Chapter XVII: Masks and Misrule (4)

[375] Jahn, 34; Mogk, iii. 387; Golther, 572; Schräder-Jevons, 303. The Germans still knew three seasons only when they came into contact with the Romans; cf. Tacitus, _Germ._ 26 ‘annum quoque ipsum non in totidem digerunt species: hiems et ver et aestas intellectum ac vocabula habent, autumni perinde nomen ac bona ignorantur.’ I do not agree with Tille, _Y. and C._ 6, that the tripartition of the year, in this pre-calendar form, was ‘of foreign extraction.’ Schräder shows that it is common to the Aryan languages. The Keltic seasons, in particular, seem to be closely parallel to the Teutonic. Of the three great Keltic feasts described by Rhys, _C. H._ 409, 513, 676; _C. F._ i. 308, the Lugnassad was probably the harvest feast, the Samhain the old beginning of winter feast, and the Beltain the high summer feast. The meaning of ‘Beltain’ (cf. _N. E. D._ s.v. Beltane) seems quite uncertain. A connexion is possible but certainly unproved with the Abelio of the Pyrenean inscriptions, the Belenus-Apollo of those of the eastern Alps, and, more rarely, Provence (Röscher, _Lexicon_, s.v. Belenus; Holder, _Alt-celtischer Sprachschatz_, s.vv. Belenus, Abelio; Ausonius, _Professores_, iv. 7), or the Bel of Bohemia mentioned by Allso (ch. xii). The Semitic Baal, although a cult of Belus, found its way into the Roman world (cf. Appendix N, No. xxxii, and Wissowa, 302), is naturally even a less plausible relation. But it is dear to the folk-etymologist; cf. e.g. S. M. Mayhew, _Baalism_ in _Trans. of St. Paul’s Ecclesiological Society_, i. 83.

[376] Tille, _Y. and C._ 7, 148, suggests an Egyptian or Babylonian origin, but the equation of the Gothic _Jiuleis_ and the Cypriote ἰλαῖος, ἰουλαῖος, ἰουλίηος, ἰούλιος as names for winter periods makes a Mediterranean connexion seem possible.

[377] Cf. ch. xi.

[378] Grimm, ii. 615, notes that Easter fires are normal in the north, Midsummer fires in the south of Germany. The Beltane fires both of Scotland and Ireland are usually on May 1, but some of the Irish examples collected by J. Jamieson, _Etym. Dict. of the Scottish Language_, s. v., are at midsummer.

[379] Tille, _Y. and C._ 71; Rhys, _C. H._ 419. The primitive year was thermometric, not astronomic, its critical moments, not the solstices, a knowledge of which means science, but the sensible increase and diminution of heat in spring and autumn. The solstices came through Rome. The _Sermo Eligii_ (Grimm, iv. 1737) has ‘nullus in festivitate S. Ioannis vel quibuslibet sanctorum solemnitatibus solstitia ... exerceat,’ but Eligius was a seventh-century bishop, and this _Sermo_ may have been interpolated in the eighth century (O. Reich, _Über Audoen’s Lebensbeschreibung des heiligen Eligius_ (1872), cited in _Rev. celtique_, ix. 433). It is not clear that the un-Romanized Teuton or Kelt made a god of the sun, as distinct from the heaven-god, who of course has solar attributes and emblems. In the same _Sermo_ Eligius says ‘nullus dominos solem aut lunam vocet, neque per eos iuret.’ But the notion of ‘domini’ may be post-Roman, and the oath is by the permanent, rather than the divine; cf. A. de Jubainville, _Intr. à l’Étude de la Litt. celt._ 181. It is noticeable that German names for the sun are originally feminine and for the moon masculine.

[380] Mogk, iii. 393; Golther, 584; Jahn, 84; Caspari, 35; Saupe, 7; Hauck, ii. 357; Michels, 93. The ploughing feast is probably the _spurcalia_ of the _Indiculus_ and of Eadhelm, _de laudibus virginitatis_, c. 25, and the _dies spurci_ of the _Hom. de Sacrilegiis_. This term appears in the later German name for February, _Sporkele_. It seems to be founded on Roman analogy from _spurcus_, ‘unclean.’ Pearson, ii. 159, would, however, trace it to an Aryan root _spherag_, ‘swell,’ ‘burst,’ ‘shoot.’ Bede, _de temp. rat._ c. 15, calls February _Sol-monath_, which he explains as ‘mensis placentarum.’ September, the month of the harvest-festival, is _Haleg-monath_, or ‘mensis sacrorum.’

[381] Pfannenschmidt, 244; Brand, ii. 1; Ditchfield, 130; Burne-Jackson, 439; Burton, _Rushbearing_, 147; Schaff, vi. 544; Duchesne, 385. The dedication of churches was solemnly carried out from the fourth century, and the anniversary observed. Gregory the Great ordered ‘solemnitates ecclesiarum dedicationum per singulos annos sunt celebrandae.’ The A.-S. _Canons_ of Edgar (960), c. 28 (Wilkins, i. 227), require them to be kept with sobriety. Originally the anniversary, as well as the actual dedication day, was observed with an all night watch, whence the name _vigilia_, wakes. Belethus, _de rat. offic._ (_P. L._ ccii. 141), c. 137, says that the custom was abolished owing to the immorality to which it led. But the ‘eve’ of these and other feasts continued to share in the sanctity of the ‘day,’ a practice in harmony with the European sense of the precedence of night over day (cf. Schräder-Jevons, 311; Bertrand, 267, 354, 413). An Act of Convocation in 1536 (Wilkins, iii. 823) required all wakes to be held on the first Sunday in October, but it does not appear to have been very effectual.

[382] S. O. Addy, in _F. L._ xii. 394, has a full account of ‘Garland day’ at Castleton, Derbyshire, on May 29; cf. _F. L._ xii. 76 (Wishford, Wilts); Burne-Jackson, 365.

[383] The classification of agricultural feasts in U. Jahn, _Die deutschen Opfergebräuche_, seems throughout to be based less on the facts of primitive communal agriculture, than on those of the more elaborate methods of the later farms with their variety of crops.

[384] Frazer, i. 193; ii. 96; Brand, i. 125; Dyer, 223; Ditchfield, 95; Philpot, 144; Grimm, ii. 762; &c., &c. A single example of the custom is minutely studied by S. O. Addy, _Garland Day at Castleton_, in _F. L._ xii. 394.

[385] A. B. Gomme, ii. 507; Hartland, _Perseus_, ii. 187; Grimm, iv. 1738, 1747; Gaidoz, _Un vieux rite médical_ (1893).

[386] Tacitus, _Germania_, 40.

[387] Vigfusson and Ungar, _Flateyjarbok_, i. 337; Grimm, i. 107; Gummere, _G. O._ 433; Mogk, iii. 321; Golther, 228.

[388] Sozomenes, _Hist. Eccles._ vi. 37. Cf. also _Indiculus_ (ed. Saupe, 32) ‘de simulacro, quod per campos portant,’ the fifth-century _Vita S. Martini_, c. 12, by Sulpicius Severus (_Opera_, ed. Halm, in _Corp. Script. Eccl. Hist._ i. 122) ‘quia esset haec Gallorum rusticis consuetudo, simulacra daemonum, candido tecta velamine, misera per agros suos circumferre dementia,’ and Alsso’s account of the fifteenth-century _calendisationes_ in Bohemia (ch. xii).

[389] Cf. ch. x.

[390] Cf. _Representations_ (Chester, London, York). There were similar watches at Nottingham (Deering, _Hist. of Nott._ 123), Worcester (Smith, _English Gilds_, 408), Lydd and Bristol (Green, _Town Life in the Fifteenth Century_, i. 148), and on St. Thomas’s day (July 7) at Canterbury (_Arch. Cant._ xii. 34; _Hist. MSS._ ix. 1. 148).

[391] Harris, 7; Hartland, _Fairy Tales_, 71.

[392] Dyer, 205.

[393] Cf. ch. viii.

[394] Dyer, 275; Ditchfield, III; cf. the phrase ‘in and out the windows’ of the singing game _Round and Round the Village_ (A. B. Gomme, s. v.).

[395] M. Deloche, _Le Tour de la Lunade_, in _Rev. celtique_, ix. 425; Bérenger-Féraud, i. 423; iii. 167.

[396] Bower, 13.

[397] Duchesne, 276; Usener, i. 293; Tille, _Y. and C._ 51; W. W. Fowler, 124; Boissier, _La Religion romaine_, i. 323. The Rogations or _litaniae minores_ represent in Italy the Ambarvalia on May 29. But they are of Gallican origin, were begun by Mamertus, bishop of Vienne (†470), adapted by the _Council of Orleans_ (511), c. 27 (Mansi, viii. 355), and required by the English _Council of Clovesho_ (747), c. 16 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 368), to be held ‘non admixtis vanitatibus, uti mos est plurimis, vel negligentibus, vel imperitis, id est in ludis et equorum cursibus, et epulis maioribus.’ Jahn, 147, quotes the German abbess Marcsuith (940), who describes them as ‘pro gentilicio Ambarvali,’ and adds, ‘confido autem de Patroni huius misericordia, quod sic ab eo gyrade terrae semina uberius provenient, et variae aeris inclementiae cessent.’ Mediaeval Rogation litanies are in _Sarum Processional_, 103, and York Processional (_York Manual_, 182). The more strictly Roman _litania major_ on St. Mark’s day (March 25) takes the place of the _Robigalia_, but is not of great importance in English folk-custom.

[398] _Injunctions_, ch. xix, of 1559 (Gee-Hardy, _Docts. illustrative of English Church History_, 426). Thanks are to be given to God ‘for the increase and abundance of his fruits upon the face of the earth.’ The _Book of Homilies_ contains an exhortation to be used on the occasion. The episcopal injunctions and interrogatories in _Ritual Commission_, 404, 409, 416, &c., endeavour to preserve the Rogations, and to eliminate ‘superstition’ from them; for the development of the notion of ‘beating of bounds,’ cf. the eighteenth-century notices in Dyer, _Old English Social Life_, 196.

[399] The image is represented by the doll of the May-garland, which has sometimes, according to Ditchfield, 102, become the Virgin Mary, with a child doll in its arms, and at other times (e.g. Castleton, _F. L._ xii. 469) has disappeared, leaving the name of ‘queen’ to a particular bunch of flowers; also by the ‘giant’ of the midsummer watch. The Salisbury giant, St. Christopher, with his hobby-horse, Hob-nob, is described in _Rev. d. T. P._ iv. 601.

[400] Grimm, i. 257; Golther, 463; Mogk, iii. 374; Hahn, _Demeter und Baubo_, 38; Usener, _Die Sintfluthsagen_, 115. There are parallels in south European custom, both classical and modern, and Usener even derives the term ‘carnival,’ not from _carnem levare_, but from the _currus navalis_ used by Roman women. A modern survival at Fréjus is described in _F. L._ xii. 307.

[401] Ditchfield, 103; _Transactions of Devonshire Association_, xv. 104; cf. the Noah’s ship procession at Hull (_Representations_, s. v.).

[402] Brand, ii. 223; Grimm, ii. 584; Elton, 284; Gomme, _Ethnology_, 73; Hartland, _Perseus_, ii. 175; Haddon, 362; Vaux, 269; Wood-Martin, ii. 46; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 291; R. C. Hope, _Holy Wells_; M.-L. Quiller-Couch, _Ancient and Holy Wells of Cornwall_ (1894); J. Rhys, _C. F._ i. 332, 354, and in _F. L._ iii. 74, iv. 55; A. W. Moore, in _F. L._ v. 212; H. C. March, in _F. L._ x. 479 (Dorset).

[403] A. B. Gomme, s. v.; Haddon, 362.

[404] Schaff, iii. 247; Duchesne, 281, 385; Rock, iii. 2. 101, 180; Maskell, i. cccxi; Feasey, 235; Wordsworth, 24; Pfannenschmidt, _Das Weihwasser im heidnischen und christlichen Cultus_ (1869). The _Benedictio Fontium_ took place on Easter Saturday, in preparation for the baptism which in the earliest times was a characteristic Easter rite. The formulae are in _York Missal_, i. 121; _Sarum Missal_, 350; Maskell, i. 13.

[405] Frazer, iii. 237; Gomme, in _Brit. Ass. Rep._ (1896), 626; Simpson, 195; Grenier, 380; Gaidoz, 16; Bertrand, 98; Gummere, _G. O._ 400; Grimm, ii. 601; Jahn, 25; Brand, i. 127, 166; Dyer, 269, 311, 332; Ditchfield, 141; Cortet, 211.

[406] To this custom may possibly be traced the black-a-vised figures who are persistent in the folk _ludi_, and also the curious tradition which makes May-day especially the chimney-sweeps’ holiday.

[407] The reasons given are various, ‘to keep off hail’ (whence the term _Hagelfeuer_ mentioned by Pfannenschmidt, 67), ‘vermin,’ ‘caterpillars,’ ‘blight,’ ‘to make the fields fertile.’ In Bavaria torches are carried round the fields ‘to drive away the wicked sower’ (of tares?). In Northumberland raids are made on the ashes of neighbouring villages (Dyer, 332).

[408] Cf. p. 113.

[409] I know of no English Easter folk-fires, but St. Patrick is said to have lit one on the hill of Slane, opposite Tara, on Easter Eve, 433 (Feasey, 180).

[410] Schaff, v. 403; Duchesne, 240; Rock, iii. 2. 71, 94, 98, 107, 244; Feasey, 184; Wordsworth, 204; Frazer, iii. 245; Jahn, 129; Grimm, ii. 616; Simpson, 198. The formulae of the _benedictio ignis_ and _benedictio cereorum_ at Candlemas, and the _benedictio ignis_, _benedictio incensi_, and _benedictio cerei_ on Easter Eve, are in _Sarum Missal_, 334, 697; _York Missal_, i. 109; ii. 17. One York MS. has ‘Paschae ignis de berillo vel de silice exceptus ... accenditur.’ The correspondence between Pope Zacharias and St. Boniface shows that the lighting of the _ignis_ by a crystal instead of from a lamp kept secretly burning distinguished Gallican from Roman ceremonial in the eighth century (Jaffé, 2291). All the lights in the church are previously put out, and this itself has become a ceremony in the _Tenebrae_. Ecclesiastical symbolism explained the extinction and rekindling of lights as typifying the Resurrection. Sometimes the _ignis_ provides a light for the folk-fire outside.

[411] Belethus (†1162), _de Div. Offic._ c. 137 (_P. L._ ccii. 141), gives three customs of St. John’s Eve. Bones are burnt, because (1) there are dragons in air, earth, and water, and when these ‘in aere ad libidinem concitantur, quod fere fit, saepe ipsum sperma vel in puteos vel in aquas fluviales eiiciunt, ex quo lethalis sequitur annus,’ but the smoke of the bonfires drives them away; and (2) because St. John’s bones were burnt in Sebasta. Torches are carried, because St. John was a shining light. A wheel is rolled, because of the solstice, which is made appropriate to St. John by _St. John_ iii. 30. The account of Belethus is amplified by Durandus, _Rationale Div. Offic._ (ed. corr. Antwerp, 1614) vii. 14, and taken in turn from Durandus by a fifteenth-century monk of Winchelscombe in a sermon preserved in _Harl. MS._ 2345, f. 49 (b).

[412] Gaidoz, 24, 109; Bertrand, 122; Dyer, 323; Stubbes, i. 339, from Naogeorgos; Usener, ii. 81; and the mediaeval calendar in Brand, i. 179.

[413] Gomme, in _Brit. Ass. Rep._ (1896), 636 (Moray, Mull); _F. L._ ix. 280 (Caithness, with illustration of wood used); Kemble, i. 360 (Perthshire in 1826, Devonshire).

[414] Grimm, ii. 603; Kemble, i. 359; Elton, 293; Frazer, iii. 301; Gaidoz, 22; Jahn, 26; Simpson, 196; Bertrand, 107; Golther, 570. The English term is _need-fire_, Scotch _neidfyre_, German _Nothfeuer_. It is variously derived from _nôt_ ‘need,’ _niuwan_ ‘rub,’ or _hniotan_ ‘press.’ If the last is right, the English form should perhaps be _knead-fire_ (Grimm, ii. 607, 609; Golther, 570). Another German term is _Wildfeuer_. The Gaelic _tin-egin_ is from _tin_ ‘fire,’ and _egin_ ‘violence’ (Grimm, ii. 609). For ecclesiastical prohibitions cf. _Indiculus_ (Saupe, 20) ‘de igne fricato de ligno, i. e. _nodfyr_’; _Capit. Karlmanni_ (742), c. 5 (Grimm, ii. 604) ‘illos sacrilegos ignes quos _niedfyr_ vocant.’

[415] Gaidoz, 1; Bertrand, 109, 140; Simpson, 109, 240; Rhys, _C. H._ 54. The commonest form of the symbol is the swastika, but others appear to be found in the ‘hammer’ of Thor, and on the altars and statues of a Gaulish deity equated in the _interpretatio Romana_ with Jupiter. There is a wheel decoration on the _barelle_ or cars of the Gubbio _ceri_ (Bower, 4).

[416] Brand, i. 97; Dyer, 159; Ditchfield, 78. Eggs are used ceremonially at the Scotch Beltane fires (Frazer, iii. 261; Simpson, 285). Strings of birds’ eggs are hung on the Lynn May garland (_F. L._ x. 443). In Dauphiné an omelette is made when the sun rises on St. John’s day (Cortet, 217). In Germany children are sent to look for the Easter eggs in the nest of a hare, a very divine animal. Among the miscellaneous Benedictions in the _Sarum Manual_, with the _Ben. Seminis_ and the _Ben. Pomorum in die S^{ti} Iacobi_ are a _Ben. Carnis Casei Butyri Ovorum sive Pastillarum in Pascha_ and a _Ben. Agni Paschalis, Ovorum et Herbarum in die Paschae_. These Benedictions are little more than graces. The _Durham Accounts_, i. 71-174, contain entries of fifteenth-and sixteenth-century payments ‘fratribus et sororibus de Wytton pro eorum Egsilver erga festum pasche.’

[417] _Tw. N._ i. 3. 42 ‘He’s a coward and a coystrill, that will not drink to my niece till his brains turn o’ the toe like a parish-top.’ Steevens says ‘a large top was formerly kept in every village, to be whipt in frosty weather, that the peasants might be kept warm by exercise and out of mischief while they could not work.’ This is evidently a ‘fake’ of the ‘Puck of commentators.’ Hone, _E. D. B._ i. 199, says ‘According to a story (whether true or false), in one of the churches of Paris, a choir boy used to whip a top marked with _Alleluia_, written in gold letters, from one end of the choir to the other.’ The ‘burial of Alleluia’ is shown later on to be a mediaeval perversion of an agricultural rite. On the whole question of tops, see Haddon, 255; A. B. Gomme, s. v.

[418] Leber, ix. 391; Barthélemy, iv. 447; Du Tilliot, 30; Grenier, 385; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 427; Belethus, c. 120 ‘Sunt nonnullae ecclesiae in quibus usitatum est, ut vel etiam episcopi et archiepiscopi in coenobiis cum suis ludant subditis, ita ut etiam se ad lusum pilae demittant. atque haec quidem libertas ideo dicta est decembrica ... quamquam vero magnae ecclesiae, ut est Remensis, hanc ludendi consuetudinem observent, videtur tamen laudabilius esse non ludere’; Durandus, vi. 86 ‘In quibusdam locis hac die, in aliis in Natali, praelati cum suis clericis ludunt, vel in claustris, vel in domibus episcopalibus; ita ut etiam descendant ad ludum pilae, vel etiam ad choreas et cantus, &c.’ Often the ball play was outside the church, but the canons of Evreux on their return from the _procession noire_ of May 1, played ‘ad quillas super voltas ecclesiae’; and the Easter _pilota_ of Auxerre which lasted to 1538, took place in the nave before vespers. Full accounts of this ceremony have been preserved. The dean and canons danced and tossed the ball, singing the _Victimae paschali_. For examples of Easter hand-ball or marbles in English folk-custom, cf. Brand, i. 103; Vaux, 240; _F. L._ xii. 75; Mrs. Gomme, s. v. _Handball_.

[419] Brand, i. 93; Burne-Jackson, 335. A Norfolk version (_F. L._ vii. 90) has ‘dances as if in agony.’ On the Mendips (_F. L._ v. 339) what is expected is ‘a lamb in the sun.’ The moon, and perhaps the sun also, is sometimes ‘wobbly,’ ‘jumping’ or ‘skipping,’ owing to the presence of strata of air differing in humidity or temperature, and so changing the index of refraction (Nicholson, _Golspie_, 186). At Pontesford Hill in Shropshire (Burne-Jackson, 330) the pilgrimage was on Palm Sunday, actually to pluck a sprig from a haunted yew, traditionally ‘to look for the golden arrow,’ which must be solar. In the Isle of Man hills, on which are sacred wells, are visited on the Lugnassad, to gather ling-berries. Others say that it is because of Jephthah’s daughter, who went up and down on the mountains and bewailed her virginity. And the old folk now stop at home and read _Judges_ xi (Rhys, _C. F._ i. 312). On the place of hill-tops in agricultural religion cf. p. 106, and for the use of elevated spots for sun-worship at Rome, ch. xi.

[420] Simpson, _passim_; cf. _F. L._ vi. 168; xi. 220. _Deasil_ is from Gaelic _deas_, ‘right,’ ‘south.’ Mediaeval ecclesiastical processions went ‘contra solis cursum et morem ecclesiasticum’ only in seasons of woe or sadness (Rock, iii. 2. 182).

[421] Dr. Murray kindly informs me that the etymology of _withershins_ (A.-S. _wiþersynes_) is uncertain. It is from _wiþer_, ‘against,’ and either some lost noun, or one derived from _séon_, ‘to see,’ or _sinþ_, ‘course.’ The original sense is simply ‘backwards,’ and the equivalence with _deasil_ not earlier than the seventeenth century. A folk-etymology from _shine_ may account for the aspirate.

[422] Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, 196; Jevons, 130; Frazer, ii. 352; Grant Allen, 318; Hartland, ii. 236; Turnbull, _The Blood Covenant_. Perhaps, as a third type of sacrifice, should be distinguished the ‘alimentary’ sacrifice of food and other things made to the dead. This rests on the belief in the continuance of the mortal life with its needs and desires after death.

[423] Grimm, i. 47; Golther, 565; Gummere, _G. O._ 40, 457. Gregory III wrote (†731) to Boniface (_P. L._ lxxxix. 577) ‘inter cetera agrestem caballum aliquantos comedere adiunxisti plerosque et domesticum. hoc nequaquam fieri deinceps sinas,’ cf. _Councils of Cealcythe and Pincanhale_ (787), c. 19 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 458) ‘equos etiam plerique in vobis comedunt, quod nullus Christianorum in Orientalibus facit.’ The decking of horses is a familiar feature of May-day in London and elsewhere.

[424] C. J. Billson, _The Easter Hare_, in _F. L._ iii. 441.

[425] N. W. Thomas in _F. L._ xi. 227.

[426] Grimm, i. 55; Golther, 559, 575; Gummere, _G. O._ 456. The universal Teutonic term for sacrificing is _blôtan_.

[427] Frazer, _Pausanias_, iii. 20; Jevons, 130, 191. Does the modern huntsman know why he ‘bloods’ a novice?

[428] Grimm, i. 47, 57, 77; Jahn, 24; Gummere, _G. O._ 459. Hence the theriomorphic ‘image.’

[429] Robertson Smith, 414, 448; Jevons, 102, 285; Frazer, ii. 448; Lang, _M. R. R._^1 ii. 73, 80, 106, 214, 226; Grant Allen, 335; Du Méril, _Com._ i. 75. Hence the theriomorphic _larva_ or mask (Frazer, _Pausanias_, iv. 239).

[430] Grimm, i. 46, 57; Golther, 576; Frazer, ii. 318, 353; Jevons, 144; Grant Allen, 325. Savages believe that by eating an animal they will acquire its bodily and mental qualities.

[431] Jahn, 14, and for classical parallels Frazer, ii. 315; _Pausanias_, iii. 288; Jevons, _Plutarch_, lxix. 143. Grant Allen, 292, was told as a boy in Normandy that at certain lustrations ‘a portion of the Host (stolen or concealed, I imagine) was sometimes buried in each field.’

[432] Frazer, ii. 318; Grant Allen, 337; Jevons, 206.

[433] _F. L._ vi. 1.

[434] Frazer, ii. 319; Jevons, 214; cf. the πάνσπερμα at the Athenian Pyanepsia.

[435] In the Beltane rite (_F. L._ vi. 2) a bit of the bannock is reserved for the ‘cuack’ or cuckoo, here doubtless the inheritor of the gods.

[436] Grimm, iii. 1240.

[437] Elton, 428.

[438] Grimm, i. 59; Gummere, _G. O._ 455.

[439] V. Hehn, _Culturpflanzen_, 438.

[440] Grimm, i. 44, 48, 53; Golther, 561; Gummere, _G. O._ 459; Schräder, 422; Mogk, iii. 388; Meyer, 199, and for Keltic evidence Elton, 270. Many of these examples belong rather to the war than to the agricultural cult. The latest in the west are _Capit. de partib. Saxon._ 9 ‘Si quis hominem diabolo sacrificaverit et in hostiam, more paganorum, daemonibus obtulerit’; _Lex Frisionum_, additio sup. tit. 42 ‘qui fanum effregerit ... immolatur diis, quorum templa violavit’; _Epist. Greg. III_, 1 (_P. L._ lxxxix, 578) ‘hoc quoque inter alia crimina agi in partibus illis dixisti, quod quidam ex fidelibus ad immolandum paganis sua venundent mancipia.’

[441] Frazer, ii. 1; Jevons, 279.

[442] Frazer, ii. 5, 59.

[443] Strabo, iv. 5. 4; Bastian, _Oestl. Asien_, v. 272. The Mexican evidence given by Frazer, iii. 134, does not necessarily represent a primitive notion of the nature of the rite.

[444] Jevons, 291; _Plutarch_, lxx. For traces of the blood-guiltiness incurred by sacrifice, cf. the βουφόνια at Athens and the _regifugium_ at Rome (Frazer, ii. 294; Robertson Smith, i. 286).

[445] Frazer, ii. 15, 55, 232; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 242, 296, 329.

[446] In three successive years of famine the Swedes sacrificed first oxen, then men, finally their king Dômaldi himself (_Ynglingasaga_, c. 18).

[447] Frazer, ii. 24; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 296.

[448] The British rule in India forbids human sacrifice, and the Khonds, a Dravidian race of Bengal, have substituted animal for human victims within the memory of man (Frazer, ii. 245).

[449] Hartland, iii. 1; Frazer, _Pausanias_, iv. 197; v. 44, 143; Bérenger-Féraud, i. 207. Mr. Frazer enumerates forty-one versions of the legend.

[450] Hartland, iii. 81; Grimm, ii. 494; Gummere, _G. O._ 396. The slaves of Nerthus were drowned in the same lake in which the goddess was dipped.

[451] _F. L._ vi. i.

[452] Frazer, iii. 319; Gaidoz, 27; Cortet, 213; Simpson, 221; Bertrand, 68; _F. L._ xii. 315. The work of Posidonius does not exist, but was possibly used by Caesar, _B. G._ vi. 15; Strabo, iv. 4. 5; Diodorus, v. 32. Wicker ‘giants’ are still burnt in some French festival-fires. But elsewhere, as in the midsummer shows, such ‘giants’ seem to be images of the agricultural divinities, and it is not clear by what process they came to be burnt and so destroyed. Perhaps they were originally only smoked, just as they were dipped.

[453] Gomme, _Ethnology_, 137; _F. L._ ii. 300; x. 101; xii. 217; Vaux, 287; Rhys, _C. F._ i. 306.

[454] _F. L._ ii. 302; Rhys, _C. F._ i. 307. In 1656, bulls were sacrificed near Dingwall (_F. L._ x. 353). A few additional examples, beyond those here given, are mentioned by N. W. Thomas, in _F. L._ xi. 247.

[455] 1 _N. Q._ vii. 353; Gomme, _Ethnology_, 32; _Village Community_, 113; Grant Allen, 290. The custom was extinct when it was first described in 1853, and some doubt has recently been thrown upon the ‘altar,’ the ‘struggle’ and other details; cf. _Trans. of Devonshire Assn._ xxviii. 99; _F. L._ viii. 287.

[456] 1 _N. Q._ vii. 353; Gomme, _Ethnology_, 30; Vaux, 285.

[457] Blount, _Jocular Tenures_ (ed. Beckwith), 281; Dyer, 297.

[458] Dunkin, _Hist. of Bicester_ (1816), 268; P. Manning, in _F. L._ viii. 313.

[459] P. Manning, in _F. L._ viii. 310; Dyer, 282.

[460] N. W. Thomas, in _F. L._ xi. 227; Dyer, 285, 438, 470; Ditchfield, 85, 131.

[461] Certain lands were held of the chapter for which a fat buck was paid on the Conversion of St. Paul (January 25), and a fat doe on the Commemoration of St. Paul (June 30). They were offered, according to one writer, alive, at the high altar; the flesh was baked, the head and horns carried in festal procession. The custom dated from at least 1274 (Dyer, 49; W. Sparrow Simpson, _St. Paul’s Cath. and Old City Life_, 234).

[462] _F. L._ iv. 9; x. 355. White bulls are said to have been led to the shrine by women desirous of children. F. C. Conybeare, in _R. de l’Hist. des Religions_, xliv. 108, describes some survivals of sacrificial rites in the Armenian church which existed primitively in other Greek churches also.

[463] _F. L._ vii. 346. Bull-baiting often took place on festivals, and in several cases, as at Tutbury, the bull was driven into or over a river. Bear-baiting is possibly a later variant of the sport.

[464] Burton, 165; _Suffolk F. L._ 71; Ditchfield, 227; Dyer, 387; Pfannenschmidt, 279; cf. the Abbots Bromley Horn-dance (ch. viii).

[465] _F. L._ iv. 5. The custom of sacrifice at the foundation of a new building has also left traces: cf. Grant Allen, 248; _F. L._ xi. 322, 437; Speth, _Builders’ Rites and Ceremonies_.

[466] Douce, 598, gives a cut of a hobby-horse, i. e. a man riding a pasteboard or wicker horse with his legs concealed beneath a foot-cloth. According to Du Méril, _Com._ i. 79, 421, the device is known throughout Europe. In France it is the _chevalet_, _cheval-mallet_, _cheval-fol_, &c.; in Germany the _Schimmel_.

[467] Dyer, 182, 266, 271; Ditchfield, 97; Burton, 40; _F. L._ viii. 309, 313, 317; cf. ch. ix on the ‘fool’ or ‘squire’ in the sword and morris dances, and ch. xvi on his court and literary congener. The folk-fool wears a cow’s tail or fox’s brush, or carries a stick with a tail at one end and a bladder and peas at the other. He often wears a mask or has his face blacked. In Lancashire he is sometimes merged with the ‘woman’ grotesque of the folk-festivals, and called ‘owd Bet.’

[468] W. Gregor, _F. L. of N. E. Scotland_, 181, says that bread and cheese were actually laid in the field, and in the plough when it was ‘strykit.’

[469] Dyer, 20, 207, 447; Ditchfield, 46; _F. L._ vi. 93. Pirminius v. Reichenau, _Dicta_ (†753), c. 22, forbids ‘effundere super truncum frugem et vinum.’

[470] _F. L. Congress_, 449, gives a list of about fifty ‘feasten’ cakes. Some are quite local; others, from the Shrove Tuesday pancake to the Good Friday hot cross bun, widespread.

[471] Grimm, i. 57; Frazer, ii. 344; Grant Allen, 339; Jevons, 215; Dyer, 165; Ditchfield, 81.

[472] _F. L._ vi. 57; viii. 354; ix. 362; x. 111.

[473] _F. L._ vi. 1.

[474] Ditchfield, 116, 227; _Suffolk F. L._ 108; Dyer, _Old English Social Life_, 197. The boys are now said to be whipped in order that they may remember the boundaries; but the custom, which sometimes includes burying them, closely resembles the symbolical sacrifices of the harvest field (p. 158). Grant Allen, 270, suggests that the tears shed are a rain-charm. I hope he is joking.

[475] Brand, ii. 13; _Suffolk F. L._ 69, 71; _Leicester F. L._ 121. A ‘harvest-lord’ is probably meant by the ‘Rex Autumnalis’ mentioned in the _Accounts_ of St. Michael’s, Bath (ed. Somerset Arch. Soc. 88), in 1487, 1490, and 1492. A _corona_ was hired by him from the parish. Often the reaper who cuts the last sheaf (i.e. slays the divinity) becomes harvest-lord.

[476] Gomme, _Village Community_, 107; Dyer, 339; Northall, 202; _Gloucester F. L._ 33.

[477] Frazer, i. 216; E. Pabst, _Die Volksfeste des Maigrafen_ (1865).

[478] Frazer, i. 219; Cortet, 160; Brand, i. 126; Dyer, 266; Ditchfield, 98.

[479] Tacitus, _Germ._ c. 43 ‘apud Nahanarvalos antiquae religionis lucus ostenditur. praesidet sacerdos muliebri ornatu.’

[480] _Conc. of Trullo_ (692), c. 62 (Mansi, xi. 671) ‘Nullus vir deinceps muliebri veste induatur, vel mulier veste viro conveniente’; _Conc. of Braga_ (of doubtful date), c. 80 (Mansi, ix. 844) ‘Si quis ballationes ante ecclesias sanctorum fecerit, seu quis faciem suam transformaverit in habitu muliebri et mulier in habitu viri emendatione pollicita tres annos poeniteat.’ The exchange of head-gear between men and women remains a familiar feature of the modern bank-holiday. Some Greek parallels are collected by Frazer, _Pausanias_, iii. 197. E. Crawley, _The Mystic Rose_ (1902), viii. 371, suggests another explanation, which would connect the custom with the amorous side of the primitive festivals.

[481] Frazer, ii. 93, 109.

[482] Ibid. i. 220; Brand, i. 157; Dyer, 217; Ditchfield, 97; Kelly, 62: cf. ch. viii.

[483] Pearson, ii. 24, 407. Cf. the evidence for a primitive human pairing-season in Westermarck, 25.

[484] Purity of life is sometimes required of those who are to kindle the new fire (Frazer, iii. 260, 302).

[485] H. Spencer, _Principles of Psychology_, ii. 629; K. Groos, _Play of Man_, 361; Hirn, 25.

[486] Gummere, _G. O._ 331.

[487] Frazer, i. 217; iii. 258.

[488] Chaucer says of the Miller (_C. T._ prol. 548):

‘At wrastlynge he wolde have alwey the ram’;

and of Sir Thopas (_C. T._ 13670):

‘Of wrastlynge was ther noon his peer,
Ther any ram shal stonde.’

Strutt, 82, figures a wrestling from _Royal MS._ 2, B. viii, with a cock set on a pole as the prize.

[489] Cf. Appendix I., and Frazer, ii. 316; Jevons, _Plutarch_, lxix. 143, on the struggle between two wards--the Sacred Way and the Subura--for the head of the October Horse at Rome.

[490] Haddon, 270. The tug-of-war reappears in Korea and Japan as a ceremony intended to secure a good harvest.

[491] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv. _Bandyball_, _Camp_, _Football_, _Hockey_, _Hood_, _Hurling_, _Shinty_. These games, in which the ball is fought for, are distinct from those already mentioned as having a ceremonial use, in which it is amicably tossed from player to player (cf. p. 128). If _Golf_ belongs to the present category, it is a case in which the endeavour seems to be actually to bury the ball. It is tempting to compare the name _Hockey_ with the _Hock-cart_ of the harvest festival, and with _Hock-tide_; but it does not really seem to be anything but _Hookey_. The original of both the hockey-stick and the golf-club was probably the shepherd’s crook. Mr. Pepys tried to cast stones with a shepherd’s crook on those very Epsom downs where the stockbroker now foozles his tee shot.

[492] _F. L._ vii. 345; M. Shearman, _Athletics and Football_, 246; Haddon, 271; Gomme, _Vill. Comm._ 240; Ditchfield, 57, 64; W. Fitzstephen, _Vita S. Thomae_ (†1170-82) in _Mat. for Hist. of Becket_ (R. S.), iii. 9, speaks of the ‘lusum pilae celebrem’ in London ‘die quae dicitur Carnilevaria.’ Riley, 571, has a London proclamation of 1409 forbidding the levy of money for ‘foteballe’ and cok-thresshyng.’ At Chester the annual Shrove Tuesday football on the Roodee was commuted for races in 1540 (_Hist. MSS._ viii. 1. 362). At Dublin there was, in 1569, a Shrove Tuesday ‘riding’ of the ‘occupacions’ each ‘bearing balles’ (Gilbert, ii. 54).

[493] Haddon, _loc. cit._; Gomme, _loc. cit._; _Gloucester F. L._ 38. Cf. the _conflictus_ described in ch. ix, and the classical parallels in Frazer, _Pausanias_, iii. 267.

[494] _F. L._ iii. 441; Ditchfield, 85.

[495] _F. L._ vii. 330 (a very full account); viii. 72, 173; Ditchfield, 50. There is a local aetiological myth about a lady who lost her hood on a windy day, and instituted the contest in memory of the event.

[496] Mrs. Gomme, s. v. _Oranges and Lemons_.

[497] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv.

[498] Dyer, 6, 481. ‘Stang’ is a word, of Scandinavian origin, for ‘pole’ or ‘stake.’ The Scandinavian _nið-stöng_ (scorn-stake) was a horse’s head on a pole, with a written curse and a likeness of the man to be ill-wished (Vigfusson, _Icel. Dict._ s. v. _níð_).

[499] Cf. with Mr. Barrett’s account, Northall, 253; Ditchfield, 178; _Northern F. L._ 29; Julleville, _Les Com._ 205; also Thomas Hardy’s _Mayor of Casterbridge_, and his _The Fire at Tranter Sweatley’s_ (_Wessex Poems_, 201). The penalty is used by schoolboys (_Northern F. L._ 29) as well as villagers.

[500] Grenier, 375; Ducange, s. v. _Charivarium_, which he defines as ‘ludus turpis tinnitibus et clamoribus variis, quibus illudunt iis, qui ad secundas convolant nuptias.’ He refers to the statutes of Melun cathedral (1365) in _Instrumenta Hist. Eccl. Melud._ ii. 503. Cf. _Conc. of Langres_ (1404) ‘ludo quod dicitur Chareuari, in quo utuntur larvis in figura daemonum, et horrenda ibidem committuntur’; _Conc. of Angers_ (1448), c. 12 (Labbé, xiii. 1358) ‘pulsatione patellarum, pelvium et campanarum, eorum oris et manibus sibilatione, instrumento aeruginariorum, sive fabricantium, et aliarum rerum sonorosarum, vociferationibus tumultuosis et aliis ludibriis et irrisionibus, in illo damnabili actu (qui cariuarium, vulgariter _charivari_, nuncupatur) circa domos nubentium, et in ipsorum detestationem et opprobrium post eorum secundas nuptias fieri consuetum, &c.’

[501] Cf. ch. xvi, and Leber, ix. 148, 169; Julleville, _Les Com._ 205, 243. In 1579 a regular _jeu_ was made by the Dijon _Mère-Folle_ of the _chevauchée_ of one M. Du Tillet. The text is preserved in _Bibl. Nat. MS._ 24039 and analysed by M. Petit de Julleville.

[502] In Berks a draped horse’s head is carried, and the proceeding known as a Hooset Hunt (Ditchfield, 178).

[503] Ducange, s. v. _Asini caudam in manu tenens_.

[504] Julleville, _Les Com._ 207.

[505] So on Ilchester Meads, where the proceeding is known as Mommets or Mommicks (Barrett, 65).

[506] On Hock-tide and the Hock-play generally see Brand-Ellis, i. 107; Strutt, 349; Sharpe, 125; Dyer, 188; S. Denne, _Memoir on Hokeday_ in _Archaeologia_, vii. 244.

[507] Cf. Appendix H. An allusion to the play by Sir R. Morrison (†1542) is quoted in chap. xxv.

[508] Laneham, or his informant, actually said, in error, 1012. On the historical event see Ramsay, i. 353.

[509] There were performers both on horse and on foot. Probably hobby-horses were used, for Jonson brings in Captain Cox ‘in his Hobby-horse,’ which was ‘foaled in Queen Elizabeth’s time’ in the _Masque of Owls_ (ed. Cunningham, iii. 188).

[510] Cf. _Representations_, s. v. Coventry.

[511] Rossius, _Hist. Regum Angliae_ (ed. Hearne, 1716), 105 ‘in cuius signum usque hodie illa die vulgariter dicta Hox Tuisday ludunt in villis trahendo cordas partialiter cum aliis iocis.’ Rous, who died 1491, is speaking of the death of Hardicanute. On the event see Ramsay, i. 434. Possibly both events were celebrated in the sixteenth century at Coventry. Two of the three plays proposed for municipal performance in 1591 were the ‘Conquest of the Danes’ and the ‘History of Edward the Confessor.’ These were to be upon the ‘pagens,’ and probably they were more regular dramas than the performance witnessed by Elizabeth in 1575 (_Representations_, s. v. Coventry).

[512] Leland, _Collectanea_ (ed. Hearne), v. 298 ‘uno certo die heu usitato (_forsan_ Hoc vocitato) hoc solempni festo paschatis transacto, mulieres homines, alioque die homines mulieres ligare, ac cetera media utinam non inhonesta vel deteriora facere moliantur et exercere, lucrum ecclesiae fingentes, set dampnum animae sub fucato colore lucrantes, &c.’ Riley, 561, 571, gives London proclamations against ‘hokkyng’ of 1405 and 1409.

[513] Brand-Ellis, i. 113; Lysons, _Environs of London_, i. 229; C. Kerry, _Accts. of St. Lawrence, Reading_; Hobhouse, 232; _N. E. D._ s. vv. _Hock_, &c.

[514] Owen and Blakeway, _Hist. of Shrewsbury_, i. 559.

[515] Dyer, 191; Ditchfield, 90.

[516] _N. E. D._ s. v. _Hock-day_.

[517] Brand-Ellis, i. 106.

[518] Ibid. i. 109.

[519] Ducange, s. v. _Prisio_; Barthélemy, iv. 463. On Innocents’ Day, the customs of taking in bed and whipping were united (cf. ch. xii).

[520] _Northern F. L._ 84; Brand-Ellis, i. 94, 96; Vaux, 242; Ditchfield, 80; Dyer, 133.

[521] Brand-Ellis, i. 106; Owen and Blakeway, i. 559; Dyer, 173; Ditchfield, 90; Burne-Jackson, 336; _Northern F. L._ 84; Vaux, 242. A dignified H. M. I. is said to have made his first official visit to Warrington on Easter Monday, and to have suffered accordingly. Miss Burne describes sprinkling as an element in Shropshire heaving.

[522] Belethus, c. 120 ‘notandum quoque est in plerisque regionibus secundo die post Pascha mulieres maritos suos verberare ac vicissim viros eas tertio die.’ The spiritually minded Belethus explains the custom as a warning to keep from carnal intercourse.

[523] Dyer, 79; Ditchfield, 83.

[524] Brand-Ellis, i. 114; Ditchfield, 252. Mr. W. Crooke has just studied this and analogous customs in _The Lifting of the Bride_ (_F. L._ xiii. 226).

[525] _Suffolk F. L._ 69; _F. L._ v. 167. The use of _largess_, a Norman-French word (_largitio_), is curious. It is also used for the subscriptions to Lancashire gyst-ales (Dyer, 182).

[526] Ditchfield, 155.

[527] Frazer, ii. 233; Pfannenschmidt, 93.

[528] Haddon, 335; Grosse, 167; Herbert Spencer in _Contemp. Review_ (1895), 114; Groos, _Play of Man_, 88, 354. Evidence for the wide use of the dance at savage festivals is given by Wallaschek, 163, 187.

[529] Grimm, i. 39; Pearson, ii. 133; Müllenhoff, _Germania_, ch. 24, and _de antiq. Germ. poesi chorica_, 4; Kögel, i. 1. 8. The primitive word form should have been _laikaz_, whence Gothic _laiks_, O. N. _leikr_, O. H. G. _leih_, A.-S. _lâc_. The word has, says Müllenhoff, all the senses ‘_Spiel, Tanz, Gesang, Opfer, Aufzug_.’ From the same root come probably _ludus_, and possibly, through the Celtic, the O. F. _lai_. The A.-S. _lâc_ is glossed _ludus_, _sacrificium_, _victima_, _munus_. It occurs in the compounds _ecga-gelâc_ and _sveorða-gelâc_, both meaning ‘sword-dance,’ _sige-lâc_, ‘victory-dance,’ _as-lâc_, ‘god-dance,’ _wine-lâc_, ‘love-dance’ (cf. p. 170), &c. An A.-S. synonym for _lâc_ is _plega_, ‘play,’ which gives _sweord-plega_ and _ecg-plega_. _Spil_ is not A.-S. and _spilian_ is a loan-word from O. H. G.

[530] Gummere, _B. P._ 328; Kögel, i. 1. 6.

[531] S. Ambrose, _de Elia et Ieiunio_, c. 18 (_P. L._ xiv. 720), _de Poenitentia_, ii. 6 (_P. L._ xvi. 508); S. Augustine, _contra Parmenianum_, iii. 6 (_P. L._ xliii. 107); S. Chrysostom, _Hom._ 47 _in Iulian. mart._ p. 613; _Hom._ 23 _de Novilun._ p. 264; _C. of Laodicea_ (†366), c. 53 (Mansi, ii. 571). Cf. _D. C. A._ s. v. Dancing, and ch. i. Barthélemy, ii. 438, and other writers have some rather doubtful theories as to liturgical dancing in early Christian worship; cf. Julian. _Dict. of Hymn._ 206.

[532] Du Méril, _Com._ 67; Pearson, ii. 17, 281; Gröber, ii. 1. 444; Kögel, i. 1. 25; _Indiculus Superstitionum_ (ed. Saupe), 10 ‘de sacrilegiis per ecclesias.’ Amongst the prohibitions are Caesarius of Arles (†542), _Sermo_ xiii. (_P. L._ xxxix. 2325) ‘quam multi rustici et quam multae mulieres rusticanae cantica diabolica, amatoria et turpia memoriter retinent et ore decantant’; _Const. Childeberti_ (c. 554) _de abol. relig. idololatriae_ (Mansi, ix. 738) ‘noctes pervigiles cum ebrietate, scurrilitate, vel canticis, etiam in ipsis sacris diebus, pascha, natale Domini, et reliquis festivitatibus, vel adveniente die Dominico dansatrices per villas ambulare ... nullatenus fieri permittimus’; _C. of Auxerre_ (573-603), c. 9 (Maassen, i. 180) ‘non licet in ecclesia choros secularium vel puellarum cantica exercere nec convivia in ecclesia praeparare’; _C. of Chalons_ (639-54), c. 19 (Maassen, i. 212) ‘Valde omnibus noscetur esse decretum, ne per dedicationes basilicarum aut festivitates martyrum ad ipsa solemnia confluentes obscoena et turpia cantica, dum orare debent aut clericos psallentes audire, cum choris foemineis, turpia quidem decantare videantur. unde convenit, ut sacerdotes loci illos a septa basilicarum vel porticus ipsarum basilicarum etiam et ab ipsis atriis vetare debeant et arcere.’ _Sermo Eligii_ (Grimm, iv. 1737) ‘nullus in festivitate S. Ioannis vel quibuslibet sanctorum solemnitatibus solstitia aut vallationes vel saltationes aut caraulas aut cantica diabolica exerceat’; _Iudicium Clementis_ (†693), c. 20 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 226) ‘si quis in quacunque festivitate ad ecclesiam veniens pallat foris, aut saltat, aut cantat orationes amatorias ... excommunicetur’ (apparently a fragment of a penitential composed by Clement or Willibrord, an A.-S. missionary to Frisia, on whom see Bede, _H. E._ v. 9, and the only dance prohibition of possible A.-S. _provenance_ of which I know); _Statuta Salisburensia_ (Salzburg: †800; Boretius, i. 229) ‘Ut omnis populus ... absque inlecebroso canticu et lusu saeculari cum laetaniis procedant’; _C. of Mainz_ (813), c. 48 (Mansi, xiv. 74) ‘canticum turpe atque luxuriosum circa ecclesias agere omnino contradicimus’; _C. of Rome_ (826), c. 35 (Mansi, xiv. 1008) ‘sunt quidam, et maxime mulieres, qui festis ac sacris diebus atque sanctorum natalitiis non pro eorum quibus debent delectantur desideriis advenire, sed ballando, verba turpia decantando, choros tenendo ac ducendo, similitudinem paganorum peragendo, advenire procurant’; cf. _Dicta abbatis Pirminii_ (Caspari, _Kirchenhistorische Anecdota_, 188); _Penitentiale pseudo-Theodorianum_ (Wasserschleben, 607); _Leonis IV Homilia_ (847, Mansi, xiv. 895); Benedictus Levita, _Capitularia_ (†850), vi. 96 (_M. G. H. Script._ iv. 2); and for Spain, _C. of Toledo_ (589), c. 23 (Mansi, ix. 999), and the undated _C. of Braga_, c. 80 (quoted on p. 144). Cf. also the denunciations of the _Kalends_ (ch. xi and Appendix N). Nearly four centuries after the _C. of Rome_ we find the _C. of Avignon_ (1209), c. 17 (Mansi, xxii. 791) ‘statuimus, ut in sanctorum vigiliis in ecclesiis historicae saltationes, obscoeni motus, seu choreae non fiant, nec dicantur amatoria carmina, vel cantilenae ibidem....’ Still later the _C. of Bayeux_ (1300), c. 31 (Mansi, xxv. 66) ‘ut dicit Augustinus, melius est festivis diebus fodere vel arare, quam choreas ducere’; and so on _ad infinitum_. The pseudo-Augustine _Sermo_, 265, _de Christiano nomine cum operibus non Christianis_ (_P. L._ xxxix. 2237), which is possibly by Caesarius of Arles, asserts explicitly the pagan character of the custom: ‘isti enim infelices et miseri homines, qui balationes et saltationes ante ipsas basilicas sanctorum exercere non metuunt nec erubescunt, etsi Christiani ad ecclesiam venerint, pagani de ecclesia revertuntur; quia ista consuetudo balandi de paganorum observatione remansit.’ A mediaeval preacher (quoted by A. Lecoy de la Marche, _Chaire française au Moyen Âge_, 447, from _B. N. Lat. MS._ 17509, f. 146) declares, ‘chorea enim circulus est cuius centrum est diabolus, et omnes vergunt ad sinistrum.’

[533] Tille, _D. W._ 301; G. Raynaud, in _Études dédiées à Gaston Paris_, 53; E. Schröder, _Die Tänzer von Kölbigk_, in _Z. f. Kirchengeschichte_, xvii. 94; G. Paris, in _Journal des Savants_ (1899), 733.

[534] H. E. Reynolds, _Wells Cathedral_, 85 ‘cum ex choreis ludis et spectaculis et lapidum proiectionibus in praefata ecclesia et eius cemeteriis ac claustro dissentiones sanguinis effusiones et violentiae saepius oriantur et in hiis dicta Wellensis ecclesia multa dispendia patiatur.’

[535] Menestrier, _Des Ballets anciens et modernes_ (1863), 4; on other French church dances, cf. Du Tilliot, 21; Barthélemy, iv. 447; Leber, ix. 420. The most famous are the _pilota_ of Auxerre, which was accompanied with ball-play (cf. ch. vi) and the _bergeretta_ of Besançon. Julian, _Dict. of Hymn._ 206, gives some English examples.

[536] Grove, 106. A full account of the ceremony at the feast of the Conception in 1901 is given in the _Church Times_ for Jan. 17, 1902.

[537] Grove, 103; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 430; _Mélusine_ (1879), 39; _N. and Q._ for May 17, 1890. The dance is headed by the clergy, and proceeds to a traditional tune from the banks of the Sûre to the church, up sixty-two steps, along the north aisle, round the altar _deasil_, and down the south aisle. It is curious that until the seventeenth century only _men_ took part in it. St. Willibrord is famous for curing nervous diseases, and the pilgrimage is done by way of vow for such cures. The local legend asserts that the ceremony had its origin in an eighth-century cattle-plague, which ceased through an invocation of St. Willibrord: it is a little hard on the saint, whose prohibition of dances at the church-door has just been quoted.

[538] Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 409. A similarly named saint, St. Martial, was formerly honoured in the same way. Every psalm on his day ended, not with the _Gloria Patri_, but with a dance, and the chant, ‘Saint-Marceau, pregas per nous, et nous epingaren per vous’ (Du Méril, _La Com._ 68).

[539] Cf. p. 26. There were ‘madinnis that dansit’ before James IV of Scotland at Forres, Elgin and Dernway in 1504, but nothing is said of songs (_L. H. T. Accounts_, ii. 463).

[540] _Carm. Bur._ 191:

‘ludunt super gramina virgines decorae
quarum nova carmina dulci sonant ore.’

_Ibid._ 195:

‘ecce florescunt lilia,
et virginum dant agmina
summo deorum carmina.’

[541] W. Fitzstephen, _Descriptio Londin_. (_Mat. for Hist. of Becket_, R. S. iii. 11) ‘puellarum Cytherea ducit choros usque imminente luna, et pede libero pulsatur tellus.’

[542] Jeanroy, 102, 387; Guy, 504; Paris, _Journal des Savants_ (1892), 407. M. Paris points out that dances, other than professional, first appear in the West after the fall of the Empire. The French terms for dancing--_baller_, _danser_, _treschier_, _caroler_--are not Latin. Caroler, however, he thinks to be the Greek χοραυλεῖν, ‘to accompany a dance with a flute.’ But the French _carole_ was always accompanied, not with a flute, but with a sung _chanson_.

[543] Paris, _loc. cit._ 410; Jeanroy, 391. In Wace’s description of Arthur’s wedding, the women _carolent_ and the men _behourdent_. Cf. Bartsch, _Romanzen und Pastourellen_, i. 13:

‘Cez damoiseles i vont por caroler,
cil escuier i vont por behorder,
cil chevalier i vont por esgarder.’

[544] On the return of Edward II and Isabella of France in 1308, the mayor and other dignitaries of London went ‘coram rege et regina karolantes’ (_Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II_, R. S. i. 152). On the birth of Prince Edward in 1312, they ‘menerent la karole’ in church and street (Riley, 107).

[545] Kögel, i. 1. 6.

[546] Mrs. Gomme, ii. 228; Haddon, 345.

[547] Cf. ch. vi on the motion _deasil_ round the sacred object. It is curious that the modern round dances go _withershins_ round a room. Grimm, i. 52, quotes Gregory the Great, _Dial._ iii. 28 on a Lombard sacrifice, ‘caput caprae, hoc ei, per circuitum currentes, carmine nefando dedicantes.’

[548] At Bradford-on-Avon, Wilts (which preserves its Anglo-Saxon church), and at South Petherton, Somerset, in both cases on Shrove Tuesday (Mrs. Gomme, ii. 230); cf. Vaux, 18. The church at Painswick, Gloucester, is danced round on wake-day (_F. L._ viii. 392). There is a group of games, in which the players wind and unwind in spirals round a centre. Such are _Eller Tree_, _Wind up the Bush Faggot_, and _Bulliheisle_. These Mrs. Gomme regards as survivals of the ritual dance round a sacred tree. Some obscure references in the rhymes used to ‘dumplings’ and ‘a bundle of rags’ perhaps connect themselves with the cereal cake and the rags hung on the tree for luck. In Cornwall such a game is played under the name of ‘Snail’s Creep’ at certain village feasts in June, and directed by young men with leafy branches.

[549] Du Méril, _La Com._ 72; Haddon, 346; Grove, 50, 81; Haigh, 14; N. W. Thomas, _La Danse totémique en Europe_, in _Actes d. Cong. intern. d. Trad. pop._ (1900).

[550] Plot, _Hist. of Staffs._ (1686); _F. L._ iv. 172; vii. 382 (with cuts of properties); Ditchfield, 139.

[551] The O. H. G. _hîleih_, originally meaning ‘sex-dance,’ comes to be ‘wedding.’ The root _hi_, like _wini_ (cf. p. 170), has a sexual connotation (Pearson, ii. 132; Kögel, i. 1. 10).

[552] Coussemaker, _Chants populaires des Flamands de France_, 100:

‘In den hemel is eenen dans:
Alleluia.
Daer dansen all’ de maegdekens:
Benedicamus Domino,
Alleluia, Alleluia.
‘t is voor Amelia:
Alleluia.
Wy dansen naer de maegdekens:
Benedicamus, etc.’

[553] Frazer, i. 35; Dyer, 7; Northall, 233. A Lancashire song is sung ‘to draw you these cold winters away,’ and wishes ‘peace and plenty’ to the household. A favourite French May _chanson_ is

‘Étrennez notre épousée,
Voici le mois,
Le joli mois de Mai,
Étrennez notre épousée
En bonne étrenne.
Voici le mois,
Le joli mois de Mai,
Qu’on vous amène.’

If the _quêteurs_ come on a churl, they have an ill-wishing variant. The following is characteristic of the French peasantry:

‘J’vous souhaitons autant d’enfants,
Qu’y a des pierrettes dans les champs.’

Often more practical tokens of revenge are shown. The Plough Monday ‘bullocks’ in some places consider themselves licensed to plough up the ground before a house where they have been rebuffed.’

[554] Mrs. Gomme, ii. 1, 399; Haddon, 343; Du Méril, _La Com._ 81. Amongst the _jeux_ of the young Gargantua (Rabelais, i. 22) was one ‘à semer l’avoyne et au laboureur.’ This probably resembled the games of _Oats and Beans and Barley_, and _Would you know how doth the Peasant?_ which exist in English, French, Catalonian, and Italian versions. On the mimetic character of these games, cf. ch. viii.

[555] Text from _Harl. MS._ 978 in H. E. Wooldridge, _Oxford Hist. of Music_, i. 326, with full account. The music, to which religious as well as the secular words are attached, is technically known as a _rota_ or _rondel_. It is of the nature of polyphonic part-song, and of course more advanced than the typical mediaeval _rondet_ can have been.

[556] On these songs in general, see Northall, 233; Martinengo-Cesaresco, 249; Cortet, 153; Tiersot, 191; Jeanroy, 88; Paris, _J. des Savants_ (1891), 685, (1892), 155, 407.

[557] H. A. Wilson, _Hist. of Magd. Coll._ (1899), 50. Mr. Wilson discredits the tradition that the performance began as a mass for the obit of Henry VII. The hymn is printed in Dyer, 259; Ditchfield, 96. It has no relation to the summer festival, having been written in the seventeenth century by Thomas Smith and set by Benjamin Rogers as a grace. In other cases hymns have been attached to the village festivals. At Tissington the well-dressing,’ on Ascension Day includes a clerical procession in which ‘Rock of Ages’ and ‘A Living Stream’ are sung (Ditchfield, 187). A special ‘Rushbearers’ Hymn’ was written for the Grasmere Rushbearing in 1835, and a hymn for St. Oswald has been recently added (E. G. Fletcher, _The Rushbearing_, 13, 74).

[558] Dyer, 240, from Hertfordshire. There are many other versions; cf. Northall, 240.

[559] Kögel, i. 1. 32.

[560] Pertz, _Leges_, i. 68 ‘nullatenus ibi uuinileodos scribere vel mittere praesumat.’ Kögel, i. 1. 61: Goedeke, i. 11, quote other uses of the term from eighth-century glosses, e.g. ‘_uuiniliod_, cantilenas saeculares, psalmos vulgares, seculares, plebeios psalmos, cantica rustica et inepta.’ _Winiliod_ is literally ‘love-song,’ from root _wini_ (conn. with _Venus_). Kögel traces an earlier term O. H. G. _winileih_, A.-S. _winelâc_ = _hîleih_. On the erotic motive in savage dances, cf. Grosse, 165, 172; Hirn, 229.

[561] _Romania_, vii. 61; _Trad. Pop._ i. 98. Mr. Swinburne has adapted the idea of this poem in _A Match_ (_Poems and Ballads_, 1st Series, 116).

[562] _Romania_, ix. 568.

[563] K. Bartsch, _Chrest. Prov._ 111. A similar _chanson_ is in G. Raynaud, _Motets_, i. 151, and another is described in the _roman_ of _Flamenca_ (ed. P. Meyer), 3244. It ends

‘E, si parla, qu’il li responda:
Nom sones mot, faitz vos en lai,
Qu’entre mos bracs mos amics j’ai.
Kalenda maia. E vai s’ en.’

[564] _Trimousette_, from _trî mâ câ_, an unexplained burden in some of the French _maierolles_.

[565] Guy, 503.

[566] Tiersot, _Robin et Marion_; Guy, 506. See the refrain in Bartsch, 197, 295; Raynaud, _Rec. de Motets_, i. 227.

[567] Langlois, _Robin et Marion: Romania_, xxiv. 437; H. Guy, _Adan de la Hale_, 177; J. Tiersot, _Sur le Jeu de Robin et Marion_ (1897); Petit de Julleville, _La Comédie_, 27; _Rep. Com._ 21, 324. A _jeu_ of _Robin et Marion_ is recorded also as played at Angers in 1392, but there is no proof that this was Adan de la Hale’s play, or a drama at all. There were folk going ‘desguiziez, à un jeu que l’en dit Robin et Marion, ainsi qu’il est accoutumé de fere, chacun an, en les foiries de Penthecouste’ (Guy, 197). The best editions of _Robin et Marion_ are those by E. Langlois (1896), and by Bartsch in _La Langue et la Littérature françaises_ (1887), col. 523. E. de Coussemaker, _Œuvres de Adam de la Halle_ (1872), 347, gives the music, and A. Rambeau, _Die dem Trouvère Adam de la Halle zugeschriebenen Dramen_ (1886), facsimiles the text. On Adan de la Hale’s earlier _sottie_ of _La Feuillée_, see ch. xvi.

[568] Thomas Wright, _Lyrical Poems of the Reign of Edward I_ (Percy Soc.).

[569] Cf. ch. xvii.

[570] The May-game is probably intended by the ‘Whitsun pastorals’ of _Winter’s Tale_, iv. 4. 134, and the ‘pageants of delight’ at Pentecost, where a boy ‘trimmed in Madam Julias gown’ played ‘the woman’s part’ (i. e. Maid Marian) of _Two Gentlemen of Verona_, iv. 4. 163. Cf. also W. Warner, _Albion’s England_, v. 25:

‘At Paske began our Morrise, and ere Penticost our May.’

[571] _Flores Historiarum_ (R. S.), iii. 130 ‘aestimo quod rex aestivalis sis; forsitan hyemalis non eris.’

[572] Cf. Appendix E.