The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion (Vol. 2 of 2)Frazer, James George
ReligionComparative
The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion (Vol. 2 of 2)
Frazer, James George
Magic; Mythology; Religion; Superstition
wheelbarrow to the village, where a round dance takes place. About
Lüneburg, also, the woman who binds the last corn is decked with a crown
of corn-ears and is called the Corn-goat.(59) In the Canton St. Gall,
Switzerland, the person who cuts the last handful of corn on the field, or
drives the last harvest-waggon to the barn, is called the Corn-goat or the
Rye-goat, or simply the Goat.(60) In the Canton Thurgau he is called
Corn-goat; like a goat he has a bell hung round his neck, is led in
triumph, and drenched with liquor. In parts of Styria, also, the man who
cuts the last corn is called Corn-goat, Oats-goat, etc. As a rule, the man
who thus gets the name of Corn-goat has to bear it a whole year till the
next harvest.(61)
According to one view, the corn-spirit, who has been caught in the form of
a goat or otherwise, lives in the farmhouse or barn over winter. Thus,
each farm has its own embodiment of the corn-spirit. But, according to
another view, the corn-spirit is the genius or deity, not of the corn of
one farm only, but of all the corn. Hence when the corn on one farm is all
cut, he flees to another where there is still corn left standing. This
idea is brought out in a harvest-custom which was formerly observed in
Skye. The farmer who first finished reaping sent a man or woman with a
sheaf to a neighbouring farmer who had not finished; the latter in his
turn, when he had finished, sent on the sheaf to his neighbour who was
still reaping; and so the sheaf made the round of the farms till all the
corn was cut. The sheaf was called the _goabbir bhacagh_, that is, the
Cripple Goat.(62) The corn-spirit was probably thus represented as lame
because he had been crippled by the cutting of the corn. We have seen that
sometimes the old woman who brings home the last sheaf must limp on one
foot.(63) In the Böhmer Wald mountains, between Bohemia and Bavaria, when
two peasants are driving home their corn together, they race against each
other to see who shall get home first. The village boys mark the loser in
the race, and at night they come and erect on the roof of his house the
Oats-goat, which is a colossal figure of a goat made of straw.(64)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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