Manchester Memoirs, Vol. Ixvi. (1922), No. 3 17 



Sir Wm. Ramsay shows that the river Halys still separates 

 the pig-g"od people from the pig-demon people (22, 32). 



The Eastern wing of the Celts had come under the 

 influence of the Attis cult. Attis, like Adonis, had been killed 

 by a boar. Now, the Western wing of the Celts was in 

 Scotland. Apparently those Celts who in Scotland ceased to 

 keep pigs and eat pork had been similarly influenced by a 

 non-Celtic religious cult which tabooed pork. Nothing short 

 of a change in religious beliefs could have accomplished so 

 great a revolution in the habits and beliefs of the Continental 

 Celts who reached Scotland. The Scottish and Irish Diarmid 

 who was killed by a " magic boar " is the Western representa- 

 tive of Attis-Adonis. 



Some writers have suggested that the Scottish hatred of 

 swine and the fear that the eating of pork will result in 

 various diseases, was "'borrowed from the Jews" — that, in 

 fact, the taboo had origin in early Christian times, pork being 

 found to be tabooed in the Old Testament, while Christ caused 

 the demons to enter the bodies of Gadarean swine. This 

 hypothesis will not stand investigation. If the early 

 Christians tabooed pork in Scotland, why were pigs kept at 

 monasteries and pork eaten by the clergy, and why was pork 

 not tabooed in England and in Ireland ? The Scottish pork 

 taboo had evidently its origin in pre-Christian times. It was 

 a prejudice based on superstition, and, as it survives to-day, 

 this prejudice is still connected with superstitions. The 

 superstitions of our own time were formerly religious beliefs. 

 Those who contend that the Scottish prejudice against pork 

 was "borrowed from the Jews" have to explain w^hy one 

 tabooed animal was selected and another overlooked. In 

 Isaiah (Chapter Ixvi, verse 17) we read, " They that sanctify 

 themselves and purify themselves in the gardens behind one 

 tree in the midst, eating swine's flesh, and the abomination 

 and the mouse, shall be consumed together, saith the Lord." 

 The early inhabitants of Scotland observed ceremonial mouse 

 feasts (25), and the liver of the mouse was until recently a 

 folk remedy for children in extremis, while roasted mouse was 

 a cure for whooping cough and small-pox. This mouse cure 

 was of Eastern origin (29, 43) and was prevalent in England 

 as well as in Scotland (H, 94-96). 



In Leviticus (Chapter xi, verses 6 and 7) the animals which 

 are tabooed include the hare and the pig : 



" And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth 

 not the hoof ; he is unclean to you. And the swine, though 



