Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/367

 ii s. i. APR. so, mo.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

359

on

Modern Greek Folk-lore and Ancient Greek Religion. By J. C. Lawson. (Cambridge University

Press.)

A QUARTER of a century ago we were surprised to learn from the late Mr. Theodore Bent's charm- ing volume ' The Cyclades ' what a large amount of old Hellenic custom and belief was still alive among the insular Greeks of the present day ; and more recently Mr. G. F. Abbott in his ' Mace- donian Folk-lore ' has garnered further material of the same kind from the mainland.

In the present volume of researches, which he describes as " a study in survivals," Mr. Lawson, one of Cambridge's wandering scholars, has made a much more thorough and exhaustive investiga- tion of the traces of the old pagan religion which linger under slight disguises among the Greek peasantry. Their Christianity, seems to have quietly appropriated, and then absorbed and assimilated, as many of the old heathen usages as it found itself unable to supplant or abolish, the concordat thus established being the popular religion.

Mr. Lawson has many new theories to advance which will challenge the attention of the classical scholar as well as of the folk-lorist. He maintains, e.g., that human sacrifices were originally offered with the intention of dispatching a messenger to the other world with tidings of importance. There is much in Comparative Religion to give counten- ance to this suggestion ; the brutal " customs " of the King of Dahomey are known to have been instigated by this idea. Other interpretations suggested by Mr. Lawson do not seem to carry equal conviction. The coin for Charos, the god of death, is so obviously a survival of the naulon due to Charon that we decline to take it, with Mr. Lawson, to be merely a prophylactic charm placed in the dead man's mouth to prevent any evil spirit making that his means of ingress. Where, if not in the mouth, could the dead man stow away the ferryman's fee, since the last gar- ment is proverbially made without pockets ?

Again, the burying of a lamp in the grave, which Mr. Lawson fancies to be an emblematic semblance of the cremation of the corpse, ought, we think, to be ranged with other forms of grave - offerings made for the behoof of the deceased in the darkness of the unexplored world, like the candle which Yorkshire folk used sometimes to place in the coffin. The lights kept burning on graves (p. 508) are capable of a similar explanation. \Vr cannot but think that a wider acquaintance with the folk-lore of other peoples would have saved the author from some improbable specula- tions.

A large, and indeed altogether disproportionate, amount of the work is devoted to the subject of vampyres, which, originally Slavonic, have now become the predominant bugbear of the Greek peasant. One name given to these creatures is arapia (p. 277), which, in company with the allied arapedes, water-demons that drag men down into wells or rivers (like our own " Jenny (uventeeth "), Mr. Lawson interprets as a modern transformation of " Arabs." This seems extremely

improbable. We venture to suggest that these words are derivatives, like Harpies (Harpyice), '' the seizers," and harpe, a bird of prey, from harpazd, to seize, with loss of the aspirate and an intruded vowel (compare the Greek arabulai, by the side of arbulai and harpides, Curtius, ii. 386). More satisfactory is the long and elaborate argu- ment in chap. ii. to establish a connexion between the modern ghoul Kantzaros or Kalli-Kantzaros and the ancient Kentauros or Centaur, and of both with the lycanthrope or were-wolf of other countries.

EVEN " a robust genius born to grapple with whole libraries " would find it difficult to keep pace with the flood of books which one year pro- duces at the present day. Fortunately, such labours of the sort as fall to the lot of the assidu- ous student of books are materially lightened by The English Catalogue of Books. The volume for 1909, issued for The Publishers' Circular by Messrs. Sampson Low, is before us, and wins the genuine gratitude which an invaluable book of reference evokes.

If we may dwell on a detail, we may express our regret that " writers with compound names are entered under the last part of the name, e.g. Gould (Sabine Baring^)." This seems to us something like revising the name a man chooses to bear, and bound to lead to oddities, if not absurdities. It is probable, for instance, that some of the great family of Smith have deli- berately helped themselves to an addition which facilitates memory of, or research for, their names. Why should they then fall back here into the general herd ?

The ' Analysis of Books published in 1909 ' offers one remarkable fact : " This year, for the first time, the number of books recorded is over 10,000, the actual figures being 10,725. This is an increase of 904 upon last year's figures."

This " record," to use common slang, is not one which can be viewed with undiluted pleasure. Even if, as is stated, new editions have gone up, there remains an immense mass of books which no serious reader wants, and which complicate further the difficulty of selecting what is really noteworthy. Reckless compilers obscure the merits of earlier books of authority from which they derive much of their matter and a super- ficial air of confidence.

WE are always glad to have new issues of " The Little Guides " of Messrs. Methuen. The latest to appear is Nottinghamshire, by Everard L Guilford, which gives in an easily accessible form a great deal of information about the county. There is so much to record that compression is necessary, a process that has been well performed. In all the details that we have looked for we find accurate information ; and there are several illustrations which show how rich Nottingham-- shire is in ancient buildings of note.

Cornwall, by S. Baring-Gould, has been added to - the " Cambridge County Geographies " (Cam- bridge University Press). We have already praised some of these attractive little books, which have probably by this time secured a vogue in- dependent of criticism. Mr. Baring-Gould is an experienced writer and knows Cornwall well. He is also a master of what may be called the human and picturesque side of history.