Tag Archives: folk rituals

Folk Ritual: Superstition – Evil Eye

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  1. Text: Perhaps the most iconic piece of folklore to emerge out of the Greek culture has been that of the Mati, otherwise known as the “evil eye”. The motif of the evil eye is world famous, a black pupil inside a white eye which is surrounding by another circle of royal blue. The belief about the evil eye is that it can be given to certain people as a consequence of their envy and jealousy onto them. This is where the idea of the “eye” comes from – as one person stares at another with negative connotations or emotions, they will potentially impart a curse of some kind onto them that will leave them sick. In order to deter this potential evil from other people, the Greeks actually hang the image of the evil eye around their homes, believing it will keep the dark spirits away. This is considered common practice in all Greek homes, a common folkloric concept that has not only been around for centuries but remains relevant in the culturre today.
  2. Informant’s Context: The presence of mati is very real. Mati comes from people being hateful – they will look at you and snare if they you look handsome or beautiful. They might gossip about you behind your back if they become jealous of you. You can tell if someone is jealous by how ticklish they are. If someone is very ticklish, they are jealous people. Mati isn’t always something that is given to people because they’re jealous though. Some people are just bad luck, they’re a jinx, even if they don’t mean pain by anyone. For example, they say that someone who has a unibrow, one eyebrow that connects, can give someone mati even if they don’t have jealousy. My husband would sometimes compliment people in passing, but because he had the unibrow he would give them mati. Not his fault. Once someone gets the mati though, they become very ill. They might have high fever, they might have migraines. Sometimes they go into shakes in their bed. To know for sure if one has mati, a test must be conducted called Xematiasma. This is when we take a glass of water and we say a prayer over the water. We then take multiple droplets of olive oil and put them into the water. If the olive oil rises to the top of the water, the person we are testing for mati does not have it. If the olive oil sinks or lowers, maybe disappearing in the water, then the person being tested definitely has it. Water and oil are supposed to separate – if this doesn’t occur, then its clear that the individual has been cursed. If they have mati, they must remove their clothes and put them in the wash, shower themselves and clean their bed sheets. They must wash the evil off themselves and get it out of everything around them. Once they’ve cleansed themselves and taken time to rest, the dark spirits will leave them. The only way someone can learn to perform the mati test is through ritual. I am the only one in my family who knows how to conduct it. I can only pass it onto a male member of my family on the Holy Thursday before Easter. It’s only at this time that I can teach the prayer that goes with the water and the way to apply the olive oil. I tried to pass it onto my grandson this year, but he wasn’t home for the Holy Thursday. If I passed it onto him, he would then only be able to pass it onto a female member of our family, also on the Holy Thursday before Easter. That’s how I was also taught these practices. My father taught me how to use the olive oil and water and what prayer to say alongside them.
  3. Collectors Interpretation: I believe the cultural and historical connotations behind the evil eye tradition are fascinating. So much of what the informant described is a folkloric metabolization of cultural concepts regarding envy, jealousy and vindictiveness. There has long been considered an issue of in-fighting in Greek culture, dating as far back as the Peloponnesian Wars that wreaked havoc on the nation. The evil eye is a manifestation of a culture that is deeply weary of spitefulness. As a piece of magical folklore, much of what the informant discussed about the mati lore is both homeopathic and contagious. The actual act of one person impressing the mati (evil spirits) onto another person by being jealous is clearly an example of contagious magic. Moreover, the ritual in which someone diagnoses mati through water and olive oil is an example of homeopathic magic. Not just that, but the concept of mati also implies that purity is necessary for health. In order to rid oneself of the dark spirits, they must clean themselves and everything they own, almost as if to say that jealousy, envy and spite are filthy qualities. It also implies that these hateful emotions can be spread. The deeper meaning behind this might be that misery loves company, and when one person hates another its easy for those ideas to proliferate amongst communities of people.

Fields

AGE: 85

Date_of_performance: May 5, 2025

Informant Name: Confidential (EZ)

Language: Greek/English

Nationality: Greek/Canadian

Occupation: Retired

Primary Language: Greek

Residence: Canada

Loi Krathong/Loy Kratong

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: California
Performance Date: April 26th, 2022
Primary Language: English

“Ok this one’s a festival–there’s–it’s called

Thai: ลอยกระทง
Phonetic: Loi Krathong
Transliteration: River Goddess Worship Festival
Translation: Loy Kratong

and it’s like a water festival. You make–how do I describe it in English? You make a float. The word in Thai is

Thai:กระทง
Phonetic: Krathong
Transliteration: Float
Translation: Float

it just means like the float or whatever. It’s kind of like a lantern festival. But yeah, that occurs. Why? It’s like semi-religious, but also Thai people just celebrate it in general, for like, the rainy season. Like the end, the end of the rain. There’s like normal festivities for celebrations, like dance and food, but like the main activity is thanking the water goddess, a water goddess for like the entire season that came before. People also use it for like, good vibes. Where it’s like sending a wish or sending a prayer. You’d make it for someone else; like, ‘oh like for my family to be safe,’ and then you’d send it down the river. When I used to go to temple a lot, like, when I was younger when you would have like the festival everyone does it in like one small pond–cause the temple only has one small pond–and it’s really fun when the pond like fills up and like everyone’s wish is like together. Oh, you also–a big part of it is also making the float, to begin with, which is like made traditionally from like banana leaves. But in America, we make–well, no, not in America–but in the modern age, we use styrofoam, which is the funniest thing to me because the most environmentally damaging thing that you could do is to make it using styrofoam. But you have the plant styrofoam and you put like fake flowers in it if you don’t have like the real thing and then you take like three yellow candles and you put them in it and like make your wish on it.”

Context:

Informant (WP) is a student aged 19 from Chino Hills, California. Her parents are from Thailand and Laos. She currently goes to USC. This piece was collected during an interview in the informant’s apartment. She learned this from family and from going to the temple. To her, it is a way to give gratitude for what a person has and to ask for more.

Interpretation:
This festival is very similar to lantern festivals that are prevalent throughout East and Southeast Asia. It is very interesting to see how the festival has changed in the modern era with Thai people being unable to obtain banana leaves in parts of the world and instead resorting to styrofoam. Historically, agriculture has been incredibly important in Thailand. A festival based around thanking a type of water goddess at the end of the rainy season, while also asking for more rain in the future, makes perfect sense for this culture. Add in the variation on lanterns, being floats, and Thailand has a festival that is both related to other Southeast Asian festivals and uniquely Thai.

Significance of Incense

Nationality: Korean
Age: 50
Occupation: Professor
Residence: South Korea
Performance Date: April 25th, 2020
Primary Language: Korean

Context :

My informant is an adult female who was born in Seoul, South Korea. She received Korean education throughout her life and mainly speaks Korean. She believes in Buddhism and has been attending temple events for a long time. Her family also are Buddhist and follows the Buddhist way when it comes to events such as funerals and ancestral rites. Here, she is describing what an incense signifies in ancestral rites. She is identified as K and this piece was collected over a phone call in Korean and was translated into English.

K : You know what incense is, right? It’s a stick you light it on fire like a candle and it produces smoke with a certain smell to it. Rather than smelling like something burning, it has a very organic smell to it. Maybe like burning wood. In Korean ancestral rites, burning an incense means that the person who burned the incense is calling the Gods and their ancestors from the sky. The smoke rises from the ground and when it reaches the sky, the God or the ancestor will know someone is calling them. If someone is only wishing for something, it is calling God to grant their dear wish. If someone is performing an ancestral rite, it means that they are calling their ancestors. 

Analysis : 

In our family, we burn incenses more than candles. Before listening to the meaning behind burning incenses, I only thought we do this for the smell of it or as a tradition; I was surprised that the smoke and the smell of the incense was meant to reach the sky. I think this aspect of burning incenses show the earnest wish of the user to see and meet the holistic figures. It should also be noted that not all incenses are meant for deep meanings like calling their God or ancestors, but a lot of people use it for its good smell.