The evil eye. An account of this ancient and wide spread superstition

246 THE EVIL EYE CHAP.
unknown age, as well as modern Indian ones,^^* show
that the pose and gesture of the hands are full of
meaning, and that
many ancient statues,
now regarded simply
as works of art, were
intended to exhibit
actions that conveyed
in their day very dis-
tinct ideas.^^''
Belonging to later
times, over the great
gate of the Alhambra
(Fig. 106) called ''La
Torre de Jtisticia,"
where the King or his
Kaid dispensed judgment
in Oriental
fashion, ^'"^
is a large
upright hand on the
keystone of the outer
Moorish arch, in defi-
ance of the strict ob-
jection of the Moslem to images. It is sculptured
in low relief, the palm outwards, with the fingers
and thumb in natural position. On this hand Ford ^^'^
remarks that some consider it
an emblem of hospitality and generosity, the redeeming qualities
of the Oriental. Others think it a type of the five principal
388 See Y\g. 115, p. 267, wliich, though modern, probably represents by-
Oriental unchangeableness equal antiquity.
388 This is fully supported by the account given by the Abate Requeno of
the statue set up by Nunia Pompilius, in which the pose of the hands was
specially ordered.
Fig. 106.
390 jjeut. xvi. 18 ; Dan. ii. 49
; i Kings vii. 7.
'"^ Mnxxs^y's Handbook for Spain, 1855, vol. i. p. 301.