[210] Folk-Lore Record, iii. 283.
[211] Nennius, Historia Britonum, Irish Version, ch. 18, p. 93.
[212] Gomme, ‘Some Traditions and Superstitions connected with Buildings,’ in The Antiquary, iii. 11. Carmichael, Carmina Gadelica, ii. 316.
[213] Baring-Gould, Strange Survivals, p. 5.
[214] Grimm, Teutonic Mythology, iii. 1142.
It seems highly probable that the building-sacrifice, like other kinds of human sacrifice, is based on the idea of substitution. A new house or dwelling-place is commonly regarded as dangerous, a wall or a tower is liable to fall down and cause destruction of life, a bridge may break, or the person who crosses it may tumble into the water and be drowned. In the Babar Islands, before entering a new house, offerings are thrown inside, that the spirit, Orloo, may not make the inmates ill.[215] Before the Sandwich Islanders could occupy their houses “offerings were made to the gods, and presents to the priest, who entered the house, uttered prayers, went through other ceremonies, and slept in it before the owner took possession, in order to prevent evil spirits from resorting to it, and to secure its inmates from the effects of incantation.”[216] Among the Kayans of Borneo, on the occasion of the king or principal chief taking possession of a newly-built house, a human victim was killed, and the blood was sprinkled on the pillars and under the house.[217] The Russian peasant believes that the building of a new house “is apt to be followed by the death of the head of the family for which the new dwelling is constructed, or that the member of the family who is the first to enter it will soon die”; and, in accordance with a custom of great antiquity, the oldest member of a migrating household enters the new house first.[218] In German folk-tales “the first to cross the bridge, the first to enter the new building or the country, pays with his life.”[219] Even nowadays, in the North of Europe, there is a wide-spread fear of being the first to enter a new building or of going over a newly-built bridge; “if to do this is not everywhere and in all cases thought to entail death, it is considered supremely unlucky.”[220] This superstition has been interpreted as a survival of a previous sacrifice;[221] but there can be no doubt, I think, that the foundation sacrifice itself owes its origin to similar notions and fears of supernatural dangers. Uncultured people are commonly afraid of anything new, or of doing an act for the first time;[222] and, apart from this, the erecting of a new building is an intrusion upon the land of the local spirit, and therefore likely to arouse its anger. There are houses which remain haunted by spirits all their time.[223] It is natural, then, that attempts should be made to avert the danger. And, human life being at stake, no preventive could be more effective than the offering up of a human victim.
[215] Riedel, De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua, p. 343.
[216] Ellis, Polynesian Researches, iv. 322.
[217] Burns, ‘Kayans of the North-West of Borneo,’ in Journal of the Indian Archipelago, iii. 145.
[218] Ralston, Songs of the Russian People, p. 126. Cf. Krauss, loc. cit. p. 21 sq. (Southern Slavs).