60 MALAY POISONS AND CHABM CUBES 



charms to make a man invulnerable {azirmt pSnimhol 

 or kebal) are generally worn round the waist. Sir Hugh 

 Clifford, however, when describing the death of a 

 " principal Moor of Malacca " who was wounded during 

 an engagement at sea with Dalboquerque in 1511, refers 

 to a Mbal charm worn as an armlet—" they found on his 

 left arm a bracelet of bone set in gold, and when they 

 took this off his blood flowed away and he expired " 

 (Ref. B), 



The wife of the Malay storekeeper at the State 

 hospital, Kota Bharu, a Kelantan woman, wears a 

 charm called azimai minjauhkan Shaitmif which is 

 intended to keep the devil away. It is made of about 

 18 inches of neatly twisted cord, in the pleats of which 

 five small scrolls of texts from the Koran are made 

 secure. Each is incased in a two-inch roll of thin zinc. 

 When *Che Bah goes to market from the hospital she 

 is accustomed to smoke her taUsman over a piece of 

 burning benzoin and then tie it round her waist, under- 

 neath her skirt, knotting it behind. Charms to deter 

 devils from getting into a house take the form of texts 

 from the Koran with Arabic figures, either written or 

 carved on the lintel of the main door, or above the doors 

 leading to the bed-chambers in houses of the well-to-do. 

 Malays use notliing like our Devonshire charms for fits, 

 such as the gruesome baked frog hung round the neck 

 in a httle silk bag, the stone charm for toothache, or 

 the tooth charm for dentition. 



Some of the Malay written tahsmans are by no means 

 texts from the Koran ; one, for example, which comes 

 from Malayo- Javanese Uterature, and which is expected 

 to drive away a bullet, is this : — 



Peace be with tliee I 



Nahi Janh'a is thy father's name, 



Nabi Rahbatta is thy mother's name, 



