LIGATURE, is also used for a state of impotency, in respect to venery, pretended to be caused by some charm or witchcraft.
Kæmpfer tells of an uncommon kind of ligature or knotting, in use among the people of Macassar, Java, Malacca, Siam, &c. By this charm or spell, a man binds up a woman, and a woman a man, so as to put it out of their power to have to do with any other person; the man being thereby rendered impotent to any other woman, and all other men impotent with respect to the woman.
Some of their philosophers pretend, that this ligature may be effected by the shutting of a lock, the drawing of a knot, or the flicking of a knife in the
VOL. XII. Part I.
wall, at the point of time wherein the priest is joining a couple together; and that a ligature, thus effected, may be dissolved, by the spouse's urining through a ring. This piece of superstition is said to obtain also among the Christians of the East.
The same author tells us, that during the ceremony of marriage in Russia, he observed an old fellow lurking behind the church-door, and mumbling over a string of words; and, at the same time, cutting a long rod, which he held under his arm into pieces; which, it seems, is a common practice at the marriages of great persons, and done with design to elude and counterwork any other person that might possibly be inducing the ligature.
The secret of inducing a ligature is delivered by the same author, as he was taught it on the spot by one of their adepts: but it is too absurd and obscene to deserve being transcribed here.
M. Marshal mentions a ridiculous form of ligature, which he received from a brahm of Indostan: "If (says he) the little worm in the wood lukerara kara be cut into two, and the one part flits and the other not, if the flitting part be bruised, and given with half a beetle to a man, and the other half to a woman, the charm will keep each from ever having to do with any other person. Phil. Trans. No. 268.