| Sir James George Frazer (1854–1941). The Golden
Bough. 1922. |
§ 11. Knots and
Rings tabooed |
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| WE have seen that among the many taboos
which the Flamen Dialis at Rome had to observe, there was one that
forbade him to have a knot on any part of his garments, and another
that obliged him to wear no ring unless it were broken. In like
manner Moslem pilgrims to Mecca are in a state of sanctity or taboo
and may wear on their persons neither knots nor rings. These rules
are probably of kindred significance, and may conveniently be
considered together. To begin with knots, many people in different
parts of the world entertain a strong objection to having any knot
about their person at certain critical seasons, particularly
childbirth, marriage, and death. Thus among the Saxons of
Transylvania, when a woman is in travail all knots on her garments
are untied, because it is believed that this will facilitate her
delivery, and with the same intention all the locks in the house,
whether on doors or boxes, are unlocked. The Lapps think that a
lying-in woman should have no knot on her garments, because a knot
would have the effect of making the delivery difficult and painful.
In the East Indies this superstition is extended to the whole time
of pregnancy; the people believe that if a
pregnant woman were to tie knots, or braid, or make anything fast,
the child would thereby be constricted or the woman would herself be
“tied up” when her time came. Nay, some of them enforce the
observance of the rule on the father as well as the mother of the
unborn child. Among the Sea Dyaks neither of the parents may bind up
anything with a string or make anything fast during the wife’s
pregnancy. In the Toumbuluh tribe of North Celebes a ceremony is
performed in the fourth or fifth month of a woman’s pregnancy, and
after it her husband is forbidden, among many other things, to tie
any fast knots and to sit with his legs crossed over each other. |
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| In all these cases the idea seems to be that the
tying of a knot would, as they say in the East Indies, “tie up” the
woman, in other words, impede and perhaps prevent her delivery, or
delay her convalescence after the birth. On the principles of
homoeopathic or imitative magic the physical obstacle or impediment
of a knot on a cord would create a corresponding obstacle or
impediment in the body of the woman. That this is really the
explanation of the rule appears from a custom observed by the Hos of
West Africa at a difficult birth. When a woman is in hard labour and
cannot bring forth, they call in a magician to her aid. He looks at
her and says, “The child is bound in the womb, that is why she
cannot be delivered.” On the entreaties of her female relations he
then promises to loosen the bond so that she may bring forth. For
that purpose he orders them to fetch a tough creeper from the
forest, and with it he binds the hands and feet of the sufferer on
her back. Then he takes a knife and calls out the woman’s name, and
when she answers he cuts through the creeper with a knife, saying,
“I cut through to-day thy bonds and thy child’s bonds.” After that
he chops up the creeper small, puts the bits in a vessel of water,
and bathes the woman with the water. Here the cutting of the creeper
with which the woman’s hands and feet are bound is a simple piece of
homoeopathic or imitative magic: by releasing her limbs from their
bonds the magician imagines that he simultaneously releases the
child in her womb from the trammels which impede its birth. The same
train of thought underlies a practice observed by some peoples of
opening all locks, doors, and so on, while a birth is taking place
in the house. We have seen that at such a time the Germans of
Transylvania open all the locks, and the same thing is done also in
Voigtland and Mecklenburg. In North-western Argyllshire
superstitious people used to open every lock in the house at
childbirth. In the island of Salsette near Bombay, when a woman is
in hard labour, all locks of doors or drawers are opened with a key
to facilitate her delivery. Among the Mandelings of Sumatra the lids
of all chests, boxes, pans, and so forth are opened; and if this
does not produce the desired effect, the anxious husband has to
strike the projecting ends of some of the house-beams in order to
loosen them; for they think that “everything must be open and loose
to facilitate the delivery.” In Chittagong, when a woman cannot
bring her child to the birth, the midwife
gives orders to throw all doors and windows wide open, to uncork all
bottles, to remove the bungs from all casks, to unloose the cows in
the stall, the horses in the stable, the watchdog in his kennel, to
set free sheep, fowls, ducks, and so forth. This universal liberty
accorded to the animals and even to inanimate things is, according
to the people, an infallible means of ensuring the woman’s delivery
and allowing the babe to be born. In the island of Saghalien, when a
woman is in labour, her husband undoes everything that can be
undone. He loosens the plaits of his hair and the laces of his
shoes. Then he unties whatever is tied in the house or its vicinity.
In the courtyard he takes the axe out of the log in which it is
stuck; he unfastens the boat, if it is moored to a tree, he
withdraws the cartridges from his gun, and the arrows from his
crossbow. |
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| Again, we have seen that a Toumbuluh man abstains
not only from tying knots, but also from sitting with crossed legs
during his wife’s pregnancy. The train of thought is the same in
both cases. Whether you cross threads in tying a knot, or only cross
your legs in sitting at your ease, you are equally, on the
principles of homoeopathic magic, crossing or thwarting the free
course of things, and your action cannot but check and impede
whatever may be going forward in your neighbourhood. Of this
important truth the Romans were fully aware. To sit beside a
pregnant woman or a patient under medical treatment with clasped
hands, says the grave Pliny, is to cast a malignant spell over the
person, and it is worse still if you nurse your leg or legs with
your clasped hands, or lay one leg over the other. Such postures
were regarded by the old Romans as a let and hindrance to business
of every sort, and at a council of war or a meeting of magistrates,
at prayers and sacrifices, no man was suffered to cross his legs or
clasp his hands. The stock instance of the dreadful consequences
that might flow from doing one or the other was that of Alcmena, who
travailed with Hercules for seven days and seven nights, because the
goddess Lucina sat in front of the house with clasped hands and
crossed legs, and the child could not be born until the goddess had
been beguiled into changing her attitude. It is a Bulgarian
superstition that if a pregnant woman is in the habit of sitting
with crossed legs, she will suffer much in childbed. In some parts
of Bavaria, when conversation comes to a standstill and silence
ensues, they say, “Surely somebody has crossed his legs.” |
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| The magical effect of knots in trammelling and
obstructing human activity was believed to be manifested at marriage
not less than at birth. During the Middle Ages, and down to the
eighteenth century, it seems to have been commonly held in Europe
that the consummation of marriage could be prevented by any one who,
while the wedding ceremony was taking place, either locked a lock or
tied a knot in a cord, and then threw the lock or the cord away. The
lock or the knotted cord had to be flung into water; and until it
had been found and unlocked, or untied, no real union of the married
pair was possible. Hence it was a grave offence, not only to cast
such a spell, but also to steal or make
away with the material instrument of it, whether lock or knotted
cord. In the year 1718 the parliament of Bordeaux sentenced some one
to be burned alive for having spread desolation through a whole
family by means of knotted cords; and in 1705 two persons were
condemned to death in Scotland for stealing certain charmed knots
which a woman had made, in order thereby to mar the wedded happiness
of Spalding of Ashintilly. The belief in the efficacy of these
charms appears to have lingered in the Highlands of Pertshire down
to the end of the eighteenth century, for at that time it was still
customary in the beautiful parish of Logierait, between the river
Tummel and the river Tay, to unloose carefully every knot in the
clothes of the bride and bridegroom before the celebration of the
marriage ceremony. We meet with the same superstition and the same
custom at the present day in Syria. The persons who help a Syrian
bridegroom to don his wedding garments take care that no knot is
tied on them and no button buttoned, for they believe that a button
buttoned or a knot tied would put it within the power of his enemies
to deprive him of his nuptial rights by magical means. The fear of
such charms is diffused all over North Africa at the present day. To
render a bridegroom impotent the enchanter has only to tie a knot in
a handkerchief which he had previously placed quietly on some part
of the bridegroom’s body when he was mounted on horseback ready to
fetch his bride: so long as the knot in the handkerchief remains
tied, so long will the bridegroom remain powerless to consummate the
marriage. |
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| The maleficent power of knots may also be manifested
in the infliction of sickness, disease, and all kinds of misfortune.
Thus among the Hos of West Africa a sorcerer will sometimes curse
his enemy and tie a knot in a stalk of grass, saying, “I have tied
up So-and-so in this knot. May all evil light upon him! When he goes
into the field, may a snake sting him! When he goes to the chase,
may a ravening beast attack him! And when he steps into a river, may
the water sweep him away! When it rains, may the lightning strike
him! May evil nights be his!” It is believed that in the knot the
sorcerer has bound up the life of his enemy. In the Koran there is
an allusion to the mischief of “those who puff into the knots,” and
an Arab commentator on the passage explains that the words refer to
women who practise magic by tying knots in cords, and then blowing
and spitting upon them. He goes on to relate how, once upon a time,
a wicked Jew bewitched the prophet Mohammed himself by tying nine
knots on a string, which he then hid in a well. So the prophet fell
ill, and nobody knows what might have happened if the archangel
Gabriel had not opportunely revealed to the holy man the place where
the knotted cord was concealed. The trusty Ali soon fetched the
baleful thing from the well; and the prophet recited over it certain
charms, which were specially revealed to him for the purpose. At
every verse of the charms a knot untied itself, and the prophet
experienced a certain relief. |
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| If knots are supposed to kill, they are also
supposed to cure. This follows from the belief that to undo the
knots which are causing sickness will bring the sufferer relief. But
apart from this negative virtue of maleficent knots, there are
certain beneficent knots to which a positive power of healing is
ascribed. Pliny tells us that some folk cured diseases of the groin
by taking a thread from a web, tying seven or nine knots on it, and
then fastening it to the patient’s groin; but to make the cure
effectual it was necessary to name some widow as each knot was tied.
O’Donovan describes a remedy for fever employed among the Turcomans.
The enchanter takes some camel hair and spins it into a stout
thread, droning a spell the while. Next he ties seven knots on the
thread, blowing on each knot before he pulls it tight. This knotted
thread is then worn as a bracelet on his wrist by the patient. Every
day one of the knots is untied and blown upon, and when the seventh
knot is undone the whole thread is rolled up into a ball and thrown
into a river, bearing away (as they imagine) the fever with it. |
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| Again knots may be used by an enchantress to win a
lover and attach him firmly to herself. Thus the love-sick maid in
Virgil seeks to draw Daphnis to her from the city by spells and by
tying three knots on each of three strings of different colours. So
an Arab maiden, who had lost her heart to a certain man, tried to
gain his love and bind him to herself by tying knots in his whip;
but her jealous rival undid the knots. On the same principle magic
knots may be employed to stop a runaway. In Swazieland you may often
see grass tied in knots at the side of the footpaths. Every one of
these knots tells of a domestic tragedy. A wife has run away from
her husband, and he and his friends have gone in pursuit, binding up
the paths, as they call it, in this fashion to prevent the fugitive
from doubling back over them. A net, from its affluence of knots,
has always been considered in Russia very efficacious against
sorcerers; hence in some places, when a bride is being dressed in
her wedding attire, a fishing-net is flung over her to keep her out
of harm’s way. For a similar purpose the bridegroom and his
companions are often girt with pieces of net, or at least with
tight-drawn girdles, for before a wizard can begin to injure them he
must undo all the knots in the net, or take off the girdles. But
often a Russian amulet is merely a knotted thread. A skein of red
wool wound about the arms and legs is thought to ward off agues and
fevers; and nine skeins, fastened round a child’s neck, are deemed a
preservative against scarlatina. In the Tver Government a bag of a
special kind is tied to the neck of the cow which walks before the
rest of a herd, in order to keep off wolves; its force binds the maw
of the ravening beast. On the same principle, a padlock is carried
thrice round a herd of horses before they go afield in the spring,
and the bearer locks and unlocks it as he goes, saying, “I lock from
my herd the mouths of the grey wolves with this steel lock.” |
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| Knots and locks may serve to avert not only wizards
and wolves but death itself. When they
brought a woman to the stake at St. Andrews in 1572 to burn her
alive for a witch, they found on her a white cloth like a collar,
with strings and many knots on the strings. They took it from her,
sorely against her will, for she seemed to think that she could not
die in the fire, if only the cloth with the knotted strings was on
her. When it was taken away, she said, “Now I have no hope of
myself.” In many parts of England it is thought that a person cannot
die so long as any locks are locked or bolts shot in the house. It
is therefore a very common practice to undo all locks and bolts when
the sufferer is plainly near his end, in order that his agony may
not be unduly prolonged. For example, in the year 1863, at Taunton,
a child lay sick of scarlatina and death seemed inevitable. “A jury
of matrons was, as it were, empanelled, and to prevent the child
‘dying hard’ all the doors in the house, all the drawers, all the
boxes, all the cupboards were thrown wide open, the keys taken out,
and the body of the child placed under a beam, whereby a sure,
certain, and easy passage into eternity could be secured.” Strange
to say, the child declined to avail itself of the facilities for
dying so obligingly placed at its disposal by the sagacity and
experience of the British matrons of Taunton; it preferred to live
rather than give up the ghost just then. |
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| The rule which prescribes that at certain magical
and religious ceremonies the hair should hang loose and the feet
should be bare is probably based on the same fear of trammelling and
impeding the action in hand, whatever it may be, by the presence of
any knot or constriction, whether on the head or on the feet of the
performer. A similar power to bind and hamper spiritual as well as
bodily activities is ascribed by some people to rings. Thus in the
island of Carpathus people never button the clothes they put upon a
dead body and they are careful to remove all rings from it; “for the
spirit, they say, can even be detained in the little finger, and
cannot rest.” Here it is plain that even if the soul is not
definitely supposed to issue at death from the finger-tips, yet the
ring is conceived to exercise a certain constrictive influence which
detains and imprisons the immortal spirit in spite of its efforts to
escape from the tabernacle of clay; in short the ring, like the
knot, acts as a spiritual fetter. This may have been the reason of
an ancient Greek maxim, attributed to Pythagoras, which forbade
people to wear rings. Nobody might enter the ancient Arcadian
sanctuary of the Mistress at Lycosura with a ring on his or her
finger. Persons who consulted the oracle of Faunus had to be chaste,
to eat no flesh, and to wear no rings. |
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| On the other hand, the same constriction which
hinders the egress of the soul may prevent the entrance of evil
spirits; hence we find rings used as amulets against demons,
witches, and ghosts. In the Tyrol it is said that a woman in
childbed should never take off her wedding-ring, or spirits and
witches will have power over her. Among the Lapps, the person who is
about to place a corpse in the coffin receives from the husband,
wife, or children of the deceased a brass
ring, which he must wear fastened to his
right arm until the corpse is safely deposited in the grave. The
ring is believed to serve the person as an amulet against any harm
which the ghost might do to him. How far the custom of wearing
finger-rings may have been influenced by, or even have sprung from,
a belief in their efficacy as amulets to keep the soul in the body,
or demons out of it, is a question which seems worth considering.
Here we are only concerned with the belief in so far as it seems to
throw light on the rule that the Flamen Dialis might not wear a ring
unless it were broken. Taken in conjunction with the rule which
forbade him to have a knot on his garments, it points to a fear that
the powerful spirit embodied in him might be trammelled and hampered
in its goings-out and comings-in by such corporeal and spiritual
fetters as rings and knots. |
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