The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)

Bonfires on the Eve of Twelfth Night. Fire applied to the fruit-trees on the Eve of Twelfth Night in Normandy and the Ardennes.

In Franche-Comté, particularly in the Montagne du Doubs, it is still the custom on the Eve of Twelfth Night (the fifth of January) to light bonfires, which appear to have, in the popular mind, some reference to the crops. The whole population takes part in the festivity. In the afternoon the young folk draw a cart about the street collecting fuel. Some people contribute faggots, others bundles of straw or of dry hemp stalks. Towards evening the whole of the fuel thus collected is piled up a little way from the houses and set on fire. While it blazes, the people dance round it, crying, “Good year, come back! Bread and wine, come back!” In the district of Pontarlier the young folk carry lighted torches about the fields, shaking sparks over the sowed lands and shouting, “Couaille, couaille, blanconnie!” – words of which the meaning has been forgotten.[720 - Ch. Beauquier, Les Mois en Franche-Comté (Paris, 1900), p. 12.] A similar custom is commonly observed on the same day (the Eve of Twelfth Night, the fifth of January) in the Bocage of Normandy, except that it is the fruit-trees rather than the sowed fields to which the fire is applied. When the evening shadows have fallen on the landscape, the darkness begins to be illuminated here and there by twinkling points of fire, which multiply as the night grows late, till they appear as numerous on earth as the stars in the sky. About every village, in the fields and orchards, on the crests of the hills, wandering lights may be discerned, vanishing and suddenly reappearing, gathering together and then dispersing, pursuing each other capriciously, and tracing broken lines, sparkling arabesques of fire in the gloom of night The peasants are observing the ceremony of the “Moles and Field-mice” (Taupes et Mulots); and that evening there is not a hamlet, not a farm, hardly a solitary cottage that does not contribute its flame to the general illumination, till the whole horizon seems in a blaze, and houses, woods, and hills stand out in dark relief against the glow of the sky. The villages vie with each other in the number and brilliancy of the fires they can exhibit on this occasion. Woods and hedges are scoured to provide the materials for the blaze. Torches of straw wound about poles are provided in abundance; and armed with them men and women, lads and lasses, boys and girls, pour forth from the houses at nightfall into the fields and orchards. There they run about among the trees, waving the lighted torches under the branches and striking the trunks with them so that the sparks fly out in showers. And as they do so they sing or scream at the top of their voices certain traditional curses against the animals and insects that injure the fruit-trees. They bid the moles and field-mice to depart from their orchards, threatening to break their bones and burn their beards if they tarry. The more they do this, the larger, they believe, will be the crop of fruit in the following autumn. When everybody has rushed about his own orchard, meadow or pasture in this fashion, they all assemble on a height or crest of a hill, where they picnic, each bringing his share of provisions, cider, or brandy to the feast. There, too, they kindle a huge bonfire, and dance round it, capering and brandishing their torches in wild enthusiasm.[721 - J. Lecœur, Esquisses du Bocage Normand (Condé-sur-Noireau, 1883-1887), ii. 126-129. Compare Amélie Bosquet, La Normandie Romanesque et Merveilleuse (Paris and Rouen, 1845), pp. 295 sq.; W. Mannhardt, Der Baumkultus (Berlin, 1875), pp. 536 sqq.] Customs of the same sort used to be observed on the same day (the Eve of Epiphany, the fifth of January) in the Ardennes. People ran about with burning torches, commanding the moles and field-mice to go forth. Then they threw the torches on the ground, and believed that by this proceeding they purified the earth and made it fruitful.[722 - A. Meyrac, Traditions, Coutumes, Légendes et Contes des Ardennes (Charleville, 1890), pp. 75 sq.]

Fires kindled on Twelfth Night or the Eve of Twelfth Night in England for the sake of the crops.

This ceremony appears to be intended to ensure a good crop of fruit by burning out the animals and insects that harm the fruit-trees. In some parts of England it used to be customary to light fires at the same season for the purpose, apparently, of procuring a plentiful crop of wheat in the ensuing autumn. Thus, “in the parish of Pauntley, a village on the borders of the county of Gloucester, next Worcestershire, and in the neighbourhood, a custom prevails, which is intended to prevent the smut in wheat. On the Eve of Twelfth-day, all the servants of every farmer assemble together in one of the fields that has been sown with wheat. At the end of twelve lands, they make twelve fires in a row with straw, around one of which, much larger than the rest, they drink a cheerful glass of cider to their master's health, and success to the future harvest; then, returning home, they feast on cakes soaked in cider, which they claim as a reward for their past labours in sowing the grain.”[723 - J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain, New Edition (London, 1883), i. 33. In many parishes of Gloucestershire it used to be customary on Twelfth Day to light twelve small fires and one large one (J. Brand, op. cit. i. 28).] Similarly in Herefordshire, “on the Eve of Twelfth Day, at the approach of evening, the farmers, their friends, servants, etc., all assemble, and, near six o'clock, all walk together to a field where wheat is growing. The highest part of the ground is always chosen, where twelve small fires, and one large one are lighted up. The attendants, headed by the master of the family, pledge the company in old cyder, which circulates freely on these occasions. A circle is formed round the large fire, when a general shout and hallooing takes place, which you hear answered from all the villages and fields near; as I have myself counted fifty or sixty fires burning at the same time, which are generally placed on some eminence. This being finished, the company all return to the house, where the good housewife and her maids are preparing a good supper, which on this occasion is very plentiful. A large cake is always provided, with a hole in the middle. After supper, the company all attend the bailiff (or head of the oxen) to the wain-house, where the following particulars are observed. The master, at the head of his friends, fills the cup (generally of strong ale), and stands opposite the first or finest of the oxen (twenty-four of which I have often seen tied up in their stalls together); he then pledges him in a curious toast; the company then follow his example with all the other oxen, addressing each by their name. This being over, the large cake is produced, and is, with much ceremony, put on the horn of the first ox, through the hole in the cake; he is then tickled to make him toss his head: if he throws the cake behind, it is the mistress's perquisite; if before (in what is termed the boosy), the bailiff claims this prize. This ended, the company all return to the house, the doors of which are in the meantime locked, and not opened till some joyous songs are sung. On entering, a scene of mirth and jollity commences, and reigns thro' the house till a late, or rather an early, hour, the next morning.”[724 - The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. lxi., February, 1791, p. 116. The article is signed J. W. and dated “Hereford, Jan. 24.” The passage is quoted, correctly in substance, but with many verbal changes, by J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain, i. 30 sq., and by (Mrs.) E. M. Leather, The Folk-lore of Herefordshire (Hereford and London, 1912), p. 93.]

One of the fires on Twelfth Day said to be intended “to burn the old witch.” Parallel custom observed in Macedonia on the Eve of Twelfth Night.

The custom was known as Wassailing and it was believed to have a beneficial effect on the crops.[725 - (Mrs.) Ella Mary Leather, The Folk-lore of Herefordshire (Hereford and London, 1912), pp. 93 sq.] According to one Herefordshire informant, “on Twelfth Day they make twelve fires of straw and one large one to burn the old witch; they sing, drink, and dance round it; without this festival they think they should have no crop.”[726 - (Mrs.) E. M. Leather, op. cit. pp. 94 sq.] This explanation of the large fire on Twelfth Day is remarkable and may supply the key to the whole custom of kindling fires on the fields or in the orchards on that day. We have seen that witches and fiends of various sorts are believed to be let loose during the Twelve Days and that in some places they are formally driven away on Twelfth Night.[727 - See above, pp. 164 (#x_15_i5)sqq.] It may well be that the fires lighted on that day were everywhere primarily intended to burn the witches and other maleficent beings swarming invisible in the mischief-laden air, and that the benefit supposed to be conferred by the fires on the crops was not so much the positive one of quickening the growth of vegetation by genial warmth as the negative one of destroying the baleful influences which would otherwise blast the fruits of the earth and of the trees. This interpretation of the English and French custom of lighting fires in fields and orchards on Twelfth Night is confirmed by a parallel custom observed by Macedonian peasants for the express purpose of burning up certain malicious fiends, who are believed to be abroad at this season. These noxious beings are known as Karkantzari or Skatsantzari. They are thought to be living people, whether men or women, who during the Twelve Days are transformed into horrible monsters, with long nails, red faces, bloodshot eyes, snottering noses, and slobbering mouths. In this hideous guise they roam about by night haunting houses and making the peasant's life well-nigh unbearable; they knock at the doors and should they be refused admittance they will scramble down the chimney and pinch, worry, and defile the sleepers in their beds. The only way to escape from these tormenters is to seize and bind them fast with a straw rope. If you have no such rope or your heart fails you, there is nothing for it but to shut yourself up in the house before dark, fasten the door tight, block up the chimney, and wait for daylight; for it is only at night that the monsters are on the prowl, during the day they resume their ordinary human shape. However, in some places strenuous efforts are made during the Twelve Days to destroy these hateful nocturnal goblins by fire. For example, on Christmas Eve some people burn the Karkantzari by lighting faggots of holm-oak and throwing them out into the streets at early dawn. In other places, notably at Melenik, they scald the fiends to death on New Year's Eve by means of pancakes frizzling and hissing in a pan. While the goodwife is baking the cakes, the goodman disguises himself as one of the fiends in a fur coat turned inside out, and in his assumed character dances and sings outside the door, while he invites his wife to join him in the dance. In other districts people collect faggots during the whole of the Twelve Days and lay them up on the hearth. Then on the Eve of Twelfth Night they set fire to the pile in order that the goblins, who are supposed to be lurking under the ashes, may utterly perish.[728 - G. F. Abbott. Macedonian Folk-lore (Cambridge, 1903), pp. 73-75.] Thus the view that the large fire in Herefordshire on Twelfth Night is intended “to burn the old witch” is far more probable than the opinion that it represents the Virgin Mary, and that the other twelve fires stand for the twelve apostles.[729 - This opinion is mentioned by (Mrs.) E. M. Leather, The Folk-lore of Herefordshire, p. 95.] This latter interpretation is in all probability nothing more than a Christian gloss put upon an old heathen custom of which the meaning was forgotten.

Other accounts of the fires on Twelfth Night in England and Ireland.

The Gloucestershire custom was described by the English traveller Thomas Pennant in the latter part of the eighteenth century. He says: “A custom savouring of the Scotch Bel-tien prevales in Gloucestershire, particularly about Newent and the neighbouring parishes, on the twelfth day, or on the Epiphany, in the evening. All the servants of every particular farmer assemble together in one of the fields that has been sown with wheat; on the border of which, in the most conspicuous or most elevated place, they make twelve fires of straw, in a row; around one of which, made larger than the rest, they drink a cheerful glass of cyder to their master's health, success to the future harvest, and then returning home, they feast on cakes made of carraways, etc., soaked in cyder, which they claim as a reward for their past labours in sowing the grain.”[730 - Thomas Pennant, “A Tour in Scotland, 1769,” in John Pinkerton's Voyages and Travels (London, 1808-1814), iii. 49.] In Shropshire also it used to be customary to kindle festal fires on the tops of hills and other high places on Twelfth Night.[731 - Thomas Hyde, Historia religionis veterum Persarum (Oxford, 1700), p. 257.] Again, in Ireland “on Twelfth-Eve in Christmas, they use to set up as high as they can a sieve of oats, and in it a dozen of candles set round, and in the centre one larger, all lighted. This in memory of our Saviour and his Apostles, lights of the world.”[732 - Sir Henry Piers, Description of the County of Westmeath, quoted by J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1883), i. 25.] Down to the present time, apparently, in the county of Roscommon, “Twelfth Night, which is Old Christmas Day, is a greater day than Christmas Day itself. Thirteen rushlights are made in remembrance of the numbers at the Last Supper, and each is named after some member of the family. If there are not enough in the household other relations' names are added. The candles are stuck in a cake of cow-dung and lighted, and as each burns out, so will be the length of each person's life. Rushlights are only used for this occasion.”[733 - H. J. Byrne, “All Hallows Eve and other Festivals in Connaught,” Folk-lore, xviii. (1907) p. 439.]

Belief of the Germanic peoples that the weather for the twelve months of the year is determined by the weather of the Twelve Days.

In these English and Irish customs observed on Twelfth Night the twelve fires or candles probably refer either to the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany or to the twelve months of the year. In favour of this view it may be said that according to a popular opinion, which has been reported in England[734 - C. S. Burne and G. F. Jackson, Shropshire Folk-lore (London, 1883), p. 408.] and is widely diffused in Germany and the German provinces of Austria, the weather of the twelve days in question determines the weather of the twelve following months, so that from the weather on each of these days it is possible to predict the weather of the corresponding month in the ensuing year.[735 - The Popish Kingdome or reigne of Antichrist, written in Latin verse by Thomas Naogeorgus and Englyshed by Barnabe Googe, 1570, edited by R. C. Hope (London, 1880), p. 46; E. Meier, Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Schwaben (Stuttgart, 1852), p. 473, § 237; A. Birlinger, Volksthümliches aus Schwaben (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1861-1862), i. 468, § 696; A. Kuhn und W. Schwartz, Norddeutsche Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche (Leipsic, 1848), p. 411; A. Kuhn, Sagen, Gebräuche und Märchen aus Westfalen (Leipsic, 1859), ii. 115, § 354; A. Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube

(Berlin, 1869), p. 61, § 74; Montanus, Die deutschen Volksfeste, Volksbräuche und deutscher Volksglaube (Iserlohn, n. d.), p. 18; M. Toeppen, Aberglauben aus Masuren

(Danzig, 1867), p. 61; L. Strackerjan, Aberglaube und Sagen aus dem Herzogthum Oldenburg (Oldenburg, 1867), ii. 29, § 294; August Witzschel, Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Thüringen (Vienna, 1878), p. 175; K. Bartsch, Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche aus Mecklenburg (Vienna, 1880), p. 250, § 1292; Christian Schneller, Märchen und Sagen aus Wälschtirol (Innsbruck, 1867), p. 231; J. Haltrich, Zur Volkskunde der Siebenbürger Sachsen (Vienna, 1885), p. 282; Willibald Müller, Beiträge zur Volkskunde der Deutschen in Mähren (Vienna and Olmutz, 1893), p. 317; Alois John, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube im deutschen Westböhmen (Prague, 1905), p. 12; P. Drechsler, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien (Leipsic, 1903-1906), i. 16 sq.] Hence in Swabia the days are called “the Twelve Lot Days”; and many people seek to pry into the future with scientific precision by means of twelve circles, each subdivided into four quadrants, which they chalk up over the parlour door or inscribe on paper. Each circle represents a month, and each quadrant represents a quarter of a month; and according as the sky is overcast or clear during each quarter of a day from Christmas to Epiphany, you shade the corresponding quadrant of a circle or leave it a blank. By this contrivance, as simple as it is ingenious, you may forecast the weather for the whole year with more or less of accuracy.[736 - E. Meier, Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Schwaben (Stuttgart, 1852), p. 473, § 237; A. Birlinger, Volksthümliches aus Schwaben (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1861-1862), i. 468, § 696.] At Hosskirch in Swabia they say that you can predict the weather for the twelve months from the weather of the twelve hours of Twelfth Day alone.[737 - A. Birlinger, op. cit. i. 470.] A somewhat different system of meteorology is adopted in various parts of Switzerland, Germany, and Austria. On Christmas, New Year's Day, or another of the twelve days you take an onion, slice it in two, peel off twelve coats, and sprinkle a pinch of salt in each of them. The twelve coats of the onion stand for the twelve months of the year, and from the amount of moisture which has gathered in each of them next morning you may foretell the amount of rain that will fall in the corresponding month.[738 - F. J. Vonbun, Beiträge zur deutschen Mythologie (Chur, 1862), p. 131; A. Birlinger, Volksthümliches aus Schwaben, i. 469; Chr. Schneller, Märchen und Sagen aus Wälschtirol (Innsbruck, 1867), p. 231.]

Belief of the Celtic peoples that the weather for the twelve months of the year is determined by the weather of the Twelve Days.

But the belief that the weather of the twelve months can be predicted from the weather of the twelve days is not confined to the Germanic peoples. It occurs also in France and among the Celts of Brittany and Scotland. Thus in the Bocage of Normandy “the village old wives have a very simple means of divining the general temperature of the coming season. According to them, the twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany, including Epiphany, represent the twelve months of the year. So the thing to do is to mark the temperature of each of these days, for the temperature of the corresponding month will be relatively the same. Some people say that this experience is rarely at fault, and more trust is put in it than in the predictions of the Double-Liégois.”[739 - Jules Lecoeur, Esquisses du Bocage Normand (Condé-sur-Noireau, 1883-1887), ii. 20 sq.] In Cornouaille, Brittany, it is popularly believed that the weather of the last six days of December and the first six of January prognosticates the weather of the twelve months; but in other parts of Brittany it is the first twelve days of January that are supposed to be ominous of the weather for the year. These days are called gour-deziou, which is commonly interpreted “male days,” but is said to mean properly “additional or supplementary days.”[740 - J. Loth, “Les douze jours supplémentaires (gourdeziou) des Bretons et les douze jours des Germains et des Indous,” Revue Celtique, xxiv. (1903) pp. 310 sq.] Again, in the Highlands of Scotland the twelve days of Christmas (Da latha dheug na Nollaig) “were the twelve days commencing from the Nativity or Big Nollaig, and were deemed to represent, in respect of weather, the twelve months of the year. Some say the days should be calculated from New Year's Day.”[741 - J. G. Campbell, Witchcraft and Second Sight in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland (Glasgow, 1902), p. 243.] Others again reckon the Twelve Days from the thirty-first of December. Thus Pennant tells us that “the Highlanders form a sort of almanack or presage of the weather of the ensuing year in the following manner: they make observation on twelve days, beginning at the last of December, and hold as an infallible rule, that whatsoever weather happens on each of those days, the same will prove to agree in the correspondent months. Thus, January is to answer to the weather of December 31st; February to that of January 1st; and so with the rest. Old people still pay great attention to this augury.”[742 - Thomas Pennant, “A Tour in Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides in 1772,” in John Pinkerton's Voyages and Travels (London, 1808-1814), iii. 384.] It is interesting to observe that in the Celtic regions of Scotland and France popular opinion hesitates as to the exact date of the twelve days, some people dating them from Christmas, others from the New Year, and others again from the thirty-first of December. This hesitation has an important bearing on the question of the origin of the twelve days' period, as I shall point out immediately.

The Twelve Nights among the ancient Aryans of India.

Thus in the popular mind the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany are conceived as a miniature of the whole year, the character of each particular day answering to the character of a particular month. The conception appears to be very ancient, for it meets us again among the Aryans of the Vedic age in India. They, too, appear to have invested twelve days in midwinter with a sacred character as a time when the three Ribhus or genii of the seasons rested from their labours in the home of the sun-god; and these twelve rest-days they called “an image or copy of the year.”[743 - The Hymns of the Rigveda, translated by R. T. H. Griffith (Benares, 1889-1892), book iv. hymn 33, vol. ii. pp. 150 sqq.; H. Zimmer, Altindisches Leben (Berlin, 1879), pp. 365-367; A. Hillebrandt, Ritual-Litteratur, Vedische Opfer und Zauber (Strasburg, 1897), pp. 5 sq. However, the Ribhus are very obscure figures in Vedic mythology. Compare H. Oldenberg, Die Religion des Veda (Berlin, 1894), pp. 235 sq.; A. A. Macdonnell, Vedic Mythology (Strasburg, 1897), pp. 131 sqq.]

The Twelve Nights are probably an ancient intercalary period introduced to equate twelve lunar months to the solar year.

This curious coincidence, if such it is, between the winter festivals of the ancient Aryans of India and their modern kinsfolk in Europe seems to be best explained on the theory that the twelve days in question derive their sanctity from the position which they occupied in the calendar of the primitive Aryans. The coincidence of the name for month with the name for moon in the various Aryan languages[744 - F. Max Müller, Lectures on the Science of Language, Sixth Edition (London, 1871), i. 6 sqq.; O. Schrader, Reallexikon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde (Strasburg, 1901), p. 547; id., Sprachvergleichung und Urgeschichte

(Jena, 1906-1907), ii. 228.] points to the conclusion that the year of our remote ancestors was primarily based on observation of the moon rather than of the sun; but as a year of twelve lunar months or three hundred and fifty-four days (reckoning the months at twenty-nine and thirty days alternately) falls short of the solar year of three hundred and sixty-five and a quarter days by roundly twelve days, the discrepancy could not fail to attract the attention of an intelligent people, such as the primitive Aryans must be supposed to have been, who had made some progress in the arts of life; and the most obvious way of removing the discrepancy and equating the lunar with the solar year is to add twelve days at the end of each period of twelve lunar months so as to bring the total days of the year up to three hundred and sixty-six. The equation is not indeed perfectly exact, but it may well have been sufficiently so for the rudimentary science of the primitive Aryans.[745 - This explanation of the sacredness of the twelve days among the Indo-European peoples of the East and West is due to A. Weber. See O. Schrader, Reallexikon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde (Strasburg, 1901), pp. 391-394; id., Sprachvergleichung und Urgeschichte

(Jena, 1906-1907), ii. 2. pp. 228-234. It is accepted by J. Loth (in Revue Celtique, xxiv. 1903, pp. 311 sq.), Professor H. Hirt (Die Indogermanen, Strasburg, 1905-1907, ii. 537, 544), Professor J. H. Moulton (Two Lectures on the Science of Language, Cambridge, 1903, pp. 47 sq.), and J. A. MacCulloch (in Dr. J. Hastings's Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, iii. 81 sq.), but is rejected on what seem to me insufficient grounds by Professor O. Schrader (ll.cc.).] As many savage races in modern times have observed the discrepancy between solar and lunar time and have essayed to correct it by observations of the sun or the constellations, especially the Pleiades,[746 - Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild, i. 307 sqq.] there seems no reason to doubt that the ancestors of the Indo-European peoples in prehistoric times were able to make similar observations, and that they were not, as has been suggested, reduced to the necessity of borrowing the knowledge of such simple and obvious facts from the star-gazers of ancient Babylonia. Learned men who make little use of their eyes except to read books are too apt to underrate the observational powers of the savage, who lives under totally different conditions from us, spending most of his time in the open air and depending for his very existence on the accuracy with which he notes the varied and changing aspects of nature.

The superstitions attaching to the Twelve Nights are not of Christian origin.

It has been proposed to explain the manifold superstitions which cluster round the Twelve Days, or rather the Twelve Nights, as they are more popularly called,[747 - Die gestriegelte Rockenphilosophie (Chemnitz, 1759), pp. 860, 861; Bavaria, Landes- und Volkskunde des Königreichs Bayern (Munich, 1860-1867), i. 365; A. Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube

(Berlin, 1869), p. 61; P. Drechsler, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien (Leipsic, 1903-1906), i. 15; A. John, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube im deutschen Westböhmen (Prague, 1905), p. 11. The phrase “the Twelve Nights” in the sense of “the Twelve Days and Nights” is doubtless derived from the ancient Aryan custom of counting by nights instead of by days and of regarding the period of the earth's revolution on its axis as beginning with the night rather than with the day. See Caesar, De bello Gallico, vi. 18; Tacitus, Germania, 11; O. Schrader, Reallexikon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde (Strasburg, 1901), pp. 844 sqq.; J. Loth, “L'Année celtique,” Revue Celtique, xxv. (1904) pp. 115 sqq. The Athenians reckoned a day from sunset to sunset, and the Romans reckoned it from midnight to midnight (Censorinus, De die natali, xxiii. 3).] by reference to the place which they occupy in the Christian calendar, beginning as they do immediately after Christmas and ending with Epiphany.[748 - A. Tille, Die Geschichte der deutschen Weihnacht (Leipsic, preface dated 1893), pp. 3 sq., 281 sqq.; O. Schrader, Reallexikon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde (Strasburg, 1901), p. 392.] But, in the first place, it is difficult to see why the interval between these two particular festivals should have attracted to itself a greater mass of superstitious belief and custom than the interval between any other two Christian festivals in the calendar; if it really did so, the ground of its special attraction is still to seek, and on this essential point the advocates of the Christian origin of the Twelve Nights throw no light. In the second place, the superstitious beliefs and customs themselves appear to have no relation to Christianity but to be purely pagan in character. Lastly, a fatal objection to the theory in question is that the place of the Twelve Days in the calendar is not uniformly fixed to the interval between Christmas and Epiphany; it varies considerably in popular opinion in different places, but it is significant that the variations never exceed certain comparatively narrow limits. The twelve-days' festival, so to speak, oscillates to and fro about a fixed point, which is either the end of the year or the winter solstice. Thus in Silesia the Twelve Days are usually reckoned to fall before Christmas instead of after it; though in the Polish districts and the mountainous region of the country the ordinary German opinion prevails that the days immediately follow Christmas.[749 - P. Drechsler, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien (Leipsic, 1903-1906), i. 15.] In some parts of Bavaria the Twelve Days are counted from St. Thomas's Day (the twenty-first of December) to New Year's Day; while in parts of Mecklenburg they begin with New Year's Day and so coincide with the first twelve days of January,[750 - A. Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube

(Berlin, 1869), p. 61, § 74. As to the varying dates of the Twelve Nights see further E. Mogk, “Mythologie,” in H. Paul's Grundriss der germanischen Philologie, iii.

(Strasburg, 1900), p. 260.] and this last mode of reckoning finds favour, as we saw, with some Celts of Brittany and Scotland.[751 - See above, p. 324 (#x_24_i20).] These variations in the dating of the Twelve Days seem irreconcilable with the theory that they derive their superstitious character purely from the accident that they fall between Christmas and Epiphany; accordingly we may safely dismiss the theory of their Christian origin and recognize, with many good authorities,[752 - Thus A. Wuttke observes that by far the greater part of the superstitions attaching to the Twelve Nights are of purely heathen origin (Der deutsche Volksaberglaube,

p. 61); and K. Weinhold similarly remarks that the superstitions in question cannot have originated in Christian dogmas, and that they point to the sacredness of the winter solstice among the heathen tribes of Germany (Weinacht-Spiele und Lieder aus Süddeutschland und Schlesien, Vienna, 1875, p. 4).] in the Twelve Days the relics of a purely pagan festival, which was probably celebrated long before the foundation of Christianity. In truth the hypothesis of the Christian derivation of the Twelve Days in all probability exactly inverts the historical order of the facts. On the whole the evidence goes to shew that the great Christian festivals were arbitrarily timed by the church so as to coincide with previously existing pagan festivals for the sake of weaning the heathen from their old faith and bringing them over to the new religion. To make the transition as easy as possible the ecclesiastical authorities, in abolishing the ancient rites, appointed ceremonies of somewhat similar character on the same days, or nearly so, thus filling up the spiritual void by a new creation which the worshipper might accept as an adequate substitute for what he had lost. Christmas and Easter, the two pivots on which the Christian calendar revolves, appear both to have been instituted with this intention: the one superseded a midwinter festival of the birth of the sun-god, the other superseded a vernal festival of the death and resurrection of the vegetation-god.[753 - See Adonis, Attis, Osiris, Second Edition, pp. 254 sqq.; and for Easter in particular see my letter “Attis and Christ,” The Athenaeum, No. 4184, January 4th, 1908, pp. 19 sq.; Franz Cumont, Les Religions orientales dans le Paganisme romain

(Paris, 1909), pp. 106 sq., 333 sq.]

An intercalary period a natural subject of superstition to primitive peoples.

If the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany were indeed an ancient intercalary period inserted for the purpose of equating the lunar to the solar year, we can better understand the curious superstitions that have clustered round them and the quaint customs that have been annually observed during their continuance. To the primitive mind it might well seem that an intercalary period stands outside of the regular order of things, forming part neither of the lunar nor of the solar system; it is an excrescence, inevitable but unaccountable, which breaks the smooth surface of ordinary existence, an eddy which interrupts the even flow of months and years. Hence it may be inferred that the ordinary rules of conduct do not apply to such extraordinary periods, and that accordingly men may do in them what they would never dream of doing at other times. Thus intercalary days tend to degenerate into seasons of unbridled license; they form an interregnum during which the customary restraints of law and morality are suspended and the ordinary rulers abdicate their authority in favour of a temporary regent, a sort of puppet king, who bears a more or less indefinite, capricious, and precarious sway over a community given up for a time to riot, turbulence, and disorder. If that is so – though it must be confessed that the view here suggested is to a great extent conjectural – we may perhaps detect the last surviving representatives of such puppet kings in the King of the Bean and other grotesque figures of the same sort who used to parade with the mimic pomp of sovereignty on one or other of the twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany. For the King of the Bean was by no means the only such ruler of the festive season, nor was Twelfth Night the only day on which he and his colleagues played their pranks. We will conclude this part of our subject with a brief notice of some of these mummers.

The Three Kings of Twelfth Night.

In the first place it deserves to be noticed that in many parts of the continent, such as France, Spain, Belgium, Germany, and Austria, Twelfth Day is regularly associated with three mythical kings named Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, and derives its popular appellation from them, being known in Germany and Austria as the Day of the Three Kings (Dreikönigstag) and in France as the Festival of the Kings (Fête des Rois). Further, it has been customary in many places to represent the three kings by mummers, who go about arrayed in royal costume from door to door, singing songs and collecting contributions from the households which they visit.[754 - J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1883), i. 21 sq.; E. Cortet, Essai sur les Fêtes religieuses (Paris, 1867), pp. 32, 38, 39-42; Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, Calendrier Belge (Brussels, 1861-1862), i. 21 sq., 30 sq.; id., Fest-Kalender aus Böhmen (Prague, n. d.), p. 18; id., Das festliche Jahr (Leipsic, 1863), pp. 23-26; Bavaria, Landes- und Volkskunde des Königreichs Bayern (Munich, 1860-1867), ii. 262 sq.; L. F. Sauvé, Le Folk-lore des Hautes-Vosges (Paris, 1889), pp. 15-18; Ch. Beauquier, Les Mois en Franche-Comté (Paris, 1900), pp. 13-15; La Bresse Louhannaise, Janvier, 1906, p. 42; P. Drechsler, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien (Leipsic, 1903-1906), i. 51; A. John, Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube im deutschen Westböhmen (Prague, 1905), pp. 32-34; E. Hoffmann-Krayer, Feste und Bräuche des Schweizervolkes (Zürich, 1913), pp. 104, 121.] The custom may very well be older than Christianity, though it has received a Christian colouring; for the mythical kings are commonly identified with the wise men of the East, who are said to have been attracted to the infant Christ at Bethlehem by the sight of his star in the sky.[755 - Matthew ii. 1-12.] Yet there is no Biblical authority for regarding these wise men as kings or for fixing their number at three. In Franche-Comté the old custom is still observed, or at all events it was so down to recent years. The Three Kings are personated by three boys dressed in long white shirts with coloured sashes round their waists; on their heads they wear pointed mitres of pasteboard decorated with a gilt star and floating ribbons. Each carries a long wand topped by a star, which he keeps constantly turning. The one who personates Melchior has his face blackened with soot, because Melchior is supposed to have been a negro king. When they enter a house, they sing a song, setting forth that they are three kings who have come from three different countries, led by a star, to adore the infant Jesus at Bethlehem. After the song the negro king solicits contributions by shaking his money-box or holding out a basket, in which the inmates of the house deposit eggs, nuts, apples and so forth. By way of thanks for this liberality the three kings chant a stave in which they call down the blessing of God on the household.[756 - Ch. Beauquier, Les Mois en Franche-Comté (Paris, 1900), pp. 13-16.] The custom is similar in the Vosges Mountains, where the Three Kings are held in great veneration and invoked by hedge doctors to effect various cures. For example, if a man drops to the ground with the falling sickness, you need only whisper in his right ear, “Gaspard fert myrrham, thus Melchior, Balthasar aurum,” and he will get up at once. But to make the cure complete you must knock three nails into the earth on the precise spot where he fell; each nail must be exactly of the length of the patient's little finger, and as you knock it in you must take care to utter the sufferer's name.[757 - L. F. Sauvé, Le Folk-lore des Hautes-Vosges (Paris, 1889), pp. 15-17. Compare the old Roman cure for the falling sickness (above, p. 68 (#x_6_i17)).] In many Czech villages of Bohemia the children who play the part of the Three Kings assimilate themselves to the wise men of the East in the gospel by carrying gilt paper, incense, and myrrh with them on their rounds, which they distribute as gifts in the houses they visit, receiving in return money or presents in kind. Moreover they fumigate and sprinkle the houses and describe crosses and letters on the doors. Amongst the Germans of West Bohemia it is the schoolmaster who, accompanied by some boys, goes the round of the village on Twelfth Day. He chalks up the letters C. M. B. (the initials of Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar), together with three crosses, on every door, and fumigates the house with a burning censer in order to guard it from evil influences and infectious diseases.[758 - O. Freiherr von Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, Fest-Kalender aus Böhmen (Prague, n. d.), pp. 17 sq.] Some people used to wear as an amulet a picture representing the adoration of the Three Kings with a Latin inscription to the following effect: “Holy three kings, Caspar, Melchior, Balthasar, pray for us, now and in the hour of our death.” The picture was thought to protect the wearer not only from epilepsy, headache, and fever, but also from the perils of the roads, from the bite of mad dogs, from sudden death, from sorcery and witchcraft.[759 - Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, Calendrier Belge (Brussels, 1861-1862), i. 22. The mere names of the three kings worn on the person were believed to be a cure for epilepsy. See J. B. Thiers, Traité des Superstitions (Paris, 1679), pp. 350 sq.] Whatever its origin, the festival of the Three Kings goes back to the middle ages, for it is known to have been celebrated with great pomp at Milan in 1336. On that occasion the Three Kings appeared wearing crowns, riding richly caparisoned horses, and surrounded by pages, bodyguards, and a great retinue of followers. Before them was carried a golden star, and they offered gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the infant Christ cradled in a manger beside the high altar of the church of St. Eustorgius.[760 - R. Chambers, The Book of Days (London and Edinburgh, 1886), i. 62, referring to Warton's History of English Poetry.]

The Lord of Misrule in England. Reign of the Lord of Misrule during the Twelve Days. Lord of Misrule in the Temple.

In our own country a popular figure during the Christmas holidays used to be the Lord of Misrule, or, as he was called in Scotland, the Abbot of Unreason, who led the revels at that merry season in the halls of colleges, the Inns of Court, the palace of the king, and the mansions of nobles.[761 - J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1883), i. 497 sqq.; E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 403 sqq.] Writing at the end of the sixteenth century, the antiquary John Stow tells us that, “in the feast of Christmas, there was in the King's house, wheresoever he was lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Master of Merry Disports; and the like had ye in the house of every nobleman of honour or good worship, were he spiritual or temporal. Amongst the which the Mayor of London, and either of the Sheriffs, had their several Lords of Misrule, ever contending, without quarrel or offence, who should make the rarest pastimes to delight the beholders. These Lords beginning their rule on Alhollon eve, continued the same til the morrow after the Feast of the Purification, commonly called Candlemas day. In all which space there were fine and subtle disguisings, masks and mummeries, with playing at cards for counters, nails, and points, in every house, more for pastime than for gain.”[762 - John Stow, A Survey of London, written in the year 1598, edited by William J. Thoms (London, 1876), p. 37.] Again, in the seventeenth century the ardent royalist Sir Thomas Urquhart wrote that “they may be likewise said to use their king … as about Christmas we do the King of Misrule; whom we invest with that title to no other end, but to countenance the Bacchanalian riots and preposterous disorders of the family, where he is installed.”[763 - Sir Thomas Urquhart, The Discovery of a most Exquisite Jewel, more precious than Diamonds inchased in Gold (Edinburgh, 1774), p. 146.] From the former passage it appears that the Lords of Misrule often or even generally reigned for more than three months in winter, namely from Allhallow Even (the thirty-first of October, the Eve of All Saints' Day) till Candlemas (the second of February). Sometimes, however, their reign seems to have been restricted to the Twelve Nights. Thus we are told that George Ferrers of Lincoln's Inn was Lord of Misrule for twelve days one year when King Edward VI. kept his Christmas with open house at Greenwich.[764 - J. Brand, op. cit. i. 499.] At Trinity College, Cambridge, a Master of Arts used to be appointed to this honourable office, which he held for the twelve days from Christmas to Twelfth Day, and he resumed office on Candlemas Day. His duty was to regulate the games and diversions of the students, particularly the plays which were acted in the college hall. Similar masters of the revels were commonly instituted in the colleges at Oxford; for example, at Merton College the fellows annually elected about St. Edmund's Day, in November a Lord of Misrule or, as he was called in the registers, a King of the Bean (Rex Fabarum), who held office till Candlemas and sometimes assumed a number of ridiculous titles. In the Inner Temple a Lord of Misrule used to be appointed on St. Stephen's Day (the twenty-sixth of December); surrounded by his courtiers, who were dubbed by various derogatory or ribald names, he presided at the dancing, feasting, and minstrelsy in the hall. Of the mock monarch who in the Christmas holidays of 1635 held office in the Middle Temple the jurisdiction, privileges, and parade have been minutely described. He was attended by his lord keeper, lord treasurer, with eight white staves, a band of gentleman pensioners with poleaxes, and two chaplains. He dined under a canopy of state both in the hall and in his own chambers. He received many petitions, which he passed on in regal style to his Master of Requests; and he attended service in the Temple church, where his chaplains preached before him and did him reverence. His expenses, defrayed from his own purse, amounted to no less than two thousand pounds.[765 - J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1883), i. 497 sqq. As to the Lords of Misrule in colleges and the Inns of Court see further E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage, i. 407 sqq.] “I remember to have heard a Bencher of the Temple tell a story of a tradition in their house, where they had formerly a custom of choosing kings for such a season, and allowing him his expences at the charge of the society: One of our kings, said my friend, carried his royal inclination a little too far, and there was a committee ordered to look into the management of his treasury. Among other things it appeared, that his Majesty walking incog. in the cloister, had overheard a poor man say to another, Such a small sum would make me the happiest man in the world. The king out of his royal compassion privately inquired into his character, and finding him a proper object of charity, sent him the money. When the committee read the report, the house passed his accounts with a plaudite without further examination, upon the recital of this article in them, ‘For making a man happy, £10:0:0.’ ”[766 - Sir Richard Steele, in The Spectator, Friday, 14th December 1711.]

Lord of Misrule at the English Court.

At the English court the annual Lord of Misrule is not to be confounded with the Master of the Revels, who was a permanent official and probably despised the temporary Lord as an upstart rival and intruder. Certainly there seems to have been at times bad blood between them. Some correspondence which passed between the two merry monarchs in the reign of Edward VI. has been preserved, and from it we learn that on one occasion the Lord of Misrule had much difficulty in extracting from the Master of the Revels the fool's coat, hobby-horses, and other trumpery paraphernalia which he required for the proper support of his dignity. Indeed the costumes furnished by his rival were so shabby that his lordship returned them with a note, in which he informed the Master of the Revels that the gentlemen of rank and position who were to wear these liveries stood too much on their dignity to be seen prancing about the streets of London rigged out in such old slops. The Lords of Council had actually to interpose in the petty squabble between the two potentates.[767 - E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage, i. 405-407.]

The Festival of Fools in France.

In France the counterparts of these English Lords of Misrule masqueraded in clerical attire as mock Bishops, Archbishops, Popes, or Abbots. The festival at which they disported themselves was known as the Festival of Fools (Fête des Fous), which fell in different places at different dates, sometimes on Christmas Day, sometimes on St. Stephen's Day (the twenty-sixth of December), sometimes on New Year's Day, and sometimes on Twelfth Day. According to one account “on the first day, which was the festival of Christmas, the lower orders of clergy and monks cried in unison Noël (Christmas) and gave themselves up to jollity. On the morrow, St. Stephen's Day, the deacons held a council to elect a Pope or Patriarch of Fools, a Bishop or Archbishop of Innocents, an Abbot of Ninnies; next day, the festival of St. John, the subdeacons began the dance in his honour; afterwards, on the fourth day, the festival of the Holy Innocents, the choristers and minor clergy claimed the Pope or Bishop or Abbot elect, who made his triumphal entry into the church on Circumcision Day (the first of January) and sat enthroned pontifically till the evening of Epiphany. It was then the joyous reign of this Pope or this Bishop or this Abbot of Folly which constituted the Festival of Fools and dominated its whimsical phases, the grotesque and sometimes impious masquerades, the merry and often disgusting scenes, the furious orgies, the dances, the games, the profane songs, the impudent parodies of the catholic liturgy.”[768 - L. J. B. Bérenger-Feraud, Superstitions et Survivances, iv. (Paris, 1896) pp. 4 sq., quoting Jacob, Mœurs et Coutumes du Moyen-Age. Compare E. Cortet, Essai sur les Fêtes religieuses (Paris, 1867), pp. 50 sqq. In some places the festival was held on the octave of Epiphany. See E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 323.] At these parodies of the most solemn rites of the church the priests, wearing grotesque masks and sometimes dressed as women, danced in the choir and sang obscene chants: laymen disguised as monks and nuns mingled with the clergy: the altar was transformed into a tavern, where the deacons and subdeacons ate sausages and black-puddings or played at dice and cards under the nose of the celebrant; and the censers smoked with bits of old shoes instead of incense, filling the church with a foul stench. After playing these pranks and running, leaping, and cutting capers through the whole church, they rode about the town in mean carts, exchanging scurrilities with the crowds of laughing and jeering spectators.[769 - E. Cortet, op. cit. p. 51; Papon, Histoire Générale de la Provence, iii. p. 212, quoted by L. J. B. Bérenger-Feraud, op. cit. iv. 9 sq.; E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 293 sq., quoting a circular letter which was addressed by the Faculty of Theology at Paris to the bishops and chapters of France on March 12th, 1445. Many details as to the mode of celebrating the Festival of Fools in different parts of France are on record. See A. de Nore, Coutumes, Mythes, et Traditions des Provinces de France (Paris and Lyons, 1846), pp. 293-295; E. Cortet, op. cit. pp. 52 sqq.; L. J. B. Bérenger-Feraud, op. cit. iv. 5 sqq.; G. Bilfinger, Untersuchungen über die Zeitrechnung der alten Germanen, ii. Das germanische Julfest (Stuttgart, 1901), pp. 72 sq.; and especially E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage, i. 274 sqq.]

Buffooneries in the churches at the Festival of Fools.

Amongst the buffooneries of the Festival of Fools one of the most remarkable was the introduction of an ass into the church, where various pranks were played with the animal. At Autun the ass was led with great ceremony to the church under a cloth of gold, the corners of which were held by four canons; and on entering the sacred edifice the animal was wrapt in a rich cope, while a parody of the mass was performed. A regular Latin liturgy in glorification of the ass was chanted on these occasions, and the celebrant priest imitated the braying of an ass. At Beauvais the ceremony was performed every year on the fourteenth of January. A young girl with a child in her arms rode on the back of the ass in imitation of the Flight into Egypt. Escorted by the clergy and the people she was led in triumph from the cathedral to the parish church of St. Stephen. There she and her ass were introduced into the chancel and stationed on the left side of the altar; and a long mass was performed which consisted of scraps borrowed indiscriminately from the services of many church festivals throughout the year. In the intervals the singers quenched their thirst: the congregation imitated their example; and the ass was fed and watered. The services over, the animal was brought from the chancel into the nave, where the whole congregation, clergy and laity mixed up together, danced round the animal and brayed like asses. Finally, after vespers and compline, the merry procession, led by the precentor and preceded by a huge lantern, defiled through the streets to wind up the day with indecent farces in a great theatre erected opposite the church.[770 - E. Cortet, Essai sur les Fêtes religieuses (Paris, 1867), pp. 53-56; L. J. B. Bérenger-Feraud, Superstitions et Survivances, iv. 28-41; E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 330-334. While the Festival of Fools appears to have been most popular in France, it is known to have been celebrated also in Germany, Bohemia, and England. See E. K. Chambers, op. cit. i. 318 sqq. In his youth the Bohemian reformer John Huss took part in these mummeries. The revellers wore masks. “A clerk, grotesquely vested, was dubbed ‘bishop,’ set on an ass with his face to the tail, and led to mass in the church. He was regaled on a platter of broth and a bowl of beer, and Huss recalls the unseemly revel which took place. Torches were borne instead of candles, and the clergy turned their garments inside out and danced” (E. K. Chambers, op. cit. i. 320 sq.).]

Festival of the Innocents and the Boy Bishop in France.

A pale reflection or diminutive copy of the Festival of Fools was the Festival of the Innocents, which was celebrated on Childermas or Holy Innocents' Day, the twenty-eighth of December. The custom was widely observed both in France and England. In France on Childermas or the eve of the festival the choristers assembled in the church and chose one of their number to be a Boy Bishop, who officiated in that character with mock solemnity. Such burlesques of ecclesiastical ritual appear to have been common on that day in monasteries and convents, where the offices performed by the clergy and laity were inverted for the occasion. At the Franciscan monastery of Antibes, for example, the lay brothers, who usually worked in the kitchen and the garden, took the place of the priests on Childermas and celebrated mass in church, clad in tattered sacerdotal vestments turned inside out, holding the books upside down, wearing spectacles made of orange peel, mumbling an unintelligible jargon, and uttering frightful cries. These buffooneries were kept up certainly as late as the eighteenth century,[771 - E. Cortet, Essai sur les Fêtes religieuses, p. 58; E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 317 sq., 336 sqq. Compare L. J. B. Bérenger-Feraud, Superstitions et Survivances, iv. 25-28. From the evidence collected by the latter writer it appears that in some places the election of the Boy Bishop took place on other days than Childermas. At Alençon the election took place on the sixth of December; at Vienne, in Dauphiné, on the fifteenth, and at Soissons on St. Thomas's Day (the twenty-first of December).] and probably later. In the great convent of the Congrégation de Notre Dame at Paris down to the latter part of the nineteenth century the nuns and their girl pupils regularly exchanged parts on Holy Innocents' Day. The pupils pretended to be nuns and a select few of them were attired as such, while the nuns made believe to be pupils, without however changing their dress.[772 - This I learn from my wife, who as a girl was educated in the convent.]

The Boy Bishop in England.

In England the Boy Bishop was widely popular during the later Middle Ages and only succumbed to the austerity of the Reformation. He is known, for example, to have officiated in St. Paul's, London, in the cathedrals of Salisbury, Exeter, Hereford, Gloucester, Lichfield, Norwich, Lincoln, and York, in great collegiate churches such as Beverley minster, St. Peter's, Canterbury, and Ottery St. Mary's, in college chapels such as Magdalen and All Souls' at Oxford, in the private chapels of the king, and in many parish churches throughout the country. The election was usually made on St. Nicholas's Day (the sixth of December), but the office and authority lasted till Holy Innocents' Day (the twenty-eighth of December). Both days were appropriate, for St. Nicholas was the patron saint of school children, and Holy Innocents' Day commemorates the slaughter of the young children by Herod. In cathedrals the Bishop was chosen from among the choir boys. After his election he was completely apparelled in the episcopal vestments, with a mitre and crosier, bore the title and displayed the state of a Bishop, and exacted ceremonial obedience from his fellows, who were dressed like priests. They took possession of the church and, with the exception of mass, performed all the ceremonies and offices. The Boy Bishop preached from the pulpit. At Salisbury the ceremonies at which he presided are elaborately regulated by the statutes of Roger de Mortival, enacted in 1319; and two of the great service-books of the Sarum use, the Breviary and the Processional, furnish full details of the ministrations of the Boy Bishop and his fellows. He is even said to have enjoyed the right of disposing of such prebends as happened to fall vacant during the days of his episcopacy. But the pranks of the mock bishop were not confined to the church. Arrayed in full canonicals he was led about with songs and dances from house to house, blessing the grinning people and collecting money in return for his benedictions. At York in the year 1396 the Boy Bishop is known to have gone on his rounds to places so far distant as Bridlington, Leeds, Beverley, Fountains Abbey, and Allerton; and the profits which he made were considerable. William of Wykeham ordained in 1400 that a Boy Bishop should be chosen at Winchester College and another at New College, Oxford, and that he should recite the office at the Feast of the Innocents. His example was followed some forty years afterwards in the statutes of the royal foundations of Eton College and of King's College, Cambridge. From being elected on St. Nicholas's Day the Boy Bishop was sometimes called a Nicholas Bishop (Episcopus Nicholatensis).[773 - J. Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1883), i. 421-431; E. K. Chambers, The Mediaeval Stage (Oxford, 1903), i. 352 sqq.; (Mrs.) Ella Mary Leather, The Folk-lore of Herefordshire (Hereford and London, 1912), pp. 138 sq.; County Folk-lore, II. North Riding of Yorkshire, York and the Ainsty, edited by Mrs. Gutch (London, 1901), pp. 352 sq.] In Spanish cathedrals, also, it appears to have been customary on St. Nicholas's Day to elect a chorister to the office of Bishop. He exercised a certain jurisdiction till Holy Innocents' Day, and his prebendaries took secular offices, acting in the capacity of alguazils, catchpoles, dog-whippers, and sweepers.[774 - J. Brand, op. cit. i. 426.]

The customs and superstitions associated with the Twelve Days or Nights are probably relics of an old heathen festival of intercalation at midwinter.

On the whole it seems difficult to suppose that the a curious superstitions and quaint ceremonies, the outbursts of profanity and the inversions of ranks, which characterize the popular celebration of the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany, have any connexion with the episodes of Christian history believed to be commemorated by these two festivals. More probably they are relics of an old heathen festival celebrated during the twelve intercalary days which our forefathers annually inserted in their calendar at midwinter in order to equalize the short lunar year of twelve months with the longer solar year of three hundred and sixty-five or sixty-six days. We need not assume that the license and buffooneries of the festive season were borrowed from the Roman Saturnalia; both celebrations may well have been parallel and independent deductions from a like primitive philosophy of nature. There is not indeed, so far as I am aware, any direct evidence that the Saturnalia at Rome was an intercalary festival; but the license which characterized it, and the temporary reign of a mock king, who personated Saturn, suggest that it may have been so. If we were better acquainted with the intercalary periods of peoples at a comparatively low level of culture, we might find that they are commonly marked by similar outbreaks of lawlessness and similar reigns of more or less nominal and farcical rulers. But unfortunately we know too little about the observance of such periods among primitive peoples to be warranted in making any positive affirmation on the subject.

Superstitions associated with intercalary periods among the Aztecs of Mexico and the Mayas of Yucatan.

However, there are grounds for thinking that intercalary periods have commonly been esteemed unlucky. The Aztecs certainly regarded as very unlucky the five supplementary days which they added at the end of every year in order to make up a total of three hundred and sixty-five days.[775 - As to the Aztec year see above, p. 287 (#x_22_i16) note 1.] These five supplementary days, corresponding to the last four of January and the first of February, were called nemontemi, which means “vacant,” “superfluous,” or “useless.” Being dedicated to no god, they were deemed inauspicious, equally unfit for the services of religion and the transaction of civil business. During their continuance no sacrifices were offered by the priests and no worshippers frequented the temples. No cases were tried in the courts of justice. The houses were not swept. People abstained from all actions of importance and confined themselves to performing such as could not be avoided, or spent the time in paying visits to each other. In particular they were careful during these fatal days not to fall asleep in the daytime, not to quarrel, and not to stumble; because they thought that if they did such things at that time they would continue to do so for ever. Persons born on any of these days were deemed unfortunate, destined to fail in their undertakings and to live in wretchedness and poverty all their time on earth.[776 - B. de Sahagun, Histoire Générale des Choses de la Nouvelle Espagne, traduite par D. Jourdanet et R. Simeon (Paris, 1880), pp. 77, 283; E. Seler, “The Mexican Chronology,” in Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin No. 28 (Washington, 1904), p. 16 (where some extracts from the Aztec text of Sahagun are quoted and translated); J. de Acosta, Natural and Moral History of the Indies (Hakluyt Society, London, 1880), ii. 392.] The Mayas of Yucatan employed a calendar like that of the Aztecs, and they too looked upon the five supplementary days at the end of the year as unlucky and of evil omen; hence they gave no names to these days, and while they lasted the people stayed for the most part at home; they neither washed themselves, nor combed their hair, nor loused each other; and they did no servile or fatiguing work lest some evil should befall them.[777 - Diego de Landa, Relation des Choses de Yucatan (Paris, 1864), pp. 204 sq., 276 sq.]

The five supplementary days of the year in ancient Egypt.

The ancient Egyptians like the Aztecs considered a year to consist of three hundred and sixty ordinary days divided into months and eked out with five supplementary days so as to bring the total number of days in the year up to three hundred and sixty-five; but whereas the Aztecs divided the three hundred and sixty ordinary days into eighteen arbitrary divisions or months of twenty days each, the Egyptians, keeping much closer to the natural periods marked by the phases of the moon, divided these days into twelve months of thirty days each.[778 - Geminus, Elementa Astronomiae, viii. 18, p. 106, ed. C. Manitius (Leipsic, 1898).] This mode of regulating the calendar appears to be exceedingly ancient in Egypt and may even date from the prehistoric period; for the five days over and above the year (haru duaït hiru ronpit) are expressly mentioned in the texts of the pyramids.[779 - G. Foucart, in Dr. J. Hastings's Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, iii. (1910) p. 93. Professor Ed. Meyer adduces astronomical and other grounds for thinking that the ancient Egyptian calendar, as we know it, began on the 19th of July, 4241 b. c., which accordingly he calls “the oldest sure date in the history of the world.” See Ed. Meyer, Geschichte des Altertums

, i. 2. (Stuttgart and Berlin, 1909), pp. 101 sq., § 197; and against this view C. F. Lehmann-Haupt, in the English Historical Review, April 1913, p. 348.] The myth told to explain their origin was as follows. Once on a time the earth-god Keb lay secretly with the sky-goddess Nut, and the sun-god Ra in his anger cursed the goddess, saying that she should give birth to her offspring neither in any month nor in any year. He thought, no doubt, by this imprecation to prevent her from bringing forth the fruit of her womb. But he was outwitted by the wily Thoth, who engaged the goddess of the moon in a game of draughts and having won the game took as a forfeit from her the seventieth part of every day in the year, and out of the fractions thus abstracted he made up five new days, which he added to the old year of three hundred and sixty days. As these days formed no part either of a month or of a year, the goddess Nut might be delivered in them without rendering the sun-god's curse void and of no effect. Accordingly she bore Osiris on the first of the days, Horus on the second, Set or Typhon on the third, Isis on the fourth, and Nephthys on the fifth. Of these five supplementary or intercalary days the third, as the birthday of the evil deity Set or Typhon, was deemed unlucky, and the Egyptian kings neither transacted business on it nor attended to their persons till nightfall.[780 - Plutarch, Isis et Osiris, 12. Compare Diodorus Siculus, i. 13. 4 sq. As to Keb and Nut, the parents of Osiris, Isis, and the rest, see A. Erman, Die ägyptische Religion (Berlin, 1905), p. 29. The Egyptian deities Keb, Nut, and Thoth are called by Plutarch by the Greek names of Cronus, Rhea, and Hermes. On account of these Greek names the myth was long thought to be of comparatively recent date; “but the Leyden Papyrus (i. 346) has shown that the legend existed in its essential features in the time of the Thebans, and the Texts of the Pyramids have carried it back to the very beginnings of Egyptian mythology” (G. Foucart, l. c.). As five days are the seventy-second, not the seventieth, part of three hundred and sixty days, it was proposed by Wyttenbach to read τὸ ἑβδομηκοστὸν δεύτερον instead of τὸ ἑβδομηκοστὸν in Plutarch's text. See D. Wyttenbachius, Animadversiones in Plutarchi Moralia (Leipsic, 1820-1834), iii. 143 sq.] Thus it appears that the ancient Egyptians regarded the five supplementary or intercalary days as belonging neither to a month nor to a year, but as standing outside of both and forming an extraordinary period quite apart and distinct from the ordinary course of time. It is probable, though we cannot prove it, that in all countries intercalary days or months have been so considered by the primitive astronomers who first observed the discrepancy between solar and lunar time and attempted to reconcile it by the expedient of intercalation.