It isn’t by loose, fanciful, and careless guess-work as to how the resemblance of Greek or Norse legends to those of the Red Indians is because of similar conditions of climate and life, that we shall arrive at details; neither will the reality be ascertained by assuming that there was a sure beginning of them all in a certain nation, or that they have been all developed out of one mythology, be it solar or Shemitic, Hindoo or Hebrew. And as it is unlucky to wash something on Saturday, or to spin on Thursday, or to work in the fields on Thursday between Easter and Pentecost, it is going to be seen that Laziness and Dirt have between them a tremendous field in Roumania. As I write I have earlier than me a replica of the Philadelphia Press, of April 14, 1889, by which a J. C. BATFORD, M.D., advertises that if any one will ship him two two-cent postage stamps–i.e., twopence–“with a lock of your hair, identify, age, and intercourse,” he will send a clairvoyant diagnosis of your illness. For with all due respect to the fact that such superstitions may need sprung up sporadically wherever comparable causes existed to create them, it is, in the first place, a really uncommon likelihood that they should assume exactly like varieties.
As a rule, with little exception, when we discover anywhere the grosser forms of fetish and black witchcraft, we may conclude that we have now remains of the world’s oldest faith, or first beginning of supernaturalism in suffering and terror, a concern of mysterious evil influences. Add to this that, as in Russia, greater than half the days within the year are Saints’ days, or fast days or festivals on which it is “unlucky” to work at all, and (illegible textual content) discover that trade cannot be mentioned to be a lot inspired by Faith in (illegible text) of its types. If jade was within the prehistoric stone age carried from Iona or Tartary throughout Europe, it’s much more probable that myths went with it quite as far and quick. The Oriental or Greek Church is discovered at every flip, even more than the Catholic, interchanged, twined, and confused with historical sorcery. Then once extra he set forward. From speaking a illness by the use of such a lock, and ascertaining what was the matter with a man, in the identical method, was a really apparent step forward. IN her very fascinating account of Roumanian superstitions, Mrs. E. GERARD (“The Land Beyond the Forest”), finds three distinct sources for them firstly, the indigenous, which seems to have been formed by or tailored to the wild and picturesque surroundings and character of the nation; secondly, those derived from the old German customs and beliefs brought by the so-called Saxon, in reality Lower Rhenish colonists; and thirdly, the influence of the gypsies, “themselves a race of fortune-tellers and witches.” All these sorts of superstition have twined and intermingled, acted and reacted upon one another in order that in lots of cases it turns into a troublesome matter to determine the precise parentage of some explicit belief or custom.
Of all folks dwelling in Europe the peasantry of Italy and Sicily and the gypsies seem to have retained most of this Shamanism and witchcraft, and as the latter have been for centuries its chief priests, travelling right here and there disseminating it, we might conclude that even the place they didn’t originate it they’ve been lively in keeping the old faith alive. No bargain should ever be concluded on a Friday, and Venus, right here called Paraschiva, to whom today is sacred, punishes all infractions of the law. There was among the many Wends a flax-goddess, Pscipolnitza, and the shears as emblematic of loss of life are naturally antipathetic to Venus, the source of life. When we discover that a superstition relies on fertility, the “mystery of technology,” or “Phallic worship”–as, as an illustration, carrying boars’ teeth or a little bit pig for a charm–we could conclude that it is rather historic, however nonetheless not older than the time when wise men had begun to reflect on the mysteries of delivery and death and weave them into myths. This paper has used a binary method assessing differences between transgender men and transgender ladies.
The examine authors also stated that average lean physique mass variations might account for performance differences between sexes. It may be often difficult to ascertain in what particular country or amongst what folks a superstition was final found, but there’s little or no hassle when we compare the great body of all such beliefs of all races and ages and thereby find the mother or father sources. This belief in holy days which carry ill-luck to those who work on them, which remains to be flourishing in every nation in the world, goes back to time whereof the reminiscence of man hath naught to the opposite. This divining by the lock of hair is extremely historic, and had its origin in the idea that he who could acquire one from an enemy could reach his soul and kill him. The exorcism of diseases as devils, and the belief that they, in common with other evils, could also be drummed, or smoked, or incanted away into animals, timber, and streams, belongs normally to Shamanism. Whether Mars has something in common with Mors I know not, but in Roumania he’s decidedly an evil spirit of dying, whence Marti, or Tuesday, is one, when spinning is positively prohibited (right here we have now Venus once more), and washing the arms and combing the hair aren’t unattended with danger.
