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Samuel Purchas
2. Ancestral voices
A few minutes before he fell into dreamlike state, Coleridge read about the
Tartars' belief in the survival of the dead. He had just read about a
tabernacle to the dead, something like a dome. The ideas and the imagery may
be similar, though there seems little direct linguistic borrowing here.
In Kubla Khan, ancestral voices prophesy war. In Purchas, after a story
about burying a chief man, we hear of a head priest who always places his
house or tent in front of that of the great Khan, and priests who make a
great noise during an eclipse, foretelling which days are holy, and which
are unlucky.
Purchas describes a culture in which the people do not begin a
war without their word. The ideas, then, are similar, though only an
occasional word reappears in Coleridge's poem.
Text
When he is dead, if he be a chiefe man, hee is buried in the field where
pleaseth him. And hee is buried with his Tent, sitting in the middest
thereof, with a Table set before him, and a platter full of meate, and a Cup
of Mares-milke. There is also buried with him a Mare and a Colt, a Horse
with bridle and saddle: and they eate another Horse…stuffing his hide with
straw, setting it aloft on two or foure poles, that hee may have in the
other world a Tabernacle and other things fitting for this use. 470
…(later, within less than a page with the text in the dreams)
Their Priests were diviners: they were many, but had one Captaine or chiefe
Bishop, who always placed his house or Tent before that of the Great Can,
about a stones cast distant….When an Eclipse happens they sound their Organs
and Timbrels, and make a great noyse….They foretell holy dayes, and those
which are unluckie for enterprises. No warres are begunne or made without
their word. 471 |
Other sources
William Bartram
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