Chapter VIII: The Saturnalia and Kindred Festivals (5)

(M319) But closely as the passion of Christ resembles the treatment of the mock king of the Saturnalia, it resembles still more closely the treatment of the mock king of the Sacaea.(922) The description of the mockery by St. Matthew is the fullest. It runs thus: “Then released he Barabbas unto them: and when he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall, and gathered unto him the whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him, and put on him a scarlet robe. And when they had platted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews! And they spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. And after that they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, and put his own raiment on him, and led him away to crucify him.”(923) Compare with this the treatment of the mock king of the Sacaea, as it is described by Dio Chrysostom: “They take one of the prisoners condemned to death and seat him upon the king’s throne, and give him the king’s raiment, and let him lord it and drink and run riot and use the king’s concubines during these days, and no man prevents him from doing just what he likes. But afterwards they strip and scourge and crucify him.”(924) Now it is quite possible that this remarkable resemblance is after all a mere coincidence, and that Christ was executed in the ordinary way as a common malefactor; but on the other hand there are so many scattered hints and indications of something unusual, so many broken lines seemingly converging towards the cross on Calvary, that it is worth while to follow them up and see where they lead us. In attempting to draw these fragmentary data together, to bridge the chasms, and to restore the shattered whole, we must beware of mistaking hypothesis for the facts which it only professes to cement; yet even if our hypothesis should be thought to bear a somewhat undue proportion to the facts, the excess may perhaps be overlooked in consideration of the obscurity and the importance of the enquiry. (M320) We have seen reason to think that the Jewish festival of Purim is a continuation, under a changed name, of the Babylonian Sacaea, and that in celebrating it by the destruction of an effigy of Haman the modern Jews have kept up a reminiscence of the ancient custom of crucifying or hanging a man in the character of a god at the festival. Is it not possible that at an earlier time they may, like the Babylonians themselves, have regularly compelled a condemned criminal to play the tragic part, and that Christ thus perished in the character of Haman? The resemblance between the hanged Haman and the crucified Christ struck the early Christians themselves; and whenever the Jews destroyed an effigy of Haman they were accused by their Christian neighbours of deriding the most sacred mystery of the new faith.(925) It is probable that on this painful subject the Christians were too sensitive; remembering the manner of their Founder’s death it was natural that they should wince at any pointed allusion to a cross, a gallows, or a public execution, even when the shaft was not aimed at them. An objection to supposing that Christ died as the Haman of the year is that according to the Gospel narrative the crucifixion occurred at the Passover, on the fourteenth day of the month Nisan, whereas the feast of Purim, at which the hanging of Haman would naturally take place, fell exactly a month earlier, namely, on the fourteenth day of the month Adar. I have no wish to blink or extenuate the serious nature of the difficulty arising from this discrepancy of dates, but I would suggest some considerations which may make us hesitate to decide that the discrepancy is fatal. In the first place, it is possible, though perhaps not probable, that Christian tradition shifted the date of the crucifixion by a month in order to make the great sacrifice of the Lamb of God coincide with that annual sacrifice of the Passover lamb which in the belief of pious hearts had so long foreshadowed it and was thenceforth to cease.(926) Instances of gentle pressure brought to bear, for purposes of edification, on stubborn facts are perhaps not wholly unknown in the annals of religion. But the express testimony of history is never to be lightly set aside; and in the investigation of its problems a solution which assumes the veracity and accuracy of the historian is, on an even balance of probabilities, always to be preferred to one which impugns them both. Now in the present case we have seen reason to think that the Babylonian New Year festival, of which Purim was a continuation, did fall in Nisan at or near the time of the Passover, and that when the Jews borrowed the festival they altered the date from Nisan to Adar in order to prevent the new feast from clashing with the old Passover. A reminiscence of the original date of Purim perhaps survives, as I have already pointed out, in the statement in the book of Esther that Haman caused _pur_ or lots to be cast before him from the month of Nisan onward.(927) It thus seems not impossible that occasionally, for some special reason, the Jews should have celebrated the feast of Purim, or at least the death of Haman, at or about the time of the Passover. But there is another possibility which, remote and fanciful as it may appear, deserves at least to be mentioned. The mock king of the Saturnalia, whose resemblance to the dying Christ was first pointed out by Mr. Wendland, was allowed a period of license of thirty days before he was put to death. If we could suppose that in like manner the Jews spared the human representative of Haman for one month from Purim, the date of his execution would fall exactly on the Passover. Which, if any, of these conjectural solutions of the difficulty is the true one, I will not undertake to say. I am fully conscious of the doubt and uncertainty that hang round the whole subject; and if in this and what follows I throw out some hints and suggestions, it is more in the hope of stimulating and directing further enquiry than with any expectation of reaching definite conclusions.

(M321) It may be objected that the mockery of Christ was done, not by the Jews, but by the Roman soldiers, who knew and cared nothing about Haman; how then can we suppose that the purple or scarlet robe, the sceptre of reed, and the crown of thorns, which the soldiers thrust upon Christ, were the regular insignia of the Haman of the year? To this we may reply, in the first place, that even if the legions stationed in Syria were not recruited in the country, they may have contracted some of the native superstitions and have fallen in with the local customs. This is not an idle conjecture. We know that the third legion during its stay in Syria learned the Syrian custom of saluting the rising sun, and that this formal salute, performed by the whole regiment as one man at a critical moment of the great battle of Bedriacum, actually helped to turn the scale when the fortune of empire hung trembling in the balance.(928) But it is not necessary to suppose that the garrison of Jerusalem really shared the beliefs and prejudices of the mob whom they overawed; soldiers everywhere are ready to go with a crowd bent on sport, without asking any curious questions as to the history or quality of the entertainment, and we should probably do the humanity of Roman soldiers too much honour if we imagined that they would be deterred by any qualm of conscience from joining in the pastime, which is still so popular, of baiting a Jew to death. But in the second place it should be observed that, according to one of the Evangelists, it was not the soldiers of Pilate who mocked Jesus, but the soldiers of Herod,(929) and we may fairly assume that Herod’s guards were Jews.

(M322) The hypothesis that the crucifixion with all its cruel mockery was not a punishment specially devised for Christ, but was merely the fate that annually befell the malefactor who played Haman, appears to go some way towards relieving the Gospel narrative of certain difficulties which otherwise beset it. If, as we read in the Gospels, Pilate was really anxious to save the innocent man whose fine bearing seems to have struck him, what was to hinder him from doing so? He had the power of life and death; why should he not have exercised it on the side of mercy, if his own judgment inclined that way? His reluctant acquiescence in the importunate demand of the rabble becomes easier to understand if we assume that custom obliged him annually at this season to give up to them a prisoner on whom they might play their cruel pranks. On this assumption Pilate had no power to prevent the sacrifice; the most he could do was to choose the victim.

Again, consider the remarkable statement of the Evangelists that Pilate set up over the cross a superscription stating that the man who hung on it was king of the Jews.(930) Is it likely that in the reign of Tiberius a Roman governor, with the fear of the jealous and suspicious old emperor before his eyes, would have ventured, even in mockery, to blazon forth a seditious claim of this sort unless it were the regular formula employed on such occasions, recognized by custom, and therefore not liable to be misconstrued into treason by the malignity of informers and the fears of a tyrant?

But if the tragedy of the ill-fated aspirant after royal honours was annually enacted at Jerusalem by a prisoner who perished on the cross, it becomes probable that the part of his successful rival was also played by another actor who paraded in the same kingly trappings but did not share the same fate. If Jesus was the Haman of the year, where was the Mordecai? Perhaps we may find him in Barabbas.

(M323) We are told by the Evangelists that at the feast which witnessed the crucifixion of Christ it was the custom for the Roman governor to release one prisoner, whomsoever the people desired, and that Pilate, convinced of the innocence of Jesus, attempted to persuade the multitude to choose him as the man who should go free. But, hounded on by the priests and elders who had marked out Jesus for destruction, the rabble would not hear of this, and clamoured for the blood of Jesus, while they demanded the release of a certain miscreant, by name Barabbas, who lay in gaol for murder and sedition. Accordingly Pilate had to give way: Christ was crucified and Barabbas set at liberty.(931) Now what, we may ask, was the reason for setting free a prisoner at this festival? In the absence of positive information, we may conjecture that the gaol-bird whose cage was thrown open at this time had to purchase his freedom by performing some service from which decent people would shrink. Such a service may very well have been that of going about the streets, rigged out in tawdry splendour with a tinsel crown on his head and a sham sceptre in his hand, preceded and followed by all the tag-rag and bobtail of the town hooting, jeering, and breaking coarse jests at his expense, while some pretended to salaam his mock majesty, and others belaboured the donkey on which he rode. It was in this fashion, probably, that in Persia the beardless and one-eyed man made his undignified progress through the town, to the delight of ragamuffins and the terror of shopkeepers, whose goods he unceremoniously confiscated if they did not hasten to lay their peace-offerings at his feet. So, perhaps, the ruffian Barabbas, when his irons were knocked off and the prison door had grated on its hinges to let him forth, tasted the first sweets of liberty in this public manner, even if he was not suffered, like his one-eyed brother, to make raids with impunity on the stalls of the merchants and the tables of the money-changers. A curious confirmation of this conjecture is supplied by a passage in the writings of Philo the Jew, who lived at Alexandria in the time of Christ. He tells us that when Agrippa, the grandson of Herod, had received the crown of Judaea from Caligula at Rome, the new king passed through Alexandria on his way to his own country. The disorderly populace of that great city, animated by a hearty dislike of his nation, seized the opportunity of venting their spite by publicly defaming and ridiculing the Jewish monarch. Among other things they laid hold of a certain harmless lunatic named Carabas, who used to roam the streets stark naked, the butt and laughing-stock of urchins and idlers. This poor wretch they set up in a public place, clapped a paper crown on his head, thrust a broken reed into his hand by way of a sceptre, and having huddled a mat instead of a royal robe about his naked body, and surrounded him with a guard of bludgeon-men, they did obeisance to him as to a king and made a show of taking his opinion on questions of law and policy. To point the jest unmistakably at the Syrian king Agrippa, the bystanders raised cries of “Marin! Marin!” which they understood to be the Syrian word for “lord.”(932) This mockery of the Jewish king closely resembles the mockery of Christ; and the joke, such as it was, would receive a keener edge if we could suppose that the riff-raff of Alexandria were familiar with the Jewish practice of setting up a sham king on certain occasions, and that they meant by implication to ridicule the real King Agrippa by comparing him to his holiday counterfeit. May we go a step further and conjecture that one at least of the titles of the mock king of the Jews was regularly Barabbas? The poor imbecile who masqueraded in a paper crown at Alexandria was probably a Jew, otherwise the jest would have lost much of its point; and his name, according to the Greek manuscripts of Philo, was Carabas. But Carabas is meaningless in Hebrew, whereas Barabbas is a regularly formed Hebrew word meaning “Son of the Father.” The palaeographic difference between the two forms is slight, and perhaps we shall hardly be deemed very rash if we conjecture that in the passage in question Philo himself wrote Barabbas, which a Greek copyist, ignorant of Hebrew, afterwards corrupted into Carabas. If this were granted, we should still have to assume that both Philo and the authors of the Gospels fell into the mistake of treating as the name of an individual what in fact was a title of office.

(M324) Thus the hypothesis which, with great diffidence, I would put forward for consideration is this. It was customary, we may suppose, with the Jews at Purim, or perhaps occasionally at Passover, to employ two prisoners to act the parts respectively of Haman and Mordecai in the passion-play which formed a central feature of the festival. Both men paraded for a short time in the insignia of royalty, but their fates were different; for while at the end of the performance the one who played Haman was hanged or crucified, the one who personated Mordecai and bore in popular parlance the title of Barabbas was allowed to go free. Pilate, perceiving the trumpery nature of the charges brought against Jesus, tried to persuade the Jews to let him play the part of Barabbas, which would have saved his life; but the merciful attempt failed and Jesus perished on the cross in the character of Haman. The description of his last triumphal ride into Jerusalem reads almost like an echo of that brilliant progress through the streets of Susa which Haman aspired to and Mordecai accomplished; and the account of the raid which he immediately afterwards made upon the stalls of the hucksters and money-changers in the temple, may raise a question whether we have not here a trace of those arbitrary rights over property which it has been customary on such occasions to accord to the temporary king.(933)

(M325) If it be asked why one of these temporary kings should bear the remarkable title of Barabbas or “Son of the Father,” I can only surmise that the title may perhaps be a relic of the time when the real king, the deified man, used to redeem his own life by deputing his son to reign for a short time and to die in his stead. We have seen that the custom of sacrificing the son for the father was common, if not universal, among Semitic peoples; and if we are right in our interpretation of the Passover, that festival—the traditional date of the crucifixion—was the very season when the dreadful sacrifice of the first-born was consummated.(934) Hence Barabbas or the “Son of the Father” would be a natural enough title for the man or child who reigned and died as a substitute for his royal sire. Even in later times, when the father provided a less precious substitute than his own offspring, it would be quite in accordance with the formal conservatism of religion that the old title should be retained after it had ceased to be appropriate; indeed the efficacy of the sacrifice might be thought to require and justify the pious fiction that the substitute was the very son of that divine father who should have died, but who preferred to live, for the good of his people. If in the time of Christ, as I have conjectured, the title of Barabbas or Son of the Father was bestowed on the Mordecai, the mock king who lived, rather than on the Haman, the mock king who died at the festival, this distinction can hardly have been original; for at first, we may suppose, the same man served in both capacities at different times, as the Mordecai of one year and the Haman of the next. The two characters, as I have attempted to shew, are probably nothing but two different aspects of the same deity considered at one time as dead and at another as risen; hence the human being who personated the risen god would in due time, after he had enjoyed his divine honours for a season, act the dead god by dying in good earnest in his own person; for it would be unreasonable to expect of the ordinary man-god that he should play the two parts in the reverse order by dying first and coming to life afterwards. In both parts the substitute would still be, whether in sober fact or in pious fiction, the Barabbas or Son of that divine Father who generously gave his own son to die for the world.(935)

(M326) To conclude this speculation, into which I have perhaps been led by the interest and importance of the subject somewhat deeper than the evidence warrants, I venture to urge in its favour that it seems to shed fresh light on some of the causes which contributed to the remarkably rapid diffusion of Christianity in Asia Minor. We know from a famous letter of the younger Pliny addressed to the Emperor Trajan in the year 112 A.D. that by the beginning of our era, less than a hundred years after the Founder’s death, Christianity had made such strides in Bithynia and Pontus that not only cities but villages and rural districts were affected by it, and that multitudes of both sexes and of every age and every rank professed its tenets; indeed things had gone so far that the temples were almost deserted, the sacred rites of the public religion discontinued, and hardly a purchaser could be found for the sacrificial victims.(936) It is obvious, therefore, that the new faith had elements in it which appealed powerfully to the Asiatic mind. What these elements were, the present investigation has perhaps to some extent disclosed. We have seen that the conception of the dying and risen god was no new one in these regions. All over Western Asia from time immemorial the mournful death and happy resurrection of a divine being appear to have been annually celebrated with alternate rites of bitter lamentation and exultant joy; and through the veil which mythic fancy has woven round this tragic figure we can still detect the features of those great yearly changes in earth and sky which, under all distinctions of race and religion, must always touch the natural human heart with alternate emotions of gladness and regret, because they exhibit on the vastest scale open to our observation the mysterious struggle between life and death. But man has not always been willing to watch passively this momentous conflict; he has felt that he has too great a stake in its issue to stand by with folded hands while it is being fought out; he has taken sides against the forces of death and decay—has flung into the trembling scale all the weight of his puny person, and has exulted in his fancied strength when the great balance has slowly inclined towards the side of life, little knowing that for all his strenuous efforts he can as little stir that balance by a hair’s-breadth as can the primrose on a mossy bank in spring or the dead leaf blown by the chilly breath of autumn. Nowhere do these efforts, vain and pitiful, yet pathetic, appear to have been made more persistently and systematically than in Western Asia. In name they varied from place to place, but in substance they were all alike. A man, whom the fond imagination of his worshippers invested with the attributes of a god, gave his life for the life of the world; after infusing from his own body a fresh current of vital energy into the stagnant veins of nature, he was cut off from among the living before his failing strength should initiate a universal decay, and his place was taken by another who played, like all his predecessors, the ever-recurring drama of the divine resurrection and death. Such a drama, if our interpretation of it is right, was the original story of Esther and Mordecai or, to give them their older names, of Ishtar and Marduk. It was played in Babylonia, and from Babylonia the returning captives brought it to Judaea, where it was acted, rather as an historical than a mythical piece, by players who, having to die in grim earnest on a cross or gallows, were naturally drawn rather from the gaol than the green-room. A chain of causes which, because we cannot follow them, might in the loose language of daily life be called an accident, determined that the part of the dying god in this annual play should be thrust upon Jesus of Nazareth, whom the enemies he had made in high places by his outspoken strictures were resolved to put out of the way. They succeeded in ridding themselves of the popular and troublesome preacher; but the very step by which they fancied they had simultaneously stamped out his revolutionary doctrines contributed more than anything else they could have done to scatter them broadcast not only over Judaea but over Asia; for it impressed upon what had been hitherto mainly an ethical mission the character of a divine revelation culminating in the passion and death of the incarnate Son of a heavenly Father. In this form the story of the life and death of Jesus exerted an influence which it could never have had if the great teacher had died, as is commonly supposed, the death of a vulgar malefactor. It shed round the cross on Calvary a halo of divinity which multitudes saw and worshipped afar off; the blow struck on Golgotha set a thousand expectant strings vibrating in unison wherever men had heard the old, old story of the dying and risen god. Every year, as another spring bloomed and another autumn faded across the earth, the field had been ploughed and sown and borne fruit of a kind till it received that seed which was destined to spring up and overshadow the world. In the great army of martyrs who in many ages and in many lands, not in Asia only, have died a cruel death in the character of gods, the devout Christian will doubtless discern types and forerunners of the coming Saviour—stars that heralded in the morning sky the advent of the Sun of Righteousness—earthen vessels wherein it pleased the divine wisdom to set before hungering souls the bread of heaven. The sceptic, on the other hand, with equal confidence, will reduce Jesus of Nazareth to the level of a multitude of other victims of a barbarous superstition, and will see in him no more than a moral teacher, whom the fortunate accident of his execution invested with the crown, not merely of a martyr, but of a god. The divergence between these views is wide and deep. Which of them is the truer and will in the end prevail? Time will decide the question of prevalence, if not of truth. Yet we would fain believe that in this and in all things the old maxim will hold good—_Magna est veritas et praevalebit._

INDEX.

Abbot of Folly in France, 334

—— of Unreason in Scotland, 331

Abdera, human scapegoats at, 254

Abeghian, Manuk, quoted, 107 _sq._

Abjuration, form of, imposed on Jewish converts, 393

Abonsam, an evil spirit on the Gold Coast, 132

Abrahams, Israel, 393 _n._ 2

Abruzzi, Epiphany in the, 167 _n._ 2

Absalom, his intercourse with his father’s concubines, 368

Absrot, village of Bohemia, 161

Abstinence as a charm to promote the growth of the seed, 347 _sqq._

Abyssinian festival of Mascal or the Cross, 133 _sq._

Accusations of ritual murders brought against the Jews, 394 _sqq._

Acilisena, in Armenia, the worship of Anaitis at, 369 _n._ 1

Acosta, J. de, quoted, 275 _sq._, 277

Adaklu, Mount, in West Africa, 135 _sq._, 206 _sq._

Adam and Eve, 259 _n._ 3

Adar, a Jewish month, 361, 394, 397, 398, 415

Adonis at Alexandria, 390;
annual death and resurrection of, 398;
his marriage with Ishtar (Aphrodite), 401.
_See also_ Tammuz

—— and Aphrodite, 386

Aegisthus and Agamemnon, 19

Aesculapius at Epidaurus, 47

Africa, Northern, cairns in, 21;
popular cure for toothache in, 62;
South, dread of demons in, 77 _sq._;
tribes of, their expulsion of demons, 110 _sq._;
West, demons in, 74 _sqq._

Agamemnon and Aegisthus, 19

Agathias on Sandes, 389

Agni, creation of the great god, 410

_Agnus castus_, used in ceremony of beating, 252, 257

Agricultural year, expulsions of demons timed to coincide with seasons of
the, 225

Agrippa, King of Judaea, his mockery at Alexandria, 418

Ague, popular cures for, 56, 57 _sq._;
Suffolk cure for, 68

Ahasuerus, King, 397, 401;
the Hebrew equivalent of Xerxes, 360

Ait Sadden, the, of Morocco, 182

—— Warain, a Berber tribe, 178

Aitan, a goddess, 173

Akamba, the, of British East Africa, riddles among the, 122 _n._

Akikuyu of East Africa, 32

Alaska, the Esquimaux of, 124

Albania, expulsion of Kore on Easter Eve in, 157

Albanian custom of beating men and beasts in March, 266

Albanians of the Caucasus, their use of human scapegoats, 218

Albîrûnî, Arab historian, 393

Alençon, the Boy Bishop at, 337 _n._ 1

Aleutian Islands, 3, 16

Alexandria, Adonis at, 390;
mockery of King Agrippa at, 418

Alexandrian calendar, 395 _n._ 1

Alfoors of Central Celebes, riddles among the, 122 _n._

—— of Halmahera, their expulsion of the devil, 112

Algeria, 31;
popular cure in, 60

All Souls’ College, Oxford, the Boy Bishop at, 337

_Allallu_ bird beloved by Ishtar, 371

Allhallow Even, 332

Almora, in Kumaon, 197

Altars, bloodless, 307

Ambarvalia, the, 359

Amboyna, belief in spirits in, 85;
disease-transference in, 187

Ameretât, a Persian archangel, 373 _n._ 1

America, Indian tribes of North-Western, their masked dances, 375 _sqq._

Amoor, Gilyaks of the, 101

Amshaspands, Persian archangels, 373 _n._ 1

Amulets against demons, 95

Anacan, a month of the Gallic calendar, 343

Anadates, at Zela, 373 _n._ 1

Anaitis, a Persian goddess, 355, 368, 369, 370, 389, 402 _n._ 1, 421 _n._
1

Ancestral spirits, propitiation of, 86

Ancona, sarcophagus of St. Dasius at, 310

Andalusia, 173

Anderson, J. D., 176 _n._ 3

Anderson, Miss, of Barskimming, 169 _n._ 2

Andree-Eysn, Mrs., quoted, 245 _sq._

Animals, transference of evil to, 31 _sqq._;
as scapegoats, 31 _sqq._, 190 _sqq._, 208 _sqq._, 216 _sq._;
guardian spirits of, 98;
prayed to, 236;
dances taught by, 237;
imitated in dances, 376, 377, 381, 382

_Aninga_, aquatic plant in Brazil, 264

Annam, 33;
demon of cholera sent away on a raft from, 190;
explanation of human mortality in, 303

Anthesteria, Athenian festival of the dead, 152 _sq._

Anthesterion, an Athenian month, 352

Antibes, Holy Innocents’ Day at, 336 _sq._

Antinmas, 167

Antiquity, human scapegoats in classical, 229 _sqq._

Antoninus, Marcus, plague in his reign, 64

Ants, jealousy transferred to, 33;
stinging people with, 263

Anu, Babylonian god, visit of Ishtar to, 399 _n._ 1

_Apachitas_, heaps of stones, 9

Aphrodite and Adonis, 386

Aphrodite, the Oriental, 369 _n._ 1

Apis, sacred Egyptian bull, 217

Apollo, temple of, at the Lover’s Leap, 254

—— and Artemis, cake with twelve knobs offered to, 351 _n._ 3

April, Siamese festival of the dead in, 150

Arab cure for melancholy, 4

Arabia, 33

Arabs, their custom as to widows, 35;
their custom in regard to murder, 63;
beat camels to deliver them from jinn, 260;
of Morocco, their custom at the Great Feast, 265

Aracan, 12 _n._ 1, 117;
dances for the crops in, 236

Araucanians, the, of South America, 12

Arawaks of British Guiana, their explanation of human mortality, 302 _sq._

Arcadian custom of beating Pan’s image, 256

Arch to shut out plague, 5;
creeping through, as a cure, 55

Arches made over paths at expulsion of demons, 113, 120 _sq._

Arctic regions, ceremonies at the reappearance of the sun in the, 124
_sq._, 125 _n._ 1

Ardennes, the King of the Bean in the, 314;
the Eve of Epiphany in the, 317

Argentina, 9

Argus, the murder of, 24

Aricia, 305;
the priest of, 273;
King of the Wood at, 409

Arician grove, the, 274, 305

—— priesthood, 305

Aries, the constellation, the sun in, 361 _n._ 1, 403

Armenia, the worship of Anaitis in, 369 _n._ 1

Armenians, their belief in demons, 107 _sq._

Arrows, invisible, of demons, 101, 126

Artaxerxes II., his promotion of the worship of Anaitis, 370

_Artemisia laciniata_, garlands of, 284

Aru Archipelago, 121 _n._ 3

Arval Brothers, the college of the, at Rome, 230, 232, 238

Aryan custom of counting by nights instead of days, 326 _n._ 2

—— languages, names for moon and month in, 325

—— peoples, their correction of the lunar year, 342

Aryans of the Vedic age, 324;
their calendar, 325, 342

Ascalon, Derceto at, 370 _n._ 1

Ascension Day, cures on Eve of, 54;
annual expulsion of the devil on, 214 _sq._;
ceremony at Rouen on, 215 _sq._;
bells rung to make flax grow on, 247 _sq._

Ash-tree in popular cure, 57

Ashantee, annual period of license in, 226 _n._ 1

Ashtaroth, 366

Ashurbanapal and Sardanapalus, 387 _sq._

Asia, Saturnalia in Western, 354 _sqq._

Asia Minor, use of human scapegoats by the Greeks of, 255

Asongtata, an annual ceremony, 208

Aspen in popular cure, 57

Ass in cure for scorpion’s bite, 49 _sq._;
introduced into church at Festival of Fools, 335 _sq._;
triumphal ride of a buffoon on an, 402 _sq._

Assam, the Kacharis of, 93;
the Lushais of, 94;
the Khasis of, 173;
the Nagas of, 177;
the Garos of, 208 _sq._

Assembly of the gods at the New Year in Babylon, 356

Assimilation of human victims to trees, 257, 259 _n._ 3

Assyria, Ashurbanapal, king of, 387 _sq._

Assyrian monarchs, conquerors of Babylonia, 356

Assyrians, the ancient, their belief in demons, 102

Astarte or Ishtar, a great Babylonian goddess, 365.
_See also_ Ishtar

—— and Semiramis, 369 _sqq._

Aston, W. G., quoted, 213 _n._ 1

Aswang, an evil spirit, exorcism of, 260

Athenians, their use of human scapegoats, 253 _sq._;
their mode of reckoning a day, 326 _n._ 2;
their religious dramas, 384

Athens, Cronus and the Cronia at, 351 _sq._

Atkhans, the, of Aleutian Islands, 3

Atlas, Berbers of the Great, 178

Atlatatonan, Mexican goddess of lepers, 292;
woman annually sacrificed in the character of, 292

Atonement, the Jewish Day of, 210

Attis and Cybele, 386

Aubrey, John, on sin-eating, 43 _sq._

Aucas, the, of South America, 12

Australia, Central, 2

——, demons in, 74;
annual expulsion of ghosts in, 123 _sq._

Austria, cure of warts in, 48

Autumn, ceremony of the Esquimaux in late, 125

Autun, the Festival of Fools at, 335

Avestad in Sweden, 20

Axim, on the Gold Coast, 131

Aymara Indians, their remedy for plague, 193

Azazel, 210 _n._ 4

Aztecs, their custom of sacrificing human representatives of gods, 275;
their five supplementary days, 339

Azur, the month of March, 403

Baal, human sacrifices to, 353, 354

_Babalawo_, priest, 212

Babar Archipelago, 8;
sickness expelled in a boat from the, 187

Baboons sent by evil spirits, 110 _sq._

Baby, effigy of, used to fertilize women, 245, 249

Babylon, festival of the Sacaea at, 354 _sqq._

Babylonia, belief in demons in ancient, 102 _sq._;
conquered by Assyria, 356;
the feast of Purim in, 393

Babylonian calendar, 398 _n._ 2

Bacchanalia, Purim a Jewish, 363

Badagas, the, of the Neilgherry Hills, 36

Badi, performer at a ceremony, 197

Baffin Land, the Esquimaux of, 125

Baganda, the, of Central Africa, 4, 7, 17 _sq._, 27, 32;
human scapegoats among the, 42

Bahima, the, of the Uganda Protectorate, 6, 32

Baiga, aboriginal priest, 27

Bali, belief in demons in, 86;
periodical expulsion of demons in, 140

Ball, games of, played as a magical ceremony, 179 _sq._;
in Normandy, 183 _sq._

_Balolo_, a sea-slug, 141

Bamboo-rat sacrificed for riddance of evils, 208 _sq._

Bananas, mode of fertilizing, 264;
the cause of human mortality, 303

Bangkok, 150

Banishment of evil spirits, 86

Banks’ Islands, 9

Banks’ Islanders, their story of the origin of death, 304

Banmanas of Senegambia, their custom at the death of an infant, 261 _sq._

Banquets in honour of the spirits of disease, 119

Bantu tribes, 77

Banyoro, the, 42, 194

Barabbas and Christ, 417 _sqq._

_Baraka_, blessed influence, 265

Barat, a ceremony performed in Kumaon, 196

Barito, river in Borneo, 87

Baron, S., quoted, 148

Barwan, river, 123

Bassa tribe, of the Cameroons, 120

Bassus, Roman officer, 309

Basutos, the, 30 _n._ 2

Batchelor, Rev. J., 261

Baton of Sinope, 350

Battas or Bataks of Sumatra, 34;
their belief in demons, 87 _sq._;
their use of human scapegoats, 213

Battle, annual, among boys in Tumleo, 143

Bavaria, mode of reckoning the Twelve Days in, 327

——, Rhenish, 56

Bavarian cure for fever, 49

Bawenda, the, 30 _n._ 2

Bean, the King of the, 313 _sqq._;
the Queen of the, 313, 315

—— clan, the, 27

Beans thrown about the house at the expulsion of demons, 143 _sq._;
thrown about the house at the expulsion of ghosts, 155

“Beardless One, the Ride of the,” 402 _sq._

Beating as a mode of purification, 262

—— human scapegoats, 196, 252, 255, 256 _sq._, 272 _sq._

—— people as a mode of conveying good qualities, 262 _sqq._;
with skins of sacrificial victims, 265;
with green boughs, 270 _sqq._

—— persons, animals, or things to deliver them from demons and ghosts, 259
_sqq._

Beating the air to drive away demons or ghosts, 109, 111, 115, 122, 131,
152, 156, 234

Beauce and Perche, in France, 57, 62

Beauvais, the Festival of Fools at, 335 _sq._

Bechuana king, cure of, 31 _sq._

Bedriacum, the battle of, 416

Befana at Rome and elsewhere, 167

Behar, 37 _n._ 4

Bekes, in Hungary, mode of fertilizing women in, 264

Bel, a Babylonian deity, 389

Belethus, J., 270 _n._

Belgium, the King of the Bean in, 313

Bella Coola Indians of N. W. America, their masked dances, 376 _n._ 2

Bells on animal used as scapegoat, 37;
rung to expel demons, 117;
rung as a protection against witches, 157, 158, 159, 161, 165, 166;
used in the expulsion of evils, 196, 200;
used at the expulsion of demons, 214, 246 _sq._, 251;
worn by dancers, 242, 243, 246 _sqq._, 250 _sq._;
rung to make grass and flax grow, 247 _sq._;
golden, worn by human representatives of gods in Mexico, 278, 280, 284

Benin, time of the “grand devils” in, 131 _sq._

Bergell in the Grisons, 247

Berkhampstead, cure for ague in, 57 _sq._

Berosus, Babylonian historian, 355, 358, 359

Besisi of the Malay Peninsula, their carnival at rice-harvest, 226 _n._ 1

Bethlehem, the star of, 330

Bevan, Professor A. A., 367 _n._ 2

Beverley minster, the Boy Bishop at, 337

Bhars of India, 190

Bhootan, cairns in, 26

Bhotiyas of Juhar, their use of a scapegoat, 209

Biajas of Borneo, their expulsion of evils, 200

Biggar, “Burning out the Old Year” at, 165

Bikol, in Luzon, 260

Bilaspur, 44

Bilda in Algeria, 60

Birch, sprigs of, a protection against witches, 162;
used to beat people with at Easter and Christmas, 269, 270

—— -trees in popular cure for gout, 56 _sq._

Bird-chief of the Sea Dyaks, 383, 384

Birds as scapegoats, 35 _sq._, 51 _sq._

Bishop, the Boy, on Holy Innocents’ Day, 336 _sqq._

—— of Innocents, 333

Bishop, Mrs., quoted, 99 _sq._

Bismarck Archipelago, the Melanesians of the, their belief in demons, 83

Bithynia and Pontus, rapid spread of Christianity in, 420 _sq._

Biyars of N. W. India, 230 _n._ 7

Black animals as scapegoats, 190, 192, 193

—— god and white god among the Slavs, 92

Black and white in relation to human scapegoats, 220, 253, 257, 272

—— Mountains in S. France, 166

Blankenheim in the Eifel, the King of the Bean at, 313

Blood, fatigue let out with, 12;
of children used to knead a paste, 129;
of pigs used in purificatory rites, 262;
drawn from ears as penance, 292

Bloodless altars, 307

Blows to drive away ghosts, 260 _sqq._

Boars, evil spirits transferred to, 31

Boas, Franz, quoted, 375 _sq._

Bocage of Normandy, games of ball in the, 183 _sq._;
mode of forecasting the weather in, 323;
Eve of Twelfth Night in the, 316 _sq._

Bock, C., quoted, 97

Bogle, George, envoy to Tibet, 203

Bohemia, “Easter Smacks” in, 268, 269;
the Three Kings of Twelfth Day in, 330

——, the Germans of Western, their custom at Christmas, 270;
Twelfth Day among, 331

Bohemian cures for fever, 49, 51, 55 _sq._, 58, 59, 63;
remedy for jaundice, 52

Böhmerwald Mountains, 159

Bolang Mongondo in Celebes, 85 _sq._, 121 _n._ 3

Bolbe in Macedonia, lake of, 142 _n._ 1

Bolivia, 9;
Indians of, 26, 193

Boloki, the, of the Upper Congo, their fear of demons, 76 _sq._

Bonfires, leaping over, 156;
on the Eve of Twelfth Day, 316 _sqq._

_Book of the Dead_, the Egyptian, 103

Borneo, the Dyaks of, 14, 383;
belief in demons in, 87;
the Kayans of, 154 _n._, 236, 382 _sq._;
sickness expelled in a ship from, 187;
the Biajas and Dusuns of, 200

Bourlet, A., quoted, 97 _sqq._

Boy Bishop on Holy Innocents’ Day, 336 _sqq._

Brahmanism, vestiges of, under Mohammedanism, 90 _n._ 1

Brahmans, sacrificial custom of the, 25;
as human scapegoats, 42 _sq._, 44 _sq._;
their theory of sacrifice, 410 _sq._

Branches, fatigue transferred to, 8;
sickness transferred to, 186

Brandenburg, Mark of, cure for headache and giddiness in, 52, 53;
cure for toothache in, 60

Bras Basah, a village on the Perak river, 199

Brass instrument sounded to frighten away demons, 147

Brazil, Indians of North-Western, 236;
custom of, 264;
their masked dances, 381

Breadalbane, use of a scapegoat in, 209

“Brethren of the Ploughed Fields,” 232

Bride, the last, privilege of, 183

Brittany, custom of sticking pins into a saint’s image in, 70;
riddles in, 121 _sq._, _n._;
forecasting the weather in, 323 _sq._

Brooms used to sweep misfortune out of house, 5

Broomsticks, witches ride on, 162

Brown, Dr. George, quoted, 142 _n._ 1

Bruguière, Mgr., quoted, 97, 150 _sq._

Brunnen, Twelfth Night at, 165

Buchanan, Francis, quoted, 175 _sq._

Buckthorn chewed to keep off ghosts, 153;
as a charm against witchcraft, 153 _n._ 1, 163;
used to beat cattle, 266

Buddha, transmigrations of, 41;
in relation to spirits, 97;
offerings to, 150

Buddhism in Burma, 95 _sq._;
the pope of, 223

Buddhist Lent, the, 349 _sq._

—— monk, ceremony at the funeral of a, 175

—— priests expel demons, 116

Buddhists of Ceylon, 90 _n._ 1;
nominal, 97

Budge, E. A. Wallis, quoted, 103 _sq._

Buffalo calf, sins of dead transferred to a, 36 _sq._

—— dance to ensure a supply of buffaloes, 171

Buffaloes as scapegoats, 190, 191

Buffooneries at the Festival of Fools, 335 _sq._

Bukaua, the, of German New Guinea, their belief in demons, 83 _sq._

Bulgarian cure for fever, 55

Bulgarians, their way of keeping off ghosts, 153 _n._ 1

Bulls as scapegoats in ancient Egypt, 216 _sq._

Bunyoro, in Central Africa, 195

Burial of infants, 45

Burkitt, Professor F. C., 420 _n._ 1

Burlesques of ecclesiastical ritual, 336 _sq._

Burma, belief in demons in, 95 _sq._;
expulsion of demons in, 116 _sq._;
the tug-of-war in, 175 _sq._

Burmese Lent, 349 _sq._

“Burning the Old Year,” 230 _n._ 7;
at Biggar, 165

—— of Sandan and Hercules, 388 _sqq._

—— witches alive, 19, 319;
on May Day in the Tyrol, 158 _sq._;
on Walpurgis Night in Bohemia;
161, in Silesia and Saxony, 163

Buru, demons of sickness expelled in a proa from, 186

Burying the evil spirit, 110

Bushes, ailments transferred to, 54, 56

Bushmen, the, 16, 30

Butterflies, annual expulsion of, 159 _n._ 1

Butterfly dance, 381

Caffres of South Africa, 11, 30, 31

Cairns to which every passer-by adds a stone, 9 _sqq._;
near shrines of saints, 21;
offerings at, 26 _sqq._
_See also_ Heaps

Cairo, cure for toothache and headache at, 63

Cake on Twelfth Night used to determine the King, 313 _sqq._;
put on horn of ox, 318 _sq._;
offered to Cronus, 351

Cakes, special, at New Year, 149 _sq._;
with twelve knobs offered to gods, 351 _n._ 3

Calabar, Old, biennial expulsion of demons at, 203 _sq._

—— River, 28

Calabria, annual expulsion of witches in, 157

Calendar of the Mayas of Yucatan, 171;
of the primitive Aryans, 325;
of the Celts of Gaul, 342 _sqq._;
the Coligny, 342 _sqq._;
the Alexandrian, 395 _n._ 1;
the Babylonian, 398 _n._ 2

Calicut, ceremonies at sowing in, 235

California, the Pomos of, 170 _sq._

Cambodia, annual expulsion of demons in, 149;
palace of the Kings of Cambodia purged of devils, 172

Cambridge, Lord of Misrule at, 330

Camel, plague transferred to, 33

Camels infested by jinn, 260

Cameroons, the, of West Africa, 120

Candlemas, dances at, 238

—— Day, 332, 333

Candles, twelve, on Twelfth Night, 321 _sq._;
burnt at the Feast of Purim, 394

Cannibal banquets, 279 _n._ 1, 283, 298

Canton, the province of, 144

Caprification, the artificial fertilization of fig-trees, 257

_Caprificus_, the wild fig-tree, 258

Car Nicobar, annual expulsion of devils in, 201 _sq._

Carabas and Barabbas, 418 _sq._

Carmona in Andalusia, 173

Carnival, bell-ringing processions at the, 247;
Senseless Thursday in, 248;
in relation to the Saturnalia, 312, 345 _sqq._

—— and Purim, 394

“Carrying out Death,” 227 _sq._, 230, 252

Casablanca in Morocco, 21

Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, the Three Kings of Twelfth Day, 329
_sqq._

Castilian peasants, their dances in May, 280

Casting the skin supposed to be a mode of renewing youth, 302 _sqq._

Cattle exposed to attacks of witches, 162;
beaten to do them good, 266 _sq._

Caucasus, the Albanians of the, 218

Caunians of Asia Minor, their expulsion of foreign gods, 116

Cecrops, first king of Attica, 351

Cedar-bark ornaments worn in dances, 376

Celebes, Bolang Mongondo in, 85, 121;
Minahassa in, 111 _sq._

——, Central, 34, 122 _n._, 265

Celts, their mode of forecasting the weather of the year, 323 _sq._;
of Gaul, their calendar, 342 _sqq._

Ceram, sicknesses expelled in a ship from, 185

Ceylon, fear of demons in, 94 _sq._

Chaeronea, the “expulsion of hunger” at, 252

Chain used to expel demons, 260

Chains clanked as a protection against witches, 163;
clanked in masquerade, 244

Chaldeans, magic of, 64

Chalking up crosses as a protection against witches, 162 _sq._

Chamar caste, 196

Chamba in India, 45

Chambers, E. K., quoted, 336 _n._ 1

Chameleon, ceremony at killing a, 28

Chariots, epidemics sent away in toy, 193 _sq._

Cheremiss of Russia, their expulsion of Satan, 156

Cherokee Indians, annual expulsion of evils among the, 128

Cheshire, cure for thrush in, 50;
cure for warts in, 57

Chickens as scapegoats, 190

Chicomecohuatl, Mexican goddess of maize, 286 _n._ 1, 291, 292;
girl annually sacrificed in the character of, 292 _sqq._

Childermas (Holy Innocents’ Day), 336

Children personating spirits, 139

China, the Miotse of, 4;
belief in demons in, 98;
men possessed by spirits in, 117;
the Mossos of, 139;
the Shans of Southern, 141;
annual expulsion of demons in, 145 _sqq._

——, aboriginal tribes of, their use of a human scapegoat, 196;
their annual destruction of evils, 202

Chinese festival of new fire, 359

Chins of Burma, their way of keeping off cholera, 123

_Chirouba_, festival in Manapur, 40

Chirus of Assam, 177 _n._ 3

Chitral, devil-driving in, 137

Chittagong, 63 _n._ 4

—— Hill Tracts, the Chukmas of the, 174

Choerilus, historian, 388 _n._ 1

Cholera sent away in animal scapegoats, 190, 191 _sq._

——, demon of, 172;
expelled, 116, 117;
sent away on a raft, 190

——, goddess of, 194

Cholula, a city of Mexico, 281

Chota Nagpur in India, 19;
annual expulsion of disease in, 139

Christ, the crucifixion of, 412 _sqq._

Christian festivals, the great, timed by the Church to coincide with old
pagan festivals, 328

Christianity, Latin, its tolerance of rustic paganism, 346

Christmas, custom of young men and women beating each other at, 270;
an old midwinter festival of the sun-god, 328

—— Day, Mexican festival on, 287;
Old (Twelfth Night), 321

—— Eve, witches active on, 160

Chukmas, the tug-of-war among the, 174

Church bells a protection against witchcraft, 157, 158

Churn-dashers ridden by witches, 160

Chwolsohn, D., on the worship of Haman, 366 _n._ 1

Ciallos, intercalary month of Gallic calendar, 343

Cilicia, Tarsus in, 388, 389, 391

Cingalese, the tug-of-war among the, 181;
devil-dancers, 38

Cinteotl or Centeotl, Mexican goddess of maize, 286 _n._ 1, 290

Circumcision Day, 334

Clangour of metal used to dispel demons, 233

Clanking chains as a protection against witches, 163

Clark, J. V. H., 209

Clarke, E. D., quoted, 20 _sq._

Clashing of metal instruments a protection against witchcraft, 158;
used to dispel demons, 233

Clavigero, historian of Mexico, 286 _n._ 1

Clippings of nails in popular cures, 57, 58

Clowns in processions, 244 _sq._

Cochinchina, mode of disposing of ghosts in, 62

Cock, disease transferred to a white, 187;
white, as scapegoat, 210 _n._ 4

Cocks as scapegoats, 191 _sq._

Coligny calendar of Gaul, 342 _sqq._

Columella on caprification, 258

Comana, sacred harlots at, 370 _n._ 1;
worship of Ma at, 421 _n._ 1

Comitium, dances of the Salii in the, 232

Communion by means of stones, 21 _sq._

Concubines of a king taken by his successor, 368

Condé in Normandy, 183

Confession of sins, 31, 36, 127

Conflicts, annual, at the New Year, old intention of, 184

Congrégation de Notre Dame at Paris, 337

Consumption, cure for, 51

Cook, A. B., 246 _n._ 2

Cook, Captain James, 80

Cootchie, a demon, 110

Cora Indians of Mexico, their dance at sowing, 238;
their dramatic dances, 381

Coran, the, 62

Corea, 11, 27;
traps for demons in, 61 _sq._;
belief in demons in, 99 _sq._;
spirit of disease expelled in, 119;
annual expulsion of demons in, 147;
the tug-of-war in, 177 _sq._

Coreans, their annual ceremonies for the riddance of evils, 202 _sq._

Corn festivals of the Cora Indians, 381

—— -ears, wreath of, as badge of priestly office, 232

—— -sieve beaten at ceremony, 145

Cornel-tree in popular remedy, 55

Cornouaille in Brittany, 323

“Corpse-praying priest,” 45

Corpses devoured by members of Secret Societies, 377

Cos, custom of Greek peasants in, 266

Cosmogonies, primitive, perhaps influenced by human sacrifices, 409 _sqq._

Cosquin, E., on the book of Esther, 367 _n._ 3

Coughs transferred to animals, 51, 52

Couppé, Mgr., quoted, 82

Crabs change their skin, 303

Crackers ignited to expel demons, 117, 146 _sq._

Creation of the world, legends of, influenced by human sacrifices, 409
_sqq._

Creator beheaded, 410;
sacrifices himself daily to create the world afresh, 411

Creeping through an arch as a cure, 55

Cretan festival of Hermes, 350

Crimes, sticks or stones piled on the scene of, 13 _sqq._

Criminals sacrificed, 354, 396 _sq._, 408

Croatia, Good Friday custom in, 268

Croesus on the pyre, 391

Cronia, a Greek festival resembling the Saturnalia, 351;
at Olympia, 352 _sq._

Cronion, a Greek month, 351 _n._ 2

Cronus and the Cronia, 351 _sq._;
and the Golden Age, 353;
and human sacrifice, 353 _sq._, 397

Cross-roads, 6, 7, 10, 24;
offerings at, 140;
ceremonies at, 144, 159, 161, 196;
witches at, 162

Crosses painted with tar as charms against ghosts and vampyres, 153 _n._
1;
chalked on doors as protection against witchcraft, 160, 162 _sq._;
white, made by the King of the Bean, 314

Crow as scapegoat, 193

Crucifixion of Christ, 412 _sqq._

Cumont, Franz, 309, 393 _n._ 1

Cuzco, its scenery, 128 _sq._

Cybele and Attis, 386

Cyrus and Croesus, 391

Dahomey, Porto Novo in, 205

Dalton, E. T., quoted, 92 _sq._

Dance at cairns, 29;
the buffalo dance to ensure a supply of buffaloes, 171;
to cause the grass to grow, 238

Dancers personate spirits, 375

Dances of the witches, 162;
of the Salii, 232;
to promote the growth of the crops, 232 _sqq._, 347;
at sowing, 234 _sqq._;
taught by animals, 237;
for rain, 236 _sq._, 238;
solemn Mexican, 280, 284, 286, 287, 288, 289;
of Castilian peasants in May, 280;
of salt-makers in Mexico, 284;
to make hemp grow tall, 315;
as dramatic performances of myths, 375 _sqq._;
bestowed on men by spirits, 375;
in imitation of animals, 376, 377, 381, 382

Dances, masked, to promote fertility, 236;
of savages, 374 _sqq._;
to ensure good crops, 382

Dancing to obtain the favour of the gods, 236

Dandaki, King, 41

“Dark” moon and “light” moon, 140, 141 _n._ 1

Darwin, Sir Francis, 153 _n._ 1

Dasius, martyrdom of St., 308 _sqq._

Dassera festival in Nepaul, 226 _n._ 1

Date palm, artificial fertilization of the, 272 _sq._

Davies, T. Witton, 360 _n._ 2

Dead, disembodied souls of the, dreaded, 77;
worship of the, 97;
ghosts of the, periodically expelled, 123 _sq._;
souls of the, received by their relations once a year, 150 _sqq._

——, spirits of the, in the Philippine Islands, 82;
in Timor, 85

Death, the funeral of, 205;
the ceremony of carrying out, 227 _sq._, 230, 252;
savage tales of the origin of, 302 _sqq._

Debang monastery at Lhasa, 218

December, annual expulsion of demons in, 145;
custom of the heathen of Harran in, 263 _sq._;
the Saturnalia held in, 306, 307, 345

Decle, L., 11 _n._ 1

De Goeje, M. J., 24 _n._ 1

Deified men, sacrifices of, 409

Delaware Indians, their remedies for sins, 263

Demonophobia in India, 91

Demon-worship, 94, 96.
_See also_ Propitiation

Demons bunged up, 61 _sq._;
omnipresence of, 72 _sqq._;
propitiation of, 93, 94, 96, 100;
religious purification intended to ward off, 104;
cause sickness, failure of crops, etc., 109 _sqq._;
of cholera, 116, 117, 123;
men disguised as, 170 _sq._, 172, 173;
decoyed by a pig, 200, 201;
conjured into images, 171, 172, 173, 203, 204, 205;
put to flight by clangour of metal, 233;
banned by masks, 246;
exorcised by bells, 246 _sq._, 251.
_See also_ Devil _and_ Devils

De Mortival, Roger, 338

Derceto, the fish goddess of Ascalon, 370 _n._ 1

De Ricci, S., 343 _n._

Deslawen, village of Bohemia, 161

Devil driven away by paper kites, 4

Devil-driving in Chitral, 137

Devil’s Neck, the, 16, 30

Devils personated by men, 235.
_See_ Demons

Devonshire, cure for cough in, 51

Dharmi or Dharmesh, the Supreme God of the Oraons, 92 _sq._

Dice used in divination, 220;
played at festivals, 350

Dieri tribe of Central Australia, their expulsion of a demon, 110

Dinkas, their use of cows as scapegoats, 193

Dio Chrysostom on the Sacaea, 368;
his account of the treatment of the mock king of the Sacaea, 414

Dionysiac festival of the opening of the wine jars, 351 _sq._

Dionysus and the drama, 384

Disease transferred to other people, 6 _sq._;
transferred to tree, 7;
caused by ghosts, 85;
annual expulsion of, 139;
sent away in little ships, 185 _sqq._

Dittmar, C. von, quoted, 100 _sq._

Divination on Twelfth Night, 316

Divine animals as scapegoats, 216 _sq._, 226 _sq._

—— men as scapegoats, 217 _sqq._, 226 _sq._

Dog, sickness transferred to, 33;
as scapegoat, 51, 208 _sq._;
sacrifice of white, 127

Dog-demon of epilepsy, 69 _n._

Doreh in Dutch New Guinea, the tug-of-war at, 178

Doubs, Montagne de, 316

Douglas, Alexander, victim of witchcraft, 39

Doutté, E., 22 _n._ 2

Doves of Astarte, the sacred, 370 _n._ 1