Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/201

 '" Hook-Stvinging in India. 175

at least confused, by the English term '^\\ooV- sivinging'^ applied to the ceremon}-.

His treatment of it is to be found in a note on "Swinging as a magical rite," appended to The Dying God, the thought underlying the note being clear, I think, not only from that portion of the volume of which it is, so to speak, an expansion, but also from its opening sentence, which reads as follows: — "The custom of swinging has been practised as a religious or rather magical rite in various parts of the world, but it does not seem possible to explain all the instances of it in the same way." Illustrations are then given of people swinging in order to procure a plentiful supply of fish and game as well as good crops, the notion appearing to be that the ceremony promotes fertilit}', though why it should be supposed to do so Dr. Frazer con- fesses himself " unable to explain," He goes on to say that " There seem to be some reasons for thinking that the Indian rite of swinging on hooks run through the flesh of the performer is also resorted to, at least in some cases, from a belief in its fertilising virtue," and in support of this view a summary of Hamilton's description of the Karwar ceremony is given.''" "Sometimes," says Dr. Frazer, "this custom of swinging on hooks, which is known among the Hindoos as Churuk Puja, seems to be intended to propitiate demons," and the case is then cited in which certain Santals asked to be allowed to perform it because their women and children were dying of sickness, and their cattle being killed by wild beasts, believing that these misfortunes befell them because the evil spirits had not been appeased.^^

The theory that the Karwar ceremony may have taken place in order, as it was thought, to promote fertility I am not concerned to refute, for that it was very closely con- nected with the crops is unquestionable. Nor do I deny that the Santalis may in the instance referred to by Dr. ^'> Supra, pp. 157-8.

^^ Supra, pp. 1 70- 1. J. G. P'razer, The Dying God, pp. 277-9.