The opinions entertained in Pliny's time descended to that of the Reformation—
Finger of birth-strangled babe,
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab.[166]
"Scrofula, imposthumes of the parotid glands, and throat diseases, they say, may be cured by the contact of the hand of a person who has been carried off by an early death;" but, he goes on to say, any dead hand will do, "provided it is of the same sex as the patient and that the part affected is touched with the back of the left hand."[167] A footnote adds that this superstition still prevails in England in regard to the hand of a man who has been hanged.
The use of dead men's toes, fingers, spinal vertebræ, etc., in magical ceremonies, especially the fabrication of magical lamps and candles, is referred to by Frommann.[168]
Grimm is authority for the statement that in both France and Germany the belief was prevalent that the fingers of an unborn babe were "available for magic."[169]
In England witches were believed to "open graves for the purpose of taking out the joints of the fingers and toes of dead bodies ... in order to prepare a powder for their magical purposes."[170]
"Saint Athanase dit même, que ces parties du corps humain [i.e., hands, feet, toes, fingers, etc.] étoient adorées comme des dieux particuliers."[171]
According to the sacred lore of the Brahmans "the Tirtha sacred to the Gods lies at the root of the little finger, that sacred to the Rishis in the middle of the fingers, that sacred to Men at the tips of the fingers, that sacred to Agni (fire) in the middle of the hand."[172]
In the Island of Ceylon "debauchees and desperate people often play away the ends of their fingers."[173]