[422] Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 196; Jevons, 130; Frazer, ii. 352; Grant Allen, 318; Hartland, ii. 236; Turnbull, The Blood Covenant. Perhaps, as a third type of sacrifice, should be distinguished the ‘alimentary’ sacrifice of food and other things made to the dead. This rests on the belief in the continuance of the mortal life with its needs and desires after death.

[423] Grimm, i. 47; Golther, 565; Gummere, G. O. 40, 457. Gregory III wrote (†731) to Boniface (P. L. lxxxix. 577) ‘inter cetera agrestem caballum aliquantos comedere adiunxisti plerosque et domesticum. hoc nequaquam fieri deinceps sinas,’ cf. Councils of Cealcythe and Pincanhale (787), c. 19 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 458) ‘equos etiam plerique in vobis comedunt, quod nullus Christianorum in Orientalibus facit.’ The decking of horses is a familiar feature of May-day in London and elsewhere.

[424] C. J. Billson, The Easter Hare, in F. L. iii. 441.

[425] N. W. Thomas in F. L. xi. 227.

[426] Grimm, i. 55; Golther, 559, 575; Gummere, G. O. 456. The universal Teutonic term for sacrificing is blôtan.

[427] Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 20; Jevons, 130, 191. Does the modern huntsman know why he ‘bloods’ a novice?

[428] Grimm, i. 47, 57, 77; Jahn, 24; Gummere, G. O. 459. Hence the theriomorphic ‘image.’

[429] Robertson Smith, 414, 448; Jevons, 102, 285; Frazer, ii. 448; Lang, M. R. R.¹ ii. 73, 80, 106, 214, 226; Grant Allen, 335; Du Méril, Com. i. 75. Hence the theriomorphic larva or mask (Frazer, Pausanias, iv. 239).

[430] Grimm, i. 46, 57; Golther, 576; Frazer, ii. 318, 353; Jevons, 144; Grant Allen, 325. Savages believe that by eating an animal they will acquire its bodily and mental qualities.

[431] Jahn, 14, and for classical parallels Frazer, ii. 315; Pausanias, iii. 288; Jevons, Plutarch, lxix. 143. Grant Allen, 292, was told as a boy in Normandy that at certain lustrations ‘a portion of the Host (stolen or concealed, I imagine) was sometimes buried in each field.’

[432] Frazer, ii. 318; Grant Allen, 337; Jevons, 206.

[433] F. L. vi. 1.

[434] Frazer, ii. 319; Jevons, 214; cf. the πάνσπερμα at the Athenian Pyanepsia.

[435] In the Beltane rite (F. L. vi. 2) a bit of the bannock is reserved for the ‘cuack’ or cuckoo, here doubtless the inheritor of the gods.

[436] Grimm, iii. 1240.

[437] Elton, 428.

[438] Grimm, i. 59; Gummere, G. O. 455.

[439] V. Hehn, Culturpflanzen, 438.

[440] Grimm, i. 44, 48, 53; Golther, 561; Gummere, G. O. 459; Schräder, 422; Mogk, iii. 388; Meyer, 199, and for Keltic evidence Elton, 270. Many of these examples belong rather to the war than to the agricultural cult. The latest in the west are Capit. de partib. Saxon. 9 ‘Si quis hominem diabolo sacrificaverit et in hostiam, more paganorum, daemonibus obtulerit’; Lex Frisionum, additio sup. tit. 42 ‘qui fanum effregerit ... immolatur diis, quorum templa violavit’; Epist. Greg. III, 1 (P. L. lxxxix, 578) ‘hoc quoque inter alia crimina agi in partibus illis dixisti, quod quidam ex fidelibus ad immolandum paganis sua venundent mancipia.’

[441] Frazer, ii. 1; Jevons, 279.

[442] Frazer, ii. 5, 59.

[443] Strabo, iv. 5. 4; Bastian, Oestl. Asien, v. 272. The Mexican evidence given by Frazer, iii. 134, does not necessarily represent a primitive notion of the nature of the rite.

[444] Jevons, 291; Plutarch, lxx. For traces of the blood-guiltiness incurred by sacrifice, cf. the βουφόνια at Athens and the regifugium at Rome (Frazer, ii. 294; Robertson Smith, i. 286).

[445] Frazer, ii. 15, 55, 232; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 242, 296, 329.

[446] In three successive years of famine the Swedes sacrificed first oxen, then men, finally their king Dômaldi himself (Ynglingasaga, c. 18).

[447] Frazer, ii. 24; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 296.

[448] The British rule in India forbids human sacrifice, and the Khonds, a Dravidian race of Bengal, have substituted animal for human victims within the memory of man (Frazer, ii. 245).

[449] Hartland, iii. 1; Frazer, Pausanias, iv. 197; v. 44, 143; Bérenger-Féraud, i. 207. Mr. Frazer enumerates forty-one versions of the legend.

[450] Hartland, iii. 81; Grimm, ii. 494; Gummere, G. O. 396. The slaves of Nerthus were drowned in the same lake in which the goddess was dipped.

[451] F. L. vi. i.

[452] Frazer, iii. 319; Gaidoz, 27; Cortet, 213; Simpson, 221; Bertrand, 68; F. L. xii. 315. The work of Posidonius does not exist, but was possibly used by Caesar, B. G. vi. 15; Strabo, iv. 4. 5; Diodorus, v. 32. Wicker ‘giants’ are still burnt in some French festival-fires. But elsewhere, as in the midsummer shows, such ‘giants’ seem to be images of the agricultural divinities, and it is not clear by what process they came to be burnt and so destroyed. Perhaps they were originally only smoked, just as they were dipped.

[453] Gomme, Ethnology, 137; F. L. ii. 300; x. 101; xii. 217; Vaux, 287; Rhys, C. F. i. 306.

[454] F. L. ii. 302; Rhys, C. F. i. 307. In 1656, bulls were sacrificed near Dingwall (F. L. x. 353). A few additional examples, beyond those here given, are mentioned by N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 247.

[455] 1 N. Q. vii. 353; Gomme, Ethnology, 32; Village Community, 113; Grant Allen, 290. The custom was extinct when it was first described in 1853, and some doubt has recently been thrown upon the ‘altar,’ the ‘struggle’ and other details; cf. Trans. of Devonshire Assn. xxviii. 99; F. L. viii. 287.

[456] 1 N. Q. vii. 353; Gomme, Ethnology, 30; Vaux, 285.

[457] Blount, Jocular Tenures (ed. Beckwith), 281; Dyer, 297.

[458] Dunkin, Hist. of Bicester (1816), 268; P. Manning, in F. L. viii. 313.

[459] P. Manning, in F. L. viii. 310; Dyer, 282.

[460] N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 227; Dyer, 285, 438, 470; Ditchfield, 85, 131.

[461] Certain lands were held of the chapter for which a fat buck was paid on the Conversion of St. Paul (January 25), and a fat doe on the Commemoration of St. Paul (June 30). They were offered, according to one writer, alive, at the high altar; the flesh was baked, the head and horns carried in festal procession. The custom dated from at least 1274 (Dyer, 49; W. Sparrow Simpson, St. Paul’s Cath. and Old City Life, 234).

[462] F. L. iv. 9; x. 355. White bulls are said to have been led to the shrine by women desirous of children. F. C. Conybeare, in R. de l’Hist. des Religions, xliv. 108, describes some survivals of sacrificial rites in the Armenian church which existed primitively in other Greek churches also.

[463] F. L. vii. 346. Bull-baiting often took place on festivals, and in several cases, as at Tutbury, the bull was driven into or over a river. Bear-baiting is possibly a later variant of the sport.

[464] Burton, 165; Suffolk F. L. 71; Ditchfield, 227; Dyer, 387; Pfannenschmidt, 279; cf. the Abbots Bromley Horn-dance (ch. viii).

[465] F. L. iv. 5. The custom of sacrifice at the foundation of a new building has also left traces: cf. Grant Allen, 248; F. L. xi. 322, 437; Speth, Builders’ Rites and Ceremonies.

[466] Douce, 598, gives a cut of a hobby-horse, i. e. a man riding a pasteboard or wicker horse with his legs concealed beneath a foot-cloth. According to Du Méril, Com. i. 79, 421, the device is known throughout Europe. In France it is the chevalet, cheval-mallet, cheval-fol, &c.; in Germany the Schimmel.

[467] Dyer, 182, 266, 271; Ditchfield, 97; Burton, 40; F. L. viii. 309, 313, 317; cf. ch. ix on the ‘fool’ or ‘squire’ in the sword and morris dances, and ch. xvi on his court and literary congener. The folk-fool wears a cow’s tail or fox’s brush, or carries a stick with a tail at one end and a bladder and peas at the other. He often wears a mask or has his face blacked. In Lancashire he is sometimes merged with the ‘woman’ grotesque of the folk-festivals, and called ‘owd Bet.’

[468] W. Gregor, F. L. of N. E. Scotland, 181, says that bread and cheese were actually laid in the field, and in the plough when it was ‘strykit.’

[469] Dyer, 20, 207, 447; Ditchfield, 46; F. L. vi. 93. Pirminius v. Reichenau, Dicta (†753), c. 22, forbids ‘effundere super truncum frugem et vinum.’

[470] F. L. Congress, 449, gives a list of about fifty ‘feasten’ cakes. Some are quite local; others, from the Shrove Tuesday pancake to the Good Friday hot cross bun, widespread.

[471] Grimm, i. 57; Frazer, ii. 344; Grant Allen, 339; Jevons, 215; Dyer, 165; Ditchfield, 81.

[472] F. L. vi. 57; viii. 354; ix. 362; x. 111.

[473] F. L. vi. 1.

[474] Ditchfield, 116, 227; Suffolk F. L. 108; Dyer, Old English Social Life, 197. The boys are now said to be whipped in order that they may remember the boundaries; but the custom, which sometimes includes burying them, closely resembles the symbolical sacrifices of the harvest field (p. 158). Grant Allen, 270, suggests that the tears shed are a rain-charm. I hope he is joking.

[475] Brand, ii. 13; Suffolk F. L. 69, 71; Leicester F. L. 121. A ‘harvest-lord’ is probably meant by the ‘Rex Autumnalis’ mentioned in the Accounts of St. Michael’s, Bath (ed. Somerset Arch. Soc. 88), in 1487, 1490, and 1492. A corona was hired by him from the parish. Often the reaper who cuts the last sheaf (i.e. slays the divinity) becomes harvest-lord.

[476] Gomme, Village Community, 107; Dyer, 339; Northall, 202; Gloucester F. L. 33.

[477] Frazer, i. 216; E. Pabst, Die Volksfeste des Maigrafen (1865).

[478] Frazer, i. 219; Cortet, 160; Brand, i. 126; Dyer, 266; Ditchfield, 98.

[479] Tacitus, Germ. c. 43 ‘apud Nahanarvalos antiquae religionis lucus ostenditur. praesidet sacerdos muliebri ornatu.’

[480] Conc. of Trullo (692), c. 62 (Mansi, xi. 671) ‘Nullus vir deinceps muliebri veste induatur, vel mulier veste viro conveniente’; Conc. of Braga (of doubtful date), c. 80 (Mansi, ix. 844) ‘Si quis ballationes ante ecclesias sanctorum fecerit, seu quis faciem suam transformaverit in habitu muliebri et mulier in habitu viri emendatione pollicita tres annos poeniteat.’ The exchange of head-gear between men and women remains a familiar feature of the modern bank-holiday. Some Greek parallels are collected by Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 197. E. Crawley, The Mystic Rose (1902), viii. 371, suggests another explanation, which would connect the custom with the amorous side of the primitive festivals.

[481] Frazer, ii. 93, 109.

[482] Ibid. i. 220; Brand, i. 157; Dyer, 217; Ditchfield, 97; Kelly, 62: cf. ch. viii.

[483] Pearson, ii. 24, 407. Cf. the evidence for a primitive human pairing-season in Westermarck, 25.

[484] Purity of life is sometimes required of those who are to kindle the new fire (Frazer, iii. 260, 302).

[485] H. Spencer, Principles of Psychology, ii. 629; K. Groos, Play of Man, 361; Hirn, 25.

[486] Gummere, G. O. 331.

[487] Frazer, i. 217; iii. 258.

[488] Chaucer says of the Miller (C. T. prol. 548):

and of Sir Thopas (C. T. 13670):

Strutt, 82, figures a wrestling from Royal MS. 2, B. viii, with a cock set on a pole as the prize.

[489] Cf. Appendix I., and Frazer, ii. 316; Jevons, Plutarch, lxix. 143, on the struggle between two wards—the Sacred Way and the Subura—for the head of the October Horse at Rome.

[490] Haddon, 270. The tug-of-war reappears in Korea and Japan as a ceremony intended to secure a good harvest.

[491] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv. Bandyball, Camp, Football, Hockey, Hood, Hurling, Shinty. These games, in which the ball is fought for, are distinct from those already mentioned as having a ceremonial use, in which it is amicably tossed from player to player (cf. p. 128). If Golf belongs to the present category, it is a case in which the endeavour seems to be actually to bury the ball. It is tempting to compare the name Hockey with the Hock-cart of the harvest festival, and with Hock-tide; but it does not really seem to be anything but Hookey. The original of both the hockey-stick and the golf-club was probably the shepherd’s crook. Mr. Pepys tried to cast stones with a shepherd’s crook on those very Epsom downs where the stockbroker now foozles his tee shot.

[492] F. L. vii. 345; M. Shearman, Athletics and Football, 246; Haddon, 271; Gomme, Vill. Comm. 240; Ditchfield, 57, 64; W. Fitzstephen, Vita S. Thomae (†1170-82) in Mat. for Hist. of Becket (R. S.), iii. 9, speaks of the ‘lusum pilae celebrem’ in London ‘die quae dicitur Carnilevaria.’ Riley, 571, has a London proclamation of 1409 forbidding the levy of money for ‘foteballe’ and cok-thresshyng.’ At Chester the annual Shrove Tuesday football on the Roodee was commuted for races in 1540 (Hist. MSS. viii. 1. 362). At Dublin there was, in 1569, a Shrove Tuesday ‘riding’ of the ‘occupacions’ each ‘bearing balles’ (Gilbert, ii. 54).

[493] Haddon, loc. cit.; Gomme, loc. cit.; Gloucester F. L. 38. Cf. the conflictus described in ch. ix, and the classical parallels in Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 267.

[494] F. L. iii. 441; Ditchfield, 85.

[495] F. L. vii. 330 (a very full account); viii. 72, 173; Ditchfield, 50. There is a local aetiological myth about a lady who lost her hood on a windy day, and instituted the contest in memory of the event.

[496] Mrs. Gomme, s. v. Oranges and Lemons.

[497] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv.

[498] Dyer, 6, 481. ‘Stang’ is a word, of Scandinavian origin, for ‘pole’ or ‘stake.’ The Scandinavian nið-stöng (scorn-stake) was a horse’s head on a pole, with a written curse and a likeness of the man to be ill-wished (Vigfusson, Icel. Dict. s. v. níð).

[499] Cf. with Mr. Barrett’s account, Northall, 253; Ditchfield, 178; Northern F. L. 29; Julleville, Les Com. 205; also Thomas Hardy’s Mayor of Casterbridge, and his The Fire at Tranter Sweatley’s (Wessex Poems, 201). The penalty is used by schoolboys (Northern F. L. 29) as well as villagers.

[500] Grenier, 375; Ducange, s. v. Charivarium, which he defines as ‘ludus turpis tinnitibus et clamoribus variis, quibus illudunt iis, qui ad secundas convolant nuptias.’ He refers to the statutes of Melun cathedral (1365) in Instrumenta Hist. Eccl. Melud. ii. 503. Cf. Conc. of Langres (1404) ‘ludo quod dicitur Chareuari, in quo utuntur larvis in figura daemonum, et horrenda ibidem committuntur’; Conc. of Angers (1448), c. 12 (Labbé, xiii. 1358) ‘pulsatione patellarum, pelvium et campanarum, eorum oris et manibus sibilatione, instrumento aeruginariorum, sive fabricantium, et aliarum rerum sonorosarum, vociferationibus tumultuosis et aliis ludibriis et irrisionibus, in illo damnabili actu (qui cariuarium, vulgariter charivari, nuncupatur) circa domos nubentium, et in ipsorum detestationem et opprobrium post eorum secundas nuptias fieri consuetum, &c.’

[501] Cf. ch. xvi, and Leber, ix. 148, 169; Julleville, Les Com. 205, 243. In 1579 a regular jeu was made by the Dijon Mère-Folle of the chevauchée of one M. Du Tillet. The text is preserved in Bibl. Nat. MS. 24039 and analysed by M. Petit de Julleville.

[502] In Berks a draped horse’s head is carried, and the proceeding known as a Hooset Hunt (Ditchfield, 178).

[503] Ducange, s. v. Asini caudam in manu tenens.

[504] Julleville, Les Com. 207.

[505] So on Ilchester Meads, where the proceeding is known as Mommets or Mommicks (Barrett, 65).

[506] On Hock-tide and the Hock-play generally see Brand-Ellis, i. 107; Strutt, 349; Sharpe, 125; Dyer, 188; S. Denne, Memoir on Hokeday in Archaeologia, vii. 244.

[507] Cf. Appendix H. An allusion to the play by Sir R. Morrison (†1542) is quoted in chap. xxv.

[508] Laneham, or his informant, actually said, in error, 1012. On the historical event see Ramsay, i. 353.

[509] There were performers both on horse and on foot. Probably hobby-horses were used, for Jonson brings in Captain Cox ‘in his Hobby-horse,’ which was ‘foaled in Queen Elizabeth’s time’ in the Masque of Owls (ed. Cunningham, iii. 188).

[510] Cf. Representations, s. v. Coventry.

[511] Rossius, Hist. Regum Angliae (ed. Hearne, 1716), 105 ‘in cuius signum usque hodie illa die vulgariter dicta Hox Tuisday ludunt in villis trahendo cordas partialiter cum aliis iocis.’ Rous, who died 1491, is speaking of the death of Hardicanute. On the event see Ramsay, i. 434. Possibly both events were celebrated in the sixteenth century at Coventry. Two of the three plays proposed for municipal performance in 1591 were the ‘Conquest of the Danes’ and the ‘History of Edward the Confessor.’ These were to be upon the ‘pagens,’ and probably they were more regular dramas than the performance witnessed by Elizabeth in 1575 (Representations, s. v. Coventry).

[512] Leland, Collectanea (ed. Hearne), v. 298 ‘uno certo die heu usitato (forsan Hoc vocitato) hoc solempni festo paschatis transacto, mulieres homines, alioque die homines mulieres ligare, ac cetera media utinam non inhonesta vel deteriora facere moliantur et exercere, lucrum ecclesiae fingentes, set dampnum animae sub fucato colore lucrantes, &c.’ Riley, 561, 571, gives London proclamations against ‘hokkyng’ of 1405 and 1409.

[513] Brand-Ellis, i. 113; Lysons, Environs of London, i. 229; C. Kerry, Accts. of St. Lawrence, Reading; Hobhouse, 232; N. E. D. s. vv. Hock, &c.

[514] Owen and Blakeway, Hist. of Shrewsbury, i. 559.

[515] Dyer, 191; Ditchfield, 90.

[516] N. E. D. s. v. Hock-day.

[517] Brand-Ellis, i. 106.

[518] Ibid. i. 109.

[519] Ducange, s. v. Prisio; Barthélemy, iv. 463. On Innocents’ Day, the customs of taking in bed and whipping were united (cf. ch. xii).

[520] Northern F. L. 84; Brand-Ellis, i. 94, 96; Vaux, 242; Ditchfield, 80; Dyer, 133.

[521] Brand-Ellis, i. 106; Owen and Blakeway, i. 559; Dyer, 173; Ditchfield, 90; Burne-Jackson, 336; Northern F. L. 84; Vaux, 242. A dignified H. M. I. is said to have made his first official visit to Warrington on Easter Monday, and to have suffered accordingly. Miss Burne describes sprinkling as an element in Shropshire heaving.

[522] Belethus, c. 120 ‘notandum quoque est in plerisque regionibus secundo die post Pascha mulieres maritos suos verberare ac vicissim viros eas tertio die.’ The spiritually minded Belethus explains the custom as a warning to keep from carnal intercourse.

[523] Dyer, 79; Ditchfield, 83.

[524] Brand-Ellis, i. 114; Ditchfield, 252. Mr. W. Crooke has just studied this and analogous customs in The Lifting of the Bride (F. L. xiii. 226).

[525] Suffolk F. L. 69; F. L. v. 167. The use of largess, a Norman-French word (largitio), is curious. It is also used for the subscriptions to Lancashire gyst-ales (Dyer, 182).

[526] Ditchfield, 155.

[527] Frazer, ii. 233; Pfannenschmidt, 93.

[528] Haddon, 335; Grosse, 167; Herbert Spencer in Contemp. Review (1895), 114; Groos, Play of Man, 88, 354. Evidence for the wide use of the dance at savage festivals is given by Wallaschek, 163, 187.

[529] Grimm, i. 39; Pearson, ii. 133; Müllenhoff, Germania, ch. 24, and de antiq. Germ. poesi chorica, 4; Kögel, i. 1. 8. The primitive word form should have been laikaz, whence Gothic laiks, O. N. leikr, O. H. G. leih, A.-S. lâc. The word has, says Müllenhoff, all the senses ‘Spiel, Tanz, Gesang, Opfer, Aufzug.’ From the same root come probably ludus, and possibly, through the Celtic, the O. F. lai. The A.-S. lâc is glossed ludus, sacrificium, victima, munus. It occurs in the compounds ecga-gelâc and sveorða-gelâc, both meaning ‘sword-dance,’ sige-lâc, ‘victory-dance,’ as-lâc, ‘god-dance,’ wine-lâc, ‘love-dance’ (cf. p. 170), &c. An A.-S. synonym for lâc is plega, ‘play,’ which gives sweord-plega and ecg-plega. Spil is not A.-S. and spilian is a loan-word from O. H. G.

[530] Gummere, B. P. 328; Kögel, i. 1. 6.

[531] S. Ambrose, de Elia et Ieiunio, c. 18 (P. L. xiv. 720), de Poenitentia, ii. 6 (P. L. xvi. 508); S. Augustine, contra Parmenianum, iii. 6 (P. L. xliii. 107); S. Chrysostom, Hom. 47 in Iulian. mart. p. 613; Hom. 23 de Novilun. p. 264; C. of Laodicea (†366), c. 53 (Mansi, ii. 571). Cf. D. C. A. s. v. Dancing, and ch. i. Barthélemy, ii. 438, and other writers have some rather doubtful theories as to liturgical dancing in early Christian worship; cf. Julian. Dict. of Hymn. 206.

[532] Du Méril, Com. 67; Pearson, ii. 17, 281; Gröber, ii. 1. 444; Kögel, i. 1. 25; Indiculus Superstitionum (ed. Saupe), 10 ‘de sacrilegiis per ecclesias.’ Amongst the prohibitions are Caesarius of Arles (†542), Sermo xiii. (P. L. xxxix. 2325) ‘quam multi rustici et quam multae mulieres rusticanae cantica diabolica, amatoria et turpia memoriter retinent et ore decantant’; Const. Childeberti (c. 554) de abol. relig. idololatriae (Mansi, ix. 738) ‘noctes pervigiles cum ebrietate, scurrilitate, vel canticis, etiam in ipsis sacris diebus, pascha, natale Domini, et reliquis festivitatibus, vel adveniente die Dominico dansatrices per villas ambulare ... nullatenus fieri permittimus’; C. of Auxerre (573-603), c. 9 (Maassen, i. 180) ‘non licet in ecclesia choros secularium vel puellarum cantica exercere nec convivia in ecclesia praeparare’; C. of Chalons (639-54), c. 19 (Maassen, i. 212) ‘Valde omnibus noscetur esse decretum, ne per dedicationes basilicarum aut festivitates martyrum ad ipsa solemnia confluentes obscoena et turpia cantica, dum orare debent aut clericos psallentes audire, cum choris foemineis, turpia quidem decantare videantur. unde convenit, ut sacerdotes loci illos a septa basilicarum vel porticus ipsarum basilicarum etiam et ab ipsis atriis vetare debeant et arcere.’ Sermo Eligii (Grimm, iv. 1737) ‘nullus in festivitate S. Ioannis vel quibuslibet sanctorum solemnitatibus solstitia aut vallationes vel saltationes aut caraulas aut cantica diabolica exerceat’; Iudicium Clementis (†693), c. 20 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 226) ‘si quis in quacunque festivitate ad ecclesiam veniens pallat foris, aut saltat, aut cantat orationes amatorias ... excommunicetur’ (apparently a fragment of a penitential composed by Clement or Willibrord, an A.-S. missionary to Frisia, on whom see Bede, H. E. v. 9, and the only dance prohibition of possible A.-S. provenance of which I know); Statuta Salisburensia (Salzburg: †800; Boretius, i. 229) ‘Ut omnis populus ... absque inlecebroso canticu et lusu saeculari cum laetaniis procedant’; C. of Mainz (813), c. 48 (Mansi, xiv. 74) ‘canticum turpe atque luxuriosum circa ecclesias agere omnino contradicimus’; C. of Rome (826), c. 35 (Mansi, xiv. 1008) ‘sunt quidam, et maxime mulieres, qui festis ac sacris diebus atque sanctorum natalitiis non pro eorum quibus debent delectantur desideriis advenire, sed ballando, verba turpia decantando, choros tenendo ac ducendo, similitudinem paganorum peragendo, advenire procurant’; cf. Dicta abbatis Pirminii (Caspari, Kirchenhistorische Anecdota, 188); Penitentiale pseudo-Theodorianum (Wasserschleben, 607); Leonis IV Homilia (847, Mansi, xiv. 895); Benedictus Levita, Capitularia (†850), vi. 96 (M. G. H. Script. iv. 2); and for Spain, C. of Toledo (589), c. 23 (Mansi, ix. 999), and the undated C. of Braga, c. 80 (quoted on p. 144). Cf. also the denunciations of the Kalends (ch. xi and Appendix N). Nearly four centuries after the C. of Rome we find the C. of Avignon (1209), c. 17 (Mansi, xxii. 791) ‘statuimus, ut in sanctorum vigiliis in ecclesiis historicae saltationes, obscoeni motus, seu choreae non fiant, nec dicantur amatoria carmina, vel cantilenae ibidem....’ Still later the C. of Bayeux (1300), c. 31 (Mansi, xxv. 66) ‘ut dicit Augustinus, melius est festivis diebus fodere vel arare, quam choreas ducere’; and so on ad infinitum. The pseudo-Augustine Sermo, 265, de Christiano nomine cum operibus non Christianis (P. L. xxxix. 2237), which is possibly by Caesarius of Arles, asserts explicitly the pagan character of the custom: ‘isti enim infelices et miseri homines, qui balationes et saltationes ante ipsas basilicas sanctorum exercere non metuunt nec erubescunt, etsi Christiani ad ecclesiam venerint, pagani de ecclesia revertuntur; quia ista consuetudo balandi de paganorum observatione remansit.’ A mediaeval preacher (quoted by A. Lecoy de la Marche, Chaire française au Moyen Âge, 447, from B. N. Lat. MS. 17509, f. 146) declares, ‘chorea enim circulus est cuius centrum est diabolus, et omnes vergunt ad sinistrum.’