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A few other local or dialectic names remain to be noticed. Two of them, στοιχει̯ά and τελώνια, denote properly two several species of supernatural beings—the former being the genii of fixed places[118], and the latter aërial beings chiefly concerned with the passage of men from this world to the next[119]—and are only loosely and locally employed in a more comprehensive sense. The name σμερδάκια, recorded from Philiatrá in Messenia, is apparently a diminutive form from a root meaning ‘terrible[120].’ A Cretan word καντανικά is of less certain etymology, but if, as has been surmised, it has any relation with the verb καντανεύω, ‘to go down to the underworld,’ and hence ‘to fall into a trance,’ (‘entranced’ spirits being thought temporarily to have departed thither,) it may denote either denizens of the lower world or beings who frighten men into a senseless and trance-like state[121]. Next come the two words ζούμπιρα and ζωντόβολα, of which I believe the interpretation is one and the same. Bernhard Schmidt[122], whose work I have constantly consulted in this and later chapters, would derive the former from a middle-Greek word ζόμβρος[123], equivalent to the ancient τραγέλαφος, a fantastic animal of Aristophanic fame; but it was explained to me in Scyros to be a jocose euphemism as applied to supernatural beings and to denote properly parasitic insects. The implied combination of superstitious awe in avoiding the name of supernatural things with a certain broad humour in substituting what is, to the peasant, one of the lesser annoyances of life is certainly characteristic of the Greek folk; and the accuracy of the explanation given to me is confirmed by the fact that in the island of Cythnos the other word, ζωντόβολα, is recorded to bear also the meaning of ‘insects[124].’ The joke, if such it be, must date from a long time back and in its prime must have enjoyed a widespread popularity; for at Aráchova on the slopes of Parnassus, a place far distant from Scyros, the word ζούμπιρα is employed in the sense of supernatural beings by persons who apparently are quite ignorant of its original meaning[125]. To these difficult terms must be added a few euphemisms of a simple nature—τὰ πίζηλα (i.e. ἐπίζηλα) ‘the enviable ones’ in one village of Tenos[126], and in many places such general terms as οἱ καλοί ‘the noble,’—οἱ ἀδερφοί μας ‘our brothers,’—οἱ καλορίζικοι ‘the fortunate ones,’—οἱ χαρούμενοι ‘the joyful ones.’ These evasions of a more direct nomenclature are very frequent, and, since the choice of epithet is practically at the discretion of the speaker, it would be impossible to compile a complete list of them.