Talismans and Amulets

This article analyses the place and value of occult arts in the healthcare market of Republican China (1912-1949). Medical historiography has long neglected the resilience of such occult arts as talismans, astrology and divination in the context of China's search for modernity. Focusing on the production, trade, and consumption of goods and services related to talismanic healing, I give voice to Chinese occultists by investigating the formation of a 'market of the occult' in the Republican era. I adopt a global perspective to clarify the changes that occult healing underwent following the popularisation of new printing technologies, mass media and transnational spiritualism in early twentieth-century China. Erstwhile embraced in secrecy, the occult was now being made public. Cheap manuals, wide-circulation newspapers and book catalogues reveal that in contrast to past studies that herald the disenchantment of the world as the hallmark of Chinese modernity, occult healing did not simply survive but thrived in the face of modern science and technology.

No doubt, every nation had possessed a set of deeply rooted
beliefs, these rendered into variant practices and traditions,
establishing civilization aspects. The belief in magic,
superstitions and divinations are categorized under these
beliefs. Mankind had tremendously believed their ability to
hurt, bring bad destiny, and on other hand, trusting their
capacity to bestow protection and guarantee good luck, thus,
motivated the appeal to possessing amulets and talismans.
This research paper deals with ‘Bāzūbands’; a form of
amulets and talismans, worn by warriors to, morally,
safeguard them and ensure triumph through Qur’ānic
inscriptions, invocations, besides other magical texts. The
research tackles some important aspects related the Safavid
and Qajar bāzūbands, like the belief in magic, its roots in the
Persian culture, an etymological study for the different terms;
‘amulet’, ‘talisman’ and ‘bāzūband’, to reveal their roots and
consequent development. This is followed by a preview for
the Shi‘ītes’ attitude regarding amulets and talismans, and the
main elements that should be exploited in fashioning them,
and the influence of the Shi‘īte belief on its mounting and
ornamentation. In addition, a detailed description for a
special collection of talismanic ‘bāzūbands’ from world-wide
museums and private collections; some of which are to be
published for the first time, is enclosed. Thenceforth, a
concise analysis for the described samples is incorporated.

The three-headed goddess Hekate is well known from texts and depictions from the middle of the first millenium BC onwards and also a common motive on so-called magical gems from the third or fourth century AD. The present paper presents a collection of the known attestations of magical gems with a depiction of Hekate and classifies these into different groups. The representations of the goddess clearly represent her typical appearance with three heads or faces, but can be separated into groups of triprosopos, trikephalos or a depiction with three heads and three bodies.

In West Africa, Berber groups such as the Tuareg of Mali and Niger use inscribed silver jewelry – rings, pendants and plaques – as talismans. A ring with a curved or flat frontal area may be inscribed with a linear cipher or, if large, carry a “magic square” design. A survey of 132 Tuareg/Berber items revealed that the symbol repertoire appears to be drawn from overlapping categories that include Eastern Arabic and Perso-Arabic numerals, and possibly Western digits and Indian Devanagari numbers as well; Arabic letters; Tifinagh and Libyco-Berber characters; and the Islamic Seven Seals (the ism al-aʿzam or Greatest Name). Most items combine symbols of different types, and reflections and rotations of stock symbols are common. The magic squares sometimes display complete or partial symmetry, with diagonals containing repeats of a single symbol. No two designs were identical, but it was possible to define sub-groups based on style and content. With numerical considerations seemingly secondary to aesthetics, none of the magic squares were mathematically competent. Tuareg gri gri plaques also carry magic square designs, but seem to contain mainly Tifinagh letters. A distinct set of rings also carry Tifinagh-based magic squares; recently-made items of this type may be “Tifinagh alphabet” souvenirs made for tourists. Cryptic apotropaic rings are also found in East Africa. In Ethiopia, especially among the Oromo in the southwestern highland district of Jimma, smiths inscribe white-metal or silver rings with talismanic symbols. The former are just convex circular bands of hard alloy into which glyphs are stamped using simple punch tools. Being softer, silver rings may instead bear symbols incised by scratching or engraving. For either material, the symbols are typically arranged evenly around the ring band; there are usually two circular series, and sometimes the symbols of the upper circle are a reflection (through the ring’s equator) of those in the lower. The Ethiopian symbol repertoire appears to be drawn from Eastern Arabic and possibly Devanagari numbers; Arabic letters; the Islamic Seven Seals; and unique symbols that resist identification. Most Ethiopian rings combine numerical and non-numerical symbols, and reflections and rotations of characters are common. As one might expect from this makeup, there is a significant overlap with the symbol repertoire of Tuareg rings. The most extreme similarities occur in the small subset of Tuareg and Ethiopian rings that carry complete sets of the Islamic Seven Seals.

This paper proposes a novel source for – or at least influence on – the iconography of the Moon trump in the Rider-Waite Tarot deck, which preserves the design from the Tarot de Marseille. In fact, the Moon template appears to date back to the earliest days of the Tarot. The proposed source or prototype is a Greco-Roman talismanic design against the Evil Eye known as the "all-suffering eye", which frequently occupies the reverse face of Byzantine copper/bronze "Holy Rider" amulets. The paper identifies compositional elements that correspond in the Evil Eye and Moon card designs, presents reasons why the moon and the Evil Eye might have been thought of as cognates, and considers other likely inputs into the Moon card's visual program.

"Amulets in Ancient Egypt" - Essay for the publication which appeared in conjunction with the exhibition "Zierde, Zauber, Zeremonien. Amulette zum Schutz von Körper, Hab und Seele" (Adornment, Magic, Ceremonies. Amulets for the Protection of the Body, Possessions and the Soul / Schriftenreihe des Landesmuseums für Natur und Mensch, Heft 51 / 2007, pages 47-58) at Landesmuseum für Natur und Mensch in Oldenburg / Germany (10 June – 26 August 2007). - The PDF also includes the foreword by Mamoun Fansa (p. 7-8), the introductory chapter by Katharina Herrmann (p. 9-21) and the catalogue with selected objects of the amulet collection of the famous ethnologist and Islamic amulets expert Peter W. Schienerl (1940-2001). - Parts of his huge collection of mainly modern Egyptian amulets are nowadays in Vienna (Weltmuseum), Berlin (Ethnologisches Museum), Dresden (Museum für Völkerkunde) and what had remained was bequested to the Oldenburg museum by his widow Jutta Schienerl (1937-2002) and entered the Landesmuseum für Natur und Mensch in 2003. - (in German)

Resumen: Este documento demuestra patrones ocultos en los cuadrados mágicos, en este caso en el cuadrado del Sol, como lo llamo C. Agrippa. Este forma figuras geométricas sorprendentes. Es un cuadrado muy enigmático y utilizado en la antigüedad como talismán para adorar al Sol.

Vestiges of scorpion symbolism in medieval and early modern European culture, largely mediated through astrological, astro-medical, and occult doctrines, and promoted in religious iconography, were further influenced by the revival of classical precedents, often reinterpreted and newly adopted in contemporary contexts. Depictions of the scorpion symbol in early modern Italian art reflect this accumulated complexity, with its contrasts between, or combinations of, positive and negative meanings. A unique example will be studied here in the portrait of Elisabetta Gonzaga (1471-1526) wearing a scorpion pendant  on her forehead. My aim is to demonstrate that this scorpion jewel is not only a significant element of her portrait, in that it relates to meaningful aspects of Elisabetta's life, character, and public image, but also constitutes evidence of prevalent beliefs and attitudes.

In Islamic magic, the Greatest Name of God is traditionally represented in graphic form by a series of seven glyphs known as the Seven Seals; the series is also known to Jewish Kabbalah. Ciphers of a very different appearance, characterised by strings of single-letter (ha’ and ‘ayn) repeats, are another recurring feature of Islamic amulets, as for example in the popular “Pleiades Square.” These ciphers are often found close to occurrences of the Seven Seals and, while much less well known, they too are alleged to represent the Greatest Name. In the present communication, an unexpected avian association for the repeat-letter ciphers is explained in terms of the mythology of the Pleiades star cluster. Moreover, the ciphers are shown for the first time to relate directly to the Seven Seals via a ca. twelfth-century CE prototype of the latter preserved in a manuscript copy of the Diwan of Ali (Brit. Mus. 577 Add. 7534). While this prototype was soon supplanted by the now canonical version of the Seven Seals, degraded forms of the Diwan series seem to have survived incognito as the repeat-letter ciphers, which persist in Shi‘a talismanic plaques sold today. Two other unexpected survivals/revivals of the Diwan Seal series in talismans of recent manufacture are also presented: one inscribed on an Ethiopian silver ring, the other concluding a Jewish Kabbalah scroll. The newly proposed Seal–cipher–Pleiades relationship links two auspicious heptads by associating the Seven Seals with the Seven Stars, a conjunction reminiscent of the seven stars/seals nexus in Revelation 1-6.

In Islamic mysticism and theurgy, the Seven Seals represent in graphic form the Greatest Name of God; in Jewish Kabbalah, the Seals bear individual Divine Names which collectively form a “Great Name.” We review and compare the primary interpretations and secondary associations for each Seal in Islam and Judaism, from which it is clear that the two traditions have developed largely independent understandings of the individual symbols. Nevertheless, points of convergence – such as the interpretation of the fourth Seal as a ladder and an ascent to/of goodness – do exist. Conversely, the attributes of the third Islamic and seventh Jewish Seals have a surprising amount in common. Collectively, the Seals have been linked via word- and letter-counting to key affirmations of each religion: the Islamic ones to the Shahāda, the Jewish ones to Psalm 46:7,11. In contrast to the Islamic Seals, individual correspondences are rarely given for the Jewish Seals and are inconsistent across sources. Kabbalistic amulets are more likely to employ the Names of the Seals than their symbols, and when present the latter are often much degraded; in contrast, Islamic talismans make frequent use of the symbol series. In Islamic magic, the Seven Seals are associated with the seven Ṭahaṭīl Names, which exhibit possible similarities to the Names of the Seals in Kabbalah. Intriguing overlaps of the Jewish Seal Names with Egyptian mythology and Vedic Sanskrit are explored, but ultimately it is thought more likely that the  seven Names derive from the Names of God’s fingers and eyes (five plus two, respectively) in the Shīʿūr Qōmah of the Hekhalot literature. Fittingly, exegesis of the Seals in both Judaism and Islam contains general themes of hands/fingers and sight/blindness.

Rock crystal is a stone frequently used for amulets, though among the materials least favored for magical intaglios. Particularly important
are the polished crystal spheres surviving both from imperial Roman Italy and from early medieval western Europe. The simple geometric forms of both groups are of course very similar, but I suggest that their usage was different in important ways.

Although the apotropaic qualities of tefillin have been generally recognised, there is one additional aspect that needs some further attention. The main purpose of this paper is therefore to present the connection between tefillin and Deuteronomy 28:10 that is drawn in the early Rabbinic literature. The said verse reads: and all the nations of the land will see that the name of Yahveh is called upon you and will be afraid of you and in itself bears the meaning of distinction, provision and protection. Yet, despite this verse’s interpretative potential, it is referred to just eleven times in the scope of both Talmuds and Midrash R. Seven of these references are clustered in the Babylonian Talmud: one (Berakhot 56a) interprets the passage as a metaphor of fame, whereas the remaining six (Berakhot 6a, 57a; Megillah 16b; Sotah 17a; Menahot 35b; Hullin 89a) explicitly state that the words the name of Yahveh is called upon you refer to head-tefillin. Meanwhile, the other four mentions (Exodus R. 15:6, 17; Deuteronomy R. 1:25; JT Berakhot 5:1 37b-38a) portray Israel as an earthly representative of Yahveh respected and feared by the heathens, despite the military supremacy of the latter. This indirect connection between tefillin and the idea of godly provision is supported by BT Menahot 36b and Mekhilta de-rabbi Ishmael to Exodus 12:23, 14:29, which explain the power of tefillin as stemming from the sacred names contained therein. This explanation fits the broader context of the apotropaic power of divine appellations.

Lamaštu is known as a baby-snatching demon that attacks especially children and pregnant women but also men and cattle. Rituals and apotropaic amulets were used in Mesopotamia, Anatolia and the Levant to protect persons and animals from this malevolent demon. These amulets were canonized in Assyria during the 1st millennium BCE. As a result, elaborated amulets depicting Lamaštu herself and several Zwischenwesen (urigallū, ugallu and lulal, apkallu and Pazuzu), as well as the afflicted patient and the āšipu-priest were created. This paper aims to examine the congruency between iconographic narrative and performed ritual. Furthermore, the visual perception of the magico-religious imagery of the amulets will be examined by identifying the agents and recipients of the pictorial message. By untangling the levels of visual communication and embedding them into ritual context, some light is to be shed on one of the most intriguing subjects in the ‘Arcane Arts’ of Mesopotamia.

Object study of a pottery amulet, ostensibly from Israel/Palestine, which came to light in a deceased estate. While it seems to date from Late Antiquity, almost every aspect of this pendant is unexpected. Its shape – a three-armed star – lacks amuletic precedents. Its surfaces bear crude figurative images which seem to have been incised after the clay was fired. On one face, three male anthropomorphic figures – reminiscent of figurae magicae from the Greek Magical Papyri (PGM) in their crudeness, disposition and ambiguity – surround a central five-pointed star. On the other face appears another male anthropomorph together with two horned deer or antelopes, two canine or feline predators, and a fish; the man and the animals all seem at peace together. The bucolic scene continues onto one edge thickness, where an additional stag-like beast appears with two more of the predators. The scenes do not conform to known templates, such as the repertoire from magical gems, and resist interpretation. The two other edge thicknesses contain pseudo-inscriptions.

Kora avar kori temetőrészlet Szihalom-Budaszögről. Archaeológiai Értesítő 138, 2013, 157-173.
The west to east oriented graves of an Early Avar period cemetery came to light at Szihalom-Budaszög in 1996. Two clay mugs turned on a fast wheel bespeak local Gepidic ceramic traditions. A wooden amulet capsule can likewise be linked to Pannonian and Transylvanian communities with a Merovingian culture. The gold and gilt bronze mounts of the capsule suggest the burial of an individual from the community’s elite. The gold mounts of the capsule are decorated with four masks arranged in a cross-like design. The stylistic and iconographic parallels to the masks point towards Italy and the regions north of the Alps. The capsule provides evidence for syncretic beliefs: the amulet was probably believed to have both pagan magical and Christian protective properties.
The small cemetery was used by a local Gepidic community with good contacts with Western Europe living under the overlordship of the Avar Khaganate.

The present article is an investigation of talismans and prayers emerging from the recently dried Zāyandehrud riverbed. Adopting an archaeological approach, this article seeks for the relation between these materials and the surrounding ritual behavior through evaluating the former. These materials are the only remnants of a behavior that is essentially immaterial. They are created to be thrown into the river and hidden in it with the intention of triggering the magical effects or breaking up them. These material objects which are discovered by chance and because of the river water stop flowing represent a covert behavior of the people of Isfahan who tend to secrecy and leave little material evidence of their behaviors. Without trying to make any judgement on any behavior, the main goal of this study is to evaluate and analyze one of the behaviors of a contemporary people through the lens of their remaining material cultures. To have a more accurate picture of various layers of this cultural behavior in the city, three different communal space i.e., mosque, shrine and cemetery have been also surveyed. At the end, after providing a brief historical background, there is a discussion focused on this kind of attitude toward the mysterious knowledges within the context of modern everyday life in Iran.

Arm. gočazm, used of ‘turquoise’ and ‘lapis lazuli’ in the 17th c., translates in the Bible as an unknown stone, the ligure, but the names have been mixed up. In Epiphanius’ De Gemmis (394) and the manuscript Erevan 1500 (1292), it has been re-placed by amet‘ist(os) ‘amethyst’. Seeing that the amethyst is called ‘ên ‘ēḡlā ‘calf’s eye’ in the same passage of the Syriac bible, gočazm must be a loanword from MP *go-čašm ‘ox eye’. It was borrowed with the meaning ‘evil-eye amulet’; such amulets typically consist of blue gemstones or dried sheep eyes. In Turkish, certain types with eye decorations are called öküzgöz ‘ox eye’ or danagöz ‘cow eye’, and are used as protective beads on cattle. The sibilant in gočazm was fronted under the influence of MP asmān- ‘sky’ as in asmān-gōn ‘sky-blue, light blue’ which may itself, as a noun, have referred directly to blue gems; at least its Classical Persian descendant was borrowed into Andalusian Arabic as ‘smānjūn ‘sapphire’. Voicing of Arm. *-sN- occurs in some Iranian loanwords, e.g. yazmik ‘jasmin’ < Pahl. yasmīn.

A single bamboo slip was found at Mawangdui tomb M2 inside the passageway leading to the pit where Li Cang (d. ca. 186 BCE), the Marquis of Dai and Prime Minister of Changsha, was buried. Though almost entirely unnoticed in previous scholarship, the M2 slip has much to tell us about the overlapping textual, ritual, administrative, and funerary practices of early Western Han China. I offer a description of the slip, translations of its contents, a consideration of how it was used at the tomb site, and an analysis of what its archaeological context tells us about the use of talismans in Western Han burials. Specifically, I show that the slip originally formed part of a multi-piece tomb inventory manuscript, and that it was removed and ritually deposited inside the passageway in order to protect the tomb from robbers and malevolent spirits.

In this paper we will overview different types and categories of Persian Shiite talismans and amulets (wood, stone, iron, textile, etc.). Fabrication, distribution, and function of such material religion will be the main aim of this presentation. For this paper we may also use some footage of ethnographic documentaries.

A manuscript detective story focused on the earliest known description in Judaism of the “seven Kabbalistic signs” or “seven Seals,” a set of symbols which even today enjoys widespread popularity in talismans from the Middle East and beyond. The IMHM blog post contains a Summary, copies of the figures, and a link to the PDF file containing the full paper, which is mirrored here.

This article provides a contextual analysis of an enigmatic object—dubbed the “Confucius Dressing Mirror” (Kongzi yijing 孔子衣鏡)—recently unearthed from the tomb of Liu He 劉賀 (Marquis of Haihun 海昏侯, d. 59 B.C.E.) in 2015. I raise questions about the prevailing identification of this object as a “dressing mirror” and a “lived object” used by Liu He for moral self-cultivation or political self-preservation in his volatile life of being the deposed ninth emperor of Han. Instead, I treat the object as an assemblage and analyze its complete material composition and physical placement in Liu He’s tomb in the broader context of funerary material culture and burial practice in early imperial China. I propose to consider the entombed object as a composite talisman to protect the deceased against baleful and harmful influences in the tomb and in his afterlife. Methodologically, this article stresses the importance of contextual analysis in shedding light on the traditional conceptual categories such as  “lived object” (shengqi 生器) and “funerary objects” (mingqi 明器) in actual funerary ritual processes.

La mort d’autrui est une épreuve que les communautés humaines ont dû apprendre à surmonter dès les premiers temps de l’Humanité. Ce travail est une exploration des différentes réponses proposées par l’homme face au problème de la perte de l’autre à travers les gestes effectués sur le corps mort, depuis les soins thanatopraxiques jusqu’aux funérailles en plusieurs temps ou la création de reliques.

La manipulation post-mortem des corps fournit régulièrement à l’archéologue des “dépôts secondaires” ou des dépôts primaires ayant subi des manipulations anthropiques post-dépositionnelles. Ces dépôts impliquent une gestion complexe et planifiée du processus funéraire et, en général, des gestes / pratiques / cérémonies en plusieurs épisodes.

Cette thèse propose un éclaircissement des concepts et de la nomenclature liés à ces dépôts spécifiques. Une analyse transchronologique et transculturelle d’études de cas archéologiques et ethnologiques nous permet d’éclairer ces phénomènes mortuaires complexes dans leur dimension anthropologique.

///////

Human remains resulting from sophisticated mortuary treatments represent a preferred information source about the organization of societies and about the belief systems of ancient people. Thereby, on the archaeological field, secondary deposits, sacred artefacts made of humain bones or dismembered burials emerge as precious raw material in order to reconstruct gestures, practices and finally the symbolic discourse built around those dead who are selected to become particular protective entities, perhaps Ancestors.

This work includes the study of double-funeral ceremonies and manipulations of human bones in funerary or ritual contexts but also complicated pre-funeral treatments (exposure, dismemberment, mummification) in a transcultural and transchronological perspective. Human remains and spatial data from archaeological contexts have been analyzed using a bioanthropological and traceological approach in order to reconstruct complex mortuary operating sequences. An ethnoarcheological study on multiple-steps funerals has been performed in order to interpret archaeological remains.

The silver inscribed amulet (PEF 2049) in the collections of the Palestine Exploration Fund was found in a tomb of the Graeco-Roman period during the excavations of the British expedition to Samaria directed by J. W. Crowfoot from 1931–35. The silver was tightly rolled up inside a cylindrical copper case and was recognized when the copper had fallen away. Comparative study of the associated finds, notably glass and lamps, suggests a date in the 4th or perhaps 5th century AD. The method of unrolling the silver sheet and its conservation is described. A copy and a transliteration of the text, which was directed at the healing of the owner, is given, with discussion of its religious setting and philological commentary.

Muka Isuskarstova je pučki nabožni tekst koji promiče štovanje Kristove krvi i rana. Nastao je u ranome novome vijeku kao odjek kasnosrednjovjekovnih oblika pobožnosti koji su se temeljili na retorici nabrajanja i prebrojavanja. Tipična ranonovovjekovna verzija Muke Isuskarstove sastoji se od Kristova obraćanja trima mističarkama koje su izmolile njegovu obznanu broja primljenih udaraca i prolivenih kapi krvi tijekom muke, od opisa višegodišnje molitvene pobožnosti u čast muke, od popisa milosti koje se tim oblikom pobožnosti mogu steći i od atribucije apotropejskih svojstva vlastitim prijepisima. Muka Isuskarstova je potvrđena u brojnim kulturama (npr. engleskoj, etiopskoj, irskoj, njemačkoj, talijanskoj), ali dosad nije bila zamijećena njezina raširenost na prostoru hrvatskoglagoljske pismenosti. Ovaj je članak zamišljen kao analiza sačuvanih hrvatskoglagoljskih potvrda Muke Isuskarstove i njima srodnih nabožnih tekstova u kojoj će se posebna pažnja posvetiti širemu komparativnome kontekstu. Usporedba hrvatskoglagoljske Muke Isuskarstove s talijanskim amuletom slična sadržaja koji je pronađen u Roccapelagu (Emilia- Romagna) pokazuje da je pojava Muke Isuskarstove na hrvatskoglagoljskome prostoru rezultat prekojadranskoga kulturalnoga transfera. Osim toga, u radu se pokazuje da hrvatski glagoljaši Muku Isuskarstovu nisu samo prepisivali u kodeksima nego su je doista upotrebljavali pri proizvodnji amuleta.

(The Passion of Jesus Christ is a popular devotional text created to promote the worship of Christ’s blood and wounds. It originated in the early modern times as an echo of late medieval listing and counting forms of piety. A typical early modern version of the Passion of Jesus Christ consists of Christ’s address to three women mystics who prayed for a revelation of the number of blows and drops of blood he shed during the Passion, a description of devotional practice in honor of the Passion, a list of graces that can be obtained by such devotion, and the attribution of apotropaic properties to its copies. It has been shown that the text was circulated in numerous cultures (e.g., English, Ethiopian, German, Irish, Italian), however, its early modern dissemination in the cultural area of Glagolitic literacy has not been treated. This paper analyzes the surviving Croatian Glagolitic attestations of the Passion of Jesus Christ by situating them in a broader comparative context. The comparison of the Croatian Glagolitic Passion of Jesus Christ with an Italian amulet found in Roccapelago (Emilia-Romagna) revealed that this text appeared in the Croatian Glagolitic cultural area as the result of a trans-Adriatic cultural transfer. Moreover, the paper shows that Croatian Glagolitic writers not only disseminated the Passion of Jesus Christ in codices, but indeed utilized it as a template in the production of textual amulets.)

 Öz Eski Mezopotamya sakinlerinin zihin dünyalarında, dönemin bilim ve kültür düzeyiyle iç içe gelişen inanç sistemlerine bağlı olarak, kendilerine sürekli zarar vermek için fırsat kolladıklarını düşündükleri, çok sayıda metafizik varlık yer almaktaydı. Bu varlık, kimi zaman yeraltı dünyasından yeryüzüne gelen kızgın bir hayalet/ruh, kimi zaman ise korkunç derecede kötü bir cin olabilirdi. Cinler ve hayaletler, insanlara genellikle herhangi bir sebep olmaksızın saldırabilir ve hem fiziksel hem de ruhsal rahatsızlık verebilirlerdi. Dolayısıyla insanların maruz kaldıkları hastalıklar ve felaketler doğrudan cinlerin ve hayaletlerin birer eylemi olarak görülmekteydi. Ayrıca bu kötücül varlıkların nezdinde suçlu ve masum aynıydı ve bir insana saldırırken ne etik değerleri ne de sosyal *

The study of amulets brings us into contact with the thoughts and desires of hundreds of
anonymous, inconsequential people at the most strained emotional moments of their lives,
revealing their innermost thoughts, and helping us understand the religious atmosphere of
that epoch. Although the majority of Greco-Roman and Late Antique amulets lack a secure
archaeological context, there are a few among them that have been recovered in situ, in
ancient Macedonia. This paper draws attention to these particular amulets, allowing a better
understanding of the people that wore them, their problems, their motivations, their deepest
needs, in order to shed some new light on the everyday religious life of the ancient Macedonians.

The research here approaches the topic of the devotional values of the act of writing/reading aloud a formalised text. Especially when speaking about the southeast European rural milieu up to the second half of the 19th century, the presence of scribes and of readers was relatively rare, although not completely absent. We are dealing with people for whom writing/copying a text and/or listening to a reader was not a habit or a daily practice, but a special event more or less attached to a ritual or the ritualised context of performance.
The paper discusses the particular case of a certain version of the Apocrypha, ‘the Legend of Sunday’, also known as the ‘Epistle Fallen From Heaven’, a version today stored in the archive of the Institute of Ethnography and Folklore in Bucharest. It was copied and carried by a soldier in the First World War, to protect himself from being injured or killed.
In the first part of the study I analyse the flexibility of this verbal structure, which allows interesting insertions by the scribe in order to increase both the efficacy of the text and the receivers’ (!) belief in its miraculous power. In this regard, the story within a story that I am speaking about worked as a vehicle to help the spread of a distinctive group of legends and magic practices. My aim is to grasp the dynamics of the believers’ expectations in the effectiveness of writing/reading/holding a special text.
Key workds: devotional writing, Heavenly Epistles, First World War, Romanian culture

Between the Heavenly Realm and the Afterlife. The Role of Prehistoric Artefacts in the Culture of Early Medieval Pomeranians

Occasionally, early medieval sites yield artefacts of much earlier dating. In some cases, the context of the finds indicates that they might have been reused in some rituals. Some researchers believe that first of all prehistoric militaria were subject to such valorisation. Symbolic meanings were also attributed, as it seems, to ornaments and parts of costumes, vessels and bones of extinct animals from bygone eras. Similar meaning was also given to fossils found in the ground: belemnites, fulgurites, meteorites, less often sulphur crystals, etc.
It is generally assumed that the phenomenon of the secondary use of prehistoric artefacts by early medieval communities can be explained by four reasons: raw material recycling, unique aesthetic features causing the continuity of use, giving analogous or new symbolic meanings resulting from their original/new purpose and chronology. In Pomerania, such artefacts were noted in various contexts related to various areas of
human activity. The fact that they were found in assemblages containing early medieval material indicates that these items were not there by accident. The vast majority of the ‘archaic’ items registered in this part of Slavdom were recovered from cemeteries and hoards. The analysis of sources shows that ancient artefacts, intentionally placed in the context of sacral structures (cemeteries, places of worship, selected hoards) could have been offerings, amulets and/or they might have fulfilled apotropaic functions. It cannot be ruled out that some specimens recovered from settlement layers could have also played such a role, although in this case, the randomness of their deposition, not necessarily resulting from the ritual activity of the early medieval community, is equally likely.

No doubt, every nation had possessed a set of deeply rooted beliefs, these rendered into variant practices and traditions, establishing civilization aspects. The belief in magic, superstitions and divinations are categorized under these beliefs. Mankind had tremendously believed their ability to hurt, bring bad destiny, and on other hand, trusting their capacity to bestow protection and guarantee good luck, thus, motivated the appeal to possessing amulets and talismans. This research paper deals with ‘Bāzūbands’; a form of amulets and talismans, worn by warriors to, morally, safeguard them and ensure triumph through Qur’ānic inscriptions, invocations, besides other magical texts. The research tackles some important aspects related the Safavid and Qajar bāzūbands, like the belief in magic, its roots in the Persian culture, an etymological study for the different terms; ‘amulet’, ‘talisman’ and ‘bāzūband’, to reveal their roots and consequent development. This is followed by a preview...

K. Lippincott and D. Pingree published in 1987 a first Latin edition and English translation of the 15th bilingual Arabic-Latin De imaginibus caelestibus, written originally by the Andalusian Ibn al-Ḥātim in the 10th century. The paper presented here aims to complete the preceding one with an Arabic edition, Spanish translation and some interpretations on the possible sources of talismanic imagery. In this brief astromagic treatise, Ibn al-Ḥātim focuses on twenty eight talismans, related to the lunar mansions, and their magical properties.

Questo articolo analizza le pratiche talismaniche in uso nella Chiesa cristiano-ortodossa del nord dell'Etiopia (regione di Gondar) (1). Designati in loco con il termine amarico debtera (2), i clerici produttori di talismani (3) sono figure un po' ai margini dell'Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC, Chiesa ortodossa etiope dell'Unicità) (4). Pur facendo parte della struttura ecclesiastica della EOTC, i debtera ricorrono, infatti, a metodi di cura considerati oscuri e dunque formalmente proibiti dalle autorità religiose ufficiali (Mercier 1975; Boylston 2012). Le ricerche etnografiche mostrano però come i debtera siano al contempo interni (5) all'EOTC, dove svolgono precisi compiti, ed esterni ad essa, proprio per il loro ruolo di costruttori di amuleti. I talismani I talismani realizzati in Etiopia corrispondono in genere a un oggetto di forma rettangolare, ottenuto tagliando una pelle di animale sulla quale vengono inserite delle scritte e delle immagini (6). Queste riprendono le tradizioni dell'EOTC, sebbene con modifiche personali del debtera che li fabbrica. I talismani sono realizzati in base ai bisogni specifici della clientela oppure in base a modelli stereotipati. Si tratta di amuleti dotati di poteri particolari, volti ad alleviare la sofferenza. L'uso del termine "sofferenza" rimanda qui al valore curativo a livello fisiologico ed emozionale di tali oggetti portafortuna. Da notare inoltre che il ricorso al termine "emozione" può sollevare qualche difficoltà, se viene qualificato a partire da una definizione troppo circoscritta ed esclusiva. Nico Frijda (1986: 77), ad esempio, descrive le emozioni come "volte a stabilire, mantenere o rompere una relazione con l'ambiente circostante (…, al punto che) possono definirsi modalità già predisposte di reazione fronte a emergenze o interruzioni". Egli sottolinea così la relazione esistente fra emozioni e realtà sociale. Secondo Strasser (1977), le emozioni si caratterizzano poi come "eruttive ed espressive" e questa loro qualità-come verrà dimostrato-si rivela estremamente utile nel contesto etiopico, dove sono strettamente associati disturbi fisiologici e stati di turbamento: entrambi sono, infatti, classificati come "malattie" che interessano il corpo. La risposta sociale all'espressione di un'emozione si traduce nell'attitudine del debtera che diviene il manager in grado di gestire il malessere del suo cliente. Per quanto mi riguarda, ritengo che una delle caratteristiche dell'attività dei debtera sia quella di servire da mediatori rispetto a emozioni potenzialmente disgreganti sul piano collettivo. Bisogna allora capire quali siano le emozioni che "disturbano" la società. Si possono nominare nel merito la gelosia e la lussuria, emozioni che sembrano urtare in modo particolare la dottrina dell'EOTC (7), poiché dannose, oscure e abominevoli. Ma cosa si cela, nella natura delle emozioni, da suggerire il ricorso ai servigi liminali di un debtera? Inoltre, come mai le emozioni sono meglio governate da un debtera produttore di amuleti anziché da altri? Nonostante esistano molti lavori sulle emozioni sotto il profilo antropologico, nessuno si è centrato sinora sullo studio etnografico delle funzioni mediatrici dei debtera nel controllo del piano emotivo. Va altresì segnalata l'importanza del rapporto tra emozioni e ritualità, esaminato da vari autori. Al