As shown by Sir E.B.Tylor in _Primitive Culture_, [123] the breath, the shadow and the pupil of the eye were sometimes held to be or to represent the soul or spirit.

Disembodied spirits are imprisoned in a tree or hole by driving nails into the tree or ground to confine them and prevent their exit.

When a man died accidentally or a woman in childbirth and fear was felt that their spirits might annoy or injure the living, a stake might be driven through the body or a cairn of stones piled over it in order to keep the ghost down and prevent it from rising and walking.

The genii of the Arabian Nights were imprisoned in sealed bottles, and when the bottle was opened they appeared in a cloud of vapour.
There seems every reason to suppose, as the same author suggests, that man first thought he had a spirit himself and as a consequence held that animals, plants and inanimate objects also contained spirits.

Because the belief that the human body had a spirit can easily be accounted for, but there seems to be no valid reason why man should have thought that all other visible objects also contained spirits, except that at the period when he conceived of the existence of a soul or spirit he still held them to be possessed of life and self-conscious volition like himself.