MANTIS DE VIDIT
Jeffrey Stuker
August 2024
The spider fascinates the toad. It is said that the large tarantulas of Brazil attract hummingbirds with their gaze, which so easily become their prey. In ancient times, the locust played an important role in magic; it was believed to have prophetic powers, which is why it was also called “mantis” (fortune teller); and it was claimed that it harmed people with its gaze. “Graus seriphos,” it was also called—a derisive name for an old maid. Belief in the magical power of this animal was so widespread in ancient Rome that when someone became ill without any apparent cause, people would cry out: Mantis te vidit (The mantis has looked at you). —The mantis of the Greeks is probably identical to the “praying mantis,” called Prego-Dieu (the animal that prays to God) by the peasants of Provence because of its unusual claws, which it raises to heaven like arms in a praying position. The mantis attacks another insect, namely a locust or a grasshopper, by assuming a peculiar, terrifying position and staring at it, turning its head slightly as it changes its position. The threatened animal is so fascinated by this that, although it can easily save itself by jumping, it remains dumbly in its place or even approaches with slow steps, only to be seized by the claws of the praying mantis.
—Siegfried Seligmann, “Insekten,” Der Böse Blick und Verwandtes: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Aberglaubens aller Zeiten und Völker: Hermann Barsdorf Verlag, Berlin, 1910, page 135.