Chapter IV

., the "Blessing of the Waters" takes place. Some of the hallowed water is put into vessels, and with these and with incense the priests sometimes make a round of the village, sprinkling the people and their houses. The fear of the |245| _Kallikantzaroi_ at this purification is expressed in the following lines:--

"Quick, begone! we must begone, Here comes the pot-bellied priest, With his censer in his hand And his sprinkling-vessel too; He has purified the streams And he has polluted us."

Besides this ecclesiastical purification there are various Christian precautions against the _Kallikantzaroi_--_e.g._, to mark the house-door with a black cross on Christmas Eve, the burning of incense and the invocation of the Trinity--and a number of other means of aversion: the lighting of the Yule log, the burning of something that smells strong, and--perhaps as a peace-offering--the hanging of pork-bones, sweetmeats, or sausages in the chimney.

Just as men are sometimes believed to become vampires temporarily during their lifetime, so, according to one stream of tradition, do living men become _Kallikantzaroi_. In Greece children born at Christmas are thought likely to have this objectionable characteristic as a punishment for their mothers' sin in bearing them at a time sacred to the Mother of God. In Macedonia{70} people who have a "light" guardian angel undergo the hideous transformation.

Many attempts have been made to account for the _Kallikantzaroi_. Perhaps the most plausible explanation of the outward form, at least, of the uncanny creatures, is the theory connecting them with the masquerades that formed part of the winter festival of Dionysus and are still to be found in Greece at Christmastide. The hideous bestial shapes, the noise and riot, may well have seemed demoniacal to simple people slightly "elevated," perhaps, by Christmas feasting, while the human nature of the maskers was not altogether forgotten.{71} Another theory of an even more prosaic character has been propounded--"that the Kallikantzaroi are nothing more than established nightmares, limited like indigestion to the twelve days of feasting. This view is |246| taken by Allatius, who says that a Kallikantzaros has all the characteristics of nightmare, rampaging abroad and jumping on men's shoulders, then leaving them half senseless on the ground."{72}

Such theories are ingenious and suggestive, and may be true to a certain degree, but they hardly cover all the facts. It is possible that the _Kallikantzaroi_ may have some connection with the departed; they certainly appear akin to the modern Greek and Slavonic vampire, "a corpse imbued with a kind of half-life," and with eyes gleaming like live coals.{73} They are, however, even more closely related to the werewolf, a man who is supposed to change into a wolf and go about ravening. It is to be noted that "man-wolves" ([Greek: lykanthrôpoi]) is the very name given to the _Kallikantzaroi_ in southern Greece, and that the word _Kallikantzaros_ itself has been conjecturally derived by Bernhard Schmidt from two Turkish words meaning "black" and "werewolf."{74} The connection between Christmas and werewolves is not confined to Greece. According to a belief not yet extinct in the north and east of Germany, even where the real animals have long ago been extirpated, children born during the Twelve Nights become werewolves, while in Livonia and Poland that period is the special season for the werewolf's ravenings.{75}

Perhaps on no question connected with primitive religion is there more uncertainty than on the ideas of early man about the nature of animals and their relation to himself and the world. When we meet with half-animal, half-human beings we must be prepared to find much that is obscure.

With the _Kallikantzaroi_ may be compared some goblins of the Celtic imagination; especially like is the Manx _Fynnodderee_ (lit. "the hairy-dun one"), "something between a man and a beast, being covered with black shaggy hair and having fiery eyes," and prodigiously strong.{76} The Russian _Domovy_ or house-spirit is also a hirsute creature,{77} and the Russian _Ljeschi_, goat-footed woodland sprites, are, like the _Kallikantzaroi_, supposed to be got rid of by the "Blessing of the Waters" at the Epiphany.{78} Some of the monstrous German figures already dealt with here |247| bear strong resemblances to the Greek demons. And, of course, on Greek ground one cannot help thinking of Pan and the Satyrs and Centaurs.[98]

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