MAGIC

mageia (“magic”) < magos (Persian fire priest) epaôidê (“incantation”) katadesmos (“binding spell”) philtron (“love charm”) goêteia (“enchantment”) thelxis (“enchantment”/”seduction”) thaumatourgia (“wonder-working”)

Magic v. Religion MAGIC RELIGION coercion prayer privacy publicity marginality centrality deception/secrecy openness impiety piety

Hekate • triple-formed (earth/sky/sea; sky/earth/chthonic world; crossroads) • Hekate/Artemis/Hermes Chthonios • Hekate/Eleusinian Demeter • liminal (crossroads; thresholds; graves; lunar phases) • fire (torches), herbs, witchcraft, necromancy • association with hounds • association with red mullet (triglê) • yew (toxos), iunx, wheel (strophalos)

Deipnon celebrated monthly at new moon offerings to Hekate and vengeful dead (1) meal set on altar of Hekate outside door of house raw eggs, cake, garlic, leeks, fish; head of household cannot look back at altar (2) expiation sacrifice (pharmakon) household members transfer transgressions to dog, then sacrificed to Hekate (3) purification of household fumigation with incense; deposition of remains (ashes, waste blood) of earlier sacrifices at altar, along with leftover food

Magic & Medicine

AIM NUMBER/PERCENT Healing 109/21% Knowledge 102/20% Love 98/19% Injury 61/12% Miscellaneous 44/8.5% Success 42/8.2% Safety 22/4.3% Invocation Service 7/1.4% Horoscopes and General Astrology 6/1.2%

pharmakon plant, herb drug, potion medicine, cure pharmakon poison magic charm scapegoat

Sacred Disease It is my opinion that those who first called this disease [epilepsy] “sacred” were the sort of people we now call witch-doctors [magoi], purifiers [kathartai], quacks and charlatans. They are exactly the people who pretend to be very pious and to be particularly wise... By such claims and trickery, these practitioners pretend to have a deeper knowledge than is given to others; with their prescriptions of “sanctifications” [hagneias] and “purifications” [katharsias], their patter about divine visitation and possession by devils [to daimonion], they seek to deceive...

If they claim to know how to draw down the moon, cause an eclipse of the sun, make storms and fine weather, rain and drought, to make the sea too rough for sailing or the land infertile, and all the rest of their nonsense, then, whether they claim to be able to do it by magic rites [ek teleteôn] or by some other method, they are impious rogues... For if a man were to draw down the moon, I would not call any of these things divine but instead human, because the divine power has been overcome and enslaved by the human will. —[Hippokrates] Sacred Disease 2.1-10, 3.12-16, 4.1-8; 11-16

medicine, drug protective object phylaktêrion amulet magic spell

There is no place where that Nature did not distribute remedies for the healing of mankind, so that even the very desert itself is a drugstore, full of wonderful examples of that well-known antipathy [discordia] and sympathy [concordia]. The oak and the olive are parted by such hatred that, if the one is planted in the hole from which the other has been dug out, it will die; and the oak also dies if it is planted near the walnut. Deadly too is the hatred between the cabbage and the vine; and the very vegetable that keeps the vine at a distance itself withers away when planted opposite cyclamen or wild marjoram… Fennel makes very agreeable fodder for the ass; to other beasts of burden, however, it is quick poison. Lifeless things, too, even the most insignificant, each have their own special poisons... The power of affinity is shown when tar is removed by oil, since both have a greasy nature. Oil alone mixes with lye, both hating water... Hence arose the art of medicine. — Pliny XXIV 1,1-5

Magic v. Religion MAGIC RELIGION coercion prayer privacy publicity marginality centrality deception/secrecy openness impiety piety

katadesmos Kallias, the shopkeeper, and his wife Thraitta, and the shop of the bald man, and the shop of Arthemion, which is adjacent to... and Philion the shopkeeper. Of all these people, I bind their soul, work, hands, feet, and shops. I bind Sosimenes and his brother, and his slave Karpos, the linen-seller, and Glykanthos, whom they call Malthake, and Agathon the shopkeeper, the slave of Sosimenes — of all these people I bind their soul, work, life, hands, and feet. (DTA 87a)

•preparation / consecration of lamella • invocation (agents / messengers) * chthonic deity (Hades, Persephone, Hekate, Hermes) * kakodaimôn * nekydaimôn * ahôros • designation of victim *identification of name and family *enumeration of parts • list of desired results • promise / threat • self-identification as god or daimon • deposition of lamella • graveyard; grave of recently deceased child • underground watercourse

If someone bound me down, whether woman or man, slave or free, foreigner or citizen, kin or otherwise, whether in malice against my work or actions, if someone bound me before Hermes Eriounios or the Possessor or the Deceitful, or anywhere else, I bind down all my enemies in return. [other side:] I bind down my adversary Dion and Granikos. —SEG 49.320:  Attica, early 4th century BCE

Magic & Religion AIMS MAGIC RELIGION relationship with higher powers mutual obligation (kharis) ritual language and behavior health, prosperity, protection failure < error, rejection of appeal