Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/262

 250 Animal Superstitions and Toternisni.

(6) The animal is commonly either dismembered and dis- tributed, or eaten at a common meal. (7) There are traces of the common meal being confined to the kin in some cases, in others to the inhabitants of the locality. (8) In some cases cakes in the form of, or bearing the name of, the animal, are substituted for the animal itself.

I will now deal briefly with the three forms of sacrifice.

[a) The Hunt.

We have already seen that the wren is a taboo-animal in the west of Europe. There is, however, a widespread custom, discussed at length by Dr. Frazer in the Golden Bough, of hunting it annually; this hunt was commonly at Christmastide or New Year, but is also found at other periods of the year.'' The wren was usually killed in the process ; it was then carried round to all the houses, a feather being in some cases left at each house ; to this feather were attributed magical proper- ties. In other cases the bird was carried round alive. In Wales there are traces of a custom of roasting, i.e. eating the wren. In the Isle of Man the featherless body was buried.

Other customs of this type are the following : — Bull : Stamford."' Cock : Guben, Belgium.^ Deer : Oxfordshire at Whitsuntide, Epping Forest at Easter,

Ireland St. Martin's Day.^ Hare : Leicester, Coleshill, Caistor, and elsewhere in South

England at Easter, Llanfechain in October, Ireland on

St. Martin's Day.^

' Golden Bough, ii., 141 ff; Byegones, Sept., 1872, April 22, 1885: Notes and Queries, 4th S., ix., 25; Suffolk Folklore, 125 Ethiog. S., No. 199.

- Hone, 1482: <rf. F., vii., 385.

^ MS. note ; Reinsberg-Dtiringsfeld, 200.

•• F., viii., 310; Hone, ii., 460; F. L. R., iv., 108, cf. v., 166.

118; F, L. i?.,iv., 108.
 * F., iii., 442; Sussex Daily News, June 10, 1895; Mo7tt. Coll., xvii.,