The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)

The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)
James Frazer

James George Frazer

The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)

Preface

With The Scapegoat our general discussion of the theory and practice of the Dying God is brought to a conclusion. The aspect of the subject with which we are here chiefly concerned is the use of the Dying God as a scapegoat to free his worshippers from the troubles of all sorts with which life on earth is beset. I have sought to trace this curious usage to its origin, to decompose the idea of the Divine Scapegoat into the elements out of which it appears to be compounded. If I am right, the idea resolves itself into a simple confusion between the material and the immaterial, between the real possibility of transferring a physical load to other shoulders and the supposed possibility of transferring our bodily and mental ailments to another who will bear them for us. When we survey the history of this pathetic fallacy from its crude inception in savagery to its full development in the speculative theology of civilized nations, we cannot but wonder at the singular power which the human mind possesses of transmuting the leaden dross of superstition into a glittering semblance of gold. Certainly in nothing is this alchemy of thought more conspicuous than in the process which has refined the base and foolish custom of the scapegoat into the sublime conception of a God who dies to take away the sins of the world.

Along with the discussion of the Scapegoat I have included in this volume an account of the remarkable religious ritual of the Aztecs, in which the theory of the Dying God found its most systematic and most tragic expression. There is nothing, so far as I am aware, to shew that the men and women, who in Mexico died cruel deaths in the character of gods and goddesses, were regarded as scapegoats by their worshippers and executioners; the intention of slaying them seems rather to have been to reinforce by a river of human blood the tide of life which might else grow stagnant and stale in the veins of the deities. Hence the Aztec ritual, which prescribed the slaughter, the roasting alive, and the flaying of men and women in order that the gods might remain for ever young and strong, conforms to the general theory of deicide which I have offered in this work. On that theory death is a portal through which gods and men alike must pass to escape the decrepitude of age and to attain the vigour of eternal youth. The conception may be said to culminate in the Brahmanical doctrine that in the daily sacrifice the body of the Creator is broken anew for the salvation of the world.

J. G. Frazer.

Cambridge,

21st June, 1913.

Chapter I. The Transference of Evil

§ 1. The Transference to Inanimate Objects

The principle of vicarious suffering.

In the preceding parts of this work we have traced the practice of killing a god among peoples in the hunting, pastoral, and agricultural stages of society; and I have attempted to explain the motives which led men to adopt so curious a custom. One aspect of the custom still remains to be noticed. The accumulated misfortunes and sins of the whole people are sometimes laid upon the dying god, who is supposed to bear them away for ever, leaving the people innocent and happy. The notion that we can transfer our guilt and sufferings to some other being who will bear them for us is familiar to the savage mind. It arises from a very obvious confusion between the physical and the mental, between the material and the immaterial. Because it is possible to shift a load of wood, stones, or what not, from our own back to the back of another, the savage fancies that it is equally possible to shift the burden of his pains and sorrows to another, who will suffer them in his stead. Upon this idea he acts, and the result is an endless number of very unamiable devices for palming off upon some one else the trouble which a man shrinks from bearing himself. In short, the principle of vicarious suffering is commonly understood and practised by races who stand on a low level of social and intellectual culture. In the following pages I shall illustrate the theory and the practice as they are found among savages in all their naked simplicity, undisguised by the refinements of metaphysics and the subtleties of theology.

Transference of evil to things. Evils swept away by rivers.

The devices to which the cunning and selfish savage resorts for the sake of easing himself at the expense of his neighbour are manifold; only a few typical examples out of a multitude can be cited. At the outset it is to be observed that the evil of which a man seeks to rid himself need not be transferred to a person; it may equally well be transferred to an animal or a thing, though in the last case the thing is often only a vehicle to convey the trouble to the first person who touches it. In some of the East Indian islands they think that epilepsy can be cured by striking the patient on the face with the leaves of certain trees and then throwing them away. The disease is believed to have passed into the leaves, and to have been thrown away with them.[1 - J. G. F. Riedel, De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua (The Hague, 1886), pp. 266 sq., 305, 357 sq.; compare id., pp. 141, 340.] In the Warramunga and Tjingilli tribes of Central Australia men who suffered from headache have often been seen wearing women's head-rings. “This was connected with the belief that the pain in the head would pass into the rings, and that then it could be thrown away with them into the bush, and so got rid of effectually. The natives have a very firm belief in the efficacy of this treatment. In the same way when a man suffers from internal pain, usually brought on by overeating, his wife's head-rings are placed on his stomach; the evil magic which is causing all the trouble passes into them, and they are then thrown away into the bushes, where the magic is supposed to leave them. After a time they are searched for by the woman, who brings them back, and again wears them in the ordinary way.”[2 - Baldwin Spencer and F. J. Gillen, The Northern Tribes of Central Australia (London, 1904), p. 474.] Among the Sihanaka of Madagascar, when a man is very sick, his relatives are sometimes bidden by the diviner to cast out the evil by means of a variety of things, such as a stick of a particular sort of tree, a rag, a pinch of earth from an ant's nest, a little money, or what not. Whatever they may be, they are brought to the patient's house and held by a man near the door, while an exorcist stands in the house and pronounces the formula necessary for casting out the disease. When he has done, the things are thrown away in a southward direction, and all the people in the house, including the sick man, if he has strength enough, shake their loose robes and spit towards the door in order to expedite the departure of the malady.[3 - J. Pearse, “Customs connected with Death and Burial among the Sihanaka,” The Antananarivo Annual and Madagascar Magazine, vol. ii., Reprint of the Second four Numbers (Antananarivo, 1896), pp. 146 sq.] When an Atkhan of the Aleutian Islands had committed a grave sin and desired to unburden himself of his guilt, he proceeded as follows. Having chosen a time when the sun was clear and unclouded, he picked up certain weeds and carried them about his person. Then he laid them down, and calling the sun to witness, cast his sins upon them, after which, having eased his heart of all that weighed upon it, he threw the weeds into the fire, and fancied that thus he cleansed himself of his guilt.[4 - Ivan Petroff, Report on the Population, Industries, and Resources of Alaska, p. 158.] In Vedic times a younger brother who married before his elder brother was thought to have sinned in so doing, but there was a ceremony by which he could purge himself of his sin. Fetters of reed-grass were laid on him in token of his guilt, and when they had been washed and sprinkled they were flung into a foaming torrent, which swept them away, while the evil was bidden to vanish with the foam of the stream.[5 - H. Oldenberg, Die Religion des Veda (Berlin, 1894), p. 322.] The Matse negroes of Togoland think that the river Awo has power to carry away the sorrows of mankind. So when one of their friends has died, and their hearts are heavy, they go to the river with leaves of the raphia palm tied round their necks and drums in their hands. Standing on the bank they beat the drums and cast the leaves into the stream. As the leaves float away out of sight to the sound of the rippling water and the roll of the drums, they fancy that their sorrow too is lifted from them.[6 - J. Spieth, Die Ewe-Stämme (Berlin, 1906), p. 800.] Similarly, the ancient Greeks imagined that the pangs of love might be healed by bathing in the river Selemnus.[7 - Pausanias, vii. 23. 3.] The Indians of Peru sought to purify themselves from their sins by plunging their heads in a river; they said that the river washed their sins away.[8 - P. J. de Arriaga, Extirpacion de la Idolatria del Piru (Lima, 1621), p. 29.]

Transference of evil to things.

An Arab cure for melancholy or madness caused by love is to put a dish of water on the sufferer's head, drop melted lead into it, and then bury the lead in an open field; thus the mischief that was in the man goes away.[9 - This I learned from my friend W. Robertson Smith, who mentioned as his authority David of Antioch, Tazyin, in the story “Orwa.”] Amongst the Miotse of China, when the eldest son of the house attains the age of seven years, a ceremony called “driving away the devil” takes place. The father makes a kite of straw and lets it fly away in the desert, bearing away all evil with it.[10 - R. Andree, Ethnographische Parallele und Vergleiche (Stuttgart, 1878), pp. 29 sq.] When an Indian of Santiago Tepehuacan is ill, he will sometimes attempt to rid himself of the malady by baking thrice seven cakes; of these he places seven in the top of the highest pine-tree of the forest, seven he lays at the foot of the tree, and seven he casts into a well, with the water of which he then washes himself. By this means he transfers the sickness to the water of the well and so is made whole.[11 - “Lettre du curé de Santiago Tepehuacan à son évêque sur les mœurs et coutumes des Indiens soumis à ses soins,” Bulletin de la Société de Géographie (Paris), Deuxième Série, ii. (1834) p. 182.] The Baganda believed that plague was caused by the god Kaumpuli, who resided in a deep hole in his temple. To prevent him from escaping and devastating the country, they battened him down in the hole by covering the top with plantain-stems and piling wild-cat-skins over them; there was nothing like wild-cat-skins to keep him down, so hundreds of wild cats were hunted and killed every year to supply the necessary skins. However, sometimes in spite of these precautions the god contrived to escape, and then the people died. When a garden or house was plague-stricken, the priests purified it by transferring the disease to a plantain-tree and then carrying away the tree to a piece of waste land. The way in which they effected the transference of the disease was this. They first made a number of little shields and spears out of plantain fibre and reeds and placed them at intervals along the path leading from the garden to the main road. A young plantain-tree, about to bear fruit, was then cut down, the stem was laid in the path leading to one of the plague-stricken huts, and it was speared with not less than twenty reed spears, which were left sticking in it, while some of the plantain-fibre shields were also fastened to it. This tree was then carried down the path to the waste land and left there. It went by the name of the Scapegoat (kyonzire). To make quite sure that the plague, after being thus deposited in the wilderness, should not return by the way it went, the priests raised an arch, covered with barkcloth, over the path at the point where it diverged from the main road. This arch was thought to interpose an insurmountable barrier to the return of the plague.[12 - Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), pp. 309 sq.]

Dyak transference of evil to things.

Dyak priestesses expel ill-luck from a house by hewing and slashing the air in every corner of it with wooden swords, which they afterwards wash in the river, to let the ill-luck float away down stream. Sometimes they sweep misfortune out of the house with brooms made of the leaves of certain plants and sprinkled with rice-water and blood. Having swept it clean out of every room and into a toy-house made of bamboo, they set the little house with its load of bad luck adrift on the river. The current carries it away out to sea, where it shifts its baleful cargo to a certain kettle-shaped ship, which floats in mid-ocean and receives in its capacious hold all the ills that flesh is heir to. Well would it be with mankind if the evils remained for ever tossing far away on the billows; but, alas, they are dispersed from the ship to the four winds, and settle again, and yet again, on the weary Dyak world. On Dyak rivers you may see many of the miniature houses, laden with manifold misfortunes, bobbing up and down on the current, or sticking fast in the thickets that line the banks.[13 - C. Hupe, “Korte Verhandeling over de Godsdienst, Zeden enz. der Dajakkers,” Tijdschrift voor Neêrlands Indië, 1846, dl. iii. pp. 149 sq.; F. Grabowsky, “Die Theogonie der Dajaken auf Borneo,” Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, v. (1892) p. 131.]

Evils transferred to other persons through the medium of things.

These examples illustrate the purely beneficent side of the transference of evil; they shew how men seek to alleviate human sufferings by diverting them to material objects, which are then thrown away or otherwise disposed of so as to render them innocuous. Often, however, the transference of evil to a material object is only a step towards foisting it upon a living person. This is the maleficent side of such transferences. It is exemplified in the following cases. To cure toothache some of the Australian blacks apply a heated spear-thrower to the cheek. The spear-thrower is then cast away, and the toothache goes with it in the shape of a black stone called karriitch. Stones of this kind are found in old mounds and sandhills. They are carefully collected and thrown in the direction of enemies in order to give them toothache.[14 - J. Dawson, Australian Aborigines (Melbourne, Sydney, and Adelaide, 1881), p. 59.] In Mirzapur a mode of transferring disease is to fill a pot with flowers and rice and bury it in a pathway covered up with a flat stone. Whoever touches this is supposed to contract the disease. The practice is called chalauwa, or “passing on” the malady. This sort of thing goes on daily in Upper India. Often while walking of a morning in the bazaar you will see a little pile of earth adorned with flowers in the middle of the road. Such a pile usually contains some scabs or scales from the body of a smallpox patient, which are placed there in the hope that some one may touch them, and by catching the disease may relieve the sufferer.[15 - W. Crooke, Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India (Westminster, 1896), i. 164 sq.] The Bahima, a pastoral people of the Uganda Protectorate, often suffer from deep-seated abscesses: “their cure for this is to transfer the disease to some other person by obtaining herbs from the medicine-man, rubbing them over the place where the swelling is, and burying them in the road where people continually pass; the first person who steps over these buried herbs contracts the disease, and the original patient recovers.”[16 - Rev. J. Roscoe, “The Bahima, a Cow Tribe of Enkole,” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, xxxvii. (1907) p. 103.] The practice of the Wagogo of German East Africa is similar. When a man is ill, the native doctor will take him to a cross-road, where he prepares his medicines, uttering at the same time the incantations which are necessary to give the drugs their medical virtue. Part of the dose is then administered to the patient, and part is buried under a pot turned upside down at the cross-road. It is hoped that somebody will step over the pot, and catching the disease, which lurks in the pot, will thereby relieve the original sufferer. A variation of this cure is to plaster some of the medicine, or a little of the patient's blood, on a wooden peg and to drive the peg into a tree; any one who passes the tree and is so imprudent as to draw out the peg, will carry away with it the disease.[17 - Rev. J. Cole, “Notes on the Wagogo of German East Africa,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute, xxxiii. (1902) p. 313.]

Evils transferred to images. Mongol transference of evil to things.

Sometimes in case of sickness the malady is transferred to an effigy as a preliminary to passing it on to a human being. Thus among the Baganda the medicine-man would sometimes make a model of his patient in clay; then a relative of the sick man would rub the image over the sufferer's body and either bury it in the road or hide it in the grass by the wayside. The first person who stepped over the image or passed by it would catch the disease. Sometimes the effigy was made out of a plantain-flower tied up so as to look like a person; it was used in the same way as the clay figure. But the use of images for this maleficent purpose was a capital crime; any person caught in the act of burying one of them in the public road would surely have been put to death.[18 - Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), pp. 343 sq.] Among the Sena-speaking people to the north of the Zambesi, when any one is ill, the doctor makes a little pig of straw to which he transfers the sickness. The little pig is then set on the ground where two paths meet, and any passer-by who chances to kick it over is sure to absorb the illness and to draw it away from the patient.[19 - Dudley Kidd, The Essential Kafir (London, 1904), p. 146.] Among the Korkus, a forest tribe of the Central Provinces in India, when a person wishes to transfer his sickness to another, he contrives to obtain the loin-cloth of his intended victim and paints two figures on it in lamp black, one upright and the other upside down. As soon as the owner of the loin-cloth puts it on, he falls a victim to the ailment which afflicted the artist who drew the figures.[20 - Central Provinces, Ethnographic Survey, iii., Draft Articles on Forest Tribes (Allahabad, 1907), p. 63.] Every nine years a Mongol celebrates a memorial festival of his birth for the purpose of ensuring the continuance of his life and welfare. At this solemn ceremony two lambskins, one black and the other white, are spread on the floor of the hut, which is further covered with a felt carpet, and on the carpet are made nine little ridges of earth brought from nine mountains, the bottom of a river, and a sepulchral mound. The owner of the hut, for whose benefit the rite is performed, next seats himself on the black lambskin, and opposite him is set an effigy of himself made of dough by a lama. The priest then throws a black stone at the effigy, praying that the black arrow of death may pierce it, after which he throws a white stone at the master of the hut, praying that the bright beam of life may endow him with wondrous strength. After that the Mongol gets up, steps over one of the ridges of earth and says, “I have overcome a mishap, I have escaped a death.” This ceremony he performs nine times, stepping over all the ridges, one after the other. Then he sits down on the white lambskin, and the lama takes the dough effigy, swings it thrice round the man whom it represents, spits on it thrice, and hands it to attendants who carry it away into the steppe. A little holy water sprinkled over the Mongol now completes his protection against perils and dangers.[21 - M. v. Beguelin, “Religiöse Volksbräuche der Mongolen,” Globus, lvii. (1890) pp. 209 sq.] This last is a case of the beneficent transference of evil; for in it no attempt seems to be made to shift the burden of misfortune to anybody else.

§ 2. The Transference to Stones and Sticks

Fatigue transferred to stones, sticks, or leaves.

In the western district of the island of Timor, when men or women are making long and tiring journeys, they fan themselves with leafy branches, which they afterwards throw away on particular spots where their forefathers did the same before them. The fatigue which they felt is thus supposed to have passed into the leaves and to be left behind. Others use stones instead of leaves.[22 - J. G. F. Riedel, “Die Landschaft Dawan oder West-Timor,” Deutsche geographische Blätter, x. 231.] Similarly in the Babar Archipelago tired people will strike themselves with stones, believing that they thus transfer to the stones the weariness which they felt in their own bodies. They then throw away the stones in places which are specially set apart for the purpose.[23 - J. G. F. Riedel, De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua (The Hague, 1886), p. 340.] A like belief and practice in many distant parts of the world have given rise to those cairns or heaps of sticks and leaves which travellers often observe beside the path, and to which every passing native adds his contribution in the shape of a stone, or stick, or leaf. Thus in the Solomon and Banks' Islands the natives are wont to throw sticks, stones, or leaves upon a heap at a place of steep descent, or where a difficult path begins, saying, “There goes my fatigue.” The act is not a religious rite, for the thing thrown on the heap is not an offering to spiritual powers, and the words which accompany the act are not a prayer. It is nothing but a magical ceremony for getting rid of fatigue, which the simple savage fancies he can embody in a stick, leaf, or stone, and so cast it from him.[24 - R. H. Codrington, D.D., The Melanesians (Oxford, 1891), p. 186.]

Heaps of stones or sticks among the American Indians.

An early Spanish missionary to Nicaragua, observing that along the paths there were heaps of stones on which the Indians as they passed threw grass, asked them why they did so. “Because we think,” was the answer, “that thereby we are kept from weariness and hunger, or at least that we suffer less from them.”[25 - G. F. de Oviedo, Histoire du Nicaragua (Paris, 1840), pp. 42 sq. (Ternaux-Compans, Voyages, Relations et Mémoires originaux, pour servir à l'Histoire de la Découverte de l'Amérique).] When the Peruvian Indians were climbing steep mountains and felt weary, they used to halt by the way at certain points where there were heaps of stones, which they called apachitas. On these heaps the weary men would place other stones, and they said that when they did so, their weariness left them.[26 - P. J. de Arriaga, Extirpacion de la Idolatria del Piru (Lima, 1621), pp. 37, 130. As to the custom compare J. J. von Tschudi, Peru (St. Gallen, 1846), ii. 77 sq.; H. A. Weddell, Voyage dans le Nord de la Bolivia et dans les parties voisines du Pérou (Paris and London, 1853), pp. 74 sq. These latter writers interpret the stones as offerings.] In the passes of the eastern Andes, on the borders of Argentina and Bolivia, “large cairns are constantly found, and every Puna Indian, on passing, adds a stone and a coca leaf, so that neither he nor his beast of burden may tire on the way.”[27 - Baron E. Nordenskiöld, “Travels on the Boundaries of Bolivia and Argentina,” The Geographical Journal, xxi. (1903) p. 518.] In the country of the Tarahumares and Tepehuanes in Mexico heaps of stones and sticks may be observed on high points, where the track leads over a ridge between two or more valleys. “Every Indian who passes such a pile adds a stone or a stick to it in order to gain strength for his journey. Among the Tarahumares only the old men observe this custom. Whenever the Tepehuanes carry a corpse, they rest it for some fifteen minutes on such a heap by the wayside that the deceased may not be fatigued but strong enough to finish his long journey to the land of the dead. One of my Huichol companions stopped on reaching this pile, pulled up some grass from the ground and picked up a stone as big as his fist. Holding both together he spat on the grass and on the stone and then rubbed them quickly over his knees. He also made a couple of passes with them over his chest and shoulders, exclaiming ‘Kenestíquai!’ (May I not get tired!) and then put the grass on the heap and the stone on top of the grass.”[28 - C. Lumholtz, Unknown Mexico (London, 1903), ii. 282.] In Guatemala also piles of stones may be seen at the partings of ways and on the tops of cliffs and mountains. Every passing Indian used to gather a handful of grass, rub his legs with it, spit on it, and deposit it with a small stone on the pile, firmly persuaded that by so doing he would restore their flagging vigour to his weary limbs.[29 - Brasseur de Bourbourg, Histoire des Nations civilisées du Mexique et de l'Amérique-Centrale (Paris, 1857-1859), ii. 564; compare iii. 486. Indians of Guatemala, when they cross a pass for the first time, still commonly add a stone to the cairn which marks the spot. See C. Sapper, “Die Gebräuche und religiösen Anschauungen der Kekchi-Indianer,” Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, viii. (1895) p. 197.] Here the rubbing of the limbs with the grass, like the Babar custom of striking the body with a stone, was doubtless a mode of extracting the fatigue from them as a preliminary to throwing it away.

Heaps of stones or sticks among the natives of Africa.

Similarly on the plateau between Lakes Tanganyika and Nyassa the native carriers, before they ascend a steep hill with their loads, will pick up a stone, spit on it, rub the calves of their legs with it, and then deposit it on one of those small piles of stones which are commonly to be found at such spots in this part of Africa. A recent English traveller, who noticed the custom, was informed that the carriers practise it “to make their legs light,”[30 - F. F. R. Boileau, “The Nyasa-Tanganyika Plateau,” The Geographical Journal, xiii. (1899) p. 589. In the same region Mr. L. Decle observed many trees or rocks on which were placed little heaps of stones or bits of wood, to which in passing each of his men added a fresh stone or bit of wood or a tuft of grass. “This,” says Mr. L. Decle, “is a tribute to the spirits, the general precaution to ensure a safe return” (Three Years in Savage Africa, London, 1898, p. 289). A similar practice prevails among the Wanyamwezi (ibid. p. 345). Compare J. A. Grant, A Walk across Africa (Edinburgh and London, 1864), pp. 133 sq.] in other words, to extract the fatigue from them. On the banks of the Kei river in Southern Africa another English traveller noticed some heaps of stones. On enquiring what they meant, he was told by his guides that when a Caffre felt weary he had but to add a stone to the heap to regain fresh vigour.[31 - Cowper Rose, Four Years in Southern Africa (London, 1829), p. 147.] In some parts of South Africa, particularly on the Zambesi, piles of sticks take the place of cairns. “Sometimes the natives will rub their leg with a stick, and throw the stick on the heap, ‘to get rid of fatigue,’ they avow. Others say that throwing a stone on the heap gives one fresh vigour for the journey.”[32 - Dudley Kidd, The Essential Kafir (London, 1904), p. 264.]

The heaps of stones or sticks generally on the tops of mountains or passes.

From other accounts of the Caffre custom we learn that these cairns are generally on the sides or tops of mountains, and that before a native deposits his stone on the pile he spits on it.[33 - S. Kay, Travels and Researches in Caffraria (London, 1833), pp. 211 sq.; Rev. H. Callaway, Religious System of the Amazulu, i. 66; D. Leslie, Among the Zulus and Amatongas (Edinburgh, 1875), pp. 146 sq. Compare H. Lichtenstein, Reisen im südlichen Africa (Berlin, 1811-1812), i. 411.] The practice of spitting on the stone which the weary wayfarer lays on the pile is probably a mode of transferring his fatigue the more effectually to the material vehicle which is to rid him of it. We have seen that the practice prevails among the Indians of Guatemala and the natives of the Tanganyika plateau, and it appears to be observed also under similar circumstances in Corea, where the cairns are to be found especially on the tops of passes.[34 - W. Gowland, “Dolmens and other Antiquities of Corea,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute, xxiv. (1895) pp. 328 sq.; Mrs. Bishop, Korea and her Neighbours (London, 1898), i. 147, ii. 223. Both writers speak as if the practice were to spit on the cairn rather than on the particular stone which the traveller adds to it; indeed, Mrs. Bishop omits to notice the custom of adding to the cairns. Mr. Gowland says that almost every traveller carries up at least one stone from the valley and lays it on the pile.] From the primitive point of view nothing can be more natural than that the cairns or the heaps of sticks and leaves to which the tired traveller adds his contribution should stand at the top of passes and, in general, on the highest points of the road. The wayfarer who has toiled, with aching limbs and throbbing temples, up a long and steep ascent, is aware of a sudden alleviation as soon as he has reached the summit; he feels as if a weight had been lifted from him, and to the savage, with his concrete mode of thought, it seems natural and easy to cast the weight from him in the shape of a stone or stick, or a bunch of leaves or of grass. Hence it is that the piles which represent the accumulated weariness of many foot-sore and heavy-laden travellers are to be seen wherever the road runs highest in the lofty regions of Bolivia, Tibet, Bhootan, and Burma,[35 - D. Forbes, “On the Aymara Indians of Peru and Bolivia,” Journal of the Ethnological Society of London, ii. (1870) pp. 237 sq.; G. C. Musters, “Notes on Bolivia,” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, xlvii. (1877) p. 211; T. T. Cooper, Travels of a Pioneer of Commerce (London, 1871), p. 275; J. A. H. Louis, The Gates of Thibet, a Bird's Eye View of Independent Sikkhim, British Bhootan, and the Dooars (Calcutta, 1894), pp. 111 sq.; A. Bastian, Die Völker des östlichen Asien, ii. (Leipsic, 1866) p. 483. So among the Mrus of Aracan, every man who crosses a hill, on reaching the crest, plucks a fresh young shoot of grass and lays it on a pile of the withered deposits of former travellers (T. H. Lewin, Wild Races of South-Eastern India, London, 1870, pp. 232 sq.).] in the passes of the Andes and the Himalayas, as well as in Corea, Caffraria, Guatemala, and Melanesia.

Fatigue let out with the blood.

While the mountaineer Indians of South America imagine that they can rid themselves of their fatigue in the shape of a stick or a stone, other or the same aborigines of that continent believe that they can let it out with their blood. A French explorer, who had seen much of the South American Indians, tells us that “they explain everything that they experience by attributing it to sorcery, to the influence of maleficent beings. Thus an Indian on the march, when he feels weary, never fails to ascribe his weariness to the evil spirit; and if he has no diviner at hand, he wounds himself in the knees, the shoulders, and on the arms in order to let out the evil with the blood. That is why many Indians, especially the Aucas [Araucanians], have always their arms covered with scars. This custom, differently applied, is almost general in America; for I found it up to the foot of the Andes, in Bolivia, among the Chiriguana and Yuracares nations.”[36 - A. d'Orbigny, Voyage dans l'Amérique Méridionale, ii. (Paris and Strasburg, 1839-1843) pp. 92 sq.]

Piles of stones or sticks on the scene of crimes. The Liar's Heap.

But it is not mere bodily fatigue which the savage fancies he can rid himself of by the simple expedient of throwing a stick or a stone. Unable clearly to distinguish the immaterial from the material, the abstract from the concrete, he is assailed by vague terrors, he feels himself exposed to some ill-defined danger on the scene of any great crime or great misfortune. The place to him seems haunted ground. The thronging memories that crowd upon his mind, if they are not mistaken by him for goblins and phantoms, oppress his fancy with a leaden weight. His impulse is to flee from the dreadful spot, to shake off the burden that seems to cling to him like a nightmare. This, in his simple sensuous way, he thinks he can do by casting something at the horrid place and hurrying by. For will not the contagion of misfortune, the horror that clutched at his heart-strings, be diverted from himself into the thing? will it not gather up in itself all the evil influences that threatened him, and so leave him to pursue his journey in safety and peace? Some such train of thought, if these gropings and fumblings of a mind in darkness deserve the name of thought, seems to explain the custom, observed by wayfarers in many lands, of throwing sticks or stones on places where something horrible has happened or evil deeds have been done. When Sir Francis Younghusband was travelling across the great desert of Gobi his caravan descended, towards dusk on a June evening, into a long depression between the hills, which was notorious as a haunt of robbers. His guide, with a terror-stricken face, told how not long before nine men out of a single caravan had been murdered, and the rest left in a pitiable state to continue their journey on foot across the awful desert. A horseman, too, had just been seen riding towards the hills. “We had accordingly to keep a sharp look-out, and when we reached the foot of the hills, halted, and, taking the loads off the camels, wrapped ourselves up in our sheepskins and watched through the long hours of the night. Day broke at last, and then we silently advanced and entered the hills. Very weird and fantastic in their rugged outline were they, and here and there a cairn of stones marked where some caravan had been attacked, and as we passed these each man threw one more stone on the heap.”[37 - (Sir) F. E. Younghusband, “A Journey across Central Asia,” Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, x. (1888) p. 494.] In the Norwegian district of Tellemarken a cairn is piled up wherever anything fearful has happened, and every passer-by must throw another stone on it, or some evil will befall him.[38 - F. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde (Heilbronn, 1879), pp. 274 sq.] In Sweden and the Esthonian island of Oesel the same custom is practised on scenes of clandestine or illicit love, with the strange addition in Oesel that when a man has lost his cattle he will go to such a spot, and, while he flings a stick or stone on it, will say, “I bring thee wood. Let me soon find my lost cattle.”[39 - F. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, p. 274; J. B. Holzmayer, “Osiliana,” Verhandlungen der gelehrten Estnischen Gesellschaft zu Dorpat, vii. (1872) p. 73.] Far from these northern lands, the Dyaks of Batang Lupar keep up an observance of the same sort in the forests of Borneo. Beside their paths may be seen heaps of sticks or stones which are called “lying heaps.” Each heap is in memory of some man who told a stupendous lie or disgracefully failed in carrying out an engagement, and everybody who passes adds a stick or stone to the pile, saying as he does so, “For So-and-so's lying heap.”[40 - Spenser St. John, Life in the Forests of the Far East

(London, 1863), i. 88.] The Dyaks think it a sacred duty to add to every such “liar's mound” (tugong bula) which they pass; they imagine that the omission of the duty would draw down on them a supernatural punishment. Hence, however pressed a Dyak may be for time, he will always stop to throw on the pile some branches or twigs.[41 - E. H. Gomes, Seventeen Years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo (London, 1911), pp. 66 sq.] The person to start such a heap is one of the men who has suffered by a malicious lie. He takes a stick, throws it down on some spot where people are constantly passing, and says, “Let any one who does not add to this liar's heap suffer from pains in the head.” Others then do likewise, and every passer-by throws a stick on the spot lest he should suffer pains. In this way the heap often grows to a large size, and the liar by whose name it is known is greatly ashamed.[42 - Ch. Hose and W. McDougall, The Pagan Tribes of Borneo (London, 1912), i. 123.]

Heaps of stones, sticks, or leaves on scenes of murder. Heaps of stones or sticks on graves.

But it is on scenes of murder and sudden death that this rude method of averting evil is most commonly practised. The custom that every passer-by must cast a stone or stick on the spot where some one has come to a violent end, whether by murder or otherwise, has been observed in practically the same form in such many and diverse parts of the world as Ireland, France, Spain, Sweden, Germany, Bohemia, Lesbos, Morocco, Armenia, Palestine, Arabia, India, North America, Venezuela, Bolivia, Celebes, and New Zealand.[43 - A. C. Haddon, “A Batch of Irish Folk-lore,” Folk-lore, iv. (1893) pp. 357, 360; Laisnel de la Salle, Croyances et Légendes du Centre de la France (Paris, 1875), ii. 75, 77; J. Brand, Popular Antiquities, ii. 309; Hylten-Cavallius, quoted by F. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, p. 274; K. Haupt, Sagenbuch der Lausitz (Leipsic, 1862-1863), ii. 65; K. Müllenhoff, Sagen, Märchen und Lieder der Herzogthümer Schleswig, Holstein und Lauenburg (Kiel, 1845), p. 125; A. Kuhn, Märkische Sagen und Märchen (Berlin, 1843), p. 113; A. Kuhn und W. Schwartz, Norddeutsche Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche (Leipsic, 1848), p. 85; A. Treichel, “Reisighäufung und Steinhäufung an Mordstellen,” Am Ur-Quelle, vi. (1896) p. 220; Georgeakis et Pineau, Folk-lore de Lesbos, p. 323; A. Leared, Morocco and the Moors (London, 1876), pp. 105 sq.; E. Doutté, “Figuig,” La Géographie, Bulletin de la Société de Géographie (Paris), vii. (1903) p. 197; id., Magie et Religion dans l'Afrique du Nord (Algiers, 1908), pp. 424 sq.; A. von Haxthausen, Transkaukasia (Leipsic, 1856), i. 222; C. T. Wilson, Peasant Life in the Holy Land (London, 1906), p. 285; W. Crooke, Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India (Westminster, 1896), i. 267 sq.; J. Bricknell, The Natural History of North Carolina (Dublin, 1737), p. 380; J. Adair, History of the American Indians (London, 1775), p. 184; K. Martin, Bericht über eine Reise nach Nederlandsch West-Indien, Erster Theil (Leyden, 1887), p. 166; G. C. Musters, “Notes on Bolivia,” Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, xlvii. (1877) p. 211; B. F. Matthes, Einige Eigenthümlichkeiten in den Festen und Gewohnheiten der Makassaren und Büginesen, p. 25 (separate reprint from Travaux de la 6e Session du Congrès International des Orientalistes à Leide, vol. ii.); R. A. Cruise, Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in New Zealand (London, 1823), p. 186.] In Fiji, for example, it was the practice for every passer-by to throw a leaf on the spot where a man had been clubbed to death; “this was considered as an offering of respect to him, and, if not performed, they have a notion they will soon be killed themselves.”[44 - Ch. Wilkes, Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition, New Edition (New York, 1851), iii. 50.] Sometimes the scene of the murder or death may also be the grave of the victim, but it need not always be so, and in Europe, where the dead are buried in consecrated ground, the two places would seldom coincide. However, the custom of throwing stones or sticks on a grave has undoubtedly been observed by passers-by in many parts of the world, and that, too, even when the graves are not those of persons who have come to a violent end. Thus we are told that the people of Unalashka, one of the Aleutian Islands, bury their dead on the summits of hills and raise a little hillock over the grave. “In a walk into the country, one of the natives, who attended me, pointed out several of these receptacles of the dead. There was one of them, by the side of the road leading from the harbour to the village, over which was raised a heap of stones. It was observed, that every one who passed it, added one to it.”[45 - Captain James Cook, Voyages (London, 1809), vi. 479.] The Roumanians of Transylvania think that a dying man should have a burning candle in his hand, and that any one who dies without a light has no right to the ordinary funeral ceremonies. The body of such an unfortunate is not laid in holy ground, but is buried wherever it may be found. His grave is marked only by a heap of dry branches, to which each passer-by is expected to add a handful of twigs or a thorny bough.[46 - E. Gerard, The Land beyond the Forest (Edinburgh and London, 1888), i. 311, 318.] The Hottentot god or hero Heitsi-eibib died several times and came to life again. When the Hottentots pass one of his numerous graves they throw a stone, a bush, or a fresh branch on it for good luck.[47 - H. Lichtenstein, Reisen im Südlichen Africa (Berlin, 1811-1812), i. 349 sq.; Sir James E. Alexander, Expedition of Discovery into the Interior of Africa (London, 1838), i. 166; C. J. Andersson, Lake Ngami, Second Edition (London, 1856), p. 327; W. H. I. Bleek, Reynard the Fox in South Africa (London, 1864), p. 76; Th. Hahn, Tsuni-Goam, the Supreme Being of the Khoi-Khoi (London, 1881), p. 56. Compare The Dying God, p. 3.] Near the former mission-station of Blydeuitzigt in Cape Colony there was a spot called Devil's Neck where, in the opinion of the Bushmen, the devil was interred. To hinder his resurrection stones were piled in heaps about the place. When a Bushman, travelling in the company of a missionary, came in sight of the spot he seized a stone and hurled it at the grave, remarking that if he did not do so his neck would be twisted round so that he would have to look backwards for the term of his natural life.[48 - Th. Hahn, “Die Buschmänner,” Globus, xviii. 141.] Stones are cast by passers-by on the graves of murderers in some parts of Senegambia.[49 - Th. Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvölker, ii. (Leipsic, 1860) p. 195, referring to Raffenel, Nouveau Voyage dans le pays des nègres (Paris, 1856), i. 93 sq.] In Syria deceased robbers are not buried like honest folk, but left to rot where they lie; and a pile of stones is raised over the mouldering corpse. Every one who passes such a pile must fling a stone at it, on pain of incurring God's malison.[50 - Eijūb Abēla, “Beiträge zur Kenntniss abergläubischer Gebräuche in Syrien,” Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palaestina-Vereins, vii. (1884) p. 102.] Between sixty and seventy years ago an Englishman was travelling from Sidon to Tyre with a couple of Musalmans. When he drew near Tyre his companions picked up some small stones, armed him in the same fashion, and requested him to be so kind as to follow their example. Soon afterwards they came in sight of a conical heap of pebbles and stones standing in the road, at which the two Musalmans hurled stones and curses with great vehemence and remarkable volubility. When they had discharged this pious duty to their satisfaction, they explained that the missiles and maledictions were directed at a celebrated robber and murderer, who had been knocked on the head and buried there some half a century before.[51 - Note by G. P. Badger, on The Travels of Ludovico di Varthema, translated by J. W. Jones (Hakluyt Society, 1863), p. 45. For more evidence of the custom in Syria see W. M. Thomson, The Land and the Book (London, 1859), p. 490; F. Sessions, “Some Syrian Folklore Notes,” Folk-lore, ix. (1898) p. 15; A. Jaussen, Coutumes des Arabes au pays de Moab (Paris, 1908), p. 336.]

Stones and sticks hurled as missiles at dangerous ghosts and demons. Missiles to ward off dangerous ghosts.

In these latter cases it may perhaps be thought that the sticks and stones serve no other purpose than to keep off the angry and dangerous ghost who might be supposed to haunt either the place of death or the grave. This interpretation seems certainly to apply to some cases of the custom. For example, in Pomerania and West Prussia the ghosts of suicides are much feared. Such persons are buried, not in the churchyard, but at the place where they took their lives, and every passer-by must cast a stone or a stick on the spot, or the ghost of the suicide will haunt him by night and give him no rest. Hence the piles of sticks or stones accumulated on the graves of these poor wretches sometimes attain a considerable size.[52 - A. Treichel, “Reisig- und Steinhäufung bei Ermordeten oder Selbstmördern,” Verhandlungen der Berliner Gesellschaft für Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte, 1888, p. (569) (bound up with Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xx. 1888).] Similarly the Baganda of Central Africa used to stand in great fear of the ghosts of suicides and they took many precautions to disarm or even destroy these dangerous spirits. For this purpose the bodies of suicides were removed to waste land or cross-roads and burned there, together with the wood of the house in which the deed had been done or of the tree on which the person had hanged himself. By these means they imagined that they destroyed the ghost so that he could not come and lure others to follow his bad example. Lest, however, the ghost should survive the destruction of his body by fire, the Baganda, in passing any place where a suicide had been burnt, always threw grass or sticks on the spot to prevent the ghost from catching them. And they did the same, for the same reason, whenever they passed the places on waste ground where persons accused of witchcraft and found guilty by the poison ordeal had been burnt to death. Baganda women had a special reason for dreading all graves which were believed to be haunted by dangerous ghosts; for, imagining that they could conceive children without intercourse with the other sex, they feared to be impregnated by the entrance into them of the ghosts of suicides and other unfortunate or uncanny people, such as persons with a light complexion, twins, and particularly all who had the mishap to be born feet foremost. For that reason Baganda women were at pains, whenever they passed the graves of any such persons, to throw sticks or grass upon them; “for by so doing they thought that they could prevent the ghost of the dead from entering into them, and being reborn.” Hence the mounds which accumulated over these graves became in course of time large enough to deflect the path and to attract the attention of travellers. It was not merely matrons who thus took care not to become mothers unaware; the same fears were entertained and the same precautions were adopted by all women, whether old or young, whether married or single; since they thought that there was no woman, whatever her age or condition, who might not be impregnated by the entrance into her of a spirit.[53 - Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), pp. 20 sq., 46 sq., 124 sq., 126 sq., 289 sq. Stones are not mentioned among the missiles hurled at ghosts, probably because stones are scarce in Uganda. See J. Roscoe, op. cit. p. 5.] In these cases, therefore, the throwing of sticks or grass at graves is a purely defensive measure; the missiles are intended to ward off the assaults of dangerous ghosts. Similarly we are told that in Madagascar solitary graves by the wayside have a sinister reputation, and that passers-by, without looking back, will throw stones or clods at them “to prevent the evil spirits from following them.”[54 - Father Finaz, S.J., in Les Missions Catholiques, vii. (1875) p. 328.] The Maraves of South Africa, like the Baganda, used to burn witches alive and to throw stones on the places of execution whenever they passed them, so that in time regular cairns gradually rose on these spots.[55 - “Der Muata Cazembe und die Völkerstämme der Maraves, Chevas, Muembas, Lundas, und andere von Süd-Afrika,” Zeitschrift für allgemeine Erdkunde, vi. (1856) p. 287.] No doubt with these Maraves, as with the Baganda, the motive for throwing missiles at such places is to protect themselves against the ghosts. A protective motive is also assigned for a similar custom observed in Chota Nagpur, a region of India which is the home of many primitive tribes. There heaps of stones or of leaves and branches may often be seen beside the path; they are supposed to mark the places where people have been killed by wild beasts, and the natives think that any passer-by who failed to add a stone or a stick to the pile would himself be seized and devoured by a wild animal.[56 - Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, lxxii. Part iii. (Calcutta, 1904) p. 87.] Here, though the ghost is not explicitly mentioned, we may perhaps suppose that out of spite he is instrumental in causing others to perish by the same untimely death by which he was himself carried off. The Kayans of Borneo imagine that they can put evil spirits to flight by hurling sticks or stones at them; so on a journey they will let fly volleys of such missiles at the rocks and dens where demons are known to reside.[57 - A. W. Nieuwenhuis, In Centraal Borneo (Leyden, 1900), i. 146.] Hence, whenever the throwing of stones at a grave is regarded as an insult to the dead, we may suppose that the missiles are intended to hit and hurt the ghost. Thus Euripides represents the murderer Aegisthus as leaping on the tomb of his victim Agamemnon and pelting it with stones;[58 - Euripides, Electra, 327 sq.] and Propertius invites all lovers to discharge stones and curses at the dishonoured grave of an old bawd.[59 - Propertius, v. 5. 77 sq.]

But the stones and sticks thrown on heaps cannot always be explained as missiles discharged at spiritual foes. Cairns raised in honour of Moslem saints.

But if this theory seems adequately to account for some cases of the custom with which we are concerned, it apparently fails to explain others. The view that the sticks and stones hurled at certain places are weapons turned against dangerous or malignant spirits is plausible in cases where such spirits are believed to be in the neighbourhood; but in cases where no such spirits are thought to be lurking, we must, it would seem, cast about for some other explanation. For example, we have seen that it has been customary to throw sticks or stones on spots which have been defiled by deeds of moral turpitude without any shedding of blood, and again on spots where weary travellers stop to rest. It is difficult to suppose that in these latter cases the evil deeds or the sensations of fatigue are conceived in the concrete shape of demons whom it is necessary to repel by missiles, though many South American Indians, as we saw, do attribute fatigue to a demon. Still more difficult is it to apply the purely defensive theory to cases where beneficent spirits are imagined to be hovering somewhere near, and where the throwing of the stones or sticks is apparently regarded by those who practise it as a token of respect rather than of hostility. Thus amongst the Masai, when any one dies away from the kraal, his body is left lying on the spot where he died, and all persons present throw bunches of grass or leaves on the corpse. Afterwards every passer-by casts a stone or a handful of grass on the place, and the more the dead man was respected, the longer is the usage observed.[60 - M. Merker, Die Masai (Berlin, 1904), p. 193.] It is especially the graves of Masai medicine-men that are honoured in this way.[61 - A. C. Hollis, The Masai (Oxford, 1905), pp. 305 sq.] In the forest near Avestad, in Sweden, the traveller, Clarke, observed “several heaps made with sticks and stones; upon which the natives, as they pass, cast either a stone, or a little earth, or the bough of a tree; deeming it an uncharitable act to omit this tribute, in their journeys to and fro. As this custom appeared closely allied to the pious practice in the Highlands of Scotland, of casting a stone upon the cairn of a deceased person, we, of course, concluded these heaps were places of sepulture.” They were said to be the graves of a band of robbers, who had plundered merchants on their passage through the forest, but had afterwards been killed and buried where they fell.[62 - E. D. Clarke, Travels in various Countries of Europe and Asia, vi. (London, 1823) p. 165.] However, in all these cases the practice of throwing stones on the grave, though interpreted as a mark of respect and charity, may really be based on the fear of the ghosts, so that the motive for observing the custom may be merely that of self-defence against a dangerous spirit. Yet this explanation can hardly apply to certain other cases. Thus in Syria it is a common practice with pious Moslems, when they first come in sight of a very sacred place, such as Hebron or the tomb of Moses, to make a little heap of stones or to add a stone to a heap which has been already made. Hence every here and there the traveller passes a whole series of such heaps by the side of the track.[63 - W. H. D. Rouse, “Notes from Syria,” Folk-lore, vi. (1895) p. 173. Compare F. Sessions, “Some Syrian Folklore Notes, gathered on Mount Lebanon,” Folk-lore, ix. (1898) p. 15.] In Northern Africa the usage is similar. Cairns are commonly erected on spots from which the devout pilgrim first discerns the shrine of a saint afar off; hence they are generally to be seen on the top of passes. For example, in Morocco, at the point of the road from Casablanca to Azemmour, where you first come in sight of the white city of the saint gleaming in the distance, there rises an enormous cairn of stones shaped like a pyramid several hundreds of feet high, and beyond it on both sides of the road there is a sort of avalanche of stones, either standing singly or arranged in little pyramids. Every pious Mohammedan whose eyes are gladdened by the blessed sight of the sacred town adds his stone to one of the piles or builds a little pile for himself.[64 - E. Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l' Afrique du Nord (Algiers, 1908), pp. 420-422.]

Stones as channels of communication with saints, living or dead.

Such a custom can hardly be explained as a precaution adopted against a dangerous influence supposed to emanate from the saint and to communicate itself even to people at a distance. On the contrary, it points rather to a desire of communion with the holy man than to a wish to keep him at bay. The mode of communion adopted, however strange it may seem to us, is apparently quite in harmony with the methods by which good Mohammedans in Northern Africa attempt to appropriate to themselves the blessed influence (baraka) which is supposed to radiate on all sides from the person of a living saint. “It is impossible to imagine,” we are told, “the extremity to which the belief in the blessed influence of saints is carried in North Africa. To form an exact idea of it you must see a great saint in the midst of the faithful. ‘The people fling themselves down on his path to kiss the skirt of his robe, to kiss his stirrup if he is on horseback, to kiss even his footprint if he is on foot. Those who are too far from him to be able to touch his hand touch him with their staff, or fling a stone at him which they have marked previously so as to be able to find it afterwards and to embrace it devoutly.’ ”[65 - E. Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l'Afrique du Nord, p. 440, quoting De Ségonzac, Voyage au Maroc, p. 82.] Thus through the channel of the stone or the stick, which has been in bodily contact with the living saint, his blessed influence flows to the devotee who has wielded the stick or hurled the stone. In like manner we may perhaps suppose that the man who adds a stone to a cairn in honour of a dead saint hopes to benefit by the saintly effluence which distils in a mysterious fashion through the stone to him.[66 - I follow the exposition of E. Doutté, whose account of the sanctity or magical influence (baraka) ascribed to the persons of living Mohammedan saints (marabouts) is very instructive. See his Magie et Religion dans l'Afrique du Nord, pp. 438 sqq. Mr. E. S. Hartland had previously explained the custom of throwing stones and sticks on cairns as acts of ceremonial union with the spirit who is supposed to reside in the cairn. See his Legend of Perseus, ii. (London, 1895) p. 128. While this theory offers a plausible explanation of some cases of the custom, I do not think that it will cover them all. M. René Dussaud argues that the stones deposited at shrines of holy men are simply material embodiments of the prayers which at the same time the suppliants address to the saints; and he holds that the practice of depositing stones at such places rests on a principle entirely different from that of throwing stones for the purpose of repelling evil spirits. See René Dussaud, “La matérialisation de la prière en Orient,” Bulletins et Mémoires de la Société d' Anthropologie de Paris, V. Série, vii. (1906) pp. 213-220. If I am right, the fundamental idea in these customs is neither that the stones or sticks are offerings presented to good spirits nor that they are missiles hurled at bad ones, but that they embody the evil, whether disease, misfortune, fear, horror, or what not, of which the person attempts to rid himself by transferring it to a material vehicle. But I am far from confident that this explanation applies to all cases. In particular it is difficult to reconcile it with the custom, described in the text, of throwing a marked stone at a holy man and then recovering it. Are we to suppose that the stone carries away the evil to the good man and brings back his blessing instead? The idea is perhaps too subtle and far-fetched.The word baraka, which in North Africa describes the powerful and in general beneficent, yet dangerous, influence which emanates from holy persons and things, is no doubt identical with the Hebrew bĕrakhah (ברכה) “blessing.” The importance which the ancient Hebrews ascribed to the blessing or the curse of a holy man is familiar to us from many passages in the Old Testament. See, for example, Genesis xxvii., xlviii. 8 sqq.; Deuteronomy xxvii. 11 sqq., xxviii. 1 sqq.]

The rite of throwing sticks or stones is perhaps best explained as a mode of purification, the evil being thought to be embodied in the missile which is thrown away.

When we survey the many different cases in which passing travellers are accustomed to add stones or sticks to existing piles, it seems difficult, if not impossible, to explain them all on one principle; different and even opposite motives appear, at least at first sight, to have operated in different cases to produce customs superficially alike. Sometimes the motive for throwing the stone is to ward off a dangerous spirit; sometimes it is to cast away an evil; sometimes it is to acquire a good. Yet, perhaps, if we could trace them back to their origin in the mind of primitive man, we might find that they all resolve themselves more or less exactly into the principle of the transference of evil. For to rid ourselves of an evil and to acquire a good are often merely opposite sides of one and the same operation; for example, a convalescent regains health in exactly the same proportion as he shakes off his malady. And though the practice of throwing stones at dangerous spirits especially at mischievous and malignant ghosts of the dead, appears to spring from a different motive, yet it may be questioned whether the difference is really as great to the savage as it seems to us. To primitive man the idea of spiritual and ghostly powers is still more indefinite than it is to his civilized brother: it fills him with a vague uneasiness and alarm; and this sentiment of dread and horror he, in accordance with his habitual modes of thought, conceives in a concrete form as something material which either surrounds and oppresses him like a fog, or has entered into and taken temporary possession of his body. In either case he imagines that he can rid himself of the uncanny thing by stripping it from his skin or wrenching it out of his body and transferring it to some material substance, whether a stick, a stone, or what not, which he can cast from him, and so, being eased of his burden, can hasten away from the dreadful spot with a lighter heart. Thus the throwing of the sticks or stones would be a form of ceremonial purification, which among primitive peoples is commonly conceived as a sort of physical rather than moral purgation, a mode of sweeping or scouring away the morbid matter by which the polluted person is supposed to be infected. This notion perhaps explains the rite of stone-throwing observed by pilgrims at Mecca; on the day of sacrifice every pilgrim has to cast seven stones on a cairn, and the rite is repeated thrice on the three following days. The traditional explanation of the custom is that Mohammed here drove away the devil with a shower of stones;[67 - E. Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l'Afrique du Nord (Algiers, 1908), pp. 430 sq.; J. Wellhausen, Reste arabischen Heidentums

(Berlin, 1897), p. 111. The explanation given in the text is regarded as probable by Professor M. J. de Goeje (Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, xvi. ,1904, p. 42.)] but the original idea may perhaps have been that the pilgrims cleanse themselves by transferring their ceremonial impurity to the stones which they fling on the heap.

This interpretation of stone-throwing agrees with ancient Greek and Indian tradition and custom.

The theory that the throwing of stones is practised in certain circumstances as a mode of purification tallies very well with the tradition as to the origin of those cairns which were to be seen by wayside images of Hermes in ancient Greece, and to which every passer-by added a stone. It was said that when Hermes was tried by the gods for the murder of Argus all the gods flung stones at him as a means of freeing themselves from the pollution contracted by bloodshed; the stones thus thrown made a great heap, and the custom of rearing such heaps at wayside images of Hermes continued ever afterwards.[68 - Etymologicum Magnum, s. v. Ἑρμαῖον, pp. 375 sq.; Eustathius on Homer, Odyssey, xvi. 471. As to the heaps of stones see Cornutus, Theologiae Graecae Compendium, 16; Babrius, Fabulae, xlviii. 1 sq.; Suidas, s. v. Ἑρμαῖον; Scholiast on Nicander, Ther. 150; M. P. Nilsson, Griechische Feste (Leipsic, 1906), pp. 388 sqq. The method of execution by stoning may perhaps have been resorted to in order to avoid the pollution which would be entailed by contact with the guilty and dying man.] Similarly Plato recommended that if any man had murdered his father or mother, his brother or sister, his son or daughter, he should be put to death, and that his body should be cast forth naked at a cross-road outside of the city. There the magistrates should assemble on behalf of the city, each carrying in his hand a stone, which he was to cast at the head of the corpse by way of purifying the city from the pollution it had contracted by the crime. After that the corpse was to be carried away and flung outside the boundaries.[69 - Plato, Laws, ix. 12, p. 873 a-c λίθον ἕκαστος φέρων ἐπὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν τοῦ νεκροῦ βάλλων ἀφοσιούτω τὴν πόλιν ὅλην.] In these cases it would seem that the pollution incurred by the vicinity of a murderer is thought to be gathered up in the stones as a material vehicle and to be thrown away with them. A sacrificial custom of the Brahmans, prescribed in one of their sacred books, is susceptible of a like interpretation. At a certain stage of the ritual the sacrificer is directed to put a stone into a water-pot and to throw it away in a south-westerly direction, because that is the region of Nirriti, the goddess of Evil or Destruction. With the stone and the pitcher he is supposed to cast away his pain and evil; and he can transfer the pain to another by saying, as he throws away the stone and the pitcher, “Let thy pain enter him whom we hate,” or “Let thy pain enter so-and-so,” naming his enemy; but in order to ensure the transference of the pain to his enemy he must take care that the stone or the pitcher is broken.[70 - Satapatha Brahmana, ix. 1. 2. 9-12, Part iv. p. 171 of J. Eggeling's translation (Sacred Books of the East, vol. xliii., Oxford, 1897). As to Nirriti, the Goddess of Destruction, see H. Oldenberg, Die Religion des Veda (Berlin, 1894), pp. 323, 351, 354, 489 note 3.]