The Devil in Dog Form - Barbara Allen Woods

(1)

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CAUFOf.OlA

"PUBUu'ATlO/05;

FOLKLORE

STUDIES

:

11 The

Devil in Dog Form

A

_{Partial Type-Index}

of

Devil

_Legends

BARBARA

ALLEN

WOODS

VnuK

I

'>•»

_£

UNIVERSITY

OF

CALIFORNIA

PRESS

BERKELEY

AND LOS ANGELES 1959

(2)

of California

Publications

Folklore

Studies

: 11

Editors

Los Angeles: W. D. Hand, W. A.

Lessa,

Charles

Speroni, M. A.

Zeitlin

Submitted by editors October 7, 1957

Issued

_June

12. 1959

Price, $3.50

University

_of

California

Press

Berkeley

and Los Angeles

California

■o

Cambridge

University

Press

London, England

G-R

.Co

lU

as

-**a

uiuvmsi'i'x

_LIBRARY

(3)

IN

MEMORY

MY GRANDMOTHER

(4)

(5)

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I

feel

especially

indebted

to the scholars abroad

who

generously

contributed their

valuable

time and energy

in supplying

data and

_{bibliography for}

this study: the

late

Inger

Boberg,

of

the

Dansk Folkemindesamling,

Copenhagen;

Carmelina

Naselli, of

the

Istituto di Storia

delle

Tradizioni

_{Popolari, Catania; Carl-Martin}

Bergstrand,

of

the Vastsvenska

Folkminnesarkivet, Goteborg; Reidar

Th.

Chris-tensen,

of

the

Norsk Folkeminnesamling, Oslo; Martti Haavio, of

the

Finnish Folk

lore

Archives,

Helsinki; Gottfried

Henssen,

of

the

Zentralarchiv

der deutschen

Volkserzahlung, Marburg; Lujza Iranyi, of

the

Hungarian Ethnographical

Mu

seum, Budapest;

P. _J.

Meertens,

of

the

Centraal Bureau voor

Nederlandsche

Vblkskunde

van de Nederlandsche

Akademie

van Wetenschappen,

Amsterdam;

and

Will-Erich

Peuckert, of

the

University of Gottingen.

For

_{financial help}

I

am

grateful to

the

Committee on

the

Advancement of Re

search

of

the

University of Pennsylvania for

a

Special

Research

Grant which

enabled

me to spend the summer

of

1956

collecting

data at the

library of

the

University of

Chicago, the

_John

G. White Collection of Folklore and Orientalia

at the

Cleveland Public Library,

and the

_{library of Harvard University.}

For

their

encouragement

I

owe thanks to the members

of

my

doctoral

committee

at the

University of California, Los

Angeles, Gustave

O. Arlt,

Hugh G. Dick,

C.

W. Hagge, Stanley

L. Robe,

and

Erik

Wahlgren;

and more recently to my

colleagues at the

University of

Pennsylvania,

especially

Adolf

D. Klarmann

and

MacEdward

Leach.

Finally,

I

want

to

thank for

his sustained interest and

encour

agement the

chairman of

my

doctoral

committee,

_{Wayland D. Hand.}

(6)

(7)

I- Problems of Making

a

_{Type-Index of}

the Legends

of

the

Devil in

Dog Form

1

Review of Legend Collections

3

Legend

and

Folk Belief

8

The

Apparatus of Classification

14

Recurrent Motifs

18

National Linguistic

Areas

21

II. The

Prince of

Darkness

22

Spook

Encountered

at

a

Haunted

Place

22

Spook Interferes

with Traveler

47

Miscellaneous

Spooks

56

III. The

Spirit of

Evil

63

The

Devil

and

Evil-Doers

63

The

Pact

with

the

Devil

75

Calling

on the

Devil

76

The

Devil

as a

Companion of

his

Ally

84

The

Devil's

Ally

in Animal Form

90

IV. The

Sovereign

of

Hell

100

The

Devil

Fetches Sinners

100

The

Ghosts

of

the

Wicked

109

Ghosts

Banished

119

V. The

Devil

as a

_{Dog in Other Folktales}

122

Treasure

Legends

122

The

Enchanted Lady

and the

Unearthing of Treasure

123

Treasure

and the

Devil

132

The

Devil

as a

Dog in Fairy Tales

142

The Helpful

Dog in

Legends

145

(8)

(9)

PROBLEMS

OF

MAKING A TYPE-INDEX

OF

THE

LEGENDS OF

THE

DEVIL IN

DOG FORM

The

present

_study

_of

the

motif of

the

devil in

dog

form

grew

out of

my disserta

tion,

"The

Devil in Dog Form:

A

Study

of

the

Literary

and

Folkloristic Back

ground of

the

Poodle

Motif

in

Goethe's Faust."1

The

conclusions

of

the dissertation

were: first, Goethe was

probably

more influenced

by

oral traditions about

the

devil

as a

dog than by the

literary

treatment

of

the

motif which

appears

in

the

printed

sources that he consulted; second, the

motif of

the

devil in

dog

form

is a

seriously regarded

folk

belief,

a

widespread and

vital tradition upon which numer

ous

devil

legends are based.

Further

research has corroborated

the conclusions

of

the dissertation.

However, it

was desirable to try to develop

a

more efficient

method for

the

handling of

legendary material.

To

my knowledge,

no

attempt has been made to study systematically

a

whole

body of

legendry on an

international

basis. Because legends are by

definition

associated

with

a

_particular

place

it would

seem impossible to make

valid

com

parisons

between those

of

one

country

and another.

Because legends are often

highly individualized it would

seem

impractical

to analyze them

in

terms

of

a

type-index.

But similarities

between various legends

of different

countries

have

been noted

from

time to time;

and

legend-type indexes have been made

for

some

countries.

Therefore, it

seemed possible after

all

to construct

a

type-index

for

legends

dealing with

the

devil,

a

figure common

to

all European folklore.

In

studying

the specific

motif of

the

devil in

dog form, such an

index

seemed

not

merely

possible,

but

imperative;

for

the

motif

itself

is

meaningless

abstracted

from

its

narrative environment.

The

study

of

the

devil in

dog

form

has thus be

come,

in

effect, an attempt to make

a

_partial

_type-index

of

the

devil

legends

of

Western Europe.

Whereas the dissertation

focused on the

folklore of

Germany,

with supporting

evidence

from

the rest

of

the

Germanic

language area, the present study

is

based

on

a

_thorough

survey

of

data

from

the

whole Germanic

language

area,'

with

supporting

evidence

from French, Italian,

and

Celtic

sources.

Not only

has the

amount of

data been

substantially

increased,

but

also the classification system has

1_{University of California,} _{Los Angeles,} _1955.

_The

_{results of my preliminary studies appeared in}

Western Folklore,

XIII

(1954), 229-235.

The

relationship between the folklore of the devil as a

dog and Goethe's poodle was analyzed

in

detail in my article published

in

Fabula,

I

(1957), 59-75.

'

_{Iceland excepted.}

_I

_{have had} access to very little Icelandic folklore outside of

J6n

Arnason's

collection oflegends translated by Carl Andersen (2d ed.; Copenhagen, 1877),

M.

Lehmann-Filhes

(10)

in Dog

been

thoroughly

revised.

In

the dissertation,

_J.

R.

W. Sinninghe's index of Dutch

legend-types" was used

with

some

modification; in

the present study, the

legend-type

index

is

one

of

my

own

devising, conceived

with

an

eye

to the legendry

of

the

devil in

general,

but

adapted,

of

course, to the problems

of form

and content

of

legends that

contain

the devil-as-a-dog

motif.

Although

the classification

system used here

is

very

much in

the style

of

the

Finnish

school

of folklore

research, the present

work

is

by no means

a

historical-geographic

study. Occurrences

of

the

motif in historical

documents

_{(sources ap}

pearing

before

_1800)'

are occasionally

noted;

but

I

have made no attempt to

investigate

older literature

completely. References here are

only

the ones encoun

tered by chance, especially

while studying

Goethe's reading,

which fortunately

included

books considered standard

sources

for

the

documentation of folklore

in

the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, such

as

Nicolas

Remy's

Daemonolatria

(1595) and

Praetorius' Anthropodemus plutonicus

(1666-1668).

For

reasons to be

discussed

in

detail below, even the geographical

distribution of

the

motif cannot

be shown

with

any great

validity. Nor

has

it

been feasible to trace

out

the

life history

of

any one

of

the two

hundred or

so

legend-types listed.

As

fascinating

as

such a

study

would

be,

it would

have

little bearing

on the specific

motif.

The

attempt to trace the

ultimate origin of

the

motif of

the

devil in

dog

form

in

the

manner of

a

_{tale study done according to the}

Finnish

method

is

_entirely

futile.

As Professor

Stith Thompson pointed out

at the

Folklore Institute of Amer

ica, held at

Indiana University during

the summer

of

1954,

the

Finnish

method

was devised to examine the development

of

complex narratives;

it

cannot be used

effectively

with

a

narrative unit of

fewer than three variables.

The

motif of

the

devil in

dog

form

is

not

even

a

narrative unit; it

is a

substantive

motif,

an equa

tion.

The

only

variable possible

is

that

of definition of

the components on

either

side

of

the equation.

The

problem of definition

is

itself

a

_{basic question}

in

this

study:

"To

the

popular mind, what

is

the

devil?" "What

is a

_dog"

is,

_fortunately,

not

so

_{problematical. However,}

I

have excluded

all natural

dogs and ghosts

of

natural

dogs; the focus

is

on

supernatural

creatures that

usurp

the dog's shape.

Since the

motif in

question

is

one reduced to the lowest terms, and hence an

attempt

to ascertain its

ultimate origins

by

anything like scholarly

method

is

impossible,

the

problem of ultimate origins

is,

for

the most part, ignored

in

this

study.

I

have also

tried

to

avoid indulging in

any free association

of

my

own

on

the theme

of

the

devil

as a

dog

in oral tradition

and demonic dogs

of

ancient

mythological literature.

The

documented

evidence

of links

between

Germanic

mythology,

for

example, and

oral

tradition5

is

far

_{too sparse to assume}

a

direct

connection

between

Garmr or Fenris-Wolf or Odin's

wolves (dogs) and the

devil

as a

dog

in

modern folklore."

'

_Katalog der niederlandischen Marchen-, Ursprungssagen-, Sagen- und Legendenvarianten,

Folklore Fellows Communications, No. 132(Helsinki, 1943,).

' An

arbitrary date marking the beginning of the scholarly collection of folklore assuch;

I

follow

Sinninghe in using this dateas acriterion to distinguish actual oral tradition and historical docu

mentation; see his introduction, p. 6.

"See Friedrich Ranke, "Grundfragen der Volkssagenforschung" (1925), in Volkssagenforschung

(Breslau, 1935), p.83.

•This

view was _{enunciated by Jacob Grimm in Deutsche Mythologie} (1834). See 4th ed.. Vol.

II

(Berlin, 1876), pp. 680, 832-833; tr. _James Steven Stallybrass, Vol.

II

(London, 1883), pp. 814 n.,

(11)

Problems of

This

study then is

limited

to

a

_{thorough examination of}

the

motif of

the devil

in

dog

form

as

it

occurs

in

the

oral

legends

of Western Europe.

Review

of

Legend

Collections

If

the present study

is

to consist

of

more than

a

mere

listing of

various

bibliographi

cal references,

if

it

is

to deal

with

the problems

of evaluation of

the data

as

well,

it

must be recognized at the outset that the

evaluation

can be

no

more

valid

than

the data considered

are complete and accurate.

Ideally

the researcher

would

have

available

complete surveys

of folk

legends

just

as

they have been transmitted

in

the

oral tradition of all

areas

of Western Europe

over the last century and

a

half.

Such

is

not

the

case

in

reality. Hence, the basic

documentation of

this study

is

of

necessity defective

in

certain

aspects

which

must be taken

into

account.

Except for

the

material

very generously

supplied

by various

folklore

in Europe,

the data

for

this study have been collected

in

research

libraries in

the

United

States.

Fortunately neither war

damage

nor

the dearth

of financial

sup

port

has

limited

these

library

collections;

but

interest has.

At

least,

a

lack

of

interest

seems

to

be

the most

likely

reason that

only

the

folk

legendry

of

the

British

Isles and

of Germany

is

available

here

in

any degree

of

completeness.

Therefore

I

have

not

been able to

see

many books listed

in European bibliographies

simply

because they were

not in

the

United

States.

It

is

well-nigh

impossible

to

judge just how much material

has

been

omitted for

this reason.

And

I

must

freely admit

that

a

_{good deal}

of material

has

_probably

_{been omitted because}

_of

my own oversight.

With

the excellent

_{interlibrary loan}

system

in

the

United

States there

can be

little

_{excuse except}

human frailty for not

_seeing

a

book

which

is

held

by some

library in

this country.

Even after

making

allowance

for

the inaccessibility

of

some

material,

_{this study}

is

still

based

on

inadequate data because

of

the

inherent

weaknesses

of

the legend

collections

available.

One

weakness lies

in

the

human fallibilities of

the

individual

collectors

who

have assembled the source

material. Collectors

may have been inac

curate

in recording

the

informants'

texts. Such

a case

_{has been noted by}

_Matthias

Zender.7

A

certain

Pfarrer Prott

collected

_{folklore in Luxemburg from}

about

1890

to

1910.

In

the

1930's

Zender

worked with

some

of

the same

informants,

and

from

them learned

of Prott's

methods

of

collecting.

Prott's informants

sometimes de

liberately lied

to

him

because he made

a

nuisance

of himself

by

demanding all

sorts

of

details and

forcing

them to give

him information. He

interfered

with

the people's

work,

and they

would tell him

something

just

to get

rid of him.

Furthermore, Prott's own

interests misled

him into

persistently asking

for

legends

which

were

_{not popular in}

the area, and neglecting some

which

were typical.

In

publishing

his material,

Prott

was

guilty of combining

scattered motifs he had

collected

into

connected narratives that have

not

existed

as

such

in oral tradition.

Nevertheless,

the man was

_probably

completely

sincere

in

his desire to record

folklore:

"Dass

Prott

wissentlich

gelogen hat,

wird

man trotz allem kaum

be-haupten

konnen.

Er

war

als

Original in

der ganzen Gegend bekannt,

und

seine

Gewahrsleute

freuten sich darauf,

ihn

beliigen

zu konnen.

Dann

hat

ihn

sein

7"Pfarrer

Prott: Ein Sagensammler des Luxemburger Landes," Zeitschrift des Vereins

_fiir

(12)

in Dog Form

iibergrosser Sammeleifer

und

sein

Wille,

die

Sage

in einer

moglichst

uralten Form

zu

bringen,

betrogen"

(p.

80).

The

failings of

the collectors thus to

a

certain extent

limit, or

even

invalidate,

the

work of

the research

folklorist. On

the other hand, the researcher has advan

tages

that serve to

control and

compensate

for

the shortcomings

of

field workers.

While

the

collector

can deal

only with

a

limited number of informants in

certain

areas over

a

limited period of

time, the research

folklorist

has at his disposal

a

vast

amount of material

collected

from innumerable informants from

various areas

over more than

a

century.

Assuming

the

validity of Hoffmann-Krayer's principle,

"das

Volk

_{produziert nicht,}

es

reproduziert nur,"

he

is

able to establish norms

at least

for

the content

of

the

material

he studies.

There

is,

in

fact,

a

tedious

consistency

in

the

folk tradition

—

a

consistency

that

enables the

interpreter

to

recognize defective sources.

Most

collectors have been conscientious

with their material according

to

their

lights.

This

is

borne

out

by the fact that over the years the

folklore

collected

from

a

_particular

area by many hands tends to

remain

the same.

Furthermore,

the

painstaking

exactitude

of skilled

collectors

in

the last fifty years yields texts by

which

one may measure the

validity of

the previous century's

work. Especially

the accuracy

of

content has been corroborated

by recent

field

workers.

f

Just

as

important

as

the shortcomings

of individual

collectors

_{in determining}

the accuracy

of

legend collections have been the various theories

on

the significance

of

the legend.

The

brothers

Grimm, who

are responsible

for

establishing

folklore

as a

discipline,

were also among the first to deal

with

legendry (Deutsche Sagen,

1816-1818).

In

their

approach

to legends, however, the

Grimms

were

influenced

by

their

work

on the

fairy

tales

_{(Kinder- und Hausmdrchen,}

_1812-1815)

and by

their

concern

with Germanic

and

Indo-European

mythology.

The

Grimms'

interest

in

legends was therefore largely

antiquarian, and

they

paid little

heed

to the

function of

legends among

living

people.

Accordingly,

the legends

in

Deutsche Sagen are often derived from

literary

sources.

The

Grimms count

as

folklore

any item

which

is

related to

oral tradition.

Hence,

material from

late medieval

chronicles

would

itself

be

considered

folklore

if it

had counterparts

in popular tradition. For

example, the

Grimms'

version

of

the

"Schlangenjungfrau" (No.

13)

comes

from

a

historical

source,

Praetorius'

Anthro-podemus

plutonicus

(the

Grimms

cite

it

by its

German title, Eine Neue

Weltbe-schreybung,

Frankfurt,

1437 [sic, 1737?]).

This

early

printed

version is

crucial

in

tracing the development

of

the tale; and

it

cannot be treated merely

as

an

other

oral variant of

the nineteenth

century.

As

will

be

seen

below

_(Lt.

1000-1008),

the

oral

variants more often

differ from

the

older

version than agree

with

it.

Thus,

to regard

historical

parallels

as

_equivalent

to

oral

texts

is

misleading,

both

in showing

the nature

of oral tradition and in showing

the

importance of

his

torical

versions

as

links

between

earlier

stages

and

modern

redactions.

The

Grimms'

reliance

on historical

documents

in

Deutsche Sagen and

their

view

of

the legend

as

the

embodiment of

vestigial pagan mythology reflect an

attitude

toward the legend

which

is

most

unfortunate.

It

implies

that legends are ancient

narratives

about

people

in

a

_{remote past.}

This

remoteness is

_{further pointed up}

by the style

in which

the legends are presented.

There

can be

little doubt

that

(13)

Problems of

Wilhelm Grimm

doctored

oral

texts,8

and

unfortunately

he made legends read

much like fairy

tales.

The

Grimms'

legends

tell

about

what

happened to

a

man

some time,

as

if

the action occurred

in

the realm

of

once-upon-a-time.

Modern

German

collectors,

on

the

other

hand,

find

texts where the action happened

about

twenty years ago to the man

who lived on

a

certain

farm down

the road.

There

is

little

reason to suppose that the style

of

legend

telling

has changed

so

drastically

in

the

intervening

century.

The

Grimms'

view on the

collecting

and

_{interpretation of}

legends

prevailed

until

about the last

quarter of

the century, and

had

considerable

influence even

beyond the borders

of

Germany.

N

orddeutsche Sagen (1848), by

Adelbert

Kuhn

and Wilhelm

Schwartz,

_J.

W. Wolf's Niederlandische

Sagen (1843),

J.

M. Thiele's

Danmarks

Folkesagn

(2

vols.,

1843),

and

Wirt

Sikes's

British Goblins

_{(1880) are}

_J

examples

of

this school

of

legend collecting.

The

early collectors

undoubtedly

rendered posterity an inestimable service

in recording folk tradition while it

was

still

unscathed by the

influence of urbanization

and the

mass

media

of communi

cation.

They

were, however, too eager to

find hidden mythological

significance

in

oral tradition. As Friedrich von

der

Leyen

has said

of

this

period of

legend re

search:

"Die

Sage

soll zugleich

Kunderin

sein

des

alten und

altesten germanischen

Heidentums.

Sie

wird

gepresst

und

gefoltert

und

aufs Streckbett gelegt, bis sie

daruber

etwas sagt.'" As early

as 1855, a

critic of

this method,

Freiherr von

Leo-prechting

refused to

follow

the contemporary

trend in

his

collection of

legends

from Lechrain:

Diese nachhinfolgenden Erzahlungen konnen

nur

zum allerkleinsten

Teile in

Wahrheit Sagen

genannt werden. Die mehrsten davon sind allzu neu und von den Erziihlern teils selbst erlebt, teils

doch mit erschaut, so dass _{an eine Oberliefening} aus _{alten Zeiten nur in der Anschauungsweise}

gedacht werden darf

Dieser Eingang wie die ganze Darstellung

in

den folgenden Blattern mag

in

seiner glaubigen

Auffassung nach gar mancher Seite hin anstossen. Des _{Sammlers Pflicht erfordert jedoch alles} so

getreu und unverfalscht wiederzugeben, wie es

nur

immer aus des Volkes

Mund

zu erholen ist.

Eine kritische Beurteilung des Aberglaubens uberhaupt, wie ein tieferes Eingehen

in

dessen Wert

beziiglich des Gewinnes

fur

die Mythologie wurden geflissentlich unterlassen.

Ein

bestandiges

Begleiten und Unterbrechen des Textes mit erklarenden Noten stort ohnehin das Verstandnis wie

den Genuss des Lesers. Darum werden es die Altmeister der Wissenschaft

nur

gut heissen, dass

weder ein Abklatsch aus Grimm's Meisterwerken gebracht, oder gar auf das ohnedies so streitvolle

Gebiet der Theologie eingegangen wurde.10

The

English folklore

collectors

of

the

nineteenth

century were

not quite

so

intent upon

the

mythological

significance

of

the

oral tradition.

Their

collections

are, however,

_rarely

_{devoted to legends alone}

or

to legend texts

as

such.

Rather,

the legends are tucked away

in

summary among expository accounts

of folk tradi

tions in

general.

William

Henderson's Notes

on the

_{Folk-Lore of}

the

Northern

Counties

₍₁₈₆₆₎

is

typical

of

this sort

of collection.

In

France, the same

kind of

folklore publication

appeared, such

as

_{Am61ie Bosquet's}

La

Normandie

roman-esque

et

merveilleuse

_(1845).

5

_Will-Erich

_{Peuckert and Otto Lauffer, Volkskunde: Quellen und Forschungen seit}

1930,

Wis-senschaftliche Forschungsberichte, Vol.

XIV

(Bern, 1951), p. 180.

»

_"Die

_Volkssage,"

_{in Adolf}

_{Spamer, Die deutsche Volkskunde, Vol.}

_I

(2d ed.; Leipzig, 1934)

p.204.

10

_Aus

_{dem Lechrain, Vol.}

_I

_{(reprint of} _{1855 ed.;} _Altotting,

(14)

The Devil

in Dog

Form

Meanwhile, in Denmark,

Svend

_{Grundtvig published}

his

Gamle

danske

Minder

i Folkemunde

₍₃

_{vols., 1854-1861),}

which

gives texts exemplary

for

accuracy,

as

is

attested by

Hans Ellekilde,

the

modern editor of Grundtvig's

posthumous

papers,

Svend

Grundtvigs

_{Danske Folkesagn 1839-83 (1944-1948).}

Grundtvig's work

was

followed

by that

of Evald

Tang

Kristensen,

_probably

the

outstanding collector of

legends anywhere since the

beginning of folklore

collecting.

From about

1870

until

his death

in

1929,

Kristensen

indefatigably

collected

folklore, mainly

legends,

so

that his

work

comprises some

thirty

_{volumes (such}

as,

Danske Sagn,

6

vols.,

1892-1901; Danske Sagn.

Ny

Raekke,

6

vols., 1928-1936;

_{Jyske Folkeminder,}

13

vols., 1871-1897).

Looking

at the vast

amount of

his

work,

one wonders

whether

Kristensen had time

_{for anything but collecting. Certainly}

_{he had very}

little time

to change his texts,

although

he may have abridged them

as

Ellekilde

claims.

The

Danish

legend collectors

are extremely

conscientious

in naming

every

informant,

and often his

birthplace

and the

town

and

parish of

his residence.

Ellekilde's edition of

the

Grundtvig

texts appends

for

each

informant

_and/or

the person

involved in

the legend's action

as

much

biographical information

as is

available.

The

Danish

legend collections

in print

are

_probably

the best

in

Western

Europe. They

give

in

accurate texts the

full

range

of Danish

legendry

with

an ample

number of

variants, and

with

ample

background

material.

A

re

searcher

could wish for no

more

than

that.

'

_About

1890,

what Friedrich von

der

Leyen

calls the "great

_{collections" ("die}

grossen

Sammlungen")

begin to appear

in

Germany.

Such

include Otto

Schell's

Bergische Sagen (1897; 2d ed.,

1922),

Alfred

Meiche's Sagenbuch

des

Konigreichs

Sachsen (1903), and

Richard Kiihnau's

Sagen aus Schlesien

₍₃

_{vols., 1910-1913).}

These

collections

deal

with

the legendry

of

a

_particular

_province;

different vari

ants

of

each legend are

included; all

sources,

_{oral or printed from minor}

col

lections and ephemeral

publications,

are cited; the legends are systematically

ar

ranged

according

to

locality

(Schell)

or

content

(Meiche, Kiihnau).

The

best

representative

of

this

kind of collection

is

_{Josef Muller's}

Sagen aus

Uri

₍₃

vols.,

1926-1945).

Miiller

not only

gives exact

documentation but

also

virtually all

his

texts are

oral

and newly collected.

When

possible, he gives the

informant's

name,

age,

occupation,

and date

of

collecting.

Muller's

legend

collection

is

monumental

from

the

_{viewpoint of}

size

and

_{quality; it}

is

the best

German

one

I

have used.

Outstanding

among the "great

collections" of other

countries

is

V. E. V.

Wess-man's Sagner

in

the series,

"Finlands

svenska

folkdiktning";

especially useful

for

this study was

Mytiska

sagner

(Helsingfors,

1931).

In

Norway, Johannes

Skar has

published

the fine

collection, Gamalt or

Seetesdal ₍₈

vols., 1901-1916); many leg

ends are

included in verbatim

texts.

For

Sweden,

Klas

Olofsson's

Folkliv

och

folkminne

. . .

i

_{Vastergotland}

₍₂

vols., 1928-1931)

is

an excellent source

for

accu

rate folk-legend texts.

The

Brabantsche

Sagenboek

(3

vols., 1909-1912), by

Alfons

de

Cock

and Is.

Teirlinck,

is

the best

regional collection from

the

Low Countries.

For England,

France,

_{Italy, Holland,}

and the

United

States there are

no

com

parably

great

regional

collections

of

legends.

For

these

countries

one

is

obliged

to search

for

texts

in

the

journals

and

in minor

collections often

intended

largely

(15)

Problems of

are indispensable

when no

other sources are

available; but

an occasional collec

tion from

this

or that

town,

or on

a

certain legend-type

or motif,

however ac

curate,

is

no

substitute

for

a

comprehensive

survey

of

the legendry

of

a

whole

region.

collections,

on

the

other hand,

are almost worse than

nothing.

Texts

are

often

emended;

and

worse

still,

they are often

reprinted in

summary

from earlier printed

collections

without

adequate

documentation.

Since the

First

World

War,

legend

collecting

has been

less

extensive,

but

more

scientific.

There

has been great accuracy

in

the

recording of

texts and more em

phasis

on vital information about

the

informants and their community.

A

very

good example

of

this sort

of collection

is

Gottfried

Henssen's

Volk

erzahlt:

Miinsterlandische

Sagen,

Mdrchen und

Schwanke

_(1935).

In

this book, Henssen

presents

a

_{portrait of}

the

community:

something

of

its topography,

economics,

and social

system.

He

then considers the

role of

the

folk narrative in

this

environ

ment.

He

tells about each narrator's

life

history and personality;

and

he analyzes

the

relationship of

the tellers and

their material

to the

community

at large.

The

texts are given verbatim,

and

the

narrators

are

identified.

An

exemplary

study

of

this

kind

has also been done

in

the

United

States: the

unpublished

dissertation

of Herbert Halpert, "Folktales and

Legends

from

the

New

Jersey Pines:

A

Col

lection

and

a

_{Study" (Indiana University,}

_1947).

Works like

this,

which

give first

hand information on

the social

environment of

folktales, are

invaluable

to the

researcher.

Instead

of

presenting

him with bald

texts and

compelling him

to

puzzle out what

the stories have meant to the people, he

is

_{supplied with}

essential

information

on the

function of

the

material

among the people to

whom it

belongs.

Not

nearly enough such

information

is available.

Another

feature

of

recent

collecting

has been

a

certain

lack of

selectivity

of

the

material.

The

legend

is

_reproduced

as

the

informant

tells it; often the

original

dialect

is

_preserved.

Texts

are

printed without

regard to the excellence

of their

form, or their conformity

to

oral tradition

as

it

has become

known from

nineteenth-century

sources.

Matthias

_{Zender's Volkssagen der Westeifel (1935) and}

Wilhelm

Bodens'

Sage,

Mdrchen und

Schwank

am

Niederrhein

_{(1937) are examples}

of

this kind of

collection.

In

the same category,

Richard Wossidlo's collection, pub

lished

posthumously

as

_{Mecklenburgische}

_Sagen

₍₂

vols.,

1939),

deserves

particular

praise.

Lady

Gregory's

Visions and

_{Beliefs in}

the West

_{of Ireland}

_{(2 vols.,}

₁₉₂₀₎

anticipates

this school

of

legend

collecting; it

is a

miscellaneous

assortment

of

stories, personal experiences, and interviews taken

down directly from oral

sources.

Doubtless,

the source

of

the most

reliable

texts,

both for

the accuracy

of

the

material

and the adequacy

of background

data, are the

folklore

_{of Europe.}

Several

of

these

have

supplied material for

the present study: the

Zentralarchiv

der

deutschen

Volkserzahlung in Marburg,

the Danske

_{Folkemindesamling in}

Copenhagen,

the

Norsk Folkeminnesamling in

Oslo, the Vastsvenska

Folkmin-nesarkivet in

Goteborg,

the

Finnish Folklore Archives in Helsinki,

and the

Hun

garian Ethnographical Museum in

Budapest.

Printed

sources,

which

perhaps

rival

the archives

for

accuracy

of textual material, warrant

special

mention:

these

are the Swedish

series,

"Svenska landsmal

och svenskt

folkliv"

₍₁₈₇₉

),

and

the Norwegian

series,

"Norsk Folkeminnelags Skrifter"

₍₁₉₂₃

_).

(16)

in Dog Form

The

discrepancies

in quantity

and

quality of

the sources used

for

the present

study to

a

large extent

invalidate

any

evaluation of

the frequency

of

the

motif

of

the

devil

as a

dog

in

various

areas.

_{Only Danish}

and

German folk

legendry are

surveyed completely.

The

legends

of

Sweden are adequately represented,

but

there

is a

numerical

preponderance

of material from

the western and southern parts

of

Sweden because

of

the generosity

of

the Vastsvenska

Folkminnesarkivet on

the

one hand, and the inaccessibility

of printed

sources

on

the other.

The

traditional

legendry

of

the Swedes

in Finland

is reflected accurately here, thanks especially

to the excellent

work of V. E. V.

Wessman.

Norwegian

legendry

is

shown here

only in

a

representative

sampling

because

of

an apparent absence

of

intensive

collecting

comparable

to that done

in

Sweden and

Denmark. Similarly,

the data

on

the legends

of Holland

and

Belgium, for

the most part, constitute

only

a

sample survey.

The

representation

of

legends

from

the

British

Isles

is

not

at

all

satisfactory, mostly because

of

the lack

of

interest

in

the

collecting of

legend texts.

The

Irish Folklore Commission

has intensive

collecting under

way,

but

so

far

no great

quantity

is

_{available in print,}

_{especially to the}

non-Gaelic

reader.

Also

inadequate

is

the survey

of

legends

from France

and

Italy. Not

many

French

and

Italian folklore

collections

are available

in

the

United

States, and those

I

have

found

do

not

reflect any great interest

in

the

collecting of

legends.

The

collection

of

legendry

in

France

seems

somewhat overbalanced

geographically

in favor of

Brittany and Normandy.

The

legendry

of Italy

seems

_{particularly poorly}

col

lected; at least,

from

various general statements

on

the prevalence

of devil motifs,

and specifically that

of

the

devil in

dog

form,"

I

assume that the

oral tradition

of Italy

has

a

good many more legends and variants than have been recorded

in

printed

collections.

Finno-Ugric,

Slavic, and

North

and

South American

mate

rials included

here are at best

a

_{smattering that came to}

hand

by sheer

luck;

they

are

included

as a

control

to show the existence

of

comparable

traditions in

places

other than

Western

Europe.

Although numerical

frequency

of

the devil-as-a-dog

motif

cannot

be shown

accurately,

it

can nevertheless be safely asserted that this study does show the

legend-types

in which

the

motif

most often occurs.

Under

some legend-types there

will

be no variants listed

for

some

areas

because

no

variants

containing

the

motif

of

the

devil in

dog

form

were

found.

This

does

not

necessarily mean, however,

that the legend-type itself does

not occur in

that area.

On

the contrary, except

when

specifically stated otherwise, most

of

the legend-types indexed here are

found

in

most

of Western Europe. Thus,

tentative conclusions can be

drawn

about the

distribution of

the

motif

relative to certain legend-types.

Legend

and

Folk

Belief

The

task

of

setting

up

an

index of

legend-types has been

fraught with difficulties

"

G. Cocchiara,

II

diavolo nella tradizione popolare italiana, Studi di tradizioni popolari, Vol.

Ill

(Palermo, n.d. [ca. 1945?]), pp. 143-145; Giuseppe Calvia, "Esseri meravigliosi e fantastici nelle

credenze sarde e specialmente di Logudoro," Archivio _{per lo studio delle tradizioni popolart,}

XXII

(1903), 4; Giovanni Crocioni,

La

gente marchigiana nelle sue tradizioni (Milano, 1951), p.

132; G. Pitre,

"II

diavolo nelle tradizioni e credenze _{popolari siciliane," Archivio per lo studio}

delle tradizioni popolari,

I

(1882), 494-495; Estella Canziani, Costumes, Traditions, and Songs

of

(17)

Problems of

because

of

the range

of narrative

forms

included in

the genre legend. As Professor

Thompson points out in The Folktale,

legends,

though all usually

regarded

as

true stories, have

no

common form:

Popular legend in Europe and Asia covers an enormous area _{not only with regard} to the ma

terial handled, but also to the form

in

which

it

is transmitted and the audience for which it is

designed.

It

is by no means _{all of one piece.} Some of

it

is essentially mythology, some less pre

tentious origin legend, some local history, some an _{embodiment of supernatural belief; and} some

assumes such definitive narrative form that it differs

little

from the complex folktale. Probably

from no point of view could a logical justification for bringing all of this material together be

made.

..

.Whatever may be the heterogeneous origin of the varied literary forms

in

which they

appear or the present-day acceptance ofthese legends, they do all have

in

common their connection

with the world of fact, at least as conceived

in

the mind of the teller of the story. As fantastic

as some of this material is,

it

is related as an object of belief and itseffect,

in

contrast with that

of

the ordinary folktale, is the effect of history, rather than of fiction.1'

Some legends

included

here

do

have

a

sufficiently clear-cut

plot

that variants are

readily identifiable

as

related to one another;

they

fall into

place

as

neatly

as

the tale-types

in

the

Aarne-Thompson,

Types of the

Folk-Tale (Folklore Fellows

Communications, No.

74,

Helsinki,

_1928).

About one-third of

the legend-types

of

this

index

are tales

of

this

kind.

The

majority of

the narratives

here

would

seem

_{to defy classification.}

_They

are

brief, highly individualized in detail,

and realistic.

There

is

every

indication

that

these

stories are

not traditional

narratives

in

the same

sense

that

fairy

tales

or

more complex legends

are.

Rather,

as

_Leoprechting

_{has suggested, they appear}

to

be incidents

which

the narrators themselves have experienced

or

witnessed,

so

that

the

traditional

element

is

limited

to the basic

folk belief

_(or

"Anschauungs-weise")

involved.

With

this astute observation,

Leoprechting

has

anticipated

the legend scholars

of

this century

who

have devoted considerable

attention

to the

relationship of

experience and

folk belief

to the legend.

Friedrich Ranke"

was one

of

the first to emphasize the

interplay of

experience

and traditional belief in

his comments

on

the legend

of

_{the person carried off}

by the

Wild Hunt

_(E

501.18.4)."

He

interprets

accounts

of

this experience

as

descriptions of

the wanderings

of

a

victim of

psychomotor

epilepsy

while

semi

conscious,

a

_description

however

cast

into

terms

of folk

belief. ".

. .

die

_Erzahlung

davon wird

zur

Sage,

weil

schon der

Erlebende

selbst sich sein

Erlebnis mit

Hilfe

von Aberglaubensvorstellungen

zurecht legt: er

glaubt

selber vom

wilden Heer

entfiihrt

zu sein;

und weil

diese

_{Erzahlung zur Bekraftigung}

bestimmter

Aber-glaubenssatze ernsthaft

glaubig

weiter

uberliefert wird"

(p.

33).

An

early

article

by

Waldemar Liungman

analyzes

in

considerable

detail

the

influence of faulty

sensory perception

and

folk belief

on the legend."

He

shows

how

certain

traditions

may be traceable to

pathological

states

of mind. For

_exam

ple,

legends about

a

_person

who

is

_spirited

off to

_fairyland

_("bergtagen"

_or

"(2d

printing; New York, 1951), p. 271.

u"Sage und Erlebnis" (1912),

in

Volkssagenforschung, pp. 27-37.

"

_Motif

_{numbers in this study are taken from Stith Thompson,}

_Motif

_{-Index of Folk-Literature,}

I-V

_{(new and} rev. ed.; _{Indiana University} Press, _1955-1957).

u "Sinnesvillor och sagenbildning samt danncd sammanhangende trosforestallningar "

(18)

in Dog

Form

"bergentriickt")

and

loses

awareness

of

time

_(F

377.

Supernatural

lapse

of

time

in fairyland)

are possibly descriptions

of

amnesia.

Or

the legends about changelings

(F

321.1) may reflect the acute anxiety

of

the

mother with childbed

fever. Such

hallucinations do not

necessarily account

for

the

origin of

the basic

belief

itself,

but

they do account

for

the

origin of

legends

in

recent times.

The

distinction

between the

age

of

the

folk belief

and that

of

the legend is an

important

one

for

the present study.

Except in

rare

cases,

where there

is

actual

historical

documen

tation

to the contrary, the legends themselves are

not old. What Ranke

says

of

the legend

of

the

flight with

the

Wild Hunt

can be

applied

here:

"Die

Sagen

von

der

Luftfahrt mit

dem

wilden Heer

sind, wenigstens

in

den

drei Beispielen, die

wir

besprachen,

uberhaupt nicht

alt, sondern sie

sind

zu der Zeit

und

in

der

Gegend selber entstanden,

in

der sie erzahlt

und

aufgezeichnet

wurden.

. . .

Alt

ist an

ihnen nur

die

_{Aberglaubensvorstellung, durch}

die der

Erlebende

selber

sein

Erlebnis apperzipierte:

die

Vorstellung

vom

wilden Heer

als etwas

Brau-sendem" (pp. 33-34).

C. W. von

Sydow subsequently

attempted

to take

into

account the influence

of

experience and

traditional belief in

a

new

system

of

classification

of

legends.

He

suggested classifying

them according

to

their origin

and circumstances

of

existence ("sagernas

uppkomst

och livsbetingelser").1"

Accordingly,

he proposed

the term memorat to be

applied

to stories based on personal experiences.

In

actual

practice, Sydow realized,

a

memorat

could not

always be

distinguished from

a

traditional

legend:

"Viele Memorate konnen

dazu

ubergehen,

Tradition

zu

werden,

indem

andere Personen

sie

interessant genug

finden fur

eine

Weitergabe.

Dabei

unterliegen

sie

in

der Regel starken stilistischen

Veranderungen.

. . .

Auf

diese Weise geht

das

einstige

Memorat iiber in

eine Erinnerungssage

(minnesageri),

aber

die

Grenze ist

oft

ausserst schwer zu

ziehen."" Furthermore,

Sydow suggested

for

other legends the terms

fabulat

and

_{belief-fabulat (Glaubensfabulat):}

Was man jedoch gewohnlich unter dem Worte Sage versteht, sind kurze, einepisodische

Erzah-lungen, in deren Hintergrund allerdings Erlebnisse und Beobachtungen stehen; doch sind sie

nicht unmittelbar aus diesen hervorgegangen, sondern aus _{einer derartigen Elementen}

entsprun-genen Vorstellung, die sich in ihnen sozusagen kristallisierte. . . .Ich schlage die Benennung Fabulat vor.. . .

• • •

Glaubensfabulate, die an den Volksglauben ankniipfen und

ihn in

verschiedenen Stiicken

veranschaulichen, z. B. hinsichtlich iibernatiirlicher Wesen, geheimer Krafte usw.. . .werden

in

der Hauptsache dann erzahlt, wenn der Glaube, iiber den sie

Licht

verbreiten wollen, gestarkt

werden muss, und wenn man vor den Gefahren warnen

will,

die drohen, wenn man z. B.gewisse

Tabus iibertritt. [Pp. 261-262.]

Sydow

goes

on to discuss various

kinds of

legends

which

are

not

so closely

to seriously regarded

folk

beliefs. Such legends

include

_{anecdotes about real per}

sons

which

are often jokes and

not

based

on

fact,

_{and aetiological}

_legends

_which

are often based

on

deliberate

fictions. Sydow has

contributed valuable

insights

to the study

of

the legend by

insisting on

the

distinction

between actual

folk

beliefs

and

superstitious

fictions.

M"Om

folkets sagner," Nordisk kultur,

IX

(1931), 98.

17_{"Kategorien der Prosa-Volksdichtung,"}

_in

_{Volkskundliche} _Gaben.

_{John Meier}

_{zum siebzigsten}

Geburtstag dargebracht (Berlin and Leipzig, 1934), p. 261.

The

essay is reprinted

in

C.

W.

(19)

Problems of

In

the

division of

legends

directly

related to

folk

beliefs, Sydow's categories,

memorat, fabulat,

and

belief-fabulat,

suggest that

these

terms are to be

_applied

to different narrative

materials.

The

findings of

the present survey indicate,

how

ever, that the

material of

legends

is

very

fluid

and may

shift in form from

one

category to another.

The

fabulat or ordinary

legend may appear at times

as a

memorat;

and the experience version often

seems

to have the

function of

asserting

the truth of

a

story.

What

Sydow calls the

belief-fabulat,

I

prefer

to call

a

corrob

orative

legend; this term again describes

not

a

distinct formal

category,

but

the

function of

the narrative.

For

legends

told

as

experiences,

as

indicated,

may be

corroborative in function;

and,

on

the

other hand, ordinary

legends may have

a

didactic or corroborative

purpose.

While

Sydow's classifications

may thus

not

represent

distinct

of

legendary

material,

they are

valuable in pointing up

the

interrelationship of

folk

belief

and experience

in

the

origin

and transmission

of

the legend.

Nowhere

is the

symbiotic relationship

between

folk belief

and legend

seen

more clearly

than in

the memorat.

Collectors of

recent years have

found

that the memorat

accounts

for

a

good many

of

the legends

currently in circulation. One collector

states:

"Die Mehrzahl meiner

Sagen

sind

Erlebnissagen.

Sie lassen sich

uberall

finden und

bei neuen Besuchen

immer

weiter

vermehren.""

Henssen's observa

tions

on the legend

narrator confirm

and, to some extent,

explain

the frequency

of

memorats:

Der Sagenerzahler ist meist ein Mensch von emsthafter Gemiitsart.

Er

ist uberzeugt von der

Wahrheit der Geschichten, die er vortragt Besonders ausgepragt ist sein Glaubensleben. Die

besten meiner Sagenerzahler waren ausgesprochen fromme Leute; neben der Hochachtung vor

den alten Cberlieferungen hatten sie _{ein besonders inniges Verhaltnis} zu den Lehren ihrer Kirche,

ganz gleich, welcher christlichen

Richtung

sie angehorten.

Fur

den guten Sagenerzahler ist

bezeichnend, dass _{er gern Geschichten bringt, denen} eigene Erlebnisse zugrunde liegen.

Weil

der

Volksglaube bei ihm noch

in

voller

Kraft

steht, _{kann er naturlich leicht unter giinstigen}

Voraus-setzungen zu einem iibersinnlichen Erlebnis kommen.

Und

handelt es sich nicht um Dinge, die

er selbst erfahren hat, so sind es _{doch die Erlebnisse der nachsten Angehorigen und Bekannten,}