Showing posts with label mythology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mythology. Show all posts

2/10/2013

Snakes inside a human being

 All until the half of the past century in smaller places around Bosnia and Herzegovina it was believed that there were snakes that can enter a human body and spend a certain amount of time inside it. Such a scenario would take place if a man fell asleep outside, in the shade of a tree, and opened his mouth during sleep. Allegedly the snake would use that moment if it was in the vicinity and enter his body. She would stay there for days, months even years. The man who had a snake inside him could be recognised by loss of weight and pale face. According to folk belief the snake would eat everything what the man ate not leaving anything for him. In order to cure himself of this mysterious disease the man would be told to lay somewhere outside, on the grass, and fall asleep and one of the inhabitants would bake a chicken and place it next to his mouth. According to belief as soon as the snake would sense the smell of roast meat she would get hungry and would go out and in such a way free the man of its presence.

 

Aždaha (Dragons)

In the past Bosniaks believed in dragons, they described them as giant snakes with wings that were able to live both in the sky and on the land. It can be concluded from the folklore that dragons were males, there was no mention of a female dragon, and the dragons fulfilled their desire for offspring with human woman and animals, especially cows. According to folklore if a dragon was attracted to a woman, he would come to her room at night or wait for her somewhere outside, on a meadow, and he would use his magical powers to put her in a trance like state. After the intercourse the dragon would fly away and the woman wouldn't have any recollection of the incident.

Fatima K. from Bosanski Novi claimed that she gave birth to a dragon in 1974: "I gave birth inside the house, sometime after midnight, after half an hour of painful labour, out came a child in a white placenta and after a few moments it disappeared?!" She claimed that she never saw the child again and therefore she concluded that she didn't give birth to a "Snijet" but to a dragon. Another confirmation to this claim is that her breasts were full of milk in the evening, but when she woke up in the morning they were all drained. This occurred on a daily basis for a couple of months. Being afraid she told this to her neighbour, an old lady, who in turn told her that it was the dragon-child that came each night to feed himself with her breast milk. After some time the night visits ceased.