Combined with the word, thus, is a gesture that faithfully reflects its meaning. Moreover, other individuals are summoned to witness the legal transaction. This is done, not so much that these persons may later be able to give definite testimony, as that they, too, shall hear the word and see the gesture, and so, in a sense, enhance the reality of that which is transpiring. Besides this oldest form of witness, who is not to testify regarding that which he has experienced, as occurs in later times, but who is merely present on the occasion of the legal transaction, there is the _compurgator_, who substantiates the oath of the man involved. The latter fortifies his statements by invoking the gods as witnesses. Now, the oath of the compurgator does not relate to the testimony of his companion, but merely to the companion himself; it is a pledge to share the punishment of the latter in case he swears falsely. As in battle, so also in calling upon the terrible powers whose vengeance is to fall upon the perjurer, companion stands protectingly by the side of companion. Thus, the oath itself is a ceremony both of cult and of magic. As a cult activity, the oath was originally given at the place where the cult was administered--that is, in the immediate presence of the gods; the method of procedure was to raise the fingers and to point them directly to the gods, who were regarded as witnesses of the act. The magical nature of the oath appears in the fact that the latter involved the conjuration of an object, which was to bring disaster upon him who took the oath in case he swore falsely. Thus, the Germans swore by their battle-steeds or their weapons, and, in so doing, they laid their hands upon these objects; or, instead of the latter, they used an oath-staff--one of the numerous metamorphoses of the magical wand--which was extended toward him who received the oath, whether the opposing party or the judge. This oath signified that the object by which the individual swore would bring ruin upon him in case he committed perjury. The oath, therefore, came to be a fixed and definitely prescribed means of judicial procedure, though this occurred only after deity cult effected a union of the two factors, cult and magic. Nevertheless, the beginnings of this development are to be found as early as the totemic age, and they approximate to the cult-oath particularly in those regions that practise ancestor worship. The Bantu, for example, swears by the head of his father or the cap of his mother, as well as by the colour of his ox. In all these cases, the intention is that the perjurer shall suffer the vengeance which the demon of the deceased or of the animal visits upon him who swears falsely.