The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12) - Mirrors

§ 11. The Corn-spirit as a Pig (Boar or Sow). 351cuts the last handful of rye or wheat “has the Sow,” and is calledSow-driver. 973 At Bohlingen, near Radolfzell in Baden, the lastsheaf is called the Rye-sow or the Wheat-sow, according to thecrop; and at Röhrenbach in Baden the person who brings the lastarmful for the last sheaf is called the Corn-sow or the Oats-sow.And in the south-east of Baden the thresher who gives the laststroke at threshing, or is the last to hang up his flail on the wall, iscalled the Sow or the Rye-sow. 974 At Friedingen, in Swabia, thethresher who gives the last stroke is called Sow—Barley-sow,Corn-sow, or the like, according to the crop. At Onstmettingen [299]the man who gives the last stroke at threshing “has the Sow”;he is often bound up in a sheaf and dragged by a rope along theground. 975 And, generally, in Swabia the man who gives the laststroke with the flail is called Sow. He may, however, rid himselfof this invidious distinction by passing on to a neighbour thestraw-rope, which is the badge of his position as Sow. So he goesto a house and throws the straw-rope into it, crying, “There, Ibring you the Sow.” All the inmates give chase; and if they catchhim they beat him, shut him up for several hours in the pig-sty,and oblige him to take the “Sow” away again. 976 In various partsof Upper Bavaria the man who gives the last stroke at threshingmust “carry the Pig”—that is, either a straw effigy of a pig ormerely a bundle of straw-ropes. This he carries to a neighbouringfarm where the threshing is not finished, and throws it into thebarn. If the threshers catch him they handle him roughly, beatinghim, blackening or dirtying his face, throwing him into filth,binding the Sow on his back, and so on; if the bearer of the Sowis a woman they cut off her hair. At the harvest supper or dinner973 W. Mannhardt, Mythologische Forschungen, p. 112.974 E. L. Meyer, Badisches Volksleben (Strasburg, 1900), pp. 428, 436.975 E. Meier, Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebaüche aus Schwaben (Stuttgart,1852), p. 445, § 162.976 A. Birlinger, Volksthümliches aus Schwaben (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1861-1862), ii. p. 425, § 379.