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Charaktêres
''Charaktêres'' (singular: charaktêr) are letter-shaped signs lacking both semantic and phonetic correlations, which were used as magic signs in ancient literary documents. Forms and use In her 2013 thesis Kirsten Dzwiza studied 94 magical texts and recorded 699 different ''charaktêres'' occurring over 943 times. The character forms are mostly nonsensical and may include ring-letters, balls, points, closed elements, separate strokes, linear elements, small element, and hieroglyphs. The most common forms consist of asterisks and configurations of straight lines with small circles at their ends. The signs appear mostly on apotropaic spells and phylacteries, but also on a few ancient curse tablets. They may appear as loose groups of characters on a magical gemstone or spell to large groups alongside other figures on a magical text or table. They are often used alongside comprehensible arcane words, like the '' voces magicae'' in the texts of the Greek Magical Papyri. Charaktê ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Onyx Intaglio- Incantation In Greek Letters MET DP280588
Onyx is a typically black-and-white banded variety of agate, a silicate mineral. The bands can also be monochromatic with alternating light and dark bands. ''Sardonyx'' is a variety with red to brown bands alternated with black or white bands. The name "onyx" is also frequently used for level-banded (parallel-banded) agates, but in proper usage it refers to color pattern not band structure. Onyx, as a descriptive term, has also been incorrectly applied to parallel-banded varieties of alabaster, marble, calcite, obsidian, and opal, and misleadingly to materials with contorted banding, such as "cave onyx" and "Mexican onyx". Etymology ''Onyx'' comes through Latin (of the same spelling), from the Ancient Greek (), meaning or . Onyx with pink and white bands can sometimes resemble a fingernail. The English word "nail" is cognate with the Greek word. Varieties Onyx is formed of chalcedony bands in alternating colors. It is cryptocrystalline, consisting of fine intergrowths of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magic (supernatural)
Magic, sometimes spelled magick, is the application of beliefs, rituals or actions employed in the belief that they can manipulate natural or supernatural beings and forces. It is a category into which have been placed various beliefs and practices sometimes considered separate from both religion and science. Connotations have varied from positive to negative at times throughout history. Within Western culture, magic has been linked to ideas of the Other (philosophy), Other, foreignness, and primitivism; indicating that it is "a powerful marker of cultural difference" and likewise, a non-modern phenomenon. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Western intellectuals perceived the practice of magic to be a sign of a primitive mentality and also commonly attributed it to marginalised groups of people. Aleister Crowley (1875–1947), a British occultist, defined "magick" as "the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will", adding a 'k' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Asterisks
The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often vocalize it as star (as, for example, in ''the A* search algorithm'' or '' C*-algebra''). An asterisk is usually five- or six-pointed in print and six- or eight-pointed when handwritten, though more complex forms exist. Its most common use is to call out a footnote. It is also often used to censor offensive words. In computer science, the asterisk is commonly used as a wildcard character, or to denote pointers, repetition, or multiplication. History The asterisk was already in use as a symbol in ice age cave paintings. There is also a two-thousand-year-old character used by Aristarchus of Samothrace called the , , which he used when proofreading Homeric poetry to mark lines that were duplicated. Origen is known to have also used the aster ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apotropaic Magic
Apotropaic magic (From ) or protective magic is a type of magic intended to turn away harm or evil influences, as in deflecting misfortune or averting the evil eye. Apotropaic observances may also be practiced out of superstition or out of tradition, as in good luck charms (perhaps some token on a charm bracelet), amulets, or gestures such as crossed fingers or knocking on wood. Many different objects and charms were used for protection throughout history. Symbols and objects Ancient Egypt Apotropaic magical rituals were practiced throughout the ancient Near East and ancient Egypt. Fearsome deities were invoked via ritual in order to protect individuals by warding away evil spirits. In ancient Egypt, these household rituals (performed in the home, not in state-run temples) were embodied by the deity who personified magic itself, Heka. The two gods most frequently invoked in these rituals were the hippopotamus-formed fertility goddess, Taweret, and the lion-deity, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amulet
An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word , which Pliny's ''Natural History'' describes as "an object that protects a person from trouble". Anything can function as an amulet; items commonly so used include statues, coins, drawings, plant parts, animal parts, and written words. Amulets which are said to derive their extraordinary properties and powers from magic or those which impart luck are typically part of folk religion or paganism, whereas amulets or Sacramental, sacred objects of Organized religion, formalised mainstream religion as in Christianity are believed to have no power of their own without faith in Jesus and being blessing, blessed by a clergyman, and they supposedly will also not provide any preternatural benefit to the bearer who does not have an Disposition#Religion, appropriate disposition. Talisman and amulets have interchangeable meanings. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curse Tablets
A curse tablet (; ) is a small tablet with a curse written on it from the Greco-Roman world. Its name originated from the Greek and Latin words for "pierce" and "bind". The tablets were used to ask the gods, place spirits, or the deceased to perform an action on a person or object, or otherwise compel the subject of the curse. Description Curse tablets are typically very thin sheets of lead with the text scratched on in tiny letters. They were then often rolled, folded, or pierced with nails, and the tablets were then usually placed beneath the ground: either buried in graves or tombs, thrown into wells or pools, sequestered in underground sanctuaries, or nailed to the walls of temples. Tablets were also used for love spells and when used in this manner they were placed inside the home of the desired target. They are sometimes discovered along with small dolls or figurines (sometimes inaccurately referred to as "Voodoo dolls"), which may also be pierced by nails. The figurines r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voces Magicae
''Voces magicae'' (singular: ''vox magica'', "magical names" or "magical words") or ''voces mysticae'' John G. Gager (1999) Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the Ancient World'. Oxford University, 278 pages. are pronounceable but incomprehensible magical formulas that occur in spells, charms, curses, and amulets from Classical Antiquity, including Ancient Greece, Egypt, and Rome. These formulas may include alternative names of gods or other unusual phrases which may have been intended as the secret, authoritative true name of certain gods. As an example: in the Greek Magical Papyri, the first spell of the first papyrus intended to summon a daimon assistant and included the phrase (in translation) "hisis your authoritative name: ARBATH ARBAOTH BAKCHABRE". The ''voces magicae'' have been said to be related to the Greek Ephesia Grammata. See also *Magic in the Greco-Roman world *Magical formula *Glossolalia Speaking in tongues, also known as glossolalia, is an activi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Véronique Dasen
Véronique Dasen (born 1957) is a Swiss archaeologist and Professor in Classical Archaeology and Art History at the University of Fribourg. Her research is led in a multidisciplinary and anthropological perspective. Her research interests range from ancient iconography and material culture, the history of the body, of medicine and magical practices to gender studies, history of childhood, and ludic culture (games and divination, games and love, passage rites). Career Dasen received her PhD in 1989 from the University of Oxford with a thesis titled "Dwarfs in Ancient Egypt and Greece", which she published as a monograph in 1993. Since 2008, she has worked as the Professor in Classical Archaeology and Art History at the University of Fribourg. She was the fifth woman to receive her habilitation from the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Fribourg in 2000. In 2016, she gave a series of lectures at the École pratique des hautes études on 'Magic, divination, and the history o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magic In The Greco-Roman World
Magic in the Greco-Roman world – that is, ancient Greece, ancient Rome, and the other cultures with which they interacted, especially ancient Egypt – comprises supernatural practices undertaken by individuals, often privately, that were not under the oversight of official priesthoods attached to the various state, community, and household cults and temples as a matter of public religion. Private magic was practiced throughout Greek and Roman cultures as well as among Jews and early Christians of the Roman Empire. Primary sources for the study of Greco-Roman magic include the Greek Magical Papyri, curse tablets, amulets, and literary texts such as Ovid's ''Fasti'' and Pliny the Elder's ''Natural History''. Terminology Pervasive throughout the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Asia until late antiquity and beyond, ''mágos'', "Magian" or "magician", was influenced by (and eventually displaced) Greek '' goēs'' (γόης), the older word for a practitioner of mag ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Greek Religion
Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed a collection of beliefs, rituals, and Greek mythology, mythology, in the form of both popular public religion and Cult (religious practice), cult practices. The application of the modern concept of "religion" to ancient cultures has been questioned as anachronistic. The Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks did not have a word for 'religion' in the modern sense. Likewise, no Greek writer is known to have classified either the gods or the cult practices into separate 'religions'. Instead, for example, Herodotus speaks of the Hellenes as having "common shrines of the gods and sacrifices, and the same kinds of customs". Most ancient Greeks recognized the Twelve Olympians, twelve major Olympian gods and goddesses—Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Athena, Ares, Aphrodite, Apollo, Artemis, Hephaestus, Hermes, and either Hestia or Dionysus—although philosophies such as Stoicism and some forms of Platonism used language that seems to assume a s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
