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evil eye| The power of injuring, bewitching, or even killing by a glance. The superstitious belief that certain people possess this power is still common in some parts of the world. Amulets are worn to protect against it. |
| Children and young people are supposed to be particularly susceptible and any unexpected calamity befalling a child may be accounted for by its having been ‘overlooked’. Animals are also regarded as susceptible. The glance of a person suffering from any physical quirk, such as a cast in the eye or a squint, is regarded as particularly dangerous. The power is supposed to be involuntary in many cases and not cultivated with evil intent. |
| The gesture of a clasped hand held out with index and little finger extended is supposed in Mediterranean cultures to avert the evil eye. |
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| ? Mentioned in | | ? References in classic literature |
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| And for this reason, as the captain looked with an evil eye on the little foundling, his wife began now to caress it almost equally with her own child. It succeeded, however; and though Sir Walter must ever look with an evil eye on anyone intending to inhabit that house, and think them infinitely too well off in being permitted to rent it on the highest terms, he was talked into allowing Mr Shepherd to proceed in the treaty, and authorising him to wait on Admiral Croft, who still remained at Taunton, and fix a day for the house being seen. Far off, the lofty jet of the whale might be seen, and nearer at hand the prowling shark, that villainous footpad of the seas, would come skulking along, and, at a wary distance, regard us with his evil eye. |