SUPERSTITIONS CONNECTED WITH THE CATAMENIAL FLUID.
For the opinions entertained by the ancients regarding its occult powers, read Pliny (Bohn’s edition), lib. xxviii. cap. 23, and again lib. viii. cap. 13. “On the approach of a woman in this state, must will become sour, seeds which are touched by her become sterile, grafts wither away, garden-plants are parched up, and the fruit will fall from the tree beneath which she sits; ... a swarm of bees if looked upon by her will die immediately, brass and iron will immediately become rusty.... Dogs tasting the catamenial fluid will go mad.... In addition to this, the bitumen which is found at certain periods of the year floating on the Lake of Judea, known as Asphaltites,—a substance which is peculiarly tenacious, and adheres to everything it touches,—can only be divided into separate pieces by a thread which has been dipped into this virulent matter.” (Lib. vii. cap. 13, and again lib. xxviii. cap. 23.) In a footnote it is stated that both Josephus (“Bell. Jud.,” lib. iv. cap. 9) and Tacitus (lib. v. cap. 6) give an account of this supposed action of this fluid on the bitumen of Lake Asphaltites. “Hail-storms, they say, whirl-winds, and lightning even, will be scared away by a woman uncovering her body merely, even though menstruating at the time.” (Lib. xxviii. cap. 23.) Menstruating women, in Cappadocia, perambulated the fields of grain to preserve them from worms and caterpillars. (Idem.) “Young vines, too, it is said, are injured irremediably by the touch of a woman in this state; and both rue and ivy plants, possessed of highly medicinal virtues, will die instantly upon being touched by her.... The edge of a razor will become blunted on coming in contact with her.”—(Idem.)
“All plants will turn pale upon the approach of a woman who has the menstrual discharge upon her.” (Pliny, lib. xix. cap. 57.) The same opinion prevailed in France down to our own times. (Idem, footnote.)
“Expiations were made with the menstrual discharge, ... not only by midwives, but even by harlots as well” (lib. xxviii. cap. 20).
Frommann cites Aristotle and Pliny in reference to the maleficent effects of the menses and of the uncanniness of a menstruating woman. Aristotle said her glance took the polish out of a mirror, and the next person looking into it would be bewitched. Frommann quotes a man who said he saw a tree in Goa which had withered because a catamenial napkin had been hung in it.—(“Tractatus de Fascinatione,” Nuremburg, 1675, pp. 17, 18.)
“Stains upon a garment made with the catamenial fluid can only be removed by the agency of the urine of the same female.”—(Pliny, lib. xxviii. cap. 24.)
“An Australian black fellow who discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at her menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself within a fortnight. Hence Australian women at these times are forbidden under pain of death to touch anything that men use.” (“The Golden Bough,” Frazer, vol. i. p. 170. He supplies other examples from the Eskimo and the Indians of North America. “Tinneh,” etc., p. 170.) In the following example we are not certain that the young women selected were undergoing purgation, but there is some reason for believing that such was the case, especially in view of the general dissemination of the ideas connected with the catamenia. “In a district of Transylvania, when the ground is parched with drought, some girls strip themselves naked, and, led by an older woman, who is also naked, they steal a harrow and carry it across the field to a brook, where they set it afloat. Next they sit on the harrow, and keep a tiny flame burning on each corner of it for an hour; then they leave the harrow and go home. A similar rain-charm is resorted to in India; naked women drag a plough across the field by night.”—(“The Golden Bough,” Frazer, vol. i. p. 17.)
For all bites of centipedes the people of Angola, Portuguese and negroes, apply the catamenial fluid. This remedy is implicitly believed in by all concerned.—(Rev. Mr. Chatelain, missionary to Angola, Africa.)
For the Inuit, see “Les Primitifs,” Réclus, Paris, 1885.
The dread felt by the American Indians on this subject is too well known to need much attention in these pages; it corresponds in every respect to the particulars recited by Pliny. Squaws, at the time of menstrual purgation, are obliged to seclude themselves; in most tribes they are compelled to occupy isolated lodges; and in all are forbidden to prepare food for any one but themselves.
It is believed that were a menstruating woman to step astride of a rifle or a bow or a lance, the weapon would have no further utility. Medicine-men are in the habit of making a saving clause, whenever they proceed to make “medicine;” this is to the effect that the “medicine” will be all right provided no woman in this peculiar condition be allowed to approach the tent or lodge of the officiating charlatan.
Among the Navajoes of Arizona it is customary for the women to wear a strip of sheep-skin, called a “chogan;” when the necessity for its use has disappeared, the woman goes outside of the village and conceals it in the forks of one of the cedar or juniper trees so numerous in the mountains. The author once found one of these; but the people with him were impressed with the idea that no good would come from being near it. At another time he knew of a young boy who had been hit by a “chogan” which had been dislodged by a wind-storm. He was almost frantic with terror, and devoted three or four days to singing and to washing in a “sweat-bath.”
The Ostiaks of Siberia would seem to have the same ideas on this subject as the Apaches and Navajoes have.—(See Pallas, “Voyages,” vol. iv. p. 95.)
Danielus Beckherius informs his readers that menstrual blood was used in medicine (pp. 23 et seq.); philters were prepared from it (idem, p. 341). “Zenith juvencarum sc. sanguines menstruum” were given for epilepsy,—that is, the first menses of a girl (idem, p. 42). The lint of the napkin itself was thus given also (idem),—“litura pannorum menstruorum datur patienti sanari morbum comitialium.” The first napkin used by a healthy virgin was preserved for use in cases of plague, malignant carbuncles, etc., dampened with water and laid on the part affected; also used in erysipelas (idem, p. 43, “Med. Microcosmus”). Dried catamenia were given internally for calculi, epilepsy, etc., and externally for podagra; they were also used in treatment of the plague, for carbuncles, aposthumes, being placed thereon with a rag wet with rosewater or oil, into which menstrual fluid had been poured; it was good as a cosmetic to drive away pimples (p. 265).
To restrain an immoderate flow of the menses a napkin was saturated with menstrual blood, and then kept for a certain time in an aperture made in the bark of a cherry-tree. “Ad immodicum menstruorum fluxum cohibendum sunt qui pannum menstruum sanguine imbutum certo tempore cerasi radice in cortice apertæ indunt, incisuramque iterum operiunt.”—(Etmuller, “Op. Omnia;” Schrod. “Dil. Zoöl.,” vol. ii. p. 265.)
Paullini prescribes the “dried catamenia of women” for the cure of kidney diseases (pp. 142, 143), also for ring-worm, felons, menstrual troubles. Frommann gives the same cure for immoderate menses, by placing the napkin in a cherry-tree.—(See “Tract. de Fascinatione,” p. 1006.)
“Excoriationi conferunt ... sanguis menstruus.”—(Avicenna, vol. i. p. 388.)
According to Flemming, menstrual blood was believed to be so powerful that the mere touch of a menstruating woman would render vines and all kinds of fruit-trees sterile (herein he seems to be following Pliny). It was believed to be valuable medicinally in relieving obstructions to the menstrual flow of other women; even the soiled smock of a woman who had menstruated happily was efficacious in assisting another woman whose menses for any cause were retarded. A small portion of the menses, dried and taken internally, mitigated the ailment known as dysmenorrhœa. Flemming states that, while in his time this remedy had been gradually superseded, its use was still kept up among the poor and ignorant, in erysipelas, face-blotches, and as an ingredient in an ointment for podagra or gout.—(“De Remediis,” pp. 16, 17.)
The Laplanders “say that they can stop a vessel in the middle of its course, and that the only remedy against the power of this charm is the sprinkling of female purgations, the odor of which is insupportable to evil spirits.”—(“Regnard’s Journey to Lapland,” in Pinkerton, vol. i. p. 180.)
“To cure a young woman of consumption she was given monthly discharges to drink.”—(“Dutchess County, New York,” 1832, Mr. Joseph Y. Bergen, Jr., Cambridge, Mass.)
Isaiah compareth our justice “panno menstruatæ.”—(Harington, “Ajax,” p. 24.)
“Crines fœminæ menstruosæ, the haires of a menstruous woman are turned into serpents within short space.”—(Scot, “Discoverie,” p. 221.)
“Men have a special objection to see the blood of women at certain times; they say that if they were to see it they would not be able to fight against their enemies and would be killed.” (Mrs. James Smith, “The Roandik Tribes,” p. 5.) Hence, although bleeding is a common Australian cure among men, women are not allowed to be bled. (Angas, vol. i. p. 3.) “This aversion is perhaps the explanation of that seclusion of women at puberty, childbirth, etc., which has assumed different forms in many parts of the world.”—(“Totemism,” Frazer, p. 54, footnote.)
Old women were suspected of using the first menstrual flow of a young girl in love-philters.—(Samuel Augustus Flemming, “De Remediis.”)
“For colic take the scrapings of the nails of a catamenial virgin, mix with water, and take.”—(Sagen-Märchen, Volksaberglauben aus Schwaben, Freiburg, 1861, p. 487.)
There were many curious ideas prevalent in olden times as to the manner in which the basilisk or cockatrice could be engendered. “Si l’on place dans une gourde de verre du sang menstruel, et si l’on fait putréfier celui-ci dans le ventre d’un cheval, il en naît un basilic.”—(“Mélusine,” Paris, January-February, 1890, p. 19.)
Although the Israelites had many notions in common with the American Indians on the subject of the catamenial fluid, and the seclusion of women undergoing purgation, there does not seem to have been any effort made to preserve or to hide the cloths used on such occasions. Thus the Prophet Isaiah (lxiv. 6) says of the idols of the Gentiles that they must be cast aside as the napkins soiled with the menses. “Hoc est disperges ea (de idolis loquitur) sicut immunditionem menstruatæ.”—(Contributed by Doctor Robert Fletcher.)
References to use of the catamenial fluid in witchcraft will be found in Beckherius, quoting Josephus:
“Hiawatha, wise and thoughtful,
You shall bless to-night the corn-fields,
Draw a magic circle round them,
To protect them from destruction.
“Rise up from your bed in silence,
Lay aside your garments wholly,
Walk around the fields you planted,
“Covered with your tresses only,
Robed with darkness as a garment.”
(“Hiawatha,” Longfellow, canto xiii.,
“Blessing the Corn-Fields.”)
Menstruating women were excluded from the Jewish synagogues and from the communion table of the early Christian Church: “Menstruatæ mulieres superstitiose exclusæ ab ecclesia.”—(Baronius, “Annales,” Lucca, 1758, tome 3, 266, xi.)