The
proofs of these two remarkable and closely analogous customs are
entirely independent of each other. Their coincidence seems to
furnish fresh presumption in favour of both.
To the question, How was the representative of the corn-spirit
chosen? one answer has been already given. Both the Lityerses story
and European folk-custom show that passing strangers were regarded
as manifestations of the corn-spirit escaping from the cut or
threshed corn, and as such were seized and slain. But this is not
the only answer which the evidence suggests. According to the
Phrygian legend the victims of Lityerses were not simply passing
strangers, but persons whom he had vanquished in a reaping contest
and afterwards wrapt up in corn-sheaves and beheaded. This suggests
that the representative of the corn-spirit may have been selected by
means of a competition on the harvest-field, in which the vanquished
competitor was compelled to accept the fatal honour. The supposition
is countenanced by European harvest-customs. We have seen that in
Europe there is sometimes a contest amongst the reapers to avoid
being last, and that the person who is vanquished in this
competition, that is, who cuts the last corn, is often roughly
handled.
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