Text: The excerpt below is a folk performance describing superstitions over splitting the pole.

Interviewer: Do you have any folk beliefs of what brings good or bad luck?

Interviewee: Ok, yes. So one of them is, if you split the pole, so if you’re walking with someone, but you split a pole, or like, as long as it’s above your waist, it counts for me. That means that you, in the future, will split apart of that person and never see them again, so like, for me, like, I feel like it brings bad luck to relationships. So either I’ll walk along the other side of the pole, or if you split it, you go back and hit it, it’s fine. So that brings bad luck, but there is like a way to undo it, I guess, as well.

Context:

This excerpt is from a conversation with a fellow Forms of Folklore student. The conversation started by specifically talking about their Romanian heritage, and the folklore that came with that identity. After talking for a while about that topic, the conversation shifted to general superstitious beliefs, as recorded above. The interviewee engages with this folk belief whenever they are walking with someone, and separated by a pole.

Analysis:

This belief is an example of sympathetic magic, as the physical separation by the pole reflects the separation of a relationship. This belief likely exists because when walking and splitting from someone for a short time, that feeling of separation is felt by a person, and that feeling, through this folk belief, is enlarged to the feeling of separating from a whole relationship. There is a way to remove the bad luck through conversion magic, by hitting the pole, allowing people to feel at ease, even after committing this offense.