DISCOVERY 



157 



similar practice from the Congo region, the mother, 

 as we have seen, expressly requesting the spirit of her 

 dead child to enter her in order to be reborn. Possibly 

 in Egypt the people may have no concrete ideas on this 

 point. The custom may have had its origin in an early 

 and definite belief in rebirth, the ceremony being 

 continued at the present day because it has become the 

 custom and is one of the recognised devices resorted to 

 as a cure for barrenness, while the belief which gave it 

 birth no longer consciously exists in the minds of the 

 people who practise the rite. 



There is a belief in the Fayum Province, and it ma\- 

 prevail in other parts of Egypt, that if a woman who has 

 lately become a mother goes to see another woman who 

 has recently given birth to a child which has died, thr 

 latter will not conceive again. Such a visit should not 

 be paid till the child has been dead for fifteen days. 

 Should such a meeting take place accidentally, the 

 mother of the dead child must counteract this evil 

 influence by visiting the child's tomb as described 

 above. 



Sometimes, if a woman has no children, her friends 

 will take her to the railway and make her lie down be- 

 tween the lines in order that the train may pass over 

 her. Again, a friend will bring a large lizard of the 

 kind called waran for a childless woman to step over 

 three, five or seven times. Yet again, the pollen of the 

 male palm is mixed in water, which is then given to a 

 childless woman to drink. All these are effective 

 methods, it is believed, of inducing conception. 



Particular stones, either those covering the body of 

 a dead Sheikh, or those of large size or peculiar shape, 

 are also visited by childless women. There is a stone 

 in the centre of a field, just outside the village of EI- 

 Habalsa in AsyQt Province, which is frequented bj* the 

 women for various reasons, one of them being for the 

 purpose of securing offspring. The stone, which is 

 roughly conical in shape and is of small size, is sur- 

 rounded by whatever crops are being cultivated on 

 that spot. It has been thus utilised by the women for 

 a long time, one hundred years I was told, though this 

 may be only a way of expressing a lengthy period. 

 Men have often tried to dig it up, excavating to a 

 considerable depth all round it, but they have never 

 come to the bottom of the stone, according to my 

 informant.^ A certain mystery is attached to the stone 

 because of this belief, thereby doubtless enhancing its 

 magical value. 



There is another very large stone at Kusiyeh, a town 

 in the near neighbourhood of El-Habalsa. It stands 

 in a field situated between two large burial grounds. 

 Childless women are in the habit of visiting the stone 

 and either walking round it or stepping over it seven 



1 Ibrahim Effendi Naruz, schoolmaster at Meir, to whom I am 

 indebted for a good deal of valuable information on this subject. 



times to enable them to have children. There is a 

 woman called " the servant " of the stone who attends 

 on such occasions and receives donations from the 

 visitors (Fig. 3). 



Just outside Dalga, a large village in Asyut Province 



Fig. 4.— stones coverixg the BURIAI.-PI.ACE Of THi; 

 SHEIKH ABDU'R-RAHi\I.A.N AT DALGA. 



and lying close to the edge of the desert, is an erection 

 of stones which covers the burial place of the Sheikh 

 Abdu'r-Rahman (Fig. 4). A domed tomb formerly 

 stood there, but it gradually fell into disrepair and in 

 course of time nothing was left of it. The stones are 

 placed over the spot where the body lies, in order to 

 prevent passers-by from treading over the dead man. 

 These stones are visited by childless women who walk 

 round them seven times in the belief that by so doing 

 their barrenness will be cured. 



The water with which a corpse is to be washed is, if 

 possible, obtained from a mosque. After the washing 

 is completed a barren woman will " jump " over the 

 water, i.e. step over it backwards and forwards, seven 

 times. My informant - told me that he saw this done 

 on one occasion, and the woman conceived a month 

 afterwards.' 



In all the cases mentioned above I liave not found 

 anything quite comparable with the belief, which many 

 anthropologists assert is held by various primitive 

 peoples, notably certain tribes in Australia, that the 

 father has nothing to do with the genesis of the child ; 



- Hideyb 'Abd-esh-Shafy of Illahun, Fayiim. 

 ' Cf . E. W. Lane, Modern Egyptians, London, 1895, PP- 

 266-7. 



