sometimes eaten for the relief of disease, although I did not verify it, is likely to be true, since S. Gertrude is invoked especially for the relief of fevers, madness, and tumours, as well as against mice.

W. L. HILDBURGH.

NOTES ON SOME CONTEMPORARY PORTUGUESE AMULETS.1

(Read at Meeting, 15th April, 1908.)

THE material forming the basis of this paper was obtained at Lisbon and at Funchal during the spring of 1905, and concerns, almost exclusively, amulets which are in common use and which may be procured at the shops, or from the sellers of cheap trinkets in the neighbourhood of the markets. A lack of sufficient knowledge of Portuguese necessitated the making of inquiries in a mixture of Spanish and Portuguese, or in English or French, so that I did not obtain that entire freedom of intercourse with the lower classes which would have been desirable. My notes can, therefore, make no pretence of including all the types of amulets used even in the two cities where they were secured.

the patroness of souls her symbol is a mouse.” Baring-Gould, Curious Myths of the Middle Ages ("Bishop Hatto ").

"Dans les images qu'on fait de Sainte Gertrude, des souris, des loirs, et des mulots courent autour d'elle et même grimpent sur sa crosse. En voici l'explication: Dans l'abbaye de Nivelles, on puisait de l'eau renfermé sous la crypte de l'église, et l'on s'en servait pour asperger les champs infestés par les campagnols et autres rongeurs ennemis de mecotlés . . . c'est surtout eu Belgique, parmi le peuple des campagnes, que sa culte est répandu: . . . Le jour de sa fête, dans beaucoup de villages, on a la coutume d'offrir du blé, comme prémices de la moisson, afin de préserver celle-ci, par l'intercession de la Sainte, du fléau des nats." Notes communicated by a Belgian correspondent, and embodied in the account of S. Gertrude in Les Petits Bollandistes, vol. iii. p. 481.

1 Many Portuguese amulets not touched upon in this paper are briefly referred to by J. Leite de Vasconcellos, in his excellent Sur les Amulettes Portugaises, published by the Societé de Geographie de Lisbonne, 1892, a

The greater part of my information was drawn from small shopkeepers, itinerant hawkers, and servants.

The amulets I saw for sale or in use in Madeira were practically identical with those of Lisbon, and appeared, for the most part, to be importations from Portugal. This fact is readily accounted for by the Portuguese character of the population, which is without an indigenous element, for the group of islands were, it is said, entirely uninhabited at the time of their discovery by the Portuguese. Although in Lisbon amulets are still very commonly used, at Funchal comparatively few are to be seen, and these are said (and justly, so far as my observation could confirm the statement) to be disappearing with a noticeable rapidity, a marked decrease of belief in the virtues of the majority of them having occurred even within the five years which had just passed. The so-called "Zodiac-rings," of gold or silver, to be found in many of the shops at Funchal, are merely copies, made there for sale to the numerous visitors, of the gold rings ornamented with the signs of the Zodiac which are made by the natives of the West Coast of Africa. There is, so far as could be determined, no amuletic virtue attributed to such rings by the people of Madeira.

The "evil eye," mau olhado, is generally believed in, and the amulets against it are very common. Of these, horns of various kinds and representations of a human hand making the "fig'

Session (which did not take place as expected) of the International Congress of Orientalists, which treats principally of amulets in their general aspects. Other papers, by the same writer, on the subject of amulets are :Amuletos populares portugueses,* from the Revista da Sociedade de Instruccão do Porto, Porto, 1882.

Amuletos italianos e portugueses,* in the Revista Scientifica, Porto, 1882. Moedas Amuletos,* in Elencho das licões de numismatica, vol. i., p. 21, 1889.

Amuletos, in 0 Archeologo Portuguès, vol. v., Lisbon, 1905.

Signification religieuse, en Lusitanie, de quelques monnaies percée d'un trou, in O Archeologo Portuguès, Lisbon, 1905.

Religoes de Lusitania, vol. i., contains several references to amulets.

There is also a portion of Concelho de Elvas,* (of Victorino d'Almeda), vol. i., pp. 495 et seq., by A. Thomás Pires, devoted to "Amuletos."

I have not been able to obtain for consultation copies of the papers

From Funchal.

The greater part of my information was drawn from small shopkeepers, itinerant hawkers, and servants.

The amulets I saw for sale or in use in Madeira were practically identical with those of Lisbon, and appeared, for the most part, to be importations from Portugal. This fact is readily accounted for by the Portuguese character of the population, which is without an indigenous element, for the group of islands were, it is said, entirely uninhabited at the time of their discovery by the Portuguese. Although in Lisbon amulets are still very commonly used, at Funchal comparatively few are to be seen, and these are said (and justly, so far as my observation could confirm the statement) to be disappearing with a noticeable rapidity, a marked decrease of belief in the virtues of the majority of them having occurred even within the five years which had just passed. The so-called "Zodiac-rings," of gold or silver, to be found in many of the shops at Funchal, are merely copies, made there for sale to the numerous visitors, of the gold rings ornamented with the signs of the Zodiac which are made by the natives of the West Coast of Africa. There is, so far as could be determined, no amuletic virtue attributed to such rings. by the people of Madeira.

The "evil eye," mau olhado, is generally believed in, and the amulets against it are very common. Of these, horns of various kinds and representations of a human hand making the "fig"

Session (which did not take place as expected) of the International Congress of Orientalists, which treats principally of amulets in their general aspects. Other papers, by the same writer, on the subject of amulets are :

Amuletos populares portugueses,* from the Revista da Sociedade de Instruccão do Porto, Porto, 1882.

Amuletos italianos e portugueses,* in the Revista Scientifica, Porto, 1882. Moedas Amuletos,* in Elencho das licões de numismatica, vol. i., p. 21, 1889.

Amuletos, in O Archeologo Portuguès, vol. v., Lisbon, 1905.

Signification religieuse, en Lusitanie, de quelques monnaies percée d'un trou, in O Archeologo Portuguès, Lisbon, 1905.

Religoes de Lusitania, vol. i., contains several references to amulets.

There is also a portion of Concelho de Elvas,* (of Victorino d'Almeda), vol. i., pp. 495 et seq., by A. Thomás Pires, devoted to "Amuletos."

I have not been able to obtain for consultation copies of the papers