GHOST STORIES.
The Russian peasants have very confused ideas about the local
habitation of the disembodied spirit, after its former tenement has
been laid in the grave. They seem, from the language of their funeral
songs, sometimes to regard the departed spirit as residing in the
coffin which holds the body from which it has been severed, sometimes
to imagine that it hovers around the building which used to be its
home, or flies abroad on the wings of the winds. In the food and money
and other necessaries of existence still placed in the coffin with the
corpse, may be seen traces of an old belief in a journey which the
soul was forced to undertake after the death of the body; in the
_pomniki_ or feasts in memory of the dead, celebrated at certain short
intervals after a death, and also on its anniversary, may be clearly
recognized the remains of a faith in the continued residence of the
dead in the spot where they had been buried, and in their subjection
to some physical sufferings, their capacity for certain animal
enjoyments. The two beliefs run side by side with each other,
sometimes clashing and producing strange results--all the more strange
when they show signs of an attempt having been made to reconcile them
with Christian ideas.[379]
Of a heavenly or upper-world home of departed spirits, neither the
songs nor the stories of the people, so far as I am aware, make
mention. But that there is a country beyond the sky, inhabited by
supernatural beings of magic power and unbounded wealth, is stated in
a number of tales of the well-known "Jack and the Beanstalk" type. Of
these the following may be taken as a specimen.
THE FOX-PHYSICIAN.[380]
There once was an old couple. The old man planted a cabbage-head
in the cellar under the floor of his cottage; the old
woman planted one in the ash-hole. The old woman's cabbage,
in the ash-hole, withered away entirely; but the old man's grew
and grew, grew up to the floor. The old man took his hatchet and
cut a hole in the floor above the cabbage. The cabbage went on
growing again; grew, grew right up to the ceiling. Again the old
man took his hatchet and cut a hole in the ceiling above the cabbage.
The cabbage grew and grew, grew right up to the sky.
How was the old man to get a look at the head of the cabbage?
He began climbing up the cabbage-stalk, climbed and climbed,
climbed and climbed, climbed right up to the sky, cut a hole in
the sky, and crept through. There he sees a mill[381] standing.
The mill gives a turn--out come a pie and a cake with a pot of
stewed grain on top.
The old man ate his fill, drank his fill, and then lay down to
sleep. When he had slept enough he slid down to earth again,
and cried:
"Old woman! why, old woman! how one does live up in
heaven! There's a mill there--every time it turns, out come a
pie and a cake, with a pot of _kasha_ on top!"
"How can I get there, old man?"
"Slip into this sack, old woman. I'll carry you up."
The old woman thought a bit, and then got into the sack.
The old man took the sack in his teeth, and began climbing up
to heaven. He climbed and climbed, long did he climb. The
old woman got tired of waiting and asked:
"Is it much farther, old man?"
"We've half the way to go still."
Again he climbed and climbed, climbed and climbed. A
second time the old woman asked:
"Is it much farther, old man?"
The old man was just beginning to say: "Not much farther--" when
the sack slipped from between his teeth, and the old
woman fell to the ground and was smashed all to pieces. The
old man slid down the cabbage-stalk and picked up the sack.
But it had nothing in it but bones, and those broken very small.
The old man went out of his house and wept bitterly.
Presently a fox met him.
"What are you crying about, old man?"
"How can I help crying? My old woman is smashed to
pieces."
"Hold your noise! I'll cure her."
The old man fell at the fox's feet.
"Only cure her! I'll pay whatever is wanted."
"Well, then, heat the bath-room, carry the old woman there
along with a bag of oatmeal and a pot of butter, and then stand
outside the door; but don't look inside."
The old man heated the bath-room, carried in what was
wanted, and stood outside at the door. But the fox went into
the bath-room, shut the door, and began washing the old
woman's remains; washed and washed, and kept looking about
her all the time.
"How's my old woman getting on?" asked the old man.
"Beginning to stir!" replied the fox, who then ate up the
old woman, collected her bones and piled them up in a corner,
and set to work to knead a hasty pudding.
The old man waited and waited. Presently he asked;
"How's my old woman getting on?"
"Resting a bit!" cried the fox, as she gobbled up the hasty
pudding.
When she had finished it she cried:
"Old man! open the door wide."
He opened it, and the fox sprang out of the bath-room and
ran off home. The old man went into the bath-room and looked
about him. Nothing was to be seen but the old woman's bones
under the bench--and those picked so clean! As for the oatmeal
and the butter, they had all been eaten up. So the old man was
left alone and in poverty.
This story is evidently a combination of two widely differing tales.
The catastrophe we may for the present pass over, but about the
opening some few words may be said. The Beanstalk myth is one which is
found among so many peoples in such widely distant regions, and it
deals with ideas of such importance, that no contribution to its
history can be considered valueless. Most remarkable among its
numerous forms are those American and Malayo-Polynesian versions of
the "heaven-tree" story which Mr. Tylor has brought together in his
"Early History of mankind."[382] In Europe it is usually found in a
very crude and fragmentary form, having been preserved, for the most
part, as the introduction to some other story which has proved more
attractive to the popular fancy. The Russian versions are all, as far
as I am aware, of this nature. I have already[383] mentioned one of
them, in which, also, the Fox plays a prominent part. Its opening
words are, "There once lived an old man and an old woman, and they had
a little daughter. One day she was eating beans, and she let one fall
on the ground. The bean grew and grew, and grew right up to heaven.
The old man climbed up to heaven, slipped in there, walked and walked,
admired and admired, and said to himself, 'I'll go and fetch the old
woman; won't she just be delighted!'" So he tries to carry his wife up
the bean stalk, but grows faint and lets her fall; she is killed, and
he calls in the Fox as Wailer.[384]
In a variant of the "Fox Physician" from the Vologda Government, it is
a pea which gives birth to the wondrous tree. "There lived an old man
and an old woman; the old man was rolling a pea about, and it fell on
the ground. They searched and searched a whole week, but they couldn't
find it. The week passed by, and the old people saw that the pea had
begun to sprout. They watered it regularly, and the pea set to work
and grew higher than the izba. When the peas ripened, the old man
climbed up to where they were, plucked a great bundle of them, and
began sliding down the stalk again. But the bundle fell out of the old
man's hands and killed the old woman."[385]
According to another variant, "There once lived a grandfather and a
grandmother, and they had a hut. The grandfather sowed a bean under
the table, and the grandmother a pea. A hen gobbled up the pea, but
the bean grew up as high as the table. They moved the table, and the
bean grew still higher. They cut away the ceiling and the roof; it
went on growing until it grew right up to the heavens (_nebo_). The
grandfather climbed up to heaven, climbed and climbed--there stood a
hut (_khatka_), its walls of pancakes, its benches of white bread, the
stove of buttered curds. He began to eat, ate his fill, and lay down
above the stove to sleep. In came twelve sister-goats. The first had
one eye, the second two eyes, the third three, and so on with the
rest, the last having twelve eyes. They saw that some one had been
meddling with their hut, so they put it to rights, and when they went
out they left the one-eyed to keep watch. Next day the grandfather
again climbed up there, saw One-Eye and began to mutter[386] 'Sleep,
eye, sleep!' The goat went to sleep. The man ate his fill and went
away. Next day the two-eyed kept watch, and after it the three-eyed
and so on. The grandfather always muttered his charm 'Sleep, eye!
Sleep, second eye! Sleep, third eye!' and so on. But with the twelfth
goat he failed, for he charmed only eleven of her eyes. The goat saw
him with the twelfth and caught him,"--and there the story ends.[387]
In another instance the myth has been turned into one of those tales
of the Munchausen class, the title of which is the "saw" _Ne lyubo, ne
slushai_, _i.e._, "If you don't like, don't listen"--the final words
being understood; "but let me tell you a story." A cock finds a pea in
the part of a cottage under the floor, and begins calling to the hens;
the cottager hears the call, drives away the cock, and pours water
over the pea. It grows up to the floor, up to the ceiling, up to the
roof; each time way is made for it, and finally it grows right up to
heaven (_do nebushka_). Says the moujik to his wife:
"Wife! wife, I say! shall I climb up into heaven and see what's going
on there? May be there's sugar there, and mead--lots of everything!"
"Climb away, if you've a mind to," replies his wife.
So he climbs up, and there he finds a large wooden house. He enters
in and sees a stove, garnished with sucking pigs and geese and pies
"and everything which the soul could desire." But the stove is guarded
by a seven-eyed goat; the moujik charms six of the eyes to sleep, but
overlooks the seventh. With it the goat sees him eat and drink and
then go to sleep. The house-master comes in, is informed by the goat
of all that has occurred, flies into a passion, calls his servants,
and has the intruder turned out of the house. When the moujik comes to
the place where the pea-stalk had been, "he looks around--no pea-stalk
is there." He collects the cobwebs "which float on the summer air,"
and of them he makes a cord; this he fastens "to the edge of heaven"
and begins to descend. Long before he reaches the earth he comes to
the end of his cord, so he crosses himself, and lets go. Falling into
a swamp, he remains there some time. At last a duck builds her nest on
his head, and lays an egg in it. He catches hold of the duck's tail,
and the bird pulls him out of the swamp; whereupon he goes home
rejoicing, taking with him the duck and her egg, and tells his wife
all that has happened.[388]
In another variant it is an acorn which is sown under the floor. From
it springs an oak which grows to the skies. The old man of the story
climbs up it in search of acorns, and reaches heaven. There he finds a
hand-mill and a cock with a golden comb, both of which he carries off.
The mill grinds pies and pancakes, and the old man and his wife live
in plenty. But after a time a Barin or Seigneur steals the mill. The
old people are in despair, but the golden-combed cock flies after the
mill, perches on the Barin's gates, and cries--
"Kukureku! Boyarin, Boyarin! Give us back our golden, sky-blue mill!"
The cock is flung into the well, but it drinks all the water, flies
up to the Barin's house, and there reiterates its demand. Then it is
thrown into the fire, but it extinguishes the flames, flies right into
the Barin's guest-chamber, and crows as before. The guests disperse,
the Barin runs after them, and the golden-combed cock seizes the mill
and flies away with it.[389]
In a variant from the Smolensk Government, it is the wife who climbs
up the pea-stalk, while the husband remains down below. When she
reaches the top, she finds an _izbushka_ or cottage there, its walls
made of pies, its tables of cheese, its stove of pancakes, and so
forth. After she has feasted and gone to sleep in a corner, in come
three goats, of which the first has two eyes and two ears, the second
has three of each of these organs, and the third has four. The old
woman sends to sleep the ears and the eyes of the first and the second
goat; but when the third watches it retains the use of its fourth eye
and fourth ear, in spite of the incantations uttered by the intruder,
and so finds her out. On being questioned, she explains that she has
come "from the earthly realm into the heavenly," and promises not to
repeat her visit if she is dismissed in peace. So the goats let her
go, and give her a bag of nuts, apples, and other good things to take
with her. She slides down the pea-stalk and tells her husband all that
has happened. He persuades her to undertake a second ascent together
with him, so off they set in company, their young granddaughter
climbing after them. Suddenly the pea-stalk breaks, they fall headlong
and are never heard of again. "Since that time," says the story, "no
one has ever set foot in that heavenly izbushka--so no one knows
anything more about it."[390]
Clearer and fuller than these vague and fragmentary sketches of a
"heavenly realm," are the pictures contained in the Russian folk-tales
of the underground world. But it is very doubtful how far the stories
in which they figure represent ancient Slavonic ideas. In the name, if
not in the nature, of the _Ad_, or subterranean abode of evil spirits
and sinful souls, we recognize the influence of the Byzantine Hades;
but most of the tales in which it occurs are supposed to draw their
original inspiration from Indian sources, while they owe to Christian,
Brahmanic, Buddhistic, and Mohammedan influences the form in which
they now appear. To these "legends," as the folk-tales are styled in
which the saints or their ghostly enemies occur, belongs the following
narrative of--
THE FIDDLER IN HELL.[391]
There was a certain moujik who had three sons. His life was
a prosperous one, and he laid by money enough to fill two pots.
The one he buried in his corn-kiln, the other under the gate of
his farmyard. Well, the moujik died, and never said a word
about the money to any one. One day there was a festival in
the village. A fiddler was on his way to the revel when, all of
a sudden, he sank into the earth--sank right through and
tumbled into hell, lighting exactly there where the rich moujik
was being tormented.
"Hail, friend!" says the Fiddler.
"It's an ill wind that's brought you hither!"[392] answers the
moujik; "this is hell, and in hell here I sit."
"What was it brought you here, uncle?"
"It was money! I had much money: I gave none to the
poor, two pots of it did I bury underground. See now, they
are going to torment me, to beat me with sticks, to tear me with
nails."
"Whatever shall I do?" cried the Fiddler. "Perhaps
they'll take to torturing me too!"
"If you go and sit on the stove behind the chimney-pipe,
and don't eat anything for three years--then you will remain
safe."
The Fiddler hid behind the stove-pipe. Then came fiends,[393]
and they began to beat the rich moujik, reviling him the while,
and saying:
"There's for thee, O rich man. Pots of money didst thou
bury but thou couldst not hide them. There didst thou bury
them that we might not be able to keep watch over them. At
the gate people are always riding about, the horses crush our
heads with their hoofs, and in the corn-kiln we get beaten with
flails."
As soon as the fiends had gone away the moujik said to the
Fiddler:
"If you get out of here, tell my children to dig up the money--one
pot is buried at the gate, and the other in the corn-kiln--and
to distribute it among the poor."
Afterwards there came a whole roomful of evil ones, and
they asked the rich moujik:
"What have you got here that smells so Russian?"
"You have been in Russia and brought away a Russian
smell with you," replied the moujik.
"How could that be?" they said. Then they began looking,
they found the Fiddler, and they shouted:
"Ha, ha, ha! Here's a Fiddler."
They pulled him off the stove, and set him to work fiddling.
He played three years, though it seemed to him only three
days. Then he got tired and said:
"Here's a wonder! After playing a whole evening I used
always to find all my fiddle-strings snapped. But now, though
I've been playing for three whole days, they are all sound. May
the Lord grant us his blessing!"[394]
No sooner had he uttered these words than every one of the
strings snapped.
"There now, brothers!" says the Fiddler, "you can see
for yourselves. The strings are snapped; I've nothing to
play on!"
"Wait a bit!" said one of the fiends. "I've got two hanks
of catgut; I'll fetch them for you."
He ran off and fetched them. The Fiddler took the strings,
screwed them up, and again uttered the words:
"May the Lord grant us his blessing!"
In a moment snap went both hanks.
"No, brothers!" said the Fiddler, "your strings don't suit
me. I've got some of my own at home; by your leave I'll go
for them."
The fiends wouldn't let him go. "You wouldn't come back,"
they say.
"Well, if you won't trust me, send some one with me as an
escort."
The fiends chose one of their number, and sent him with the
Fiddler. The Fiddler got back to the village. There he could
hear that, in the farthest cottage, a wedding was being celebrated.
"Let's go to the wedding!" he cried.
"Come along!" said the fiend.
They entered the cottage. Everyone there recognized the
Fiddler and cried:
"Where have you been hiding these three years?"
"I have been in the other world!" he replied.
They sat there and enjoyed themselves for some time.
Then the fiend beckoned to the Fiddler, saying, "It's time to
be off!" But the Fiddler replied: "Wait a little longer! Let
me fiddle away a bit and cheer up the young people." And so
they remained sitting there till the cocks began to crow. Then
the fiend disappeared.
After that, the Fiddler began to talk to the sons of the rich
moujik, and said:
"Your father bids you dig up the money--one potful is
buried at the gate and the other in the corn-kiln--and distribute
the whole of it among the poor."
Well, they dug up both the pots, and began to distribute
the money among the poor. But the more they gave away the
money, the more did it increase. Then they carried out the
pots to a crossway. Every one who passed by took out of
them as much money as his hand could grasp, and yet the
money wouldn't come to an end. Then they presented a petition
to the Emperor, and he ordained as follows. There was a
certain town, the road to which was a very roundabout one.
It was some fifty versts long, whereas if it had been made in a
straight line it would not have been more than five. And so
the Emperor ordained that a bridge should be made the whole
way. Well, they built a bridge five versts long, and this piece
of work cleared out both the pots.
About that time a certain maid bore a son and deserted him
in his infancy. The child neither ate nor drank for three years
and an angel of God always went about with him. Well, this
child came to the bridge, and cried:
"Ah! what a glorious bridge! God grant the kingdom of
heaven to him at whose cost it was built!"
The Lord heard this prayer, and ordered his angels to
release the rich moujik from the depths of hell.[395]
With the bridge-building episode in this "legend" may be compared the
opening of another Russian story. In it a merchant is described as
having much money but no children. So he and his wife "began to pray
to God, entreating him to give them a child--for solace in their
youth, for support in their old age, for soul-remembrance[396] after
death. And they took to feeding the poor and distributing alms.
Besides all this, they resolved to build, for the use of all the
faithful, a long bridge across swamps and where no man could find a
footing. Much wealth did the merchant expend, but he built the bridge,
and when the work was completed he sent his manager Fedor, saying--
"'Go and sit under the bridge, and listen to what folks say about
me--whether they bless me or revile me.'
"Fedor set off, sat under the bridge, and listened. Presently three
Holy Elders went over the bridge, and said one to another--
"'How ought the man who built this bridge to be rewarded?' 'Let there
be born to him a fortunate son. Whatsoever that son says--it shall be
done: whatsoever he desires--that will the Lord bestow!'"[397]
The rest of the story closely resembles the German tale of "The
Pink."[398] In the corresponding Bohemian story of "The Treacherous
Servant,"[399] it may be observed, the bridge-building incident has
been preserved.
But I will not dwell any longer on the story of the Fiddler, as I
propose to give some account in the next chapter of several other
tales of the same class, in most of which such descriptions of evil
spirits are introduced as have manifestly been altered into what their
narrators considered to be in accordance with Christian teaching. And
so I will revert to those ideas about the dead, and about their
abiding-place, which the modern Slavonians seem to have inherited from
their heathen ancestors, and I will attempt to illustrate them by a
few Russian ghost-stories. Those stories are, as a general rule, of a
most ghastly nature, but there are a few into the composition of which
the savage element does not enter. The "Dead Mother," which has
already been quoted,[400] belongs to the latter class; and so does the
following tale--which, as it bears no title in the original, we may
name,
THE RIDE ON THE GRAVESTONE.[401]
Late one evening a certain artisan happened to be returning
home from a jovial feast in a distant village. There met him
on the way an old friend, one who had been dead some ten
years.
"Good health to you!" said the dead man.
"I wish you good health!" replied the reveller, and straight
way forgot that his acquaintance had ever so long ago bidden
the world farewell.
"Let's go to my house. We'll quaff a cup or two once
more."
"Come along. On such a happy occasion as this meeting
of ours, we may as well have a drink."
They arrived at a dwelling and there they drank and revelled.
"Now then, good-bye! It's time for me to go home," said
the artisan.
"Stay a bit. Where do you want to go now? Spend the night
here with me."
"No, brother! don't ask me; it cannot be. I've business
to do to-morrow, so I must get home as early as possible."
"Well, good-bye! but why should you walk? Better get on
my horse; it will carry you home quickly."
"Thanks! let's have it."
He got on its back, and was carried off--just as a whirlwind
flies! All of a sudden a cock crew. It was awful! All around
were graves, and the rider found he had a gravestone under
him!
Of a somewhat similar nature is the story of--
THE TWO FRIENDS.[402]
In the days of old there lived in a certain village two young
men. They were great friends, went to _besyedas_[403] together, in
fact, regarded each other as brothers. And they made this
mutual agreement. Whichever of the two should marry first
was to invite his comrade to his wedding. And it was not to
make any difference whether he was alive or dead.
About a year after this one of the young men fell ill and
died. A few months later his comrade took it into his head to
get married. So he collected all his kinsmen, and set off to
fetch his bride. Now it happened that they drove past the
graveyard, and the bridegroom recalled his friend to mind, and
remembered his old agreement. So he had the horses stopped,
saying:
"I'm going to my comrade's grave. I shall ask him to come
and enjoy himself at my wedding. A right trusty friend was
he to me."
So he went to the grave and began to call aloud:
"Comrade dear! I invite thee to my wedding."
Suddenly the grave yawned, the dead man arose, and said:
"Thanks be to thee, brother, that thou hast fulfilled thy
promise. And now, that we may profit by this happy chance,
enter my abode. Let us quaff a glass apiece of grateful drink."
"I'd have gone, only the marriage procession is stopping
outside; all the folks are waiting for me."
"Eh, brother!" replied the dead man, "surely it won't take
long to toss off a glass!"
The bridegroom jumped into the grave. The dead man
poured him out a cup of liquor. He drank it off--and a hundred
years passed away.
"Quaff another cup, dear friend!" said the dead man.
He drank a second cup--two hundred years passed away.
"Now, comrade dear, quaff a third cup!" said the dead
man, "and then go, in God's name, and celebrate thy marriage!"
He drank the third cup--three hundred years passed away.
The dead man took leave of his comrade. The coffin lid fell;
the grave closed.
The bridegroom looked around. Where the graveyard had
been, was now a piece of waste ground. No road was to be
seen, no kinsmen, no horses. All around grew nettles and tall
grass.
He ran to the village--but the village was not what it used
to be. The houses were different; the people were all strangers
to him. He went to the priest's--but the priest was not the one
who used to be there--and told him about everything that had
happened. The priest searched through the church-books, and
found that, three hundred years before, this occurrence had
taken place: a bridegroom had gone to the graveyard on his
wedding-day, and had disappeared. And his bride, after some
time had passed by, had married another man.
[The "Rip van Winkle" story is too well known to
require more than a passing allusion. It was doubtless
founded on one of the numerous folk-tales which
correspond to the Christian legend of "The Seven
Sleepers of Ephesus"--itself an echo of an older tale
(see Baring Gould, "Curious Myths," 1872, pp. 93-112,
and Cox, "Mythology of the Aryan Nations," i.
413)--and to that of the monk who listens to a bird
singing in the convent garden, and remains entranced
for the space of many years: of which latter legend a
Russian version occurs in Chudinsky's collection (No.
17, pp. 92-4). Very close indeed is the resemblance
between the Russian story of "The Two Friends," and
the Norse "Friends in Life and Death" (Asbjoernsen's
New Series, No. 62, pp. 5-7). In the latter the
bridegroom knocks hard and long on his dead friend's
grave. At length its occupant appears, and accounts
for his delay by saying he had been far away when the
first knocks came, and so had not heard them. Then he
follows the bridegroom to church and from church, and
afterwards the bridegroom sees him back to his tomb.
On the way the living man expresses a desire to see
something of the world beyond the grave, and the
corpse fulfils his wish, having first placed on his
head a sod cut in the graveyard. After witnessing many
strange sights, the bridegroom is told to sit down and
wait till his guide returns. When he rises to his
feet, he is all overgrown with mosses and shrub (var
han overvoxen med Mose og Busker), and when he reaches
the outer world he finds all things changed.]
But from these dim sketches of a life beyond, or rather within the
grave, in which memories of old days and old friendships are preserved
by ghosts of an almost genial and entirely harmless disposition, we
will now turn to those more elaborate pictures in which the dead are
represented under an altogether terrific aspect. It is not as an
incorporeal being that the visitor from the other world is represented
in the Skazkas. He comes not as a mere phantom, intangible,
impalpable, incapable of physical exertion, haunting the dwelling
which once was his home, or the spot to which he is drawn by the
memory of some unexpiated crime. It is as a vitalized corpse that he
comes to trouble mankind, often subject to human appetites, constantly
endowed with more than human strength and malignity. His apparel is
generally that of the grave, and he cannot endure to part with it, as
may be seen from the following story--
THE SHROUD.[404]
In a certain village there was a girl who was lazy and slothful,
hated working but would gossip and chatter away like anything.
Well, she took it into her head to invite the other girls to a spinning
party. For in the villages, as every one knows, it is the
lazybones who gives the spinning-feast, and the sweet-toothed
are those who go to it.
Well, on the appointed night she got her spinners together.
They span for her, and she fed them and feasted them. Among
other things they chatted about was this--which of them all was
the boldest?
Says the lazybones (_lezhaka_):
"I'm not afraid of anything!"
"Well then," say the spinners, "if you're not afraid, go
past the graveyard to the church, take down the holy picture
from the door, and bring it here."
"Good, I'll bring it; only each of you must spin me a distaff-ful."
That was just her sort of notion: to do nothing herself, but
to get others to do it for her. Well, she went, took down the
picture, and brought it home with her. Her friends all saw that
sure enough it was the picture from the church. But the picture
had to be taken back again, and it was now the midnight hour.
Who was to take it? At length the lazybones said:
"You girls go on spinning. I'll take it back myself. I'm
not afraid of anything!"
So she went and put the picture back in its place. As she
was passing the graveyard on her return, she saw a corpse in a
white shroud, seated on a tomb. It was a moonlight night;
everything was visible. She went up to the corpse, and drew
away its shroud from it. The corpse held its peace, not uttering
a word; no doubt the time for it to speak had not come yet.
Well, she took the shroud and went home.
"There!" says she, "I've taken back the picture and put
it in its place; and, what's more, here's a shroud I took away
from a corpse."
Some of the girls were horrified; others didn't believe what
she said, and laughed at her.
But after they had supped and lain down to sleep, all of a
sudden the corpse tapped at the window and said:
"Give me my shroud! Give me my shroud!"
The girls were so frightened they didn't know whether they
were alive or dead. But the lazybones took the shroud, went to
the window, opened it, and said:
"There, take it."
"No," replied the corpse, "restore it to the place you took
it from."
Just then the cocks suddenly began to crow. The corpse
disappeared.
Next night, when the spinners had all gone home to their
own houses, at the very same hour as before, the corpse came,
tapped at the window, and cried:
"Give me my shroud!"
Well, the girl's father and mother opened the window and
offered him his shroud.
"No," says he, "let her take it back to the place she took
it from."
"Really now, how could one go to a graveyard with a corpse?
What a horrible idea!" she replied.
Just then the cocks crew. The corpse disappeared.
Next day the girl's father and mother sent for the priest,
told him the whole story, and entreated him to help them in their
trouble.
"Couldn't a service[405] be performed?" they said.
The priest reflected awhile; then he replied:
"Please to tell her to come to church to-morrow."
Next day the lazybones went to church. The service began,
numbers of people came to it. But just as they were going
to sing the cherubim song,[406] there suddenly arose, goodness
knows whence, so terrible a whirlwind that all the congregation
fell flat on their faces. And it caught up that girl, and then flung
her down on the ground. The girl disappeared from sight;
nothing was left of her but her back hair.[407]
They are generally the corpses of wizards, or of other sinners who
have led specially unholy lives, which leave their graves by night and
wander abroad. Into such bodies, it is held, demons enter, and the
combination of fiend and corpse goes forth as the terrible Vampire
thirsting for blood. Of the proceedings of such a being the next story
gives a detailed account, from which, among other things, may be
learnt the fact that Slavonic corpses attach great importance to their
coffin-lids as well as to their shrouds.
THE COFFIN-LID.[408]
A moujik was driving along one night with a load of pots. His
horse grew tired, and all of a sudden it came to a standstill
alongside of a graveyard. The moujik unharnessed his horse
and set it free to graze; meanwhile he laid himself down on
one of the graves. But somehow he didn't go to sleep.
He remained lying there some time. Suddenly the grave
began to open beneath him: he felt the movement and sprang
to his feet. The grave opened, and out of it came a corpse--wrapped
in a white shroud, and holding a coffin lid--came out
and ran to the church, laid the coffin-lid at the door, and then
set off for the village.
The moujik was a daring fellow. He picked up the coffin-lid
and remained standing beside his cart, waiting to see what would
happen. After a short delay the dead man came back, and was
going to snatch up his coffin-lid--but it was not to be seen.
Then the corpse began to track it out, traced it up to the moujik,
and said:
"Give me my lid: if you don't, I'll tear you to bits!"
"And my hatchet, how about that?" answers the moujik.
"Why, it's I who'll be chopping you into small pieces!"
"Do give it back to me, good man!" begs the corpse.
"I'll give it when you tell me where you've been and what
you've done."
"Well, I've been in the village, and there I've killed a couple
of youngsters."
"Well then, now tell me how they can be brought back to
life."
The corpse reluctantly made answer:
"Cut off the left skirt of my shroud, and take it with you.
When you come into the house where the youngsters were killed,
pour some live coals into a pot and put the piece of the
shroud in with them, and then lock the door. The lads will be
revived by the smoke immediately."
The moujik cut off the left skirt of the shroud, and gave up
the coffin-lid. The corpse went to its grave--the grave opened.
But just as the dead man was descending into it, all of a sudden
the cocks began to crow, and he hadn't time to get properly
covered over. One end of the coffin-lid remained sticking out
of the ground.
The moujik saw all this and made a note of it. The day
began to dawn; he harnessed his horse and drove into the village.
In one of the houses he heard cries and wailing. In he
went--there lay two dead lads.
"Don't cry," says he, "I can bring them to life!"
"Do bring them to life, kinsman," say their relatives.
"We'll give you half of all we possess."
The moujik did everything as the corpse had instructed him,
and the lads came back to life. Their relatives were delighted,
but they immediately seized the moujik and bound him with
cords, saying:
"No, no, trickster! We'll hand you over to the authorities.
Since you knew how to bring them back to life, maybe it was
you who killed them!"
"What are you thinking about, true believers! Have the
fear of God before your eyes!" cried the moujik.
Then he told them everything that had happened to him
during the night. Well, they spread the news through the
village; the whole population assembled and swarmed into the
graveyard. They found out the grave from which the dead man
had come out, they tore it open, and they drove an aspen stake
right into the heart of the corpse, so that it might no more rise
up and slay. But they rewarded the moujik richly, and sent him
away home with great honor.
It is not only during sleep that the Vampire is to be dreaded. At
cross-roads, or in the neighborhood of cemeteries, an animated corpse
of this description often lurks, watching for some unwary wayfarer
whom it may be able to slay and eat. Past such dangerous spots as
these the belated villager will speed with timorous steps,
remembering, perhaps, some such uncanny tale as that which comes next.
THE TWO CORPSES.[409]
A soldier had obtained leave to go home on furlough--to pray
to the holy images, and to bow down before his parents. And
as he was going his way, at a time when the sun had long set,
and all was dark around, it chanced that he had to pass by a
graveyard. Just then he heard that some one was running after
him, and crying:
"Stop! you can't escape!"
He looked back and there was a corpse running and gnashing
its teeth. The Soldier sprang on one side with all his
might to get away from it, caught sight of a little chapel,[410] and
bolted straight into it.
There wasn't a soul in the chapel, but stretched out on a
table there lay another corpse, with tapers burning in front of
it. The Soldier hid himself in a corner, and remained there,
hardly knowing whether he was alive or dead, but waiting to see
what would happen. Presently up ran the first corpse--the one
that had chased the Soldier--and dashed into the chapel. Thereupon
the one that was lying on the table jumped up, and cried
to it:
"What hast thou come here for?"
"I've chased a soldier in here, so I'm going to eat him."
"Come now, brother! he's run into my house. I shall eat
him myself."
"No, I shall!"
"No, I shall!"
And they set to work fighting; the dust flew like anything.
They'd have gone on fighting ever so much longer, only the
cocks began to crow. Then both the corpses fell lifeless to
the ground, and the Soldier went on his way homeward in peace,
saying:
"Glory be to Thee, O Lord! I am saved from the wizards!"
Even the possession of arms and the presence of a dog will not always,
it seems, render a man secure from this terrible species of
cut-throat.
THE DOG AND THE CORPSE.[411]
A moujik went out in pursuit of game one day, and took a
favorite dog with him. He walked and walked through woods
and bogs, but got nothing for his pains. At last the darkness of
night surprised him. At an uncanny hour he passed by a graveyard,
and there, at a place where two roads met, he saw standing
a corpse in a white shroud. The moujik was horrified, and knew
not which way to go--whether to keep on or to turn back.
"Well, whatever happens, I'll go on," he thought; and on he
went, his dog running at his heels. When the corpse perceived
him, it came to meet him; not touching the earth with its feet,
but keeping about a foot above it--the shroud fluttering after it.
When it had come up with the sportsman, it made a rush at him;
but the dog seized hold of it by its bare calves, and began a tussle
with it. When the moujik saw his dog and the corpse grappling
with each other, he was delighted that things had turned out so
well for himself, and he set off running home with all his might.
The dog kept up the struggle until cock-crow, when the corpse
fell motionless to the ground. Then the dog ran off in pursuit of
its master, caught him up just as he reached home, and rushed at
him, furiously trying to bite and to rend him. So savage was it,
and so persistent, that it was as much as the people of the house
could do to beat it off.
"Whatever has come over the dog?" asked the moujik's
old mother. "Why should it hate its master so?"
The moujik told her all that had happened.
"A bad piece of work, my son!" said the old woman. "The
dog was disgusted at your not helping it. There it was fighting
with the corpse--and you deserted it, and thought only of saving
yourself! Now it will owe you a grudge for ever so long."
Next morning, while the family were going about the farmyard,
the dog was perfectly quiet. But the moment its master
made his appearance, it began to growl like anything.
They fastened it to a chain; for a whole year they kept it
chained up. But in spite of that, it never forgot how its master
had offended it. One day it got loose, flew straight at him, and
began trying to throttle him.
So they had to kill it.
In the next story a most detailed account is given of the manner in
which a Vampire sets to work, and also of the best means of ridding
the world of it.
THE SOLDIER AND THE VAMPIRE.[412]
A certain soldier was allowed to go home on furlough.
Well, he walked and walked, and after a time he began to draw
near to his native village. Not far off from that village lived a
miller in his mill. In old times the Soldier had been very
intimate with him: why shouldn't he go and see his friend? He
went. The Miller received him cordially, and at once brought
out liquor; and the two began drinking, and chattering about
their ways and doings. All this took place towards nightfall, and
the Soldier stopped so long at the Miller's that it grew quite
dark.
When he proposed to start for his village, his host exclaimed:
"Spend the night here, trooper! It's very late now, and perhaps
you might run into mischief."
"How so?"
"God is punishing us! A terrible warlock has died among
us, and by night he rises from his grave, wanders through the
village, and does such things as bring fear upon the very boldest!
How could even you help being afraid of him?"
"Not a bit of it! A soldier is a man who belongs to the
crown, and 'crown property cannot be drowned in water nor
burnt in fire.' I'll be off: I'm tremendously anxious to see my
people as soon as possible."
Off he set. His road lay in front of a graveyard. On one
of the graves he saw a great fire blazing. "What's that?"
thinks he. "Let's have a look." When he drew near, he saw
that the Warlock was sitting by the fire, sewing boots.
"Hail, brother!" calls out the Soldier.
The Warlock looked up and said:
"What have you come here for?"
"Why, I wanted to see what you're doing."
The Warlock threw his work aside and invited the Soldier to
a wedding.
"Come along, brother," says he, "let's enjoy ourselves.
There's a wedding going on in the village."
"Come along!" says the Soldier.
They came to where the wedding was; there they were
given drink, and treated with the utmost hospitality. The Warlock
drank and drank, revelled and revelled, and then grew
angry. He chased all the guests and relatives out of the house,
threw the wedded pair into a slumber, took out two phials and
an awl, pierced the hands of the bride and bridegroom with the
awl, and began drawing off their blood. Having done this, he
said to the Soldier:
"Now let's be off."
Well, they went off. On the way the Soldier said:
"Tell me; why did you draw off their blood in those phials?"
"Why, in order that the bride and bridegroom might die.
To-morrow morning no one will be able to wake them. I alone
know how to bring them back to life."
"How's that managed?"
"The bride and bridegroom must have cuts made in their
heels, and some of their own blood must then be poured back
into those wounds. I've got the bridegroom's blood stowed
away in my right-hand pocket, and the bride's in my left."
The Soldier listened to this without letting a single word
escape him. Then the Warlock began boasting again.
"Whatever I wish," says he, "that I can do!"
"I suppose it's quite impossible to get the better of you?"
says the Soldier.
"Why impossible? If any one were to make a pyre of aspen
boughs, a hundred loads of them, and were to burn me on that
pyre, then he'd be able to get the better of me. Only he'd
have to look out sharp in burning me; for snakes and worms
and different kinds of reptiles would creep out of my inside, and
crows and magpies and jackdaws would come flying up. All
these must be caught and flung on the pyre. If so much as a
single maggot were to escape, then there'd be no help for it; in
that maggot I should slip away!"
The Soldier listened to all this and did not forget it. He and
the Warlock talked and talked, and at last they arrived at the
grave.
"Well, brother," said the Warlock, "now I'll tear you to
pieces. Otherwise you'd be telling all this."
"What are you talking about? Don't you deceive yourself;
I serve God and the Emperor."
The Warlock gnashed his teeth, howled aloud, and sprang
at the Soldier--who drew his sword and began laying about him
with sweeping blows. They struggled and struggled; the Soldier
was all but at the end of his strength. "Ah!" thinks he,
"I'm a lost man--and all for nothing!" Suddenly the cocks
began to crow. The Warlock fell lifeless to the ground.
The Soldier took the phials of blood out of the Warlock's
pockets, and went on to the house of his own people. When he
had got there, and had exchanged greetings with his relatives,
they said:
"Did you see any disturbance, Soldier?"
"No, I saw none."
"There now! Why we've a terrible piece of work going
on in the village. A Warlock has taken to haunting it!"
After talking awhile, they lay down to sleep. Next morning
the Soldier awoke, and began asking:
"I'm told you've got a wedding going on somewhere here?"
"There was a wedding in the house of a rich moujik,"
replied his relatives, "but the bride and bridegroom have died
this very night--what from, nobody knows."
"Where does this moujik live?"
They showed him the house. Thither he went without
speaking a word. When he got there, he found the whole
family in tears.
"What are you mourning about?" says he.
"Such and such is the state of things, Soldier," say they.
"I can bring your young people to life again. What will
you give me if I do?"
"Take what you like, even were it half of what we've got!"
The Soldier did as the Warlock had instructed him, and
brought the young people back to life. Instead of weeping
there began to be happiness and rejoicing; the Soldier was
hospitably treated and well rewarded. Then--left about, face!
off he marched to the Starosta, and told him to call the peasants
together and to get ready a hundred loads of aspen wood.
Well, they took the wood into the graveyard, dragged the Warlock
out of his grave, placed him on the pyre, and set it alight--the
people all standing round in a circle with brooms, shovels,
and fire-irons. The pyre became wrapped in flames, the Warlock
began to burn. His corpse burst, and out of it crept snakes,
worms, and all sorts of reptiles, and up came flying crows, magpies,
and jackdaws. The peasants knocked them down and
flung them into the fire, not allowing so much as a single maggot
to creep away! And so the Warlock was thoroughly consumed,
and the Soldier collected his ashes and strewed them
to the winds. From that time forth there was peace in the
village.
The Soldier received the thanks of the whole community.
He stayed at home some time, enjoying himself thoroughly.
Then he went back to the Tsar's service with money in his
pocket. When he had served his time, he retired from the
army, and began to live at his ease.
The stories of this class are very numerous, all of them based on the
same belief--that in certain cases the dead, in a material shape,
leave their graves in order to destroy and prey upon the living. This
belief is not peculiar to the Slavonians but it is one of the
characteristic features of their spiritual creed. Among races which
burn their dead, remarks Hertz in his exhaustive treatise on the
Werwolf (p. 126), little is known of regular "corpse-spectres." Only
vague apparitions, dream-like phantoms, are supposed, as a general
rule, to issue from graves in which nothing more substantial than
ashes has been laid.[413] But where it is customary to lay the dead
body in the ground, "a peculiar half-life" becomes attributed to it by
popular fancy, and by some races it is supposed to be actuated at
intervals by murderous impulses. In the East these are generally
attributed to the fact of its being possessed by an evil spirit, but
in some parts of Europe no such explanation of its conduct is given,
though it may often be implied. "The belief in vampires is the
specific Slavonian form of the universal belief in spectres
(_Gespenster_)," says Hertz, and certainly vampirism has always made
those lands peculiarly its own which are or have been tenanted or
greatly influenced by Slavonians.
But animated corpses often play an important part in the traditions
of other countries. Among the Scandinavians and especially in Iceland,
were they the cause of many fears, though they were not supposed to be
impelled by a thirst for blood so much as by other carnal
appetites,[414] or by a kind of local malignity.[415] In Germany tales
of horror similar to the Icelandic are by no means unknown, but the
majority of them are to be found in districts which were once wholly
Lettic or Slavonic, though they are now reckoned as Teutonic, such as
East Prussia, or Pomerania, or Lusatia. But it is among the races
which are Slavonic by tongue as well as by descent, that the genuine
vampire tales flourish most luxuriantly: in Russia, in Poland, and in
Servia--among the Czekhs of Bohemia, and the Slovaks of Hungary, and
the numerous other subdivisions of the Slavonic family which are
included within the heterogeneous empire of Austria. Among the
Albanians and Modern Greeks they have taken firm root, but on those
peoples a strong Slavonic influence has been brought to bear. Even
Prof. Bernhard Schmidt, although an uncompromising opponent of
Fallmerayer's doctrines with regard to the Slavonic origin of the
present inhabitants of Greece, allows that the Greeks, as they
borrowed from the Slavonians a name for the Vampire, may have received
from them also certain views and customs with respect to it.[416]
Beyond this he will not go, and he quotes a number of passages from
Hellenic writers to prove that in ancient Greece spectres were
frequently represented as delighting in blood, and sometimes as
exercising a power to destroy. Nor will he admit that any very great
stress ought to be laid upon the fact that the Vampire is generally
called in Greece by a name of Slavonic extraction; for in the islands,
which were, he says, little if at all affected by Slavonic influences,
the Vampire bears a thoroughly Hellenic designation.[417] But the
thirst for blood attributed by Homer to his shadowy ghosts seems to
have been of a different nature from that evinced by the material
Vampire of modern days, nor does that ghastly _revenant_ seem by any
means fully to correspond to such ghostly destroyers as the spirit of
Gello, or the spectres of Medea's slaughtered children. It is not only
in the Vampire, however, that we find a point of close contact between
the popular beliefs of the New-Greeks and the Slavonians. Prof.
Bernhard Schmidt's excellent work is full of examples which prove how
intimately they are connected.
The districts of the Russian Empire in which a belief in vampires
mostly prevails are White Russia and the Ukraine. But the ghastly
blood-sucker, the _Upir_,[418] whose name has become naturalized in so
many alien lands under forms resembling our "Vampire," disturbs the
peasant-mind in many other parts of Russia, though not perhaps with
the same intense fear which it spreads among the inhabitants of the
above-named districts, or of some other Slavonic lands. The numerous
traditions which have gathered around the original idea vary to some
extent according to their locality, but they are never radically
inconsistent.
Some of the details are curious. The Little-Russians hold that if a
vampire's hands have grown numb from remaining long crossed in the
grave, he makes use of his teeth, which are like steel. When he has
gnawed his way with these through all obstacles, he first destroys the
babes he finds in a house, and then the older inmates. If fine salt be
scattered on the floor of a room, the vampire's footsteps may be
traced to his grave, in which he will be found resting with rosy cheek
and gory mouth.
The Kashoubes say that when a _Vieszcy_, as they call the Vampire,
wakes from his sleep within the grave, he begins to gnaw his hands and
feet; and as he gnaws, one after another, first his relations, then
his other neighbors, sicken and die. When he has finished his own
store of flesh, he rises at midnight and destroys cattle, or climbs a
belfry and sounds the bell. All who hear the ill-omened tones will
soon die. But generally he sucks the blood of sleepers. Those on whom
he has operated will be found next morning dead, with a very small
wound on the left side of the breast, exactly over the heart. The
Lusatian Wends hold that when a corpse chews its shroud or sucks its
own breast, all its kin will soon follow it to the grave. The
Wallachians say that a _murony_--a sort of cross between a werwolf and
a vampire, connected by name with our nightmare--can take the form of
a dog, a cat, or a toad, and also of any blood-sucking insect. When he
is exhumed, he is found to have long nails of recent growth on his
hands and feet, and blood is streaming from his eyes, ears, nose and
mouth.
The Russian stories give a very clear account of the operation
performed by the vampire on his victims. Thus, one night, a peasant is
conducted by a stranger into a house where lie two sleepers, an old
man and a youth. "The stranger takes a pail, places it near the youth,
and strikes him on the back; immediately the back opens, and forth
flows rosy blood. The stranger fills the pail full, and drinks it dry.
Then he fills another pail with blood from the old man, slakes his
brutal thirst, and says to the peasant, 'It begins to grow light! let
us go back to my dwelling.'"[419]
Many skazkas also contain, as we have already seen, very clear
directions how to deprive a vampire of his baleful power. According to
them, as well as to their parallels elsewhere, a stake must be driven
through the murderous corpse. In Russia an aspen stake is selected for
that purpose, but in some places one made of thorn is preferred. But a
Bohemian vampire, when staked in this manner in the year 1337, says
Mannhardt,[420] merely exclaimed that the stick would be very useful
for keeping off dogs; and a _strigon_ (or Istrian vampire) who was
transfixed with a sharp thorn cudgel near Laibach, in 1672, pulled it
out of his body and flung it back contemptuously. The only certain
methods of destroying a vampire appear to be either to consume him by
fire, or to chop off his head with a grave-digger's shovel. The Wends
say that if a vampire is hit over the back of the head with an
implement of that kind, he will squeal like a pig.
The origin of the Vampire is hidden in obscurity. In modern times it
has generally been a wizard, or a witch, or a suicide,[421] or a
person who has come to a violent end, or who has been cursed by the
Church or by his parents, who takes such an unpleasant means of
recalling himself to the memory of his surviving relatives and
acquaintances. But even the most honorable dead may become vampires by
accident. He whom a vampire has slain is supposed, in some countries,
himself to become a vampire. The leaping of a cat or some other animal
across a corpse, even the flight of a bird above it, may turn the
innocent defunct into a ravenous demon.[422] Sometimes, moreover, a
man is destined from his birth to be a vampire, being the offspring of
some unholy union. In some instances the Evil One himself is the
father of such a doomed victim, in others a temporarily animated
corpse. But whatever may be the cause of a corpse's "vampirism," it is
generally agreed that it will give its neighbors no rest until they
have at least transfixed it. What is very remarkable about the
operation is, that the stake must be driven through the vampire's body
by a single blow. A second would restore it to life. This idea
accounts for the otherwise unexplained fact that the heroes of
folk-tales are frequently warned that they must on no account be
tempted into striking their magic foes more than one stroke. Whatever
voices may cry aloud "Strike again!" they must remain contented with a
single blow.[423]
FOOTNOTES:
[379] Some account of Russian funeral rites and beliefs, and of the
dirges which are sung at buryings and memorials of the dead, will be
found in the "Songs of the Russian People," pp. 309-344.
[380] Afanasief, iv. No. 7. From the Archangel Government.
[381] _Zhornovtsui_, _i.e._ mill-stones, or a hand-mill.
[382] Pp. 341-349 of the first edition. See, also, for some other
versions of the story, as well as for an attempt to explain it, A. de
Gubernatis, "Zoological Mythology," i. 243, 244.
[383] See _supra_, chap. I. p. 36.
[384] Afanasief, iv. No. 9.
[385] Ibid., iv. No. 7. p. 34.
[386] _Prigovarivat'_ = to say or sing while using certain (usually
menacing) gestures.
[387] Afanasief, iv. p. 35.
[388] Afanasief, vi. No. 2.
[389] Afanasief, "Legendui," No. 33.
[390] Chudinsky, No. 9.
[391] Afanasief, v. No. 47. From the Tver Government.
[392] "You have fallen here" _neladno_. _Ladno_ means "well,"
"propitiously," &c., also "in tune."
[393] _Nenashi_ = not ours.
[394] _Gospodi blagoslovi!_ exactly our "God bless us;" with us now
merely an expression of surprise.
[395] _Iz adu kromyeshnago_ = from the last hell. _Kromyeshnaya t'ma_
= utter darkness. _Kromyeshny_, or _kromyeshnaya_, is sometimes used
by itself to signify hell.
[396] _Ha pomin dushi._ _Pomin_ = "remembrance," also "prayers for the
dead."
[397] Afanasief, vii. No. 20. In some variants of this story, instead
of the three holy elders appear the Saviour, St. Nicholas, and St.
Mitrofan.
[398] "Die Nelke," Grimm, _KM._, No. 76, and vol. iii. pp. 125-6.
[399] Wenzig, No. 17, pp. 82-6.
[400] See Chap. I. p. 32.
[401] Afanasief, v. p. 144.
[402] Afanasief, vi, p. 322, 323.
[403] Evening gatherings of young people.
[404] Afanasief, v. No. 30 _a_, pp. 140-2. From the Voroneje
Government.
[405] _Obyednya_, the service answering to the Latin mass.
[406] At the end of the _obyednya_.
[407] The _kosa_ or single braid in which Russian girls wear their
hair. See "Songs of the Russian People," pp. 272-5. On a story of this
kind Goethe founded his weird ballad of "Der Todtentanz." Cf.
Bertram's "Sagen," No. 18.
[408] Afanasief, v. pp. 142-4. From the Tambof Government.
[409] Afanasief, vi. pp. 324, 325.
[410] _Chasovenka_, a small chapel, shrine, or oratory.
[411] Afanasief, vi. pp 321, 322.
[412] Afanasief, v. pp. 144-7. From the Tambof Government.
[413] On this account Hanush believes that the Old Slavonians, as
burners of their dead, must have borrowed the vampire belief from some
other race. See the "Zeitschrift fuer deutsche Mythologie," &c., vol.
iv. p. 199. But it is not certain that burial by cremation was
universally practised by the heathen Slavonians. Kotlyarevsky, in his
excellent work on their funeral customs, arrives at the conclusion
that there never was any general rule on the subject, but that some
Slavonians buried without burning, while others first burned their
dead, and then inhumed their ashes. See "Songs of the Russian People,"
p. 325.
[414] See the strange stories in Maurer's "Islaendische Volkssagen,"
pp. 112, and 300, 301.
[415] As in the case of Glam, the terrible spectre which Grettir had
so much difficulty in overcoming. To all who appreciate a shudder may
be recommended chap. xxxv. of "The Story of Grettir the Strong,"
translated from the Icelandic by E. Magnusson and W. Morris, 1869.
[416] The ordinary Modern-Greek word for a vampire, +vourkolakas+, he
says, "is undoubtedly of Slavonic origin, being identical with the
Slavonic name of the werwolf, which is called in Bohemian _vlkodlak_,
in Bulgarian and Slovak, _vrkolak_, &c.," the vampire and the werwolf
having many points in common. Moreover, the Regular name for a vampire
in Servian, he remarks, is _vukodlak_. This proves the Slavonian
nature (_die Slavicitaet_) of the name beyond all doubt.--"Volksleben
der Neugriechen," 1871, p. 159.
[417] In Crete and Rhodes, +katachanas+; in Cyprus, +sarkomenos+; in
Tenos, +anaikathoumenos+. The Turks, according to Mr. Tozer, give the
name of _vurkolak_, and some of the Albanians, says Hahn, give that of
+vourvolak-ou+ to the restless dead. Ibid, p. 160.
[418] Russian _vampir_, South-Russian _upuir_, anciently _upir_;
Polish _upior_, Polish and Bohemian _upir_. Supposed by some
philologists to be from _pit'_ = drink, whence the Croatian name for a
vampire _pijawica_. See "Songs of the Russian People," p. 410.
[419] Afanasief, _P.V.S._ iii. 558. The story is translated in full in
"Songs of the Russian People," pp. 411, 412
[420] In a most valuable article on "Vampirism" in the "Zeitschrift
fuer deutsche Mythologie und Sittenkunde," Bd. iv. 1859, pp. 259-82.
[421] How superior our intelligence is to that of Slavonian peasants
is proved by the fact that they still drive stakes through supposed
vampires, whereas our law no longer demands that a suicide shall have
a stake driven through his corpse. That rite was abolished by 4 Geo.
iv. c. 52.
[422] Compare with this belief the Scotch superstition mentioned by
Pennant, that if a dog or cat pass over a corpse the animal must be
killed at once. As illustrative of this idea, Mr. Henderson states, on
the authority of "an old Northumbrian hind," that "in one case, just
as a funeral was about to leave the house, the cat jumped over the
coffin, and no one would move till the cat was destroyed." In another,
a colly dog jumped over a coffin which a funeral party had set on the
ground while they rested. "It was felt by all that the dog must be
killed, without hesitation, before they proceeded farther, and killed
it was." With us the custom survives; its explanation has been
forgotten. See Henderson's "Notes on the Folk Lore of the Northern
Counties of England," 1866, p. 43.
[423] A great deal of information about vampires, and also about
turnskins, wizards and witches, will be found in Afanasief, _P.V.S._
iii. chap. xxvi., on which I have freely drawn. The subject has been
treated with his usual judgment and learning by Mr. Tylor in his
"Primitive Culture," ii. 175, 176. For several ghastly stories about
the longing of Rakshasas and Vetalas for human flesh, some of which
bear a strong resemblance to Slavonic vampire tales, see Brockhaus's
translation of the first five books of the "Kathasaritsagara," vol. i.
p. 94; vol. ii. pp. 13, 142, 147.