TRANSFORMATION 225 



another to name a future child after him, because he 

 expected advantage from it. 1 It is no far-fetched 

 inference to suppose that he thereby expected to 

 secure a new birth. In the Romagna it is usual to 

 give the names of grandfathers uncles and other 

 relatives to children, but not the names of relatives 

 who are living, lest their death be accelerated a 

 vague reminiscence probably of the real reason. 2 In 

 the Valdelsa the name by constant custom is that of 

 the last person in the family who has died. 3 If a child 

 die among the christianised Indians of Sonora, Mexico, 

 the next that is born takes the name of the departed. 4 

 The reverse is the case in the province of Posen 

 (Polish Prussia) and in the north of England, where a 

 subsequent child must not be named after one that is 



1 Zeits. des Vereins, v. 99. Maurer cites on the authority of 

 Vigfusson a curious tale of an Icelandic peasant who lived at the 

 end of the sixteenth century, and to whose wife when pregnant the 

 Devil himself appeared and desired that his name should be given 

 to the child about to be born When the parents however came 

 to the baptism the priest refused to baptize the boy by the name of 

 Satan, and called him Natan. He grew up a clever man and a 

 renowned physician, but was guilty of all sorts of crimes and 

 ultimately came to a violent end (Maurer, 193). 



2 Placucci, 78, 23. The reason, however, may be derived from 

 the belief that to bestow the name is to bestow a part of the life and 

 personality of the original owner of the name, who would thus lose 

 it. Even if this be so, the bestowal of the name of one who is dead 

 would be in some sense at any rate to revive him. How far the 

 present belief in Italy definitely regards a baby as a dead relative 

 returned is doubtful (see Pigorini-Beri, 283, Leland^/r. Rom. Rem. 

 200) ; though witches are thought to be born again (Leland. op. cit. 

 1 99). The opposite result to that expected in the Romagna is 

 looked for at Chemnitz when the first children take their parents' 

 names. In such a case the children die before the parents (Grimm, 

 Teut. Myth. 1778). 



3 ArchiviO) xv. 50. 



4 Amer. Anthrop, N. S. vi. 79 note. 



i P 



