Part 10
Leo IV. died on the 17th July, 855; and Benedict III. was consecrated on the 1st September in the same year; so that it is impossible to insert between their pontificates a reign of two years, five months, and four days. It is, however, true that there was an antipope elected upon the death of Leo, at the instance of the Emperor Louis; but his name was Anastasius. This man possessed himself of the palace of the Popes, and obtained the incarceration of Benedict. However, his supporters almost immediately deserted him, and Benedict assumed the pontificate. The reign of Benedict was only for two years and a half, so that Anastasius cannot be the supposed Joan; nor do we hear of any charge brought against him to the effect of his being a woman. But the stout partisans of the Pope-Joan tale assert, on the authority of the "Annales Augustani,"[29] and some other, but late authorities, that the female Pope was John VIII., who consecrated Louis II. of France, and Ethelwolf of England. Here again is confusion. Ethelwolf sent Alfred to Rome in 853, and the youth received regal unction from the hands of Leo IV. In 855 Ethelwolf visited Rome, it is true, but was not consecrated by the existing Pope, whilst Charles the Bald was anointed by John VIII. in 875. John VIII. was a Roman, son of Gundus, and an archdeacon of the Eternal City. He assumed the triple crown in 872, and reigned till December 18, 882. John took an active part in the troubles of the Church under the incursions of the Sarasins, and 325 letters of his are extant, addressed to the princes and prelates of his day.
Any one desirous of pursuing this examination into the untenable nature of the story may find an excellent summary of the arguments used on both sides in Gieseler, "Lehrbuch," &c., Cunningham's trans., vol. ii. pp. 20, 21, or in Bayle, "Dictionnaire," tom. iii. art. Papesse.
The arguments in favor of the myth may be seen in Spanheim, "Exercit. de Papa FA"mina," Opp. tom. ii. p. 577, or in Lenfant, "Histoire de la Papesse Jeanne," La Haye, 1736, 2 vols. 12mo.
The arguments on the other side may be had in "Allatii Confutatio FabulA| de Johanna Papissa," Colon. 1645; in Le Quien, "Oriens Christianus," tom. iii. p. 777; and in the pages of the Lutheran Huemann, "Sylloge Diss. Sacras.," tom. i. par. ii. p. 352.
The final development of this extraordinary story, under the delicate fingers of the German and French Protestant controversialists, may not prove uninteresting.
Joan was the daughter of an English missionary, who left England to preach the Gospel to the recently converted Saxons. She was born at Engelheim, and according to different authors she was christened Agnes, Gerberta, Joanna, Margaret, Isabel, Dorothy, or Jutt--the last must have been a nickname surely! She early distinguished herself for genius and love of letters. A young monk of Fulda having conceived for her a violent passion, which she returned with ardor, she deserted her parents, dressed herself in male attire, and in the sacred precincts of Fulda divided her affections between the youthful monk and the musty books of the monastic library. Not satisfied with the restraints of conventual life, nor finding the library sufficiently well provided with books of abstruse science, she eloped with her young man, and after visiting England, France, and Italy, she brought him to Athens, where she addicted herself with unflagging devotion to her literary pursuits. Wearied out by his journey, the monk expired in the arms of the blue-stocking who had influenced his life for evil, and the young lady of so many aliases was for a while inconsolable. She left Athens and repaired to Rome. There she opened a school and acquired such a reputation for learning and feigned sanctity, that, on the death of Leo IV., she was unanimously elected Pope. For two years and five months, under the name of John VIII., she filled the papal chair with reputation, no one suspecting her sex. But having taken a fancy to one of the cardinals, by him she became pregnant. At length arrived the time of Rogation processions. Whilst passing the street between the amphitheatre and St. Clement's, she was seized with violent pains, fell to the ground amidst the crowd, and, whilst her attendants ministered to her, was delivered of a son. Some say the child and mother died on the spot, some that she survived but was incarcerated, some that the child was spirited away to be the Antichrist of the last days. A marble monument representing the papess with her baby was erected on the spot, which was declared to be accursed to all ages.
I have little doubt myself that Pope Joan is an impersonification of the great whore of Revelation, seated on the seven hills, and is the popular expression of the idea prevalent from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries, that the mystery of iniquity was somehow working in the papal court. The scandal of the Antipopes, the utter worldliness and pride of others, the spiritual fornication with the kings of the earth, along with the words of Revelation prophesying the advent of an adulterous woman who should rule over the imperial city, and her connection with Antichrist, crystallized into this curious myth, much as the floating uncertainty as to the signification of our Lord's words, "There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of God," condensed into the myth of the Wandering Jew.
The literature connected with Antichrist is voluminous. I need only specify some of the most curious works which have appeared on the subject. St. Hippolytus and Rabanus Maurus have been already alluded to. Commodianus wrote "Carmen Apologeticum adversus Gentes," which has been published by Dom Pitra in his "Spicilegium Solesmense," with an introduction containing Jewish and Christian traditions relating to Antichrist. "De Turpissima Conceptione, Nativitate, et aliis PrA|sagiis Diaboliciis illius Turpissimi Hominis Antichristi," is the title of a strange little volume published by Lenoir in A. D. 1500, containing rude yet characteristic woodcuts, representing the birth, life, and death of the Man of Sin, each picture accompanied by French verses in explanation. An equally remarkable illustrated work on Antichrist is the famous "Liber de Antichristo," a blockbook of an early date. It is in twenty-seven folios, and is excessively rare. Dibdin has reproduced three of the plates in his "Bibliotheca Spenseriana," and Falckenstein has given full details of the work in his "Geschichte der Buchdruckerkunst."
There is an Easter miracle-play of the twelfth century, still extant, the subject of which is the "Life and Death of Antichrist." More curious still is the "Farce de l'AntA(C)christ et de Trois Femmes"--a composition of the sixteenth century, when that mysterious personage occupied all brains. The farce consists in a scene at a fish-stall, with three good ladies quarrelling over some fish. Antichrist steps in,--for no particular reason that one can see,--upsets fish and fish-women, sets them fighting, and skips off the stage. The best book on Antichrist, and that most full of learning and judgment, is Malvenda's great work in two folio volumes, "De Antichristo, libri xii." Lyons, 1647.
For the fable of the Pope Joan, see J. Lenfant, "Histoire de la Papesse Jeanne." La Haye, 1736, 2 vols. 12mo. "Allatii Confutatio FabulA| de Johanna Papissa." Colon. 1645.
FOOTNOTE:
[29] These Annals were written in 1135.
The Man in the Moon.
[Illustration: From L. Richter.]
Every one knows that the moon is inhabited by a man with a bundle of sticks on his back, who has been exiled thither for many centuries, and who is so far off that he is beyond the reach of death.
He has once visited this earth, if the nursery rhyme is to be credited, when it asserts that--
"The Man in the Moon Came down too soon, And asked his way to Norwich;"
but whether he ever reached that city, the same authority does not state.
The story as told by nurses is, that this man was found by Moses gathering sticks on a Sabbath, and that, for this crime, he was doomed to reside in the moon till the end of all things; and they refer to Numbers xv. 32-36:--
"And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day. And they that found him gathering sticks brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation. And they put him in ward, because it was not declared what should be done to him. And the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp. And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones till he died."
Of course, in the sacred writings there is no allusion to the moon.
The German tale is as follows:--
Ages ago there went one Sunday morning an old man into the wood to hew sticks. He cut a fagot and slung it on a stout staff, cast it over his shoulder, and began to trudge home with his burden. On his way he met a handsome man in Sunday suit, walking towards the Church; this man stopped and asked the fagot-bearer, "Do you know that this is Sunday on earth, when all must rest from their labors?"
"Sunday on earth, or Monday in heaven, it is all one to me!" laughed the wood-cutter.
"Then bear your bundle forever," answered the stranger; "and as you value not Sunday on earth, yours shall be a perpetual Moon-day in heaven; and you shall stand for eternity in the moon, a warning to all Sabbath-breakers." Thereupon the stranger vanished, and the man was caught up with his stock and his fagot into the moon, where he stands yet.
The superstition seems to be old in Germany, for the full moon is spoken of as _wadel_, or _wedel_, a fagot. Tobler relates the story thus: "An arma mAe ket alawel am Sonnti holz ufglesa. Do hedem der liebe Gott dwahl gloh, A¶b er lieber wott ider sonn verbrenna oder im mo verfrura, do willer lieber inn mo ihi. Dromm siedma no jetz an ma im mo inna, wenns wedel ist. Er hed a pA1/4scheli uffem rogga."[30] That is to say, he was given the choice of burning in the sun, or of freezing in the moon; he chose the latter; and now at full moon he is to be seen seated with his bundle of fagots on his back.
In Schaumburg-Lippe,[31] the story goes, that a man and a woman stand in the moon, the man because he strewed brambles and thorns on the church path, so as to hinder people from attending Mass on Sunday morning; the woman because she made butter on that day. The man carries his bundle of thorns, the woman her butter-tub. A similar tale is told in Swabia and in Marken. Fischart[32] says, that there "is to be seen in the moon a manikin who stole wood;" and PrA|torius, in his description of the world,[33] that "superstitious people assert that the black flecks in the moon are a man who gathered wood on a Sabbath, and is therefore turned into stone."
The Dutch household myth is, that the unhappy man was caught stealing vegetables. Dante calls him Cain:--
"... Now doth Cain with fork of thorns confine, On either hemisphere, touching the wave Beneath the towers of Seville. Yesternight The moon was round." _Hell_, cant. xx.
And again,--
"... Tell, I pray thee, whence the gloomy spots Upon this body, which below on earth Give rise to talk of Cain in fabling quaint?" _Paradise_, cant. ii.
Chaucer, in the "Testament of Cresside," adverts to the man in the moon, and attributes to him the same idea of theft. Of Lady Cynthia, or the moon, he says,--
"Her gite was gray and full of spottis blake, And on her brest a chorle painted ful even, Bering a bush of thornis on his backe, Whiche for his theft might clime so ner the heaven."
Ritson, among his "Ancient Songs," gives one extracted from a manuscript of the time of Edward II., on the Man in the Moon, but in very obscure language. The first verse, altered into more modern orthography, runs as follows:--
"Man in the Moon stand and stit, On his bot-fork his burden he beareth, It is much wonder that he do na doun slit, For doubt lest he fall he shudd'reth and shivereth.
...
"When the frost freezes must chill he bide, The thorns be keen his attire so teareth, Nis no wight in the world there wot when he syt, Ne bote it by the hedge what weeds he weareth."
Alexander Necham, or Nequam, a writer of the twelfth century, in commenting on the dispersed shadows in the moon, thus alludes to the vulgar belief: "Nonne novisti quid vulgus vocet rusticum in luna portantem spinas? Unde quidam vulgariter loquens ait:--
"Rusticus in Luna, Quem sarcina deprimit una Monstrat per opinas Nulli prodesse rapinas,"
which may be translated thus: "Do you know what they call the rustic in the moon, who carries the fagot of sticks?" So that one vulgarly speaking says,--
"See the rustic in the Moon, How his bundle weighs him down; Thus his sticks the truth reveal, It never profits man to steal."
Shakspeare refers to the same individual in his "Midsummer Night's Dream." Quince the carpenter, giving directions for the performance of the play of "Pyramus and Thisbe," orders: "One must come in with a bush of thorns and a lantern, and say he comes in to disfigure, or to present, the person of Moonshine." And the enacter of this part says, "All I have to say is, to tell you that the lantern is the moon; I the man in the moon; this thorn-bush my thorn-bush; and this dog my dog."
Also "Tempest," Act 2, Scene 2:--
"_Cal._ Hast thou not dropt from heaven?
"_Steph._ Out o' th' moon, I do assure thee. I was the man in th' moon when time was.
"_Cal._ I have seen thee in her; and I do adore thee. My mistress showed me thee, and thy dog, and thy bush."
The dog I have myself had pointed out to me by an old Devonshire crone. If popular superstition places a dog in the moon, it puts a lamb in the sun; for in the same county it is said that those who see the sun rise on Easter-day, may behold in the orb the lamb and flag.
I believe this idea of locating animals in the two great luminaries of heaven to be very ancient, and to be a relic of a primeval superstition of the Aryan race.
There is an ancient pictorial representation of our friend the Sabbath-breaker in Gyffyn Church, near Conway. The roof of the chancel is divided into compartments, in four of which are the Evangelistic symbols, rudely, yet effectively painted. Besides these symbols is delineated in each compartment an orb of heaven. The sun, the moon, and two stars, are placed at the feet of the Angel, the Bull, the Lion, and the Eagle. The representation of the moon is as below; in the disk is the conventional man with his bundle of sticks, but without the dog. There is also a curious seal appended to a deed preserved in the Record Office, dated the 9th year of Edward the Third (1335), bearing the man in the moon as its device. The deed is one of conveyance of a messuage, barn, and four acres of ground, in the parish of Kingston-on-Thames, from Walter de Grendesse, clerk, to Margaret his mother. On the seal we see the man carrying his sticks, and the moon surrounds him. There are also a couple of stars added, perhaps to show that he is in the sky. The legend on the seal reads:--
"Te Waltere docebo cur spinas phebo gero,"
which may be translated, "I will teach thee, Walter, why I carry thorns in the moon."
[Illustration: {Representation of the moon in Gyffyn Church.}]
[Illustration: {The seal with the legend visible.}]
The general superstition with regard to the spots in the moon may briefly be summed up thus: A man is located in the moon; he is a thief or Sabbath-breaker;[34] he has a pole over his shoulder, from which is suspended a bundle of sticks or thorns. In some places a woman is believed to accompany him, and she has a butter-tub with her; in other localities she is replaced by a dog.
The belief in the Moon-man seems to exist among the natives of British Columbia; for I read in one of Mr. Duncan's letters to the Church Missionary Society, "One very dark night I was told that there was a moon to see on the beach. On going to see, there was an illuminated disk, with the figure of a man upon it. The water was then very low, and one of the conjuring parties had lit up this disk at the water's edge. They had made it of wax, with great exactness, and presently it was at full. It was an imposing sight. Nothing could be seen around it; but the Indians suppose that the medicine party are then holding converse with the man in the moon.... After a short time the moon waned away, and the conjuring party returned whooping to their house."
Now let us turn to Scandinavian mythology, and see what we learn from that source.
MAcni, the moon, stole two children from their parents, and carried them up to heaven. Their names were Hjuki and Bil. They had been drawing water from the well Byrgir, in the bucket SA"gr, suspended from the pole Simul, which they bore upon their shoulders. These children, pole, and bucket were placed in heaven, "where they could be seen from earth." This refers undoubtedly to the spots in the moon; and so the Swedish peasantry explain these spots to this day, as representing a boy and a girl bearing a pail of water between them. Are we not reminded at once of our nursery rhyme--
"Jack and Jill went up a hill To fetch a pail of water; Jack fell down, and broke his crown, And Jill came tumbling after"?
This verse, which to us seems at first sight nonsense, I have no hesitation in saying has a high antiquity, and refers to the Eddaic Hjuki and Bil. The names indicate as much. Hjuki, in Norse, would be pronounced Juki, which would readily become Jack; and Bil, for the sake of euphony, and in order to give a female name to one of the children, would become Jill.
The fall of Jack, and the subsequent fall of Jill, simply represent the vanishing of one moon-spot after another, as the moon wanes.
But the old Norse myth had a deeper signification than merely an explanation of the moon-spots.
Hjuki is derived from the verb jakka, to heap or pile together, to assemble and increase; and Bil from bila, to break up or dissolve. Hjuki and Bil, therefore, signify nothing more than the waxing and waning of the moon, and the water they are represented as bearing signifies the fact that the rainfall depends on the phases of the moon. Waxing and waning were individualized, and the meteorological fact of the connection of the rain with the moon was represented by the children as water-bearers.
But though Jack and Jill became by degrees dissevered in the popular mind from the moon, the original myth went through a fresh phase, and exists still under a new form. The Norse superstition attributed _theft_ to the moon, and the vulgar soon began to believe that the figure they saw in the moon was the thief. The lunar specks certainly may be made to resemble one figure, and only a lively imagination can discern two. The girl soon dropped out of popular mythology, the boy oldened into a venerable man, he retained his pole, and the bucket was transformed into the thing he had stolen--sticks or vegetables. The theft was in some places exchanged for Sabbath-breaking, especially among those in Protestant countries who were acquainted with the Bible story of the stick-gatherer.
The Indian superstition is worth examining, because of the connection existing between Indian and European mythology, on account of our belonging to the same Aryan stock.
According to a Buddhist legend, SAckyamunni himself, in one of his earlier stages of existence, was a hare, and lived in friendship with a fox and an ape. In order to test the virtue of the Bodhisattwa, Indra came to the friends, in the form of an old man, asking for food. Hare, ape, and fox went forth in quest of victuals for their guest. The two latter returned from their foraging expedition successful, but the hare had found nothing. Then, rather than that he should treat the old man with inhospitality, the hare had a fire kindled, and cast himself into the flames, that he might himself become food for his guest. In reward for this act of self-sacrifice, Indra carried the hare to heaven, and placed him in the moon.[35]
Here we have an old man and a hare in connection with the lunar planet, just as in Shakspeare we have a fagot-bearer and a dog.
The fable rests upon the name of the moon in Sanskrit, ASec.aASec.in, or "that marked with the hare;" but whether the belief in the spots taking the shape of a hare gave the name ASec.aASec.in to the moon, or the lunar name ASec.aASec.in originated the belief, it is impossible for us to say.
Grounded upon this myth is the curious story of "The Hare and the Elephant," in the "Pantschatantra," an ancient collection of Sanskrit fables. It will be found as the first tale in the third book. I have room only for an outline of the story.
THE CRAFTY HARE.
In a certain forest lived a mighty elephant, king of a herd, Toothy by name. On a certain occasion there was a long drought, so that pools, tanks, swamps, and lakes were dried up. Then the elephants sent out exploring parties in search of water. A young one discovered an extensive lake surrounded with trees, and teeming with water-fowl. It went by the name of the Moon-lake. The elephants, delighted at the prospect of having an inexhaustible supply of water, marched off to the spot, and found their most sanguine hopes realized. Round about the lake, in the sandy soil, were innumerable hare warrens; and as the herd of elephants trampled on the ground, the hares were severely injured, their homes broken down, their heads, legs, and backs crushed beneath the ponderous feet of the monsters of the forest. As soon as the herd had withdrawn, the hares assembled, some halting, some dripping with blood, some bearing the corpses of their cherished infants, some with piteous tales of ruination in their houses, all with tears streaming from their eyes, and wailing forth, "Alas, we are lost! The elephant-herd will return, for there is no water elsewhere, and that will be the death of all of us."
But the wise and prudent Longear volunteered to drive the herd away; and he succeeded in this manner: Longear went to the elephants, and having singled out their king, he addressed him as follows:--
"Ha, ha! bad elephant! what brings you with such thoughtless frivolity to this strange lake? Back with you at once!"
When the king of the elephants heard this, he asked in astonishment, "Pray, who are you?"