Sometimes it was prescribed that the cart-wheel used for fire-making
and the axle on which it turned should both be new. Similarly it was
said that the rope which turned the roller should be new; if
possible it should be woven of strands taken from a gallows rope
with which people had been hanged, but this was a counsel of
perfection rather than a strict necessity.
Various rules were also laid down as to the kind of persons who
might or should make the need-fire. Sometimes it was said that the
two persons who pulled the rope which twirled the roller should
always be brothers or at least bear the same baptismal name;
sometimes it was deemed sufficient if they were both chaste young
men. In some villages of Brunswick people thought that if everybody
who lent a hand in kindling the need-fire did not bear the same
Christian name, they would labour in vain. In Silesia the tree
employed to produce the need-fire used to be felled by a pair of
twin brothers. In the western islands of Scotland the fire was
kindled by eighty-one married men, who rubbed two great planks
against each other, working in relays of nine; in North Uist the
nine times nine who made the fire were all first-begotten sons, but
we are not told whether they were married or single.
Pages:
1763
1764
1765
1766
1767
1768
1769
1770
1771
1772
1773
1774
1775
1776
1777
1778
1779
1780
1781
1782
1783
1784
1785
1786
1787