Page:The Journal of English and Germanic Philology Volume 18.djvu/421

 The Origin of the German Carnival Comedy 417 The custom is also known as the expulsion of Winter in Germany and other parts of Europe. 103 When performed on Shrove Tuesday or Ash Wednesday, 104 the ceremony of the expulsion of Death or Winter was pretty generally known as the Burial of the Carnival (Shrove Tuesday) in Germany as well as in France, Spain and other countries of Europe. 105 But the names of Death, Winter and Carnival seem to cover an ancient tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation. 106 The personification of Death, Winter or Carnival was effected by means of a leaf-clad actor called straw-man (Wild Man) or by an effigy. The leaf-clad mummer is often called Shrovetide Bear 107 or Carnival Fool. 108 When the original meaning of the ceremony was lost and the effigy was supposed to embody and to be responsible for all the excesses committed during the Carnival, 109 its execution was transferred to Ash Wednesday, and the ceremony was known as the burning of the Carnival Fool. 110 In analogy to Carnival, Lent, then, also obtained personification. 111 The effigy of Death is also known as Old Woman, 112 and that of Winter as Mrs. Winter or Ugly Woman, 113 or Winter's Grandmother, i.e., Old Woman or Witch. 114 In its simplest form the effigy of Death, Winter or Carnival was carried or carted out of the village, 115 or thrown over the boundary of the next village. 116 But it was also thrown into the water, beheaded, hanged, burned, not uncommonly, in the 103 Ibid., iv. 247, 260., ix. 404*?., x. 120. "*Ibid., iv. 209, 221, 226, 228^., x. 120. 106 Ibid., iv. 208-9, 222, 224-33. 106 Ibid., iv. 252sq., xi. 2sqq.; Chambers, op. cit., i. 186. 107 Cf. Frazer, op. cit., iv. 230. 108 /&*., iv. 231sq. Ibid., iv. 232. 110 We shall see later that the true Carnival Fool is not the representative of the dead vegetation spirit; cf. infra, p. 438. 111 Cf. Frazer, op. cit., iv. 227, 230, Ibid., iv. 237, 240, 243, x. 116, 120. Ibid., iv. 242sg. M Ibid.,x. 116. 115 Ibid., ii. Ksq., iv. 233, 252sg. 116 IMd. t iv. 237.