Table Of ContentThis Dover edition, first published in 1978, is an unabridged republication of the
work originally published by Oxford University Press, London, in 1930. This
edition is published by special arrangement with Oxford University Press,
Oxford.
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Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
PREFACE
CHAPTER I. - THE UNIVERSAL USE OF AMULETS DUE TO MAN’S
BELIEF IN THE EXISTENCE OF DEMONS AND EVIL SPIRITS.
CHAPTER II. - ARAB AND PERSIAN AMULETS AND TALISMANS.
CHAPTER III. - BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN AMULETS.
CHAPTER IV. - COPTIC AMULETS.
CHAPTER V. - EGYPTIAN AMULETS.
CHAPTER VI. - ETHIOPIAN (ABYSSINIAN) AMULETS.
CHAPTER VII. - GNOSTIC AMULETS.
CHAPTER VIII. - HEBREW AMULETS.
CHAPTER IX. - MANDAEAN (MANDAÎTIC) AMULETS.
CHAPTER X. - PHOENICIAN AMULETS.
CHAPTER XI. - SAMARITAN AMULETS.
CHAPTER XII. - SYRIAC AMULETS.
CHAPTER XIII. - BABYLONIAN TERRA-COTTA DEVIL-TRAPS.
CHAPTER XIV. - THE RING AMULET.
CHAPTER XV. - STONES AND THEIR PROPHYLACTIC AND
THERAPEUTIC QUALITIES.
CHAPTER XVI. - THE IMPORTANCE OF COLOUR, SHAPE, AND
FORM IN AMULETS.
CHAPTER XVII. - THE SWSTIKA OR SVASTIKA.
CHAPTER XVIII. - THE CROSS.
CHAPTER XIX. - THE CRUCIFIX.
CHAPTER XX. - THE EVIL EYE.
CHAPTER XXI. - ABBÂLÂH.
CHAPTER XXII. - ASTROLOGY.
CHAPTER XXIII. - THE KABBALISTIC NAMES AND SIGNS, AND
MAGICAL FIGURES, AND SQUARES OF THE SEVEN
ASTROLOGICAL STARS OR PLANETS.
CHAPTER XXIV. - THE STARS OR SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC AND
THEIR INFLUENCES, THE HOUSES OF HEAVEN AND THE DEKANS.
CHAPTER XXV. - THE STONES OF THE PLANETS AND THEIR
INFLUENCES.
CHAPTER XXVI. - THEORIES ABOUT NUMBERS AND THEIR
MYSTIC AND SACRED CHARACTER.
CHAPTER XXVII. - DIVINATION.
CHAPTER XXVIII. - DIVINATION BY WATER.
CHAPTER XXIX. - DIVINATION BY MEANS OF THE LIVER OF AN
ANIMAL.
CHAPTER XXX. - THE INSCRIBED BRONZE DIVINING DISK OF
PERGAMON.
CHAPTER XXXI. - DIVINATION BY EARTH OR SAND (GEOMANCY).
CHAPTER XXXII. - LUCKY AND UNLUCKY DAYS.
CHAPTER XXXIII. - THE HAND OF FÂIMAH.
CHAPTER XXXIV. - CONTRACTS WITH THE DEVIL.
CHAPTER XXXV. - ENVOÛTEMENT.
CHAPTER XXXVI. - MISCELLANEOUS.
INDEX.
A CATALOG OF SELECTED DOVER BOOKS IN ALL FIELDS OF
INTEREST
PREFACE
EARLY 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 ûyûnji 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 accommodated 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 manuscripts, 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 Chinese
Embassy in London came to him for information 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 antiquities under
his charge came from Egypt, Babylonia 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
abbâlâh, the Sinaitic inscriptions, the monuments of Susa and Persepolis, the
inscriptions of Mal Amir, the Himyaritic inscriptions, astrology, the ritual of
fire-worship, the rites of the Yazîdîs or Devil-worshippers, etc. His answers and
short dissertations 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 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 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 “
Superstitions.” 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 produce 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 vastness of the literature of this
subject, which is growing daily, is furnished by the fact that the “ Quellen-
Register” in DR. SELIGMANN’S Der Böse 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 comparatively
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, 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 abbalists,
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, crystal-gazers, palmists and fortune-tellers with whom I
came in contact in Egypt, the Sûdân and Mesopotamia 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 descendants 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
did. He did not think it possible for his god to exist without the help of magical
powers. At a later period he 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 formulated. 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.
1
In a papyrus at St. Petersburg there is a remarkable passage in which it is
stated that the great god, presumably R , created magic for the benefit of man. It
occurs in a work written by a king called KHATI, who reigned during the
troublous times between the downfall of the VIth 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-R 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 to gratify them; and
