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Amulets and Superstitions - E. A. Wallis Budge
Alexander T H E L I B R A R Y C A T (New Alexandria library of Texas)A vulture tied to the neck of a mummy gave it the strength of the goddess Isis … Women in Central Africa ate a frog to have large families … A serpent head amulet could ward off venomous snakes … Ethiopians wore stones to keep the Evil Eye away … Abracdabra healed a man suffering from fever … Hebrew women wore stones to prevent miscarriage … Emeralds cured diseases of the eye … Garnets protected man from terrifying dreams and skin diseases … Melitites warded off infantile diseases … Moonstones protected men against epilepsy … Rubies protected men from witchcraft, plague, and famine … By far the most thorough, most fascinating coverage of amulets and superstitions is the present book by Dr. E. Wallis Budge. In it he presents a wealth of information on the origins of amulets and talismans of many cultures and traditions: Arab, Persian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Egyptian, Ethiopian, Gnostic, Hebrew, Mandaean, Phoenician, Samaritan, and Syriac. He discusses ring amulets, terra cotta devil-traps; stones and their prophylactic and therapeutic qualities; the importance of color, shape, and form in amulets; the Swastika; the cross; the crucifix; the evil eye; the Kabbalah; astrology; the seven astrological planets; theories about numbers (good and bad luck numbers, sequences, magic squares); divination by water, earth, or sand; lucky and unlucky days; the hand of Fatimah; contracts with the devil and envoûtement. The text is profusely illustrated, with many reproductions of amulets, stones, prayers, crosses, numbers, seals, gods, rings, signs of the zodiac, and much more. Dr. Budge of the British Museum was one of the foremost Egyptologists of the twentieth century. Dover also published many of his other works: The Dwellers on the Nile, Egyptian Magic, The Egyptian Book of the Dead, and The Gods of the Egyptians. By Sir Budge, (1857-1934), curator of the Egyptian Antiquities in the British Museum, who also translated the "Egyptian Book of the Dead." From the book's preface: "I have described the principal amulets which were used by the Semitic peoples of Western Asia, Egypt, Nambia and Ethiopia. I have added a series of short chapters in which I have tried to set forth the principal theories about the powers of 'working' amulets, and the meaning of the inscriptions and symbols inscribed on them, and to indicate the beliefs concerning them which were held by the ancient Babylonian and Egyptian magicians, and by the later Kabbalists, Gnostics, both pagan and Christian, and astrologers. And I have incorporated in the many of the views of the astrologers, makers of horoscopes, casters of nativities, diviners, crystal gazers, palmists and fortune-tellers with who I came in contact in Egypt, the Sudan and Mesopotamia." The author discusses: the Evil Eye, and amulets used by: Arabs, Persians, Babylonians, Coptics, Egyptians, Abyssinians, Gnostic, Hebrew, Mandaeen, Phoenician, Samaritan, Syriac; the Ring amulet; beliefs concerning Divination by water or animal's livers or sand; the Hand of Fatima; Babylonian demon Humbaba, god Khepera, Rd, Thoth; the Seven Seals; and much, much more. Many photographs and illustrations. Originally published in 1930. Here are the contents to this Amazing Unknown of our Age THE UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS DUE TO MAN’S PAGE BELIEF IN THE EXISTENCE OF DEMONS EVIL SPIRITS. AND 1 II. ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS AND TALISMANS 33 III. BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS ... 82 IV. COPTIC AMULETS . ... 127 V. EGYPTIAN AMULETS . ... 133 VI. ETHIOPIAN (ABYSSINIAN) AMULETS ... 177 VII. GNOSTIC AMULETS . ... 200 VIII. HEBREW AMULETS . ... 212 IX. MANDAEAN (MANDAITIC) AMULETS ... 239 X. PHOENICIAN AMULETS. 250 XI. SAMARITAN AMULETS . ... 258 XII. SYRIAC AMULETS . • • • 272 XIII. BABYLONIAN TERRA-COTTA DEVIL-TRAPS • • • 283 XIV. THE RING AMULET . • • • 291 XV. STONES AND THEIR PROPHYLACTIC AND THERA- PEUTIC QUALITIES . 306 XVI. THE IMPORTANCE OF COLOUR, SHAPE, AND FORM IN AMULETS . 326 XVII. THE SWASTIKA OR SVASTIKA. 331 XVIII. THE CROSS 336 XIX. THE CRUCIFIX . 350 IV CONTENTS PAGE THE EVIL EYE ... ... ... ... ... 354 XXI. KABBALAH... ... ... ... ... ... 366 XXII. ASTROLOGY ... ... ... ... ... 380 XXIII. THE KABBALISTIC NAMES AND SIGNS, AND MAGICAL FIGURES, AND SQUARES OF THE SEVEN ASTROLOGICAL STARS OR PLANETS... 390 XXIV. THE STARS OR SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC AND THEIR INFLUENCES, THE HOUSES OF HEAVEN AND THE DEKANS. ... ... 406 XXV. THE STONES OF THE PLANETS AND THEIR INFLUENCES . 423 XXVI. THEORIES ABOUT NUMBERS AND THEIR MYSTIC AND SACRED CHARACTER 427 XXVII. DIVINATION . 443 XXVIII. DIVINATION BY WATER. 445 XXIX. DIVINATION BY MEANS OF THE LIVER OF AN ANIMAL ... ... ... ... 450 XXX. THE INSCRIBED BRONZE DIVINING DISK OF PERGAMON . 458 XXXI. DIVINATION BY EARTH OR SAND (GEOMANCY) 460 XXXII. LUCKY AND UNLUCKY DAYS. 464 XXXIII. THE HAND OF FATIMAII. 467 XXXIV. CONTRACTS WITH THE DEVIL. 472 XXXV. ENVOUTEMENT. 481 XXXVI. MISCELLANEOUS. 487 INDEX ... . ... 497 V LIST OF PLATES PLATE PAGE I.—1. Arabic amulet made of the skin of the unborn kid 35 2. Arabic amulet made of paper 35 II. Silver amulet case inscribed on both sides with a series of short texts from the Kur’an ... 37 III. Silver necklace with plaques and tubes to hold small amuletic rolls . 41 IV. Mirza Khan’s Kur’an amulet 57 V. Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from the Kur’an . 63 VI. Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from the Kur’an 65 VII.—1. Mother-of-pearl amulet, Christ baptized by John 2. Mother-of-pearl amulet for a girl. From the Falls of the Jordan ... ... ... 71 VIII.—1 & 2. Two silver Indian pregnancy amulets... 75 3. Brass amulet of a soldier 75 4. Silver Hebrew amulet with the hexagon of Solomon 75 5 & 6. Two silver pregnancy amulets inscribed in Arabic 75 IX.—1. Amulet armlet of a Turkish soldier. 77 2. Slate amulet inscribed with Arabic letters as numerals 77 X. Ten archaic Babylonian and Assyrian amulets 83 XI. Seven Babylonian cylinder-seal amulets ... VI LIST OF PLATES PLATE PAGE XII. Eight Babylonian and Assyrian amulets . 93 XIII. Three Babylonian amulets . 95 XIV. Bronze Pazuzu-Nergal plaque . 105 XV. Lamashtu plaque—obverse .107 XVI. Lamashtu plaque—reverse . Ill XVII. The amulet of’Absara Dengel 181 XVIII. Extract from a Mandaean amulet in the British Museum 243 XIX. Extract from a Mandaean amulet with magical drawings 245 XX. Extract from a Samaritan phylactery in the British Museum 263 XXL The metal case which held the same 265 XXII. A group of five crosses in gold, Limoges enamel and steel , LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Face of the Babylonian demon Humbaba... ... ... 2 The god Khepera in his phantom boat ... ... ... 7 Ra, the Sun-god ... ... ... ... ... ... 9 Thoth, the Word-god... ... ... ... ... ... 9 Specimens of Arabic magical writings ... ... ... 39 The Seven Seals and the Hexagram ... ... ... 40 Magical number squares ... ... ... ... 45 and 46 The Kur’an amulet and its case with a magnifying lens ... 53 The Ayat al-Kursi ... ... ... ... ... ... 54 The Ayat al-’Arsh ... ... ... ... ... ... 56 The Fatihat al-Kitab ... ... ... ... ... 59 The Surah of the Unity of God ... ... ... ... 61 The animal amulets inscribed on their bases ... ... 86 Cylinder-seal engraved with a figure of the naked goddess 92 A Babylonian house-amulet . ... ... ... 97 Two prophylactic figures ... ... ... ... ... 100 Two prophylactic figures ... ... ... ... ... 101 The Sirrush ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 102 Two men beating a drum ... ... ... ... ... 103 Fish amulet ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 103 Pazuzu, son of Hanpu, king of the air devils ... ... 110 Two Achaemenian seals ... ... ... ... ... 125 Six Pehlevi seals ... ... ... ... ... ... 126 Saint George of Lydda ... ... ... ... ... 131 The amulet of the Sun-god at sunrise and sunset. 134 The Prayer-spell of the Heart-scarab ... ... ... 139 The Baboon, the associate of Thoth " ... ... ... 141 The Cat slaughtering the Serpent of Darkness . 145 The Vulture-goddess Mut ... ' ... ... ... 150 The Divine Goose ... ... v ... ... ... ... 151 Amuletic figures of Egyptian gods and goddesses... 156-158 The Shabti Spell 159 The Metternich Stele—obverse .166 The Metternich Stele—reverse Egyptian Amulets The magical forms of the Cross in Ethiopia The Divine Face The Chariot of Elijah The Net in which Solomon caught devils ... AND THE REST FROM PAGE 190 ONWARD- Solomon and his wife... Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden The Cross with the Divine Face The Cross of’Abu Fara Chnoumis above a Bacchic altar Anubis and the goddess of Truth ... Horns the Child in the boat of Iao The god Abrasax The three-headed Hecate, the Queen of Hell A god in the form of Osiris as a mummy ... The Arch-demon Set, ass-headed Amulet from a magical papyrus Hebrew child-bed amulet Hexagram amulet from the Book of Raziel Two triangles amulet from the Book of Raziel Amulet to secure success in business Three amulets in the secret writing Portrait of Cornelius Agrippa Seven seal amulets inscribed in Hebrew, etc.
Related papers
Marcela A. Garcia Probert. and Petra Sijpesteijn, Amulets and Talismans of the Middle East and North Africa in Context. Transmission, Efficacy and Collections, Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2022, 306 p.
Tahkik İslami İlimler Araştırma ve Neşir Dergisi, 2022
Two Hebrew Amulets from the Klau Library: Jewish Magic in the Modern Mediterranean
L’eredità di Salomone: La magia ebraica in Italia e nel Mediterraneo, 2019
Textual Amulets from Antiquity to Early Modern Times - The Shape of Words
Bloomsbury Studies in Material Religion, 2023
Comparing amulets over time and space, this volume focuses on the function of written words on these fascinating artefacts. Ranging from Roman Egypt to the Middle Ages and the Modern period, this book provides an overview on these artefacts in the Mediterranean world and beyond, including Europe, Iran and Turkey. A deep analysis of the textuality of amulets provides comparative information on themes and structures of the religious traditions examined. A strong emphasis is placed on the material features of the amulets and their connections to their ritual purposes. The textual content, as well as other characteristics, is examined systematically, in order to establish patterns of influence and diffusion. The question of the production, which includes the relationship that linked professional magicians, artists and craftsmen to their clientele, is also discussed, as well as the sacred and cultural economies involved.
The Use of an Ancient Egyptian Amulet for the Living: University of Memphis (1999.4.268)
This research analyzes the historical context and symbolism of a unique ancient Egyptian artifact, an ancestor bust amulet, in the Institute of Egyptian Art and Archaeology from the University of Memphis (1994.4.268). This amulet is one of only four known in the world. We suggest that the living wore it as a representation of deceased relatives who achieved eternal life after successfully journeying through the Realm of the Dead, gaining the title of “effective spirit.” The deceased then become intermediaries and affected the living. Because of this, the amulet offered protection by symbolizing the solar cycle of renewed existence.
A history of amulets in ten objects
Science Museum Group Journal , 2019
What are amulets? How are they situated in the larger narrative of European healing? Varied and complex objects, amulets present both challenges and opportunities for historians and museums alike. Yet an examination of these often-overlooked items within a medical context can provide significant information about cure and protection over different times and geographies. This article analyses ten amulets from the Science Museum collections, and asks what we can learn from exploring these objects' material features and varying functions. It argues for a reconsideration of amulets from their categorisation by nineteenth-and twentieth-century collectors and classification by modern museums, to their recognition as a significant part of the history of healing.
Koch, I., Kleiman, S., Oeming, M., Gadot, Y., and Lipschits, O. 2017. Amulets in Context: A View from Late Bronze Age Tel Azekah. Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections 16: 9–24.
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.
An Egyptian Amulet
This paper translates a Serpent amulet (through depicted sign language) among others to demonstrate that its uderlyng theme was also found in other ancient cultures.
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Ill
CONTENTS
PAGE
I.
THE UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS DUE TO MAN’S
BELIEF IN THE EXISTENCE OF DEMONS AND
EVIL SPIRITS.
1
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS AND TALISMANS
33
III.
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
...
82
IV.
COPTIC AMULETS
.
...
127
EGYPTIAN AMULETS
.
...
133
ETHIOPIAN (ABYSSINIAN) AMULETS
...
177
VII.
GNOSTIC AMULETS
.
...
200
VIII.
HEBREW AMULETS
.
...
212
...
239
II.
V.
VI.
IX.
X.
XI.
XII.
MANDAEAN (MANDAITIC) AMULETS
PHOENICIAN AMULETS.
250
SAMARITAN AMULETS
.
...
258
SYRIAC AMULETS
.
•••
272
XIII.
BABYLONIAN TERRA-COTTA DEVIL-TRAPS
• • •
283
XIV.
THE RING AMULET
•••
291
XV.
.
STONES AND THEIR PROPHYLACTIC AND THERAPEUTIC QUALITIES
XVI.
THE
IMPORTANCE
OF
FORM IN AMULETS
XVII.
XVIII.
XIX.
.
COLOUR,
SHAPE,
306
AND
.
326
THE SWASTIKA OR SVASTIKA.
331
THE CROSS
...
...
336
THE CRUCIFIX
.
350
...
...
...
a 2
CONTENTS
IV
t
PAGE
XX.
THE EVIL EYE
...
...
...
...
...
354
XXI.
KABBALAH...
...
...
...
...
...
366
XXII.
ASTROLOGY
...
...
...
...
...
380
XXIII.
THE
KABBALISTIC
MAGICAL
NAMES
FIGURES,
AND
AND
SIGNS,
SQUARES
SEVEN ASTROLOGICAL STARS OR
OF
AND
THE
PLANETS...
390
XXIV. THE STARS OR SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC AND THEIR
INFLUENCES, THE HOUSES OF HEAVEN AND
THE DEKANS.
XXV. THE
STONES
OF
INFLUENCES
THE
...
PLANETS
...
...
AND
...
...
406
THEIR
...
...
423
XXVI. THEORIES ABOUT NUMBERS AND THEIR MYSTIC
AND SACRED CHARACTER
XXVII.
XXVIII.
...
427
.
443
DIVINATION BY WATER.
445
DIVINATION
...
...
XXIX. DIVINATION BY MEANS OF THE LIVER OF AN
ANIMAL
XXX.
THE
...
INSCRIBED
PERGAMON
XXXI.
BRONZE
...
DIVINING
...
...
DISK
OF
.
DIVINATION BY EARTH OR SAND
(GEOMANCY)
450
458
460
XXXII.
LUCKY AND UNLUCKY DAYS.
464
XXXIII.
THE HAND OF FATIMAII.
467
XXXIV.
CONTRACTS WITH THE DEVIL.
472
XXXV.
ENVOUTEMENT.
481
XXXVI.
MISCELLANEOUS.
487
INDEX
497
...
.
...
V
LIST OF PLATES
PLATE
PAGE
I.—1. Arabic amulet made of the skin of the
unborn kid
...
...
...
...
...
2. Arabic amulet made of paper
...
...
35
35
II. Silver amulet case inscribed on both sides with
a series of short texts from the Kur’an
...
37
III.
Silver necklace with plaques and tubes to hold
small amuletic rolls ...
...
...
...
41
Mirza Khan’s Kur’an amulet ...
...
57
Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from
the Kur’an
...
...
...
...
...
63
VI. Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from
the Kur’an
...
...
...
...
...
65
IV.
V.
...
VII.—1. Mother-of-pearl amulet, Christ baptized by
J ohn
...
...
...
...
...
...
2. Mother-of-pearl amulet for a girl.
From
the Falls of the Jordan
...
...
...
VIII.—1 & 2. Two silver Indian pregnancy amulets...
3. Brass amulet of a soldier ...
...
...
4. Silver Hebrew amulet with the hexagon of
Solomon
...
...
...
...
...
5 & 6. Two silver pregnancy amulets inscribed
in Arabic
...
...
...
...
...
IX.—1. Amulet armlet of a Turkish soldier...
...
2. Slate amulet inscribed with Arabic letters
as numerals
...
...
...
...
...
X. Ten archaic Babylonian and Assyrian amulets
XI. Seven Babylonian cylinder-seal amulets
...
/1
71
75
75
75
75
77
77
83
89
LIST OF PLATES
VI
PLATE
PAGE
XII. Eight Babylonian and Assyrian amulets
...
93
XIII.
Three Babylonian amulets
...
...
...
95
XIV.
Bronze Pazuzu-Nergal plaque ...
...
...
105
XV.
Lamashtu plaque—obverse
...
...
...
107
XVI.
Lamashtu plaque—reverse
...
...
...
Ill
The amulet of’Absara Dengel ...
...
...
181
Extract from a Mandaean amulet in the British
Museum
...
...
...
...
...
243
Extract from a Mandaean amulet with magical
drawings
...
...
...
...
...
245
Extract from a Samaritan phylactery in the
British Museum
...
...
...
...
263
The metal case which held the same ...
...
265
A group of five crosses in gold, Limoges enamel
and steel
...
...
...
...
...
345
XVII.
XVIII.
XIX.
XX.
XXL
XXII.
Vll
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Face of the Babylonian demon Humbaba...
...
...
2
The god Khepera in his phantom boat
...
...
...
7
Ra, the Sun-god
...
...
...
...
...
...
9
Thoth, the Word-god...
...
...
...
...
...
9
Specimens of Arabic magical writings
...
...
...
39
The Seven Seals and the Hexagram
...
...
...
40
Magical number squares
...
...
...
...
45 and 46
The Kur’an amulet and its case with a magnifying lens ...
53
The Ayat al-Kursi
...
...
...
...
...
...
54
The Ayat al-’Arsh
...
...
...
...
...
...
56
The Fatihat al-Kitab
...
...
...
...
...
59
The Surah of the Unity of God
...
...
...
...
61
The animal amulets inscribed on their bases
...
...
86
Cylinder-seal engraved with a figure of the naked goddess
92
A Babylonian house-amulet
.
...
...
...
97
Two prophylactic figures
...
...
...
...
...
100
Two prophylactic figures
...
...
...
...
...
101
The Sirrush
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
102
Two men beating a drum
...
...
...
...
...
103
Fish amulet ...
...
...
...
...
...
...
Pazuzu, son of Hanpu, king of the air devils
...
...
Two Achaemenian seals
...
...
...
...
...
Six Pehlevi seals
...
...
...
...
...
...
Saint George of Lydda
...
...
...
...
...
The amulet of the Sun-god at sunrise and sunset.
The Prayer-spell of the Heart-scarab
...
...
...
103
110
125
126
131
134
139
The Baboon, the associate of Thoth "
...
...
...
141
The Cat slaughtering the Serpent of Darkness
.
145
The Vulture-goddess Mut
... '
...
...
...
150
The Divine Goose
...
... v ...
...
...
...
151
Amuletic figures of Egyptian gods and goddesses...
156-158
The Shabti Spell
...
...
The Metternich Stele—obverse
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
159
166
viii
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
The Metternich Stele—reverse
Egyptian Amulets
The magical forms of the Cross in Ethiopia
The Divine Face
The Chariot of Elijah
The Net in which Solomon caught devils ...
Solomon and his wife...
Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden
The Cross with the Divine Face
The Cross of’Abu Fara
Chnoumis above a Bacchic altar
Anubis and the goddess of Truth ...
Horns the Child in the boat of Iao
The god Abrasax
The three-headed Hecate, the Queen of Hell
A god in the form of Osiris as a mummy ...
The Arch-demon Set, ass-headed
Amulet from a magical papyrus
Hebrew child-bed amulet
Hexagram amulet from the Book of Raziel
Two triangles amulet from the Book of Raziel
Amulet to secure success in business
Three amulets in the secret writing
Portrait of Cornelius Agrippa
Seven seal amulets inscribed in Hebrew, etc.
Three forms of the Pentagram
Hebrew magical square
German magical square
Hebrew amulet
Cylinder-seal of Prshndt
Cylinder-seal of Hrtkl
Cylinder-seal of Plthan
Cylinder-seal of Yrpal
Cylinder-seal of Srgd
Cylinder-seal of Mdbrg
Cylinder-seal of Akdbn the eunuch
The Hebrew and Samaritan Alphabets
Magical square from a Samaritan Phylactery
167
172-176
178
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
.
205
.
206
.
207
.
208
.
208
.
209
.
210
.
211
.
225
.
226
.
227
.
228
.
229
.
231
.
232
.
233
.
234
.
235
.
237
.
254
.
254
.
255
.
255
.
256
.
256
.
257
268
271
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
IX
PAGE
Facsimile of a page of the Syriac “ Book of Protection ”
273
Gabriel spearing the woman of the Evil Eye
...
...
274
Mar George of Lydda spearing the Great Dragon...
...
275
King Solomon spearing a devil
...
...
...
...
276
Elijah and Enoch eating the fruit of the Tree of Life
...
277
Mar Daniel spearing the ravening wolf
...
...
...
278
Thaumasius spearing the spirit of the daughter of the moon
279
Rabban Hormizd spearing a lion ...
...
...
...
280
The Four Evangelists
...
...
...
...
...
281
Babylonian Devil-trap, with a magical inscription
...
284
Babylonian Devil-trap, with a magical inscription
...
286
Babylonian Devil-trap, with a magical inscription
...
287
Babylonian Devil-trap, with a magical inscription
...
289
The goddess Nekhebit bestowing the sovereignty of the
whole earth on the king of Egypt
...
...
...
292
Two forms of the signet ring
...
...
...
...
293
Cylinder-seal of Sebak-neferu-Ra and inscription
...
294
Two rings with bezels
...
...
...
...
...
294
Magical square of figures on a ring
...
...
...
302
The magical square of Musawwir ...
...
...
...
303
Magical diamond square on a ring ...
...
...
...
303
Forms of the Swastika
...
...
...
...
332-335
Forms of the Cross
...
...
...
...
...
336-343
Silver Host case in the form of a cross. The Crucifixion
344
Silver Host case in the form of a cross. The Ascension...
347
The Kabbalistic Tree
...
...
...
...
...
371
Drawing of the Perfect man of the Kabbalists
...
...
372
The Ten Sephiroth in ten concentric circles
...
...
373
The Ten Sephiroth as a wheel
...
...
...
...
374
Magical letter-wheels and letter-circles
...
...
...
376
The Twelve Houses of Heaven
...
...
...
...
384
The Seven Worlds, the Earth, and the World Ocean
...
385
The Egyptian gods of the Five Planets
...
...
...
386
The Circles of the Signs of the Zodiac
...
...
...
387
Symbols of Stars and Constellations
...
...
...
388
The Seals of the Seven Angels
...
...
...
...
389
The Kabbalistic symbols of the Astrological Planets
39L 392
The Kamea of Lead ...
...
...
...
...
...
394
X
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
The Kame'a of Tin (or silver)
The Kame'a of Iron ...
The Kame'a of Gold ...
The Kame'a of Copper
The Kame'a of Quicksilver ...
The Kame'a of Silver
Symbols of the Moon and other planets
The human hand and the stars
Specimen of Kabbalistic Scripts
The Signs of the Zodiac
Sacred Heart with Signs of the Zodiac
The Creation Hexagram
Bronze liver in Piacenza
Clay model of a liver of a sheep—obverse
Clay model of a liver of a sheep—reverse ...
The divining disk of Pergamon
Fragment of a geomantic tablet
The Hand of Fatimah
Devils waiting to carry off the soul of a man
The Virgin Mary rescuing two souls from devils ...
The Virgin Mary rescuing the soul of the cannibal
The magical rod of Ningishzida
...
394
395
...
395
...
396
...
396
...
397
398, 399
...
402
...
404
...
410
...
415
...
432
...
452
...
454
...
455
...
45P
...
462
...
468
...
477
...
478
479, 480
...
489
XI
PREFACE
E
ARLY in the year 1873 the late Dr. Samuel
Birch, Keeper of Oriental Antiquities in the
British Museum, gave me permission to copy
cuneiform tablets in his private study, and to use
the Departmental Library. His study, which was
entered from the Kuyunjik Gallery and no longer
exists, was a comparatively small room, and he
was obliged to transact his business, both official
and private, in the presence of the few students
whom he allowed to work in it. These were accom¬
modated at a table and a desk which stood under
the north and west windows respectively. Day by
day there came to him antica dealers and amateur
collectors, who wished to show him objects which
they possessed or were about to acquire, and to
know what purpose they had served, what the marks
or inscriptions on them meant, and what their
pecuniary value was. The objects brought were
usually Oriental, papyri, Egyptian and Coptic,
cuneiform tablets, figures of gods, palm-leaf manu¬
scripts, rings, pendants, necklaces, amulets of all
kinds, inscribed metal plaques, Chinese pottery
and seals, etc. But no matter what the object
put before him was, Birch always seemed to know
something about it, and to be able to refer his
visitors to authoritative books, or to living scholars,
for further information. That he was the greatest
Egyptologist in England, and that officials from the
Xll
PREFACE
Chinese Embassy in London came to him for infor¬
mation about ancient Chinese history and the old
forms of Chinese pictographs we all knew, but one
could only listen and wonder at the encyclopaedic
character of his general knowledge. Naturally he
was consulted by many members of the general
public on matters dealing with Egyptology and
Assyriology, for the greater number of the anti¬
quities under his charge came from Egypt, Baby¬
lonia and Assyria. But some of his visitors asked
him for information, and usually got it, about the
Moabite Stone, the Cyprian inscriptions (which were
at that time undeciphered), the Massorah, the Kab¬
balah, the Sinaitic inscriptions, the monuments of
Susa and Persepolis, the inscriptions of Mai Amir,
the Himyaritic inscriptions, astrology, the ritual of
fire-worship, the rites of the Yazidis or Devilworshippers, etc. His answers and short disserta¬
tions were always interesting, and that we, i.e.
Naville, Strassmaier, W. H. Rylands and myself,
more often listened to them than worked need not
be wondered at.
One day, when he seemed to have a little leisure,
I ventured to ask him if members of the public ever
put to him questions which he could not answer ?
and he replied, “ Yes, often/’ Said I, “ Then what
happens ? ” He answered promptly, “ I confess
my ignorance, and refer the visitor to another member
of the staff. When the enquirer has gone I at once
write down the question he has asked on a slip of
paper, and as soon as I can I try to obtain the
information necessary to answer the question. And
if the day ever comes when you are an Assistant in
this Department I recommend you to write all the
PREFACE
Xlll
sensible questions which you are asked upon slips of
paper and search out the answers to them. Many
members of the public ask the same question ?
especially about matters of general interest/’
Ten years later I had the good fortune to become
one of Dr. Birch’s Assistants, and in due course I
was asked many questions by the public which I
could not answer satisfactorily. Therefore I adopted
Dr. Birch’s plan and wrote such questions on slips
of paper, and I continued to do this during the years
of my long service in the British Museum. When I
resigned in 1924 and left my official residence I
brought away with me a very thick bundle of slips
with questions written on them. During the first
years of my service the questions were of a very
miscellaneous character and dealt with a great
variety of subjects. But when Dr. Birch’s successor
found that the answering of questions orally and by
letter took up so much of his time daily, he moved
the Trustees to change the title of the Department
to that of “ Department of Egyptian and Assyrian
Antiquities.” This change limited the scope but
not the number of enquiries, and little by little the
questions chiefly concerned Egyptian and Assyrian,
Babylonian and other Semitic antiquities.
As opportunity offered, after my retirement I
read over the mass of slips which I had collected,
and discovering by the letters sent to me that the
public were asking much the same kinds of questions
which their fathers and mothers had asked me thirty
and forty years ago, I determined to deal with the
questions, as far as possible comprehensively, and
to write a book which in a series of chapters would
supply answers to them ; and the present volume
XIV
PREFACE
is the result. As at least three-fourths of the
questions concerned amulets and the beliefs which
they represented I have called it “ Amulets and
Superstitions/' though perhaps a more correct
title would have substituted “ Magic" for “Super¬
stitions/' But the reader must note that in this
book no attempt has been made to deal with amulets
in general, for the writing of a history of the amulets
which have been and still are in use throughout the
world is beyond the power of any one man. Such
a work would fill many thick volumes, and only a
syndicate of specialists working together could pro¬
duce the necessary “ copy ” for the printer. The use
of amulets is the result of the belief in the power of the
Evil Eye in man and beast, and a proof of the vast¬
ness of the literature of this subject, which is growing
daily, is furnished by the fact that the “ OuellenRegister ” in Dr. Seligmann’s Der Bose Blick (Berlin,
1910) contains nearly 2,500 entries. And in his
Die Zauberkraft der Auges (Hamburg, 1922) the
authorities quoted number many hundreds more.
In this volume I have described the principal
amulets which were used by the Semitic peoples of
Western Asia, Egypt, Nubia and Ethiopia, beginning
with those of the third millennium b.c. from Sumer
and Elam. I have given many illustrations of them,
reproduced photographically from the collections in
the British Museum, and from those which are in
the hands of private collectors, including my own.
The description of the actual amulet is a com¬
paratively simple matter, for in most cases the
object explains itself. But when we come to the
inscriptions on amulets, which consist of symbols,
sacred and divine names used as words of power,
PREFACE
xv
spells, etc., explanations of some length are necessary
of the ideas and beliefs which they represent.
Therefore I have added a series of short chapters
in which I have tried to set forth the principal
theories about the powers of “ working ” amulets, and
the meaning of the inscriptions and symbols inscribed
on them, and to indicate the beliefs concerning
them which were held by the ancient Babylonian
and Egyptian magicians, and by the later Kabbalists, Gnostics, both pagan and Christian, and
astrologers. And I have incorporated in them
many of the views of the astrologers, makers of
horoscopes, casters of nativities, diviners, crystalgazers, palmists and fortune-tellers with whom I
came in contact in Egypt, the Sudan and Meso¬
potamia during my official Missions to those countries.
The use of amulets dates from the time when
animism or magic satisfied the spiritual needs of
man. Primitive man seems to have adopted them
as a result of an internal urge or the natural instinct
which made him take steps to protect himself and
to try to divine the future. He required amulets
to enable him to beget children, to give him strength
to overcome his enemies, visible and invisible, and
above all the Evil Eye, and to protect his women
and children, and house and cattle ; and his de¬
scendants throughout the world have always done
the same. When the notion of a god developed
in his mind, he ascribed to that god the authorship
of the magical powers which he believed to be
inherent in his amulets, and he believed that his
god needed them as much as he himself did. He
did not think it possible for his god to exist without
the help of magical powers. At a later period he
XVI
PREFACE
regarded his god as the bestower of magical powers
on men, and we find this view current among the
civilized priests of Egypt, Sumer and Babylonia.
These priests did not reject the crude magical beliefs
and practices of their predecessors, whether savage
or semi-savage; on the contrary they adopted*many
of them unaltered, and they formed an integral part
of the mystery of the religion which they formu¬
lated. Henceforth magic and religion went hand
in hand. The gods became magicians, and employed
magic when necessary, and dispensed it through
their priests to mankind.
The Jewish Rabbis and some of the Christian
Fathers condemned the use of amulets, some because
they associated them with magic, and some because
they regarded their use as an indication of distrust in
the wisdom and arts of Divine Providence. But
their condemnation had no lasting effect except to
incite men to do what was arbitrarily forbidden,
and the making and wearing of amulets went on
as before. Men have always craved for amulets
and the priests, both Pagans and Christians, should
have taken steps to satisfy this craving. In this
way they could have more or less controlled the
use of amulets of every kind. The ancient literature
of Babylonia and Egypt makes it clear that magic
was believed to be an essential part of the equipment
of the gods, who used it to help themselves and each
other, and when they willed transmitted it to men.
In a papyrus at St. Petersburg1 there is a remarkPublished by W. Golenischeff, Les Papyrus hieratiques
No. 1115, iii6a and iii6b de VErmitage imperial d
St. Petersbourg, 1913. The papyrus is not older than the
XVIIIth Dynasty, but the work itself was written under the
IXth or Xth Dynasty.
1
PREFACE
XVII
able passage in which it is stated that the great god,
presumably Ra, created magic for the benefit of
man. It occurs in a work written by a king called
who reigned during the troublous times
between the downfall of the Vlth Dynasty and the
rise of the Theban Kingdom, in the third millennium
before Christ. This work contains a series of
“ Teachings/' which the king advised his son
Meri-ka-Ra to follow closely.
In section XXVIII
the king enumerates the great things which God
has done for men and women, whom he describes as
the “ flocks and herds of God," and says, “ He made
heaven and earth for their pleasure ; He dissipated
the darkness of the waters (i.e. the primeval ocean) ;
He made the breezes of life for their nostrils ; they
(i.e. men and women) are the images of Him and
they proceeded from His members ; He rises in
the sky to gratify them ; He made fruits and
vegetables and flocks and herds, and feathered
fowl and fish for their food ; He slew his enemies,
he destroyed his own children when they murmured
against him and rebelled ; He made the daylight
Khati,
to gratify them ;
AA/VWN
AA/VWN
n
and
AA/WVN
I I I
-_Qi
for resisting the power
of the night
as well as
£
/WVSAA
I I I
li
-<2>-
Cl
n
(sic)
of [evil] happenings [and] the dream
ra
ffi
for a weapon
magic
He made for them
LJ
(j> <—m
u
o
of the dayT
The word kekau here rendered “ magic," includes
in its meaning, spells, incantations, words of power,
b
XV111
PREFACE
and all the arts of the witch and sorcerer. The
word Kheprit must mean unlucky or untoward, or
evil happenings. And the kind of dream is not
indicated ; the writer may mean the dream which
terrifies, or the dreams in which the dreamer is
shown future events, and is enabled in consequence
to arrange or rearrange his affairs in respect of
them. If it is the latter kind of dream which is
referred to by the king, we have a proof that dreams
were often employed by the gods in making their
will known to the Egyptians. And this proves that
the art of divining by means of dreams was commonly
practised.
The literature of Babylonia also gives instances
of the use of magic by the gods themselves. Thus
when the Abyss-god Apsu rebelled against his
overlord Ea, he had no opportunity of fighting him,
for Ea first cast a mighty spell on him which made
him fall into a heavy sleep, and then he killed him
and seized his habitation ; and Mummu, the com¬
mander-in-chief of the forces of Apsu, was over¬
powered or bewitched by the same means and
rendered impotent. When the gods found that
they were to be attacked by Tiamat, the personifica¬
tion and mother of all evil, and by all the powers of
darkness under the leadership of her son Kingu,
they selected Marduk, the son of Ea, as their
champion, and endowed him with the power which
they believed would enable him to avenge their
cause effectively. But before he set out on his
mission, they felt it necessary to make quite sure
that his power as a magician was adequate for his
task. They caused a cloak to appear in their
midst, and said to him, “ Thou shalt be chief among
PREFACE
xix
the gods, to cause the overthrow [of Tiamat] and
the reconstruction [of creation], and it shall come
to pass. Nevertheless speak one word only and let
the cloak disappear. Speak a second [word] and
let the cloak reappear uninjured.”
Thereupon
Marduk uttered a word of power and the cloak
disappeared ; he uttered a second and the cloak
reappeared. When the gods saw that their champion
was able to invest his words with magical power
they were satisfied and gave him the sceptre and
throne and other symbols of sovereignty and the
invincible weapon with which he was to slay Tiamat.
An instance of the invincible magical power
attributed to the great god Neb-er-djer [i.e. the Lord
to the limit) or Khepera is furnished by an Egyptian
papyrus in the British Museum (No. 10188). In the
Book of Knowing the Generations of Ra it is stated
that the god existed by himself in the primeval
ocean in name only.
In some way not described
by the use of keka or magic, he worked on his heart
[i.e. mind) and so became a being, whom the Egyptians
knew as Khepera or Ra. That the god existed by
means of his name only is proved by the well-known
legend in which the god reveals the secret name to
Isis, who craved to know it so that she might rule
over the whole world. Through her knowledge of
magic Isis was able to construct a venomous reptile
and to make it bite the god with such terrible effect
that he nearly died. When death stared him in the
face, he revealed his secret name to Isis, and she
recited a spell which healed him. Thus Isis was
skilled in the art of Black Magic as well as White.
The idea of a god existing in name only is also found
in Ethiopic literature, and some native writers have
b2
PREFACE
XX
gone so far as to state that the Three Persons of the
Trinity at first existed in name only in the primeval
ocean, and that their existence is maintained by
the use of words of power, i.e. magic.
And the ancient gods of Babylonia also used
amulets. A most interesting example of this fact
is given in the Creation Epic. When the great god
Marduk, the son of Ea, the champion of the gods,
set out to fight Tiamat, he was heavily armed and
carried invincible weapons ; but he carried between
his lips an amulet made of red paste, or red stone,
in the form of an eye, and he held in one hand
a bunch of herbs which was intended to protect
him from any magical influence which would be
hostile to him.1 And there is no doubt that Tiamat,
the “ mother of everything,” the fomenter and leader
of rebellion against the gods, also possessed a
remarkable object, which seems to have been of the
nature of an amulet and which, in any case, was the
source of all her power. In the texts this object is
called “ Duppu Shemati,” which is usually trans¬
lated “ Tablet of Destinies,” but no detailed descrip¬
tion of it is extant. Whence she obtained it is not
known, and whether she carried it on her head or
wore it on her breast is not clear.
Tiamat created a number of horrible creatures
of monstrous shape and form, to help her in her
fight against the gods, and she made her first born
son Kingu the commander-in-chief of her forces.
In one place she calls Kingu “ my only spouse.”
She bestowed upon him all the power which she
could, and she gave him the Tablet of Destinies
and fastened it to his breast, though a variant
1 Meissner,
Altonentafesche Texte, II,
41, 44, line 61 f.
PREFACE
xxi
(line 105, Third Tablet of Creation) says that she
placed it on his head. When Marduk had defeated
Kingu and his host, he took from him the Tablet
of Destinies “ which should never have been his/'
and sealed it with his seal, which showed that he
regarded the Tablet as being legally his, and fastened
it on his breast. This action suggests that the
Tablet was, like the Paizah of the Mongols, a sign of
authority, which was worn on the breast, being
suspended from the neck by a chain. In this case
also we must ask, How did Tiamat get it ? Was it
given to her, and if so by whom ?
It is evident from
the narrative of the Creation Texts that the Tablet
was the source of TiamaEs power, and that her
spells and incantations enabled her to use it in
producing evil results, i.e. to work Black Magic with
it. In itself it cannot have been a thing of evil,
for when Marduk obtained possession of it he fastened
it to his breast. Therefore it seems that we must
regard the Tablet of Destinies as an amulet.
The whole of the Babylonian story of the Creation
shows that men believed that all the great works
of the gods and devils were performed by magic.
The magic of Marduk was more powerful than that
of Tiamat, and his spells and incantations were more
powerful than hers and therefore made her curses
and spells to have no effect.
Some form of the belief that the gods of the
Sumerians, Babylonians and Egyptians made use
of amulets as protectors on urgent occasions made
its way, probably at a very early date, into Ethiopia.
In the Book of the Mysteries of Heaven and Earth
we find an account of the rebellion of Satan against
the Almighty. The Prince of Darkness mustered his
XXII
PREFACE
troops and engaged in battle with the hosts of God.
Twice the divine armies were repulsed and over¬
thrown and Satan was about to assume the position
of the conqueror of God. The Almighty reformed
His armies and sent them forth a third time to
destroy Satan and his followers, but on this occasion
He sent forth with them a Cross of Light on which
the Names of the Three Persons of the Trinity were
written. When Satan saw the Cross and the Three
Names of Power, his boldness and courage forsook
him, his arms lost their strength and the weapons
which he was wielding fell from them and he and
his hosts turned their backs and were hurled down
into the abyss of hell by the now invincible angels
of God. The Abyssinian belief in the power of the
Cross to vanquish evil spirits and the diseases caused
by them is based on this Legend ; and from early
Christian times the Cross has been regarded as the
amulet and talisman par excellence throughout
Ethiopia.
Since the oldest civilized ancient nations believed
that their gods had need of and made use of magic,
it is not surprising that men and women had recourse
to magic in periods of stress and difficulty. What
was good for the gods was good also for man. Men
made and used amulets to protect themselves, and
the fundamental idea in their minds was to safe¬
guard the life and strength which had been given
to them by the gods, although the divine powers
seemed inattentive to them; each generation in
every country borrowed something from its pre¬
decessors, but, apparently, abandoned no essential
part of the tradition, belief or teaching concerning
amulets.
It was always assumed that materials
PREFACE
XXlll
from which amulets were made possessed certain
qualities or attributes or powers which were beneficial
to man. The influence of the inscription or device
or name or word of power which was written upon
the amulet, supplemented and perhaps increased
the innate power in the material. To this power
belief added that of the good will or affection or love
of the giver of the amulet. When to these was
added the firm belief of the wearer of the amulet
in the qualities of the material it is clear that no
amulet could be regarded as a piece of inert and dead
matter. It became, in fact, a “ working ” amulet.
A dose of medicine might be regarded as an amulet
applied internally, and the effect of the matter which
composed the dose was supplemented by the spell
of the pagan, or the prayer of the Christian. The
good will of both, and the Faith of the patient
joined to them, healed him and saved his life. The
power and effect of Faith in all such matters cannot
be over-estimated.
Looking back over the history of amulets it is
difficult to understand why ecclesiastical and other
bodies condemned their use. The universal use of
the amulet was, and still is, due to an instinct of the
race, viz., that of self-preservation, and has nothing
evil connected with it ; it has never been, and never
can be, connected with what is commonly called
“ Black Magic/’ If we examine carefully the groups
of amulets and amuletic inscriptions described and
translated in this book, we find that each and all of
them was believed to derive its protective powers
from figures of the gods either engraved or drawn,
and from the great names of the gods and of their
divine attributes and the figures of sacred animals,
XXIV
PREFACE
and from inscriptions which contain divine names in
various forms. All these amulets base their appeal
to the Divine Powers for virility, fecundity, pre¬
servation of the family, success and well-being on
the belief of their makers and wearers in the triumph
of the Power of God over the Satans of every age
and country, and the victory of Good over Evil,
Law over Chaos, and Light over Darkness. The
wearers of many of them may be said to have per¬
formed acts of worship when they wore them, and
should have won the approval of their spiritual
pastors and masters. It is probable that in Baby¬
lonia, Assyria and Egypt amulets were designed
and made by workmen attached to the great temples,
and that the inscriptions on them were drafted by
the priests and engraved by employes in the
temples.
Erom the Babylonian and Egyptian inscriptions
we know that amulets made of certain kinds of
stones secured for their wearers the presence of
gods and goddesses, and brought them into daily
contact with divine beings. Men possessing these
had no need to have recourse to any system of
divination in order to find out what the will of the
gods was in respect of themselves, for no man “ whose
god was always with him ” could come to harm.
The insatiable desire to know the future was and
still is a deep-rooted instinct in man, and many
kinds of divination were practised in the earliest
times. Some amulets were believed to make the
wearer dream dreams in which his future would be
revealed to him, but as few men were satisfied with
their own interpretations of their dreams, a class of
professional interpreters of dreams came into being.
PREFACE
XXV
The interpreters of dreams and omens were usually
members of the priesthoods of the temples, and
were men of solid learning, but in country villages
impostors and charlatans were many. The ancient
Asiatic peoples seem to have had three methods of
divination, viz., by lots, by the pronouncements of
astrologers, and by oracles which were given by the
priests of the great temples. And among many
peoples the “ seer ” was commonly consulted about
the future. Ordinary folk cast lots and though their
kind of divination was denounced by both the
Hebrews and the Christians, it was often resorted
to by them when other means of divination failed.
Balaam, the diviner, was slain by the Israelites
(Joshua xiii. 22), but Matthias was chosen to be an
apostle by the casting of lots (Mark xv. 24) ! The
astrologer and the “ seer ” (especially the latter)
were likewise denounced, because their prophetic
ecstacy or frenzy was regarded as madness and
delirium.
The most reputable form of divination was
enquiry by oracle. Shamash was the “ Lord of
Oracles,” but many other great Babylonian gods were
givers of oracles ; the first man in Babylonia to
enquire by oracle was Enmeduranki, the king of
Sippar, who reigned in prehistoric times. The
goddess Ishtar of Arbela, too, gave oracular responses
to Esarhaddon, King of Assyria. In Egypt the
great giver of oracles was Ra, the Sun-god, or AmenRa. In Israel God gave His oracles through Aaron
and his successors, but the story of Saul shows that
there were occasions when He would give no oracle.
“ Saul asked counsel of God, . . . but He answered
him not that day ” (1 Sam. xiv. 37). And again,
XXVI
PREFACE
“ When Saul enquired of the Lord, the Lord
answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim,
nor by prophets ” (i Sam. xxviii. 6). In desperation
Saul consulted the witch of Endor and a day or so
later met his fate. The witch herself, before she
obeyed his commands, reminded him that he had
“ put away those who had familiar spirits, and the
wizards out of his land ” (i Sam. xxviii. 3).
Now although the Law decreed that there should
not be in Israel any one who used divination, or
observed times, or who was an enchanter, or a witch,
or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits,
or a wizard or a necromancer (Deut. xviii. 10, 11),
we find that one kind of divination was permitted
by the Law, namely, the enquiry by Urim and Tummim, and that Moses gave very careful directions
for the preparation of the means by which it could
be carried out. Urim and Tummim were the names
of two small pebbles, or plaques, or bits of wood,
which were used much as we use dice. They were
kept in a small pocket or pouch which was made at
the back of the “ breast-plate of judgment ” (Exod.
xxviii. 30 ; Lev. viii. 8), and it was the duty of
Aaron and his successors to keep them there in
safety, and to produce them when men wished to
enquire of them. It is quite clear that the use of
these two little objects for divining purposes was very
ancient, and that Moses, being unable to suppress
entirely the arts of divining which were among the
Israelites, adopted this the oldest and most reputable
form of divination and kept it under the control of
himself and the priests of the Levites. In short, he
regularized the use of Urim and Tummim and made
enquiry by them a semi-religious ceremony ; and
PREFACE
XXVll
naturally he condemned all other forms of divination
just as he condemned the use of all other amulets
except the Phylacteries or frontlet bands which were
worn between the eyes, the Mezuzah or door-post
amulet, and the Sisith, i.e. tassel or fringe.
The object of all systems of divination was to
compel the gods and the Deity to make their wills
in respect of certain matters known to earnest,
and it may be added, lawful enquirers, and Moses
in common with pagan priests considered that there
were occasions when the orthodox Israelite might
be assisted in his quest.
Chrysostom and many other Christian Fathers
condemned the use of amulets and systems of divina¬
tion because of their connection with magic, but it is
quite clear that the Christians of the Orient clung
to many practices of pagan magic long after they
had ceased to exist among European Christians. To
the latter faith in God’s Government was sufficient,
and systems of divination were therefore unnecessary,
and their priests were not called upon to be as
tolerant as their brethren in the European parts of
Asia Minor, Egypt, Nubia, Palestine, and Syria.
Evidences of this are given in the New Testament.
The story of the Star which led the Magi (Matt,
ii. 2) shows that astrology was regarded with tolera¬
tion by St. Matthew and his readers ; the mention
of the dream of Joseph (Matt. ii. 12, 13, 19, 22) and
the dream of Pilate’s wife proves that dreams were
still regarded as legalized forms of divination. The
waking dreams or trance of Peter (Acts x. 10) and
Paul (Acts xxii. 17) were thought of in the same
light by the early Christians. The pagan belief in
the virtue which is latent in the shadow of a holy
xxviii
PREFACE
man is referred to in Acts v. 15, where we are told
that the sick folk and demoniacs on whom the shadow
of Peter fell “ were healed every one.” The belief
was common that there were healing powers in the
apparel of holy men, and when the “ handkerchiefs
and aprons ” of Paul were brought and laid upon
the sick, “ the diseases departed from them, and the
evil spirits went out of them ” (Acts xix. 12).
Soon after the close of the IVth century of our
Era a sort of revival in the use of amulets began,
and the Christians began to make use of amulets
which were connected with their religion. First and
foremost was the Cross, which appeared in various
forms, and the sign of the Cross, which was commonly
used by the clergy and laity alike to drive away
devils and disease-producing spirits. Then came
pictures of the Virgin Mary, and pictures and figures
of the Archangels and the great saints, and the
cult of the relics of the martyrs who were the victims
of the numerous persecutions which took place in
the first four centuries of our Era. Untanned leather
and parchment and papyrus and stones were also
inscribed with extracts from the Scriptures, and
finally, after the invention of paper, amulets and
talismans of paper became common. And a species
of Christian Magic came into being. The greatest
Name and word of power was Jesus, and the Host
and sacramental oil and incense became to many
amulets of invincible power, and the Sacred Elements
were actually called “ immortal medicine.”
Oriental magic of every kind made its way into
Europe in the Middle Ages, and traces of it are
recognizable throughout the West, even at the pre¬
sent day. The mathematician and the astronomer
PREFACE
XXIX
and the physician have founded their sciences on
the lore of the Sumerians and Babylonians and
Assyrians, and believe that they have taken from
the arithmetic and astrological and medical tablets
everything there is of value in them, but in this
they are mistaken. Astrology, divination, the use
of numbers, and the system of medicine which were
in use in Mesopotamia in the third millennium before
Christ are as much alive and as active in that country
as ever, and are held by the natives in far higher
esteem than the exact sciences which Europeans
have derived from them. And even in England
and America at the present time large numbers of
people are influenced by beliefs which were common
in Babylonia four or five thousand years ago. No
amount of development, culture or education will
make men abandon wholly the use of amulets and
systems of divination. For amulets give their
wearers a sense of comfort, and protection and well¬
being, and they harm no one. And he who practises
the arts of divination can harm nobody but himself.
Writers of books and articles on occult matters
in encyclopaedic works frequently refer to astrology
and divination and kindred subjects as if they were
products of the ages of ignorance and are rapidly
becoming non-existent ; but if they really believe
this they have fallen into grievous error. We are told
that astrology is a pseudo-science, although it has
been developed entirely on the lines of experiment
and experience, and accurate records of facts. This
development does not make it an exact science, but
it is impossible not to be struck with the general
accuracy of the readings of a large number of the
characters of men and women which are based upon
XXX
PREFACE
the readings of horoscopes. There are living among
us parents who have had horoscopes made imme¬
diately after births of their children, and who bring
up their children according to the directions supplied
by the horoscopist. Similarly there are medical
practitioners who have horoscopes of their patients
made, and who use the information derived from them
as a guide to the treatment which they eventually
prescribe for their patients. Among one’s friends
and acquaintances are many men and women who
have their horoscopes made annually, and who
plan their work and travel and pleasure in accord¬
ance with the positions of the planets and the Signs
of the Zodiac at the Vernal Equinox. The publica¬
tion of the astrological works by Mr. Waite and
“ Sepharial ” and Miss Adams and others proves
that the number of astrologers and amateur astro¬
logers in our country must be very great. Men
have always believed that their lives are directed
by the stars, and among a large proportion of the
dwellers on the earth it will never die. The results
which astrologers obtain sometimes are so remark¬
able, and their prognostications are so often
fulfilled to the letter by subsequent events, that even
the unbeliever is compelled to admit that there
must be “ something in it.”
Palmistry likewise is dubbed a pseudo-science.
It grew up in the East and made its way into Europe
via India and Mesopotamia and Egypt. The Oriental
experts in palmistry are usually learned and able
men who are shrewd and wise judges of character,
and they can undoubtedly give accurate estimates
as to the nature of the past and present of men’s
lives by examining the lines of the hand. When
PREFACE
XXXI
palmistry came into being is unknown, but it seems
to have been used as a means of divination by the
earliest inhabitants of our earth. Parsee friends
assert that the face and the palms of the hands supply
a key to the true nature, character and disposition
of every man. And every one who has seen the
Parsee expert handling this key, and been able to
check his statements subsequently, must admit
that his character sketches are accurate, and that
the fulfilment of his prophecies is so exact as to be
uncanny. He can literally read faces and hands
and the ability to do so enables him to avoid contact
with bad and vicious men.
The art of crystal-gazing, or “ Scrying/’ is
practised by many men and women, and some
“ gazers ” obtain very remarkable results. There
is no imposture when the “ gaze ” is honest, for the
staring into the crystal globe hypnotizes the ‘"gazer,”
and his mind falls into the state of the “ seer ” of
old, who saw visions which he was unable to describe.
In short, he goes into a sort of trance, which causes
the optic nerve to stimulate the brain, and makes
it dispatch visions along it into the eye. Excessive
“ Scrying ” is harmful to the sight, and excess in the
use of the ball of crystal should be carefully avoided.
The skilled “ gazer ” can obtain just as good results
for the enquirer by gazing into a mirror, or into
water or a cup or bowl, or pail, or a pond, or water
or ink cupped in the hand.
The belief in the existence of witches has perished
in our land, although at a few outlying districts
in Western Scotland and Ireland “ spae women ” (or
“ wise women ”) are said still to be found. But it
must not be thought that the belief in witchcraft
XXXI1
PREFACE
has died out, for such is not the case. There are in
all large towns numbers of women who earn quite
good livings by fortune-telling by cards and by
trances in which they claim to hold converse with
the dead, and to be able to bring the living and the
dead together. These women make no pretence
to read the past in the lives of their clients, but
claim to foretell the futures of some of them, and
it must be admitted that their efforts are sometimes
extraordinarily successful, that is to say their
prognostications are often fulfilled literally. An
experienced and discreet clairvoyante numbers her
clients by the score, and they belong to all classes—
soldiers, sailors, politicians, civil servants, and
ecclesiastics,besides a considerable number of women,
titled and untitled. The wish to divine the future
seems to be as general now as ever. Divining by
means of trance is described as very exhausting for
the diviner, and conscientious clairvoyantes say
that they can only “ work ” for a limited number of
hours each day, and that these hours must not be
consecutive. The modern witch, male or female,
no longer dispenses “ hell broth ” and decoctions of
drugs, and philtres made from bats’ eyes, and the
insides of reptiles, and human fat, and the juice of
adders, because the Taw stands in the way, and she
no longer travels through the air astride of a besom
or broomstick. But there is little doubt that she
still exercises her traditional wiles and crafts among
civilized folk who pay her well for her trouble. It
is only fair to say that she deceives herself as well
as her clients.
The witch man of the West is much less to be
feared or concerned about than his colleague in the
PREFACE
XXXlll
East. No one who has lived among Sudani peoples
and the Fang people of West Africa and the devilridden natives of the swamps of Lower Babylonia
can help believing that their witch-doctors possess
some kind of psychic power unknown to us. They
seem to kill their own enemies, and for payment
other people’s enemies, by suggestion, that is to
say, the witch doctor goes to a man and tells him
that he should die on or before a certain day, and
he follows this up by wishing intensively for the
man’s death, and at length the man does actually
die. The witch doctor also seems to have the power
of “ suggesting ” blindness or rheumatism, or some
wasting disease which will cause the victim to
welcome death. The only answer that anyone who
has seen the witch-doctors of the East work can give
to the question,
Is it possible for any man, black
or white, to possess such a power of suggestion ? ” is
“ I do not know.” When in the East the traveller
believes that it is possible and goes delicately, and is
afraid ; in the West he still believes but is unafraid.
Against the wearing of amulets little objection,
it seems to me, can be made. It may be foolish or
superstitious to wear and treasure inanimate objects,
even thought they be made of gold or silver or plati¬
num or precious stones. The wearers gain from them
feelings of comfort and protection, and they often
represent the affection and love of friends. And
beautiful amulets evoke the admiration of their
wearers and their friends, and frequently satisfy
the lust of the eye for beauty. In the Near East
amulets are used universally and unashamedly. The
old camel postman who guided me from Damascus
to Baghdad attributed our safe arrival to the five
XXXIV
PREFACE
blue beads which were fastened on the foreheads of
each of his camels. Such success as I had in collect¬
ing manuscripts in the Tiyari country was also
attributed to the blue beads, and the Kuban amulets
which I bought there. Under the protection of a
small bag of dust from the tomb of Rabban Hormizd
our caravan travelled from Mosul through the country
of the Yazidis or Devil-worshippers, and under the
protection of a bag of dust from Kubbah Idris our
boat sailed in safety from Dulgo to Koshah in the
Third Cataract. When the Shammar Arabs pillaged
our caravan and stole our food and clothes and
carried off our beasts they discussed the question
as to whether they should cut our throats or strip
us naked and turn us loose into the desert for. God
to kill by thirst and cold. They did neither, but
Muhammad Amin assured me that we escaped only
because he was wearing on his breast an agate
plaque engraved with the Throne Verse from the
Kuban, and I had another in my cigar case. From
this it seems that Muslim amulets are tolerant of
Christians. The same authority assured me that
we were able to shoot two of the thieves who came
to steal two cases of indigo from our raft at Kahah
Sherkat, and to slit our sheep skin bags and sink us,
because we had those two amulets in our possession.
To him the wearing of orthodox amulets was a species
of worship. It was the same in Egypt. The acrobats
refused to exhibit their sword dance until we gave
them time to put on their amulets, and the dancing
women of Kana and Mansurah cheerfully divested
themselves of everything except the little neck
bands on which they wore their amulets. Dozens
of instances of a similar character might be quoted.
PREFACE
XXXV
In the West, too, many great and distinguished
men had a firm belief in the power of their amulets
to protect them. The late Czar of Russia attached
great value to a ring which contained a piece of the
wood of the True Cross ; the ring had protected his
grandfather, but on the day in which he forgot
to take the ring with him he was assassinated
(Sharper Knowlson, Origins of Popular Super¬
stitions, p. 156). Mr. J. D. Rockefeller, a Non¬
conformist, has for years carried in his pocket an
“ eagle stone ” in a hollow in which there are con¬
cretions which rattle when the stone is shaken.
He regarded it as a charm against disease, shipwreck
and other calamities (ibid., p. 10). The late Prof. W.
Wright, of Cambridge, a very hard-headed Scotsman,
wore by day and night a gold ring from Loango on
which were worked in wire the Twelve Signs of the
Zodiac. He used to say that he could never work
unless he had it on his finger.
A colleague at
Cambridge being worsted in an official dispute with
him, cursed him by the ineffable Name of God,
and Wright believed that the fatal disease which
attacked him was due to this curse.
During the last fifty years the Egyptian scarab has
become a very favourite and popular amulet or
mascot because of the ideas of new life and resurrec¬
tion which the Egyptians associated with it. But one
lady paid £50 for a pretty blue glazed porcelain scarab
of Oueen Hatshepsut because she believed that she
was a reincarnation of the Great Queen, and had
in herself the divinity of the god Amen her father.
And another lady paid a large sum for a pretty
scarab of Oueen Ti because she believed that she
was a reincarnation of that beautiful woman, whom
XXXVI
PREFACE
in features she thought she resembled. On the
other hand many owners of scarabs have changed
their opinions, and because they regarded them as
sources of ill-luck and misfortune have presented
them to the British Museum.
Paragraphs in the daily press often contain inter¬
esting reading about the objects which are chosen
as mascots. The late Sir Henry Segrave always
carried with him a rabbit’s paw, which the negroes
say is the luckiest thing in the world. The paw
was with him at Daytona when he made all his
great successes as the speed king. But when calamity
overtook his boat and death claimed him the rabbit’s
paw was not with him ! (Evening Standard, June 14,
1930). The Australian cricketers had a large rubber
kangaroo mascot, which one of their number knocked
over and broke. Mr. Woodfull had it repaired and
set up at once (Evening Standard, June 16, p. 11).
Eight people killed an octopus near Corbiere light¬
house in Jersey ; they took it back to their hotel
and set it up as a mascot (Daily Express, June 17,
p. 11). An instance of how the rabbit’s paw saved
the life and the money of a man is told in Mr. Ernest
Poole’s excellent story, The Car of Croesus, p. 164.
When Hobbs went in to play he wanted 16 runs to
beat Grace’s record of 54,896 runs, and with him went
a white sparrow ; the sparrow stayed until he scored
40 runs and then flew away. The bystanders said
“ Hobbs’ luck has gone,” and three balls later Hobbs
was bowled (Sunday Graphic, August 10, 1930, p. 2).
Surely one of the strangest mascots ever placed on
a motor car is that of Mr. Somerset Maxwell : this
is a tiny figure of a huntsman in pink, holding up
g dead fox (Evening Standard, Oct, 15, p. 1),
PREFACE
XXXVll
“Fear,” the Wisdom of Solomon saith, “is
nothing else but a betraying of the succours which
reason offereth ” (xvii. 12). It is impossible not to
conclude that it was man’s fear which brought
amulets into being, and that it is only his belief
which endows them with power, and his implicit
and invincible faith which makes them operative.
My grateful thanks are due to the Trustees of the
British Museum for their permission to photo¬
graph extracts from—1, Mandaean, Samaritan and
Syriac manuscripts ; 2, diagrams from MSS. of the
Kabbalah ; 3, amulets and drawings from printed
books, including the rare Book of Raziel ; and 4, a
comprehensive collection of Sumerian, Babylonian,
Assyrian, Phoenician, Pehlevi and other amulets.
This work has been greatly facilitated through the
kindness of my former colleagues, Dr. L. O. Barnett,
Keeper of the Department of Oriental Printed Books
and Manuscripts, and Mr. J. D. Teveen, B.A., and
their staff of Clerks. The selection of the amulets
from Babylonia and Elam for publication was made
by Mr. Sidney Smith, of the British Museum. His
translation of the texts explaining the use of the
prophylactic and atropopaeic figures which Mr.
Woolley excavated at Ur of the Chaldees and
described in a learned paper in the Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society, have brought to light many
fundamental facts concerning early Mesopotamian
religion. The co-operation of the trained philologist
and the expert excavator has produced most ex¬
cellent results. To Mr. C. J. Gadd, of the British
Museum, I am indebted for many facts concerning
ancient Babylonian beliefs about precious stones,
and for the information about the clay model of a
XXXV111
PREFACE
sheep’s liver in the British Museum, which his
researches have made available. Further, I am
greatly indebted to Dr. Moses Gaster, Chief Rabbi
of the Sephardic Communities in England, for
permission to publish several extracts from the
Corpus of his works which he published this year
under the title of Studies and Texts in Magic, Folk¬
lore, Samaritan Archaeology, 3 vols., 1923-28. Much
has been written by commentators and others about
the phylacteries which are mentioned in the New
Testament, what they were and what they were not,
etc., but Dr. Gaster was the first to publish phy¬
lactery-texts, and to translate and explain not
only the language of the Samaritans, but also their
philosophy and their religion.
During the writing of this book I have consulted
many works on the so-called “ Occult Sciences,”
and read many scores of papers and articles on the
various subjects which I have dealt with in the
following pages. The more useful to the student
are undoubtedly the volumes of Dr. S. Seligmann.
This distinguished author has shown that amulets
and amuletic objects are the result of the belief
of man in the Evil Eye, and its far-reaching and
terrible power. This he has made clear in his works,
Der hose Blick und Verwandter, 2 vols., 1910, and
Die Zauberkraft der Auges, 1922, and they will form
the standard works on the subject for many years
to come. The Kabbalah is a great fount of occult¬
ism and mysticism as well as forming a great system
of religious philosophy. The Kabbala Denudata by
Baron von Rosenroth (1677-78), and the Kabbalah
by Ginsburg (1865), and the works of Mr. Waite
pje very useful books on the subject, but the practical
PREFACE
XXXIX
side of Kabbalah is very successfully handled by
Dr. Erich Bischoff, a skilled Hebraist, in his
Die Kabbalah (Einfuhrung), Leipzig, 1923, and more
fully in his larger work, Die Elemente der Kabbalah,
2 vols., 1920. The student will also find much of
interest in the German translations of the old books
of magic by Peter of Abano, Pictorius of Villingen,
Gerhard of Cremona, in Linden’s edition of
Cornelius Agrippa, 3 vols., Berlin, 1921.
The
extracts from Mr. Montgomery’s translations of the
texts on the terra-cotta “ devil-traps ” found at
Babylon and Niffar well illustrate the character of
the magic of the Mandaeans.
The addition of a Bibliography to a volume already
bulky was unnecessary, because the works of the
principal authorities are named in the various
chapters. Those who wish to explore occult litera¬
ture, both ancient and modern, more fully should
consult the lists of books and papers given by
Dr. Seligmann, and the invaluable SuBjECT-Index
volumes published by the British Museum. The
long and very full Index which I have added
will, I hope, make reference to this book easy.
My thanks are also due to Messrs. G. A. Crane,
S. J. Wadlow and the Readers of the staff of
Messrs. Harrison & Sons, Ltd., for many practical
suggestions which I have gladly adopted.
E. A. Wallis Budge.
21 st October, 1930.
48, Bloomsbury Street,
Bedford Square, W.C.i.
CHAPTER
THE
UNIVERSAL
BELIEF
IN
USE
THE
OF
I.
AMULETS
EXISTENCE
OF
DUE
TO
DEMONS
MAN’S
AND
EVIL SPIRITS.
every place in our own country and in foreign
lands where excavations on the sites of ancient
cities have been made, the spade of the excavator
has brought to light a number of objects of various
kinds and sizes which we may call generally
Amulets and Talismans, and regard as the works
of men who were believers in Magic. The use of
these objects was not confined to any one place,
or people, or period, and the great mass of the
evidence about the matter now available justifies
the statement that the use of amulets and talismans
was and, it may be added, still is, universal. We
may even go further and say that it is coeval with
the existence of Homo sapiens on the earth. It is
natural to ask why amulets and talismans are so
numerous, and so widely distributed over the earth,
and what purpose they served ? The answer to
these questions is not far to seek. Early man lived
days of misery and nights of anxiety and fear, not
to say terror. To feed himself and his woman and
their children was often difficult, and to avoid or
overcome the beasts and reptiles which were his
natural enemies must have taxed his wit and
strength to the uttermost ; and the fear of the
unknown dangers of the darkness and night, when
In
2
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
the beasts of prey were prowling round his cave
or his thicket, added greatly to his misery. In
some places the vicissitudes of climate laid an
Face of the very early Babylonian demon Humbaba, whose voice was like
that of a storm, and whose breath was like a hurricane. He was con¬
quered by Gilgamish, King of Erach, and Enkidu. The face is formed of
a single raised line, the twistings of which represent the convolutions of
the entrails, and form the features. How the demon came to have his
face represented thus is discussed by Sidney Smith in the Liverpool
Annals, vol. xi. p. 107 f.
The above rough tracing made from Plate V of the Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society, July, 1926, is published with the kind permission
of the Council of the Society. The original is in the British Museum,
' No. 116737.
additional burden upon him and he had to be ever
on the watch in order to frustrate the attacks of
his human enemies. The physical difficulties which
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
3
he faced and triumphed over were indeed sufficient
to trouble and exhaust him ; but, though why he did
so is inexplicable, he proceeded to fashion in his
mind a whole host of invisible, hostile beings,
devils, demons and evil spirits.
These, he
believed, not only had the power to curse him and
everything he had, but also to cast upon him and
his woman and beasts the Evil Eye, and he went
daily and hourly in terror lest they should do so.
He attributed all his bodily ills and ailments to the
operations of the evil spirits, and any and every mis¬
fortune that might befall any member of his family
and his servants and other possessions. He attri¬
buted horrible forms to them, and thought them
capable of assuming any disguises, animal or human,
which would enable them to work their wicked wills
on him. The men and women who openly made
themselves servants of the evil spirits he regarded
as magicians and witches, and he believed that
they as well as the evil spirits could, at will, do
him incalculable harm, and compass his death.
As time went on his fear of evil spirits did not
diminish; on the other hand, it increased, and
each generation became more devil-ridden than
its predecessor.
The civilized Sumerians, Baby¬
lonians, and Egyptians, like the savages or half-civil¬
ized peoples who were their neighbours, were as
much obsessed by the fear of evil spirits as their
savage ancestors who had lived in Mesopotamia
and Egypt some thousands of years before them.
This, in the case of the Sumerians and Babylonians,
is made quite clear by #the great Legend of the
Creation, written in cuneiform, which has come
down to us.
4
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
THE EVIL SPIRITS OF BABYLONIA.
According to this Legend the great primeval,
watery abyss called Apsu was the home of both
devils and gods, i.e. evil spirits and good spirits ;
the abyss and its inhabitants had existed from ever¬
lasting. The evil spirits had hideous forms, part
animal, part bird, part reptile and part human ;
the good spirits were in the image of men. After a
countless series of aeons had passed two gods
appeared, Anshar and Kishar, and they performed
some preliminary act of creation, and after another
very long period of time had elapsed the great gods
of Babylonia, among them Anu, the Sky-god, Bel,
the Earth-god, and Ea, god of the watery abyss,
came into being. These gods began the work of
ordering Creation, and in so doing caused Apsu to be
greatly troubled. This god saw with dismay that
chaos, of which he was the symbol and type, was
doomed to disappear as a result of the operations of
the gods, and he took counsel with Tiamat and
began to evolve plans to destroy the works and powers
of the gods. Tiamat is shown by native reliefs and
figures to have had the scaly body of a Typhonic
animal or serpent, and to have possessed wings and
claws. She was the personification of all evil, yet,
strange to say, she was the “ mother of everything/’
and was the keeper of the Tablet of Destinies,
probably a sort of talisman by means of which she
preserved her being. Apsu and Tiamat sent forth an
envoy called Mummu to obstruct the work of Ea, but
m the fight which followed Ea was the conqueror,
and Tiamat’s plan was defeated and Apsu was
slain. Then Tiamat spawned a brood of devilish
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
5
monsters, and she and her male counterpart Kingu
collected their hosts of evil beings, and made ready
to fight the gods ; and the Tablet of Destinies
was transferred to Kingu by Tiamat to assist him
in gaining the victory over them.
The gods, feeling themselves unable to cope with
Tiamat, nominated Marduk, their champion, and
having bestowed upon him all their powers this
god armed himself with a bow, spear, a club and
a net, and set out to do battle with Tiamat. When
Kingu saw Marduk arrayed in his terrible panoply
of war, he was terrified and stumbled about and
took refuge in the body of Tiamat, and all his allies
became stupefied with fear. When Marduk ap¬
proached Tiamat she recited the spells and incanta¬
tions which she believed to render him powerless,
but they had no effect upon him. Straightway he
cast his net over her, and blew a gale of wind into
her through her mouth, and as soon as her body
was blown up like a bladder he drove his spear
through her hide, and she split asunder and her
womb fell out from her. He took the Tablet of
Destinies from Kingu’s breast, and then one by
one he caught the Eleven Allies of Tiamat in his
net and trampled upon them. He smashed in the
skull of Tiamat with his club and, having split her
body into two parts, he fashioned the vault of
heaven out of one of them, and out of the other he
constructed the abode of Ea or the World-Ocean.
This done, Marduk set to work to arrange the
heavens and the earth and everything which is
in them in the order in which they now are. As the
gods complained to him that there was no one to
worship them or to bring offerings to them, Marduk,
6
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
after consultation with the other gods, determined
to create man. He proposed that one of the gods
should be sacrificed, so that the others might be
rendered free of service, and the gods decided that
Kingu should suffer death because he had been the
commander-in-chief of the forces of evil which had
opposed Marduk. Thereupon Kingu was seized
and bound in fetters, and slain, and Ea fashioned
man from his blood for the service of the gods. Man
therefore had in him the taint of evil which always
prompted him to evil ways and deeds.
The Babylonian story of the Creation makes it quite
clear that Marduk conquered all the ringleaders of
the revolt against the gods, but he did not destroy
the hosts of evil utterly, and these remained in
existence to vex and harass and injure men who were
descended from the man who had been made from
the evil blood of Kingu. Thus Marduk’s victory
was not complete and absolute, for he did not destroy
evil once and for all. He safeguarded himself and
his fellow-gods, but men were left by him to be the
prey of the evil spirits which had escaped from his
wrath. The enormous number of clay tablets in the
great Museums of the world, inscribed in cuneiform
with spells and incantations against devils and evil
spirits, prove that the Babylonians were far more
afraid of evil spirits than of their gods.
/
THE EVIL SPIRITS OF EGYPT.
The Literature of Ancient Egypt does not supply
us with any detailed account of the Creation,
but the texts state briefly that there was a time
when nothing existed except a mass of dark and
inert water, of great and indefinite extent, called
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
7
or Nenu. It was covered by dense darkness,
and was the abode of a god called Neberdjer,
who existed there either in the form of a liquid or
essence, or in name only, and of a host of creatures
in Typhonic forms who are called “ Mesu Betshu
Nu
The god Khepera, i.e. the “ Generator,” in the form of a beetle-headed
man, seated in his phantom or “ spirit ” boat, which is sailing over the
waters of the primeval Ocean called Nu or Nenu. Motion was given to
the boat by the hawk-headed paddle which possessed magical power.
i.e. spawn of rebellious malice.
The god took
counsel with his heart, and possessing magical
power (/ieka), he uttered his own name as a spell
or word of power, and he straightway came into
being under the form of the god Khepera, and
began the work of creation. The inert powers of
8
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
evil were disturbed by his actions and at once began
to oppose him actively. The making of light was
the first act of creation, and the fight between Set,
the personification of darkness and night and evil,
and Her-ur, the personification of light and day
and night, began. The Day was established, but so
was the Night, and thus matters stood for a long
period. Khepera next created a god, Shu, and a
goddess, Tefnut, from matter ejected from his
body, and thus was formed the first triad or Trinity.
The work of creation proceeded rapidly and the
heavens and the earth were fashioned ; the sun,
moon, and stars were assigned their places in the
sky, men and women were formed from the tears
which dropped from the eyes of Khepera, and
animals, birds and reptiles appeared on the earth.
Then Set collected his powers of darkness and evil,
and waged war against the Sun-god Ra and was
defeated. He next set the monster Apep in the
eastern part of the sky so that he and his allies
might destroy the Sun-god Ra, and prevent him
rising upon our world. Ra sent forth his rays and
darts of fire and scattered the allies of Apep, and
he cast a spell upon Apep himself which paralysed
him and reduced him to impotence. The Sun-god
rose in the heavens triumphantly and continued his
course across the sky until the evening, when he
disappeared into the darkness of night. But when
he wished to rise on the following morning he found
all his enemies lying in wait for him, for Apep had
recovered his strength and surrounded himself with
his old allies, and the fight with the Sun-god was
renewed and enacted daily. Thus Ra never gained
an absolute victory over Apep, and he failed to
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
9
slay him, and as a result his evil spirits were able
to attack men and to harm them spiritually and
physically.
In spite of the high character of their religion, the
Egyptians found it necessary to burn daily a wax
figure of Apep in the great temple of Amen-Ra at
Thebes, and to recite numerous spells in order to
prevent that monster from obstructing the course
Ra, the self-created, self-existent,
and everlasting Sun-god, who caused
his material body to come into
being by pronouncing his own
secret name, which was unknown
to mortal ever.
Thoth, the mind and tongue of Ra,
the Word-god, through whose utterances all things material come into
being.
He invented writing and
was the first writer of magical and
religious books, and the author of
spells, incantations, etc.
of the Sun-god and from working destruction upon
themselves through the operations of the spirits of
evil. The Egyptians embraced Christianity in the
first century of our Era, but retained their belief
in evil spirits and in the efficacy of amulets and
talismans, and magic, as means of defence against
them ; and they believe this at the present day.
The greater number of the modern Egyptians are
10
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
Muhammadans, but though they confess many times
daily their belief in the almightiness of Allah, their
fear of evil spirits is very great, and they resort to
many forms of magic for protection for themselves
and their families and their beasts and cattle.
EVIL SPIRITS IN CHRISTIAN LANDS.
Several Christian Apocrypha contain the state¬
ment, based upon Hebrew traditions written after
the Captivity, that God created nine classes of
angels who were divided into three groups, viz. : —
i. Cherubim, Seraphim and Thrones.
2. Lords,
Powers and Rulers.
3. Principalities, Archangels
and Angels. The Egyptian and Ethiopian Churches
hold the view that Michael, “ the angel of the
Face/' was the commander-in-chief of all these
angels, and that he and all the angels of his class
were created during the first hour of the sixth day
of Creation, i.e. on Friday.
But another class of
angels, the tenth, was created on that day, towards
the evening, and its commander was Satnael or
Satan. The creation of Adam followed that of the
angels, and when Satan saw the great honour which
God bestowed upon the hrst man he was filled with
wrath.
A week later he usurped the honour due to
God, and declared war on the hosts of the Almighty.
These consisted of horsemen, shield-bearers, chario¬
teers, torch-bearers, dagger-bearers, axe-bearers,
cross-bearers, lamp-bearers and slingers, in number
about 4,100,000 beings of fire. The angels uttered
their battle cries and prepared to fight, but Satan
charged them and put them to flight ; the divine
hosts reformed and renewed the fight, but Satan
charged them and put them to flight a second time.
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
11
God then sent to His hosts a Cross of Light on which
was inscribed the names of the Three Persons of
the Trinity, and when Satan and his devils saw this,
their strength oozed out of them and they became
faint, and turned their backs and fled. Michael
and the angels pursued them, and drove them
down into hell, where they are still believed to dwell
by many Christian peoples. None of the founders
of the great religions of the world have attempted
to teach their followers that the Devil, by whatever
name he may be called, and the spirits of evil have
been destroyed. In some religious systems the
Devil and God have been regarded as almost equal
though opposing powers, and there have not been
wanting peoples, e.g. the Yazidis, who worshipped the
Devil. And
adherents to
The mind
advanced to
even in Europe there are many more
Satanism than is commonly thought.
of primitive man was not sufficiently
enable him to understand stories of
the fight between the Devil and God, i.e. Darkness
and Evil, and Good and Light, such as have been
described in the preceding paragraphs, still less to
invent them. It seems to have been instinct rather
than reason which directed him to the use of amulets
and talismans as a means of defence against the Evil
Eye and the attacks of evil spirits, and which induced
him to believe that the things which he chose as
amulets possessed some innate power to protect him.
But before further consideration of this question we
must try to find out what the words “ amulet ” and
“ talisman ” really mean and, supposing we can find
their correct, or even probable, meanings, whether
they will tell us what was the idea in the mind of
primitive man which underlay his use of amulets.
12
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
“ AMULET ” AND “ TALISMAN/’
The word amulet is borrowed from the Latin
amuletum, which we find in Pliny, who uses the
word to indicate (i) an object which preserves a
man from some trouble ; (2) medical or prophylactic
treatment ; and (3) a substance used in medicine.
He says that the European cyclamen prevents all
magical arts from coming near the place where it
is planted, and that it is therefore called “ amulet ”
(Nat. Hist., xxv. p. 115) ; that if a living bat be
carried round the house, and nailed to a window with
its head downwards, it will act as an “ amulet ”
(ibid., xxix. p. 83) ; the large, indented horns of the
scarabaeus, attached to the bodies of infants, have
all the virtues of an “ amulet ” (ibid., xxx. p. 130) ;
it is useful to tie a piece of amber to delicate children
as an “ amulet ” (ibid., xxvii. p. 51) ; all over the
East men wear jasper as an “ amulet ” (ibid., xxvii.
p. 117) ; in connection with the use of another
“ amulet ” the user had to spit upon urine and
into the shoe of the right foot (ibid., xxviii. p. 88) ;
the blood of the basilisk is regarded as a remedy for
various diseases, and as an “ amulet ” which will
protect a man from spells and incantations (ibid.,
xxix. p. 66) ; the gall of a black dog is an “ amulet ”
for the whole house, if it be cleaned or fumigated
therewith (xxxi. p. 82). One ancient writer thought
that “ amulet ” was equivalent to “ phylactery,”
and according to another it meant something which
drove away the Evil Eye ; but no one seems to
have known the exact meaning of the word. Some
have connected “ amulet ” with the sacramental
vessel called <x/xt? and others with 'a/qua, a knot
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
13
or band, and dfivXov, or amylum, but it is unlikely
that any one of these suggested derivations, except
the last, will be accepted. In many books it is
stated that “ amulet " is derived from the Arabic
himala, which the lexicographer Dozy says is the
word for the cord by which an amulet is suspended
from the neck, as well as for the amulet itself.
Hofler thought that “ amulet " was derived from
some lost Etruscan word, or from an Etruscan word
to which the Latin suffix eto was added. Seligmann
(.Heil und Schutzmittel, Stuttgart, 1920, p. 26) is
of opinion that “ amulet " is derived from the Old
Latin amoletum, i.e. a “ means of defence/' and
this derivation seems to me to be the best of those
which have been suggested.
We shall never know exactly what meaning was
attached to the word “ amulet " bv its inventor, or
by those who first used one, or even by Pliny, but
clearly it was different from the meaning which we
attach to it to-day. To us an “ amulet " is an object
which is endowed with magical powers, and which of
its own accord uses these powers ceaselessly on be¬
half of the person who carries it, or causes it to be
laid up in his house, or attaches it to some one of his
possessions, to protect him and his belongings from
the attacks of evil spirits or from the Evil Eye.
As for “ Talisman," the derivation and meaning
of this strange word are difficult to determine.
It is found in Arabic under the forms tilasm and
tillasm, plural talasim, tilasmat and tilassamat, and
the root talisam means “ to make marks like a
magician." But there is little evidence that the
Arabs borrowed the word from the Greek TeXea/xa,
one of the meanings of which is a " consecrated
14
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
religious object/' The object of the talisman is
quite different from that of the amulet. The amulet
is supposed to exercise its protective powers on
behalf of the individual or thing continually, whereas
the talisman is only intended to perform one specific
task. Thus a talisman may be placed in the ground
with money or treasure, which it is expected to
protect and to do nothing else. But the line which
divides the amulet from the talisman has rarely
been observed by any people who regard such things
as parts of the machinery of magic, and in modern
times the use and meanings of the two objects are
generally confounded, even by educated folk who
are superstitious. And the experts are not agreed on
the subject.
BULLA,
FASCINUM AND FETISH.
Bulla was the name given to a certain kind of
amulet by the Romans and Christians during the
early centuries of our Era ; its primary meaning
is some object which is rounded and inflated or
swollen, e.g. a bubble, the boss of a shield, a metal
stud, the head of nail or door-bolt, etc. This amulet
was made of wood or metal, and was worn by the
living as an ornament, and also buried with the dead ;
in shape it resembled a flat, rounded capsule, with
a little loop at the top. When made of metal it
was often engraved with magical figures and inscrip¬
tions, and it was filled with some substance to which
magical powers and properties were attributed,
this substance being the real amulet.
Thus the
complete Bulla was an amulet in its case.
The
substance in the case was called praebia, and
was composed of various ingredients, each of which
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
15
was believed to drive away evil from the wearer and
to defeat the machinations of witches and magicians.
The Christians (Copts) of Akhmim in Upper Egypt
tied bullae to the necks of their dead, and they
contained dust from a saint's tomb, or dust made
from saints' bones, or some small bone or other
sacred relic.
The Greeks and Romans believed firmly that
certain men had the power to harm their fellows,
and even to kill them, and to destroy cattle by
looking at them. The Greek fiao-Kcuveiv means to
“ kill with a glance of the eye." The amulet used
against the Evil Eye 6<£#a\/xos fiacTKavos was called
Baskaniqn or Probaskanion, and Fascinum, and
it was usually in the form of the phallus.
As
children were specially liable to be attacked by the
Evil Eye, models of the phallus were hung round
their necks (Varro, De Lingua Lat., vii. pp. 97, 107).
It was used as a house-amulet and was also placed
in gardens, and in front of blacksmiths' forges, and
even under chariots. Other names of the phallus
amulet were mutonium, scaevola, and Satyrica signa ;
for the last name see Pliny, Nat. Hist., xix. p. 19, §1.
FETISH.
The word Fetish is of Portuguese origin. Some
derive it from “ feitiyo," i.e. something which is
made by the hand, and is therefore regarded as
artificial, and unnatural, and later the word comes
to mean magical ; others derive it from “ faticeira,"
i.e. “ witch," or from “ faticaria," i.e. “ witch¬
craft." The word was, as Dr. Nassau says, originally
applied to the amulets and talismans, e.g. crucifixes,
crosses, rosaries, images of saints, relics, etc., which
16
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
were in use among the Roman Catholic natives on
the west coast of Africa in the XVth and XVIth
centuries. The natives themselves used quite other
words to describe their amulets and talismans which
they regarded as “ Medicine/’ because they healed
sicknesses as well as warded off evils.
Thus
we have “ Gri-gri,” “Juju,” “Wong,” “ Monda,”
“ Mkissi,” “ Biang,” etc.
The religions of the negro peoples on the west
coast of Africa and elsewhere is commonly known
as Fetishism. According to some travellers and
students, the natives believe that the fetish con¬
tains a god or spirit which the priest can keep
there and command to do his will ; but such
is not the case.
This view is the result of a
misconception, and is due to the teachings of the
Christian missionaries who did not understand the
natives’ views about the fetish, or realize the fact
that it only contained medicine. There is no doubt,
as Seligmann says, that there are two kinds of
fetishes, viz. the natural or simple fetish, and the
artificial fetish, which is either charged or impreg¬
nated with “ medicine,” i.e. some substance which
is supposed to possess magical properties and to be
also prophylactic in character. The simple fetish
corresponds roughly to our amulets and talismans,
and the objects forming them are simple in nature,
and are easily made, and they produce their effects
by means of the native power which dwells in them.
They are commonly employed for household pur¬
poses. The artificial fetish contains two substances,
viz. the substance which possesses magical powers,
and the “ medicine,” which is really an extract, or a
decoction, or an essential form of some well-known
17
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
medicine. The choice of the magical substance is
the secret of the medicine man, and he alone decides
what magical substance and what “ medicine ” to
mix together in order to obtain the result desired by
the man or woman who wants the fetish. Like
modern physicians in England and Europe, each
medicine man has his own particular methods in the
making of fetishes, and there are fetish specialists
in Africa as there are specialist physicians in Harley
Street.
The medicines used by the medicine man
are substantially the same as those mentioned in,
Egyptian Medical Papyri, and medical tablets
written in cuneiform, and in Arabic and Ethiopian
Books of Medicine. One of the most complete lists,
of such medicines is given by Pechuel-Loesche,
who enumerates :—Leaves, flowers, juices, fruits,
roots, rinds of fruits and vegetables, bushes, trees,
and climbing plants ; the gall, whiskers and dung
of leopards, the gall of the crocodile, heads of snakes,
frogs, lizards, turtles, and fish ; crabs, scorpions,
and all kinds of reptiles, the eyes, brains, livers and
feathers of certain birds ; hides, hair, paws, and dung
of beasts which are swift, strong and courageous ;
teeth, horns and bones ; resin, coloured earths,
spittle, salt, powder of red-wood, the milk of women
and the urine of virgins. No part of a man or a
pig is used in “ medicine ” for fetish purposes. The
substance possessing the magical powers may be laid
upon objects of dress, or placed in a purse or bag, or
laid up for safety in the figure of a man or animal ;
and it is believed that the “ medicine ” administered
will be more efficacious if it also contains the personal
strength of the medicine man himself.
B
18
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
The objects with which the medicine man sur¬
rounds himself or hangs upon his person are very
numerous, and among them may be mentioned : —
Mussel-shells, talons of birds and claws of animals,
teeth, horns, feathers, locks or tufts of hair, strips
of leather, cords, string, rags, bags, pieces of earth,
balls of resin, leaves, fruits, plates, dishes, bottles,
pots, chains, baskets, stumps of wood, rolls of cloth,
bits of sacking, boxes, images made of wood, metal,
bones, ivory, figures of apes, leopards, serpents,
crocodiles, hippopotami, elephants, men, etc. Many
of the fetishes on the west coast of Africa are
decorated with pieces of looking-glass or mirrors,
which are placed on the body, back or front, or on
the face, and sometimes mirrors take the places of
eyes in the large fetish figures.
Mirrors were
introduced into the country by the Christian
Europeans, and the natives at once associated
them with “ white man's magic," and made use of
them in the way here stated in order to increase
the power of their own magic. Another form of the
fetish figure also seems to be due to the missionaries
who brought with them pictures of the Crucifixion.
On the coast of Loango the natives made a wooden
figure in the form of a man, and drove nails into it
until the whole body was covered with nails and
fragments of iron ; one such “ nail-fetish " mentioned
by Seligmann had a crown of thorns fixed on its
Read, and small box-shaped attachments in which
the “ medicine " was placed. Some authorities
think that the medicine man who made such figures
borrowed the idea of the box-shaped attachments
from the reliquaries of the Roman Catholic mis¬
sionaries.
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
THE
ORIGIN
AND
DEVELOPMENT
OF
THE
19
AMULET.
The amulets worn by primitive men and women
were made of simple natural substances, and at
first were chosen simply because they were of
unusual form and colour, or because their substance
was new to them. The oldest amulets were the
objects which roused man’s curiosity, or excited his
wonder and admiration, and his natural love of
possession led him to make them his own property,
and to take them to his dwelling. Among such
objects were leaves of unusual form and colour,
berries, nuts, and fruits, and the seeds and roots of
trees and plants. Any strange vegetable growth,
e.g. mandragora roots, always possessed a strong
fascination for him.
In the same way stones of
unusual colours, or having markings on them, or
veins of different colours running through them,
e.g. the marbles and the agates, or containing
pyrites, or having striae in them, were promptly
taken possession of by him, and carried home. A
stone which had become perforated naturally was
especially prized by him, and to the first man who
threaded such a stone on grass, or on a thong cut
from the skin of some animal, and then hung it
round his neck, belongs the credit of having intro¬
duced the wearing of amulets into the world. The
perforated stone suggested to him the boring of
other stones which he used as amulets, and which
he could then hang on his body, and next the per¬
foration of the beads which his women up to that
time had attached to their bosoms by means of mud.
At a very early period the properties of rock-salt,
rock-alum, and rock-crystal would add to the
20
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
attraction of their appearance, and the sparkle in them
probably suggested dimly to him that they possessed
life like himself. The portions of their bodies with
which animals and reptiles slew their prey also
attracted his attention, and hence the horns, claws,
teeth and tails of animals, and the skin of serpents,
were used as amulets at a very early period. The
dwellers on the sea-coast, and on lakes filled with
fish, made amulets of shells and parts of fishes ;
and little fingers, toes, eyes, phalli and hair of
human beings have been regarded as powerful
amulets in many countries. Objects coloured white,
blue, red and yellow have more often been chosen
as amulets than those which were grey or brown or
black. As soon as man learned the art of working
in metals he made many amulets, in many forms,
in gold, silver, copper and iron. When he had learned
to write figures of men, animals, birds, fish, trees and
plants cut in stone or wood, or drawn upon some sub¬
stance which served as a writing material, were also
used by him as amulets ; and at length large stones
covered all over with inscriptions, pyramids, the
walls of the corridors and chambers of which were
covered with hundreds of lines of text, tombs, inscribed
coffins and rolls of papyri, volumes of sacred writings,
obelisks, colossal stone figures, etc., were considered
as amulets, and were expected to protect in one way
or another those who caused them to be made.
We shall never know accurately what primitive
man expected his various amulets to do for him,
or how he thought they worked for his good, but
it is quite clear from the number and variety of
them that there was no one amulet which he believed
to be capable of protecting him from every danger.
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
21
We may divide amulets into two classes :
(i) Personal and Individual, and (2) General.
The most important of the personal class were those
which protected a man from sickness and disease,
and preserved and increased his natural strength
and virility, especially in the procreation of children.
Another important group comprised those which
protected the pregnant woman and preserved her
from miscarriages, and gave her easy delivery, and
a full and regular supply of milk when nursing her
children. The male child was protected by amulets
either attached to his neck or hidden in some portion
of his apparel, and the female child by amulets laid
upon or tied to various parts of her body. Special
dangers, e.g. plague, pestilence, sun-stroke, death
by lightning and the attacks of wild beasts, scorpion
stings, snake-bite, wounds inflicted in battle, drown¬
ing, etc., had to be guarded against by special
amulets. The mariner carried amulets to preserve
him from shipwreck and death by sea-monsters, the
business man relied on amulets to give him success
in his trafficking, and in amulets the caravan man
sought safety for himself and his asses or camels.
The crops of the farmer were protected by amulets
placed either in the earth or hung above them, and
amulets were attached to the horns or foreheads
of prominent beasts in his herds, and amuletic
signs were marked on certain members of his flocks
to frighten wild beasts away from them. It was
necessary for every amulet to be powerful enough
to overcome the influence of the Evil Eye, and every
attack of the evil spirits which were regarded as the
instigators of every sickness, disease, accident, mis¬
fortune and calamity.
22
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
Among General Amulets may be included
those which were hidden in the walls of houses or
under them, and those which were placed at the
entrances to the villages, and in certain parts of
them. Primitive man judged the potency of an
amulet by results. If, having adopted a certain
object as an amulet, his affairs prospered and
he remained in good health, his belief in it was
increased and he regarded it as a precious possession,
and his neighbours congratulated him on his good
fortune.
But if his affairs did not prosper and
trouble came upon him, his belief in the amulet
ceased, and he abandoned it in favour of another.
Amulets might be lost or stolen, and in such
cases, it seems, they either lost their beneficent
powers or withheld them from their finders or new
owners.
Why certain objects were chosen as amulets is
quite clear in some cases, but in others we can only
guess at the reasons. Thus a man carried the claws
and teeth of lions and tigers and other savage and
powerful animals because he believed they would
add to his strength in fighting wild beasts and human
foes. He thought that the feathers of birds would
add to the rapidity of his movements, and swiftness
in attacking man and beast, and make his eyesight
more keen. An amulet of serpent skin would add
to his craftiness and cunning in the chase and so on.
Some amulets may be described as homoeopathic,
for “ medicine ” made from yellow coloured plants
and flowers, and water in which yellow stones had
been washed, was given to patients suffering from
jaundice, and red stones were worn to stop bleedings,
blood fluxes and wounds from bleeding overmuch.
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
23
In other words, it was believed that there was some
intimate connection or relationship between the
yellow plant and stone and the yellow colour of the
body afflicted with jaundice. Similarly, the red
colour of the stone and blood were thought to be
connected, and so on. Various explanations of
the use of homoeopathic and other amulets by
savages and semi-civilized peoples have been given
by scientific anthropologists, but none of them can
be made to explain the use of all the known kinds of
amulets, and it is more than probable that all are
wrong.
The truth seems to be that primitive man
believed that every object which he used as an
amulet possessed, either as a result of its natural
formation or through the operation of some super¬
natural spirit which had incorporated itself in it, a
power which to him was invisible. It was this
power, which existing in everything, animate and
inanimate, turned every object into an amulet,
and as such it became a prized possession. This
power was, so to speak, brought into activity or
operation by the person who carried it, and then
it performed his wish and will. The amulet was
no longer merely passive matter, but an operating
force.
This force or power is called by the Mela¬
nesians and Polynesians “ Mana,” and the greatest
authority on magic and religion in the Pacific,
the Rev. R. H. Codrington, describes it thus :
“ Mana is a power or influence, not physical, and
in a way supernatural ; but it shows itself in physical
force, or in any kind of power or excellence which
a man possesses. This Mana is not fixed in any¬
thing, and can be carried in almost anything ; but
24
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
spirits, whether disembodied souls or supernatural
beings, have it and can impart it, and it essentially
belongs to personal beings to originate it, though it
may act through the medium of water, or a stone, or
a bone ” (The Melanesians, Oxford, 1891, p. 119).
It works to affect everything which is beyond the
ordinary power of men, outside the common pro¬
cesses of nature, it is present in the atmosphere of
life, attaches itself to persons and to things, and is
manifested by results which can only be ascribed
to its operation. Wizards, doctors,weather mongers,
prophets, diviners, dreamers, all alike, everywhere
in the islands work by this power (ibid., p. 192).
“ Mana is the stuff through which magic works ;
it is not the trick itself, but the power whereby the
sorcerer does the trick ” (E. Clodd, Magic in Names.
London, 1920, p. 3).
From the practical point of view Mana may be
used either for good or evil, and healing medicine
and poison are alike regarded as Mana.
In
short, all traffickings with the unseen and occult,
whether licit or illicit, involve Mana.
As regards
the meaning to be attached to Mana from a
scientific point of view, Dr. R. R. Marett says:
“ There is no reason why, for the general purposes
of comparative science, Mana should not be taken
to cover all cases of magico-religious efficacy,
whether the efficacy be conceived as automatic or
derived, i.e. as proceeding immediately from the
nature of the sacred person or thing, or mediately
because a ghost or spirit has put it into the person
or thing in question ” (Hastings’ Encyclopaedia,
vol. viii. p. 377, col. 2). We may then say that
every effective amulet was believed to possess Mana,
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
25
which re-acted to the Mana and will or wish of its
possessor, and that it is this belief, whether formu¬
lated or not, which has induced man in all ages to
rely upon amulets for protection and assistance.
This belief was the outcome of men's fear of
unseen evil spirits and their works, and the Evil
Eye, and this fear is as real and powerful in some
countries at the present day as it was in primitive
times.
We may rest assured that as soon as the medicine
man, or magician, saw that his fellow men needed
amulets, he promptly took means to supply them,
and that he spared himself no pains in proving to
them that he alone was able to supply them with
“ genuine '' amulets, i.e. those which contained
Mana and were able to fulfil their owner's desires.
He claimed that he himself was filled with Mana,
which had been incorporated in him by his ancestral
spirits, that he was able to hold converse with every
kind of spirit, good and bad, and that he knew their
wills and was able to influence their actions; and in
addition to this he claimed to have special knowledge
of the various natural objects which contained Mana,
and how to add to that Mana the Mana which
was inherent in himself. And when the medicine
man, or magician, died his colleagues or successor
proclaimed that magic could be worked not only
by parts of his body, but also by his apparel and
possessions, and even by the earth or dust from
the place where he was buried. In fact, each and
every object that had belonged to him or was con¬
nected with him possessed Mana, and was a powerful
amulet. It is this belief that makes the boatman
on the Nile in Nubia tie a little bagful of dust
26
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
from Kubbah Idris to the bows of his boat to save
him from shipwreck in the Third Cataract. The
Nestorian caravan-men at Mosul and in its neigh¬
bourhood carry with them dust from the tomb of
Rabban Hormizd at Al-Kosh, and the Jacobites
seek protection in the dust from the tomb of Mar
Mattai. The Persian Muslims carry away dust
from the tomb of their saints at Karbala, and the
Arabs make amulets of the dust from the tomb of
Muhammad the Prophet. The cult of the relics of
saints springs from the belief that their bodies,
whether living or dead, possessed Mana, and in
the Middle Ages at least men did not seem to care
whether the relics were genuine or “ faked/' This
is proved by Seligmann, who states (op. cit., p. 49)
that the praeputium Christi is shown in Rome,
Charroux, Antwerp, Paris, Brugge, Boulogne,
Besancon, Nancy, Metz, Le Puy, Conques,
Hildesheim and Calcutta, and is venerated as a
genuine relic.
The Mana which existed naturally in objects
which were chosen for amulets was, so to speak,
increased and “ fixed ” by the formulas or spells
which the magician pronounced over them. In
other words, the spell itself was Mana, and if the
objects were without Mana before its utterance, from
the moment the words were spoken they became
“ working ” amulets. Words, like blood and hair,
and saliva, contained Mana and without the utter¬
ance of the formula or spell no “ medicine ” had
or could have any good, still less full, effect. When
the priest, in course of time, superseded the
magician, the prayer superseded the spell.
The
spell was a command, the prayer an entreaty. We
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
27
are justified in assuming that spells were transmitted
orally from one generation of magicians to another
for many centuries, and even after men learned the
art of writing the conservative magician would cling
to the methods of his predecessors and refuse to make
use of the new-fangled invention. But at length
he realized that his spells were made permanent
by the written characters, and the inscribed amulet,
or “ charm/' as it is often called, came into
being.
The Sumerians, Babylonians and Assyrians
wrote their spells on clay tablets, which were often
baked in furnaces ; the Egyptians wrote them on
papyri, slabs of calcareous stone, potsherds (ostraka),
and figures of wood, stone and wax, and cut them
on wooden tablets and on large stone stelae, e.g. the
Metternich stele ; the Jews wrote them on parch¬
ment and, in the Middle Ages, on paper and on
terra-cotta bowls ; the Gnostics and Greeks cut
them on semi-precious stones ; the Persians and
Arabs1 cut them on tablets of agate, onyx, carnelian
and schist, and wrote them on the skin of the un¬
born gazelle and on parchment and paper ; the
Japanese burnt them into wood ; the Chinese
wrote them on silk paper ; and the Indians inscribed
them on plates of copper and wrote them on
palm leaves and bark paper. Copies of magical
texts are now multiplied by means of the printing
press, and the ordinary paper of commerce has
1
The Arabs wrote copies of some of the Surahs of the
Kur’an on the flat bones of sheep and oxen, and fine examples
of these, with legible Arabic inscriptions on them, are preserved
in
the
British
Manuscripts).
Museum
(in
the
Department
of
Oriental
28
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
superseded parchment, wood, palm leaves and
bark paper.
The ink which the ancient writers of magical
formulas used was generally black or red. In copies
of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, which are written
in hieroglyphs, the instructions concerning the per¬
formance of rites and ceremonies which follow
certain Chapters, and are usually called “ Rubrics/’
are written in red ink. In the Book of Over¬
throwing Apep it is ordered that the name of this
fiend is to be written in green ink.
AMULET CASES.
In many countries the possessor of an amulet
carries his treasure in a box made of precious metal,
or in a little bag made of silk, or linen, or cloth
or leather, his idea in the first place being to protect
it from injury and contamination, and in the second
place to keep it out of the sight of evil spirits and
men and women possessing the Evil Eye. This is
also the case when a book containing magical or
sacred texts was regarded as an amulet. The
Egyptian inserted his papyrus Book of the Dead
in a painted wooden figure of the god Osiris,
and a short extract from it in the wooden bases of
figures of Ptah-Seker-AsAr ; gold figures of the
gods when worn as amuletic pendants were enclosed
in cases of silver or some other metal.
The
extracts from the Kur’an, which were written on
long strips of paper and were worn by Persian
women as pendants on their necklaces, were inserted
in oblong silver cases inscribed with amuletic texts.
The Arabs and Persians, whether nomads or
dwellers in towns and villages, always keep their
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
29
Ivur’ans in cases, some of them being studded
with jewels, and the
Abyssinian wraps up
his Psalter, and his Book of the Praises
Mary, and his amulets in many thick sheets
leather.
of
of
Modern Oriental authorities on amulets impress
upon their clients the necessity of possessing many
amulets, for according to them an amulet should
only be expected to protect its owner from one
danger. Certain kinds of amulets should always be
in contact with the skin, and should only be worn
on parts of the body where this is possible. These
may be placed on the scalp, or forehead, or fastened
to the ears, or set in necklaces and pectorals which
lie on the breast, or fixed by cords over the umbilicus
and genital organs, or tied on the upper part of the
left arm, or on the wrist, or at the base of the spine^
or on the leg below the knee. Amulets of a more
general character may be carried in the turban, or
fastened to the tarbush or to the hat of the European,
or in a pocket or stitched into some part of the
apparel near the heart. The latter class may be
used with advantage for the protection of the house
or of any special chamber in it by hanging them on
the walls. If they be tied to the bed of a sick man,
or placed in some position where he can see them,
they will bring about his recovery. It is good for
a sick man to drink the water in which they have
been dipped or washed. Tied to a pole set up in
an orchard they will increase the fruit-bearing power
of the trees, and prevent the fruit from being eaten
by birds and slugs and caterpillars ; if a pole with
the proper kind of amulets tied to it be set up in a
held where crops are growing, the crops will ripen
30
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
satisfactorily. To protect horned cattle tie the
amulets to the horns, or fasten them in holes drilled
in the horns ; to protect sheep, goats and pigs, tie
the amulets to their heads, or to that part of their
bodies where the tails join the back.
Amulets
intended to avert the Evil Eye from animals or
children must be large, and either made of some
bright coloured substance, or painted a bright colour.
In the bazars of Cairo and Tanttah large blueglazed pottery beads, fully half an inch in diameter,
used to be sold to caravan men, who made bandlets
of them and tied them to the foreheads of their
camels before they set out on their journeys across
the desert. The natives believed that the baleful
glances of the Evil Eye would be attracted to the
beads, and averted from the animals ; strips of
red and green cloth and bits of polished brass are
often used as amulets against the Evil Eye instead
of the blue beads. It is tolerably certain that
the brass bosses and ornaments which decorate
the harness of cart horses and shire-stallions
were, like the great brass horns which rise
from their collars, originally intended to protect
the animal from the Evil Eye; but this fact has
been forgotten, and amulets have degenerated into
mere ornaments. Similarly the long fringes and
tassels which are now fastened to saddle-bags as
ornaments in the East, represent the long, knotted
thongs of leather which were tied to the saddle¬
bags so that the sound of their striking together
when the horseman was riding fast might frighten
away evil spirits.
In these, as in many other
cases, the true meanings of the ornaments have
been forgotten.
UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS
31
FAKED AMULETS.
It follows from the nature of the case, that in
countries where everyone wishes to possess an
amulet of one kind or another, or many amulets,
that the magician must often find it difficult to
meet all the demands made upon him. It is then
that the pseudo-magician finds his opportunity,
and he makes and sells what the natives call “ dead ”
amulets. All over the East forged amulets are
common. In Persia and 'Irak we find forged sealcylinders and engraved stones, inscribed divining
bowls and tablets and reliefs, and in Egypt forged
scarabs, rings, figures, jewellery, gems, papyri, etc.,
have been made and sold to both natives and
travellers for the last 150 years.
During the
rebellion of the Mahdi in the Sudan thousands of
his soldiers bought amulets purporting to con¬
tain magical texts from the Kuban, and magical
prayer which, they believed, would protect them
and give them victory. The writer has seen many
of their leather cases cut open, and they contained
nothing but carefully folded blank sheets of
paper, wrapped in an outer sheet inscribed “ Bismillah," i.e. “ in the Name of God/' And the
Abyssinian peasant is often cheated in the same
way.
In connection with amulets may be mentioned
a series of objects which are regarded as bringers of
luck and are known as “ Mascots." The word is
also applied to men and women who are supposed
to be lucky in themselves and to bring luck to others ;
it is derived from the French mascotte and is pro¬
bably cognate with the Provengal masco, “ witch."
32
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
It came into general use through the Comic Opera
of Andraus called “ La Mascotte,” where we have
the following :—
Un jour, le diable, ivre d'orgueil :
Choisit dans sa grande chaudiere
«
Des demons qu’avaient l’mauvais oeil
Et les envoya sur la terre !
Mais le bon Dieu, not' protecteur
Ouand il Uapprit, creant de suite
Des anges qui portaient bonheur,
Chez nous les envoya bien vite !
Ces envoyes du paradis.
Sont des mascottes, mes amis,
Heureux celui que le del dote
D'une mascotte !
(Quoted by Seligmann, op. cit.. p. 30.)
Nearly every large motor car is provided with a
mascot fixed on the bonnet of the radiator, and
nearly every famous regiment has its mascot, a goat,
or a bear, etc. The Teddy-bear is also regarded
as a luck bringer. It made its first appearance in an
American toy factory, and was called “ Teddy ”
in honour of Roosevelt, then President of the
American Republic.
CHAPTER II.
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS AND TALISMANS.
The Arabs in all periods of their history have
worn amulets and talismans to protect their bodies
and cattle and houses from the attacks of evil
spirits, and especially against the Evil Eye. The
amulets of the primitive Arabs, i.e. those who
lived before the Christian Era, were made of stone,
wood, and probably bone, and were, it would seem
from the few scattered notices about them which
have come down to us, uninscribed. The pagan
Arabs of the first six centuries of our Era followed
the example of their ancestors and wore and made
use of many kinds of amulets and talismans, but they
associated with them ideas which were borrowed from
Hebrew, Egyptian, and Gnostic writings. Muhammad
himself sanctioned such borrowings, and in the Kur’an
passed on to his followers the history of Solomon as a
magician, and a belief in the magical names of Allah.
The simplest form of amulet worn by the Arabs
and Persians in modern times consists of a piece
of paper on which is written a short prayer, or
spell, or verse from the Kur’an, or a magical name
or names.
The inscription must be written by
a holy man of some kind, on material chosen by
him, with black ink.
The Cairenes and others
prefer to have the inscription written with ink
made in France or England because it “ bites ”
into the paper deeply. Native ink, charcoal and
water, or burnt sheep’s wool and water, washes off
c
34
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
the paper easily.
When written upon the paper,
which is believed to have acquired the magical
qualities which the native to this day associates
with writing, is folded up and laid flat in a card¬
board, or cheap leather, case. A cord is attached
to the case, which is either tied under the left arm
or hung round the neck. People of means and
position cause the magical texts even Surahs from
the Kur'an, to be written on gazelle skin, preferably
on the skin of the unborn animal, and in such cases
the amulet is rolled up and carried in a metal tube,
made usually of silver. A portion of a very elab¬
orate amulet written on the skin of an unborn kid
is reproduced on Plate I, No. i ; the original is in
my possession. The upper end is illuminated in
bright colours, in the style of the early nineteenth
century. The blocks of text are Surahs of the Iyur’an,
written in red and black, with their titles in blue.
No. 2 on the same plate is a reproduction from the
first part of a paper amulet which was rolled up and
carried in a silver case. This amulet was written
in Persia and, judging by the paper, some time in
the second half of the XVIIth century. Though
small, the writing is very clear and the floral design
is well executed. Mirza Khan, a Persian diploma¬
tist, for some years resident in London, from whom
I purchased both amulets, said that he had never seen
a finer specimen of amuletic calligraphy.
Amuletic texts, or talismans, were sometimes
written on thin sheets of lead which were folded
up flat and carried in metal cases, but examples of
such are very rare. Fragments of such amulets
have been found among the ruins of Babylon, side
by side with thin leaves of lead inscribed in Greek.
PLATE I
No. i.
Amulet made of the skin of
an unborn kid.
No. 2.
Amulet made of paper.
C
2
PLATE II
Silver amulet case inscribed on both sides with a series of short texts from
the Kur’an. (From Baghdad, XVIIth century.)
'
'
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
39
The cases in which girls and women wear their
amulets are often of a very elaborate character
and a good, characteristic example is shown on
Plate II.
Here we have a silver amulet case,
the outside of which is covered with texts from
the Kuban, and the long chain by which it
was suspended from the neck. The owner of the
case withdrew the amulet and kept it as a means
of protection for himself, but he sold the case
willingly ! On Plate III is a necklace with two rows
of ornaments.
In the upper row are twelve hollow
silver plaques, joined by rings, each of which con¬
tained a small piece of paper on which a magical
name was written. The lower row consists of twleve
small silver cases, pointed at both ends, which are
attached by rings to the twelve plaques above
them, and have silver pendants, some two and some
three. Each tube originally contained a small roll of
paper inscribed with verses from the Kuban. Each
roll of paper was supposed to afford protection to the
wearer during one month, and as the necklace contains
twelve rolls, she was protected during the whole year.
The inscriptions which are found on Arab amulets
to-day may be divided into two classes : (i) those
which are composed of characters borrowed from
the Hebrews, Egyptians and Gnostics, and of which
the phonetic values and meanings are unknown.
The following are examples of these : —
>§< i in Hfiii#
Both these are given in the autographed book of Al-Buni, from whom
they are quoted by Doutte, pp. 155, 158.
40
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
(2) Inscriptions which consist of series of unknown
signs or characters, series of letters of some known
alphabet, rows of figures or numbers, magical
names, names of the planets, names of the days of
the week, names of angels, devils, fiends, etc.,
names of God, and Surahs of the Kur’an. An
example of the amulet in which both classes of
inscriptions appear is given by Doutte in his Magie
et Religion dans VAfrique du Nord, Algiers, 1908,
p. 154. This is known as the “ Seven Seals/' and
appears in the form of a rectangle containing 7x7
squares, arranged in seven lines, and each line has
in it seven signs, or letters, or names.
has these seven signs :—-
l> n7
The first line
(III
Now the first of these is the well-known pentacle
which is frequently confounded with the hexagon
and is a design which is said to have been
cut on the bezel of King Solomon’s ring. But the
pentacle is many centuries older than the hexagon,
for it is found drawn on pots from ancient Baby¬
lonian sites. The pentacle and the six other signs
in the first line are the Seven Seals in the amulet,
and
they
either
represent
the
great
Names
or
Symbols of God.
The second line contains seven letters of the
Arabic alphabet, viz. F, G, SH, TH, ZA, KH
and Z. These are the seven letters which do not
occur in the seven lines of the first Surah of the
Kur’an, and they begin the seven names of God
Silver necklace with plaques and tubes to hold small amuletic rolls inscribed with verses from the Kur’an.
(From Hillah.)
PLATE III
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
43
which we find in the third line of the amulet
Fard, Gabbar, Shakur, Thabit, Zahir, Khabir,
Zaki.
The fourth line contains the names of seven
angels, viz. Rukyail, Gabriel, Samsamail. Michael,
Sarfyail, ‘Anyail, and Kasfyail. The names of all
these angels, or rather archangels, are of Hebrew
origin.
The fifth line contains the names of the Seven
Kings of the Genii:—Mudhhib, Marra (?), Akhmar,
Buskan, Shamhurash, Ibyacl and Mimum. These
names are of Arab origin, and some of them seem
to describe the outward appearances of the kings,
e.g. the White One, the Golden One, the Red One,
the Lightning One.
The sixth line contains the numbers of the days
of the week, the first, the second, etc., and the
seventh line gives the names of the five planets—
Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, and the
Sun and Moon. Thus we see that the amulet of the
Seven Seals was believed to carry with it the pro¬
tection of God, by whatever name called, and of the
archangels, and the kings of the spirits, the Jinn and
the Jann, and the five planets and the sun and moon,
and the days of the week, and the seven letters.
In fact, the wearer of the amulet was believed to be
protected by God and His creation generally,
the
seven letters, each written seven times and arranged
in seven lines containing forty-nine squares, also
form a powerful amulet. The wearer is even more
protected if it be written on some part of the wearer,
which seems to suggest that the figures and signs
which men had tattooed on their bodies carried
with them some magical protection. The “ tribal
44
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
marks ” which are seen on the faces of Arabs at the
present day are probably the remains of amuletic
signs or names.
Groups of letters of the alphabet play a promi¬
nent part in amuletic inscriptions. The earlier
magicians arranged them in an order, which was
not necessarily alphabetic ; to some of them they
assigned meanings or symbolisms, but of others they
regarded the meanings as incomprehensible to the
human understanding. The twenty-eight letters are
connected directly with the twenty-eight stations
of the moon, and with the heavenly bodies, and the
Signs of the Zodiac and the Dekans. Letters to
the early Hebrews were the essence of things and,
as Doutte has observed (op. cit., p. 172), the Romans
described all human knowledge as “ letters/’ using
the word as the peoples of the North used “ runes.”
The Arabs, like the Hebrews, attributed greater
powers to some letters than to others, and a proper
knowledge of the use of these formed a separate
branch of the study of magic. Each letter had its
special powers, and a single letter might be developed
into a design which would in itself form an effective
amulet.
The powers of the letters are intimately associated
with numbers, for each letter in the Arabic alphabet
has a numerical value. No. 1 = God. No. 2 is
important because it is said in the Ivur’an, “And
of everything have we created two kinds ” (Surah,
li, verse 49) [i.e. male and female, heaven and earth,
sun and moon, light and darkness, plains and
mountains, winter and summer, sweet and bitter,
Jalal ud-Din]. No. 3 is important. No. 4 is very
important, for there are 4 archangels, 4 chief devils,
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
45
4 elements, 4 seasons, 4 cardinal points, and an
amulet must be a square. No. 5 has always
possessed a special significance, perhaps of com¬
pleteness. The Arabs pray 5 times daily, and they
have 5 fundamental dogmas, and 5 “ pillars” of
religion. No. 6 has no special importance. No. 7
plays a very prominent part in Arab magic. Of the
amulet of the Seven Seals mention has already been
made. God created seven heavens, seven earths,
seven seas, seven hells with seven doors, the seven
members of the body used during the ceremonies
of prayer, the seven periods of life, the seven Climes,
the seven days of the week, and the seven Prophets
who preside over the seven days of the week, viz.
Moses, Jesus, David, Solomon, Jacob, Adam, and
Muhammad.
No. 8 is divisible by 2 and 4, both
important numbers. No. 9 = 8 -f 1 and 3X3, and
3 is a specially magical number. Nos. 10, 12, 40
50, 100, no and 1,000 have their magical powers
increased by adding or subtracting 1.
Now, as letters possess magical powers and have
numerical values, amuletic inscriptions can be com¬
posed of letters only or numbers only ; both letters
and figures are often arranged in lines, each con¬
taining three or four letters or figures, and three or
four lines form a magical square.
Here is a
simple square, quoted by Doutte, containing the
numbers 1 to 9. Whether these are added up
fj
4
9
2
3
5
7
8
1
6
perpendicularly, or horizontally, or diagonally, the
total is always 15.
An example of the four-lined
46
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
square, each line containing four numbers, is here
given ;
the numbers given are 1-16. Whether
4
14 15
1
9
7
6
12
5
11
10
8
16
2
3
13
these are added up perpendicularly, or horizontally,
or diagonally, the total is always 34. The know¬
ledge of arithmetic required by those who con¬
structed such squares was considerable, and it
seems to have formed the foundation of the Arab
science of mathematics. The Arabs thought that
the magical powers of some of the 28 letters were
greater than those of others ; thus Alif, the first
letter of the Arabic alphabet, is also the first letter
of the name of Allah, and as its numerical value
was one it represented Allah the One God. The
names of God, the Archangels, etc., might be written
with letters or with the numerical values of the
letters which formed the names, and in either form
they made a protective amuletic inscription.
Many amulets contain the Hebrew names of God
and the Archangels, but the names which the Arabs
believe to possess the greatest magical power are
the names of the attributes of God. The title Allah,
the meaning of which is unknown, is called “ Isnru
az-Zat,”
the “ essential name/’ and these
attributes are known as “ Asmau as-Sifat/’ In
alluding to them Muhammad the Prophet spoke of
•
•
them as “ Al-Asmau al-husna,” i.e. the “ Beautiful
Names ” (Iyur’an, Surah vii. verse 179), and to
this day they are known as the “ Beautiful or
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
47
Excellent Names of God.” Abu Hurairah said
that the “ Names of God were ninety-nine in number,
and that he who recites them shall enter Paradise.”
The commentators say that Muhammad had no
intention to limit the names of God to ninety-nine,
and that all he wished the orthodox Muslims to do
was to recite this number daily. The lists of the
names given by the traditionalists do not agree.
Some lists begin with the name Allah and others
end with it ; and some begin with Al-Ahad, i.e.
“ the One,” and others end with it. The following
list of the Ninety-nine Names is that of Tirmidhi
(see Doutte, op. cit., p. 200) and Hughes (Diet.
Islam, p. 141):—
1. Ar-Rahman
2. Ar-Rahim
3. Al-Malik
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
Al-Kuddus
As-Sal am
Al-Mu’min
Al-Muhaimin
Al-'Aziz
Al-Jabbar
Al-Mutakabbir
Al-Khalik
Al-Bari
Al-Musawwir
Al-Ghaffar
Al-Kahhar
Al-Wahhab
Al-Razzak
18. Al-Fattah
19. Al-Alim
20. Al-Kabiz . .
The Merciful.
The Compassionate.
The King.
The Holy.
The Peace.
The Faithful.
The Protector.
. .
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
Mighty.
Repairer.
Great.
Creator.
Maker.
Fashioner.
Forgiver.
Dominant.
Bestower.
Provider.
Opener.
Knower.
Restrainer.
48
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
21. Al-Basit . .
22. Al-Khafiz..
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
Ar-Rafb .
Al-Muhzz
Al-Muzil .
As-Samf .
Al-Basir .
Al-Hakim
.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
Al-‘Adl
Al-Latif . .
Al-Khabir
Al-Halim
Al-'Azim . .
Al-Ghafur
Ash-Shakur
.
.
.
36. Al-‘Ali
. .
37. Al-Kabir . .
38. Al-Hafiz . .
39. Al-Muldt . .
40. Al-Hasib . .
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
Al-Jalil
. .
Al-Karim
Ar-Rakib
Al-Mujib . .
Al-Wask . .
Al-Hakim
47. Al-Wadud
48. Al-Majid . .
49. Al-Bais
50. Ash-Shahid
51. Al-Hakk . .
52. Al-Wakil . .
53. Al-Kawi . .
54. Al-Matin . .
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
Spreader.
Abaser.
Exalter.
Honourer.
Destroyer.
Hearer.
Seer.
Ruler.
The
The
The
The
The
The
Just.
Subtle.
Aware.
Clement.
Grand.
Forgiving.
The
The
The
The
Grateful.
Exalted.
Great.
Guardian.
The
The
The
The
The
The
Strengthener.
Reckoner.
Majestic.
Generous.
Watcher.
Approver.
The Comprehensive.
The Wise.
The Loving.
The Glorious.
The Raiser.
The
The
The
The
The
Witness.
Truth.
Advocate.
Strong.
Firm.
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
49
55. Al-Wali
The Patron.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
Al-Hamid
Al-Muhsi
Al-Mubdi
Al-Mudd
Al-Muhyi
The
The
The
The
The
Laudable.
Counter.
Beginner.
Restorer.
Ouickener.
61. Al-Mumit
The
The
The
The
The
Killer.
Living.
Subsisting.
Finder.
Glorious.
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
One.
Eternal.
Powerful.
Prevailing.
Bringer Forward.
Deferrer.
First.
Last.
Evident.
Hidden.
Governor.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
Al-Hayy
Al-Kaiyum
Al-Wajid
Al-Majid
Al-Wahid..
As-Samad
Al-Kadir . .
Al-Muktadir
Al-Mukaddim
Al-Mu’akhkhir
72.
73.
74.
75.
Al-Awwal
Al-Akhir
Az-Zahir
Al-Batin
76.
77.
78.
79.
Al-Wali
Al-MutaAli
Al-Barr
At-Tawwab
•
. .
81.
82.
83.
84.
The Exalted.
The Righteous.
The Accepter of Re¬
pentance.
The Avenger.
The Pardoner.
The Kind.
[dom.
The Ruler of the KingThe Lord of Majesty
86. Al-Jami'
and Liberality.
The Equitable.
The Collector.
80. Al-Muntakim
Al-(Afuw
Ar-Ra'uf
Malik ul-Mulk
. .
Dhul-Jalah wadIkram
85. Al-Muksit
D
50
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
87. Al-Ghani . .
88. Al-Mughni
89. Al-MuTi . .
90. Al-Manb . .
91. Az-Zarr . .
92.
93.
94.
95.
96.
An-Nafb
An-Nur
Al-Hadi
Al-BadT
Al-Baki
.
.
.
.
.
97. Al-Warith
98. Ar-Rashid
99. As-Sabur
.
.
.
.
.
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
The
Independent.
Enricher.
Giver.
Withholder.
Distresser.
Profiter.
Light.
Guide.
Incomparable.
Enduring.
Heir.
Director.
The Patient.
Muslim sages have agreed that God has one
great and exalted name, which is above all others.
Muhammad himself declared that it was to be found
in the Second or Third Surahs of the Kuban, and
as the only names of God given in these are ArRahman, Ar-Rahim, Al-Hayy and Al-Kaiyum, it
should be one of these four names. The importance
of the Ninety-Nine Names of God from a magical
point of view is that when God is adjured by any
one of them He is bound to fulfil the wish or prayer
of the person who addresses Him by it. The idea
that the great and ineffable name of God has only
been known to the high priests is borrowed from the
Jews, who believed that it was known only to Moses
and his successors who used it only once a year, when
they went into the Holy of Holies to plead for for¬
giveness for Israel. Most of the names of God are
taken from the Kuban, and every large amulet
is inscribed with several of them.
These were
carefully chosen by the man or woman for whom the
amulet was made, and they give the attributes of
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
51
God which endear Him to him or her, and to which
it was thought He would certainly make answer.
As so many of the texts found on amulets are
taken from the Kur'an, or are based upon it, the
following description of that famous work may be
found useful.
or '' The Kuban,” i.e. “ the reading ”
or '' what ought to be read,” is the name given by
the Muslims to the collection of '' revelations ” or
'' instructions ” which Muhammad the Prophet
Al-Kur’an,
declared had been sent to him from God by the hand
of the Archangel Gabriel. These revelations were,
during the Prophet's lifetime, written upon skins,
palm leaves, slices of stone, and bones of sheep and
oxen. Specimens of these inscribed bones are
preserved in the Department of Oriental Manuscripts
in the British Museum. At the suggestion of 'Omar
in the year 633 all these '' revelations ” were col¬
lected by Abu Bakr’s orders into one book, and a
fair copy of them was made by Zaid ibn-Thabit, a
former secretary of Muhammad, who knew both
Hebrew and Syriac. 'Omar gave this copy to his
daughter Hafsah, who was one of the widows of
Muhammad. Extracts and copies were made from
this, but so many mistakes and interpolations
crept into the text that the Khalifah 'Othman
ordered Zaid and three scholars of the Koraish tribe
to make a new Recension of the Kur’an. This was
done, and copies of it having been sent to Kufah on
the Euphrates, Basrah on the Shatt al-'Arab, Damas¬
cus, Cairo, Makkah and Madinah, every other version
of every " revelation ” which could be found was ruth¬
lessly burnt. Subsequently even Hafsah'scopy was
destroyed by Marwan, the governor of Madinah.
52
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
Learned Muhammadans assert that the Kuban
existed in heaven from all eternity in a form which
they call the “ Mother of the Book ” or the “ Pre¬
served Tablet,” which is a part of the essence of
God, who was its Creator. A copy of this was made
on paper in heaven and it was bound in silk and
ornamented with the gold and precious stones of
Paradise. This was committed to the care of the
Archangel Gabriel, who revealed it to the Prophet
piecemeal, but allowed him to see the complete
book once a year. The Kuban contains 114 sections,
each of which is called a Surah. Some were revealed
at Makkah, others at Madinah, and others partly
at Makkah and partly at Madinah. The number of
verses in the whole book is given as 6,000, or 6,214,
or 6,219, or 6,225, or 6,226, or 6,236 ; the number of
words in it is 77,639, or 99,464 ; and the number of
letters is 323,015, or 330,113.
Each section is
introduced by the words “ In the Name of Allah,
the Merciful, the Compassionate.” The Arabs regard
the Kuban as the source of all knowledge and
wisdom ; they think its language is the purest Arabic
in the world, and the most beautiful, and that its
eloquence is incomparable. In spite of all the care
which the Arabs have lavished on the preservation
of the text, a few slight variations in it exist, but
these are held to be due to the fact that the “ revela¬
tions ” were made to the Prophet in seven distinct
dialects of Arabic. At one time a woman was not
allowed to possess a copy of the Kuban, and when
a man died his copy was buried with him. But when
I was in the Tiyaro district on the Persian border,
I bought several copies wrapped up in earth-stained
pieces of linen, and reeking with damp, and even
•
•
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
53
mildew, which starving women dug up out of their
husbands’ graves and were only too thankful to
find a purchaser.
The Arabs regard the whole Kur’an as a powerful
amulet, and many of them never travel without it
In recent years miniature copies of it have been
made by photo-lithography and enclosed in smah
The Kur’an Amulet, which is frequently carried or worn by the members
of the caravans which travel from Persia to Hillah, Kufa, Karbala and
carry dead Shiah Muslims to the last-named city for burial.
metal cases (with rings for attachment to necklaces,
etc.), in one side of which little lenses, have been
fixed to be used as magnifying glasses. The whole
book measures i inch X § inch X re inch, and the
little lens in the case is sufficiently strong to enable
the traveller to read his favourite chapters by the
light of the camp fire. A photograph of the amulet
and its case is given above.
54
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
But although the whole Kuban is regarded as a
powerful amulet, there are certain chapters in it
which the Arabs have always considered to be of more
importance than the others, and these are frequently
written upon skin or paper, or engraved on semi-
Ayat al-Kursi.
precious stones of a special shape. One of the most
beautiful passages, which Muhammadans greatly
admire and recite in their prayers and wear as an amu¬
let, is the following extract from Surah ii, verse 256:—
“ God ! there is no God but He ; the living the
self-subsisting ;
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
55
Neither slumber nor sleep seizeth Him ;
To Him [belongeth] whatsoever is in heaven,
and on earth,
Who is he that can intercede with Him but
through His good pleasure ?
He knoweth that which is past, and that which
is to come unto them ;
And they shall not comprehend anything of His
knowledge, but so far as He pleaseth.
His throne is extended over heaven and earth,
and the preservation of both is no burden
unto Him.
He is the High, the Mighty/'
(Sale's translation.)
A
This beautiful passage is known as Ayat al-Kursi,
i.e. the “ Throne Verse." The word “ Throne " is an
allegorical description of the Divine Providence which
sustains all creation and is incomprehensible to
human beings.
There is another very important text which is
also known as a Throne Verse, and is called Ayat
al-‘Arsh.
It is formed by the two last verses (Nos.
129 and 130) of Surah x, and reads:
“ Now hath an apostle come unto you of our
own nation, an excellent [person];
It is [grievous] unto him that ye commit
wickedness.
[He is] careful over you, [and] compassionate
and merciful towards the believers.
If they turn back, say, God is my support :
There is no God but He.
On Him do I trust ; and He is Lord of the
Magnificent Throne." (Sale's translation.)
56
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
The Magnificent, or Sublime, Throne here referred
to is the Imperial Throne of God, on which He sits.
It is situated in the heavens high above the Kursi.
More important still as an amulet is the Surah of
the Kuban which is the “ Beginning of the Book.”
This is the famous “ Fatihat,” which is a prayer
and which is held in the greatest veneration by
Muslims all over the world. It is to them what the
Lord's Prayer and the Sign of the Cross are to
Christians. It stands by itself at the beginning of
the Book, and is always carefully and beautifully
written.
It is often enclosed within decorated
borders full of rich designs and colour, and lavishly
ornamented with burnished gold. The general cha¬
racter of the designs and the elaborate decorations
which are found in modern manuscripts of the
Kuban are well illustrated (except in the matter of
PLATE IV
**■)<*.<*■!
Kfiflpm
Mirza Khan’s Kur’an amulet.
HipwrCf t •
IIWUIIHU'I' I' Uiu IIJWJWM<WI<<W<WWW
-
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
59
colours) by the reproduction of the two first pages
of a small copy which was obtained for me from
Persia by Mirza Khan. The Mullah who paid for the
production of the book carried it as an amulet in an
elaborate gold case. This later he was obliged to sell to
obtain money to enable him to return to Persia when
the war broke out in 1914 (Plate IV). The titles of the
Surahs are written in red upon gold. Every column
The Fatihat al-Kitab.
of text is enclosed within a gold border, and there is
a line of gold under every line of text. Each column
of text contains 21 lines. This copy measures
4 inches X 2§ inches X | inch, and is dated Anno
Hijra 1289 = a.d. 1872.
The paper is thin and
very tough and is parchment-like in colour.
The Fatihat, like every other Surah or Chapter
except the ninth, is preceded by the words, “ In the
60
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
Name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate/'
and may be thus translated :—
1. Praise be unto Allah, the Lord of the worlds.
2. The Merciful, the Compassionate.
3. King of the Day of Judgment.
4. Thee do we worship, of Thee we entreat for
help.
5. Direct us in the path which is straight.
6. The path of those on whom Thou hast shown
favour.
7. Not of those with whom Thou art angry.
Nor those who wander (i.e. stray from the
Straight Path).
The prayer in lines 5-7 has been much discussed
by commentators, both Muslim and Christian. Sale
translated it : “ Direct us in the right way, in the
way of those to whom thou hast been gracious ;
not of those against whom thou art incensed, nor
of those who go astray." Al-Zamakhshari renders
lines 6 and 7 thus : “ The way of those to whom
thou hast been gracious, against whom thou art
not incensed, and who have not erred." In other
words, he makes the three lines apply wholly to
Muslims, whilst Sale thinks that “ those to whom
God had been gracious " were the Prophets, and that
“ those against whom he was incensed" were the
Jews, and “ those who go astray " to the Christians.
There are several shorter extracts from the Kur'an
which are very popular as amuletic inscriptions, and
among these of special interest is the short Surah
(No. CXII), which contains the declaration of the
Unity of Allah.
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
61
In the Name of Allah, the Merciful, the Com¬
passionate.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Say : He Allah [is] One.
Allah the self-subsisting.
He begetteth not, and He was not begotten.
And there is no one like unto Him.
The recital of this Surah is supposed to confer
upon a man the decree of merit which he would
acquire if he recited one-third of the whole Kur’an.
The Surah of the Unity of God.
It is held in great veneration by the Muslims and,
naturally, detested by Christians.
The following are Surahs directed against witch¬
craft and the Devil:
I. SURAH CXIII.
THE CHAPTER OF THE DAYBREAK.
In the Name of God
passionate.
the
Merciful, the Com¬
1. Say : I fly for refuge to the Lord of the
Daybreak.
2. From the evil things which He hath created.
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
62
3. And from the evil of the night when it hath
come.
4. And from the evil of [women who] are
blowers on knots.
5. And from the evil of the envious man when
he hath envied.
II.
SURAH CXIV.
THE CHAPTER OF MAN.
In the Name of God the
passionate.
Merciful, the Com¬
1.
2.
3.
4.
Say : I fly for refuge to the Lord of men.
The king of men.
The God of men.
From the evil of the whisperer who slyly
withdraweth.
5. Who whispereth evil words into the breasts
of men.
6. From the genii and men.
The words “ blowers on knots ” refer to magicians,
male and female, who recite incantations which are
intended to do harm to the fellows whilst they tie
knots in a string—in other words, “ weave spells.”
These two Surahs were revealed to Muhammad at
the same time, and must be regarded as forming
one whole; and the Prophet used them for a very
special service. The commentators say that a Jew
called Lubaid and his daughters bewitched Muham¬
mad by tying eleven knots in a cord which they hid
in a well. The result was that the Prophet fell
seriously ill and would undoubtedly have died had
not God intervened.
He sent down these Surahs to
him, and also instructed the Archangel Gabriel to tell
him how to use them, and where the cord was
Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from the Kur’an. Dated
a.h.
1113.
(From Baghdad.)
PLATE V
.
Persian agate amulet inscribed with texts from the Kur'an.
The original is 4 inches long and is
2f
inches in the
PLATE VI
E
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
67
hidden. Muhammad sent 'All to fetch the cord,
and when it was brought he recited over the eleven
knots the eleven verses in the two Surahs, and as
he recited each line one of the knots untied itself ;
as soon as the last knot was loosed Muhammad
was freed from his bewitchment, and recovered his
normal health.
In the Arabic treatises which deal with amulets
and talismans and supply the reader with magical
texts, we find that little drawings or vignettes are
mingled with the texts. These are of many kinds,
Thus we find grotesque figures of men and animals,
figures of archangels, the Signs of the Zodiac, the
Sun and Moon and the five planets, mythological
beasts, linear designs and geometrical patterns,
and very frequently the human hand stretched out
flat with the fingers well apart, or all close together.
All these drawings are borrowed from the Egyptians,
Copts, Gnostics and Hebrews, for the Arab is a
better borrower of such things than inventor. The
Sunni Arabs, or traditionalists, only employ some
of these, but the Shiahs, or “ free thinkers ” adopt
them all. As a rule, Persian amulets are more artistic
than those of the Arabs. Two of the finest Persian
or Shiah amulets known to me are reproduced on
Plates V and VI.
The first is a rectangular slice of Persian agate
bevelled at the corners. And it seems to have been
made in the year 1113 of the Hijra, i.e. a.d 1701.
It was made for a follower of ‘All, the son-inlaw of the Prophet, and to him the text in the
centre, written in large Arabic letters, refers. At
each corner is a circle containing a divine name,
and the first border, i.e. that with diamond-shaped
68
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
ornaments, contains forty-eight of the ninety-nine
“ Beautiful Names ” of God.
The second and
fourth borders, which are separated by an ornamental
border, contains extracts from the Kur’an, viz. the
Fatihah, and the Throne Verses, the Declaration
of the unity of God, etc. The texts, decorated
border, etc., were inscribed on the stone by the
fumes of acid and are therefore very difficult to
read, even in the reproduction which is nearly
double the size of the original. And the manner
in which the scribe found it necessary to break
up the words increases the difficulty. This amulet
formed the centre-piece of a very elaborate necklace
of amulets, and was mounted in a heavy silver
frame. It is in fact a “ House-amulet/’ The second
amulet is in the form in which the Shiahs or freethinking Muslims of Karbala prefer to make their
amulets. It was set in a silver frame and was
hung on the wall of a house in Karbala on the
Euphrates by means of a chain which passed
through the projection on the upper edge.
The
texts inscribed on the edge are the Fatihah and
the Throne Verses. The decorated centre is of
an unusual character, for the held is filled up
with annules, circles divided into 4, or 8, or 16
sections, and circles surrounded with annules or
filled with crosses.
From what has been said above it is clear that the
wearing of amulets bearing texts from the Kuban
may be regarded as a religious exercise, for their
sole object is to put the wearer into communication
with Allah, so that He may afford His protection.
And most Arabs regard the practice of wearing
amulets of this kind not only as harmless, but even
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
69
as meritorious, and the science of them is a branch
of White Magic.
In Arabia and Mesopotamia and Syria the common
words for amulet are Tamimah and ‘Udzah and
Ta'widzah, and in Egypt and North Africa Khurza.
The stones used for amulets are usually choice agates
across which run white bands, or the dark grey
semi-transparent agates which are brought from
India. These are carefully cut into the required
shapes and highly polished, and then the inscrip¬
tions are either cut with a lapidary’s wheel or a
graver’s tool. As engraving on stone is a very
costly matter, even in the East, another method of
inscribing the stone amulet has been found. The
slice of agate, or carnelian, or chalcedony having
been chosen, the amulet maker covers it all over
with a thin layer of wax. Care is taken that the
wax touches the surface of the stone everywhere,
and that there are no air bubbles between the wax
and the stone. The waxed stone is then handed over
to the skilled scribe, who writes the inscription in
the wax with a sharp-pointed graver, taking care
that the tool touches the stone as each letter of
the inscription is written. The waxed stone is then
exposed to the fumes of hydrochloric acid, which
eat into the stone wherever its surface has been
laid bare by the scribe’s graver. When the fumes
of the acid have done their work, the stone is cleared
of wax, and the inscription stands out clearly on
the stone. The writing lacks the beauty and char¬
acter of that cut with a wheel or graver, but the
cheapness of amulets which are made in this way
brings them within the reach of many who cannot
afford
those
which
are
engraved.
Among
the
70
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
officials of the great mosques at Baghdad, Kazmain,
Karbala, Damascus, Cairo, and Persia there were
men who specialized in the making of amulets, but
during the last forty years these men, and their
successors, have devoted themselves to making
imitations of Persian and Babylonian antiquities,
which they sell to travellers and the uninitiated.
The amulets bought in the mosques, and those
which were specially made there for private in¬
dividuals, were usually blessed by a Mullah. The
engraver on stone, or the scribe who wrote on paper
or leather, began his work by pronouncing the words
“ Bism Illah,'' i.e. “ in the Name of God.”
As
the Name of God was regarded as God Himself, the
engraver or the scribe were sure of God's help when
he pronounced His Name. These words are said
to have been written on Adam's side, and on the
wings of Gabriel, and on the seal of Solomon,
and on the tongue of Jesus (see Doutte, op. cit.,
p. 211). The ink used by the scribe was sometimes
perfumed with musk, or oil of roses, or extract of
saffron, and sometimes sticks of incense were kept
burning whilst he was copying certain texts.
Though the greater number of Persian and Arab
amulets are made of agate and carnelian because
of the magical power which was believed to exist
in these stones, other substances were often used
by amulet manufacturers in places where limestone
formations did not exist. Thus on the coasts of the
Red Sea and in Palestine amulets made of motherof-pearl shell are found.
Examples of such are
reproduced on Plate VII, Nos. i and 2.
No. 1
is inscribed in Arabic with a prayer that the
wearer may be defended from internal troubles and
PLATE
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ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
73
has a pierced projection by which it was hung by a
cord from the neck ; its owner was a little girl who
was wearing it over the umbilicus. I obtained it
at Suez. The Christians in Palestine and Syria
also wore, and still wear, amuletic plaques made
of mother-of-pearl shell, and a good example of
the class is reproduced on Plate VII, No. 2. The
scene cut on this plaque represents the baptism
of Christ by St. John the Baptist, who stands
upon a stone in the Jordan. He holds a long cross¬
headed staff in his right hand and pours water on
the head of our Lord with his left hand. Above is
a dove symbolizing the Holy Ghost descending
through an opening in the clouds. On the right
is an angel.
The ancient Egyptians appear to have used
large shells from the Red Sea as amulets, and
these were held to be more effective when the
nomens and prenomens of kings were cut upon
them.
Thus we have in the British Museum
shells inscribed with the nomen and prenomen of
Usertsen I (Xllth Dynasty), and the prenomen
of Amenemhat II (Xllth Dynasty), and the pre¬
nomen of Rameses II the Great (Nos. 15423, 20744,
29434, etc.).
The Muslim soldier has always felt that he needed
the protection of amulets, and he always provided
himself with as many as he could get before he set
out on the march. The commonest military amulet
is a strip of paper inscribed with an extract from
the Kur'an, or with the Name Allah, and the names of
Muhammad and 'All, and those of some or all of the
Seven Archangels. Sometimes the strip developed
into a long roll of paper, which was tied to the
74
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
breast or body of the warrior. The Turkish soldiers
who during the reign of ‘Abd al-Hamid fought
in Southern Arabia wore amulets made of stone
and metal. A specimen of a brass amulet is given
on Plate VIII, No. 3. This is a curved, rectangular
shield-shaped plaque with rounded corners and
two pierced projections by which it was sewn
to the tunic of the soldier. On the upper part is
an extract from the Kuban, and below this are
two magical designs with conical tops and two
magical squares.
On the back of a similar
plaque in my possession is a magical square filled
with numbers which represent the names of celestial
beings. The desert Arabs in the Yaman regarded
these brass amulets as objects of very great value,
and there is no doubt that they murdered many of
the Turkish soldiers in order to cut the brass amulets
from their jackets. An amulet which was taken
from the left arm of a Turkish officer is shown on
Plate IX. It is formed of three oval agate plaques,
mounted in thick silver cases, and inscribed with
texts from the Kuban, viz. the declaration of the
Unity of Allah, the opening prayer, etc. On the
stone to the right is the name of Muhammad, which
is here regarded as a word of power. The cord by
which these stones were fastened to the left arm of
their owner is made of silk, and the eyelets at the
ends of the cord are bound round with wire.
Among objects which are believed to carry with
them magical protection must be mentioned what
may be called the “ Dust Amulet/’ the dust being
earth, or sand, or dust taken from the tomb of a
saint. For many centuries the pilgrims to Makkah
(Mecca), the birthplace of Muhammad the Prophet,
PLATE VIII
Miscellaneous amulets in silver and brass.
1 and 2. Silver amulets worn by Indian Muslim women who are about to become
mothers.
(From the west coast of India.)
3. Brass shield-shaped amulet from the strap of the left shoulder of a soldier who
fought in the Yaman. On it are inscribed two magical squares of figures and
passages from the Kur’an.
(From Aden.)
4. Hebrew amulet inscribed with the hexagon of Solomon, and Shaddai, a name
of God.
5 and 6. Silver amulets inscribed in Arabic with prayers for the well-being of
their wearers, who were women about to become mothers. (From the Sudan.)
cu
Slate amulet inscribed with a magical inscription formed wholly of Arabic numerals, found at Kurnah
Amuletic armlet which was found on the left arm of a Turkish officer during a fight with the Sinaitic
Arabs at al-Kantarah on the Suez Canal.
PLATE IX
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
79
have carried away from the mosque pinches of dust
which they tied up in little bags and hung round
their necks. The boatmen on the Nile above the
Second Cataract tie little bags containing dust
from the tomb of Kubbah Idris, a famous Murghani shaikh, in the belief that it will procure them
a safe passage through the Cataract. And when I
visited the Monastery of Rabban Hormizd at
Alkosh I saw men scraping up the dust from the
ground close to the Saint’s tomb, to carry away
with them in little bags and boxes as a protection
against the dangers of the desert.
Here for convenience sake may be mentioned the
string of ninety-nine beads, and a “ pillar,” which
is commonly called the “ Muhammadan Rosary.”
It must not be confused with the string of 165 beads
which Christians use in keeping count of the Aves,
Paternosters and Glorias of the form of prayer which
constitutes the “ Rose-garden [of Mary].” Early
Christian monks and anchorites were in the habit
of repeating the Lord’s Prayer a great number of
times daily, and the story of Paul the anchorite
shows that some of them kept count of their prayers
by means of pebbles. The monk Paul collected
three hundred pebbles in his gown, and when he
finished a prayer he threw out a pebble ; when the
pebbles came to an end, he knew that he had said
the full number of prayers. There is no evidence
that the monks used strings of pebbles, and when
the Christian and Muhammadan rosaries first came
into use is not known. The Arabs have a tradition
that the early Muslims counted the praises of Allah
by means of pebbles, or on their fingers, but they
think that Muhammad did not use a rosary. The
80
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
Buddhists used a rosary containing ioo or 108 beads,
and carried it on their wrist like a bracelet, or wore
it as a necklace (see Waddell, The Buddhism of
Tibet, London, 1895). On the whole it seems
probable that the Muslims borrowed the rosary
from the Buddhists, and that the Crusaders borrowed
it from the Saracens and introduced it into Europe.
Some think that it was introduced into Christendom
by Domenic, the founder of the Black Friars, about
a.d. 1221, with the sanction of Pope Pius V.
The Muhammadans call their Rosary “ Subhah,”
because it is used for the “ praise ” of Allah. Each
of its 99 beads is associated with one of the “ beautiful
names ” of Allah, and the “ pillar ” or elongated
bead which completes the 100 is reserved for the
ineffable Name of God. Dividing marks, made
usually of bone or ivory, are placed after the 33rd
and 66th beads, so that the devotee may rest at
these points. The beads are usually made of wood,
acacia-sycamore, sunt-wood, shdj-wood, and sandal
wood, but coloured glass beads are very popular
among the fallaliin, or peasants. Beads are also
made of ivory or bone and the grey, smoke-coloured
agates found in Arabia. The beads of the rosaries
carried by men are small, but on days of festival
the girls and women wear rosaries made of large
wooden beads coloured red. Large numbers of
these are brought from Makkah by pilgrims who
ha*ve made the hajj or journey to the sacred city of
the Muslims. Before colouring the beads are dipped
in water from the holy well of Zemzem, which was
shown to Hagar by the angels, and from which she
gave her son Ishmael to drink. And a subhah
which has been blessed by a holy man is supposed
ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS
81
to bring a blessing on the user of it. A tassel made
of some brightly coloured stuff is generally attached
to the cord on which the “ pillar ” is strung, and
Egyptians have told me that it is intended to keep
off the Evil Eye, and that evil spirits dislike tassels
and fringed objects. The leather fringes attached
to saddle bags are said to serve the same purpose,
especially when the animal carrying them is in
motion.
In ancient Pentateuch rolls some of the
letters have fringes attached to them, presumably
with the same object.
CHAPTER
III.
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS.
The literature of the Sumerians and Babylonians
which has come down to us proves that the peoples
who occupied Mesopotamia from about 3000 b.c.
downwards attached very great importance to magic
in all its branches, and that they availed themselves
of the services of the magician on every possible
occasion. This is probably true also of the preSumerian inhabitants of the country, but as they
had not acquired the art of writing, we have no
means of knowing exactly what they thought or
believed. The Sumerians invented and developed
a system of writing, and the inscriptions which they
wrote on tablets of clay and stone suggest that they
lived anxious lives and were in perpetual fear of the
attacks of hosts of hostile and evil spirits which
lost no opportunity of attempting to do them harm.
To protect themselves against these they employed
charms and spells and incantations, and in order
to destroy the operations of the Evil Eye they wore
amulets of various kinds, both inscribed and un¬
inscribed. And to protect their houses they buried
little clay figures in the foundations or embedded
them
in
the walls. We will consider first the
Amulets in the forms of animals, birds, fish, etc.
Among the early amulets in the British Museum
the following are of special interest, for they are
Archaic, that is to say they were made before
2500 b.c. (Plate X).
Archaic Babylonian and Assyrian amulets.
PLATE X
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
85
1. The fore-parts of two animals (bulls or lions ?)
united [No. 116709] ; symbolic of two-fold strength.
[Compare the two Lion-gods of Yesterday and To¬
day, seated, back to back, supporting the horizon.
Book of the Dead Papyrus of Ani, sheet 7. The
double Tion-god mentioned in Chapter III = Shu
and Tefnut.] All animals were thus treated, and
the device persisted through the ages.
2. The frog, symbolic of fertility, as in Egypt,
in glazed clay [No. 116913].
3. Two fish, side by side, symbolic of fertility
[No. 120089]. These may represent the Sign of the
Zodiac, Pisces, and possess an astral significance.
[Compare the Egyptian mythological fishes, the
Ant and the Abtu.]
4. The bull, symbol of strength and virility
[No. 116711]. Compare the Egyptian royal title
"mighty bull.”
5. The sow (?), probably symbolic of fecundity
[No. 118529].
Compare the Egyptian figure of a
sow with young in the British Museum [No. 11976]
and the figures [Nos. 1700 and 1795].
6. The ram, symbol of virility [No. 118530].
Compare the Ram of Amen and the Ram of Mendes.
7. A bird of prey (?).
Signification unknown
[No. 118020].
8. A sacred bull [No. 116355].
Sometimes the
figure is marked on the forehead with a triangle.
Herodotus says (iii. 28) that the Apis Bull has on the
forehead a white triangle, and in the bronze figures of
Apis, or sacred Bull of Memphis, this white blaze is
represented by a triangular piece of silver inlaid in
the forehead. This figure is of the shape of an Apis
Bull mummified. Its exact signification is unknown.
86
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
9. A lion’s head, symbolic of strength [No. 118527].
10. A horse : symbolism unknown [No. 118019].
The ape.
The oldest known specimen of
this amulet is made of gold and was found at Ur
of the Chaldees.
It probably symbolized virility
and fecundity. Amuletic figures of the goat and
calf are fairly common, and a civet-cat is cut on a
seal in the possession of Captain Spencer Churchill.
No. 118529.
No. 118527.
No. 118530.
Figures of animals which were used as amulets
were sometimes engraved on their bases with pro¬
tective designs, animals, men, etc.
Examples of
these designs are given above. On No. 118529 is the
figure of a man, on No. 118527 are scorpions (?) and
on No. 118530 are three animals.
Amulets in the form of Cylinder-seals are a
large and important class, and these are of special
interest. The cylinder-seal was made of precious
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
87
and semi-precious stones, e.g. agate, amethyst,
carnelian, chalcedony, crystal, emerald (root of),
haematite, jade, jasper, lapis lazuli, marble, onyx,
sand, steatite, topaz, etc. There is little doubt that
each kind of stone was believed to possess qualities
peculiar to itself, and to have the power to protect
the wearer from certain evils and troubles. This is
proved by a text to which Mr. C. J. Gadd has been
so kind as to call my attention (No. 185 in Ebeling’s
Keilschrift texte aus Assur, religidsen Inhalts). From
this we learn that a seal made of ka-gi-na stone
(haematite ?) will help a man to destroy his enemy.
A seal made of lapis lazuli will possess a god, and
“ his god will rejoice in him/' A seal made of
DU-SHi-A, i.e. rock crystal, will extend the posses¬
sions of a man, and its name is good, i.e. auspicious.
A man possessing a seal made of tu-ud-ash stone
will walk in joy of heart. Wheresoever a man
carrieth a seal made of za-tu-mush-gir, i.e. green
serpentine, “ blessing and blessing shall be given
to it.” And he who possesses a seal made of Gug
stone, i.e. red jasper or carnelian, will never be
separated from the protection of his god.
The cylinder-seal was used both as a seal and as
an amulet. When used as a seal it was rolled over
the moist clay of the tablet in a space which was
provided for it. When this was done the design
on the seal and the name of its owner stood up
above the surface of the tablet in relief. The wit¬
nesses to the contract, which was written both on
the clay case and the tablet inside it, affixed their
seals to the document, and on some of the “ casetablets ” in the British Museum as many as ten or
a dozen impressions of the seals of the contracting
88
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
parties and their witnesses will be found. The
designs on cylinder-seals were cut in outline by a
metal graver, and a drill was used in producing the
deeper parts. There seems to be little doubt that
the cylinder-seal was introduced into Egypt from
Babylonia at a very early period, and the hiero¬
glyph
shows that it was attached to a cord
or chain by which it might be hung round the neck.
In Egypt the cylinder-seal was made of wood,
bronze or copper, bone or ivory, blue glazed porce¬
lain, etc. Its use ceased in Egypt before the rise
of the New Kingdom, and in Babylonia before the
conquest of Alexander the Great took place. The
names cut on cylinder-seals are of various kinds,
and the common scene of the type usually called
“ Gilgamish and Enkidu fighting beasts ” almost
certainly represents the combat of good genii against
the assault of evil and hostile monsters.
The series of typical cylinder-seals reproduced
on Plate XI may now be described.
1. Cylinder-seal of Adda the scribe, about 2500
B.c. The scene represents the Sun-rise, and was
intended to relieve the wearer from fears of the
powers of darkness. The Sun-god is rising between
two mountains on one of which grows the sacred
tree. On the right stands Ea, the Water-god, with
the river of fish flowing about him.
On the
left is the goddess Ishtar, who is helping Shamash,
the Sun-god, to emerge from the mountain. On
the right and left are attendant deities [No. 89115].
2. Scene from a cylinder-seal representing the
Judgment of Zu (?) before Ea. An ancient legend
says that Zu coveted the sovereignty of Enlil, and
that one morning when Enlil was taking his seat
PLATE XI
89538
107390
89128
89119
89490
Babylonian cylinder-seal amulets.
/
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
91
on his throne, he seized the Tablet of Destiny of the
Gods, and carried it off to a mountain where he
hid himself. The gods were in great distress at the
theft, and Anu, the Sky-god, entreated them to
select a champion and to send him forth to punish
Zu and recover the Tablet. The god Adad was
chosen, but he refused to fight, and several other
gods did the same. The text describing the end
of the matter is wanting, but it seems that Zu was
captured and brought before Ea, who pronounced
judgment upon him. The value of this seal as an
amulet depended upon the moral teaching of the
myth. About 2500 b.c. [No. 103317].
3. Scene from a cylinder-seal representing early
heroes fighting wild animals. It was also used to
drive away from a man the demons which produce
sickness and disease. Archaic period [No. 89538].
4. Scene from a cylinder-seal representing the
gods fighting the gods of evil and the slaughter of
the demon-gods, whose skulls are being smashed by
the divine maces. Period doubtful [No. 89119].
5. Scene from a characteristic cylinder-seal of the
Kassite Period. On the right is a figure of Shamash
the Sun-god, seated, and before him is a rosette.
Above this is a form of the Kassite Cross.
The
inscription is a prayer to the Sun-god for the life
and prosperity of the owner [No. 89128].
6. Scene from a cylinder-seal of the Archaic
period, with a representation of a row of homed
animals with an eye above them. The eye sym¬
bolized divine protection [No. 107390].
7. Scene from a cylinder-seal of the Kassite period,
representing nine frogs. The frog was a fertility
amulet [No. 89490].
92
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
8. (See below.) Scene from a cylinder-seal repre¬
senting the adoration of a god by a worshipper who is
accompanied by a priest and an attendant bringing an
animal as an offering. Before the god are the solar
disk and crescent moon, symbols which were adopted
by the Himyarites, and later by Arabs and Turks,
and behind him is a naked goddess or woman whose
presence is difficult to explain. The following illus¬
tration is made from a plaster cast of the seal in the
British Museum.
Sometimes the cylinder-seal was engraved with
a wholly religious scene and a prayer, e.g. that of
Shuanishuria (B.M. No. 89001), which reads, “ O
Marduk, thou [great] Tord, thou Ruler of the Judg¬
ments of Heaven and of Earth, unto Shuanishuria
thy servant who feareth thee, may thy countenance
be favourable/’ A fine selection of cylinder-seals
is exhibited in the British Museum, and descrip¬
tions of them will be found in the Guide to the
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities, 3rd edit.,
London, 1922, p. 223 f.
As examples of inscribed stone amulets of a later
date may be mentioned :—1. A memorial tablet in the form of an amulet
inscribed with the name and titles of Esashaddon,
King of Assyria, about 680 b.c. It was worn to
give protection from the demon Lamashtu, of which
PLATE XII
D
4
2
91499
117725
30005
1
3
118713
113864
7
6i
103057
119437
8
Sumerian, Babylonian and Assyrian amulets
«
PLATE XIII
I
?
I
u
offlt o$
“gis^s ?
I g r: f*
mi
x;g<u
<<5li
Babylonian amulets.
i
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
97
more will be said later. Whether the name of the
king was regarded as a " word of power/’ or whether
the king himself was held to be a magician, like
Solomon, is uncertain ; in either case it is interesting
to find him associated with Lamashtu [No. 113864,
Plate XII, No. 1].
Amulets in this form, with
the names of gods upon them, and belonging to
Minaean times are found in South Arabia.
2. A limestone amulet similar in shape to the
preceding. On one side is the figure of a goddess
seated on a throne with her feet resting on the back
of an animal. She has a star on her head, and holds
a circular object in her right hand ; above her is a
disk, solar or lunar, and before her an offering
stand (?). The inscription is an invocation to her
[No. 22464, Plate XIII, No. 1].
3. Amulet inscribed on one side, with an incanta¬
tion to the female devil Lamashtu. On the other
is a figure of Lamashtu, who is standing on the back
of a wild ass. She is grasping a serpent in each
hand, and is suckling a jackal and a wild pig
[No. 117759, Plate XIII, No. 2].
4. A house-amulet. On the upper half are cut
in outline figures of four gods, who are probably
Marduk, who is standing on a magical beast, Ishtar,
Nabu, who is standing on a magical beast, and
Tashmetum [No. 118796; see page 98].
In addition to the amulets in the form of animals,
cylinder-seals, tablets, plaques, etc., the Sumerians,
Babylonians and Assyrians sought to protect them¬
selves and their houses from sickness and evil spirits
by the use of prophylactic figures of gods and men,
goddesses and women, animals, reptiles, etc.
That
they did so has been known for many years, for
a
98
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
George Smith tells us in his Assyrian Discoveries
(p. 78) that he found a brick box below a late pavement
containing six terra-cotta figures which he described
as having human bodies, and the heads of lions and
large wings. The five small terra-cotta dogs, with
their names inscribed on their left sides, which have
been exhibited in the British Museum for the last
forty years (see Guide, p. 221, Nos. 65-69), were for
long thought to be models of the hunting dogs of
Ashur-bani-pal.1
But we now know that the
1 One of these dogs is figured on Plate XII, No. 2. His
name was “ Dan-rigishshu/, i.e. the “ Loud-Bayer ” [No. 30005].
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
99
Assyrians were in the habit of burying figures of
dogs of different colours under the thresholds of
their houses, so that the spirits of the dogs might
repel the attacks of such evil spirits as tried to make
an entry into the houses.
The number of figures
of dogs buried under a house was usually ten, and
they were arranged five on each side of the door-way.
Dr. Koldewey found under the pavements of buildings
at Babylon small unbaked clay figures of gods, and
groups of statuettes lying in small brick boxes.
In 1924-26 Mr. C. Leonard Woolley found at
Ur of the Chaldees among the ruins of a building
which probably dated from about the middle of the
Vllth century b.c. a series of boxes formed of three
bricks of the plano-convex type, one of the four
sides of the square being open. The cover of each
box was a pavement brick. In each box was usually
a single figure or statuette. The boxes were hned
up all round the rooms against the walls, the open
side of each box facing towards the centre of the
chamber ; the figures stood in their boxes like
sentries and guarded the area of the room. With
the figure in each box were found remains of food¬
stuffs, such as grain and the bones of a pigeon or
some small bird, and generally a broken fragment
of pottery. All the figures were made of unbaked
clay, and were covered with a thin layer of lime,
on which details of the form and dress were roughly
sketched in black. A large number of these pro¬
phylactic figures have been discussed and figured
by Mr. C. L. Woolley in his article, “ Babylonian
Prophylactic Figures/' in the Journal Royal Asiatic
Society, October, 1926, p. 689 f. In this paper
are included several translations from cuneiform
100
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
inscriptions which explain the use of these figures by
Mr. Sidney Smith of the British Museum. These
prove that the figures were used in rituals in order
to avert evil hap, sickness, disease, and calamities of
all kinds. The selection of these figures for illus¬
tration in this book was made for me by Mr. Sidney
No. 90996.
No. 91837.
Smith, and the principal types are reproduced by
the illustrations here given.
i. Human figure wearing a fish skin robe. The
head of the fish forms a high pointed cap, and the
body of the fish hangs down behind. The special
function of this figure is unknown [B.M., No. 91837].
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
101
2. Bearded male figure wearing a horned head¬
dress and a long plain garment reaching to the feet ;
the Papsukkal type of Koldewey [B.M., No. 90996].
3. A human figure naked down to the waist, with
the feet and claws of an eagle, and wearing a horned
cap [B.M., No. 118713], Plate XII, No. 3.
No. 118714.
No. 103225.
4. Bear standing on its hind legs. The right arm
is raised, and the club which was in the hand is
broken away [B.M., No. 118714].
3. The Sirrush or Mushrush, an animal con¬
quered by Marduk ; it was buried under floors or
affixed to walls. A large figure of this animal was
102
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
found on the Ishtar Gate at Babylon [B.M., No.
103381] (see below).
For another example see
Plate XII, No. 4 [B.M., No. 91499].
6. Figure of a being, half man and half animal,
holding a magical staff ; figures of this being were
placed behind walls to repel the attacks which devils
might make on the building [B.M., No. 103225].
7. Plaque with figures of two men fighting, and
two men beating a drum ; it was used to repel the
attacks of devils [B.M., No. 91906].
The Sirrush, No. 103381.
8. A fish which was dedicated to a god during the
recital of a ritual [B.M., No. 102986].
9. Figure of a monkey, in blue glaze with black
lines ; its significance is unknown [B.M., No. 117725],
Plate XII, No. 5.
10. Plaque with a figure of the goddess Ishtar
standing on a lion and astral symbols [B.M., No.
119437], Plate XII, No. 6.
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
103
11. Plaque with a figure of a scorpion-man to
avert the attacks of demons [B.M., No. 86262].
Plate XII, No. 7.
12. Figure of a bird-headed winged being holding
a pot similar to the beings represented on the sculp¬
tures of Ashur-nasir-pal. This class of figure was
No. 91906.
buried under the floor of the Kummu, or room in the
temple in which the sick were tended [B.M., No.
90998].. Plate XIII, No. 3.
13. The wild boar. “ On the 29-feet level among
fragments of the painted Jemdal Nasr pots there
was found a steatite figure of a wild boar,
inches
long and carved in the round. The whole character
of the crouching brute is rendered with amazing
104
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
skill, but more marked than the realism of the work
is its curious style. It is the oldest piece of sculpture
that we have from Ur, and it implies the apprentice¬
ship of many generations” (Woolley, in The Times,
February n, 1930, p. 13).
14. Bronze plaque used for averting the attacks
of devils. On one side is a figure of the devil
Pazuzu, and on the other the head of Nergal. In
the third register a sick man lying on a couch is
represented, and above and below are rude figures
of the animals which it was the object of the priest
to placate by means of prayers and offerings [B.M.,
No. 108979], Plate XIV. The finest known example
of this class of amulet is described in the following
paragraphs.
LABARTU OR LAMASHTU.
Among all the devils and fiends of which the
Mesopotamians lived in terror, the one that seems
to have been the most dreaded was Labartu (or, as
the name is now read, Lamashtu), a she-devil, and
the daughter of the great god Anu. She lived in the
mountains, and deserts, and cane brakes in the
marshes, ard the magicians composed a whole series
of incantations and spells against her. She attacked
pregnant women and young children with such
dire results to them that people were terrified at the
mere mention of her name. Many texts of the
Lamashtu Ritual have been published by Campbell
Thompson, Myhrman and Thureau Dangin, but it
seems that the whole of the series has not come
down to us. Stones played a very prominent part
in the ritual, and it is clear that each kind of stone
possessed its special magical powers ; and many of
Bronze Pazuzu-Nergal plaque.
[Brit. Mus., No. 108979.]
PLATE
XIV
PLATE XV
Labartu or Lamashtu plaque.
(Obverse.)
Reproduced from the Catalogus of the De Clercq Collection
(vol. ii. plate xxxiv).
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
109
the stones used were in the form of cylinders.
Some stones were male and others female. They
were tied to various parts of the body by knotted
cords of different colours, and sometimes had to
remain in position for lengthy periods, even ioo days.
The goddess Lamashtu was a violent, raging devil
of terrifying aspect. In form she resembled a
leopard (?), her face was that of a lion, and her feet
were like those of the Storm-god Zu. With her
hair tossed about wildly, and her breasts uncovered
she burst out of the cane brakes like a whirlwind
and chased the ox and the sheep and thrust her
hands into their flesh and blood. She glided like
a serpent into the houses, and went in and came out
at her own good pleasure. All miscarriages among
women, and all droppings of their young by animals,
were attributed to her and her baleful influences
operating through objects animate and inanimate.
Tamashtu is figured on a series of plaques in metal
and stone which have, for the most part, been dis¬
cussed by Karl Frank (see his Babylonische Beschworungs reliefs) and Thureau Dangin in Revue
d’Assyriologie, vol. xviii. No. IV, p. 171 f, “ Rituel
et amulettes contre LabartuA The finest example
of these is reproduced on Plates XV and XVI. It is
a rectangular bronze plaque measuring 5J inches
in height by 3^ inches in width. It was bought in
Syria in 1879 by M. Peretie, and was acquired by
De Clercq, and published by Clermont Ganneau in
the Revue archeologique (“ L’enfer Assyrien ”), Decem¬
ber, 1879, and republished in the Catalogus De
Clercq (vol. ii. Plate xxxiv). On the back of the
plaque is the figure of an animal demon, standing
upright with the two fore-paws resting on the
110
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
upper edge of the plaque, which also supports the
head of the monster, which is in the round. The
face looks down on the figures, etc., on the front of
the plaque. The body is that of a lion, and
is covered with scales and has four wings. The
head has a pair of ram's horns, which lie flat on
Pazuzu, son of Hanpu, King of the air devils.
the sides of the head, the eyes are round and
fierce, and the shape of the mouth shows that the
lion is supposed to be roaring. His tail is a scorpion,
and the phallus, which lies along the lower part of
the belly, terminates in a snake's head. His hind
legs have the claws of a bird of prey instead of feet,
PLATE XVI
Labartu or Lamashtu plaque.
(Reverse.)
Reproduced from the Catalogus of the De Clercq Collection
(vol. ii. plate xxxiv).
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
113
and they rest on the lower projecting border of the
plaque. The name of this animal demon is Pazuzu.
An inscription published by Thureau Dangin [Revue,
p. 190) makes him say, “ [I am Pazuzu, the son
of Hanpu, king of the evil spirits of the air ; I go
forth from the mountains raging like a whirlwindJ”
The British Museum possesses several heads of
figures of Pazuzu, chiefly in stone. The one in
bronze, No. 93089, has been published by Layard ;
No. 22459 (stone), by L. W. King, Babylonian
Religion, p. 189 ; and Nos. 91873-91876 (stone),
by Campbell Thompson, Devils. vol. i, Plate II.
The front of the plaque is divided into four registers,
the largest of which is at the bottom. Register I
contains ten emblems which are, beginning on the
left side, viz. (1) a cylindrical crown with several pairs
of horns ; (2) a ram-headed staff ; (3) a thunder¬
bolt ; (4) a lance ; (5) two reeds bound together ;
(6) an eight-rayed star on a disk ; (7) a disk with the
wings and tail of a bird ; (8) a crescent ; (9) seven
globes ; (10) a lamp.
Register II contains figures of seven demons,
each facing to the right and wearing a long fringed
garment held in position by a belt round the
waist.
Their right arms are raised, and their
clenched hands, ready to strike, are behind their
heads, and their left arms are extended a little in
front of them, the hands being clenched. The
hrst has the head of a panther, the second the head
of a lion, the third the head of a wolf, the fourth the
head of a ram, the fifth the head of an ibex, the sixth
the head of a bird, the seventh the head of a serpent.
Register III: Here we see a draped man lying at
full length on a cushion, with his right arm raised
H
114
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
and the palm of the hand turned towards his face.
The cushion rests on a bier with one end rounded
and bent upwards ; the legs of the bier are round and
are fastened together by cords. At each end of the
bier stands a bearded man wearing the skin of a
fish, the head of which serves as a covering for the
man’s head, and the tail reaches the ground behind
him. The right hand of each man is raised, and in
his left he holds a small vessel or bucket ; his right
leg is extended in front of him. On the left is a
lamp which rests on a flat tablet which is tied to a
tripod. On the left are two lion-headed beings
facing each other, with legs terminating in the claws
of birds of prey. Each wears a short tunic which
is held in position by a fillet and a belt, and has a
dagger in his belt. Each grasps the clenched left
hand of the other, and the right hand of each is
raised behind his head.
The last figure in this
Register has his face turned away from the bier.
He is bearded, and wears an ordinary head cloth
and a short tunic with a belt.
Register IV: Here we have represented a river
bank with reeds and a stream in which five fish
are swimming to the right. The central figure is
that of a devil with a woman’s body which is
covered with hair ; her head, which is cased in
a rounded cap (?) of unusual shape, is that of
a roaring lioness.
Her arms are raised, and
in each hand, which is on the level of her face, she
holds a two-headed serpent. A small dog is
sucking at her right breast and a pig at her left
breast ; and her legs terminate in the claws of a
bird of prey. She kneels on the back of an ass with
her right knee, and her left claw rests on the ass’s
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
115
head. In the space between her legs and the back of
the ass is a scorpion. The ass is placed in a boat,
the bow of which ends in the head of a serpent, and
the stern in the head of a bull. The ass has one
hind leg fastened by a rope to the boat or the bank
of the stream. Standing on the bank to the left is
a hairy monster with his arms in the same position
as those of the beings in the Second Register. He
is perhaps the king of the evil spirits Pazuzu. In
the space to the right are nine objects which are
difficult to identify.
The general meaning of the group of scenes
depicted on this bronze amulet is quite clear. The
female devil in the boat is Lamashtu, whose home
is the infernal regions whence she comes when she
arrives on the earth to carry out her campaign of
slaughter and death. The only way to stop her
from carrying out her baneful plans is to get her
back again in the Underworld, and it is necessary
to coax her to leave this earth by promising to give
her gifts. What these gifts are is duly set out in
the incantations which are engraved on Lamashtu
amulets, and they include jewels, a spindle, a cloak
for her journey from earth to hell, provisions of
various kinds, e.g. cakes of bread baked on hot
cinders, malt, bread soaked in beer, drink necessary
to keep her from thirsting, a flask of choice oil,
sandals which will not wear out on the journey,
roasted grain packed in four leather bags, and all
these are to be stowed in four clay vessels. In short,
she must be provided with oil to anoint herself,
apparel in which to dress herself, water and grain
with which she can make beer, and means of trans¬
port, viz. a suitable boat and receptacles for her
116
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
provisions. The texts go on to say that she is to
set out on her westward journey through the desert
to hell at a certain time before the sun sets, and that
she must go direct to the place of sunset. She
must then make her way over the mountains which
block the road to hell, and when this is done she
must cross the river of hell, which is no other than
the great World-Ocean Nar Marratu.
The scenes on the Lamashtu amulets and the texts
of the incantations agree closely, and the following
prayer, which was published by L. W. King (Baby¬
lonian Magic, Plates 67 and 68) and translated in full
by Thureau Dangin, shows that men really carried out
the regulations concerning offerings to Tamashtu :
“ O Shamash, the etimmu devil which terrifieth me,
who hath clung to me for several days past, and will
not leave me, who doggeth my steps by day, and
terrifieth me all night long, who maketh the skin
of my body to rise up, and the hair of my head to
stand up, who constraineth my forehead, and maketh
my face feverish, and drieth up my palate, and
poisoneth my flesh, and parcheth all my members,
whether it be a ghost of my family and of my
ancestor, or the ghost of some man who hath died
a violent death, or whether it be a homeless ghost—
it may or may not be one of these. O Shamash,
in thy presence, I have sought for a garment with
which to clothe it, and sandals for its feet, and a
belt of leather for its waist, and a pot of water from
which it may drink, I have given it the flour of
malt, and I have supplied it with food for the
journey. May it depart to the West; may he be
committed to the care of Ne-Gab, the great gate¬
keeper of hell ; may Ne-Gab, the great gatekeeper
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
of hell, keep him in strict custody.
lock fast the lock.”
117
May his key
The following are specimens of the shorter incan¬
tations : —
I. —(i) Incantation : (2) Lamash, daughter of
Anu ; (3) Whose name has been uttered by the gods ;
(4) Innin, queen of queens; (5) Lamashtu, O great
lady; (6) Who seizes the painful Asakku;
whelming the ‘Alu; (8) Come not nigh what
to the man; (9) Be conjured by Heaven
conjured by the Earth ; (11) Be conjured
(12) Be conjured by Ea.
(7) Over¬
belongeth
; (10) Be
by Enlil;
II. —(1) Incantation : Lamashtu, “ Daughter of
Anu ” ; (2) is thy first name. The second is, “ Sister
of the gods of the streets ; (3) The third is, “ Sword
which splitteth the skull ” ; (4) The fourth is, “ She
who kindleth a fire ” ; (5) The fifth is, “ Goddess
[the sight] of whose face causeth horror” ; (6) The
sixth is, “ Committed to the hands.”
Returning to the figures which were used as
amulets and the incantations which were recited
in connection with them, a specimen incantation
may now be given : —
1.
Incantation, that a . . . demon and an evil
demon (utukku ?) may not [dwell] in the house of a
man.
seven figures of the apkallu
(i.e. the teachers who lived before the Elood) made
of the wood of the bay-tree (?) which are crowned
2.
Ritual.—On
with the head-dress proper to each of them, and wear
the apparel proper to each of them.
118
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
3. And carry in their right hand a [piece of] baytree (?) wood which has been burned in the hre at
the top and bottom and place their left hands on
their chests.
4. Write their names on their left hip. On the first
image, covered in red paste for its outer garment,
5. Write, “ Day of life, born of Ur.”
second, covered in gypsum,
On the
6. Write, “ Day of plenty, gracious son of Nippur.”
On the third, covered in gypsum and with water
drawn on him in black wash,
7. Write, “ Day of delight grown up in Eridu.”
On the fourth, covered with black wash, write,
“ Fortunate day, created in Kullah.”
8. On the fifth, covered with Im-Kal-La* write,
“ Day of bright face, nursling of Kesh.”
On the
sixth, covered in green paste,
9. Write, “ Lucky day, exalted judge of Lagash.”
On the seventh, wearing Im-Kal* of carnelian (?),
10. Write, “ Day that has given life to him who is
smitten protection of Shuruppak.”
11. Bury at the head of the bed. Recite before
them the incantation, “ O you seven eldest (or,
leading) apkallu.”
12. Seven clay figures of the apkallu, which have
faces of birds and wings fitted, and carry a mulilu
(cleansing implement ?) in their right hands.
13. And a wooden bucket in their left hands,
covered in gypsum, cloaked with a bird’s wings on
the teqeti.
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
119
14. Bury in the second pavement of the house
at the head of the bed. Recite before them the
incantation, “ You are the figures of the guardian
apkallu.”
15. Seven clay figures of the apkallu, covered in
gypsum, cloaked in the skin of a fish of black paste,
carrying in their right hands the same thing, and in
their left hands the same thing,
16. Bury in the frieze on the wall of the kummu
chamber. Their incantation as before.
17. Seven clay figures of the apkallu, covered in
gypsum, cloaked in the skin of a fish, grasping in
their right hands the date-spathe, with their left
hands
18. Their breasts, bury facing the door behind
the chair. Incantation as before.
19. Seven clay figures of the apkallu, covered in
gypsum, cloaked in the skin of a fish,
20. Carrying in their right hands the urigallu
reed (standard ?), grasping their breasts with their
left hands, bury in the middle of the house in front
of the chair.
21. Seven tamarisk figures of the divine Seven,
crowned with the head-dress proper to each of them,
wearing the apparel proper to each of them,
22. Standing on a base of p(b)uridu (reed matting),
covered with red paste, carrying in their right hands a
kultu of copper,
120
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
23. In their left hands a copper dagger, their
waists girdled with a band of copper, caps of copper
on their heads . . .
24. With horns of copper fitted, bows and quivers
stand at their sides,
25. Bury opposite the figure of tamarisk. Recite
before them the incantation, “ You are the figures
of the divine Seven, the great gods.”
The text then goes on to speak of a tamarisk
figure of the goddess Narudu which is to be buried
in the kamu gate (i.e. the principal gate), seven
figures of weapon-men or “ club-bearers ” which
are to be buried in the same gate behind the daggerbearers ; a tamarisk figure inscribed “ Over-thrower
of evil deeds ” and “ Introducer of the good shedu
and good lamassu
; a tamarisk figure of the god
of the house ; clay figures of the Fish-man ; of the
Scorpion-man, male and female ; of Latarak in
green and black paste ; of the Lion-man ; of ten
dogs. The figures of the dogs, which were to be
painted in different colours, were to be buried in the
kamu gate. For the complete translation from which
the above extracts are taken, see Sidney Smith,
Journal Royal Asiatic Society, 1926.
Some details of the Ritual of prophylactic and
evil-averting figures are supplied in the following
extract published by Zimmern, No. 54, and rendered
into English by Sidney Smith (<Journal Royal Asiatic
Society, 1926, p. 205).
Incantation : For the raising up of their arms
I have stretched out a red cloth above, I have hung
a spotted cord round, in their hands I have set
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
121
the date-spathe. I have made the usurtu perfect,
I have put a wash of gypsum round them. At the
head of the seven of them, of those with terrible
wings, I have set Nergal. I put Nusku at their
head in the furnace. Two figures, twins, bound
together, whose form is complete “ overthrowers of
wicked devils/’ I set at the sick man’s head, right and
left. The figure of Lugal* Gir* Ra* who has no equal,
I set on the riksu of the house: the figure of
Shit*ham-Ta-E-A- who has no rival, the figure of
Narudu, the sister of the great gods, I set at the
bottom of the bed.
That nought evil might
approach, I set Latarak and Latarak in the gate.
To drive away everything evil I set up a hulduppu
opposite the gate. Fighting twins of gypsum I
drew on the door. Fighting twins of the enclosure,
of bitumen, I set up in the gateway wings, right and
left. Two figures of the guardians of Ea and Marduk
I set up in the gate, right and left. The incantation
is the incantation of Marduk. The magician is the
figure of Marduk. Repeat for so-and-so the son of
so-and-so, whose god is so-and-so, whose goddess is
so-and-so, in whose body there is sickness, the incan¬
tation, “ When the cattle come home, when the
cattle go out, do you, offspring of the sweet water,
holy sons of Ea, eat what is good, drink honey,
may nought that is evil approach the place you
guard.”
When you have recited this before the seven
figures of those with wings, in front of whom Nergal
stands, recite the following before the seven figures
of the divine Seven, made of wood of the bay-tree (?)
122
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
which carry clubs. Incantation : “ Beating down
the evil rabisu, sparing life, exercising force, turning
back the breast of the evil, preserving the oracular
utterances of Enlil, hre that overwhelms the un¬
friendly dagger that overbears fate . . . that
lights up mankind, divine Seven that destroy the
wicked/'
The following illustrates the symbolism of the
objects which were used in the Ritual : —
14. The gypsum and bitumen which they smear
on the gate of the sick man’s house.
15. The gypsum is the god Ninurta, the bitumen
is the utukku demon. Ninurta pursues the utukku
demon.
16. The two zisurru which surround the
man’s bed are the gods Lugal- Gir- Ra*
Shit-ham-Ta-E- A17. The three meal-heaps
down are Anu, Enlil and Ea.
which
are
sick
and
thrown
18. The usurtu which they drew in front of the
bed, that is the net; it surrounds everything bad.
19. The skin of the gugallu, and the URUDUNIG -KAL • GA which they ... at the head of the
sick man.
of the gugallu is Anu, and the
URUDU- NIG-KAL-GA is Enlil; the urigallu reeds.
20. The skin
21. Which are set up at the head of the sick man
are the divine Seven, the great gods, the sons of
Ishara.
22. The hulduppu goat which is set at the head
of the bed of the sick man is the god Nin. AMASH*
KU • G A •
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
123
23. The shepherd of Enlil. The censer and torch
which are put in the sick man’s house.
24. The censer is the god Ku-Bu* the torch is
Nusku.
See Sidney Smith in Journal Royal Asiatic Society,
1926, p. 205 f.
CYLINDER-SEALS AS VOTIVE OFFERINGS.
In the observations on the cylinder-seal printed
above we have only dealt with it as an amulet ;
but it seems that the cylinder-seal was sometimes
used as a votive offering, and was laid before the
god, and was thereafter regarded as the property
of the god.
Sidney Smith has called attention
{Journal Royal Asiatic Society, 1926, p. 444) to the
fact that among the large number of cylinder-seals
now known, whilst the greater number of them show
marks of hard wear, and cleaning and of being worn
as amulets, many are in such an excellent state of
preservation that they look as if they had only just
left the hands of their makers. Basing his opinion
on a tablet in the British Museum (No. 117666),
he thinks that this is due to the fact that
cylinder-seals
which were u before ” a divine
statue or symbol would not be continually used,
and that they were thus enabled to retain
their pristine clearness.
The tablet to which
he refers, and the text of which he translates, is
inscribed with a royal command in which an
official is ordered to search for a certain cylinderseal, and to take it and bring it to him. The correct¬
ness of this view is proved by two cylinder-seals
which were found at Babylon, the one bearing
124
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
the image of Marduk, and the other that of Adad ;
both seem to have belonged to the “ treasure of
Marduk/'
THE
CYLINDER-SEAL
IN
ASSYRIA,
PERSIA AND
PHOENICIA.
The Babylonians of the late Empire used cylinderseals in the same way as the early Babylonians,
but as a rule they are much smaller, though the
traditional scenes and figures are found on them.
The Assyrians also used cylinder-seals and intro¬
duced on them the characteristic figures of their
gods, and figures of men grouped about the sacred
tree. The Cappadocians and Hittites also adopted
the cylinder-seal, but the scenes found on them are
arranged differently from those found on Babylonian
cylinder-seals. Figures of gods standing upon lions
appear for the first time. The Phoenicians borrowed
Assyrian designs for their cylinder-seals, but wrote
the names of their owners with Phoenician letters.
About the time of the downfall of the Assyrian
Empire after the destruction of Nineveh (612 b.c.),
the place of the cylinder-seal for sealing clay tablets
was taken by cone-seals, in sard, carnelian, agate,
chalcedony, etc., and they were used for this purpose
throughout the Persian Period down to about 350 b.c.
The favourite stone for seals of this period was
chalcedony, and on these were cut symbols of the
gods Shamash, Sin, Adad, Marduk and Nabu ;
mythical beasts and winged demons ; men standing
by the sacred tree above which is the symbol of the
god Asshur ; scenes from the Gilgamish legend ;
man-headed goat-fish,
man-headed birds, cock,
crescent ; hunting scenes, etc. The scenes on two
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS
125
chalcedony cones are here reproduced. In the first
(B.M., No. 115604) we see three bulls’ heads created
in a disc formation. This device was magical, and
it appears in many forms during the Achaemenian
No. 115604.
No. 119919.
Period, and after down to the Middle Ages. In the
second (B.M., No. 119919) we see a mounted horseman
engaged in conflict with some animal ; perhaps the
foundation of the legend of St. George and the
Dragon.
SASSANIAN AMULETS AND SEALS.
Here for convenience sake may be mentioned the
large class of amulets and amuletic seals which were
used in Western Iran or Persia during the period of
the rule of the Sassanides, i.e. from about a.d. 226632. They are commonly known as “ Pehlevi
gems,” because the inscriptions upon them, which
are usually the names of the owners or gods, are
written in Pehlevi characters. These characters
were derived from a Semitic alphabet, which was
probably Syriac. Pehlevi seals are made of different
kinds of stone, agate, lapis lazuli, sard, carnelian,
chalcedony, and variegated hard stones. The larger
specimens are rounded and pierced and were
threaded on string or wires and carried like cylinderseals, or attached to.the body like amulets; the
smaller ones, which are flat, formed the bezels of
126
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
rings. On the largest of them, which resemble
oval plaques, we find busts of governors and women.
Favourite representations on them are :—Palm
branches and flowers held in hands, animals, especi¬
ally the winged horse (Pegasus ?), birds, reptiles,
mythological creatures, and elaborate linear devices.
Six characteristic specimens from the British Museum
Collection are here given,
(i) Three little men
and an indeterminate object; this scene is very
No. 119382.
No. 119351.
No. 119392.
No. 119979.
No. 119983.
No. 119971.
common and
[No. 119382].
probably illustrates some legend
(2) Three lions' heads in disc form
[No. 119351].
(3) A palm branch and a man
worshipping a star and the crescent moon [No.
119392]. (4) A symbol which was probably sup¬
posed to possess magical powers [No. 119979].
(5) A semi-human figure grasping the symbols of
the Beginning and the End ; between his legs is
the figure of an animal (mouse ?) [No. 119983].
(6) A hand with the thumb and index-finger touch¬
ing [No. 119971].
CHAPTER
IV.
COPTIC AMULETS.
According to the Life of St. Anthony, the Great,
of Egypt, the Egyptians were in the habit of embalm¬
ing the bodies of the saints and martyrs, and of
placing them not in graves but in their houses so
that they might do honour to them. Anthony had
entreated the bishops to order the people not to do
this, but the custom continued. When he was
dying he commanded those who were about him,
saying : “ Dig a grave then, and bury me therein,
and hide my body under the earth. And let these
my words be observed carefully by you, and tell ye
no man where ye lay me ; [and there I shall be] until
the Resurrection of the dead, when I shall receive
[again] this body without corruption ” (Budge,
Paradise of the Fathers, Vol. i. p. 72).
This passage
makes it quite clear that the Egyptian Christians
continued to mummify their dead long after their
conversion to Christianity, and the tombs of Egypt
of the early Christian period support Anthony’s
statement. Anthony died about a.d. 360, and
thus it is certain that the Egyptian Christians had
been mummifying their dead for at least 260 years,
for the introduction of Christianity into Egypt
cannot be placed later than about a.d. ioo. There
is no satisfactory evidence showing under whose
auspices the Christianizing of Egypt took place,
128
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
though it is generally attributed to St. Mark, who
began to preach in Alexandria about a.d. 69.
Though the form of the Egyptian Religion which
was in use between 200 b.c. and a.d. ioo, with its
doctrine of a Last Judgment and its fastings and
prayers and asceticism generally, was an excellent
preparation for the reception of Christianity by the
Egyptians, when once their conversion was effected,
they determined to break absolutely with the old
pagan religion and its cults. They discarded the
hieroglyphic, hieratic and demotic scripts, and for¬
mulated an alphabet for themselves, which included
the Greek alphabet and a number of conventional
forms of old Egyptian characters ; in this mixed
alphabet they wrote the Coptic version of the Scrip
tures. They rejected the spells and the Vignettes
of the Book of the Dead, and abandoned the use of
the funerary amulets of the ancient Egyptians, and
all their amuletic symbols save one, viz. the sign
-p dnkh which means “ life, living/’
What object
this sign represented cannot be said, but as to the
idea which both pagans and Egyptians associated
with it there is no doubt. Gods and goddesses, and
men and women, are seen holding it, and it seems
that the life of every being, divine or human, depended
upon his or her possession of it. From first to last
the gods are seen carrying it in their right hands,
and they gave life to their kings and servants pre¬
senting it to them.
It has been suggested that -p*
is a conventional representation of some organ of
the human body connected with procreation, and
this view is probably correct.
may, the Egyptian Christian
But be this as it
adopted it as an
COPTIC AMULETS
129
equivalent of the Cross of Christ, and it symbolized
to them life everlasting.
On the stele of Abraham
(B.M., No. 1257) we have it in this form
with the letters & and I1.
On the stele of Pleinos
(B.M., No. 679) we have the ordinary Greek cross
p
, the
__ t--Q_
and two dnkh crosses ‘
FT
n ir—C—?
A*
On the stele of Sabinos (B.M. 1352) we have \/ ,
and & and jft.
On another stele are cut
figures of doves holding -r (B.M., 1327).
found a mummy with the suwastika
Naville
drawn on
the left shoulder (see Deir el-Bahari, li, p. 5), but
there is no proof that the mummy was that of a
Christian. There is in the British Museum (No. 54051)
a mummy of a child of the early Christian or late
Roman period ; the hands are crossed over the breast,
and in one he holds a cross
and in the other
a flower (lotus (?) which suggests that the mummy
is that of a girl). On a portion of a mummy swathing
found at Lycopolis is painted a Christian cross
5
(No. 55056). On a very rare amulet which
was given to the British Museum by Sir Rider
Haggard, the Birth of Christ is represented
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
130
(No. 469) ;
Mary is seated under a tree and she
holds ^ in one hand ; on the reverse is the sign -p
and the legend, “ One God in heaven.”
As the
woman is seated under a tree and not in a cave, it
has been suggested that it is the birth of the Buddha
which is represented.
3
The amuletic signs
and \/
which are
seen
on Coptic monuments older than the time of Con¬
stantine the Great, have not been found in the
form of amulets.
Attempts have been made to
show that the sign
is
derived
from
they appear to the writer to be unsuccessful.
but
The
is found woven into textiles from
Akhmim.
From the excavations of Coptic sites at
Akhmim and elsewhere the following amulets have
been recovered : —
The Cross, both in the Greek and Coptic
forms, made of bronze, sometimes inlaid with paste
or stones, bone, ivory (?), mother-of-pearl, iron,
glass.
1.
The Dove, symbolic of the Holy Ghost, in
mother-of-pearl.
2.
3. Pendants
unknown.
in
mother-of-pearl ;
significance
4. Bone figures of the Virgin Mary seated in a
shrine.
131
COPTIC AMULETS
5. Bone plaques carved with figures of St. George
spearing a dragon ; the spear is cross-headed, and
the saint holds a cross in his left hand.
6. Plaques of shell inscribed
and
Saint George of Lydda.
7. Terra-cotta bottles stamped with a cross.
The Fish, a symbol of Christ. The fish became
a very popular amulet when it was pointed out
that the letters of l^Ovs = ’I^crous yptcrro? deov G09
crcoTr/p,
Jesus Christ, son of God, the Saviour.”
The cross resting on a fish, and a cross with a fish on
each side of it are found cut upon gems. See Forrer,
Reallexikon, Strassburg, 1907, p. 427, Tafel 109.
8.
“
132
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
9. Terra-cotta oil flasks from the tomb of St.
Menas, on which are stamped figures of the saint,
camels, etc. See Budge, Texts relating to Saint
Mena, London, 1909, p. 33 f. The dolphins which
protected the saint’s body at sea are often sculptured
on funerary Coptic stelae.
10. Large crosses made of lead and stone, which
were used as funerary monuments. (See B.M.,Nos.
46708 and 1339.)
Among the Copts the amulets which were intended
to protect the dead took the form of sheets of
inscribed papyrus ; many of these are preserved in
the British Museum. One contains a copy of the
apochryphal letter of King Abgar to Christ, and the
first words of each of the Four Gospels (Oriental
4919 (2)).
Another is inscribed “ Lord God
Almighty help me ! ” and a third is inscribed with
some of the vowels, each seven times repeated and
in separate lines (Crum, Catalogue, p. 175).
CHAPTER
EGYPTIAN
V.
AMULETS.
The Egyptians in all periods of their history were
lovers of amulets, and they placed them under and
in their houses and tombs, and set them up in their
temples, and wore them when living, and caused
them to be placed on their bodies when dead. They
made them of many kinds of stones, both common
and semi-precious, various kinds of wood, gold,
copper, silver-gold, ivory, bone, shell, wood, wax,
faience, etc. The common word for amulet in the
dynastic period was nik-t, T\
“ protector
;
B
C±
, which means
a synonym frequently used in the
the
thing which
keeps safe," the “ strengthened" Many of the
substances of which amulets were made were believed
to possess influence or properties which could be
absorbed by the wearers. Amulets with names of
gods or words of power inscribed upon them were
held to be more powerful than those which were
uninscribed, and those which had been “ blessed "
by the magician, and therefore contained a portion
of his spiritual power, were the most powerful of
all. Most of the Egyptian amulets known have
come from the tombs of Egypt, and were “ pro¬
tectors " worn by the dead ; it is probable that they
are identical with those which were worn by the
living.
134
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
The oldest amulets from Egypt belong to the
Neolithic period. Among them are figures in flint
of the crocodile, some horned animal (goat ?), the
head of a cow with a woman’s face (the goddess
Hathor ?), the hippopotamus, the cuttle-fish (?),
and the objects
and /p ; the first of the two
objects may be the Kef-pesh, an instrument used
in connection with birth ceremonies, and the second
may be a feather. All these were worn to give the
wearers virility and fecundity, and the last two
mentioned are probably models of some human
The great amulet of the Sun-gods of sunrise and sunset in the form of a
lion with a head at each end of his body.
organ of generation. The flint arrow heads were
also used as amulets. To the same period belong
the green slate models of tortoises or turtles, rams,
stags, bears, birds (bats ?), which are exhibited in
the British Museum (see Guide to the flh, 5th and
6th Egyptian Rooms, p. 281 f).
The oldest amuletic sign used by the dynastic
Egyptians
is -p.
to
which
they
assigned
the
phonetic value of dnkh or anh.
What object it
represents is not known, but it was probably some
part of the human body which the Egyptians
believed to be intimately connected with generation
EGYPTIAN AMULETS
135
and with the maintenance of life. The meaning of
the word ankh is “ life/' “ living/' in fact “ ever¬
lasting life " and the “ life which cannot die."
Every god and goddess and divine being possessed
it, and by it their life was maintained. They
bestowed it on kings and also on the souls who were
acquitted in the Hall of Judgment, and those
who received it lived for
i.£. “ one hundred
thousand millions of years." When the Egyptians
embraced Christianity in the 1st century they
adopted the sign -p though of pagan origin, and
its meaning, and it appears on funerary monuments
side by side with the Christian Cross. The amulet
-j- was made of wood, wax, metal, stones of various
kinds,
faience,
etc. ;
this
fact proves
that the
Egyptians did not know what object the sign ^
represented.
i. The
The principal funerary amulets were :
Scarab,
scarabaeus sacer,
one of the
class of the dung-eating beetles. This beetle collects
a mass of dung, lays in it one egg, and then kneads
the dung together and finally makes it into a round
ball about 2 inches in diameter. This done, it turns
its head away from the ball, and with its hind legs
rolls the ball along the ground into some sunny
place, where under the influence of the heat of the
sun, the egg is hatched, and the little beetle lives
and flourishes on the excrement with which the egg
has been surrounded. For a naturalist's description
of the beetle, see J. H. Fabre, The Sacred Beetle and
others, London, 1919. From the earliest times the
Egyptians associated this beetle with the god of
creation, and its egg-ball with the sun ; the god was
136
AMULETS AND SUPERSTITIONS
believed to roll the ball of the sun across the sky
even as the beetle rolled its ball over the ground.
And heat and life came from the sun, just as the
larva of the beetle, hatched in the egg-ball and
nourished on its substance, proceeded from the eggball. The god who rolled the solar ball across the
sky was called Kheperd, i.e. “ the Roller/’ and in
the Book of Ammi Tuat we see him pushing the
sun into the sky at dawn. The Egyptians wore
models of the beetle when living to give them the
life and strength of the god of creation. They
placed in their mummies models in green stone or
black basal
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