I lift an ornate silver container – its contents filled with the lovely aroma of fresh coffee beans. I remove my jacket (and my shoes) and settle into a comfortable couch, surrounded by too many pillows. A large map of a land I don’t recognize is illuminated in an orange glow. Trinkets and treasures from other worlds, other times, litter the walls. I am in the interior of a small candle shoppe tucked away in the recesses of Hollywood. Let your instinct take hold and tell a story that you may not know you had inside of you. Rather than go on a journey, let the journey take you. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.I invite you to let your imagination take you – and create something. The Encyclopedia of Witches and Witchcraft. The fifth man vanished, and the treasure sank beyond reach. In one Nova Scotia tale, four men who discovered the site of buried treasure were digging silently when one of them noticed that suddenly a fifth man had joined them. The spirits were to be summoned in the name of God and promised anything in order to help them find “a place of untroubled rest.” According to lore, if the ghost caused a treasure hunter to speak or scream-as they invariably did-the treasure vanished. These ghostly guards were stationed by Captain Kidd and other pirates of the time, who reputedly killed a man at every site where they buried their loot. Seventeenth-century lore advised treasure hunters to carry lanterns containing consecrated candles in order to conjure the ghosts of dead men who were said to guard buried treasure. However, in 1726, Daniel Defoe, writing in History of the Devil, maintained that blue candle flames were not supernatural but were merely produced by “any extraordinary emission of sulphurous or of nitrous particles” in close quarters. In the late 18th century, the concept of blue candle flames as ghost calling cards was “so universally acknowledged, that many eminent philosophers have busied themselves in accounting for it, without once doubting the truth of it,” according to Francis Grose’s Provincial Glossary with a Collection of Local Proverbs, and Popular Superstitions (1787 1790). In some beliefs, the death omen can be nullified by extinguishing the candle under running water or by blowing it out. Shakespeare used this latter superstition in Richard the Third, in which the Ghost of Buckingham enters to blue candlelight at dead midnight. In German lore, a candlewick that divides in two and burns in twin flames presages a death (interestingly, the same phenomenon in Austrian lore merely foretells the arrival of a letter).Ī candle that burns dim means that a ghost is nearby so does a candle that burns blue. A superstition common to the British Isles holds that candles whose wax drips not straight down but around the candle, thus giving the appearance of a winding sheet, is also a Death Omen whoever is in the direction of the drip is the doomed one. In Suffolk lore, a burning candle accidentally shut in a pantry is an omen of the same. The candle must be obtained from an “unlucky” person (hence the opposite, or lucky) such as a witch, wizard, seer, or one who has flat feet or is “ringlet-eyed” or “langlipit” (probably hare-lipped).Ī guttering candle generally presages a death in the family, while in American folklore, a candle left burning in an empty room will cause a death in the family. The candle is kept burning throughout the night. In the Scottish Lowlands, a washed and laid out corpse is given a “saining” (blessing) by the oldest woman present, who lights a candle and passes it three times over the body. Because of the association with wakes, three burning candles are considered an ill omen and harbinger of death in the superstitions of the theatre, three candles are never to be lit in dressing rooms. Three candles are burned at Irish wakes, and the candle ends are then used to treat burns. Another custom calls for burning candles in all rooms of the house until the corpse is buried.Ī similar custom from Ireland calls for burning 12 candles in a circle around a corpse until it is buried, for the circle of fire will prevent evil spirits from carrying off the dead one’s soul. Old Jewish customs, adopted by Christians, call for lighting candles for the dying and dead: a lit candle by the bedside of a dying person frightens away Demons, and it must remain lit for a week after death, perhaps to keep the air purified. in Egypt and Crete, providing light to repel evil spirits in religious ceremonies. The actual origin of candles is unknown, but they were in use as early as 3000 B.C.E. Candles have been used since ancient times in humankind’s most important rituals and rites of passage, including those pertaining to the dead and ghosts of the dead.
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