Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 26, 1915.djvu/425

 Collectanea. 4 1 1

•other parts of Spain) for preservation against or relief from hemor- rhoids or piles. ^

Fig. 30. An ovoid piece of material, seemingly similar in nature to the unidentified material of the object of Fig. 29, but finer grained, in a silver mounting. I obtained no information •concerning this.

Fig. 31. A compound amulet, for a woman, composed of a chain carrying {a) a globular milky and pinkish agate bead, mounted in silver; {B) two pierced date-stones; (r) a small opalescent glass bead ; and id) a deer's canine tooth in a silver socket ; Toledo. The agate bead is for the regulation of lactation and of menstruation. The date-stones are to secure abundant milk during nursing; such are quite commonly employed for this purpose at Toledo, and my informant had herself so used them. The opalescent bead is an object commonly used for lactation (cf. stipra, vol. xvii., p. 468, and vol. xxiv., p. 66). The deer's canine was said to be probably for the protection of a teething child, or possibly to be intended as a cure for toothache ; I think, however, that it, also, may be a lactation amulet, because it is creamy in colour, and rather drop-like in shape.

Fig. 32. A compound amulet, composed of a chain carrying [a) two perforated date-stones on a wire with {b) a globular bead of whitish and pinkish agate, whose zoning causes it to have somewhat the appearance of an eyeball, mounted in silver ; and {c) a small silver representation (inscribed " Neva ") of an image of the Virgin and Child. It is worth observing that both in this specimen and in the one above two date-stones are utilized ; I could gather no reason for the duplication, but I think that possibly it may be due to the two breasts which are to be affected.

In the earliest series of these notes I have illustrated and described {supra, vol. xvii., Fig. 32) another compound amulet of this kind, also from Toledo, comprising a red bead, a facetted

1 Rodriguez Lopez mentions (op. cit., p. 129) that in Galicia an "Indian chestnut " is carried in the pocket to prevent hemorrhoids or piles. In Italy, Bellucci records (op. cit.. Tablet xiv., No. 6) that a fruit of the " Indian chest- nut" (Aesculus Hippocastaniun L.), old and ■worm-eaten, is carried in the pocket as a cure for hemorrhoids.