One of the most pervasive myths about birthmarks is what is known as "maternal impression." According to the abstract of an article published in the journal Dermatology, this phenomenon describes a belief that birthmarks result from the marked child's mother having some sort of strange or frightening encounter during her pregnancy or from certain types of experiences that would otherwise be considered perfectly normal. For example, Japanese tradition held that a pregnant woman who gazed into a fire would give birth to a child with a "burn mark." The Peter Ch'ng Clinic interpreted this to be a mole or cafe au lait spot.
A similar myth is that of a woman who "is startled and touches her face," thus causing the baby to be born with a mark such as a haemangioma or port-wine stain on that same spot on their face. There's even a more modern variant of this legend — that if a pregnant woman has an x-ray it will cause her baby to be born with a mark of some kind.
Yet another way that birthmarks are supposedly caused by the mother relates to something she eats — port-wine stains from drinking wine, cafe au lait stains from drinking coffee, et cetera. Similarly, strawberry marks are sometimes said to be caused by overconsumption of the fruit. Some believe that if an expectant mother scratches herself while having a craving, her child will have a birthmark in that spot.
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