Sleep Walking and Moon Walking: A Medico-Literary StudySadger, J.
Science
Sleep Walking and Moon Walking: A Medico-Literary Study
Sadger, J.
Psychoanalysis; Sleepwalking
The folk, like the family physician, have not a doubt of the sexual
basis of the moon mania with her as with individuals in general. When
puberty is established or she has a child of her own the attacks will
cease, is the opinion of the latter. The servant maid Grete also, a
living book of fairy tales among her people, explains the moon
wandering as nothing else than the result of an unsatisfied sense
desire. There was a young knight who had wooed a rich woman of gentle
birth. Shortly before midnight they were both led into the bridal
chamber. "Yet hardly were they alone together when a strange voice
outside before the castle called, 'Conrad, come down here! Conrad, come
down here!' And again it called, 'Conrad, come down here!' The voice
sounded so plaintive and at the same time so threatening. The bridegroom
said, 'That is my best friend; he is in need and calls me.' The maiden
said however, 'The voice belongs to my cousin, who was found dead two
years ago.' Then she shuddered so that the gooseflesh stood up over her
whole body," and she implored her bridegroom not to follow the evil
spirit or at least to remain with her until the ghostly hour was past
and the full moon was up. But he would not be restrained: "Be it an evil
spirit or a good, no one shall call me in vain!" "And he went out. The
lady went to the window but could see nothing for the darkness outside
and for the tears in her eyes. Then the haunted hour was over and the
full moon arose and she waited and waited, but the knight never
returned. Thereupon she swore to take no rest on a night when the moon
was full until she had gone to bed with her bridegroom. And as her first
bridegroom never and nevermore came back, so she waited for another, but
there was no one who knew her story who would woo her, because each one
thought it would fare with him as it had fared with that other. Thus she
died; her oath is however still unfulfilled. Whenever it is full moon,
she is looking out to see if any bridegroom comes and she laments
sorely, and holds her hands weeping toward the moon."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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