Human sacrifices are offered in connection with the foundation of buildings. This is a wide-spread custom, which not only occurs among various uncivilised and semi-civilised peoples of the present day, but which is proved to have existed among the so-called Aryan races.[201] In India we find traces of it in traditions and popular beliefs.[202] The Hindu rajas, we are told, used to lay the foundation of public buildings in human blood.[203] When Mr. Grierson wanted to photograph a Bihār peasant house, the grandmother of the family refused to allow any of the children to appear in the picture, her reason being that the Government was building the bridge across the Gandak and wanted children to bury under the foundations.[204] Among the ancient Romans the old custom survived in the practice of placing statues or images under the foundations of their buildings.[205] In the island of Zacynthus the peasants to this day believe that in order to secure the durability of important buildings, such as bridges and fortresses, it is desirable to kill a man, especially a Muhammedan or a Jew, and bury him on the spot.[206] South Slavonian folk-tales speak of the immuration of a woman or a child as a foundation sacrifice.[207] In Servia no city was thought to be secure unless a human being, or at least the shadow of one, was built into its walls;[208] and the Bulgarians, when going to build, are still said to take a thread and measure the shadow of some casual passer-by, and then bury the measure under the foundation-stone, expecting that the man whose shadow has been thus treated will soon die.[209] A similar custom prevails in Roumania.[210] According to Nennius, when Dinas Emris in Wales was founded by Gortigern, all the materials collected for the fortress were carried away in one night; and materials were thus gathered thrice, and were thrice carried away. When he then asked of his Druids, “Whence this evil?” the Druids told him that it was necessary to find a child whose father was unknown, put him to death, and sprinkle with his blood the ground on which the citadel was to be built.[211] A Scotch legend tells that, when St. Columba first attempted to build a cathedral on Iona, the walls fell down as they were erected; he then received supernatural information that they would never stand unless a human victim was buried alive, and, in consequence, his companion, Oran, was interred at the foundation of the structure.[212] It is reported that, when not long ago the Bridge Gate of Bremen city walls was demolished, the skeleton of a child was found embedded in the groundwork;[213] and when the new bridge at Halle, finished in 1843, was building, “the common people fancied a child was wanted to be walled into the foundations.”[214]
[201] Sartori, ‘Ueber das Bauopfer,’ in Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xxx. 5 sqq. Tylor, Primitive Culture, i. 104 sqq. Baring-Gould, Strange Survivals, p. 4 sqq. Trumbull, Threshold Covenant, p. 46 sqq. Grant Allen, Evolution of the Idea of God, p. 249 sqq. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, p. 284 sqq. Andree, Ethnographische Parallelen, p. 18 sqq. Nyrop, Romanske Mosaiker, p. 63 sqq. Krause, ‘Das Bauopfer bei den Südslaven,’ in Mittheilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien, xvii. 18 sqq. Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube der Gegenwart, § 440, p. 300 sq.
[202] Winternitz, ‘Bemerkungen über das Bauopfer bei den Indern,’ in Mittheil. Anthr. Gesellsch. in Wien, xvii. [37] sqq.
[203] Wheeler, History of India, iv. 278.
[204] Grierson, Bihār Peasant Life, p. 4.
[205] Coote, ‘A Building Superstition,’ in Folk-Lore Journal, i. 23.
[206] Schmidt, Volksleben der Neu-Griechen, p. 197.
[207] Krauss, loc. cit. p. 19 sqq.
[208] Ralston, Songs of the Russian People, p. 127.
[209] Ibid. p. 127. Krauss, loc. cit. p. 21.