The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-DayChamberlain, Alexander Francis
Science
The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-Day
Chamberlain, Alexander Francis
Child rearing; Children -- Folklore; Folklore and children
"There is a kind of superstition connected with the _nowidu_ [the
South African 'bull-roarer'], that playing with it invites a gale of
wind. Men will, on this account, often prevent boys from using it when
they desire calm weather for any purpose" (543. 223).
Dr. Boas tells us that the Shushwap Indians of British Columbia
attribute supernatural powers to twins, and believe: "They can make good
and bad weather. In order to produce rain they take a small basket
filled with water, which they spill into the air. For making clear
weather, they use a small stick to the end of which a string is tied. A
small flat piece of wood is attached to the end of the string, and this
implement is shaken. Storm is produced by strewing down on the ends of
spruce branches" (404. 92).
The Nootka Indians have a like belief regarding twins: "They have the
power to make good and bad weather. They produce rain by painting their
faces with black colour and then washing them, or by merely shaking
their heads" (404. 40).
Among some of the Kwakiutl Indians, upon the birth of twins "the father
dances for four days after the children have been born, with a large
square rattle. The children, by swinging this rattle, can cure disease
and procure favourable winds and weather" (404. 62).
In Prussia, when it snows, the folk-belief is "the angels are shaking
their little beds," and Grimm's story of "Old Mother Frost" has another
rendering of the same myth: "What are you afraid of, my child! Stop with
me: if you will put all things in order in my house, then all shall go
well with you; only you must take care that you make my bed well, and
shake tremendously, so that the feathers fly; then it snows upon earth.
I am Old Mother Frost."
An Eskimo legend states that thunder and lightning are caused by an
adult person and a child, who went up in the sky long, long ago; they
carry a dried seal-skin, which, when rattled, makes the thunder, and
torches of tar, which, when waved, cause the lightning.
The Mississaga Indians explain a fierce storm of thunder and lightning
by saying that "the young thunder-birds up in the sky are making merry
and having a good time." In like manner, the Dakotas account for the
rumbling of thunder, "because the old thunder-bird begins the peal and
the young ones take it up and continue."
In the poetry of the ancient Aryans of Asia the wind is called "the
heavenly child," some idea of which survives in the old pictures in
books representing the seasons, and in maps, where infants or cherubs
are figured as blowing at the various points of the compass. But to
return to rain-making. Grimm has called attention to several instances
in Modern Europe where the child figures as "rain-maker."
_Girl Rain-Makers_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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