Curious Myths of the Middle Ages Part 10

"Her gite was gray and full of spottis blake, And on her brest a chorle painted ful even, Bering a bush of thornis on his backe, Whiche for his theft might clime so ner the heaven."

Ritson, among his "Ancient Songs," gives one extracted from a ma.n.u.script of the time of Edward II., on the Man in the Moon, but in very obscure language. The first verse, altered into more modern orthography, runs as follows:--

"Man in the Moon stand and st.i.t, On his bot-fork his burden he beareth, It is much wonder that he do na doun slit, For doubt lest he fall he shudd'reth and s.h.i.+vereth.

"When the frost freezes must chill he bide, The thorns be keen his attire so teareth, Nis no wight in the world there wot when he syt, Ne bote it by the hedge what weeds he weareth."

Alexander Necham, or Nequam, a writer of the twelfth century, in commenting on the dispersed shadows in the moon, thus alludes to the vulgar belief: "Nonne novisti quid vulgus vocet rustic.u.m in luna portantem spinas? Unde quidam vulgariter loquens ait:--

"Rusticus in Luna, Quem sarcina deprimit una Monstrat per opinas Nulli prodesse rapinas,"

which may be translated thus: "Do you know what they call the rustic in the moon, who carries the f.a.got of sticks?" So that one vulgarly speaking says,--

"See the rustic in the Moon, How his bundle weighs him down; Thus his sticks the truth reveal, It never profits man to steal."

Shakspeare refers to the same individual in his "Midsummer Night's Dream." Quince the carpenter, giving directions for the performance of the play of "Pyramus and Thisbe," orders: "One must come in with a bush of thorns and a lantern, and say he comes in to disfigure, or to present, the person of Moons.h.i.+ne." And the enacter of this part says, "All I have to say is, to tell you that the lantern is the moon; I the man in the moon; this thorn-bush my thorn-bush; and this dog my dog."

Also "Tempest," Act 2, Scene 2:--

"_Cal._ Hast thou not dropt from heaven?

"_Steph._ Out o' th' moon, I do a.s.sure thee. I was the man in th' moon when time was.

"_Cal._ I have seen thee in her; and I do adore thee. My mistress showed me thee, and thy dog, and thy bush."

The dog I have myself had pointed out to me by an old Devons.h.i.+re crone. If popular superst.i.tion places a dog in the moon, it puts a lamb in the sun; for in the same county it is said that those who see the sun rise on Easter-day, may behold in the orb the lamb and flag.

I believe this idea of locating animals in the two great luminaries of heaven to be very ancient, and to be a relic of a primeval superst.i.tion of the Aryan race.

There is an ancient pictorial representation of our friend the Sabbath-breaker in Gyffyn Church, near Conway. The roof of the chancel is divided into compartments, in four of which are the Evangelistic symbols, rudely, yet effectively painted. Besides these symbols is delineated in each compartment an orb of heaven. The sun, the moon, and two stars, are placed at the feet of the Angel, the Bull, the Lion, and the Eagle. The representation of the moon is as below; in the disk is the conventional man with his bundle of sticks, but without the dog. There is also a curious seal appended to a deed preserved in the Record Office, dated the 9th year of Edward the Third (1335), bearing the man in the moon as its device. The deed is one of conveyance of a messuage, barn, and four acres of ground, in the parish of Kingston-on-Thames, from Walter de Grendesse, clerk, to Margaret his mother. On the seal we see the man carrying his sticks, and the moon surrounds him. There are also a couple of stars added, perhaps to show that he is in the sky. The legend on the seal reads:--

"Te Waltere docebo cur spinas phebo gero,"

which may be translated, "I will teach thee, Walter, why I carry thorns in the moon."

[Ill.u.s.tration: {Representation of the moon in Gyffyn Church.}]

[Ill.u.s.tration: {The seal with the legend visible.}]

The general superst.i.tion with regard to the spots in the moon may briefly be summed up thus: A man is located in the moon; he is a thief or Sabbath-breaker;[34] he has a pole over his shoulder, from which is suspended a bundle of sticks or thorns. In some places a woman is believed to accompany him, and she has a b.u.t.ter-tub with her; in other localities she is replaced by a dog.

The belief in the Moon-man seems to exist among the natives of British Columbia; for I read in one of Mr. Duncan's letters to the Church Missionary Society, "One very dark night I was told that there was a moon to see on the beach. On going to see, there was an illuminated disk, with the figure of a man upon it. The water was then very low, and one of the conjuring parties had lit up this disk at the water's edge. They had made it of wax, with great exactness, and presently it was at full. It was an imposing sight. Nothing could be seen around it; but the Indians suppose that the medicine party are then holding converse with the man in the moon.... After a short time the moon waned away, and the conjuring party returned whooping to their house."

Now let us turn to Scandinavian mythology, and see what we learn from that source.

Mani, the moon, stole two children from their parents, and carried them up to heaven. Their names were Hjuki and Bil. They had been drawing water from the well Byrgir, in the bucket Sgr, suspended from the pole Simul, which they bore upon their shoulders. These children, pole, and bucket were placed in heaven, "where they could be seen from earth." This refers undoubtedly to the spots in the moon; and so the Swedish peasantry explain these spots to this day, as representing a boy and a girl bearing a pail of water between them.

Are we not reminded at once of our nursery rhyme--

"Jack and Jill went up a hill To fetch a pail of water; Jack fell down, and broke his crown, And Jill came tumbling after"?

This verse, which to us seems at first sight nonsense, I have no hesitation in saying has a high antiquity, and refers to the Eddaic Hjuki and Bil. The names indicate as much. Hjuki, in Norse, would be p.r.o.nounced Juki, which would readily become Jack; and Bil, for the sake of euphony, and in order to give a female name to one of the children, would become Jill.

The fall of Jack, and the subsequent fall of Jill, simply represent the vanis.h.i.+ng of one moon-spot after another, as the moon wanes.

But the old Norse myth had a deeper signification than merely an explanation of the moon-spots.

Hjuki is derived from the verb jakka, to heap or pile together, to a.s.semble and increase; and Bil from bila, to break up or dissolve.

Hjuki and Bil, therefore, signify nothing more than the waxing and waning of the moon, and the water they are represented as bearing signifies the fact that the rainfall depends on the phases of the moon. Waxing and waning were individualized, and the meteorological fact of the connection of the rain with the moon was represented by the children as water-bearers.

But though Jack and Jill became by degrees dissevered in the popular mind from the moon, the original myth went through a fresh phase, and exists still under a new form. The Norse superst.i.tion attributed _theft_ to the moon, and the vulgar soon began to believe that the figure they saw in the moon was the thief. The lunar specks certainly may be made to resemble one figure, and only a lively imagination can discern two. The girl soon dropped out of popular mythology, the boy oldened into a venerable man, he retained his pole, and the bucket was transformed into the thing he had stolen--sticks or vegetables.

The theft was in some places exchanged for Sabbath-breaking, especially among those in Protestant countries who were acquainted with the Bible story of the stick-gatherer.

The Indian superst.i.tion is worth examining, because of the connection existing between Indian and European mythology, on account of our belonging to the same Aryan stock.

According to a Buddhist legend, Sakyamunni himself, in one of his earlier stages of existence, was a hare, and lived in friends.h.i.+p with a fox and an ape. In order to test the virtue of the Bodhisattwa, Indra came to the friends, in the form of an old man, asking for food.

Hare, ape, and fox went forth in quest of victuals for their guest.

The two latter returned from their foraging expedition successful, but the hare had found nothing. Then, rather than that he should treat the old man with inhospitality, the hare had a fire kindled, and cast himself into the flames, that he might himself become food for his guest. In reward for this act of self-sacrifice, Indra carried the hare to heaven, and placed him in the moon.[35]

Here we have an old man and a hare in connection with the lunar planet, just as in Shakspeare we have a f.a.got-bearer and a dog.

The fable rests upon the name of the moon in Sanskrit, cacin, or "that marked with the hare;" but whether the belief in the spots taking the shape of a hare gave the name cacin to the moon, or the lunar name cacin originated the belief, it is impossible for us to say.

Grounded upon this myth is the curious story of "The Hare and the Elephant," in the "Pantschatantra," an ancient collection of Sanskrit fables. It will be found as the first tale in the third book. I have room only for an outline of the story.

THE CRAFTY HARE.

In a certain forest lived a mighty elephant, king of a herd, Toothy by name. On a certain occasion there was a long drought, so that pools, tanks, swamps, and lakes were dried up. Then the elephants sent out exploring parties in search of water. A young one discovered an extensive lake surrounded with trees, and teeming with water-fowl. It went by the name of the Moon-lake. The elephants, delighted at the prospect of having an inexhaustible supply of water, marched off to the spot, and found their most sanguine hopes realized. Round about the lake, in the sandy soil, were innumerable hare warrens; and as the herd of elephants trampled on the ground, the hares were severely injured, their homes broken down, their heads, legs, and backs crushed beneath the ponderous feet of the monsters of the forest. As soon as the herd had withdrawn, the hares a.s.sembled, some halting, some dripping with blood, some bearing the corpses of their cherished infants, some with piteous tales of ruination in their houses, all with tears streaming from their eyes, and wailing forth, "Alas, we are lost! The elephant-herd will return, for there is no water elsewhere, and that will be the death of all of us."

But the wise and prudent Longear volunteered to drive the herd away; and he succeeded in this manner: Longear went to the elephants, and having singled out their king, he addressed him as follows:--

"Ha, ha! bad elephant! what brings you with such thoughtless frivolity to this strange lake? Back with you at once!"

When the king of the elephants heard this, he asked in astonishment, "Pray, who are you?"

"I," replied Longear,--"I am Vidschajadatta by name; the hare who resides in the Moon. Now am I sent by his Excellency the Moon as an amba.s.sador to you. I speak to you in the name of the Moon."

"Ahem! Hare," said the elephant, somewhat staggered; "and what message have you brought me from his Excellency the Moon?"

"You have this day injured several hares. Are you not aware that they are the subjects of me? If you value your life, venture not near the lake again. Break my command, and I shall withdraw my beams from you at night, and your bodies will be consumed with perpetual sun."

The elephant, after a short meditation, said, "Friend! it is true that I have acted against the rights of the excellent Majesty of the Moon.

I should wish to make an apology; how can I do so?"

The hare replied, "Come along with me, and I will show you."

The elephant asked, "Where is his Excellency at present?"