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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
CHAP. XLI. DOOR OF THE DEAD
209
254 segq.) [" The first seven days, including that on which the demise has taken place, are generally deemed to be lucky for the burial, especially the odd ones. But when they have elapsed, it becomes requisite to apply to a day-professor The
popular almanac which chiefly wields sway in Amoy and the surrounding country, regularly stigmatises a certain number of days as tîng -sn; , jít : ` days of reduplication of death,' because encoffining or burying a dead person on such a day will entail another loss in the family shortly afterwards." (De Groot, I. 103, 99-Ioo.)—H. C.]
NOTE 6.—The Chinese have also, according to Duhalde, a custom of making a new opening in the wall of a house by which to carry out the dead ; and in their prisons a special hole in the wall is provided for this office. This same custom exists among the Esquimaux, as well as, according to Sonnerat, in Southern India, and it used to exist in certain parts both of Holland and of Central Italy. In the " clean village of Broek," near Amsterdam, those special doors may still Le seen. And in certain towns of Umbria, such as Perugia, Assisi, and Gubbio, this opening was common, elevated some feet above the ground, and known as the " Door of the Dead."
I find in a list, printed by Liebrecht, of popular French superstitions, amounting to 479 in number, condemned by Maupas du Tour, Bishop of Evreux in 1664, the following : " When a woman lies in of a dead child, it must not be taken out by the door of the chamber but by the window, for if it were taken out by the door the woman would never lie in of any but dead children." The Samoyedes have the superstition mentioned in the text, and act exactly as Polo describes.
L" The body [of the Queen of Bali, 17th century] was drawn out of a large aperture made in the wall to the right hand side of the door, in the absurd opinion of cheating the devil, whom these islanders believe to lie in wait in the ordinary passage." (John Crawfurd, Hist. of the Indian Archipelago, II. p. 245.)—H. C.]
And the Rev. Mr. Jaeschke writes to me from Lahaul, in British Tibet : " Our Lama (from Central Tibet) tells us that the owner of a house and the members of his family when they die are carried through the house-door ; but if another person dies in the house his body is removed by some other aperture, such as a window, or the smokehole in the roof, or a hole in the wall dug expressly for the purpose. Or a wooden frame is made, fitting into the doorway, and the body is then carried through ; it being considered that by this contrivance the evil consequences are escaped that might ensue, were it carried through the ordinary, and, so to say, undisguised house-door ! Here, in Lahaul and the neighbouring countries, we have not heard of such a custom."
(Duhalde, quoted by Marsden ; Semedo, p. 175 ; Mr. Sala in N. and Q., 2nd S. XI. 322 ; Lubbock, p. Soo; Sonnerat, I. 86; Liebrecht's Gervasius of Tilbury, Hanover, 1856, p. 224 ; Mag. Asiat. II. 93.)
CHAPTER XLI.
OF THE PROVINCE OF CAMUL.
CAMUL is a province which in former days was a
kingdom. It contains numerous towns and villages, but
the chief city bears the name of CAMUL. The province
lies between the two deserts ; for on the one side is the
VOL. I. O
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