Omens from the Actions of Animals.
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Jastrow, Morris
If a woman gives birth to twins, one male and one female, it is an unfavorable omen. The land is in favor[628], but that house (wherein the child was born) will be reduced.
And again,
If a woman gives birth to twins, and both are brought out alive(?),[629] but the right hand of one is lacking, the ruler (?) will be killed by force, the land will be diminished....
If a woman gives birth to twins, and both are brought out alive (?), but neither of them have right hands, the produce of the country will be consumed by the enemy.
If a woman gives birth to twins, and both are brought out alive (?), but the right foot of one is missing, an enemy will for one year disturb the fixed order of the country.[630]
It will be observed that these omens bear on public as well as private affairs. The part played by public matters in them varies, but that the king and the country are so frequently introduced is an indication again of the official character given to these omen tablets. Only priests whose chief concern was with the court and the general welfare would have been impelled to mingle in this curious way the fate of the individual with that of the country at large. The birth of twins in itself is an omen for the house where the event occurs; but twins that are monstrosities, with a foot or a hand lacking, portend something of import to the general welfare.
The tablet proceeds, after finishing one phase of the subject, with omens to be derived from infants whose features resemble those of certain animals. In this case again we will see that the mind of the compiler is now directed towards the fate of the individual and again toward the ruler or the country. In the 2d tablet of the series we read that
If a woman gives birth to a child with a lion's head,[631] a strong king will rule in the land.
If a woman gives birth to a child with a dog's head, the city in his district[632] will be in distress, and evil will be in the country.
If a woman gives birth to a child with a swine's head, offspring and possession (?) will increase in that house.
If a woman gives birth to a child with a bird's head, that land will be destroyed.
If a woman gives birth to a child with a serpent's head, for thirty days (?) Nin-Gishzida[633] will bring a famine in the land, and Gilgamesh[634] will rule as king in the land.
In the same tablet[635] such monstrosities are taken up as children born with two heads, with a double pair of eyes, or with the eyes misplaced, with two mouths or more than two lips. The two heads, strange enough, generally portend good fortune, though not invariably. Thus an infant with two heads is an omen of strength for the country; and again
If a woman gives birth to a child with two heads, two mouths, but the regular number of eyes, hands, and feet[636], it is an omen of vigorous life [for the country, but the son] will seize the king his father and kill him.
But
If a woman gives birth to a child with two heads and two mouths, and the two hands and two feet are between them[637], disease will settle upon that city (where the monstrosity was born).
If the deformity consists in the misplacement of certain organs, the omen is invariably bad.
If a woman gives birth to a child with two eyes on the left side, it is a sign that the gods are angry against the land, and the land will be destroyed.
And again,
If a woman gives birth to a child with three eyes on the left side and one on the right, the gods will fill the land with corpses.
The third tablet proceeds with other parts of the body. It begins with a list of peculiarities observed in regard to the ears. The resemblance of certain features in children to the corresponding features of animals is an observation made by many nations. In modern times Lavater, it will be recalled, based his study of human physiognomy in part upon the resemblance of the nose, eyes, mouth, and ears, and general shape of the head to the features of such animals as the lion, jackass, dog, and swine. We may well believe, therefore, that when the Babylonians refer to a child with a lion's or a dog's ear, they had in mind merely a resemblance, but did not mean that the child actually had the ear of a lion or dog or the like.
At times the connection between the omen and its interpretation is quite obvious. In a portion of this same series we are told that[638]
If a woman gives birth to a child with a lion-like ear, a mighty king will arise in the land.
It will be recalled that a 'lion head' portends the same, and it is evident that in both cases the lion suggests strength. We are in the presence of the same order of ideas that controls the belief in 'sympathetic magic.' The corollary to 'like produces like' is 'like means like.' In other cases, the logic underlying the interpretation of the omen must be sought for in views connected with some accompanying feature.
If a woman gives birth to a child with the right ear missing, the days of the ruler will be long.
If a woman gives birth to a child with the left ear missing, distress will enter the land and weaken it.
While in general the absence of any part of the body is a sign of distress for the country and individual by a perfectly natural association of ideas, yet this general principle is modified by the further consideration that 'right' is a good omen and 'left' a bad one. But this consideration which makes the absence of the 'right' ear a good omen may again be offset by the entrance of a third factor. So we are told that
If a woman gives birth to a child with a small[639] right ear, the house of the man[640] will be destroyed.
The omen of misfortune in this case is the deformity in the organ, and the fact that the more important right ear is deformed, so far from mitigating the force of the omen, accentuates its consequences.
If a deformed right ear is disastrous, we are prepared to learn that
If a woman gives birth to a child with both ears short, the house of the man will be utterly rooted out.
No less than eleven varieties of deformed ears are enumerated. It must not be supposed, however, that the factors involved in this omen science are always or even generally so simple. In most cases the connection between the sign and the conclusion drawn, is not clear to us because of the multiplicity of factors involved. Further publication and study of omen texts will no doubt make some points clear which are now obscure, but we cannot expect ever to find out all the factors that were taken into account by the populace and the schoolmen, in proposing and accepting certain interpretations of certain omens, any more than we can fathom the reasons for the similar superstition found among other nations[641] of antiquity and modern times. Recognizing certain principles in some of the omens, we are justified in concluding that whatever else determined the interpretation of omens, caprice did not enter into consideration, but rather an association of ideas that escapes us, simply because our logic differs from the logic of primitive peoples in certain important particulars.
The list of peculiarities occurring in the case of babes continues as follows:
If a woman gives birth to a child whose mouth is shaped like a bird's, the country will be stirred up.
If a woman gives birth to a child without any mouth, the mistress of the house will die.
If a woman gives birth to a child with the right nostril lacking, misfortune is portending.
If a woman gives birth to a child with both nostrils lacking, the land will witness distress, and disease will destroy the house of the man.
If a woman gives birth to a child whose jaw is lacking, the days of the ruler will be long, but the house of the man will be destroyed.
If a woman gives birth to a child whose lower jaw is lacking, the ground will not bear fruit during the year.
It will be observed that, while most of the portents are evil, the ruler of the land is here generally vouchsafed immunity. The priests had to be somewhat on their guard lest by the very terror that they aroused, the hold of the rulers over the people might be loosened. Moreover, the rulers were sufficiently hedged in by their positions, as we have seen, and were in no danger of regarding themselves as safe from the anger of the gods.