Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 49, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 February 1917 — QUEER THINGS IN KOREA [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

QUEER THINGS IN KOREA

TO THE natives of Korea, the world is populous with active and malevolent beings who are ready at any moment to fall upon them in wrath, according to a statement made by Dr. I. M. Casanowicz, assistant curator of old world archeology of the United States National museum, concerning the paraphernalia of a Korean sorceress now deposited in the museum collections. Doctor Casanowlcz says the Koreans believe that these beings or spirits haunt every tree, mountain and watercourse ; are on every roof, fireplace ami beam, and infest even their chimneys, living rooms and kitchens; that they beset them at home and waylay them when abroad. They seem to be everywhere at all times and make their lives miserable. To their iriflueence the Koreans attribute every ill, all bad luck, official malevolence, loss of power or position, and especially sickness; demons, consisting of selfexistent malicious spirits and spirits of departed impoverished persons who died in distress, and spirits whose natures ate partly 7 kindly, which include the ghosts of prosperous and good people, but even the latter appear to be easily offended and extraordinarily capricious. Two Classes of Sorcerers. To cope with these two fortns of spirits and be assured of a little peace and quiet, the Koreans have two classes of sorcerers, or, as they call them, “shamans;” the.Pansu and the Mutang. Both classes are mediators between the people and the spirits, but they bear little relation to each other. The former are “fortune-tellers,” and the Th Casanowicz said: “The office of the Pansu la restricted to blind men, perhaps owing to the common belief among primitive peoples that those who have been deprived of physical sight have been given an inner spiritual vision. The Mutang is always a woman, generally from the lower classes and of bad repute, and her calling is considered the very lowest in the social scale. While the Pansu Is, as it were, born or made by dint of his loss of eyesight, the Mutang enters upon her office in consequence of a ‘supernatural call,’ consisting in the assurance of demoniacal possession, the demon being supposed to have become her double and to have superimposed his personality upon hers. The ‘possession’ is often accompanied by hysteria and patheological symptoms. The spirit may seize any woman, maid or wife, rich or poor, plebeian or patrician, and compel her to serve him, and on receiving the ‘call of the spirit’ a woman will break every tie of custom and relationship, leave home and family to become henceforth a social outcast,-so that she is not even allowed to live within the city walls. But notwithstanding her low social status, her services are in constant demand. “In traveling through the country, the Mutang or sorceress is constantly to be seen going through the various musical and dancing performances in the midst of a crowd in front of a at the close of the nineteenth century the fees annually paid in Korea to the sorcerers were estimated at $750,000. Pansu Is Master of Spirits. “The Pansu acts as master of the spirits, having gained by his potent formula and ritual an ascendancy over them. By his spells he can direct them. The Mutang is supposed to, be able to influence them with her friendship with them. She has to 'pray to them and coax them to go. By her performances she puts herself en rapport With the spirits apd is able to ascertain their will and to name the ran-

som for which they- will release the | victim who is under torment. “More varied than the functions of ' the Pansu are the pacifications and propitiations, called kauts or kuts, performed by the Mutang. The kaut may be carried out either at the house of the patient or at the home of the Mutang, or at some shrine or temple, called tang, dedicated to some spirits, which are seen on the hilisides in Korea. If, as is occasionally the case, the Mutang belongs to a noble family, she is allowed by her family to ply her trade only in her own house. Those who require her services send the re- . quired fee and necessary offerings, and I the ceremony is performed by the Mutang in her own house or at the tang. 1 “Her equipment consists of a number of dresses, some of them very costly ; a drum shaped like an hourglass, about four feet high; copper cymbals; a copper gong; a copper rod with small j bella or tinklers suspended from it by copper chains; a pair of telescoping baskets ; strips of silk and paper bani ners which float around her as she dances; funs, umbrellas; wands and j images of men and animals.” I The paraphernalia of the sorceress or exorcist was acquired for the United States National museum through • the agency of the late W. W. Rockhill, formerly envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of., the United States to China, and is now exhibited in the section of historic religions In i the older building of the museum. Healing the Sick. . “The service of the Mutang most in demand is the healing of the sick,” continued Doctor Casanowicz. “If a sick man believes that his distemper has t been caused- by a spirit - ,"he sends to I the Mutang to describe the. symptoms and learn what spirit Is doing mischief. The Mutang may declare the mime of ' the spirit without going to the pa- ' tient’s house, or may say that she must see the patient first. On retalnj ing her fee she names a ‘fortunate’ j day for the ceremony, which will be performed either at her house or shrine or at the patient’s house, according to the seriousness of the ailment and the fee he can pay. r —k - j “The .performance of a certain sorceress reported took place before the open door of the sick man’s house, in an inclosed st>ace within which were tables laden with food and delicacies. Three old women accompanied the Mutang, two of them beating large hour-glass-shaped drums, ■while the third clashed symbols. The sorceress faced them, dressed in rose-pink silk and a gauze robe of buff, its sleeves trailing on the ground. Her hair was decorat- : cd with strips of white pi) per and a curious cap of buff gauze with red patches. Over her left shoulder she carried a brightly painted stick supporting a gong upon which she beat with another stick, executing at the same time a slow, rhythmic movement accompanl-ed by a chant. Every now and then one of the ancient drummers gathered pieces of food and, scattering them to the four winds for the spirits to eat, invoked them by saying: ‘Do not trouble this house any more, and we will again appease you by ofThe exorcism lasted-from two in the afternoon until four the next morning, when after fourteen hours of treatment the patient began to recover. It is believed by another writer, however, that all the gestures and whirling, and the noise of the drums and cymbals, must In some cases actually ‘kill’ instead of ‘cure.’ ”

STREET SCENE IN SEOUL