Chapter 6 Sympathetic Witchcraft: Contact Witchcraft

So far we have mainly considered only that branch of sympathetic magic known as homeopathic or mock magic.Its main principle, as we have seen, is "like breeds like" or "like fruit like cause".Another great branch of sympathetic magic, which I used to call contact magic.It is based on the concept that once things have come into contact with each other, they will always retain some kind of connection between them, even if they have moved away from each other.In such a sympathetic relationship, whatever is done to one partner must have the same effect on the other.Thus, like homeopathic witchcraft, its logical basis remains a false association; its material basis, if we may call such a thing, is something like modern physics. It is an intermediary like the "ether" in science, which connects two distant objects and transmits the influence of one to the other.The most familiar example of contact with witchcraft is the magical power of induction that is believed to exist between a person and a part of his body, such as hair or nails.For example, anyone who possesses someone else's hair or nails, no matter how far away, can achieve his wishes through them to the body to which they belong.Such superstitions are spread all over the world.Instances of this kind involving hair and nails will be dealt with in later chapters of this book.Knocking out one or more of a boy's front teeth during initiation ceremonies among Australian tribes was not uncommon.This ritual is something every male member must undergo before he can enjoy the treatment and privileges of an adult.The reasons for this are not quite clear, and what is relevant to us here is the idea that a sympathetic relationship continued to exist between the boy and his knocked-out tooth; In the tribes along the forest river, the knocked out teeth should be placed under the bark of the tree, and the tree must grow by the river or pond.If the bark grows up and covers the tooth or the tooth falls into the water, it means that all is well. If the tooth is exposed and ants crawl over it, the natives believe that Every boy is bound to suffer from oral disease; in the Merlin tribe of New South Wales, or other tribes, the knocked-out tooth is first guarded by an elder, and then passed from head to head, until It spread throughout the commune before it got back to the boy's father and finally back into his hands.However, although it was passed by many hands, it should never be placed in a bag that already contained something magical, believing that if it did, the owner of the tooth would be in great danger .The late Dr. Howett was at one time the custodian of the teeth, which were knocked out of the mouths of newly grown children in a bar mitzvah ceremony.The old people begged him not to take them away in a bag, for they knew that his bag already contained quartz crystals.They said that if he did that, the magic of these crystals would go into the teeth and harm their children.About a year after Dr. Howett returned from that ceremony, he was visited by a headman from the Merlin tribe, who had traveled about 250 miles from his homeland to retrieve the teeth.The headman said that he had been specially sent to fetch these teeth, because one of the boys had become sickly, and it was believed that this was caused by damage to that tooth of his which was transmitted to his body.The doctor assured the headman that the teeth had been kept in a separate case at all times, away from anything like quartz crystals that might affect them.But the headman still wrapped up these teeth carefully and hid them on his body and took them home.

Basuto [see "Biblical Antithesis Lanting Returns Witnesses] The people always carefully hid their extracted teeth, lest they fall into the hands of mysterious figures who frequented the cemetery, so as to prevent those who It is possible to apply magic to their teeth to harm them.In Sussex, about 50 years ago, a maid protested violently about throwing out children's baby teeth.She asserted that if they were found and eaten by some animal, the child's new teeth must be identical to the animal's teeth.She also cited the example of Master Simmons as proof.One of the physical defects that Master Simmons often complained about was a very large pig's tooth in the upper jaw.And it was his mother who was to blame for inadvertently throwing his fallen baby tooth into a pig trough.A similar belief has led men to consciously apply homeopathic principles in the replacement of teeth, replacing old teeth with new, better ones.In many parts of the world it is customary to deliberately drop a lost tooth where it is easy for mice to find it.The man who has lost a tooth hopes that by continuing the sympathetic relationship between him and the lost tooth, his remaining teeth will be as strong and useful as the teeth of these rodents.For example, in Germany, it is said that almost everyone knows such a motto: If you lose a tooth, put it in a mouse hole.If you do the same for the deciduous teeth that the child has fallen out, it can also save the child from toothache.Or you can go behind the fire, and throw your teeth back over the top of your head, and say, "Give me your iron teeth, Mouse, and I will give you my bone teeth." After that your rest of the teeth will remain intact; on the island of Raratonga, far from Europe in the Pacific Ocean, the following prayer is usually recited after a young child's teeth are pulled:

Big rat!little mouse! Here are my old teeth, Please give me a new tooth. Then the tooth was thrown on the thatched roof of the child's house, because there must have been a rat's nest on that decaying thatched roof.The reason for praying to the rat in this situation - is because the relatives know that the rat's teeth are the strongest.