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signorformica · 5 years ago

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Image: A perturbed young woman fast asleep with an incubus sitting on her chest, symbolizing a suffocating nightmare with paralysis. Engraving by J.P. Simon ~ 1810 Wellcome Library London

Derived from Late Latin incubo ("a nightmare induced by such a demon"), from incubare ("to lie upon"), this weird figure and its variations, that are often said to be responsible for unwanted pregnancies (especially in unmarried women), has received many names around the world and through the ages: the Southern African incubus demon is the “Tokolosh” or “Tikoloshe”, a dwarf-like supernatural entity; in Bolivia it is known as “La Sajra”, with appearance of a cat; in Brazil and the rainforests of the Amazon basin: “Boto”, a combination of siren and incubus; “El Trauco” in the traditional mythology of the Chiloé Province of Chile: a hideous deformed dwarf who lulls nubile young women and seduces them; “El Mohán” in Colombia; “El Sombrerón” in Guatemala; “Chusalongo” in Ecuador: an entity dressed in black, that suddenly transforms into a clawed dwarf; in Turkish culture an incubus is known as “Karabasan”: evil beings, thought to be spirits or jinns, that descend upon some sleepers at night. In many cases the victim's health gradually deteriorates and in some cases develops suicidal tendencies.

In Swedish folklore there is the “Mara” or “Mare”, a spirit or goblin that rides on the chests of humans while they sleep, giving them bad dreams; in Mexico it is known as “Jarel” (referring to the sleep paralysis with the words «se te sube el muerto») ; in Philippines they call him “Tikbalang”; “Dorlis” or “husband-in-the-night” in Martinique and some African regions; “Liderc” in Hungary: here, a Satanic lover that flies at night and appears as a fiery light (an ignis fatuus); “El Kuripí” in Paraguay: a creature with a gigantic male member; “Baku” (“Eater of dreams”) in Japan; “Popo Bawa”, in Zanzibar.

The “Alp” of the Germanic folklore is one of the better known (sometimes likened to a vampire, but its behavior is more akin to that of the incubus), as well as the “Mårt” or “Mårt-pressure” (also called “a Mårt-ride”); “The Popobawa” is the name used in Swahili language, which translates literally as "bat-wing": a sort of dark shadow cast by mischievous and evil spirits when they attack at night.

Nevertheless, the earliest mentions of an incubus come from Mesopotamia, ca.2400 BC • via Bibliothèque Infernale on FB

Nachtmahr— Nightmare. Johann Heinrich Füssli ~ 1781 Detroit Institute of Art

Nightmare, by Nicolai Abraham Abildgaard ~ 1800 Vestjaellands Art Museum, Sorø

Nightmare. Édouard de Beaumont. Paris ~ 1871

Sogno di Ecuba (The Dream of Hecuba). Fresco by Giulio Romano ~ 16th century Palazzo Ducale di Mantova

Mareridtscene - Nightmare. Ditliv Blunck ~ 1846

A woman fast asleep with devil on stomach. The night mare. M.J. Schmid fec., & Henry Fuseli Wellcome Library

Nachtmahr— Nightmare. Johann Heinrich Füssli ~ ca.1790 Goethehaus (Frankfurt) collection.

Front cover of “A treatise on the incubus, or night-mare, disturbed sleep, terrific dreams, and nocturnal visions; with the means of removing these distressing complaints" 1816, by John Augustine Waller

https://archive.org/details/treatiseonincubu00wall/page/n6/mode/2up

Medical photographs depicting hysteria as the root cause of the visions of incubus and demons. Women under Hysteria. Between 1876 and 1880

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BITING A GHOST —Pu Songling (1640-1715) Shen Linsheng once told me this story. A friend of his, an elderly man, was taking a nap one summer’s day and had drifted into a dreamlike state, when he perceived a woman raising his doorblind and entering his room, her head swathed in a length of white cotton and her body clothed in the hempen dress of mourning. She walked on into the inner apartments of the house, and he thought she must be his neighbor’s wife come to pay his own wife a visit. On reflection he found it strange that she should be making a social call dressed in full mourning, and was still puzzling over this when the woman came out again. He looked at her more closely this time, and saw that she was a woman of some thirty years, with a sallow complexion, bloated features, a pronounced frown, and a strange expression on her face that struck fear into his heart. She hesitated a while and then slowly approached his bed. He feigned sleep, but secretly watched her every movement. The next second, she hoisted up her skirts, clambered on to his bed, and pressed herself down on top of him with the force of a ton weight. His mind was still clear, but his hands when he tried to lift them seemed tied fast, and his feet when he tried to move them were paralyzed. He would have cried out for help, but try as he might, he found he could make no sound. The woman now began to sniff her way all over the old man’s face, rubbing her nose in turn on his cheeks, his nose, his eyebrows, his forehead. Her nose was cold as ice, and her chill breath penetrated his very bones. He conceived a sort of desperate plan: he would let her work her way down to his jaw and then he would bite into her. Soon enough she reached his jaw, and he sunk his teeth deep into her face, summoning up every remaining ounce of strength. She tried to pull away, struggling and yelping in pain, but the old man bit into her harder than ever. He felt the blood dribbling down his jaw and dripping down on to the pillow. He was still struggling to hold on when he heard his wife’s voice out in the courtyard, and cried out: “Help! There’s a ghost in here!” He relaxed his jaw in order to speak and thereby released the woman, who flitted from the room. His wife came hurrying in and, seeing nothing whatsoever, made fun of her husband for having been deluded by a nightmare. The old man told her in detail about the apparition and protested that the blood shed by the strange woman would be proof that it had been no mere nightmare. There was indeed a great wet stain on both pillow and bed, as if a large quantity of water had leaked through the roof, and when he bent down and smelled it, it gave off such an extraordinarily foul stench that the old man began to vomit violently. Several days later, he could still taste the lingering stench in his mouth.

*Image: Winged guardian, China, 550-600 AD, glazed earthenware - Royal Ontario Museum • via Bibliothèque Infernale on FB

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