Moonlight and Mirrors in The Night

The Moon-mirror By PJ 2011

According to ancient western superstitions during the full moon It was thought that to sleep in direct moonlight caused madness or blindness. In time, the word, lunatic, from "luna", meaning Moon, and "tic", meaning struck, evolved from this belief. 

A well popularized Moon mythology of Europe is of the werewolf the shape-shifts into a wolf, at the appearance of the full Moon. Lesser known variant of the same mythology is that in the light of the full Moon it was said that a woman that lay in moonlight or who stare as the full Moon would become pregnant and give birth to a monster, possible even a werewolf that shape-shifts at the night of the full Moon.

The Moon was thought to be important to bring potency to the healing and magic powers of herbs were said to be at the peak during the night of the full Moon, this one probably has more credence than one would think, knowing that the night cycle of plants cause them to change how they flow water and nutrition's from the roots, and also cause the osmotic pressure that gives the plant fresh morning-dew when observed in the morning. Though they would do this at any night the extra pull of the full Moon should make them more potent, and also for practical reasons it is a lot easier to collect herbs during the light of a full moon than on a night of only starlight. This is also probably part of the stories of how the witches were traveling using their broomsticks during the night of the full Moon, out to collect all the magical and medicinal herbs.

One other interesting legend I came over is a twist on the bad luck caused by the breaking of a mirror which, we commonly know is supposed to mean 7 years of bad luck, but what I had not heard about before was you could break this curse if you take the mirror pieces outside and bury them in moonlight.

The Moonlight and Mirrors in Samoan Folklore

I found out that is a widespread practice among Samoans to cover the mirrors at night, and if one does not do so, they think there might be someone else other then yourself starring back at you. 

To put it in the words of Loa from Samoa. 

-"cover the mirrors at night as Nek Minnit Miku is said to be staring at you"- 

When it comes to the Moon, and moonlight, The Samoan mythology is deeply connected to The Moon, and I heard multiple accounts how one is not supposed to sleep with moonlight falling on ones face. Also how those that would let that happen would find themselves paralyzed unable to move or let anyone know as they can't speak, yell or force themselves to wake up. Which is why it is very important to not only cover your mirrors but also cover up the windows so the moonlight cannot cause you to become frozen in the night. 

In the words of Loa from Samoa about the topic of moonlight

-Yea that moonlight one is scary. Happened to my mum and sisters. And in New Zealand too.. Its called '' malu 'ia '' they said they couldn't move and like they were screaming but they couldn't hear themselves.. So ever since that i made sure my curtain is always closed!-

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Samoan Curfew

This is a true story that happened to Loa's father and her uncle back in their home island of Samoa about 40 years ago.

This happened to my father and his cousin back in Samoa when they were about 15 years old, and like any ordinary island child they loved to swim. In Samoa, they have a curfew for the village people to be in the house by 6 or 7 p.m. to do prayer. So around that time the officials of the village would ring a bell or blow a conch shell to inform that curfew was in effect. It was not only forbidden by law but was forbidden because around that time, the ancestral spirits would roam free and anyone could be "taken" at that time.

My father, being a trouble maker decided that he and his cousin would hide out on the beach so they could swim throughout the night. Well as they swam, they started to see the torches and knew right away that the officials were getting ready to enforce curfew. So they hid and kept the noise down until the officials went back into their houses. That was a stupid mistake.

While they were celebrating in the water for not being caught my father and his cousin started to notice a faint sound in the distance on the beach. They tried to look who it was that was making the noise but they couldn't figure that out. As the people started getting closer, they could see that they were chanting and holding torches so they assumed it was the officials doing another round of enforcing curfew. Then they noticed the people were wearing clothes of way back in the day and the chanting was actually of an older Samoan language that was hardly used. My father knew right away that something was wrong, so he convinced his cousin that they should hurry back to their house.

While returning home they felt for some reason like they were being held by some kind of force because these men kept getting closer and closer even though my father and cousin was running faster and faster. Eventually they reached home and my grandmother and some of the other elders of the family were waiting impatiently for them. As soon as they got there, my grandmother could see what had happening, so she quickly rinsed my father and his cousin off with fresh water to get the salt water scent away from them. She hurried as fast as she could because she could see the spirits coming closer and closer. As they were only a few feet away my grandmother just finished washing my father and cousin off. Then when see looked up the spirits were gone.

AT this point my grandmother stared crying. She beat m father and cousin and explained that the curfew was not only for the purpose of the officials but for the respect of the spirits that walked around at night. She told my father they had just disrespected our ancestors. And she explained how lucky they were that she was there to know how to handle the situation because this had also happened to her when she was a young girl. My father and his cousin from that day never broke curfew and till this day, they look back on that event and wonder what if?

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