Chapter V: Appendix (3)

“When a woman takes a husband,” says a historian of the first missionary work in Otaheite, “she immediately provides herself with a shark’s tooth, which is fixed, with the bread-fruit gum, on an instrument that leaves about a quarter of an inch of the tooth bare, for the purpose of wounding the head, like a lancet. Some of these have two or three teeth, and struck forcibly they bring blood in copious streams; _according to the love they bear the party_, and the violence of their grief, _the strokes are repeated on the head_; and this has been known to bring on fever, and terminate in madness. If any accident happen to the husband, [to] his relations, or friends, or their child, the shark’s tooth goes to work; and even if the child only fall down and hurt itself, the blood and tears mingle together.... They have a very similar way of expressing their joy as well as sorrow; for whether a relation dies, or a dear friend returns from a journey, the shark’s tooth instrument ... is again employed, and the blood streams down.... When a person of eminence dies ... the relatives and friends ... repeat before it [the corpse] some of the tender scenes which happened during their life time, and wiping the blood which the shark’s teeth has drawn, deposit the cloth on the tupapow as the proof of their affection.”[174]

In illustration of this custom, the same writer says, in the course of his narrative: “When we had got within a short mile of the Isthmus, in passing a few houses, an aged woman, mother to the young man who carried my linen, met us, and to express her joy at seeing her son, struck herself several times on the head with a shark’s tooth, till the blood flowed plentifully down her breast and shoulders, whilst the son beheld it with entire insensibility [He saw in it only the common proof of his mother’s devoted love].... The son seeing that I was not pleased with what was done, observed coolly, that it was the custom of Otaheite.”[175]

This custom is again referred to by Mr. Ellis, as observed by him in the Georgian and the Society Islands, a generation later than the authority above cited. He speaks of the shark’s tooth blood-letter, as employed by men, as well as by women; although more commonly by the latter. He adds another illustration of the truth, that it is _the blood itself_, and not any suffering caused by its flowing, that is counted the proof of affection; by its representing the outpoured life, in pledge of covenant fidelity.

Describing the scenes of blood-giving grief, over the dead bodies of the mourned loved ones, he says: “The females on these occasions sometimes put on a kind of short apron, of a particular sort of cloth; which they held up with one hand, while they cut themselves with the other. In this apron they caught the blood that flowed from these grief-inflicted wounds, until it [the apron] was almost saturated. It was then dried in the sun, and given to the nearest surviving relatives, as a proof of the affection of the donor, and was preserved by the bereaved family as a token of the estimation in which the departed had been held.”[176] There is even more of vividness in this memorial, than in that suggested by the Psalmist, when he says:

“Put thou my tears into thy bottle.”[177]

There would seem to be a suggestion of this same idea in one of Grimm’s folk-lore fairy tales of the North. A queen’s daughter is going away from her home, attended by a single servant. Her loving mother would fain watch and guard her in her absence. Accordingly, “as soon as the hour of departure had arrived, the mother took her daughter into a chamber, and there, with a knife, she cut her [own] finger with it, so that it bled. Then, she held her napkin beneath, and let three drops of blood fall into it; which she gave to her daughter, saying: ‘Dear child, preserve this well, and it will help you out of trouble.’”[178] That blood represented the mother’s very life. It was accustomed to speak out in words of counsel and warning to the daughter. But by and by the napkin which held it was lost, and then the power of the young princess over her mother’s servant was gone, and the poor princess was alone in the wide world, at the mercy of strangers.

Acting on the symbolism of this covenanting with another by the loving proffer of one’s blood, men have reached out toward God, or toward the gods, in desire for a covenant of union, and in expression of fidelity of devotedness, by the giving of their blood God-ward. This, also, has been in the East and in the West, in ancient days and until to-day.

There was a gleam of this, in the Canaanitish worship of Baal, in the contest between his priests and the prophet Elijah, before King Ahab, at Mount Carmel. First, those priests shed the blood of the substitute bullock, at the altar of their god, and “called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal hear us! But there was no voice, nor any that answered.” Then they grew more earnest in their supplications, and more demonstrative in their proofs of devotedness. “They leaped [or, limped] about the altar which was made.... And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lances, till the blood gushed out upon them.”[179] Similar methods of showing love for God are in vogue among the natives of Armenia, to-day. Describing a scene of worship by religious devotees in that region, Dr. Van Lennep says: “One of them cuts his forehead with a sword, so that ‘the blood gushes out.’ He wears a sheet in front, to protect his clothes, and his face is covered with clots of blood.”[180] Clearly, in this case, as in many others elsewhere, it is not as a means of self-torture, but as a proof of self-devotedness, that the blood is poured out--the life is proffered--by the devotee, toward God.

Among the primitive peoples of North and of South America, it was the custom of priests and people, to draw blood from their own bodies, from their tongues, their ears, their noses, their limbs and members, when they went into their temples to worship, and to anoint with that blood the images of their gods.[181] The thorns of the maguey--a species of aloe--were, in many regions, kept ready at places of sacrifice, for convenient use in this covenant blood-letting.[182] A careful student of these early American customs has said of the obvious purpose of this yielding of one’s blood in worship, that it “might be regarded as an act of individual devotion, a gift made to the gods by the worshiper himself, out of his own very substance [of his very life, as in the blood-covenant].... The priests in particular owed it to their special character [in their covenant relation to the divinities], to draw their blood for the benefit of the gods [in renewed pledge to the gods]; and nothing could be stranger than the refined methods they adopted to accomplish this end. For instance, they would pass strings or splinters through their lips or ears, and so draw a little blood. But then a fresh string, or a fresh splinter, must be added every day, and so it might go on indefinitely; for the more there were, the more meritorious was the act;”[183] precisely as is the standard of love-showing by blood-letting among Turkish lovers and Otaheitan wives and mothers, in modern times.

A similar giving of blood, in proof of devotedness, and in outreaching for inter-communion with the gods through blood, is reported in India, in recent times. Bishop Caldwell, of Madras, referred to it, a generation ago, in his description of the “Devil Dance” among the Tinnevelly Shawars.[184] The devotee, in this dance, “cuts and lacerates himself till the blood flows, lashes himself with a huge whip, presses a burning torch to his breast, drinks the blood which flows from his own wounds, or drains the blood of the sacrifice; putting the throat of a decapitated goat to his mouth.” Hereby he has given of his own blood to the gods, or to the devils, and has drunk of the substitute blood of the divinities--in the consecrated sacrifice; as if in consummation of the blood-covenant with the supernal powers. “Then as if he had acquired new life [through inter-union with the object of his worship], he begins to brandish his staff of bells, and to dance with a quick but wild unsteady step. Suddenly the afflatus descends; there is no mistaking that glare or those frantic leaps. He snorts, he swears, he gyrates. The demon has now taken bodily possession of him. [The twain are one. The two natures are intermingled].... The devil-dancer is now worshiped as a present deity, and every bystander consults him respecting his diseases, his wants, the welfare of his absent relations, the offerings to be made for the accomplishments of his wishes, and in short everything for which superhuman knowledge is supposed to be available.” In this instance, the _mutual_ covenant is represented; the devotee both giving and receiving blood, as a means of union.

On this idea of giving one’s self to another, by giving of one’s blood, it is, that the popular tradition was based, that witches and sorcerers covenanted with Satan by signing a compact in their own blood. And again it was in recognition of the idea that two natures were inter-united in such a covenant, that the compact was sometimes said to be signed in Satan’s blood.

Among the many women charged with witchcraft in England, by the famous Matthew Hopkins, the “witch-finder” in the middle of the Seventeenth century, was one, at Yarmouth, of whom it is reported, that her first temptation came to her when she went home from her place of employment, discouraged and exasperated by her trials. “That night when she was in bed, she heard a knock at the door, and going to her window, she saw (it being moonlight) a tall black man there: and asked what he would have? He told her that she was discontented, because she could not get work; and that he would put her into a way that she should never want anything. On this she let him in, and asked him what he had to say to her. He told her he must first see her hand; and taking out something like a penknife, he gave it a little scratch, so that a little blood followed; a scar being still visible when she told the story. Then he took some of the blood in a pen, and pulling a book out of his pocket, bid her write her name; and when she said she could not, he said he would guide her hand. When this was done, he bid her now ask what she would have.”[185] In signing with her own blood, she had pledged her very life to the “tall black man.”

Cotton Mather, in his “Wonders of the Invisible World,” cites a Swedish trial for witchcraft, where the possessed children, who were witnesses, said that the witches, at the trysting-place where they were observed, were compelled “to give themselves unto the devil, and vow that they would serve him. Hereupon they cut their fingers, and with blood writ their names in his book.” In some cases “the mark of the cut finger was [still] to be found.” Moreover the devil gave meat and drink both to the witches and to the children they brought with them. Again, Mather cites the testimony of a witness who had been invited to covenant with the Devil, by signing the Devil’s book. “Once, with the book, there was a pen offered him, and an inkhorn with liquor in it that looked like blood.”[186] Another New England writer on witchcraft says that “the witch as a slave binds herself by vow, to believe in the Devil, and to give him either body or soul, or both, under his handwriting, or some part of _his_ blood.”[187]

It is, evidently, on this popular tradition, that Goethe’s Faust covenants in blood with Mephistopheles.

MEPHISTOPHELES.

“But one thing!--accidents may happen; hence
A line or two in writing grant, I pray.”

FAUST.

. . . . . . . . . .
“Spirit of evil! what dost thou require?
Brass, marble, parchment, paper, dost desire?
Shall I with chisel, pen, or graver, write?
Thy choice is free; to me ’tis all the same.”

MEPHISTOPHELES.

. . . . . . . . . .
“A scrap is for our compact good.
Thou under-signest merely with a drop of blood.”
. . . . . . . . . .
“Blood is a juice of very special kind.”[188]

Even “within modern memory in Europe,” there have been traces of the primitive rite of covenanting with God by the proffer of one’s blood. In the Russian province of Esthonia, he who would observe this rite, “had to draw drops of blood from his fore finger,” and at the same time to pledge himself in solemn covenant with God. “I name thee [I invoke thee] with my blood, and [I] betroth thee [I entrust myself to thee] with my blood,”--was the form of his covenanting. Then he who had given of his blood in self-surrendering devotedness, made his confident supplications to God with whom he had thus covenanted; and his prayer in behalf of all his possessions was: “Let them be blessed through my blood and thy might.”[189]

Thus, in ancient Egypt, in ancient Canaan, in ancient Mexico, in modern Turkey, in modern Russia, in modern India, and in modern Otaheite; in Africa, in Asia, in America, in Europe, and in Oceanica: Blood-giving was life-giving. Life-giving was love-showing. Love-showing was a heart-yearning after union in love and in life and in blood and in very being. That was the primitive thought in the primitive religions of all the world.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Of the possibility of a covenant between those of different religions, Lane says (_Arab.-Eng. Lexicon_, s. v. _’Ahd_): “Hence عهد ذو (_dho ’ahd_) an appellation given to a Christian and a Jew (and a Sabean, who is a subject of a Muslim government) meaning one between whom and the Muslims a compact, or covenant exists, whereby the latter are responsible for his security and freedom and toleration as long as he lives agreeably to the compact.” And the Blood Covenant is more sacred and more binding than any other compact.

[2] Prov. 18 : 24.

[3] John 15 : 13.

[4] See Lane’s _Lex._ s. v. “Hejâb.”

[5] Eccl. 4 : 9, 10.

[6] See Freytag, and Catafago, s. v.

[7] See “Brothers of the Covenant,” p. 6, _supra_.

[8] _Sprachliches aus den Zeltlagern der syrischen Wüste_, p. 37.

[9] See Redhouse’s Turkish and English Dictionary, s. vv. _sood_ and _soot_.

[10] See Lane, and Freytag, s. vv. _rada’a_, and _thady_.

[11] See reference to Ibn Hishâm, 125, in Prof. W. Robertson Smith’s _Old Test. in Jewish Church_, Notes to Lect. XII. See, also, p. 59, _infra_.

[12] See Lane, and Freytag, s. v. _sahama_; also Smith’s _Old Test. in Jewish Church_, Notes to Lect. XII.

[13] See Livingstone’s _Travels and Res. in So. Africa_, pp. 290-296.

[14] _Ibid._, p. 525.

[15] See Livingstone’s _Travels and Res. in So. Africa_, p. 324 f.

[16] See Livingstone’s _Travels and Res. in So. Africa_, p. 526.

[17] _Ibid._, p. 213.

[18] Cameron’s _Across Africa_, I., 333.

[19] _Ibid._, I., 333 f.

[20] _Across Africa_, I., 369.

[21] See page 9, _supra_.

[22] _Through the Dark Continent_, I., 107, 130 f.

[23] _Ibid._, I., 492.

[24] _Ibid._, I., 52, 492.

[25] _How I found Livingstone_, pp. 267-304.

[26] _Thro. Dark Cont._, I., 489 f.

[27] _Ibid._, I., 130.

[28] _Ibid._, I., 487-492.

[29] _Thro. Dark Cont._, I., 493.

[30] _Ibid._, I., 493 f.

[31] _Thro. Dark Cont._, I., 123.

[32] _Ibid._, I., 227-237.

[33] _Thro. Dark Cont._, I., 268.

[34] _Ibid._, II., 144-146.

[35] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 177 f.

[36] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 188.

[37] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 305 f.

[38] _Ibid._, II., 315.

[39] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 330-332.

[40] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 402-408.

[41] _The Congo_, I., 304-312.

[42] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 281-283.

[43] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 286.

[44] See pages 26-28, _supra_.

[45] “Bula Matari,” or “Rock Breaker,” or Road Maker, was a name given to Stanley by the natives.

[46] _The Congo_, I., 383-385.

[47] See page 7 f., _supra_.

[48] _The Congo_, II., 21-24.

[49] _Ibid._, II., 38.

[50] _The Congo_, II., 48.

[51] _Ibid._, II., 68.

[52] _Ibid._, II., 79.

[53] _Ibid._, II., 109.

[54] _Ibid._, II., 118.

[55] _Ibid._, II., 132.

[56] _Ibid._, II., 171.

[57] _Ibid._, II., 177.

[58] _Thro. Dark Cont._, II., 297-302.

[59] _The Congo_, II., 79-90.

[60] _Ibid._, II., 104 f.

[61] Aristotle’s _Ethics_, IX., 8, 3. This is not made as an original statement, by Aristotle, but as the citation of one of the well-known “proverbs” of friendship.

[62] See _Nouveau Dictionnaire de Médecine et de Chirurgie Pratiques_, (ed. 1884) s. v. “Transfusion.”

[63] See Appendix, _infra_.

[64] See Carlyle’s _Heroes and Hero-Worship_, Lect. I.; also Anderson’s _Norse Mythology_, pp. 215-220, 371-374.

[65] See Anderson’s _Norse Mythol._, pp. 372, 408 f.

[66] See Wilkinson’s _Ancient Egyptians_, III., 142; Renouf’s _The Religion of Ancient Egypt_, p. 118 f.; Ebers’s _Picturesque Egypt_, I., 100 f.

[67] See De Wette’s _Biblische Dogmatik_, § 79.

[68] See Carlyle’s _Hero Worship_, Lect. I.

[69] Odin “is the author of war.” He is called “Valfather (Father of the slain), because he chooses for his sons all who fall in combat.” Anderson’s _Norse Mythol._, p. 215 f.

[70] Mills’s _History of Chivalry_, chap. IV.

[71] Rom. 6 : 4-6; Col. 2 : 12.

[72] Anderson’s _Viking Tales of the North_, p. 59.

[73] _Ibid._, p. 191 f.

[74] Apparently these articles form a “heap of witness,” or are the aggregated symbolic witnesses of the transaction; as something answering to this usage is found in connection with the rite in various parts of the world.

[75] He who would be true in friendship must be true in all things. The good friend is a good citizen. See 1 Peter 2 : 17.

[76] See Job 3 : 2-9.

[77] Here is the idea of an absolute inter-merging of natures, by this rite.

[78] See Matt. 13 : 12; 25 : 29.

[79] Here is an indication of the witness-bearing nature of these accessories of the rite.

[80] Compare these blessings and cursings with those under the Mosaic laws: Deut. 27 : 9-26; 28 : 1-68.

[81] See Matt. 6 : 31, 32.

[82] “This is a natural, simple, and beautiful allusion in common use among the Malagasy, to denote an inseparable association. The rice is planted in water, grows in water, is boiled in water, and water is the universal beverage taken with it when eaten.”

[83] Ellis’s _Hist. of Madagascar_, I., 187-190.

[84] Cited in Ellis’s _Hist. of Mad._, I., 191, note.

[85] St. John’s _Life in the Forests of the Far East_, I., 116 f.

[86] In “The Century Magazine” for July, 1885, p. 437.

[87] Forbes’s _A Naturalist’s Wanderings in the Eastern Archipelago_, p. 452.

[88] Peter Martyr’s _De Rebus Oceanicis et Novo Orbe_, p. 338; cited in Spencer’s _Des. Soc._, II., 34.

[89] See Bancroft’s _Native Races of the Pacific Coast_, I., 741.

[90] See page 10, _supra_.

[91] Southey’s _Brazil_, I., 240.

[92] Lynd’s _History of the Dakotas_, p. 73, note.

[93] Burton’s _City of the Saints_, p. 117.

[94] See page 54, _supra_.

[95] _Miss. Voyage to So. Pacif. Ocean_, p. 360 f.

[96] See page 10, _supra_.

[97] See page 54, _supra_.

[98] See page 55 f., _supra_.

[99] _Opera_, p. 545.

[100] _Toxaris_, chap. 37.

[101] See references to arms as accessories to the rite, in Africa, and in Madagascar, and in Timor, at pages 16, 32, 35 f., 45 f., 53, _supra_.

[102] _Annales_, XII., 47.

[103] See page 11, _supra_.

[104] _Arcanum_; literally “mysterious,”--not in the sense of secret, or occult, but with reference to its sacred and supernatural origin and sanction.

[105] See p. 9, _supra_.

[106] _Catilina_, cap. XXII.

[107] _Historiæ_, IV., 1, 4.

[108] _Apologet._, cap. IX.

[109] See stamp on outside cover.

[110] _Hist._, IV., 70.

[111] See note (footnote 101), at page 59, _supra_.

[112] See the references to imprecatory invokings, in connection with the observance of the rite in Syria, in Central Africa, in Madagascar, and in Timor, at pages 9, 20, 31, 46 f., 53, _supra_.

[113] _Hist._, III., 8.

[114] See page 45 _supra_, note (footnote 74).

[115] See references to the welcoming of new friends by the natives of Africa and of Borneo, at the celebration of this rite, at pages 36 f., 51, _supra_.

[116] Sextus Pompeius Festus, whose chief work, in the third or fourth Christian century, was an epitome, with added notes and criticisms, of an unpreserved work of M. Verrius Flaccus, on the Latin language and antiquities.

[117] See Rosenmüller’s _Scholia in Vet. Test._, apud Psa. 16 : 4.

[118] See Scheller’s, and Harpers’, _Latin Dictionary_, s. v. “Assiratum.”

[119] See Curtius’s _Griechische Etymologie_, s. v., ἔαρ (_ear_).

[120] See Gesenius, and Fuerst, _s. vv._

[121] Deut. 12 : 23.

[122] See Lane, and Freytag, _s. vv._

[123] See Delitzsch’s _Assyrische Lesestücke_, The Syllabary, p. 20; and Sayce’s _Assyrian Grammar_, The Syllabary.

[124] See Castellus’s _Lexicon Syriacum_, s. v.

[125] See page 7, _supra_.

[126] Cited from “Tod’s Travels, Journal Indian Archipelago, Vol. V., No. 12,” in Balfour’s _Cycl. of India_, s. v., “Brother.”

[127] See Elliott and Roberts’s _Views in India_, II., 64.

[128] _Ayeen Akbery_, II., 453.

[129] See citation from Wetzstein, at page 9 f., _supra_.

[130] See Anderson’s _Norse Mythol._, p. 149; his _Viking Tales_, pp. 184, 237, 272 f.; Wood’s _Wedding Day in all Ages and Countries_, p. 139.

[131] Lettsom’s _Nibelungen Lied_, pp. 299, 388.

[132] Gen. 41 : 41, 42.

[133] Esther 3 : 10-12; 8 : 2.

[134] Luke 15 : 22.

[135] See Wood’s _Wedding Day_; also Jones’s _Finger Ring Lore_.

[136] Cited in Jones’s _Finger Ring Lore_, p. 289.

[137] See _Ibid._, pp. 87-90.

[138] _Persian- und Ost-Indische Reise_, II., 196.

[139] See pp. 59 f., 62, _supra_.

[140] See Godwyn’s _Romanæ Historiæ_, p. 69; Brewer’s _Dict. of Phrase and Fable_, s. vv. “Ring,” “Ring Finger”; Jones’s _Finger Ring Lore_, p. 275. See also Appendix, _infra_.

[141] Lane’s _Mod. Egypt._, II., 293.

[142] See Bock’s _Head Hunters of Borneo_, p. 221 f.

[143] _Finger Ring Lore_, p. 174.

[144] See page 63 f., _supra_.

[145] See _Finger Ring Lore_, pp. 177-197.

[146] Cited in Jones’s _Credulities Past and Present_, p. 204 f.

[147] See _Appendix_.

[148] See Wilkinson’s _Anc. Egypt._, II., 340-343; Layard’s _Nineveh and its Remains_, II., 250, 358; also 2 Sam. 1 : 10.

[149] _Modern Egyptians_, I., 39.

[150] Frere’s _Old Deccan Days_, pp. 225-245.

[151] Dubois’s _Des. of Man. and Cust. of India_, Part II., chap. 7.

[152] See p. 194, _supra_.

[153] Prov. 4 : 18.

[154] See Lepsius’s _Todtenbuch_; Bunsen’s _Egypt’s Place in Universal History_, V., 125-133; Renouf’s _The Religion of Ancient Egypt_, pp. 179-208.

[155] See Lenormant and Chevallier’s _Ancient History of the East_, I., 308.

[156] Renouf’s _The Religion of Ancient Egypt_, p. 208.

[157] Bunsen’s _Egypt’s Place_, V., 133.

[158] See _Egypt’s Place_, V., 127.

[159] _Ibid._, V., 174 f.

[160] This is the rendering of Birch. Ebers has looked for an explanation of this gloss, in the rite of circumcision (_Ægypten u. d. Bücher Mose’s_, p. 284 f.); but the primary reference to the “arm” of the god, and to the union secured through the interflowing blood, point to the blood-covenant as the employed figure of speech; although circumcision, as will be seen presently, was likewise a symbol of the blood-covenant--for one’s self and for one’s seed. Brugsch also sees a similar meaning, to that suggested by Ebers, in this reference to the blood. His rendering of the original text is: “Reach me your hands. I have become that which ye are” (_Religion u. Mythol. d. alt. Ægypt._, I., 219). Le Page Renouf, looking for the symbolisms of _material_ nature in all these statements, would find here “the crimson of a sunset” in the “blood which flows from the Sun-god Rā, as he hastens to his suicide” (_Trans. of Soc. of Bib. Arch._, Vol. VIII., Part 2, p. 211). This, however, does not conflict with the _spiritual_ symbolism of oneness of nature through oneness of blood. And no one of these last three suggested meanings accounts for the oneness with the gods through blood, which the deceased claims, unless the symbolism of blood-covenanting be recognized in the terminology. That symbolism being recognized, the precise source of the flowing blood becomes a minor matter.

[161] See Wilkinson’s _Anc. Egypt._, III., 473; Renouf’s _Relig. of Anc. Egypt_, pp. 191-193; Lenormant’s _Chaldean Magic_, p. 88.

[162] See _Todtenbuch_, chap. LXVIII.; _Egypt’s Place_, V., 211.

[163] See Pierret’s _Vocabulaire Hiéroglyphique_, p. 721 f.; also, Birch’s “Dict. of Hierog.” in _Egypt’s Place_, V., 519.

[164] See page 65 f., _supra_.

[165] See _Todtenbuch_, chap. CLVI.; _Egypt’s Place_, V., 315; _Trans. of Soc. of Bib. Arch._, VIII., 2, 211.

This amulet is also called _tet_; a word of the same phonetic force as _tet_, the “arm,” or the “bracelet,” but of different letters. This word () seems to have the root-idea of “word;” as if it were applied to the text of the blood-covenant.

The amulet as constructed for the mummy, was stained with the water or liquid of the tree called _ankh am_ (). The amulet itself, according to Brugsch, was also called _ankh merer_ (). But _ankh_ () means either to _live_ (the ordinary meaning), or to _swear_, to _make oath_ (more rarely), and _merer_ () is a reduplicated form of _mer_ () _to love_, _love_, _friendship_. The meaning of _ankh merer_, as applied to the blood-amulet may be, oath, or covenant, or pledge of love or friendship. The word _merer_, in the compound _ankh merer_, is followed with the determinative of the flying scarabæus () which was commonly placed (_Anc. Egypt._, III., 346) upon the breast, in lieu of the heart of the dead (_Ibid._, III., 486). See page 100, _infra_.

And here the inquiry is suggested, Was the _ankh am_ the same as the modern _henneh_? Note the connection of _henneh_ with the marriage festivities in the East to-day.

“Paint one hand with henna, mother;
Paint one hand and leave the other.
Bracelets on the right with henna;
On the left give drink to henna.”

(Jessup’s _Syrian Home Life_, p. 34.)

[166] See _Egypt’s Place_, V., 232.

[167] See _Egypt’s Place_, V., 174, 254, 282.

[168] _Ibid._, V., 323.

[169] See _Zeitschrift für Ægyptische Sprache_, erstes Heft, 1885, p. 16.

[170] See page 81 f., _supra_.

[171] See Pierret, Brugsch, Birch, _s. v._

[172] _Uarda_, I., 192.

[173] Ferriol’s _Recueil de cent Estampes representant differentes Nations du Levant_, Carte 43, and Explication, p. 16.

[174] _First Miss. Voyage to the So. Sea Islands_, pp. 352-363.

[175] _Ibid._, p. 196.

[176] Ellis’s _Polynesian Researches_, I., 529.

[177] Psa. 56 : 8.

[178] “The Goose Girl,” in Grimm’s _Household Tales_.

[179] 1 Kings 18 : 26-28.

[180] Van Lennep’s _Bible Lands_, pp. 767-769.

[181] See Herrera’s _Gen. Hist. of Cont. and Isl. of America_, III., 209, 211, 216, 300 f.; Clavigero’s _Hist. of Mex._, Bk. VI., chaps. 22, 38; Motolinia’s _Hist. Ind. de Nueva España_, p. 22; Landa’s _Relat. Yucatan_, XXXV.; Ximenez’s _Hist. Ind. Gautem._, pp. 171-181; Palacio’s _San Salv. and Hond._ (in Squier’s _Coll._, I.) 65 ff., 106, 116; Simon’s _Ter. Not. Conq. Tier. Firm. en Nue Gran._ (in Kingsborough’s _Antiq. of Mex._, VIII.) 208, 248; all cited in Spencer’s _Des. Soc._, II., 20-26, 28, 33. See, also, Bancroft’s _Native Races of Pacif. Coast_, I., 665, 723; II., 259, 306, 708, 710.

[182] Serving the purpose of the Otaheitan shark’s-teeth. See page 86 f., _supra_.

[183] Réville’s _Native Religions of Mexico and Peru_, p. 84 f.

[184] Cited in Adam’s _Curiosities of Superstition_.

[185] Cited in Benson’s _Remarkable Trials and Notorious Characters_, p. 11.

[186] Cited in Drake’s _The Witchcraft Delusion in New England_, I., 187; II., 214.

[187] _Ibid._, I, xviii. See also, Appendix, _infra_.

[188] _Faust_, Swanwick’s translation, Part I., lines 1360-1386.

[189] See Tylor’s _Primitive Culture_, II., 402; citing Boecler’s _Ehsten Aberglaübische Gebraüche_, 4.

LECTURE II.

SUGGESTIONS AND PERVERSIONS OF THE RITE.

II.

SUGGESTIONS AND PERVERSIONS OF THE RITE.

1. SACREDNESS OF BLOOD AND OF THE HEART.

Apart from, and yet linked with, the explicit proofs of the rite of blood-covenanting throughout the primitive world, there are many indications of the root-idea of this form of covenanting; in the popular estimate of blood, and of all the marvelous possibilities through blood-transference. These indications, also, are of old, and from everywhere.

To go back again to the earlier written history of the world; it is evident that the ancient Egyptians recognized blood as in a peculiar sense life itself; and that they counted the heart,--as the blood-source and the blood-centre,--the symbol and the substance of life. In the Book of the Dead, the deceased speaks of his heart,--or his blood-fountain,--as his life; and as giving him the right to appear in the presence of the gods: “My heart was my mother; my heart was my mother; my heart was my being on earth; placed within me; returned to me by the chief gods, placing me before the gods”[190] [in the presence of the gods]. In the process of embalming, the heart was always preserved with jealous care;[191] and sometimes it was embalmed by itself in a sepulchral vase.[192] It was the heart--as the life, which is the blood--that seems to have been put into the scales of the divine Judge for the settling of the soul’s destiny;[193] according to all the Egyptian pictures of the judgment. Throughout the Book of the Dead, and in all the sacred teachings and practices of the ancient Egyptians, with reference to human life and human destiny, the heart is obviously recognized as the analogon of blood, and blood as the analogon of life. Moreover, the life, which is represented by the blood and by the heart, appears to be counted peculiarly the gift and the guarded treasure of Deity, and as being in itself a resemblance to, if not actually a part of, the divine nature.[194]

Even of the lower animals, the heart and the heart’s blood were counted sacred to the gods, and were not to be eaten by the Egyptians; as if life belonged only to the Giver of life, and, when passing out from a lower organism, must return, or be returned, only to its original Source.

When the soul stands before the forty-two judges, in the Hall of the Two Truths, to give answer concerning its sins, one of its protesting avowals, as recorded in the Book of the Dead, is: “Oh Glowing Feet, coming out of the darkness! I have not eaten the heart;”[195] In my earthly life-course, I have not committed the sacrilege of heart-eating. Yet, of the sacrificial offering of “a red cow,” as prescribed in the Book of the Dead, “of the blood squeezed from the heart, one hundred drops,”[196] make a portion for the gods. In one of the tombs of Memphis, there is represented a scene of slaughtering animals. As the heart of an animal is taken out, the butcher who holds it says,--as shown by the accompanying hieroglyphics,--“Take care of this heart;”[197] as if that were a portion to be guarded sacredly. “Keep thy heart with all diligence [or, as the margin has it, “above all thou guardest”]; for out of it are the issues of life.”[198] It may, indeed, have been from the lore of Egypt that Solomon obtained this proverb of the ages, to pass it onward to posterity with his stamp of inspiration.

It would even seem that the blood of animals was not allowed to be eaten by the Egyptians; although there has been a question at that point, among Egyptologists. Wilkinson thinks that they _did_ employ it in cooking;[199] but this is only his inference from a pictured representation of the blood being caught in a vessel, when an animal is slaughtered for the table. On the other hand, that same picture shows the vessel of blood being borne away, afterwards, on uplifted hands;[200] as it would have been if it were designed for a sacred libation. Again, the other picture, reported by Birch, as showing the butcher’s care of the heart, represents the blood as “collected in a jar with a long spout”; such as was used for sacred libations.[201] It is evident that blood was offered to the gods of Egypt in libation, as was also wine.[202] Indeed the common Egyptian word for blood (, _senf_) is regularly followed by the determinative of outpouring (). The word _tesher_, “red,” is sometimes used as a synonym for _senf_; in this case (and in this only) the determinative of outpouring is added to the hieroglyphics for _tesher_. Moreover, among the forty-two judges, before whom the dead appears, he who is “Eater of Blood” comes next in order before the “Eater of Hearts”;[203] as if blood-eating, like heart-eating, were a prerogative of the gods.

If proof were still wanting that, in ancient Egypt, it was the heart which was deemed the epitome of life, and that the _heart_ had this pre-eminence because of its being the fountain of _blood_--which is life--that proof would be found in “The Tale of the Two Brothers”; a story that was prepared in its present form by a tutor of the Pharaoh of the exodus, while the latter was yet heir presumptive to the throne. This story has been the subject of special study by De Rougé, Chabas, Maspero, Brugsch, Birch, Goodwin, and Le Page Renouf. It is from the latter’s translation, that I draw my facts for this reference.[204]

Anpu and Bata were brothers. Bata’s experience with the wife of Anpu was like that of Joseph in the house of Potiphar. He was true, like Joseph. Like Joseph, he was falsely accused, his life was sought, and his innocence was vindicated. Then, for his better protection, Bata took his _heart_ out from his body, and put that in a safe place, while he made his home near it. To his brother he had said:

“I shall take my heart, and place it in the top of the flower of the cedar, and when the cedar is cut down it will fall to the ground. Thou shalt come to seek it. If thou art seven years in search of it, let not thy heart be depressed, and when thou hast found it thou shalt place it in a cup of cold water. Oh, then I shall live (once more).”

After a time the cedar, through the treachery of Bata’s false wife, was cut down. As it fell, with the heart of Bata, the latter dropped dead. For more than three years Anpu sought his brother’s heart; then he found it. “He brought a vessel of cold water, dropped the heart into it, and sat down according to his daily wont. But when the night was come, the heart absorbed the water. Bata [whose body seems to have been preserved--like a mummy--all this time] trembled in all his limbs, and continued looking at his elder brother, but his heart was faint. Then Anpu took the vessel of cold water which his brother’s heart was in. And when the latter [Bata] had drunk it up, his heart rose in its place; and he became as he had been before. Each embraced the other, and each one of them held conversation with his companion.”

The revivified Bata was transformed into a sacred bull, an Apis. That bull, by the treachery, again, of Bata’s wife, was killed. “And as they were killing him, and he was in the hands of his attendants, he shook his neck, and two drops of blood fell upon the two door-posts of His Majesty [in whose keeping was the sacred bull]; one was on the one side of the great staircase of His Majesty, the other upon the other side; and they grew up into two mighty persea trees, each of which stood alone.” Thus the blood was both life and life-giving, and the heart was as the very soul of its possessor, in the estimation of the ancient Egyptians.

In primitive America also, as in ancient Egypt, the blood and the heart, were held pre-eminently sacred. Among the Dakotas, in North America, the heart of the deer and of other animals killed in hunting, was offered to the spirits.[205] In Central America and in South America, it was the blood and the heart of the human victims offered in sacrifice, which were counted the peculiar portion of the gods.[206] In description of a human sacrifice among the Nahuas of Central America,[207] a Mexican historian says: “The high priest then approached, and with a heavy knife of obsidian cut open the miserable man’s breast. Then, with a dexterity acquired by long practice, the sacrificer tore forth the yet palpitating heart, which he first offered to the sun, and then threw at the feet of the idol. Taking it up, he again offered it to the god, and afterwards burned it; preserving the ashes with great care and veneration. Sometimes the heart was placed in the mouth [of the idol] with a golden spoon. It was customary also to anoint the lips of the image, and the cornices of the door with the victim’s blood.”[208]

Of the method among the Maya nations,[209] south of the Gulf of Mexico, a Spanish historian[210] says: “The bleeding and quivering heart was held up to the sun, and then thrown into a bowl prepared for its reception. An assistant priest sucked the blood from the gash in the chest, through a hollow cane; the end of which he elevated towards the sun, and then discharged its contents into a plume-bordered cup held by the captor of the prisoner just slain. This cup was carried around to all the idols in the temples and chapels, before whom another blood-filled tube was held up, as if to give them a taste of the contents. This ceremony performed, the cup was left at the palace.”

Yet another record stands: “The guardian of the temple ... opened the left breast of the victim, tore out the heart, and handed it to the high priest, who placed it in a small embroidered purse which he carried. The four [assisting] priests received the blood of the victim in four jicaras or bowls, made from the shell of a certain fruit; and descending, one after the other, to the court yard, [they] sprinkled the blood with their right hand in the direction of the cardinal points [of the compass]. If any blood remained over, they returned it to the high priest, who placed it, with the purse containing the heart, in the body of the victim, through the wound that had been made; and the body was interred in the temple.”[211]

Commenting on these customs in Central America, Réville--the representative comparative-religionist of France--says: “Here you will recognize that idea, so widely spread in the two Americas, and indeed almost everywhere amongst uncivilized peoples [nor is it limited to the uncivilized], that the heart is the epitome, so to speak, of the individual--his soul in some sense--so that to appropriate his heart is to appropriate his whole being.”[212] What else than this gave rise to the thought of preserving the _heart_ of a hero, or of a loved one, as a symbol of the living presence of the dead? It was by his heart, that King Robert Bruce was to lead his army to the Holy Land; and how many times, in history, have men bequeathed their hearts to those dear to them, as the poet Shelley’s heart was preserved by his friends, and by them given to Mrs. Shelley.

In the Greek and Roman sacrifices, it was the blood of the victim, which, as the life of the victim, was poured out unto the gods, as unto the Author of life.[213] Moreover, there is reason for supposing that the _heart_ was always given the chief place, as representing the very life itself, in the examination and in the _tasting_ of the “entrails” (σπλάγχνα, _splangkhna_) in connection with the sacrifices of those classic peoples.[214] An indication of this truth is found in a statement by Cicero, concerning the sacrifices at the time of the inauguration of Cæsar: “When he [Cæsar] was sacrificing on that day in which he first sat in the golden chair, and made procession in the purple garment, there was no _heart_ among the entrails of the sacrificial ox. (Do you think, therefore, that any animal which has blood can exist without a heart?) Yet he [Cæsar] was not terrified by the phenomenal nature of the event, although Spurinna declared, that it was to be feared that both mind [literally ‘counsel’] and life were about to fail him [Cæsar]; for both of these [mind and life] do issue from the heart.”[215]

Similarly it has been, and to the present day it is, with primitive peoples everywhere. Blood libations were made a prominent feature in the offerings in ancient Phoenicia,[216] as in Egypt. In India, the Brahmans have a saying, in illustration of the claim that Vishnu and Siva are of one and the same nature: “The heart of Vishnu is Sivâ, and the heart of Sivâ is Vishnu; and those who think they differ, err.”[217] The Hindoo legends represent the victim’s heart as being torn out and given to the one whom in life he has wronged.[218] In China, at the great Temple of Heaven, in Peking, where the emperors of China are supposed to have conducted worship without material change in its main features for now nearly three thousand years,[219] the blood of the animal sacrifice is buried in the earth[220] while the body of the sacrificial victim is offered as a whole burnt offering.[221]

The blood is the life; the heart as the fountain of blood is the fountain of life; both blood and heart are sacred to the Author of life. The possession, or the gift, of the heart or of the blood, is the possession, or the gift, of the very nature of its primal owner. That has been the world’s thought in all the ages.

2. VIVIFYING POWER OF BLOOD.

The belief seems to have been universal, not only that the blood is the life of the organism in which it originally flows, but that in its transfer from one organism to another the blood retains its life, and so carries with it a vivifying power. There are traces of this belief in the earliest legends of the Old World, and of the New; in classic story; and in medical practices as well, all the world over, from time immemorial until the present day.

For example, in an inscription from the Egyptian monuments, the original of which dates back to the early days of Moses, there is a reference to a then ancient legend of the rebellion of mankind against the gods; of an edict of destruction against the human race; and of a divine interposition for the rescue of the doomed peoples.[222] In that legend, a prominent part is given to human blood, mingled with the juice of mandrakes[223]--instead of wine--prepared as a drink of the gods, and afterwards poured out again to overflow and to revivify all the earth. And the ancient text which records this legend, affirms that it was in conjunction with these events, that there was the beginning of sacrifices in the world.

An early American legend has points of remarkable correspondence with this one from ancient Egypt. It relates, as does that, to a pre-historic destruction of the race, and to its re-creation, or its re-vivifying, by means of transferred blood. Every Mexican province told this story in its own way, says a historian; but the main features of it are alike in all its versions.

When there were no more men remaining on the earth, some of the gods desired the re-creation of mankind; and they asked help from the supreme deities accordingly. They were then told, that if they were to obtain the bones, or the ashes of the former race, they could revivify those remains by their own blood. Thereupon Xolotl, one of the gods, descended to the place of the dead, and obtained a bone (whether a _rib_, or not, does not appear). Upon that vestige of humanity, the gods dropped blood drawn from their own bodies; and the result was a new vivifying of mankind.[224]

An ancient Chaldean legend, as recorded by Berosus, ascribes a new creation of mankind to the mixture by the gods of the dust of the earth with the blood that flowed from the severed head of the god Belus. “On this account it is that men are rational, and partake of divine knowledge,” says Berosus.[225] The blood of the god gives them the life and the nature of a god. Yet, again, the early Phœnician, and the early Greek, theogonies, as recorded by Sanchoniathon[226] and by Hesiod,[227] ascribe the vivifying of mankind to the outpoured blood of the gods. It was from the blood of Ouranos, or of Saturn, dripping into the sea and mingling with its foam, that Venus was formed, to become the mother of her heroic posterity. “The Orphics, which have borrowed so largely from the East,” says Lenormant,[228] “said that the immaterial part of man, his soul [his life], sprang from the blood of Dionysus Zagreus, whom ... Titans had torn to pieces, partly devouring his members.”

Homer explicitly recognizes this universal belief in the power of blood to convey life, and to be a means of revivifying the dead. When Circé sent Odysseus,

“To consult
The Theban seer, Tiresias, in the abode
Of Pluto and the dreaded Proserpine.”

she directed him, in preparation, to

“Pour to all the dead
Libations,--milk and honey first, and next
Rich wine, and lastly water;”

and after that to slay the sacrificial sheep. But Circé’s caution was:

“Draw then the sword upon thy thigh, and sit,
And suffer none of all those airy forms
To touch the blood, until thou first bespeak
Tiresias. He will come, and speedily,--
The leader of the people,--and will tell
What voyage thou must make.”

Odysseus did as he was directed. The bloodless shades flocked about him, as he sat there guarding the life-renewing blood; but even those dearest to him, he forbade to touch that consecrated draught.

“And then the soul of Anticleia came,--
My own dead mother, daughter of the king
Autolycus, large minded. Her I left
Alive, what time I sailed for Troy, and now
I wept to see her there, and pitied her,
And yet forbade her, though with grief, to come
Near to the blood till I should first accost
Tiresias. He too came, the Theban seer,
Tiresias, bearing in his hand a wand
Of gold; he knew me and bespake me thus:--
‘Why, O unhappy mortal, hast thou left
The light of day to come among the dead,
And to this joyless land? Go from the trench
And turn thy sword away, that I may drink
The blood, and speak the word of prophecy.’
He spake; withdrawing from the trench, I thrust
Into its sheath my silver-studded sword,
And, after drinking of the dark red blood,
The blameless prophet turned to me and said--”[229]

Then, came the prophecy, from the blood-revivified seer.

The wide-spread popular superstition of the vampire and of the ghoul, seems to be an outgrowth of this universal belief, that transfused blood is re-vivification. The bloodless shades, leaving their graves at night, seek renewed life, by drawing out the blood of those who sleep; taking of the life of the living, to supply temporary life to the dead. This idea was prevalent in ancient Babylon and Assyria.[230] It has shown itself in the Old World and in the New,[231] in all the ages; and even within a little more than a century, it has caused an epidemic of fear in Hungary, “resulting in a general disinterment, and the burning or staking of the suspected bodies.”[232]

An added force is given to all these illustrations of the universal belief that transferred blood has a vivifying power, by the conclusions of modern medical science, concerning the possible benefits of blood-transfusion.[233] On this point, one of the foremost living authorities in this department of practice, Dr. Roussel, of Geneva, says: “The great vitality of the blood of a vigorous and healthy man has the power of improving the quality of the patient’s blood, and can restore activity to the centres of nervous force, and the organs of digestion. _It would seem that health itself can be transfused with the blood of a healthy man_”;[234] death itself being purged out of the veins by inflowing life. And in view of the possibilities of new life to a dying one, through new blood from one full of life, this writer insists, that “every adult and healthy man and woman should be ready to offer an _arm_, as the natural and mysteriously inexhaustible source of the wonder-working elixir.”[235] Blood-giving can be life-giving. The measure of one’s love may, indeed, in _such_ a case, be tested by the measure of his yielded blood.[236]

Roussel says, that blood transfusion was practised by the Egyptians, the Hebrews, and the Syrians, in ancient times;[237] and he cites the legend, that before Naaman came to Elisha to be healed of his leprosy,[238] his physicians, in their effort at his cure, took the blood from his veins, and replaced it with other blood. Whatever basis of truth there may be in this legend, it clearly gained its currency through the prevailing conviction that new blood is new life. There certainly is ample evidence that baths of human blood were anciently prescribed as a cure for the death-representing leprosy; as if in recognition of this root idea of the re-vivifying power of transferred blood.

Pliny, writing eighteen centuries ago, concerning leprosy, or elephantiasis, says[239]: “This was the peculiar disease of Egypt; and when it fell upon princes, woe to the people; for, in the bathing chambers, tubs were prepared, with human blood, for the cure of it.” Nor was this mode of life-seeking confined to the Egyptians. It is said that the Emperor Constantine was restrained from it, only in consequence of a vision from heaven.[240]

In the early English romance of Amys and Amylion, one of these knightly brothers-in-arms consents, with his wife’s full approbation, to yield the lives of his two infant children, in order to supply their blood for a bath, for the curing of his brother friend’s leprosy.[241] In this instance, the leprosy is cured, and the children’s lives are miraculously restored to them; as if in proof of the divine approbation of the loving sacrifice.

It is shown, indeed, that this belief in the life-bringing power of baths of blood, to the death-smitten lepers, was continued into the Middle Ages; and that it finally “received a check from an opinion gradually gaining ground, that only the blood of those would be efficacious, who offered themselves freely and voluntarily for a beloved sufferer.”[242] There is something very suggestive in this thought of the truest potency of transferred life through transferred blood! It is this thought which finds expression and illustration in Longfellow’s Golden Legend. In the castle of Vautsberg on the Rhine, Prince Henry is sick with a strange and hopeless malady. Lucifer appears to him in the garb of a traveling physician, and tells him of the only possible cure for his disease, as prescribed in a venerable tome:

“‘The only remedy that remains
Is the blood that flows from a maiden’s veins,
Who of her own free will shall die,
And give her life as the price of yours!’
That is the strangest of all cures,
And one, I think, you will never try;
The prescription you may well put by,
As something impossible to find
Before the world itself shall end!”

Elsie, the lovely daughter of a peasant in the Odenwald learns of the Prince’s need, and declares she will give her blood for his cure. In her chamber by night, her self-surrendering prayer goes up:

“‘If my feeble prayer can reach thee,
O my Saviour, I beseech thee,
Even as thou hast died for me,
More sincerely
Let me follow where thou leadest,
Let me, bleeding as thou bleedest,
Die, if dying I may give
Life to one who asks to live,
And more nearly,
Dying thus, resemble thee!’”

Her father, Gottlieb, consents to her life-surrender, saying to the Prince:

“‘As Abraham offered, long ago,
His son unto the Lord, and even
The Everlasting Father in heaven
Gave his, as a lamb unto the slaughter,
So do I offer up my daughter.’”

And Elsie adds:

“‘My life is little,
Only a cup of water,
But pure and limpid.
Take it, O Prince!
Let it refresh you,
Let it restore you.
It is given willingly
It is given freely;
May God bless the gift!’”

The proffered sacrifice is interfered with before its consummation; but its purposed method shows the estimate which was put, from of old, on voluntarily yielded life for life.