Mouras Encantadas

I was talking to a friend (daughter of Sicily) and mentioned the notion of an "Evil Eye".

"Do you think it's real?" she asked.

I wasn't sure.  I'm not sure what inexplicable phenomena I believe in or not.

My grandmother, Vovo, was afraid of thunder & lightning.  She'd go around screaming & unplugging things & getting people off the phone & covering up the mirrors. (Mirrors?)

My mom still reflexively gets off the phone during a thunderstorm.  Even a cell phone.

And there is this article, about mysterious Portuguese women (Mouras Encantadas) building stone tombs, dolmens, megaliths-whatever you want to call them.  These stone monuments are dated from 4800 BC to 1200 BC.

"Portuguese sources that were written down in the late 19th century, people seek out mouras in midday, at midnight or in midsummer to help them with illnesses, infertility or with hard luck in love. The mouras may require a moral test before giving help. In these stories mouras are surrounded by rabbits, chickens and piglets, which they may give to people as gifts.

There is another category of story where mouras appear to people as a sign of approaching death or appear to women in difficult childbirth and may even decide the outcome of the birth—whether mother and baby survive."

The research comes out of the work of Henna Lindstrom, who studied the phenomena beyond Portugal:

She said linguistics connects the Portuguese mouras to many other European goddesses, including the Greek Moirae, or Fates, who held everyone's destiny in their minds and to whom even Zeus had to answer. The Fates, like the Mouras Encantadas, wove mankind's fate on their looms and then cut it at death.

“Linguistics gives also a hint about the tasks of these moura-mari-marion goddesses by connecting them to the themes of death and spirits, and folkloristics connect them to life, fertility, health and old wisdom,”  Lindström wrote.

My friend also asked if the Azores were thought to be the lost islands of Atlantis.  (A topic for another time!)