熊の頭蓋骨

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書誌事項

タイトル別名
  • The Bear’s Skull
  • 熊の頭蓋骨--聖遺物・偶像・仮面
  • クマ ノ ズガイコツ セイイブツ グウゾウ カメン
  • Relic, Idol, Mask
  • 聖遺物・偶像・仮面

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説明

At the time of the bear festival, which dates back to the pre-Christian age, a bear is symbolically (and sometimes even really) killed. Then, after being beheaded, it is reborn symbolically and its resurrection is celebrated. In Siberia and in Japan, among the Ainus and other people who practice shamanism like the Inuits, the bear is also sacrificed. Prehistoric religions must have celebrated this anthropomorphic animal, and the bear has become, so to speak, an “idol”. Medieval European literature retain many traces of ancient rituals and myths, and many literary texts evoke the mythical figure of the bear (in particular, the famous King Arthur whose name means ‘the bear’in all Celtic languages). The com bat of the knight against the giant constitutes a recurrent motif, and this combat always ends with the ritual beheadding of the giant and with the solemn exhibition of his head. We know that the Celts had a ritual built around the decapitated head, and this Celtic ritual of exposing human skulls can be compared to similar rituals of exposing bears’ skulls. Originally, it must have represented the same cultural practice, which could date back to the prehistoric period. In fact, the Ainus conserve the skull of the immolated bear as a talisman, while the Eskimos use it for their shamanic dances. The bear’s skull becomes a ”mask“ in the latter case. The motif of the decapitated head survived in the Middle Ages in a number of stories belonging to hagiographic legends. In this kind of story, having been beheaded, the saint picks up his decapitated head, and goes home as if nothing happened. In the list of this type of saint prepared by Pierre Saintyves, some names meaning ‘the bear’ can be observed. So, we can see that, in the Occidental Christian hagiography, there is a mythical theme of the beheadding of a bear. Probably, we should view the persistant cult of “relics” in Christianity, in connection with this ancient ritual of the head conserved from a sacred animal or creature. Most likely, the bear is considered a symbolic object and rich in anthropological meaning due to the way its head compares to the human skull. Moreover, the skull of the bear permits us to distinguish three stages in the constitution of an anthropological metaphor of the sacred: “relic”, “idol” and “mask”. That’s why, analogically, and through the bear, human beings associated this relation with the sacred and with myth.

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