Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/251

 Animal Superstitions and Toteinisni. 239

relics of the pilgrims who crossed the mountains on their way to Rome. Mrs. Partington with her broom has never seemed to me quite an ideal figure.

I. 2. The Animal Tabooed or Sacrosanct.

I now turn to the taboos. This section is highly impor- tant on its own account, but inasmuch as it exemplifies that local character of superstitions on which I have laid so much stress, it is not too much to say that it is the one on which more than any other the theory must stand or fall.

(a) The Animal must not be Killed.

To the list of animals which enjoy a local sanctity may be prefixed those which seem to be respected everywhere — the stork, robin, swallow, ladybird. They are, however, like many other animals on this list, either killed or carried in proces- sion annually.

The following are respected locally : — Bat: Baschurch (Salop). ^

Bee : Russia, Normandy, Prague, and many other places.^ Beetle: Reutlingen (Swabia).^ Blackbird : Salop, Montgomeryshire.* Butterfly, white : Llanidloes.^

coloured : W. Scotland.^

Cat : Zielensig (Mark), Berlin, Niederlausitz,t Prague, Bavaria, parts of France, Thuringia, N.E. Scotland, &c.'^ Cockchafer : parts of Germany.^

' Burne, p. 214.

- De Gubernatis, p. 507 n. ; De Nore, p. 270 ; Grohmann, No. 602.

^ MS. note.


 * Burne, p. 214; MS. note.

" Napier, p. 116.
 * Mont. Coll., X., 260.

■^ Z. des V.fiir V., i., 182, viii., 399; Z. fiir Eth., xv., 90 ; MS. note; Grohmann, No. 357; Liebrecht, No. 645 Witzschel, ii., 277; Gregor, p. 123. 8 Am Urdksbr., Oct., 1S82, p. 15.