Charms to ward off the Evil Eye

The odd thing was that we were standing close to a finger-post which announced "Parish Church". Although such a combination of circumstances means absolutely nothing to most of us in the twenty-first century, it would have produced all manner of suppositions and worries had it occurred in medieval times or even some time later.

This, of course, is the time to ask: Why? The answer is that any person or animal with peculiar eyes was thought to be possessed by the Evil Eye. Indeed, anyone's eyes who were different colours or seemingly set too close together, or were crossed or indeed in any way different from what was considered "normal", was thought to have the infamous Evil Eye.

This was thought to give those people or animals the power to inflict discomfort, illness or misfortune upon others, while in some cases it was believed they could actually destroy things with little more than a mere glance.

I am not sure how, or even if, the Evil Eye can be associated with hypnotism but there is little doubt it was a very widely-held belief, not only in this country but overseas.

Indeed, belief in the Evil Eye can be traced to the beginning of recorded history in most countries of the world. Certainly it was a very strong belief in ancient Rome, Greece, Egypt and Assyria where, in some cases, it was thought the power of the Eye was triggered by little more than acts of jealousy.

There is little wonder, therefore, that worried people did their best to avoid being looked at by people or animals with distinctive eyes, and another factor was that people with such eyes did not necessarily inflict hurt upon another.

Many people with eye defects therefore did their best not to look at others; they did not want to harm their friends or family and in a book called About Yorkshire published in 1883, there is an account of a man living near Robin Hood's Bay who always walked with his eyes looking at the ground. Believing that his look was cursed and that it would harm anyone upon whom he gazed, he never looked at anyone while speaking to them and dare not even look upon his own children.

There is a similar tale of another Yorkshireman with the Evil Eye who, when he rose on a morning, stared for a long time at a pear tree outside his bedroom. He believed that the most powerful evil was present during the early morning upon waking, and that such evil in his gaze would be absorbed by the tree. In that way, he hoped it would not affect anyone else that day. Oddly enough, the tree withered and died.

It follows that if the people were so worried about the effect of the Evil Eye, they would do their best to reduce its powers and limit the damage it could inflict. For this reason all manner of charms were carried around and used to thwart its powers - and this is why that finger-post is relevant.

A clenched hand with all the fingers closed and the thumb lodged between the first and second fingers was a sign which was used in ancient times to ward off the Evil Eye. These were found in tombs in Etruria which was an ancient country in Italy, but a more modern version was a hand with all the fingers clenched except the first. This was pointing - and so the hand with a pointing finger was considered ideal for warding off the affects of the Evil Eye.

It is not surprising, therefore, that people used finger-posts to guide them safely upon their journeys - and to ensure good fortune at the same time. In ancient Greece, miniature pointing hands were fashioned as good luck mascots and made out of blue glass. In other countries, such as Egypt, small blue beads were used to ward off the effects of the Evil Eye.

It follows that people devised all sorts of good luck charms in an attempt to foil the effects of the Evil Eye. The sign of the cross was considered one of the most potent but spittle and even fire were used as well as iron objects, rings, various plants like rue or blackthorn, arrows, images of angels, stars and many others. The technique was either to wear the charm in case the Evil Eye was encountered, or else to make use of a charm at the first possible moment after being gazed upon by someone with the Evil Eye.

One very common trick was to spit on the ground immediately the Evil Eye had passed over it, but perhaps the simplest precaution, was to keep as far away as possible from any person or animal with the Evil Eye. And even today, we do not like people who will not look at us directly in the face but neither do we like people who point fingers at us!

A RECENT visit to some friends in a small market town in North Yorkshire was made all the more delightful as we watched the birds feeding in their garden. We were told that, with a spot of luck, a nuthatch would make an appearance and sure enough, right on cue, this handsome small bird appeared to join bluetits and others at the table.

Although the nuthatch is present all year in this country, it is not a very common bird and is rarely seen because it likes thick woodland. It will, however, make its home in parklands and large gardens but it needs lots of trees, both for nesting and for its food.

Its diet is somewhat varied because it eats both insects and nuts, the nuts coming from a variety of trees. For the insects, it explores crevices in the bark. In some ways, the nuthatch is like a small woodpecker because, having found a tasty nut, it will wedge it firmly into a crack in the bark and then attack it with its powerful beak. Eventually, the nut will crack and so a meal is obtained.

For its nest, it will make use of a hole in a tree trunk but will pack wet mud, mixed with its saliva, around the hole to reduce it to a size which prevents predators from taking the eggs or chicks. When the mud sets, it is as hard as rock. It will, however, make the occasional use of a convenient nest box or even a hole in a wall.

The nuthatch's predominant colour is rather like that of a bluetit and in fact, nuthatches can often be seen in the company of these tits. With a slate blue back, a prominent black stripe through the eye and warm buff underparts, with just a hint of pink towards the tail, they are about the size of a house-sparrow. They can easily be overlooked when working among trees but the nuthatch boasts one very unusual skill - it can hop head first down a tree trunk just as easily as it can climb.

Not long ago, I took a walk through the woods which contain Whitfield Gill Force above Askrigg; I had been led to believe nuthatches could be seen in those woods but never spotted any - although I did find just one of their distinctive nests.

I WAS quite fascinated at the market last Friday when a man to whom I was speaking made reference to a theeaker. It's a number of years since I heard this term used to describe a thatcher; in the dialect of the North Riding the word sounds as I have written it, i.e. theeaker, although an Anglicised version would be theaker.

A similar word was also used, i.e. thack. Thacking and theeaking meant - and still mean - the same thing. The verb "to theak" or "to thack" was widely used to describe the practice of thatching buildings with either straw, reeds or heather, and it has also spawned a small selection of others words for tools, e.g. theeakband or thackband, theeakprod or thackprod, and theeak-batten or thack-batten.

A thackband, originally made of plainted straw, was lashed around a thackprod, which was a pointed piece of wood or peg used to hold the lashing tight on the roof. The thack-batten was used to hammer down the thatch and another word was threave or theeave, this being 12 bundles of thatching straw laid out ready for use.