When fear „ties itself“ to death

 It was once believed that a person will fall ill if an animal jumps in front of him from a bush unexpectedly or if something else surprises him in a different manner. Repercussions of such a shock have an equally detrimental effect for both the psyche and body. Through some empirical, but also magical experiences, the Bosnian people have always believed that due to huge shock the human body literally shrinks, or better yet – contorts, which is also mentioned in other cultures where such unnatural deformities were cured with the help of massages whose main purpose was to relax the body and return it to its original form.

But, the effect of shock have a much more complex effect on the human body and mind, which is according to folk wisdom best manifested by the claim that due to sudden fear certain organs in the body can move, such as the heart or the gizzard. Both organs are prone to movement during such a sudden bodily convulsion, when a person literally loses its breath, which then further aggravates the patient’s condition. Based on such a belief in folk medicine certain magical rituals of rehabilitation were created, such as lead melting and "salivanje strune", which we will discuss later on.

Due to intensive stress i.e. great fear when a person experiences a rapid loss of fluid inside the mouth, saliva, and since the old days to the frightened a glass of water was offered to them so that “they can come to their senses”. Feeling of fear is such a strong emotion which immediately saps the body’s energy –hypoglycaemia- which is why it is necessary to react quickly in order to recover it. Based on this knowledge the regular practice among Bosnian folk is that to the frightened person a glass of sugar water was offered. It is a known fact that cold water can have a beneficial effect on the person in shock if the person is sprinkled with it or washes its face with it; since the cold itself leads to a short term and effective shock, but this time a positive one.

Drawing attention is practiced in other situations, for example, with the goal of calming down a crying child, which is usually caused by fear from someone or something, which was transferred from one generation to the other from the mother onto the daughter. Namely, our grandmothers would use the tip of their finger to pass over the child’s nose when he was crying in order to get his/her attention, additionally they would produce a high pitched tone which is reminiscent of sound that a mouse makes (ccccc...), they would do this by placing their lips together and drawing air through the opening of the lips, this would produce a sound similar to the sound of the letter C, this would draw attention and stop the most intensive urge for crying – getting hysterical. This would cause the child to calm down gradually*.

According to people, fear has such a destructive influence on humans that it can even cause death. Some stravarke in Bosnia claim: “that in certain situations fear can “get tied” to the patient’s death” – i.e. a person actually dies because of it, and such people can’t be helped. During the Austro-Hungarian occupation of Bosnia, Dr. Leopold Gluck wrote about this (“Addition to the folk healing of Bosnia and Herzegovina”), where he mentions at the beginning of his study about folklore understanding of fear among the Bosnian people: “It is true that sudden mental shocks, which are usually marked by horror and fear, are the cause and the nerves get more or less disrupted by so called shock – overemphasized fear from which the nerves react aggressively in main human organs, especially the heart, when even death can occur”.




*Although the crying of a child in the first months, but also the first years of life, is not considered to be bad since it helps with the development of lungs, longer crying periods in men was not allowed because of the fear of hernia and hydrocele.

Influence of fear onto the nerves and bowels

Fear manifests itself in two ways inside the human body – through the bowels and nerves. As doctor Leopold Gluck has noted the first form appears primarily in children in form of uncontrollable jolting of the body while they're sleeping, which is declared in a milder form, also appearance of epilepsy, which is of course a more difficult form of disease. Among the adults, fear is manifested as an acute insanity or a strong headache, weakness in the limbs, especially trembling in the legs and dark circles around the eyes. Similarly frequent night mares are accompanying symptoms of fear.

When the fear is accumulated in the bowels then the diseased suffers from a chronic diarrhoea, due to which he weakens. In addition to that, it is still considered today that grown people  which get diarrhoea due to fatty food or generally suffer from what is in general medicine classified as an irritable bowls syndrome were in childhood subject to physical or mental abuse due to which they suffered a great fright.

In case that fear has caused epilepsy folk medicine suggests that a diseased child in time of an epileptic attack mustn’t be fed nor touched, as long as the cramps are present, and under his nose a rag dipped in vinegar must be placed, with an intent that the sharp smell will ease the current difficulties in which the child is in. When the cramps become less intense, the mother wipes the saliva from the child’s mouth, and places a wrap i.e. a linen rag dipped in vinegar on the forehead and bellybutton (1). Only when the cramps completely stop, after some time, the mother is allowed to nurse the child.

If the fear (disease) has caught the bowels, before sunrise, it is recommended to pick a few branches of rue/sedefil (Ruta graveolens), crush it, mix with some water, and filter it through a gauze. Filtered liquid is spiced up with a half of tea spoon of honey and sugar and in the end that mixture is left somewhere outside – “on the sun and air” – for 24 hours. This remedy is given to the child three days in a row at dawn, i.e. one hour before sunset. To adults, this remedy is given for a longer period of time, usually around nine days, or just water in which completely crushed leaves of a plant Veronica officinalis is submerged.

Leaves of this plant were in the past given as a prophylactic remedy, as an amulet, to pregnant women, but also children, to carry it on their chest in order to be protected from the influence of fear.

In Visoko, but also other neighbouring places, Veronica officinalis or stravna trava would be placed in a metal bowl with spring water, which would be kept, covered on the stove until the water boils. As soon as this happens, while holding a bowl or casserole above the diseased person’s head the stravarka would pour the boiled water from the vessel and she would upturn the vessel in the middle of the casserole, making sure that there is no physical contact with the person. If the vacuum sucks the water underneath the vessel – “absorbs water” – the diseased person will be freed from the influence of fear. An identical procedure is repeated two more times. The diseased person uses the water to wash his face, his arms and legs are wiped and the rest of the water, with the plant, is poured in an intersection.

For curing symptoms of fear Bosnian stravarke often recommend this herbal tea mixture: a fingertip of Mentha pulegium and Veronica officinalis is submerged in two decilitres of water and is left covered for half an hour. The tea should be drunk three times a day with some honey.

Healing power of lead

Among the Bosnian people it is believed that lead that it possesses prophylactic properties which is confirmed by a custom of saying: “lead into the devil’s ears!” as soon as someone hears some bad news, especially about a disease of an accident. The most famous characteristics of lead, because of which it is usually an irreplaceable prop when curing fear, is that lead absorbs negative energy.

In folk medicine in BiH an influence of homeopathy is evident as well as a psychological belief that a shock can be cured by a new shock. Namely, when an individual, especially a child, is mightily frightened due to an unexpected and highly negative surprise, where it is literally overwhelmed by chill and tingling across his stomach and chest, the scared person loses its breath for a moment and then according to stravarke the heart can be moved – “jump out” – a few millimetres or centimetres to the left or the right.

Besides classic symptoms of tension, tiredness, paleness in the face and sudden jitters in sleep, a person whose “heart moved” often loses its breath and has feelings of something piercing their chest. The only cure in that state, according to stravarke, is the ritual of lead melting, whose efficiency in this case is clearly not based on the idea that the frightened person, over which the ritual is performed, will suffer a new shock from a loud sound which is produced by the molten lead touching cold water. During that short term shock, during the three times the lead is molten and poured in a vessel with water, the heart will slowly go back in its place. Material proof for this the stravarke find in the shape of the lead itself which must be shaped as an elongated tear, which is called – heart.



After being subjected to a magical ritual with lead, three hot coals are also thrown inside the water whose sound needs to have a calming effect on the diseased person, since the sound itself symbolises an extinguishing i.e. calming down. The water is used by the diseased person to wash his face and drink some of the water, which concludes the healing process.

There once existed a rule that measuring of fear must be performed before the lead melting ritual, in order to completely eliminate all influence of fear. Stravarke think that fear can enter a person’s blood and bones and “then it is difficult to get it out of a person”, and one must be persistent and inventive when curing.


(1) It is important to mention, that these two places on the human body are considered to be two cardinal spots, according to Bosnian occultism, through which the human body is connected to the spiritual world.