Note 133.4 — PSYCHE’S TASK

Precautions taken in India against the ghosts of women who die in pregnancy, childbed, or soon after it. The Hindoos of the Punjaub believe that if a mother dies within thirteen days of her delivery, she will return in the guise of a malignant spirit to torment her husband and family. To prevent this some people drive nails through her head and eyes, while others also knock nails on either side of the door of the house.133.4 A gentler way of attaining the same end is to put a nail or a piece of iron in the clothes of the poor dead mother,133.5 or to knock nails into the earth round the places where she died, and where her dead body was washed and cremated. Some people put pepper in the eyes of the corpse to prevent the ghost from seeing her way back to the house.133.6 In Bilaspore, if a mother dies leaving very young children, they tie her hands and feet before burial to prevent her from getting up by night and going to see her orphaned little ones.134.1 The Oraons of Bengal are firmly convinced that any woman who dies in pregnancy or childbirth becomes an evil and dangerous spirit (bhut), who, if steps are not taken to keep her off, will come back and tickle to death those whom she loved best in life. “To prevent her, therefore, from coming back, they carry her body as far away as they can, but no woman will accompany her to her last resting-place lest similar misfortune should happen to her. Arrived at the burial-place, they break the feet above the ankle, twist them round, bringing the heels in front, and then drive long thorns into them. They bury her very deep with her face downwards, and with her they bury the bones of a donkey, and pronounce the anathema, ‘If you come home may you turn into a donkey’; the roots of a palm-tree are also buried with her; and they say, ‘May you come home only when the leaves of the palm-tree wither,’ and when they retire they spread mustard seeds all along the road saying, ‘When you try to come home pick up all these.’ They then feel pretty safe at home from her nocturnal visits, but woe to the man who passes at night near the place where she has been buried. She will pounce upon him, twist his neck, and leave him senseless on the ground, until brought to by the incantations of a sorcerer.”134.2 Among the Lushais of Assam, when a woman died in childbed, the relatives offer a sacrifice to her departed soul, “but the rest of that village treat the day as a holiday and put a small green branch on the wall of each house on the outside near the doorpost to keep out the spirit of the dead woman.”134.3