Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/245

 Bibliographical Notes. 233

to find the entrance to its old home, with the result of disturbing the survivors. The practice of burying living animals beneath the walls of a building survives to this day ; the usage is a survival of foundation sacri- fice. The idea seems to be that the spirit of the victim may watch the boundary, and exclude evil demons ; thus in Fyn, a ghost had its walk through the gate, but a dog being interred in the entrance, the ghost was compelled to stay outside. The same usages were anciently applied to protect the boundary of the village, or the shore of the sea, from the en- croaching ocean. The guardian spirit of a church is still supposed to watch the place, and prevent profanation ; if the old custom of burying a living animal is dispensed with, it is supposed that the first person buried in the churchyard will be appointed as guardian. As the writer points out, the thought of a sacrifice to a mysterious power may also have been work- ing in the minds of the persons who have buried the animals.

Dr. Stanislas Prato discusses the symbol of the vase, noting the myth of Pandora, and the manner in which, in a Brazilian legend, transformations result from the prohibited opening of a tucuman kernel containing animals of might. He sets forth the modern symbolism of the vessel, and exam- ines the tales connected with the choice of the caskets in Shakespeare's " Merchant of Venice."

N. B. Emerson abstracts the Hawaiian version of the Maui-legend ; in his report Maui appears as a transformer akin to the familiar figure of Ameri- can aboriginal mythology ; Maui obtains the secret of fire, hitherto only known to the mud-hen, and delays the overrapid course of the Sun by breaking off the rays which stand out from his body, like spines from a sea-urchin, thus weakening the luminary. Maui, in spite of his beneficent activity, appears as a very dissolute and generally worthless personage, who is finally killed for thieving by the great gods. The activity of this trans- former, therefore, altogether answers to the character of the American one, according to the view set forth by Dr. Boas in the publication forming the sixth volume of the " Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society," who regards the purposes of the agent of transformation as purely selfish.

Brief tales recorded by W. W. Gill from the atoll of Manahiki are in- teresting, in that they show how the general idea of the giant-queller is modified by the environment ; Tamaro kills a white shark, and finds a subaqueous paradise in the home of the fish-god.

Under the title of "An Ancient Egyptian Creation Myth," A. Wiede- mann gives an account of the legend contained in the hieratic papyrus, No. 10,188 of the British Museum, found at Thebes in i860. This papyrus, although only dated from the year 306-5 B. c, gives a narration which, in the view of Wiedemann, is of great antiquity, antedating other Egyptian legends on the subject, and belonging to a period earlier than the time of the pyramids. The myth deals with Ra, the sun-god, as creator, from the first existing together with the primordial waters. Ra is conceived as human in shape, the visible sun being his eye ; he raises heaven and earth from the waters. Afterwards, from him, by a process answering to that of male generation, arise the divine pair, Shu and Tefnut,

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