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PILWIZ, BILWIT. 475
in Bavaria, Franconia, Vogtland and Silesia. H. Sachs uses
locks :
bilbitzen of matting the hair in knots, pilmitz of tangled
als ob sie hab der rab
f ir har verbilbitzt, zapfet und stroblet,
gezoblet/ i. 5, 309 b . ii. 2, 100 d
; pilmitzen, zoten und fasen/ iii.
3, 12 a . In the Ackermann von Bohmen, cap. 6, pilwis means
the same as witch; pielweiser, magician, soothsayer/ Bohme s
Beitr. zum schles. recht 6, 69. an. 1529 (at Schweidnitz), a
pielweiss buried alive/ Hoffmann s Monatschr. p. 247. 1582
(at Sagan), two women of honest carriage rated for pilweissen
and /ibid. 702.
( du ! pileweissin A. Gryphius, p. 828.
Las de deine bilbezzodn auskampln says the angry mother to
her child, i den bilm.ezschedl get nix nei/ get your b. clots
combed out, you don t come in in that shaggy scalp, Schm. 1,
168. pilmeskmd, a curse like devil s child, Delling s Bair. idiot.
1, 78. On the Saale in Thuringia, bulmuz is said of unwashed
or uncombed children ; while bilbezschnitt, bilwezschnitt, bilfez-
schnitt, pilmasschnid (Jos. Rank. Bohmerwald, p. 274) denotes a
cutting through a field of corn, which is regarded as the work
of a spirit, a witch, or the devil.
This last-mentioned belief is also one of long standing.
messes alterius
Thus the Lex Bajuvar. 12 (13), 8 : si quis
initiaverit maleficis artibus, et inventus fuerit, cum duodecim
solidis componat, quod aranscarti 1 dicunt. I dare say such a
delinquent was then called a piliwiz, pilawiz ? On this passage
Mederer remarks, p. 202-3 : An honest countryman told me
about the so-called bilmerschnitt, bilberschnitt, as follows : The
spiteful creature, that wants to do his neighbour a rascally mis
chief, goes at midnight, stark naked, with a sickle tied to his foot,
and repeating magic spells, through the middle of a field of corn
just ripe. From that part of the field that he has passed his
sickle through, all the grains fly into his barn, into his bin/
Here everything is attributed to a charm practised by man. 2
1 Goth, asans (messis), OHG-. aran, arn.
2 Can this magic be alluded to so early as in the Kaiserchronik (2130-37) ?
diu muoter heizit Rachel,
diu hat in geleret :
swenne sie in hiez sniden gan,
sin hant incom nie ddr an,
sin sichil sneit schiere
mer dan andere viere ;
wil er durch einin berc varn,
der stet immer mer ingegen im uf getan.
(His mother E. taught him : when she bade him go cut, he never put his hand to
it, his sickle soon cut more than any other four if ; he will drive through a hill, it
opens before him.)