VI

The Double

In Anthropology

Man's shadow, I thought, is his vanity.
NIETZSCHE


Our point of departure will be those superstitious notions associated with the shadow which even today are encountered among us and which writers—for example, Chamisso, Andersen, and Goethe—could consciously utilize.

Quite generally known in all of Germany, Austria, and Yugo-چslavia is a test made on Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve: whoever casts no shadow on the wall of the room by lamplight, or whose shadow is headless, must die inside of a year.1 There is a similar belief among the Jews that whoever walks by moonlight in the seventh night of Whitsuntide, and whose shadow is headless, will die that same year.2 There is a saying in the German provinces that stepping upon ones own shadow is a sign of death."8 Contrasting with the belief that whoever casts no shadow must die is a German belief that whoever sees his shadow as a duple during Epiphany must die.4 Various theories, some of them rather complicated, have been offered to explain this idea. We shall single out the one referring to the belief in a guardian spirit.5

From this shadow-superstition, some scholars believe, developed the belief in a guardian spirit, which in its turn is closely related to the double-motif.6 Rochholz [see n. 2] takes the shadow following his [sic] body to be the original content of the stories about second sight, visions of oneself, the shadow in the armchair, the double, and the apparition lying in one's bed.7 As time passes, the shadow which survives the grave becomes the double which is born with every child.8 Pradel [see n. 3] finds an explanation for the belief in the disastrous effect of the duple shadow in the idea that one's guardian angel appears at the hour of death and joins one's shadow.9 Here lies the root of the idea important to our theme: that the double who catches sight ofhimself must die within a year.10 Rochholz, who has especially been concerned with the belief in guardian spirits, thinks that the meaning of such spirits as bénéficient was the original one and that only gradually did their harmful (death) meaning develop along with the strengthening of the belief in a Ufe after death.11 "So an individual's shadow, which in his lifetime had been a helpful attendant spirit," must shrivel into a terrifying and persecuting specter that torments its protégé and chases him unto death" (Rochholz [see n. 2] ).13 How extensively this occurs will become clear in the psychological discussion of the whole topic.

These superstitious notions and fears of modern civilized nations concerning the shadow have their counterpart in numerous and widespread prohibitions (taboos) of savages which refer to the shadow. From Frazer's rich collection of material, we realize that our "superstition" finds an actual counterpart in the "belief of savages.14 A large number of primitive peoples believe that every injury inflicted upon the shadow also harms its owner ( Frazer, p. 78), thereby opening wide onthe door to necromancy and magic. It is noteworthy that in some of the literary works we have discussed an echo of magical influence can be recognized in the death of the main character at the wounding of his reflection, portrait, or double.15 According to Negelein, "the attempt to destroy persons by wounding their doubles is widely known, even from antiquity" [sic]. Also, according to Hindu belief, one destroys an enemy by stabbing his picture or shadow in the heart (Oldenberg, Veda, p. 508 [see n. 80]).le

Primitive peoples have no end of special taboos relating to the shadow. They take care not to let their shadows fall upon certain objects (especially foods); they fear even the shadows of other people (especially pregnant women, mothers-in-law, etc.; see Frazer, pp. 83 £F. ) ; and they pay heed that no one steps upon their shadows. On the Solomons, east of New Guinea, every native who steps upon the King's shadow is punished with death (Rochholz, p. 114). The same is true in New Georgia (Pradel, p. 21) and among the Kaffirs (Frazer, p. 83). Primitive peoples are also especially careful not to let their shadows fall upon a corpse or its grave, and for this reason funerals very often took place at night (Frazer, p. 80).

The meaning of death in all these events is reduced to the fear of illness or other harm. Whoever casts no shadow, dies; whoever has a small or faint shadow is ill, while a well-outlined shadow indicates recovery (Pradel). Such tests for health were really made, and many peoples even nowadays carry the sick out into the sunlight in order to lure back their expiring souls with their shadows. With the opposite intention, the inhabitants of Amboyna [Amboina, Ambon] and Uliase, two islands on the Equator, never leave their houses at noon, because in this location their shadows disappear and they are afraid of losing their souls along with them (Frazer, p. 87). Relevant here are the notions about the short and the long shadows, the small and the lengthening ones, on which Goethe's17 and Andersen's fairy tales are based, as is the poem by Stevenson-Dehmel. The belief that the health and strength of a person increase with the length of his shadow (Frazer, pp. 86f.)18 pertains here, just as does the distinction of the Zulus between the long shadow of a person, which becomes an ancestral spirit, and the short, which remains with the deceased.

Attached to this belief is another superstition, associated with the rebirth of the father in the son. Savages who believe that the soul of the father or grandfather is reborn in the child fear, according to Frazer (p. 88), too great a resemblance of the child to his parents.19 Should a child strikingly resemble its father, the latter must soon die, since the child has adopted his image or silhouette. The same holds for the name, which the primitive views as an essential part of the personality. In European culture the belief is still retained that if two offspring of the same family bear the same name, one must die.20 We recall here the same "nomenphobia" in Poe's William Wilson and can also understand, on the basis of "name magic," the invocation of spirits by calling their names.21

According to Freud, all tabooed objects have an ambivalent character, and signs pointing to this are also not lacking in shadow-concepts. The ideas of rebirth of the paternal shade in the child, just pointed out, lead to the already-mentioned notions of the shadow as a protective spirit born simultaneousl with the child. In direct contrast to the ideas of death in shadow superstition are the ideas—even though much less current—of the shadow as a fecundating agent ( Pradel, pp. 25 f. ). Th image of the shadow of death surrounding mankind finds its opposite Biblical expression in the Annunciation, which promises Mary, though virginal, a son, for Shapis 6 power of the Most High shall overshadow thee," Luke 1:15 ["virtus Altissimi obumbrabit tibi," Luc. 1:35]).

We note that St. Augustine and other patristic fathers see in the expression erurxwHr«. the concept of coolness as the opposite to sensual procreation. Pradel relevantly cites the expression, "Just be quiet; you aren't overshadowed by the Holy Spirit." From this basis he adduces a Tahitian myth, according to which the goddess Hiña becomes pregnant from the shadow of a breadfruit tree which her father Taaroa shook.22 The taboos of the mother-in-law's shadow, which Frazer cites, are obviously intended to prevent such an impregnation by means of a shadow.23 Thus, for example, among the natives of South Australia a ground for divorce occurs when the husband's shadow accidently falls upon his mother-in-law. In Central India there is a general fear of being impregnated by a shadow, and pregnant women avoid contact with a man's shadow since it might cause her child to resemble him (Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 93). When we compare these fancies with those of the increasing and decreasing

shadow and with the correspondingly variable virility (the Samson motif), the symbolic representation of the shadow for male potency becomes evident. In its turn, it is related to one's own regeneration in descendants, and hence to fertility.

Similar to Lenau's ballad "Anna," the concept of the shadow's fertility is also the basis of Richard Strauss' opera The Woman without a Shadow. The opera was derived from an Oriental source, and Hugo von Hofmannsthal wrote the libretto. Its focus is upon an Oriental princess [sic] whose father has incurred a terrible guilt. The guilt can be expiated (so prophesies a red falcon to the princess on her wedding day) only if there is prospect of her bearing a child within three years of the marriage. The years pass but the princess's wish remains unfulfilled—she is a woman without a shadow. At the close of the third year, the red falcon reappears and grants a respite of five days. In this emergency, the nurse makes use of a ruse: she finds a young dyer who yearns for the blessing of children, refused him by his quarrelsome wife. Corresponding to a belief current in Eastern legends, the nurse intends to purchase this woman's shadow—i.e., fertility—in return for costly treasures and for a lover quickly and illusively conjured from a wisp of straw. From the fire on the hearth, the voices of the unborn children—who, in the shape of little fishes, have been placed magically through the window and into the frying-pan—sound a warning lament (reminiscent of a Grimm fairy tale). The Empress feels a deep, humane sympathy for the poor woman, whom she does not want to deprive of a point of destiny which signifies the essence of female delight. In this moment of spiritual purgation a marvelous light encloses her, and the longing of her heart becomes reality. She, the shadowless woman who formerly was as transparent as crystal, suddenly casts a shadow; and Richard Strauss causes the mystical chorus of the unborn children to sound forth from higher spheres. Just as almost all symbols of good fortune were originally fertility symbols, the shadow, too, has gained a meaning of good fortune from this aspect. Not only the curative effect of the shade of certain trees (especially in the Bible) is pertinent here, but above all the role of the shadow as the guardian of treasure ( cf. Pradel)—indeed, even as the augmenter of it (practically, too, the shadow functioned as the marker of property boundary lines ). In the Indie fairy tale of the woodcutter's daughter, the spirit wooing the poor girl says to her father: "Give me your daughter; then shall your shadow grow, and your treasures shall become great" (Rochholz, after the fairy tale collection of the Somadeva Bhatta). We are reminded here of Peter Schlemihl, the student Balduin, and others who are recompensed for the loss of their shadows by wealth. They intend to use this wealth to gain the beloved girl, but they fail miserably.

Nor are the heroes of similar literary creations any more successful when the problem of the double takes the form of the exchange of physiques (the Amphytrion motif)—for example, in Théophile Gautier's short story The Soul-Exchange. The particular interest of this story lies in its placing the wish for rejuvenation into the foreground. Octave, who falls into a protracted illness from his unrequited love for someone else's wife, obtains from his aged physician the soul of his troublesome rival, hoping in this way to gain a hearing with the wife. She, however, recog-nizes the deception and remains cool toward him. Her husband challenges Octave to a duel and Octave kills him; but, tormented by conscience, he goes again to the old doctor, who now transfers his own soul into the body of the young man. Octave's soul in its turn vanishes into the senile body of the doctor.

These motifs emerge with particular force in Jules Renard's grotesque novel Doctor Lerne, the main character of which undertakes to solve the problem anatomically and surgically by inverting the personality through an exchange of brains. Old Lerne, who has been rejected by Emma, the embodiment of sexuality, assumes the young body of his nephew in order to be loved by Emma as much as the robust youth. His project, however, meets with as little success as in Gautier's short story. The duel with the double appears here in this way: the "nephew," magically placed into the body of a bull, almost slays his physical identity (with another brain); he is jealous because it is embracing Emma, the creature of sexuality. This extreme step is prevented only by the uncle's interrupting the remarkable duel between the animal and human self. At the critical moment he exclaims: "Dear friend, by doing that you will kill yourself!"

In these, as well as in several other developments of the double-motif, a particular accent is placed upon the theme of impotence. In many cases the impotence is adduced as a motivation for the physique-exchange and for the rejuvenation associated with it. In other cases it easily betrays this tendency—for example, in Arthur Schnitzler's short story Casanova's "Return Home. In this story the aging hero purchases a nuit ¿[amour with a beautiful and coy woman from her youthful lover, who externally resembles Casanova in his youth.

The idea early appeared in psychoanalytic circles of interpreting Schlemihl's lack of a shadow as impotence,24 and Robert Hamerling's Homunculus [1888] (Book V) seems to allude to this idea: ". . . Peter Schlemihl; the well-known 'man' (the worst-off!) without a shadow. . . ." Wilde's fairy tale "The Young Fisherman and His Soul" (in The Pomegranate House) would fit in with the castration meaning of the loss of shadow. The hero wants to get rid of his soul, which stands between him and his beloved mermaid, and with a knife cuts off his shadow. His life finally ends, like that of Dorian Gray, in suicide. We turn now from such individually distinct meanings of the double and shadow in their obviously symbolistic-sexual sense to the more comprehensive problem of that image which has been constructed by one's guardian spirit into a pursuing and torturing conscience, well founded in the traditions of folklore. Folklorists are in agreement in emphasizing that the shadow is (»equivalent with the human soul. From this fact we derive not only the particular regard for the shadow, but also for all taboos referable to it and for superstitious fears of death after stepping upon it, since injury, harm, or loss of one's soul will bring about death. We quote Tylor25 on the identification of the shadow with the soul among primitive peoples, including the most undeveloped natives of Tasmania:

So the Tasmanian used his word for 'shadow' simultaneously to mean 'spirit'; the Algonquins call a person's soul "his shadow'; in the Quiche language nahib serves for 'shadow, soul'; the Arawak neja means 'shadow, soul, image'; the Abiponians had only one word, loákal, for 'shadow, soul, echo, image. . . . The Basutos not only call the spirit which remains after death the senti, or 'shadow,' but they believe that when someone walks along the river bank, a crocodile could seize his shadow on the water and draw it down; and in Old Calabar we find this same identification of the spirit with the shadow, the loss of which is very dangerous for one.28

According to Frazer, certain natives of Australia assume also the existence, apart from the soul localized in the heart (ngot), of a soul very closely associated with the shadow (choi).21 Among the Massim in British New Guinea the spirit, or the soul, of a deceased person is called arugo, equivalent in meaning with 'shadow' or 'reflection.'28 The Kai in Dutch New Guinea consider their souls, or parts of them, to be in their reflections and shadows; therefore, they are careful not to step upon their shadows.29 In North Melanesia the word nio, or niono, means both shadow and soul.30 Among the Fiji Islanders the term for 'shadow' is yaloyalo, a reduplication of tie word for 'soul,' yalo.alIncidental to noticing that the natives of the Strait of Torres islands use the word for spirit, mari, at the same time for 'shadow,' or 'image,' Frazer thinks that many uncivilized peoples derived their denomination for the human soul from observing shadows or the reflection of the body in water.32

A series of further folkloric investigations has shown without any doubt that primitive man considered his mysterious double, his shadow, to be an actual spiritual being:

That man in the Cameroons naturally meant his shadow, when he said, "I can see my soul every day: I simply place myself toward the sun" (Mansfeld). So Spieht reports of the people of Ewe: "The person's soul can be seen in his shadow." J. Wamek of the Bataks: "They beh'eve that their shadows embody their individual souls."

Klamroth of the Saramos: "The shadow cast by a h'ving person becomes a kungu (spirit) by uniting with the soul of the deceased; for the soul (mayo; anatomically also lieart') disintegrates, but the shadow does not disintegrate." Guttmann of the Jagga Negroes: "What remains of the deceased, and descends into the realm of the dead, is his shadow, kirische. This is not just a figure of speech for the personality deprived by death of a body, but rather it means quite literally the person's shadow as it is cast upon the earth by sunlight. The same concept is found among the Salish and Denes in Canada's Far West."33

The Fiji Islanders believe that every person has two souls— a dark one which exists in his shadow and goes to Hades, and a bright one which exists in his reflection on the surface of water or in glass and which remains nearby his place of death.34 From this meaning of the shadow, the numerous precepts and prohibitions ( taboos ) relating to it can be sufficiently well understood.

If we ask how it came about that the shadow was taken to be the soul, the views of primitive peoples living with nature—as well as the views of ancient civilized peoples—are of help toward an answer: that the primordial concept of the soul, as Negelein puts it, was a "primitive monism" in which the soul figured as an analogon to the form of the body. So the shadow, inseparable from the person, becomes one of the first "embodiments" of the human soul, "long before the first man saw his reflection in a mirror" (Negelein). The belief of primitive peoples all over the world in the human soul as being an exact copy of the body, first perceivable in the shadow,35 was also the original soul-concept of ancient civilized peoples. Erwin Rohde, probably the most sensitive observer of the belief in the soul and of its cult in Greece, says: "The belief in the psyche was the oldest and very first hypothesis by which one explained the apparitions of dreams, of fainting, and of ecstatic vision by assuming a special physical agent in these obscure actions. Already in Homer we can note the path in the course of which the psyche evaporates into a mere abstraction."38 "According to the Homeric conception, man has a twofold existence: in his perceptible presence, and in his invisible image which only death sets free. This, and nothing else, is his psyche. In the living human being, completely filled with his soul, there dwells, like an alien guest, a weaker double, his self other than his psyche . . . whose realm is the world of dreams. When the other self is asleep, unconscious of itself, the double is awake and active."37 "Such an eidolon and second self, duplicating the visible self, has originally the same meaning as the genius of the Romans, the fravauli of the Persians, and the Ka of the Egyptians." In Egypt, too, the shadow was the oldest form of the soul ( Negelein according to Maspero ) ; and according to Moret38 there were alternate terms for soul, double (Ka), image, shadow, and name.39 By referring to a copious literature, Spiess also supports the belief of savages in the continued existence of a shadow-like soul after death (p. 172 [see n. 37]); and he also cites the meaning of the Hebrew expression "Rephaim" for what remains of man after death: "the weary or the feeble ones, i.e., the shadows, the inhabitants of the Underworld, a name analogous to the Greek term" (p. 422).

The most primitive belief in the soul is therefore linked with death, as Spiess has shown for civilized peoples, and as Frazer (The Belief . . .") has especially shown for the most undevel-oped savages. The first concept of the soul among primitives, which is significant for the entire development of human history, is that of tibe spirits of the deceased imagined in most instances as shadows, just as even today we speak of the "realm of shades" of departed ones.

Since the souls of the deceased are shadows, they themselves cast no shadows—a condition which the Persians, for example, asserted directly of those again brought back to life.40 Indeed, according to several authors, the observation that the corpse no longer casts a shadow is said to have lent support to the assump- tion that the soul had escaped in the shadow.41 Thus the Arcadian sacred region of Lykaion, in which a complete lack of shadows prevails, was considered to be the realm of those initiated into death.42 According to Pausanias, Description of Greece (VIII, 38, 6), the entrance into this region was denied to mankind, and whoever transgressed the law necessarily had to die within a year's time. Here, therefore, as in almost all of the cited superstitious ideas, the lack of a shadow indicates approaching death, the absence of whose shadow is anticipated. Thus, according to Rochholz (p. 19), in the Lycaic abaton "the protective daimon retreats from the consecrated intruder and abandons him to the terrors of death."48

Not only the souls, but also the spirits, elves,44 daimons, ghosts, and magicians4* closely associated with them have no shadows, because they originally are themselves shadows, i.e., souls. For this reason, spirits and elves, considered to be shadowless by New Zealanders, accept nothing offered to them except the shadow.48 The high-born damsel is recognized by the fact that she casts no shadow, because she is a spirit. The devil, according to a Russian belief (Gaster), also has no shadow because he is an evil spirit, and for this reason is he so eager for human shadows (cf. the pact by Schlemihl, Balduin, and others). Whoever has come under the devil's influence casts no shadow (Pradel). The numerous legends in which the devil is cheated of his reward by receiving "only" the shadow instead of the soul which was his due47 appear to represent a too-serious reaction upon the loss of a shadow. Originally—as Schlemihl and his successors demonstrate—it may have been mankind who was deceived in this case, since man underestimated the shadow, the value of which was known to the devil.48

From abundant folkloric material of civilized peoples, Negelein has shown that "the superstitious ideas and customs deriving from the mirror image resemble in all their chief features those produced by the shadow-image." Also prominent in this connection are the apprehensions of death and of misfortune. In German territories the prohibition exists of placing the corpse before a mirror or of looking at it in a mirror; for then two corpses appear, and the second one foretells a second incident of death.49 According to a Dalmatian superstition, also found in Oldenburg, whoever sees himself in a mirror will die as long as there is a corpse in the house.50

The general applicability of this fear is apparent from the frequency of its contrary measure, which requires the veiling of mirrors so that the soul of the deceased person may not remain in the house. This custom is practised today in Germany and France and among the Jews, Lithuanians, and others.51 Since the soul of the departed person is thought to be in the mirror, it can become visible there under certain circumstance. In Silesia it is said that at midnight on New Year's Eve, if one takes two burning lights in front of a mirror and calls the name of a deceased person, that person will appear in the mirror.52 In France one's reflection is said to be glimpsed in a mirror as one will appear at the hour of death, if previously on the eve of Epiphany a certain ceremony is carried out.53

These ideas are associated with the prohibitions of gazing at oneself in the mirror at night. If this is done, one loses his own image—i.e., one's soul. As a result, death is a necessary consequence,54 an idea based in East Prussia upon the belief that in such cases the reflection of the devil appears behind one. If, in fact, anyone notices the reflection of another face beside his own, he will soon die.55 For similar reasons it is disastrous for ill and asthénie persons to see their reflections,56 especially according to a Bohemian belief.57 In all of Germany the falling down or breaking of a mirror is taken to be a sign of death,68 although along with that, and as a euphemistic compensation, seven years of trouble are in prospect.59 Also, whoever's last view of himself was in a broken mirror must die60 or suffer seven years of distress.61 If thirteen people are sitting together, whoever is sitting opposite a mirror must die.62 In order to obtain protection from the mysterious forces of the mirror, a cat is reflected in a new mirror in certain regions.63 Precautions, too, are taken against allowing small children to gaze at themselves in a mirror. These precautions result from the fear of one's own reflection, which subjects one's double to all kinds of harm;64 and if the child is not protected, he will become proud and frivolous or else will become ill and die.™

According to Negelein, the conviction that the mirror reveals concealed matters is based upon the belief in a double. This reference includes, first of all, the magic use of the mirror in order to discern the future. So in Oldenburg, for example, it is said that one can see his future in a mirror by stepping in front of it at midnight with two burning lights, gazing attentively into it, and calling one's name thrice. In association with the customs we have cited, it is clear here that "whether," not "what," is meant by "future"; that is, what is of primary interest to the individual is his own lifespan. In contrast, the significance of the mirror as a prophet of love diminishes, although a girl, in practicing similar customs, generally sees her "intended one" (equivalent, to her, with "the future").68 Vain girls, however, see the devil's face when they look into the mirror at night,67 and if they smash a mirror, they think that they will not be married for seven years.

We shall omit the magical and mantic applications of the mirror and water reflections (reported by Negelein and Haberland [see n. 50] ) and shall pass directly to its origin among primitive peoples.98 Savages believe that the soul is embodied in the image reproduced by glass, water, portrait, or by a shadow.6* This belief relates to the numerous taboos attached to these objects.70 In a tribe in Dutch India, adolescent children must not look into a mirror because it is thought that it will deprive them of beauty and cause ugliness.71 Zulus do not look into a dirty swamp, since it casts no reflection. They believe that a monster dwelling there has taken the reflection away, so that they have to die. When someone dies among the Basutos without obvious cause, they believe that a crocodile has submerged his reflection.

The similarly based dread of one's own portrait or of a photograph is found all over the world, according to Frazer.72 It is present among the Eskimos, the American Indians, and tribes in Central Africa, as well as in Asia, East India, and Europe. Since these people visualize the person's soul in his image, they fearthat the foreign possessor of this image can have a harmful or deadly effect upon it. Many savages actually believe that death is imminent if their picture is taken or is in the possession of a stranger. Frazer relates delightful stories of the savages' fear of photography, as does, more recently, the missionary Leuschner of the Yaos in South China." This fear of one's own image, because of the belief in the soul, overlaps every figurative representation. Meinhof says: "A plastic representation of a human being can disturb the African very much; and it has happened that the work of art had to be destroyed in order to tranquilize the excited person" [in most of West Africa plastic art is usually in the form of human beings]. Warneck reports of the Waschambas that they did not want to be alone with the photographs of human beings which the missionaries had put up in their room; they feared that the pictures could come alive and approach them.74

A German superstition has it that one may not allow one's portrait to be painted;75 otherwise one will die.78 Frazer has traced the same belief in Greece, Russia, and Albania, and he gives evidence of its traces in modem England and Scotland."

In ancient civilizations we also find ideas corresponding to the superstitions we have cited. Among the Indies and Greeks we find, for example, the rule not to gaze into one's reflection in the water,78 since this action will soon result in death.79 "When one can no longer see his eidolon in a mirror, this is a sign of death."80 Also, the Greeks considered it a sign of death if one dreamed that he saw his reflection in water.81 Germanic belief likewise attributed a thanatoptic significance to the reflection in water. If, however, the same phenomenon in a dream is interpreted as a sign of long life, we will take it up not only as a contrary objective, but will also connect it with the meaning of water-dreams as they have to do with birth.82

A connection is readily made here with the interesting mythological traditions which demonstrate the belief in the fecundating effect attributed to the shadow in mirror-superstitions as well83—primarily the myth of Dionysus and the mysteries relating to it. His mother, Persephone, had looked at herself in a mirror before she bore Zagreus,84 a fact which Negelein interprets as a "conception through the coeffectivity of personality and double." As we know, Zagreus, upon his rebirth as Dionysus, was carried in Zeus' thigh as a compensation, as it were, for his original female conception. In this story of rebirth, too, a mirror has its share. The polymorphous Zagreus was looking at himself as a bull in a mirror made by Hephaistos, when the Titans sent by Hera, his enemy, came and tore him apart despite his metamorphosis. Only his heart was saved, from which Dionysus was born in the aforementioned way with the help of Semele.85 But Proclus reports one more significant genethliac myth concern- ing Dionysus: he is said to have looked at himself in the mirror forged by Hephaistos and, led astray by this image, to have created all things.86 This late-Greek idea of the creation of the material world has its archetype in Indie cosmogony, which took the reflection of the primeval essence to be the foundation of the material world and which continued in Neo-Platonic and gnostic doctrines. Thus the gnostics asserted that Adam had lost his divine nature by gazing into a mirror and becoming enamored of his own reflection.87

The harmful effect of contemplating one's reflection in a mirror is clearly represented by the legend of Entelidas, as reportedby Plutarch.88 Entelidas, delighted by his reflection in the water, became ill of his own evil gaze and lost his beauty upon recovering health. The well-known fable of Narcissus in the late version transmitted to us combines in a unique synthesis both aspects of the belief: the ruinous and the erotic. Ovid relates that at the birth of Narcissus the seer Tiresias was asked if the child could expect a long life. The answer was yes, as long as he does not see himself.89 Once, however, Narcissus, who was equally unresponsive to youths and maidens, caught sight of himself in the water and became so enamored of the handsome boy so splendidly reflected that the longing for this image caused his death. According to a later legend, Narcissus took his own life after having become entranced by his reflection; and even in the nether world he saw his image in the Styx. According to a still later rationalist view in Pausanias,90 Narcissus became inconsolable after the death of his twin sister, who resembled him completely in clothing and appearance, until he viewed his reflection; and, although he knew that he saw only his shadow, he still felt a certain assuagement of his affection's grief.91 Even though we know that the questioning of Tiresias, and other elements,92 are a later po- etic embroidery upon the original legend, it still does not seem to be certain that the fable originally, as Frazer thinks,93 was only a poetic expression of the superstition that the youth died after viewing his reflection (his double) in the water. Nor is it certain that his falling in love with his own image—which, after all, is the essence of the Narcissus legend—only later developed into an explanation when this original meaning was no longer known.

NOTES
1. Th. Vernaleken, Mythen und Bräuche des Volkes in Österreich
[Vienna, 1859], p. 341; [Otto Frh. von] Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, Dos fest-
liche Jahr [in Sitten, Gebräuchen und Festen der germanischen Völker
(Leipzig, 1863)], p. 401; A Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube [der
Gegenwart, ed. E. H. Meyer (3rd ed.; Berlin, 1900)], II, 207, 314.

2. E. L. Rochholz, "Ohne Schatten, ohne Seele. Der Mythus vom Körper- schatten und vom Schattengeist," Germania, V (1860), [69-94], contained in the same author's Deutscher Glaube und Brauch [im Spiegel der heid- nischen Vorzeit] (Berlin, 1867), I, 59-130 (quotations). About Jewish shadow-traditions specifically, cf. [M.] Gaster, ["Zur Quellenkunde deut-scher Sagen und Märchen"], Germania, XXVI ( 1881 ), 210.

3. Wuttke, op. cit., p. 388. In Silesia and Italy it is said that in such cases one no longer grows; cf. Fritz W. Pradel, "Der Schatten im Volksglauben," Mittig, d. Schles. Ges. f. Volksk., XII (1904), 1-36 [1-37?].

4. Wuttke, op. cit. Among the Slovaks the same is true for Christmas Eve; cf. J. v. Negelein, "Bild, Spiegel und Schatten im Volksglauben," Arch. f. Rel-Wiss., V (1902), 1-17.

5. Pradel, op. cit.; Rochholz, op. cit.

6. See E. H. Meyer, Germanische Mythologie (Berlin, 1891), pp. 62, 66 ff. In Modem Greek, 'shadow' is used direcüy in the sense of protective spirit; cf. Bernhard Schmidt, [Dos] Volksleben der Neugriechen [und das hellenische Alterthum (Leipzig, 1871)], I, 169, 181, 199, 229, 244.

7. Heino Pfannenschmid, [Germanische Erntefeste im heidnischen und christlichen Cultus mit besonderer Beziehung auf Niedersachsen (Hannover, 1878)], p. 447, was the first to object to this explanation, which was felt by several to be too one-sided.

8. Negelein, op. cit.

9. Pertinent here is the Grimm fairy tale (number 44) about "Godfather Death," whom the hero successfully escapes by lying in bed in reverse position ( cf. also the note in Vol. Ill ).

10. Adolf Bastían, Ethnische Elementargedanken in der Lehre vom Menschen (Berlin, 1895), p. 87; Wuttke, op. cit., p. 212; Rochholz, op. cit., p. 103; [Otto] Henne am Rhyn, "Kultur der Vergangenheit [in vergleichender Darstellung]," in Gegenwart und Zukunft (Königsberg, 1892), I, 193. According to Wuttke (p. 49), the expression "second sight" originally had the meaning of a double's sight; whenever the person sees himself, however, he must die in the course of a year. Cf. Villiers de l'Isle-Adam, Das zweite Gesicht [Berlin, 1909].

11. Rochholz, op. cit., pp. 128 ff. According to him, 'shadow' later became equivalent with Tiarm" (Schatten = Schaden); i.e., taken synonymously with "black; on the left; false; not at liberty; damned'; [these German words do not have the same etymological origin].

12. In German antiquity, Rochholz distinguishes three kinds of the protective spirit, which correspond to the three ages of man and to the three times of day—visible by the respective shadow—and which seem to have some sort of relationship to the Norns. With the Nordic belief, "Whoever sees his fylgja, him it abandons, and he loses his life thereby," Rochholz makes interesting references to the legends of the Staufenberger, of Melusine, The White Lady, Orpheus, and so on. The love affair of this fylgja with her body leads to other problems, such as the mystical concept of the soul as bridegroom and similar ideas. About the belief in a protective spirit, cf. F. S. Krauss, Y reta, Glück und Schicksal im Glauben der Südslawen (Vienna, 1888).

13. A widespread locution, "to fear one's shadow," is frequently used by writers. Cf. here the painful fear of Maeterlinck's "Princess Maleine" at the sight of a shadow. Further, in R. Stratz' Foolish Virgin (p. 307), we find: "You are afraid of yourself and are running away from yourself like the man who quarreled with his shadow." Pradel, from whom these references are taken, cites in connection with this the expression Plato (Apol. 118 D, Republic 520). In Strindberg's Inferno. Legends, a passage reads: " 1 believe you are afraid of your own shadow,' laughed the physician contemptuously" (p. 228).

14. James G. Frazer, "The Soul as a Shadow and a Reflexion," The Golden Bough: Taboo and the Perils of the Soul (3rd ed.; London, 1911-1915), III, 77-100.

15. This relation also finds an echo in the Germanic legal custom of the so-called "expiation by the shadow," according to which, e.g., a serf insulted by a freeman takes revenge on the latter's shadow (literature in Rochholz, p. 119; see also Jakob Grimm, Deutsche Rechtsaltertümer (4th ed.; Leipzig, 1922), pp. 677 ff.). In Emperor Maximilian's time, the punishment for having "cut off' a shadow with a spade was severe. A passage in Luther's "Table Talk" refers to this (Pradel, pp. 14 ff.), as does a tale by Hermann Kurtz in Erzählungen (Stuttgart, 1858) Vol. I. This expiation by die shadow, quite seriously intended, appears in isolated Orientai traditions with an ironic emphasis upon its worthlessness (cited by Pradel, op. cit., p. 23). In the Bahar Danush (Benfey, Pantschatantra, I, 127), a youth's shadow is to be whipped on the complaint of a maiden whose image in a mirror he has kissed. To King Bokchoris of Egypt, the wisest judge of his time, was attributed the famous judgment which sent a complaining courtesan, whose charms a lover had enjoyed in a dream, to the shadow, or to the reflected image, for the amount to be paid for amends (Plutarch, Demetrius, 27); Erwin Rohde, in Der griechische Roman und seine Vorläufer (3rd ed.; Leipzig, 1914), 370, 1 [sic], sees in this the model for the lawsuit about the donkey's shadow (cf. Wieland's Die Abderiten; cf. also Robert Reinick, Märchen-, Lieder- und Geschichtenbuch (Bielefeld, 1873).

16. For greetings and curses applicable to the shadow, see Oldenberg, p. 526, n. 4.

17. Strikingly similar to the shadow-motif in Goethe's tale is a story from South America told by Frazer (op. cit., p. 87): "The Mangaians [sic; Mangaia is one of the Cook Islands in Polynesia] tell of a mighty warrior, Tukaitawa, whose strength waxes and wanes with the length of his shadow." At last, a hero discovers the secret of Tukaitawa's power (the Samson-theme) and slays him at noon, when his shadow is slightest.

18. So believe the Bagandas of Central Africa and the Kaffirs in South Africa. In Solothurn, the greater or less intensity of the shadow was considered as a criterion of health (Walzel, introduction to Chamisso's works, Deutsche Nationdliteratur, Vol. CXLIX).

19. J. v. Negelein, "Ein Beitrag zum indischen Seelenwanderungs-glauben," in Arch. f. Rel.-Wiss., 1901. See also Frazer, "The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead," Among the Aborigines of Australia . . . (London, 1913), I, 92, 315, 417.

20. Henne am Khyn, op. cit., p. 187.

21. For the prevention of magical customs, the Jews forbade the mention of the name "Jehova." See Friedrich Giesebrecht, Über die alttest. Schätzung des Götternamens [und ihre religionsgeschichtliche Grundlage] (Königsberg, 1901). Giesebrecht shows that the name, aie shadow, and the soul are identical in popular belief (p. 79) and explains that the name becomes a threatening double of the person (p. 94). Concerning the taboo of names, cf. Freud, "Totem und Tabu," Ges. Schriften, IX; and concerning its effect in our unconscious, cf. Freud, "Zur Psychopathologie des Alltagslebens," Ges. Schriften, IV.

22. After Rehsener in Zeitschrift d. Vereines f. Volksk., VIII, 128; cf. Georg Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvölker, VI, 624 f., who sees in this the remnant of the old Tahitian belief that the moon, which resembles breadfruit, copulates during the new moon.

23. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 83 ff. Frazer himself believes, moreover, that the "avoidances" in the relationship of mother-in-law and son-in-law could arise from the fear of incest (p. 85, n. 6). Freud has given the psychoanalytical confirmation and extension of this view (Totemund Tabu).

24. There has been much controversy about the meaning of Schlemihl's shadow, and the literature about it is rather large; cf. Julius Schapler, Chamisso-Studien (Amsberg, 1909). The shadow was claimed to be an allegorical representation of the fatherland, position in Ufe, the family, the home area, religious adherence, orders and titles, human respect, social talent, and so on; and correspondingly, the loss of the shadow meant the lack of these things. Even in the lifetime of the author, who was skeptical toward all of these interpretations, the shadow is said to have been interpreted, with his agreement, as the individual's external honor ([Karl Joseph] Simrock, [Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie mit Einschluss der Nordischen], 4th ed. [Bonn, 1874], p. 482). This would, however, by no means prevent its having other—and unconscious—meanings, of which Chamisso himself has provided several. Because it reminds us of popular superstition, the following comment by the author is of interest. He is said to have made it to a friend a few weeks before his death: "People have so often asked what the shadow might be. Indeed, if they were to ask what my shadow is now, I would say that it is my lack of health; my lack of a shadow consists of my illness." The quote is from Franz Kern, Zudeutschen Dichtem (Berlin, 1895), p. 115. In the concluding section of this book it will be apparent to what extent the sexually symbolic interpretations can be subsumed under a more inclusive psychological understanding. Impotence and other interpretations are cited in Sadger, "Psychiatrisch- Neurologisches in psychoanalytischer Beleuchtung." Zentralblatt f. d. Gesamt geb. d. Medizin (1908), Nos. 7 and 8. 158]

25. Tylor, Primitive Culture [3rd. ed.; London, 1891], I, pp. 423 ff.

26. Adolf Bastían, Vorstellungen von der Seele, pp. 9 f. [?].

27. Frazer, "The Belief in Immortality . . . ," p. 129.

28. Ibid., p. 207. 29. Ibid., p. 267.

31. Ibid., p. 412.

30. Ibid., p. 395.

32. Ibid., p. 173.

33. Quoted after G. [Gerhard] Heinzelmann, Animlsmus und Religion. . . ( [Gütersloh], 1913), pp. 18 f.

34. Frazer, "The Belief in Immortality . . . ," p. 411. Similar views of two souls among the Greenlanders and Algonquins are reported by Paul Radestock, Schlaf und Traum (Leipzig, 1878 [1879]), p. 252, n. 2. The Tamis in German New Guinea also distinguish between a long, motile soul identified with the shadow, and a short one, which leaves the body only at death (Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 291).

35. The rather undeveloped North-Melanesians, among whom aie terms for 'soul' and 'shadow' are formed from the same linguistic root (see above), "think that the soul is like the man himself (Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 395); and "the Fijisan pictured to themselves the human soul as a miniature of the man himself' (ibid., p. 412)

36. Erwin Rohde, Psyche: SeelencuÜ und Unsterblichkeitsglaube der Griechen (3rd ed., Tübingen, 1903), I, 6ff. and 46. Similar material about the Greenlanders and oilier peoples is found in Radestock, op. cit., chap. 1 and its annotations.

37. Cf. the Homeric concept of the soul as the shadow («BuXo?) of the once living person (Iliad xxiii. 104; Odyssey x. 495; and xi, 207). rAVocrh"s i¡tl,le eotlshlfu ,e nntmgo e tahnwne íhr"veo o miSmse trehe Zeaua lllssyslto aawi nndiE tehPd iamntnr uaothnccehldu ps dSoaerptpmiaepl sses aT,o rofsE d Hienn ta wda(ieJ csedk nlrauea na,p mgssy1,g c8eeh7sxe7cc )hla,a incidmhp t.se a: s2"dh8Yea3er-. According to Spiess, after death the \l>v\ri, the soul, which is identical with the spirit, becomes an «UuXoy, i.e., a shadow, a dream-image (Odyssey xi. 222).

38. Alexandre Moret, Annales du Musée Guimet (Paris, 1902), Part 14, p. 33.

39. Also, the practice of embalming the dead, particularly among the Egyptians (but also elsewhere—see Spiess, op. cit., pp. 182 f.; and Frazer, op. cit., pp. 144 ff.), as well as the custom of placing gifts into the grave (food and fire for the souls) point to the fact that originally the soul was imagined to be very material and equal to the body.

40. Spiess, op. cit., p. 266. In Dante's Purgatory, the "shades" also cast no shadows. Rohde says of the immortality of these souls: "They live scarcely no more than does the image of the living person in the mirror."

41. Negelein, op. cit.; Herbert Spencer, Prinzipien der Soziologie, tr. into German by B. Vetter [Stuttgart, 1877-1897], II, 426.

42. [Friedrich Gottlob] Welker, Kleine Schriften [Bonn, 1844-67], lu, 161, refers to the belief of the Pythagoreans, who took literally the locution, "getting rid of one's shadow." In accordance with their view the dead person s soul casts no shadow. In Arcadia this was a euphemistic expression for death (cf. our 'umschatten') and only later was this expression taken literally. Concerning the various ideas of this cultic lack of a shadow, cf. W. H. Röscher, "Die Schattenlosigkeit des Zeus Abatons auf dem Lykaion," in Fleckeisens Jahrbuch für klassisches Altertum, CXLV (1892), as well as the literature cited there, especiaDy Karl Otfried Müller, Die Dorter (Breslau, 1824), I, 308.

43. Concerning the human sacrifices held in the Lycaic sacred place, see Negelein, op. cit.

44. [Rochholz, op. cit., p. 75.]

45. Negelein, op. cit.

46. Waitz, op. cit., pp. 297, 300.

47. See Jakob Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie (4th ed.; Berlin, 1875- 1878), pp. 855, 976, and the note on p. 302; Karl Victor Miillenhoff, Sagen, Märchen und Lieder der Herzogthümer Schleswig-Holstein und Lauenburg (Kiel, 1845[?]), pp. 554 ff. About the Spanish legend of the devil of Salamanca, which Theodor Körner treated in a romance, cf. the sources in Rochholz, op. cit., p. 119; the poem itself is in Deutsche Nationalliteratur, CLII, 200. In Salamanca, the devil was giving instructions to seven pupils, of whom the last had to pay with his soul. Once, however, he pointed to his shadow with the remark that it would be the last to leave the room. The devil took the shadow, and the pupil remained shadowless and unhappy for the rest of his Me.

48. This is shown by the traditions in which the devil directly stipulates the shadow as the pay for his aid—(see, e.g., Konrad Maurer, Isländische Sagen [Isländische Volkssagen der Gegenwart . . . (Leipzig, I860)], p. 121)—or in which a person whom the devil has somehow cheated must be without a shadow for the rest of his life (see Mullenhoff, op. cit., p. 454 f.; Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, p. 976). The tradition cited by Rochholz (p. 119) is interesting, according to which a Count Villano ('scoundrel'), who had given over his shadow to the devil, learned from him the art of rejuvenating old people (rejuvenation-motif) and wanted to apply it to himself. In old age, therefore, he had himself killed, cut into pieces, and these parts placed into a glass which was buried in horse manure. This was prematurely discovered, however, and the not yet completely developed child was burned (on this theme cf. Herbert Silberer's essay, "Homunculus," Imago, III (1914), 37-79.

49. Wuttke, op. ctt., pp. 435 ff.

50. Karl Haberland, "Der Spiegel im Glauben und Brauch der Völker," Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie, XIII (1882), 324-47. Cf. also Hiess, Rhein. Mus. (1894), LIX, 185.

51. Haberland, op. cit., p. 344. According to Frazer, op. cit., p. 95, this is true also in Belgium, England, Scotland, Madagascar, and among the Jews in Crimea and the Mohammedans in Bombay. The reasoning is that the soul of the survivor, reflected in a mirror, could be taken away by the spirit of the dead person which is staying in the house.

52. Haberland, op. cit.

53. Ibid.

54. Ibid., pp. 341 ff., after Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie, appendix, Deutscher Aberglaube, no. 104; Friedrich Wilhelm Panzer, Beiträge zurdeutschen Mythologie: Studien zur germanischen Sageneeschichte (Munich, 1910), II, 298; Ludwig Strackerjan, Aberglaube und Sagen aus dem Herzogtum Oldenburg (2nd ed.; Oldenburg, 1909), I, 262; Wolff- Mannhardt, I, 243; IV, 147[?]; J. N. Ritter von Alpenburg, Mythen und Sagen Tirols (Zürich, 1857), p. 252; Wuttke, op. cit., p. 205.

55. Wuttke, op. cit., p. 230.

56. Negelein, op. cit.

57. Haberland, op. cit.; Frazer, op. cit., p. 95.

58. Haberland, op. cit.

59. Wuttke, op. cit., p. 198.

60. Ibid., p. 404

. 61. Ibid., p. 198.

62. Haberland, op. cit.

63. Negelein, op. cit.

64. Ibid.

65. Wuttfce, op. cit., pp. 368 f.; see also Weber's Demokritos, TV, 46.

66. Wuttke, op. cit., pp. 229 f., 234; Haberland, op. cit. E. T. A. Hoffmann also repeatedly used this popular belief in his writings; see K. Olbrich, "Hoffmann und der deutsche Volksaberglaube," in Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Schlesische Volkskunde (1900). F. S. Krauss, in "Urquell,^ deals with the mirror-superstition associated with the "nights of Andreas."

67. Negelein, op. cit.

68. Cf. the essay on "Spiegelzauber" by G. Roheirn, Imago, V ( 1917- 1919), 63-120, which is based upon abundant folldoric material; cf. also his book of the same title in the Internationale Psychoanalytische Bibliothek.

69. Thomas Williams, who lived among the Fiji Islanders, tells the following story which is characteristic for the psychic meaning of the mirror-image: "I once placed a good-looking native suddenly before a mirror. He stood delighted. 'Now,' said he softly, 'I can see into the world of spirits.'" (after Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 412.)

70. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," pp. 92 ff.

71. Ibid., p. 93. Heist, who treats the problem of the double in Amphytrion, gives the psychological basis of this superstition in his remarks "On the Puppet-Theatre. Here he tells of a handsome and well-educated youth who, in order to imitate the pose of the "Boy Extracting Thorn From Foot," began to stand all day long before the mirror; and continually one charm after the other left him . . . and when a year had passed, not one trace of loveliness could be discovered in him." Cf. here the legend of Entelidas and the favorite novel character of Dorian Gray; [see pp. 18, 67].

72. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," pp. 96-100.

73. Leuschner, Mitteilungen der Geographischen Gesellschaft zu Jena (1913). Concerning similar material on the Malay Archipelago, cf. Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, XXII, 494 f. According to [Carl] Meinhof, Afrikanische Religionen (Berlin, 1912), the recording of the voice with the phonograph occasionally meets with similar difficulties.

74. Warneck, Lebenskräfte des Evangeliums (1908), p. SO, n. 3.

75. Wuttke, op. cit., p. 289.

76. J. A. E. Köhler, Volksbrauch, Aberglauben . . . im Voigtlande (Leipzig, 1867), p. 423.

77. In Russian superstition, the mirror-image of a person is connected with his innermost being (Spencer [Vetter], op, cit., p. 426).

78. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 94.

79. Ludwig Preller, Griechische Mythologie [4th ed.; Berlin, 1894], I, 598.

80. Hermann Oldenberg, Die Religion ¿1er Veda (2nd ed.; Stuttgart, 1917), p. 527.

81. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 94.

82. Haberland, op. cit.

83. The following is after Haberland, op. cit., pp. 328 f. The ancient belief reported by Aristotle and Pliny, that a mirror into which a menstruating woman gazes becomes spotted, may be cited here only incidentally In Mecklenburg and Silesia mirrors are covered, as in the case of a death, also when a woman in childbed is in the house, apparently to protect the child in the womb from enchantments.

84. Georg Friedrich Creuzer, Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker, besonders der Griechen (3rd ed.; Leipzig and Darmstadt, 1836- 1843), IV, 196.

85. Wolf gang Menzel, Die vorchristliche Unsterblichkeitslehre (Leipzig, 1870 [1869]), II, 66.

86. Menzel, op. cit.; Creuzer, op. cit., IV, 129.

87. Menzel, op. cit., p. 68.

88. Mordía, quest, cono. V 7, 3.

89. Metamorphoses iii. 342 ff.

90. Pausanias 9, 31, 6.

91. A comic counterpart to this is offered by the Kamchatka narrative of the simple god Kutka, on whom the mouse plays a trick by painting on him, while asleep, the face of a woman. When he sees this in the water, he falls in love with himself (Tylor, op. cit., p. 104). Cf. the similar idea of Hebbel [p. 24, note 24].

92. I.e., Übe union of Narcissus with his echo which, unheard by the coy youth, is consumed with sorrow until "vox tantum atque ossa supersunt" ["only her voice and her bones (lineaments?) survive"]. As punishment for this spurned love, the poet causes the youth to fall into tormentingself-love.

93. Frazer, "The Belief . . . ," p. 94.