Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/538

 502 Reviews.

account of the fact that such customs may have grown up inde- pendently of one another, also among people who have had much intercourse among themselves or even blended together" (p. 9 sq.). Among the rites discussed in detail the following are of special interest. Anxious care is devoted to the grinding and cleaning of the wheat for the wedding feast, and the grit removed from it is not allowed to fall into strange hands, lest sorcery may be worked through it ; it is thrown into water to produce rain, or on the floor of the tent or house that there may be many guests — as many as the pieces of grit (p. 94 sq.). Bride and bridegroom are rubbed with a preparation of henna as a purification or protective against evil spirits, because it contains much sanctity {baraka) (pp. 118, 295). The pair are veiled not only to guard them against evil spirits, but because their " sanctity " is dangerous : any one who sees the bride is supposed to become blind (p. 169). The bridegroom is beaten by his friends possibly as "a ceremonial punishment because he is deserting their class, but it is expressly said to rid him of evil influences" (p. 120 sq.). Similarly, the mock fights between the parties of bride and bridegroom are modes of purification (pp. 128, 223, 245). The youth is dressed as a girl, or whiskers are painted on the bride's face as a sign of that assimilation between the pair which best serves the purpose of neutralizing the danger of sexual contact (pp. 27, 153). Stones are flung at the bride and her party so that she shall carry away all the evil of the village, or to rid her of evil, or as a safeguard against divorce (pp. 177, 190). The rites connected with the bride's arrival at her new home are designed with the intention of preventing her from conveying evil with her (p. 214 sq.). This seems to be one reason for throwing grain, flour, bread, fruits, and the like over her, though in some cases this may be a fertility charm (p. 216). She is lifted into her husband's house because the threshold is haunted by the Ginn, the result of that uncanny feeling which superstitious people are apt to experience when they first enter a dwelling, or as an expression of her reluctance to be given away in marriage (p. 220). When the bride throws her slipper at the bridegroom the intention may be to assert her pre- dominance in the household, or it may be a method of purifica- tion, while the old shoes thrown at her may be merely, as in an