Читать книгу The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 03 of 12) - Frazer James George - Страница 8

Spiritual dangers of eating and drinking and precautions taken against them.

In the opinion of savages the acts of eating and drinking are attended with special danger; for at these times the soul may escape from the mouth, or be extracted by the magic arts of an enemy present. Among the Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast “the common belief seems to be that the indwelling spirit leaves the body and returns to it through the mouth; hence, should it have gone out, it behoves a man to be careful about opening his mouth, lest a homeless spirit should take advantage of the opportunity and enter his body. This, it appears, is considered most likely to take place while the man is eating.”416 Precautions are therefore taken to guard against these dangers. Thus of the Battas of Sumatra it is said that “since the soul can leave the body, they always take care to prevent their soul from straying on occasions when they have most need of it. But it is only possible to prevent the soul from straying when one is in the house. At feasts one may find the whole house shut up, in order that the soul (tondi) may stay and enjoy the good things set before it.”417 The Zafimanelo in Madagascar lock their doors when they eat, and hardly any one ever sees them eating.418 In Shoa, one of the southern provinces of Abyssinia, the doors of the house are scrupulously barred at meals to exclude the evil eye, and a fire is invariably lighted, else devils would enter and there would be no blessing on the meat.419 Every time that an Abyssinian of rank drinks, a servant holds a cloth before his master to guard him from the evil eye.420 The Warua will not allow any one to see them eating and drinking, being doubly particular that no person of the opposite sex shall see them doing so. “I had to pay a man to let me see him drink; I could not make a man let a woman see him drink.” When offered a drink of pombe they often ask that a cloth may be held up to hide them whilst drinking. Further, every man and woman must cook for themselves; each person must have his own fire.421 The Tuaregs of the Sahara never eat or drink in presence of any one else.422 The Thompson Indians of British Columbia thought that a shaman could bewitch them most easily when they were eating, drinking, or smoking; hence they avoided doing any of these things in presence of an unknown shaman.423 In Fiji persons who suspected others of plotting against them avoided eating in their presence, or were careful to leave no fragment of food behind.424

Seclusion of kings at their meals.

If these are the ordinary precautions taken by common people, the precautions taken by kings are extraordinary. The king of Loango may not be seen eating or drinking by man or beast under pain of death. A favourite dog having broken into the room where the king was dining, the king ordered it to be killed on the spot. Once the king's own son, a boy of twelve years old, inadvertently saw the king drink. Immediately the king ordered him to be finely apparelled and feasted, after which he commanded him to be cut in quarters, and carried about the city with a proclamation that he had seen the king drink. “When the king has a mind to drink, he has a cup of wine brought; he that brings it has a bell in his hand, and as soon as he has delivered the cup to the king, he turns his face from him and rings the bell, on which all present fall down with their faces to the ground, and continue so till the king has drank… His eating is much in the same style, for which he has a house on purpose, where his victuals are set upon a bensa or table: which he goes to, and shuts the door: when he has done, he knocks and comes out. So that none ever see the king eat or drink. For it is believed that if any one should, the king shall immediately die.” The remnants of his food are buried, doubtless to prevent them from falling into the hands of sorcerers, who by means of these fragments might cast a fatal spell over the monarch.425 The rules observed by the neighbouring king of Cacongo were similar; it was thought that the king would die if any of his subjects were to see him drink.426 It is a capital offence to see the king of Dahomey at his meals. When he drinks in public, as he does on extraordinary occasions, he hides himself behind a curtain, or handkerchiefs are held up round his head, and all the people throw themselves with their faces to the earth.427 Any one who saw the Muata Jamwo (a great potentate in the Congo Basin) eating or drinking would certainly be put to death.428 When the king (Muata) of Cazembe raises his glass to his mouth to drink, all who are present prostrate themselves and avert their faces in such a manner as not to see him drinking.429 At Asaba, on the Lower Niger, where the kings or chiefs number fully four hundred, no one is allowed to prepare the royal dishes. The chiefs act as their own cooks and eat in the strictest privacy.430 The king and royal family of Walo, on the Senegal, never take their meals in public; it is expressly forbidden to see them eating.431 Among the Monbutto of central Africa the king invariably takes his meals in private; no one may see the contents of his dish, and all that he leaves is carefully thrown into a pit set apart for that purpose. Everything that the king has handled is held sacred and may not be touched.432 When the king of Unyoro in central Africa went to drink milk in the dairy, every man must leave the royal enclosure and all the women had to cover their heads till the king returned. No one might see him drink. One wife accompanied him to the dairy and handed him the milk-pot, but she turned away her face while he drained it.433 The king of Susa, a region to the south of Abyssinia, presides daily at the feast in the long banqueting-hall, but is hidden from the gaze of his subjects by a curtain.434 Among the Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast the person of the king is sacred, and if he drinks in public every one must turn away the head so as not to see him, while some of the women of the court hold up a cloth before him as a screen. He never eats in public, and the people pretend to believe that he neither eats nor sleeps. It is criminal to say the contrary.435 When the king of Tonga ate, all the people turned their backs to him.436 In the palace of the Persian kings there were two dining-rooms opposite each other; in one of them the king dined, in the other his guests. He could see them through a curtain on the door, but they could not see him. Generally the king took his meals alone; but sometimes his wife or some of his sons dined with him.437