Another fact which tends to prove the continuity of the superstition is that, during the Romano-British period, the bodies of persons who had committed suicide were not allowed to be burnt. The prohibition was afterwards extended to those who had died in their infancy[925].
Surveying the general question of suicide, one or two intermediate stages of folk-custom may be noted. In the early days of English history, suicides and murderers were buried at crossroads. It has been argued that this procedure was not altogether intended to heap indignity on the corpse, but that the intersecting roads were emblematic of the Cross, for which reason such spots were therefore deemed self-consecrated[926]. That this idea was prevalent two or three hundred years ago, one would not care to deny; nevertheless it was a late accretion. Else, why was a stake driven through the body of the person so interred? Dishonour to the dead may not, indeed, have been the primary motive which impelled the survivors to behave in this manner, although a desire to prevent the ghost walking was doubtless a strong constituent[927]. The living would naturally object to the burial of a criminal or murderer near an inhabited house[928]; the ghost, angry at being disembodied, according to the elementary notions of our forefathers, might walk abroad, and wreak vengeance or disaster on whomsoever it would. This fear was common among priscan folk, and is widespread even at the present day. Professor Frazer has shown how the natives of Uganda bury still-born babes, and children born feet foremost, at cross-roads. Women, passing by, throw dust or grass on the mound to prevent the spirit entering themselves and being reborn. The bodies of suicides are also burned at cross-roads. Westermarck has collected and collated many analogous practices and beliefs from such far-sundered countries as India and Servia, Japan and Morocco[929]. If, following this high authority, we are disposed to agree that the crossways were believed to disperse such energy as might be ascribed to the deceased person[930], that this mode of interment diverted diseases, and warded off all evil influences from the living, we shall the more readily perceive why the superstition retained its vitality in later times. When the Cross became the symbol of the new religion, the old belief about suicides was reinforced so far as the idea of protection was concerned, though the superstition might be weakened in respect of any supposed indignity to the dead. Even here, however, there is room for further investigation, and writers like Mr Andrew Lang have questioned whether the supposed efficacy of the Cross is a sufficient explanation[931]. The idea of abandonment, as it appears to the present writer, must have been an essential portion of the ceremony, and this was the natural consequence of the theory that the soul of the suicide was self-doomed to perish.
A middle stage of the belief is illustrated by the Scottish practice of burying self-murderers outside the churchyard, but close by the wall. (Cf. p. 352 supra.) This plan was afterwards modified to the extent of allowing the body to come technically within the yard, but to be placed actually beneath the wall, so that no one might walk over the grave[932]. In England, we find constant reference to the burial of suicides in the open fields. The custom of driving a stake through the bodies of persons found felo de se has been noticed. This brutal treatment, excusable in folk who, in the dawn of the world, had a real horror of ghosts and vampires, was only abolished by law in the year 1823[933]. Yet, as if to prove the unequal working of the human mind, and to exemplify the truism that like customs have not everywhere the same lease of life, we find remarkable exceptions to the rule. While the barbarous belief concerning suicide still held its sway, church discipline was, on the whole, gradually relaxing, and ordinary burials were permitted to take place within the sacred building. Then came the exception which we have examined. A certain part of the burial-ground was devoted to burials of murderers and suicides. In at least two cases, as attested by parish registers, the bodies of murderers were admitted into the church, though still on the North side of the fabric (A.D. 1616 and 1620)[934]. The fact is, that one can scarcely mention a single custom or tradition which has not been disregarded exceptionally at certain periods, though the main current has flowed on almost as strongly as ever. No doubt each particular infraction was the result of powerful local influences. For, even to this hour, as has been clearly shown, the body of the suicide or the manslayer may be interred in the churchyard, and yet remain, according to the superstition, “out of sanctuary.”
CHAPTER IX
THE CHURCHYARD YEW
The student who attempts to master the problem of the churchyard yew finds himself in danger of being bowed down by the burden of conflicting facts and theories.
With respect to the facts, there lies at hand a note-book containing the jottings of years, but so plethoric are its pages, that a mass of detail must be correlated and much matter shorn away before the case can be presented with any degree of lucidity.
Concerning the theories, folk-memory lends us little help. It does not ring true, and there is more than a suspicion that it has been influenced by ideas gathered from the printed book of the ecclesiologist and the antiquary.
“Things are as they are, and the consequences of them will be what they will be, wherefore, then, should we desire to be deceived?” Following the spirit of Butler’s philosophy, let us leave aside all hypotheses for the present, and review the facts. It will conduce to clearness if the particulars are summarized in due order.
The botanist will tell us that the yew (Taxus baccata) is a fine-grained, slow-growing tree belonging to the sub-division Taxineae of the Natural Order Coniferae, or Pinaceae. Its timber is tough, durable, and elastic, so that there is some truth in the New Forest proverb: “A post of yew will outlast a post of iron.” The trunk of the yew is deeply channelled, and its reddish-brown bark easily peels off. Looking at the narrow, leathery leaves, which are dark and glossy on the upper surface, but rather pale on the undersides, one might casually conclude that they are arranged in two rows on opposite sides of the twig. Closer inspection, however, proves that the leaves spring from all sides of the axis, but that a twist at the base of each leaf gives a false appearance of a plain double series[935]. The yew is dioecious, that is, the male and the female flowers grow on separate trees, but occasionally both kinds of inflorescence may be seen on the same tree. Over a large area of the Northern Hemisphere our familiar yew is met with, and an allied species grows in North-East America and Japan. The columnar variety (var. fastigiata), known as the Irish, or Florence Court yew, is said to have originated as a wild sport at Florence Court, in county Fermanagh, about 130 years ago[936]. Its outline looks very unlike that of the common yew, which has horizontal branches, and it has no further practical bearing on our subject.
It is important to note that the yew is demonstrably indigenous to Britain. It can be traced back not merely to the Neolithic Age[937], but even to the Glacial period[938]; hence there need be no debate concerning its possible introduction in later times.