Textual Amulets from Antiquity to Early Modern Times - The Shape of Words (original) (raw)
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Textual Amulets and Writing Traditions in the Ancient World
Guide to the Study of Ancient Magic, ed. David Frankfurter, 2019
A survey of the development of 'unlettered' amulets to fully written amulets from earliest Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Phoenician times on through to the Greek and Roman periods, with particular attention paid to the birth of Babylonian cuneiform amulets; the Pharaonic mortuary texts and decree capsules; the Punic gold lamellae; the early Hebrew amulets; and the first inscribed Greek incantations, emphasizing the continuity and continuance of these amuletic traditions well into the Roman period.
AMULET-EXORCISM CYLINDERS (Scrolls) WITH MAGIC INVOCATION, (17TH, 18TH C.) FROM SPARTA-PISIDIA-IN ASIA MINOR Contribution to the research for Christian amulets, 2023
We can generally distinguish the texts relevant to magic in two types: the magic scrips and the magic objects, which constitute an application of the magic scrips upon one, or for one particular person. The manuscripts presented in the rotulus form, known as scrolls, namely a vertical cylinder, continue the long tradition of Christian exorcisms ; they are recognized as sanctifying acts by the Church, and belong to the category of "negative" sanctions, in which religion and magic are combined. We assume that the way of presenting amulet A is also very rare; in it the selected texts are supplemented with sixteen coloured miniatures of saints, sketched by the miniature-writer himself, who should, no doubt, be a priest. After this, the recessional of the specific Introit saint follows; sometimes his Kontakion as well. Further on, small extracts from liturgical or apocrypha texts are added and, as a rule, they are completed with a magic amulet prayer. The appeal to beneficent spirits is not depicted on the amulets with random words or even sentences. Mystic names are included, symbols and characters, a number of magic words, Greek or Hebrew names, while, among the appeals to the lot of saints, various elements of the Notory Art of Solomon as well as of pagan witchcraft are added. Their presence could be justified according to the items accompanying every saint as one further element for the creation and strengthening of the small story-texts, which sometimes also create what is known today as historiolae. Namely, the writer, following his own symbolic system, shaped and presented in the amulets a number of ideas, yet mainly practical feelings, deriving from personal-individual experiences. In the texts, which consist of about 1200 verses on the whole, and which we transcribed, located, remarked upon in many ways and compared with respective magic-religious passages, there are a lot of magic Nomina Sacra , holy names; in them there are also found words and expressions which reveal strongly the appeal or prayer for help or even protection. Besides, they are adorned with linear depicted jewels and coloured, large, capital letters. These magic texts but mainly the magic traditions, especially those of the areas around the Mediterranean, are acknowledged as a depreciated cultural phenomenon, the meaning of which has not been comprehended until today; moreover, its boundaries have not been wholly determined yet by the researchers. Undoubtedly, however, the writer, especially the one of manuscript A, (Codex Spartae Asiae Minoris Α΄) succeeds in combining the power of the magic papyrus and the Christian word, together with the power of the picture of the signet-amulets, creating, together with the sketches of the saints and the colour, the necessary atmosphere of mystic influence, but the strengthening of interpersonal sentimental relationships as well, in a dynamics effort to help their protégé. Finally, however, as
Tahkik İslami İlimler Araştırma ve Neşir Dergisi, 2022
The need for achieving something and protection has always been prevailing in all societies throughout history, whether it is nature, spirits or a higher deity that have been recourse to. Amulets and talismans are put in use as the mediums for this purpose. Even though their definition and use in practice is not clear-cut, amulets are described as some kind of magical object that can be used continuously and by different users for different purposes the person needs. Talismans, on the other hand, are designed for defined needs and purposes and a specific person. They do not display a monotype characteristic in terms of structure, production, use and perception. However, the fact that their functions are perceived as a way to communicate with the supernatural in the hope of getting divine intervention and help for the specific purpose and need they are being used. Amulets and talismans reflect the socio-cultural and historical background in which they emerged and developed as objects of religious, medical and mystical practices for protection from evil, diseases, etc. Amulets and Talismans of the Middle East and North Africa in Context, a collection of articles focused on various aspects of amulets and talisman and edited by Marcela A. Garcia Probert and Petra M. Sijpesteijn aims to examine these historical objects, their use, interpretation, transformation in time, how people perceived them as well as their functions within the framework of a living religion.
The article explores the apotropaic use of the written word through τhe inscriptions found on Byzantine amulets, i.e. portable items of a private use, which were addressed to a Christian audience and have a magical character because of their depictions, symbols and inscriptions, which are not derived from the traditions of the official church. The aim of the paper is to investigate the perceptions behind the creation, possession and use of these artifacts and to demonstrate that the written word appearing on these objects has all the characteristics of a ritual language, as it is defined in anthropological and religious studies
Microtheologies behind the Biblical amulets : six case studies
Journal of Juristic Papyrology, 2019
Recent years witnessed an increasing interest in Christian amulets with Biblical texts. Several catalogues and monographic contributions have been published, facilitating the research on historical and religious aspects of these artefacts. The paper offers a methodological framework, founded mainly on the concept of semiophore formulated by Krzysztof Pomian, as well as six case studies, which show how the analysis of material and textual aspects of a scriptural amulet might reveal theological ideas, more or less consciously shared by its producers and users.
Scribal Overkill: Textual Density on Ancient Jewish Amulets, 2024
Examining the Jewish textual amulets from Late Antiquity, we can see great variation in their textual density, i.e., the average amount of text written on each square centimeter of the thin sheet of metal. This variation is due in part to the nature of the metals on which the amulets were inscribed, but also reflects the technical competence of individual amulet producers, and their belief in the powers of the texts they were inscribing. Moreover, in order to fill the entire writing surface with text without spilling over to the other side, some amulet producers wrote the text on more than one sheet of metal, thus filling up one sheet, and then continuing the text on the next sheet, whereas other amulet producers tended to add ever-smaller textual units towards the end of their amulet, so as to have their text end at the very end of the writing surface. And the desire to write as much text as possible on each amulet seems to have been stronger among the Jewish amulet producers than among their non-Jewish colleagues, probably because of the strong Jewish belief in the power of words to change the world around us.
In this article we present an up-to-date list of Greek (and Latin) amulets and formularies from Egypt that contain Christian elements. We first discuss the criteria whereby an item is identified as an amulet or formulary and as containing Christian elements; these criteria are used to classify items as having been certainly, probably, or possibly produced or used as an amulet. We then describe some of the main patterns observed in the corpus: the geographical and chronological distribution of the items, the language in which they were written (Greek versus Latin), the materials on which they were written, the purposes for which they were applied, and the dynamics of continuity and change as Christian forms and elements were introduced into the genre. We conclude with an appendix listing all the items included in the corpus and tabulating a basic set of characteristics for each item.
Medieval Byzantine Magical Amulets and their Tradition
diverse yet distinctive group of magical amulets has periodically attracted the attention of scholars from Renaissance times to the present. The amulets take many forms, including engraved gems and cameos, enamel pendants, die-struck bronze tokens, cast or engraved pendants of gold, silver, bronze, and lead, and rings of silver and bronze. All share a common motif-an enigmatic representation of a face from which radiates a varying number of serpents-and this device is usually accompanied by a Greek inscription, often abbreviated or blundered, beginning 'imi~pa p?ta'vrl eLEavg•vrln... ('womb, black, blackening...').
This paper presents evidence for the function of Egyptian amulets in daily life at Late Bronze Age Tel Azekah. The finding of the remains of two individuals in a destroyed Late Bronze Age building along with clusters of Egyptian scarabs and figurative amulets indicates that these artifacts were their personal belongings. It is argued that these Egyptian-originated charm practices were adopted and adapted by the locals, who incorporated them into their own religion.