Note 47.3 — Chapter VIII · THE LIFE-TOKEN IN TALE AND CUSTOM.

Closely connected with the Life-token, as we have already seen, is divination concerning the prospects of life of persons who are not absent. This is a wide subject; and here we can only select a few examples among those whose form is similar to those of the Life-token. The Thuringian practice of divining as to absent members of the family seems to be one of several Teutonic methods of divination by the baking of bread. The decrees of Burchard of Worms, issued probably early in the eleventh century, refer to the omen drawn on the first of January by baking a loaf of bread in the name of any one and noting how it rises and whether it becomes compact and light. Another practice is described, of sweeping the hearth and placing grains of barley on the heated place: if the grains popped, they indicated danger; otherwise, if they remained quiet.47.3 At Rauen, in the north of Germany, if a newly baked loaf have a crack, one of the family will die.48.1 In Suffolk, to overturn a loaf in the oven is to have a death in the house.48.2 In Saxony on the Bohemian border the same augury is obtained by making as many little cakes as there are persons in the house, giving to each cake the name of one of the persons, and punching a hole in it with your finger. He whose hole closes up in baking will die.48.3 In Hungary on Saint Lucien’s Day a feather is stuck in each cake, and the death-augury is drawn if the feather be burnt in baking. On Christmas Eve in many places every one eats a nut and fills the shell with water. If the shell be dry by the next morning he must die during the year.48.4