Folk-lore of Shakespeare. Dyer Thomas Firminger Thiselton
Massinger’s “Virgin Martyr” (iii. 3), Harpax, an evil spirit, following Theophilus in the shape of a secretary, speaks thus of the superstitious Christian’s description of his infernal enemy:
“I’ll tell you what now of the devil:
He’s no such horrid creature; cloven-footed,
Black, saucer-ey’d, his nostrils breathing fire,
As these lying Christians make him.”
GOOD AND EVIL DEMONS
It was formerly commonly believed that not only kingdoms had their tutelary guardians, but that every person had his particular genius or good angel, to protect and admonish him by dreams, visions, etc.84 Hence, in “Antony and Cleopatra” (ii. 3), the soothsayer, speaking of Cæsar, says:
“O Antony, stay not by his side:
Thy demon, – that’s thy spirit which keeps thee, – is
Noble, courageous, high, unmatchable,
Where Cæsar’s is not; but, near him, thy angel
Becomes a fear, as being o’erpower’d.”
Thus Macbeth (iii. 1) speaks in a similar manner in reference to Banquo:
“There is none but he
Whose being I do fear; and, under him,
My Genius is rebuked; as, it is said,
Mark Antony’s was by Cæsar.”
So, too, in “2 Henry IV.” (i. 2), the Chief-justice says:
“You follow the young prince up and down, like his ill angel.”
We may quote a further reference in “Julius Cæsar” (iii. 2), where Antony says:
“For Brutus, as you know, was Cæsar’s angel.”
“In the Roman world,” says Mr. Tylor, in his “Primitive Culture” (1873, vol. ii. p. 202), “each man had his ‘genius natalis,’ associated with him from birth to death, influencing his action and his fate, standing represented by its proper image, as a lar among the household gods and at weddings and joyous times, and especially on the anniversary of the birthday when genius and man began their united career, worship was paid with song and dance to the divine image, adorned with garlands, and propitiated with incense and libations of wine. The demon or genius was, as it were, the man’s companion soul, a second spiritual Ego. The Egyptian astrologer warned Antonius to keep far from the young Octavius, ‘For thy demon,’ said he, ‘is in fear of his.’”
The allusion by Lady Macbeth (i. 5), in the following passage, is to the spirits of Revenge:
“Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty!”
In Nash’s “Pierce Pennilesse” we find a description of these spirits and of their office. “The second kind of devils which he most employeth are those northern Martii, called the Spirits of Revenge, and the authors of massacres and seed-men of mischief; for they have commission to incense men to rapine, sacrilege, theft, murder, wrath, fury, and all manner of cruelties; and they command certain of the southern spirits to wait upon them, as also great Arioch, that is termed the Spirit of Revenge.” In another passage we are further told how “the spirits of the aire will mixe themselves with thunder and lightning, and so infect the clime where they raise any tempest, that suddenly great mortalitie shall ensue of the inhabitants.” “Aerial spirits or devils,” according to Burton’s “Anatomy of Melancholy,” “are such as keep quarter most part in the aire, cause many tempests, thunder and lightnings, tear oakes, fire steeples, houses, strike men and beasts,” etc. Thus, in “King John” (iii. 2), the Bastard remarks:
“Now, by my life, this day grows wondrous hot;
Some airy devil hovers in the sky,
And pours down mischief.”
It was anciently supposed that all mines of gold, etc., were guarded by evil spirits. Thus Falstaff, in “2 Henry IV.” (iv. 3), speaks of learning as “a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil.” This superstition still prevails, and has been made the subject of many a legend. Thus, it is believed by the peasantry living near Largo-Law, Scotland, that a rich mine of gold is concealed in the mountain. “A spectre once appeared there, supposed to be the guardian of the mine, who, being accosted by a neighboring shepherd, promised to tell him at a certain time and on certain conditions, where ‘the gowd mine is in Largo-Law,’ especially enjoining that the horn sounded for the housing of the cows at the adjoining farm of Balmain should not blow. Every precaution having been taken, the ghost was true to his tryst; but, unhappily, when he was about to divulge the desired secret, Tammie Norrie, the cowherd of Balmain, blew a blast, whereupon the ghost vanished, with the denunciation:
‘Woe to the man that blew the horn,
For out of the spot he shall ne’er be borne.’
The unlucky horn-blower was struck dead, and, as it was found impossible to remove the body, a cairn of stones was raised over it.”85
Steevens considers that when Macbeth (iii. 2) says:
“Good things of day begin to droop and drowse;
Whiles night’s black agents to their preys do rouse,”
he refers to those demons who were supposed to remain in their several places of confinement all day, but at the close of it were released; such, indeed, as are mentioned in “The Tempest” (v. 1), as rejoicing “to hear the solemn curfew,” because it announced the hour of their freedom.
Among other superstitions we may quote one in the “Merchant of Venice” (iii. 1), where Salanio says: “Let me say ‘amen’ betimes, lest the devil cross my prayer.”
Of the devils mentioned by Shakespeare may be noted the following:
Amaimon is one of the chief, whose dominion is on the north side of the infernal gulf. He might be bound or restrained from doing hurt from the third hour till noon, and from the ninth hour till evening. In the “Merry Wives of Windsor” (ii. 2) Ford mentions this devil, and in “1 Henry IV.” (ii. 4) Falstaff says: “That same mad fellow of the north, Percy; and he of Wales, that gave Amaimon the bastinado, and made Lucifer cuckold.”86
The north was always supposed to be the particular habitation of bad spirits. Milton, therefore, assembles the rebel angels in the north. In “1 Henry VI.” (v. 3), La Pucelle invokes the aid of the spirits:
“Under the lordly monarch of the north.”
Barbason. This demon would seem to be the same as “Marbas, alias Barbas,” who, as Scot87 informs us, “is a great president, and appeareth in the forme of a mightie lion; but at the commandment of a conjurer cometh up in the likeness of man, and answereth fullie as touching anything which is hidden or secret.” In the “Merry Wives of Windsor” (ii. 2) it is mentioned by Ford in connection with Lucifer, and again in “Henry V.” (ii. 1) Nym tells Pistol: “I am not Barbason; you cannot conjure me.”
The names of the several fiends in “King Lear,” Shakespeare is supposed to have derived from Harsnet’s “Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures” (1603).
Flibbertigibbet, one of the fiends that possessed poor Tom, is, we are told (iv. 1), the fiend “of mopping and mowing, who since possesses chambermaids and waiting-women.” And again (iii. 4), “he begins at curfew, and walks till the first cock; he gives the
Ibid. vol. i. pp. 365-367.
See Jones’s “Credulities, Past and Present,” 1880, p. 133.
See Scot’s “Discovery of Witchcraft,” 1584, p. 393; Douce’s “Illustrations of Shakespeare,” p. 264.
Ibid. p. 378.