Friday, March 29, 2024
Tamilnadu

People


Beliefs and Superstitions

Beliefs about Children

A mirror  should not be shown  to babies as it is supposed to make them dumb. A person  should not clean his teeth while baby sitting.

When  the first tooth of a child  falls out  the fallen  tooth is carefully placed in a lump  of cow -dung, symbol of fertility, and thrown over roof  in the belief that such action will hasten the re-growth of the child 's teeth.
On suspicion  that a person's  jealous eye  is the cause of child's illness or some misery in the family, at his next  visit some one in the family follows  him, collects a handful  of earth on which  that person  had set foot and circles it clockwise  around the child's head thrice, to ward off evil and then throws it in to the oven. If a child has breathing difficulty immediately after birth its forehead is scorched  with a hot needle.

When the fist two children  die, the death of the third child is averted  by disfiguring  its face, by piercing the left nostril and putting a gold wire ring  through it. These mutilations  are effected to make the child  ugly and thus prevent him/her  being the cynosure  of this  child by giving the child a humble name like  Kuppusamy (Lord of refuse), Kuppammal (lady of refuse ), Pakri( Fakir) or Pichai (beggar).