleye,
This dagger shal thurghout thin herte go.
This fruit cometh of the bicchel bones two,
Forswering, ire, falsenesse, and homicide.']
[110] [Of Isis and Osiris, ch. 62.]
[111] [Description of the Western Islands of
Scotland, p. 41. 'The Natives told me, that the Rock on the East-side
of Harries in the Sound of Island Gulfs hath a Vacuity near the Front, on the Northwell fide of the Sound; in which they fay there is a Stone that they call
the Lunar-Stone which advances and retires according to the Increase and
Decrease of the Moon.
A POOR Man born in the Village Rowdill, commonly call'd St. Clements-blind, lost
his Sight at every Change of the Moon, which oblig'd him to keep his bed for a
day or two, and then he recover'd his Sight.']
[112] [Unable to trace in RP.]
[113] [Hall, Epigram Against Marston. This
epigram actually appears in Marston's satire, The Scourge of Villainy,
Satire 10, lines 47-54 where Marston rebukes Hall's original attack with the
claim; 'An Epigram which the Author Vergidemiarum [i.e. Hall who
wrote the satirical work Virgidemiarum] caused to be pasted to the latter
page of every Pygmalion that came to the Stationers of Cambridge.' The
lines are as follows:
'I ask'd Physicians what their counsel was
For a mad dog, or for a mankind ass?
They told me, though there were confections' store
Of poppy-seed and sovereign hellebore,
The dog was best cured by cutting and kinsing
The ass must be kindly whipped for winsing.
Now then, S. K., I little pass
Whether thou be a mad dog or a mankind ass.' From Collected Works, vol.
3, p. 369 (1887 ed).
As the editor of Marston's collected works points out in the introduction to
volume 1, 'kinsing' is a play on the word 'kinsayder,' a name assumed by Marston.
See also Wright's Glossary, or Collection of Words, Phrases, Names, and
Allusions, etc., vol. 3, p. 484: 'KINSING. Some operation performed for the
cure of a mad dog.
I ask't physitions what their counsell was
For a mnd dogge or for a mankind asse
They told me, be.
The dogge was best cured by cutting and kinsing,
Hall's Egr. against Marston.
This was an allusion to Marston's assumed name of Kinsayder; which in other
places also brings in the mention of a dog. John Marston being named, it is
said,
What, monsieur Kinsayder, lifting up your leg, and
p—ss—g against the world.
Marston himself introduces the name of Kinsayder, in his comedy of What you
will, and there again it is united with cur:
Away, idolater! Why you don Kinsayder,
Thou canker-eaten rusty cur.
Act ii, Anc. Dr., ii, p. 555.
The person so addressed is a poet, named Lampatho Doria, who thus appears
intended to personate Marston himself.'
As Massey has 'Hall's Egr. against Marston', I assume he got
it from Wright.]
[114] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 3, pp. 327-8, the 5th ed. 'Lee-Penny.' 'The Lee-penny, or Lee-stone, is a curious piece of antiquity belonging to the family of Lee in Scotland. It is a stone, of a dark red colour and triangular shape, and its size about half an inch on each side. It is set in a piece of silver coin, which, though much defaced, by some letters still remaining, it is supposed to be a shilling of Edward the First, the cross being very plain, as it is on his shillings. It has been, by tradition, in the Lee family since the year 1320; that is, a little after the death of King Robert Bruce, who having ordered his heart to be carried to the Holy Land, there to be buried, one of the noble family of Douglas was sent with it, and it is said got the crowned heart in his arms from that circumstance; but the person who carried the heart was Simon Locard of Lee, who just about this time borrowed a large sum of money from Sir William de Lindsay, a prior of Ayr, for which he granted a bond of annuity of ten pounds of silver, during the life of the said Sir William de Lindsay, out of his lands of Lee and Cartland. The original bond, dated 1323, and witnessed by the principal nobility of the country, is still remaining among the family papers. As this was a great sum in those days, it is thought it was borrowed for that expedition; and from his being the person who carried the royal heart, he changed his name to Lockheart, as it is sometimes spelt, or Lockhart, and got a heart within a lock for part of his arms, with the motto Corda serata pando. This Simon Lockhart having taken prisoner a Saracen prince or chief, his wife came to ransom him, and on counting out the money or jewels, this stone fell out of her purse, which she hastily snatched up; which Simon Lockhart observing, insisted to have it, else he would not give up his prisoner. Upon this the lady gave it him, and told him its many virtues, viz. that it cured all diseases in cattle, and the bite of a mad dog both in man and beast. It is used by dipping the stone in water, which is given to the diseased cattle to drink; and the person who has been bit, and the wound or part infected, is washed with the water. There are no words used in the dipping of the stone, nor any money taken by the servants, without incurring the owner's displeasure. Many are the cures said to be performed by it; and people come from all parts of Scotland, and even as far up in England as Yorkshire, to get the water in which the stone is dipped, to give their cattle, when ill of the murrain especially, and black leg. A great many years ago, a complaint was made to the ecclesiastical courts, against the Laird of Lee, then Sir James Lockhart, for using witchcraft. It is said, when the plague was last at Newcastle, the inhabitants sent for the Lee-penny, and gave a bond for a large sum in trust for the loan; and that they thought it did so much good, that they offered to pay the money, and keep the Lee-penny; but the gentleman would not part with it. A copy of this bond is very well attested to have been among the family papers, but supposed to have been spoiled along with many more valuable ones, about fifty years ago, by rain getting into the charter-room, during a long minority, and no family residing at Lee. The most remarkable cure performed upon any person, was that of Lady Baird, of Sauchton Hall, near Edinburgh; who having been bit by a mad dog, was come the length of hydrophobia; upon which, having sent to beg the Lee-penny might be sent to her house, she used it for some weeks, drinking and bathing in the water it was dipped in, and was quite recovered. This happened above eighty years ago; but it is very well attested, having been told by the lady of the then Laird of Lee, and who died within these thirty years. She also told, that her husband, Mr. Lockhart, and she were entertained at Sauchton Hall, by Sir Robert Baird and his lady, for several days, in the most sumptuous manner, on account of the lady's recovery, and in gratitude for the loan of the Lee-penny so long, as it was never allowed to be carried from the house of Lee.']
[115] [Monuments de l'Égypt de la Nubie, vol. 4, p. 322.]
[116] [Lery, Historie d'un voyage fait en la terre du Bresil, p. 153. 'Jean de Lery, in the account of his adventures among the Indians of Brazil, about 1557, describes the wooden grating set up on four forked posts, "which in their language they call a boucan;" on this they cooked food with a slow fire underneath, and as they did not salt their meat, this process served them as a means of keeping their game and fish.' Quoted by Tylor, Researches into the Early History of Mankind, p. 262.]
[117] [The Canterbury Tales, 'The Prologue,'
(Tyrwhitt's 1822 ed.), vol. 1, p. 185, lines 564-5.
'Wel coude he stelen corne, and tollen thries.
And yet he had a thomb of gold parde.'
Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 3, p. 388, the 5th ed.
'Turning Cat in Pan.' 'I suspect "the miller's thumb" to have been the
name of the strickle used in measuring corn, the instrument with which corn is
made level and struck off in measuring; in Latin called "radius," which
Ainsworth renders "a stricklace or stricke, which they use in measuring of
corn." Perhaps this strickle had a rim of gold, to show it was standard; true,
and not fraudulent.']
[118] [Kelly, Curiosities of Indo-European Tradition and Folklore, pp. 225-6. 'The witch's broom, or besom, appears to be not less ancient than her cauldron, for it is known in the folk-lore of the Hindus as well as in that of the West. "The Asiatic as well as the European witches practise their spells by dancing at midnight, and the principal instrument they use on such occasions is a broom." Hence It is tolerably clear that the broom must originally have been supposed, like the sieve, to be used for some purpose or other in the economy of the upper regions. Now it seems that in modem times, besides serving the witch as a nag, the implement is intended for sweeping the sky; for that is a work assigned to its riders, as may be inferred from the prevalent belief in the Harz, that on the 1st of May the witches must dance away all the snow upon the Blocksberg. The besom is a type of the winds, and therefore an appropriate utensil in the hands of the witches who are wind-makers and workers in that element. They say in the Mark that if you want a wind you must bum an old broom; and it is a nautical tradition in Hamburg, that if you have long had a contrary wind, and meet with another ship, you must throw an old broom before it. The wind will then chop round and become a good one for you, and a bad one for the other ship.']
[119] [Ibid., pp. 226-7. 'It is well known in England, and also in Germany, that no witch can Step over a besom laid along the threshold of the house door on the inside. She will kick it or push it aside before she can enter your house, and by this token you may know her for what she is. An axe (Thor's weapon) and a broom are laid crosswise on the inner side of the threshold over which the nurse has to step when she goes out with an infant to have it christened. This is done that the babe may be safe from all the devices of the powers of evil. When the cattle are first driven out to pasture in the spring, a besom made in "the twelve days" is laid on the threshold of their stall, or of the gate of the cattle-yard, and they are made to step over it, by which means they are secured against witchcraft throughout the year.']
[120] [Ibid., p. 228. 'In the Altenburg territory people go up a hill on Walpurgis night with all the old besoms they can gather, which they then set on fire, and run about with them, playing all sorts of tricks upon each other. The Czechs of Bohemia do the same thing on St John's day, and young men and lads are busy for weeks beforehand in collecting all the worn-out besoms they can beg or steal for the occasion. They dip them in tar, light them, and run with them from one bonfire to another, jumping over each of the latter. The burnt stumps of the broom handles are stuck in the cabbage gardens, to preserve the plants from flies and caterpillars. In some places the lads and lasses toss their burning besoms into the air, and sing a rhyme, in which they ask for a token how many years they have to live. If the besom is still alight when it comes down, and continues to bum on the ground, they expect to live through the year, and they count upon another year of life, for every time the experiment is repeated with success.']
[121] [Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 1, p. 307, the 5th ed. 'Midsummer Eve.' 'In the Churchwardens' Accounts of St. Martin Outwich (see Nichols's Illustrations, p. 273), we have: "1524. Payde for byrche and bromes at Midsom £1, ijd." "1525. Payde for byrch and bromes at Mydsom £1, iijd."']
[122] ['The following curious
passage is taken from Dr. King's Miscellany Poems; see his Works,
1776, iii. 256:
"When the young people ride the Skimmington,
There is a general trembling in a town.
Not only he for whom the person rides
Suffers, but they sweep other doors besides;
And by that hieroglyphic does appear
That the good woman is the master there."'
From Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 192.]
[123] [Bunsen, Egypt's Place in Universal History, vol. 1, p. 551, no. 149.]
[124] [Geography., bk. 17, 1. 40. 'On the other side of the river is the city Oxyrynchus, and a nome of the same name. They worship the oxyrynchus, and have a temple dedicated to this animal; but all the other Egyptians worship the oxyrynchus. For all the Egyptians worship in common certain animals; three among the land animals, the ox, the dog, and the cat; two among the winged tribe, the hawk and the ibis; and two of the aquatic animals, the fish lepidotus and the oxyrynchus. There are also other animals which each people, independently of others, worship; as the Saïtæ and Thebaïtæ, a sheep; the Latopolitæ, the latus, a fish inhabiting the Nile; the people of Lycopolis, a wolf; those of Hermopolis, the cynocephalus; those of Babylon, near Memphis, a cephus, which has the countenance of a satyr, and in other respects is between a dog and a bear; it is bred in Ethiopia. The inhabitants of Thebes worship an eagle; the Leontopolitæ, a lion; the Mendesians, a male and female goat; the Athribitæ, a shrewmouse; different people worshipping different animals. They do not, however, assign the same reasons for this difference of worship.' Tr., Hamilton & Falconer.]
[125] [Davies, The Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 137.]
[126] [Ibid., as above note.]
[127] [Taliesin, 'Gwawd Llud y Mawr,' Welsh Archaiology, p. 74. See also Davies, The Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 568, and Skene, Four Ancient Books of Wales, p. 273.]
[128] [CN, p. 244. 'White Cow, "A child that
sucks a white cow will thrive better." (Wilts.)
J. Westbt Gibson.—(Vol. vii. p. 152.)']
[129] ['Letter' in NQ, 4th ser., 8, 335. 'THE SERPENT ON CRESTS. The serpent is the emblem of eternity, or sometimes of the Eternal Spirit. My crest (a serpent issuing from a crown, which is pierced by three arrows) is, I have been told, a symbol of royal martyrdom, some ancestor having adopted it, I presume, in veneration of his patron saint, who may have been a royal martyr.—HENRY F. PONSONBY.']
[130] [Jomard, Description de l'Egypt, 1809.]
[131] [Rit. ch. 99. Cf. Renouf.]
[132] [Taliesin, ch. 2, in Davies, The Mythology and Rites of the British Druids, p. 213.]
[133] [Rit. ch. 9. Cf. Renouf.]
[134] [From Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 351. 'SIR THOMAS BROWNE is of
opinion that the human faces described in alehouse signs, in coats of arms, &c.
for the sun and moon, are reliques of Paganism, and that these visages
originally implied Apollo and Diana. Butler, the author of Hudibras, asks a
shrewd question on this head, which I do not remember to have seen solved:
"Tell me but what's the nat'ral cause
Why on a sign no painter draws
The full moon ever, but the half?"']
[135] [Bk. 1, lines 157-60 (p. 8 of London, 1922 ed.):
'But when the swinging Signs your Ears offend
With creaking Noise, then rainy Floods impend;
Soon shall the Kennels swell with rapid Streams,
And rush in muddy Torrents to the Thames.']
[136] ['The round of a milk-score is, if I mistake not, also marked with a cross
for a shilling, though unnoted by Lluellin (Poems, 1679, p. 40), in the
following passage:
"By what happe
The fat harlot of the tappe
Writes, at night and at noone,
For a tester half a moone,
And a great round for a shilling."'
From Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 1, 156, the 5th ed.]
[137] ['As do the following in the British Apollo,
fol. Lond. 1710, vol. iii. No . 34:
"I'm amazed at the signs,
As I pass through the town:
To see the odd mixture,
A Magpye and Crown,
The Whale and the Crow,
The Razor and Hen,
The Leg and Sev'n Stars,
The Bible and Swan,
The Ax and the Bottle,
The Tun and the Lute,
The Eagle and Child,
The Shovel and Boot."'
From
Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 355; see also Hotten, History of
Signboards, p. 18.]
[138] [Rit. ch. 17. 'These same are behind the constellation of the Thigh [Ursa major] of the Northern heaven.' Birch's tr. Cf. Renouf.]
[139] [History of Sign-Boards, p. 61. 'Names of battles
and glorious faits d' armes have also been much used as signs, thus,
GIBRALTAU, PORTOBELLO, the BATTLE OF THE NILE, the MOUTH OF THE NILE, TRAFALGAR,
the BATTLE OF WATERLOO, the BATTLE OF THE PYRAMIDS, are all more or less common.
The BULL AND MOUTH is said to have a similar origin, being a corruption of
Boulogne Mouth, the entry to Boulogne Harbour, which grew into a popular sign
after the capture of that place by Henry VIII. The first house with this sign is
said to have been an inn in Aldgate. In less than a century the name was already
corrupted into the "Bull and Mouth," and the sign represented by a black bull
and a large mouth. Thus it appears on the trades tokens, and also in a sculpture
in the facade of the Queen's Hotel, St Martin's-le-Grand, formerly the Bull
and Mouth Inn. Of the same time also dates the BULL AND GATE, a corruption of
the Boulogne Gates, which Henry VIII ordered to he taken away, and transported
to Hardes, in Kent, where they still (?) remain. The Bull and Gate was a noted
inn in the seventeenth century in Holborn, where Fielding makes his hero Tom
Jones put up on his arrival in London. It is still in existence under the same
name, though much reduced in size. There is another in New Chapel Place, Kentish
Town; and a few imitations of it were carried to distant provincial towns by
the coaches of old times.'
Ibid., pl. 8.
See also
Brand,
Observations on
Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 356. '"In London," says Steevens,
"we have still the sign of the Bull and Gate, which exhibits but an odd
combination of images. It was originally (as I learn from the title-page of an
old play) the Bullogne Gate, i.e. one of the gates of Bullogne; designed perhaps
as a compliment to Henry VIII. who took that place in 1544. The Bullogne Mouth,
now the Bull and Mouth, had probably the same origin, i.e. the mouth of the
harbour of Bullogne."']
[140] [CN, p. 107. 'Gobawm Saer.—Among the moat celebrated characters of antiquity, there is not one whose fame is more widely spread throughout Ireland than that of "Golmwn Saer," whose skill as an architect was only equalled by the lessons of wisdom which dropped from his lips, many of which are to this day current among the peasantry through the length and breadth of the land. "Once upon a time," as to Gobawn and his son were on their travels, they came to a place where there was a palace in progress of erection for the king of the country, and they turned aside to inspect the work. At the moment of their arrival the workmen were engaged in putting up the beams which joined together by legs from the "couples" of the roof; this, from the height and size of the building, happened to be a most laborious and dangerous task. The Gobawn having looked on at their ill-planned efforts for some time, took up an axe, and falling his glove down as a block, quickly fashioned a number of pegs; then flinging them up one by one to the places already pierced in the couples for their reception, he threw the hatchet at each, and drove it home with unerring aim; then taking up his glove uninjured, proceeded quietly on his way, leaving the workmen lost in amazement. The king came in presently, and having been told of the wonderful exploit, immediately declared that no one but the Gobawn Saer could have done this, and immediately despatched messengers to bring him back, and offer him any remuneration he might require to complete the building.']
[141] [Library, bk. 1:96. See note below.]
[142] [Wilkinson, Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, 2nd ser., vol. 2, p. 30. 'Diodorus mentions a figure of Justice without a head, standing in the lower regions, "at the gates of Truth," which I have found in the judgment scenes attached to the funereal rituals on the papyri of Thebes. In one of the subjects of a mummy case in the British Museum, the Goddess occurs under the form of a sceptre (surmounted by an ostrich feather), from which proceed her two arms, supporting the body of the deceased. Another figure of the same Goddess, issuing from a mountain, presents him at the same time two emblems, supposed to represent water, or the drink of Heaven.']
[143] [Dunbar, Poems. 'In Scotland a wisp of straw upon a pole is, or was heretofore, the indication of an alehouse. So in a quotation already made, from Dunbar's macaronic Will of Maister Andro Kennedy: "Et unum ale-wisp ante me."' From Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities, vol. 2, p. 353.]
[144] ['Poly-Olbion,' in
The Complete Works, vol. 1, p. 78, song 3, lines 375-83. 'That
there should come a day (which now was near at hand
By all forerunning signs) that on the Eastern strand,
If Parret stood not fast upon the English side,
They all should be suppress'd: and by the British pride
In cunning overcome; for why, impartial Fate
(Yet constant always to the Britons' crazed state)
Forbad they yet should fall; by whom she meant to show
How much the present Age, and after-times should owe
Unto the line of Brute.']
[145] [Baring-Gould, Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, p. 137. Horne Tooke, Diversions of Purley, vol. i. p. 397. 'In England the notion was turned to theological profit by being claimed as a judgment on wretches who insulted St. Augustine and St. Thomas of Canterbury. Horne Tooke quotes thus from that zealous and somewhat foul-mouthed reformer, Bishop Bale: 'Johan Capgrave and Alexander of Esseby sayth, that for castynge of fyshe tayles at thys Augustyne, Dorsett Shyre menne hadde tayles ever after. But Polydorus applieth it unto Kentish men at Stroud by Rochester, for cuttinge of Thomas Becket's horse's tail. Thus hath England in all other land a perpetuall infamy of tayles by theyr wrytten legendes of lyes, yet can they not well tell where to bestowe them truely an Englyshman now cannot travayle in an other land, by way of marchandyse or any other honest occupyinge, but it is most contumeliously thrown in his tethe, that al Englishmen have tailes. The story at last sank into a commonplace of local slander between shire and shire, and the Devonshire belief that Cornishmen had tails lingered at least till a few years ago.' Both from Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. 1, p. 384.]
[146] [Pengelly, Kent's Cavern, its Testimony to the Antiquity of Man.]
[147] [NQ, 7, 4th ser., 1871.]
[148] [Roby, Traditions of Lancashire, vol. 1,
p. 27. 1st
ser. 'A similar exploit is recorded in the Scandinavian legends, and it may be
traced under a variety of circumstances and events in the poetry of Iceland,
Denmark, and Norway, affording another intimation, among many, of the sources
whence our popular mythology is derived.
Towards the latter end of the reign of William, the Norman conqueror, Gamel, the
Saxon Thane, Lord of Recedham or "Rached," being left in quiet possession of his
lands and privileges by the usurper, "minded,'' as the phrase then was, for the
fear of God and the salvation of his immortal soul, to build a chapel unto St. Chadde, nigh to the banks of the Rache or Roach. For this pious use, a
convenient place was set apart, lying on the north bank of the river, in a low
and sheltered spot, now called "The Newgate." Piles of timber and huge stones
were gathered thither in the most unwonted profusion; insomuch, that the
building seemed destined for some more ambitious display than the humble
edifices called churches then exhibited, of which but few existed in the
surrounding districts.
The foundations were laid. The loose and spongy nature of the soil required
heavy stakes to be driven, upon and between which were laid several courses of
rubble-stone, ready to receive the grouting or cement. Yet in one night was the
whole mass conveyed, without the loss of a single stone, to the summit of a
steep hill on the opposite bank, and apparently without any visible marks or
signs betokening the agents or means employed for its removal. It did seem as
though their pathway had been the viewless air, so silently was all track
obliterated. Great was the consternation that spread among the indwellers of the
four several clusters of cabins, dignified by the appellation of villages, and
bearing, with their appendages, the names of Castletown, Spoddenland,
Honorsfield, and Buckland. With dismay and horror this profanation was
witnessed. The lord, more especially, became indignant. This daring presumption
this wilful outrage, so like bidding defiance to his power, bearding the lion
even in his den, was deemed an offence calling for signal vengeance on the
perpetrators.']
[149] [CN, p. 1. 'The church of Breedon, in Leicestershire, stands alone on a high hill, the village being at its foot. The hill is so steep on the side towards the village, that a carriage can only ascend by taking a very circuitous course; and even the footpath winds considerably, and in some parts ascends by steps formed in the turf. The inconvenience of such a situation for the church is obvious, and the stranger, of course, wonders at the folly of those who selected a site for a church which would necessarily preclude the aged and infirm from attending public worship. But the initiated parishioner soon steps forward to enlighten him on the subject, and assures him the pious founder convenience of the village, and assigned a central spot for the site of the church. There the foundation was dug, and there the builders began to rear the fabric; but all they built in the course of the day was carried away by doves in the night, and skilfully built in the same manner on the hill where the church now stands. Both founder and workmen, awed by this extraordinary interference, agreed to finish the edifice thus begun by doves.']
[150] [CN, p. 2. 'The parish church of Winwick, Lancashire, stands near that miracle-working spot where St. Oswald, king of the Northumbrians, was killed. The founder had destined a different site for it, but his intention was overruled by a singular personage, whose will he never dreamed of consulting. It must here be noticed that Winwick had then not even received its name; the church, as not uncommon in those days, being one of the earliest erections in the parish. The foundation of the church, then, was laid where the founder had directed, and the close of the first day's labour showed the workmen had not been idle, by the progress made in the building. But the approach of night brought to pass an event which utterly destroyed the repose of the few inhabitants around the spot. A pig was seen running hastily to the site of the new church; and as he ran he was heard to cry or scream aloud "We-ee-wick, We-ee-wick, We-ee-wick!" Then, taking up a stone in his mouth, he carried it to the spot sanctified by the death of St. Oswald, and thus employing himself through the whole night, succeeded in removing all the stones which had been laid by the builders. The founder, feeling himself the site of his church, unhesitatingly yielded to the wise counsel of the pig. Thus the pig not only decided the site of the church, but gave a name to the parish.']