Civilizations of the Supernatural. Witchcraft, Ritual, and Religious Experience in Late Antique, Medieval, and Renaissance Traditions
Civilizations of the Supernatural. Witchcraft, Ritual, and Religious Experience in Late Antique, Medieval, and Renaissance Traditions
Contributor(s): Fabrizio Conti (Editor)
Subject(s): Christian Theology and Religion, History, Philosophy, Cultural history, Special Branches of Philosophy, Ancient World, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion, Philosophy of Religion, 6th to 12th Centuries, 13th to 14th Centuries, 15th Century, History of Religion
Published by: Trivent Publishing
Keywords: Witchcraft; ritual; religion; theology; magic; supernatural; medieval history; renaissance; antiquity; pagan magic; superstition; Christianity; graphophagy; Agrippa; Shakespeare; Bible
Summary/Abstract: Civilizations of the Supernatural: Witchcraft, Ritual, and Religious Experience in Late Antique, Medieval, and Renaissance Traditions brings together thirteen scholars of late-antique, medieval, and renaissance traditions who discuss magic, religious experience, ritual, and witch-beliefs with the aim of reflecting on the relationship between man and the supernatural. The content of the volume is intriguingly diverse and includes late antique traditions covering erotic love magic, Hellenistic-Egyptian astrology, apotropaic rituals, early Christian amulets, and astrological amulets; medieval traditions focusing on the relationships between magic and disbelief, pagan magic and Christian culture, as well as witchcraft and magic in Britain, Scandinavian sympathetic graphophagy, superstition in sermon literature; and finally Renaissance traditions revolving around Agrippan magic, witchcraft in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, and a Biblical toponym related to the Friulan Benandanti’s visionary experiences. These varied topics reflect the multifaceted ways through which men aimed to establish relationships with the supernatural in diverse cultural traditions, and for different purposes, between Late Antiquity and the Renaissance. These ways eventually contributed to shaping the civilizations of the supernatural or those peculiar patterns which helped men look at themselves through the mirror of their own amazement of being in this world.
- E-ISBN-13: 978-615-81689-8-4
- Print-ISBN-13: 978-615-81689-1-5
- Page Count: 383
- Publication Year: 2020
- Language: English
Aelian on Tortoise Sex and the Artifice of “Erotic Love Magic”
Aelian on Tortoise Sex and the Artifice of “Erotic Love Magic”
(Aelian on Tortoise Sex and the Artifice of “Erotic Love Magic”)
- Author(s):Naomi Janowitz
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Ancient World, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:13-30
- No. of Pages:18
- Keywords:love magic; Ancient Greek; rites of sexuality; literary anecdotes
- Summary/Abstract:For the Roman author Claudius Aelianus (Aelian, ca. 175–235 CE), intercourse is not a simple issue for animals. In his book On Animals, Aelian introduces the tortoise as follows: “Tortoises are the most lustful land animals but the males only, the females do not willingly mate.” Luckily, nature offers a solution to this dilemma. Male tortoises, Aelian states, use a plant to stimulate an appetite for sex in reluctant female tortoises. Christopher Faraone, in a sophisticated analysis of the anecdote, considers it evidence of “love magic.” He connects the anecdote with much earlier Greek rites via their standard classification in this category. Ancient Greek love magic includes agape-inducing formulas/rites used by men to turn women into passionate lovers and philia-inducing formulas/rites used by women to attract men. The category “love magic” is widely used to evaluate and classify rites, adopted recently by Radcliffe Edmonds. Evidence includes the use of lead tablets with cursing formula (fourth century B.C.E.), rites related to intercourse or sexuality found in the Greek papyri (first-fourth centuries C.E.), and numerous Greek and Roman literary anecdotes about goddesses or women who poison or attempt to poison men for marital or love interests.
- Price: 8.00 €
The Dodekaoros, Magical Papyri, and Magical Gems
The Dodekaoros, Magical Papyri, and Magical Gems
(The Dodekaoros, Magical Papyri, and Magical Gems)
- Author(s):Attilio Mastrocinque
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Ancient World, Theology and Religion, History of Religion
- Page Range:31-63
- No. of Pages:33
- Summary/Abstract:The Dodekaoros is an astrological system based on twelve symbolic animals, each one representing a form of the Sun when approaching a particular constellation and zodiacal sign. This system was used for horoscopes. Its origin has no certain chronology and is known from the late Hellenistic Age thanks to the Babylonian astrologist Teukros. Nevertheless, the system was probably older and seems to be rooted in the Egyptian speculations about the different forms of the Sun God. Its use in some magical papyri and gems is studied here by taking also new data into account. In particular, we will review the Papyri Graeca Magica (thereafter PGM) IV, 1644-1649, XXXVIII, 1-26, reporting the Dodekaoros with an orientation (with the cat in S-E), and III, 500-535, where καν[θάρου should be read and not καμ[μάρου. Two features will prove particularly useful in our research: the orientation of the system and the nocturnal part of the animal series. Several animal forms of the Dodekaoros also appear on magical gems, where they are placed in the cardinal points. In PGM II, 103-40 and on a magical gem, the Sun has 4 four forms in the different quarters of the sky and – this system can be understood only if we remember that these forms depend on the Dodekaoros and if we place one half the forms beneath the Earth, during the night; moreover, in PGM VIII, 6-11 four animals of the Dodekaoros are displaced into the four cardinal points. Some series of magical gems represent five animal forms of the Dodekaoros repeated thrice in order to depict the lower, the middle, and the upper parts of the world. These iconographies were aimed to represent the solar god in his variety of forms with his related influences over the world. This chapter will first study the meaning of the Dodekaoros, then its descriptions in magical papyri with or without orientation, and finally it will analyze several magical gems.
- Price: 8.00 €
How to Deal With the Evil Daimones
How to Deal With the Evil Daimones
(How to Deal With the Evil Daimones)
- Author(s):Tiana Blazevic
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Ancient World, Theology and Religion, History of Religion
- Page Range:65-97
- No. of Pages:33
- Keywords:Neoplatonism; Ritual Control; Magic; Theurgy; Daimones; Apotropaic; Egypt; Greco-Roman Magic; Ritual; Demonology
- Summary/Abstract:This chapter analyses the self-styling of Porphyry and Iamblichus as Priestly-Philosophers and divine theurgists who were competing against the ritualists of the so-called magical papyri. Using an anthropological perspective and a close reading of the relevant texts, this study establishes that knowledge of daimones was unequivocally tied up in the production and negotiation of power relations in late antiquity. This chapter will demonstrate the striking similarities between Neoplatonic daimonic theories and the magical papyri. This chapter is also the first serious attempt at looking at the practical aspects of late antique demonology in pagan writers.
- Price: 8.00 €
Prayer and Incantation on Early Christian Amulets
Prayer and Incantation on Early Christian Amulets
(Prayer and Incantation on Early Christian Amulets)
- Author(s):Joseph E. Sanzo
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Christian Theology and Religion, History, Ancient World, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion, History of Religion
- Page Range:99-116
- No. of Pages:18
- Keywords:Amulet; prayer; magic; religion; materiality; euchê; phylaktêrion.
- Summary/Abstract:This chapter examines the manifold ways late antique Christian practitioners (ca. third-seventh centuries) negotiated the boundaries between Christian prayers and traditional amuletic practices. I supplement recent research, which has usefully demonstrated the overlapping characteristics of prayers and incantations, by focusing on the semantic range and principal traits of the term euchê (and its cognates) when it is present on Greek and Coptic amulets and ritual handbooks. The analysis is further augmented by a discussion of how some practitioners diminished or highlighted the material properties of prayers in their apotropaic and curative rituals.
- Price: 4.50 €
Astrological Amulets in the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius
Astrological Amulets in the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius
(Astrological Amulets in the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius)
- Author(s):Paolo Vitellozzi
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Ancient World, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion, History of Religion
- Page Range:117-176
- No. of Pages:60
- Keywords:Sacred Book; Hermes Trismegistus; Asclepius; Zodiac; Egyptian Decans; Amulets; Ancient Magic; Astrology; Herbs and Plants; Engraved Gems; Lapidaries; Stones; Graeco-Roman Religion.
- Summary/Abstract:The Hermetic treatise known as the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius (Ἱερὰ βίβλος) contains recipes for making magical amulets consecrated to the thirty-six decans of the Egyptian zodiac, thus providing reliable descriptions of these astrological figures. For each amulet, the treatise then recommends a gemstone, a plant, and a food prohibition which are evidently connected with the astrological nature of the decans themselves, according either to the Egyptian tradition or to the Hellenic magical lore. Relying on the most recent studies on decanal iconographies, this chapter aims at providing examples of engraved gems produced following the prescriptions in the Sacred Book; many of these specimens are found in the corpus of the so-called “magical gems”, some Roman imperial amulets which were deeply investigated in the last decades. Moreover, the essay will attempt to understand the astrological theories underlying the creation of the amulets described by the treatise, trying to determine the ideal relationship among the different ingredients to be used. This will eventually lead to further conclusions regarding magical practises in the Graeco-Roman world.
- Price: 9.00 €
Magic and Disbelief in Carolingian Lyon
Magic and Disbelief in Carolingian Lyon
(Magic and Disbelief in Carolingian Lyon)
- Author(s):Michael D. Bailey
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:177-202
- No. of Pages:26
- Keywords:Agobard of Lyon; Carolingian church; disenchantment; hail; reform; skepticism; unbelief; weather magic
- Summary/Abstract:The Middle Ages are often associated with credulity, especially toward magic, compared to modern Western society, which is often regarded as thoroughly disenchanted. Yet not all medieval people believed unhesitatingly in all magical practices. The early ninth-century Carolingian archbishop Agobard of Lyon described a remarkable system of weather-magic widely believed by people in his diocese of which he was completely skeptical. He justified his disbelief through references to biblical texts, but this study argues that his disbelief was grounded in his own encounters with and investigations of these magical practices, and focused only on certain elements within them.
- Price: 4.50 €
The Merseburg Charms
The Merseburg Charms
(The Merseburg Charms)
- Author(s):Martina Lamberti
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:203-220
- No. of Pages:18
- Keywords:Old High German literature; Merseburg Charms; pagan spells; pagan Germanic deities; religion and magic;Medieval culture;
- Summary/Abstract:Among the texts of Old High German literature, two alliterative spells, the Merseburg charms, contained in a tenth-century liturgical manuscript, show some analogies with Christian prayers. This chapter focuses on the role of Christianity in the literary production of medieval Germany, with special regard to magic formulas. Attention is drawn on the manuscriptʼs paleography and contents, and it continues with the magic “genre” and the study of spells. Then, the Merseburg charms are analysed on the basis of content, structure, language, and parallels with other texts. The purpose of this study is to show the analogies between Christian prayers and heathen charms with regard to their allusions to the divine and the fulfillment of performative acts.
- Price: 8.00 €
Hirsuta et cornuta cum lancea trisulcata
Hirsuta et cornuta cum lancea trisulcata
(Hirsuta et cornuta cum lancea trisulcata)
- Author(s):Francesco Marzella
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:221-246
- No. of Pages:26
- Keywords:Witchcraft; Hagiography; Arthurian Legend; Anglo-Latin Literature; Geoffrey of Monmouth; William of Malmesbury
- Summary/Abstract:This paper investigates the perception of witchcraft and magic in three Latin literary sources that were written or circulated in twelfth century Britain. The study focuses on both historical and narrative aspects, stressing how the approach to witchcraft can be influenced by the different purposes of the texts. The analysis of the texts will prove how very often behind the images of women endowed with supernatural powers or learned in magical arts lies a warning against potentially dangerous cultural and religious ‘othernesses’.
- Price: 8.00 €
Sympathetic Graphophagy in Late Medieval Scandinavian Leechbooks and Collections of Charms
Sympathetic Graphophagy in Late Medieval Scandinavian Leechbooks and Collections of Charms
(Sympathetic Graphophagy in Late Medieval Scandinavian Leechbooks and Collections of Charms)
- Author(s):Andrea Maraschi
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:247-264
- No. of Pages:18
- Keywords:Sympathetic magic; graphophagy; late medieval Scandinavia; magic-religion-science triad; late medieval North; medieval leechbooks; medieval magic; medieval medicine
- Summary/Abstract:This article examines four late medieval Scandinavian manuscripts (ca. 1400-1500 AD), namely three leechbooks and a collection of charms, with the aim of investigating the still remarkable importance of sympathetic magic in Christian times for practitioners of both magic and medicine. Particular attention is paid to the role of graphophagy, that is, the practice of eating or drinking written formulas so as to absorb their powers. The sources show that modern distinctions between magic, religion, and science are unsuitable to describe the mindset of their authors. On the contrary, these sources shared the ancient belief that written formulas (whether Christian or not) could be literally taken via ingestion.
- Price: 8.00 €
Superstitions in a Sermon of Stanisław of Skarbimierz (ca. 1360-1431)
Superstitions in a Sermon of Stanisław of Skarbimierz (ca. 1360-1431)
(Superstitions in a Sermon of Stanisław of Skarbimierz (ca. 1360-1431))
- Author(s):Ewelina Kaczor
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Christian Theology and Religion, History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion, History of Religion
- Page Range:265-285
- No. of Pages:21
- Keywords:medieval preaching; sermons; superstition; popular devotion; Church reform
- Summary/Abstract:Stanisław’s of Skarbimierz’ sermon no. 47 from his collection Sermones sapientiales provides one of the most detailed records of superstitions in a Polish sermon. Moreover, to a large degree, such a record is independent of material contained in earlier sources concerning the same topic. This suggests that the sermon was an instrument for correcting the beliefs and practices of a living congregation into which the preacher had insight and was versed in its folk beliefs and practices. The aim of this chapter is to study the accounts of these superstitions and to examine the preacher’s attitude toward it.
- Price: 8.00 €
Operari per fidem
Operari per fidem
(Operari per fidem)
- Author(s):Noel Putnik
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:287-311
- No. of Pages:25
- Keywords:magic; religion; theurgy; ritual; faith; emanation; ascent; De occulta philosophi
- Summary/Abstract:This essay examines Cornelius Agrippa’s understanding of magic and magical ritual, which was profoundly religious, albeit not in line with mainstream Christian theology. Through a textual analysis, I scrutinize the Neoplatonic roots of Agrippa’s theory of magic and suggest that he viewed a properly executed magical ritual as resulting in a state of rapture, or an altered state of consciousness. As part of the analysis, I explore tempting textual parallels between the suggested notion of magical rapture in Agrippa and similar concepts found in the New Testament, Plotinus, and Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite.
- Price: 8.00 €
Reasoning with Witchcraft
Reasoning with Witchcraft
(Reasoning with Witchcraft)
- Author(s):Melissa Pullara
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:313-336
- No. of Pages:24
- Keywords:witch; drama; moral philosophy; religious belief; early modern England
- Summary/Abstract:In this chapter, I argue that the Weird Sisters in Macbeth influence him to pursue rational deliberation, a key facet of humanist moral philosophy, wherein people make decisions that serve an individual good rather than a universal morality. I conduct a literary analysis of the play to demonstrate how Shakespeare parallels the witches and Macbeth by highlighting their linguistic similarities and shared propensity for rhetorical, and by extension, psychological manipulation through rationalization. In so doing, Shakespeare reveals that the potential for the abuse of reason towards individual gain is an innate part of a flawed human nature which people, particularly those who make up larger religious and political institutions, seek to deny by displacing that internal threat onto external forces in an attempt to ignore their own moral fallibilities. I end the chapter with a brief look at Thomas Middleton’s The Witch and Ben Jonson’s Masque of Queens to demonstrate how other early modern English playwrights complicate the relationship between witch and human characters to demonstrate how closely related the two are.
- Price: 8.00 €
Envisioning the Afterlife from the “Seaport of Friuli”
Envisioning the Afterlife from the “Seaport of Friuli”
(Envisioning the Afterlife from the “Seaport of Friuli”)
- Author(s):Cora Presezzi
- Language:English
- Subject(s):History, Middle Ages, Theology and Religion
- Page Range:337-370
- No. of Pages:34
- Price: 8.00 €
