Magical Practices Research Articles

Unveiling Superstition in Vieste: Popular Culture and Ecclesiastical Tribunals in the 18th-Century Kingdom of Naples

This study aims to analyse two trials involving magic, superstition, exorcism, and witchcraft, which were held in 1713 in the Diocese of Vieste (present-day Apulia), Kingdom of Naples. It aims to illuminate the dynamics between the Church, magical practices, and the territorial context, providing insights into this less-explored period in inquisition history when the Catholic Church’s fight against superstition was beginning to wane. The first trial against Rita di Ruggiero is very rich in detail, giving us a clear vision of which magical practices were used during the Modern Age. Additionally, it touches, albeit only marginally, on a theme that will be crucial for the duration of these practices in the Kingdom of Naples: the complex interactions between state and ecclesiastical authorities. The second 1713 trial involving Elisabetta Del Vecchio explores accusations of bewitchment, contributing to our understanding of witchcraft paradigms.

“The Strength of The(Ir) Illusion” (Macbeth 3.5.27): Transmission of Magic and the Ambiguity of Magical Spaces in Macbeth and The Tempest

“The strength of the(ir) illusion” (Macbeth 3.5.27): Transmission of Magic and the Ambiguity of Magical Spaces in Macbeth and The Tempest. Starting from Ina Habermann and Michelle Witen’s 2016 taxonomy of space in Shakespearean drama, our paper focuses on setting and social/ gendered space. What we aim to discuss is how two of Shakespeare’s plays involving magic—namely Macbeth and The Tempest—associate various settings with witchcraft and magic, while also constructing space simultaneously as magical and political, a topophrenic “thirdspace” (cf. Tally, 2019; Soja, 1996), where disorder rules and where power relations in general, and gender relations in particular, are negotiated between ordinary characters and magic-wielding ones (the witches and Hecate vs. Prospero and Ariel, as well as Sycorax). The paper also discusses what “rough” magic is in these plays (a term used in The Tempest, first addressed critically by Robert Egan, 1972), roughness being, on the one hand, a reference to the impurity of the art employed, and, on the other, a nod to the transgression(s) implied by magic practices. Keywords: gender, performance, magic, thirdspace, transgression, transmission

Magical Discursive Practices in Russian Public Discourse

The article examines the discursive practices of modern Russian public discourse, which includes political communication as a necessary part. The author considers first of all those discursive practices and the corresponding speech acts that are magical in nature. Such types of speech acts are proposed to be called “the acts of magical embodiment”. The pronunciation of the act of magical embodiment leads to a change in the world, resulting from the release of mystic forces associated with both the speaker’s supernatural abilities and the participation of mysterious forces. Among the acts of magical embodiment, there are vows, curses, tabooing and overcoming the taboos (use of euphemisms and concealment), prohibitions, benevolence, spells, and others. The use of magical practices in public discourse has a long tradition in political communication, especially in the creation of slogans. In modern public communication, many speech practices of magical nature have a legal basis. Current practice suggests that every mention of a prohibited political actor is accompanied by an indication of the prohibition. The curse as an act of magical embodiment sometimes adjoins the practice of imposing restrictions on “foreign agents”. Concealment (tabooing and overcoming the taboos) is enforced by the law on the “right to be forgotten”.

On the issue of code switching in the speech of multilinguals on the Lithuanian-Belarusian borderland (based on field materials)

The article deals with cases of switching codes in the speech of the inhabitants of Lithuania, as well as the border Lithuanian-Belarusian territories, who speak Polish, Lithuanian and Belarusian (Russian) languages. The analyzed texts were written down by Rita Balkute during ethnographic expeditions, which were not aimed at revealing the actual linguistic features of the speech of the informants. Analysis of the material shows that ethnolinguistic factors play an important role in code switching; for example, informants often switch to Polish when describing magical practices or when quoting spells. The article discusses the reasons for such transitions, as well as cases of mixing codes when hybrid texts are formed in Polish and Belarusian.

Pop spiritualnost

Magical practices have undergone significant changes in the past decades, shifting towards accessibility and individuality. With the rise in popularity of individual, custom-designed magical rituals, popular culture has proven to be one of the important aspects associated with the new practice. Influential, reaching a wide audience, with a strong focus on immersive visual aspects, it is of no surprise that practitioners have started to include popcultural elements into their rituals. New schools of magic, such as the influential Chaos Magick, have proven to be a fertile ground for these innovative practices. This paper will focus on the mutual interaction between occult knowledge represented through visual means in popular culture and the magical practice of modern mages.

Limits of doctrinal identification of a religious group – the сase of two religious communities in the Kama region

The article aims at the identification of new religious groups with a specific focus on local religious communities. Various sources were utilized in the research, including audio recordings of seminars held within one of the groups, interviews, participant observations, photographs, personal correspondence with former members, and sacred literature. The primary objective of the study was to determine the group’s place within the established classification of religions. The analysis revealed that relying solely on self-identity and cult practices is inadequate for establishing the religious identity of the community. To address this, the author opted to analyze the doctrines of the groups as the basis for identification. The most stable and frequently mentioned categories were selected for consideration. The findings indicated that while the groups claimed affiliation with the Christian tradition, this association was formal and limited to traditional imagery and narratives. Both teachings examined contained a significant number of elements borrowed from other religions, particularly in terminological aspects. Additionally, they extensively employed mythological principles to describe the world and acknowledged the use of magical practices. The incorporation of non-religious techniques and forms of activity, along with secular terminology and popular scientific data, led the author to conclude that these groups cannot be defined as religious solely. Instead, they occupy a liminal position in the social space and represent a new model of people’s consolidation.

Between Curse and Cross.

Abstract By expanding the source base to include the so-called curse tablets, this study attempts to illuminate some aspects from a difficult Pauline paragraph. In Gal 3:10–14, Paul makes a very close connection between law and curse using Old Testament quotations. Some explanations on the employment of curses in legal contexts are used here to clarify on the background of popular magical practice certain features of the Pauline understanding of the law as well as the role of Christ as a counter-curse. An important prerequisite for this methodological approach is the common cultural repertory shared by the author and his readers.

Potential of Bioresource Usage in The Tropical Area of Southeast Asia for Human Mental Well-Being

Human health and well-being depend on lifestyle, and current unhealthy lifestyles cause many health problems, including mental health problems. Therefore, people are searching for natural remedies to overcome such well-being problems. Medicinal plants have been used as a primary source of health care and treatments for many diseases. However, the recent search for valuable plants concentrates on human physical well-being. This attention needs to shift to mental well-being as the current limited and poor diet and modern lifestyle adversely affect people's mental health. Southeast Asia consists of tropical countries with abundant bioresources for potential medicinal plants and various food crops. Many underutilized plants have vast marginalized medicinal potentials and have yet to be fully exploited. The traditional knowledge of the application of medicinal plants for mental well-being and in superstitions and healing rituals in Southeast Asia is described in this paper. Scientific exploration of many traditional healing and magic practices in Southeast Asia will benefit in understanding the application of medicinal plants. The incorporation of advanced technologies in detecting beneficial plant compounds from such traditional practices in Southeast Asia will aid humans in finding remedies for modern health problems. This review focuses on the usage of potential plants available in Southeast Asia for human mental well-being and the application of herbals in superstitions and healing rituals.

The Dead in Vernacular Magic Practices among Bosniaks

Based on fieldwork research among the Bosniak (Muslim) population in rural areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina, this article starts with the technique of summoning the dead, aimed at obtaining information about missing goods. It argues that the practice of summoning the dead, like practices aimed at magically harming others, is based on the same moral rules that govern everyday relations between the living and the dead. While these rules are generally followed and observed in everyday life, they can also be deliberately inverted to one’s own advantage or to the disadvantage of others. Ultimately, I argue that the dead prove to be moral agents who act when moral norms are violated.

Fever, sun, and blood: sermons, amulets, and incantations as sources for magical practices in Medieval Europe

ABSTRACT This paper presents a novel method to access lived religion and magical practices of a Medieval congregation via sermons combined with material culture. Previously, scholars have dismissed sermons as having low ‘truth value’ due to the copying inherent in the genre. In this paper, I first examine how one Danish sermon was adapted from a German model to fit a local context. This adaptation reveals specific local practices that the preacher thought were relevant to his congregation. Secondly, I demonstrate how several practices described in the sermons are mirrored in surviving non-normative material evidence such as amulets and incantations in manuscripts. This interdisciplinary combination of sermon studies, magic studies, archaeology, and medieval studies yields an as-yet-untapped source group. The paper concludes that 1) sermons can indeed be used as sources for magical practices and lived religion, and 2) they can be used as sources for practices that did not leave material evidence. Finally, discussions of the importance of material evidence in sermon studies and how magical practices were both locally anchored and part of an international network are broached.

Whose Soul Is It?—Destinative Magic in East-Central Europe (14th–18th Centuries)

This study explores destinative elements in late medieval and early modern learned magic in East-Central Europe, focusing on names, images, characters, invocations, and addresses facilitating communication with transcendental entities. It contends that a thematic shift occurred in the early modern era, witnessing a decline in destinative talisman texts, replaced by a surge in treasure-hunting manuals. Drawing from legal cases and treasure-hunting manuals, the research aims to categorize the “souls” frequently invoked in these practices. The term “souls” is interpreted as either spirits or the souls of the deceased, reflecting the significant role of the dead in treasure hunting, often conducted in cemeteries. This shift is linked to changes in the sociocultural background of practitioners, marking a transformation in magical practices from destinative talismans to treasure hunting, revealing a nuanced evolution in East-Central European magical traditions.

“Yer a Wizard”: How Fantasy Fiction Facilitates Playing with Emotions and Reinforces Magical Thinking

In this paper, the author argues that fantasy literature serves as a cognitive playground that helps us practise and reaffirm our magical-thinking intuitions. He demonstrates how, just as in magical practices, magic in fantasy fiction becomes a tool for overcoming difficulties and restoring a sense of balance, security, and control. He contends that supernatural agents can be seen as emotional correlatives, giving faces and voices to emotional states and describing a phenomenon from the perspective of how it feels, rather than from a rational viewpoint. This opens up a possibility to articulate those aspects of our emotional lives that are difficult to express in terms of mimetic representation. He posits that, through distancing, fantasy fiction creates a safe environment for engaging with such emotional states, in which magic restores our intuition that no matter how dark our situation appears, we have an inner capacity to overcome it. The main example that is used in the paper is J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series.

TINDAK PIDANA PERDUKUNAN TINJAUAN PASAL 545, 546, 547 KUHP DENGAN PASAL 252 KUHP 2023

In Indonesia, the practice of black magic is not new. Although the practice is opposed to religion because it associates partners with God, it is still carried out by people who want to achieve their goals practically or harm someone. In the legal regulations in the Criminal Code, the practice of witchcraft is regulated in Articles 545, 546 and 547. In reality, this article is rarely used as a legal basis for the arrest or sentencing of black magic practitioners. The article on black magic has been discussed for a long time in the draft Bill of the Penal Code, there are many pros and cons about this article on shamanism which is called the’pasal santet’. In 2023 the new Penal Code was passed and the article on witchcraft was regulated in Article 252. with the legal research method, this research focuses on examining the normative law that applies in Indonesia with descriptive analysis until this research concludes that the act of shamanism is a disturbing thing, articles 545, 546, and 547 are considered inappropriate in dealing with this, so that article 252 is needed as legal certainty.

Infirmities and invisible ink: enslaved Muslims and magic in Malta, c.1598–c.1608

This article examines accusations of magic made against enslaved Muslims in Malta over the period 1598–1608. In this period numerous enslaved Muslims were accused of magic before the Roman Inquisition, and the surviving records describe these accusations and magical practices in detail. This article explores the types of magic Muslims were accused of, and why they seem to have been attractive to Christians as magical practitioners. It employs a statistical analysis to outline patterns of accusation, and uses the detail from individual cases to discuss these patterns. The authors argue that accusations against enslaved Muslims had several distinctive features. Muslims were believed to be particularly good at curing illnesses caused by sorcery, which was linked to wider early modern stereotypes about Islam. They were also more likely to use books and writing in the Arabic language. Finally, their practice of love magic for Christian women crossed gender boundaries in a way that male Christian practitioners did not, although this particular aspect should be seen in the context of a wide variety of types of magic practised for both men and women. However, despite these differences, their services were not seen as completely distinct from those of Christian practitioners. Magic was thus an area where people of different faiths interacted, especially in certain circumstances. This picture corresponds to some degree to patterns identified in recent studies of enslaved and non-Christian healers who came before the Inquisition in Latin America and Africa, and the article thus offers suggestions for comparison with these studies.

Любовь, богатство, власть и греховность в «текстах желаний»: особенности бурятских заговоров

This article delves into the examination of “wish texts,” specifically Buryat conspiracies centered around the topics of love, wealth, and power. One of the earliest forms of oral poetry, conspiracies hold great significance within the traditional ritual folklore of the Buryats and were widely utilized in their magical practices. There are special Buryat conspiracies aiming to possess magical abilities, achieve material advantage, or possess a beloved person. These conspiracies are of particular interest since they reflect the ideas of the Buryats about sin, the traditional values of Buryat society. The sinful nature of conspiracies was not so much determined by their goals but rather by the methods employed to achieve them. The depiction of sinfulness is particularly evident in the text of the love plot origins, which explicitly portrays the fundamental spiritual values of the Buryats that the petitioner is willing to forsake in pursuit of their desires. The analysis indicates the existence of a unique category of social conspiracies within the Buryat, Yakut, and Tuvinian texts, primarily involving male individuals as perpetrators. The majority of these individuals were considered outsiders, who, for unclear reasons, were willing to defy societal norms and regulations, including both the impoverished and solitary individuals, as well as the wealthy and those who had fallen out of favor with authorities.

«НАПРЯЖЕННОЕ» ЗВУЧАНИЕ В ОБРЯДНОСТИ И МАГИИ (НА МАТЕРИАЛЕ КУЛЬТУРНО-ЯЗЫКОВОЙ ТРАДИЦИИ КОСТРОМСКОЙ ОБЛАСТИ)

This article is devoted to studying Russian folk rituals, magic practices and beliefs, in which the sound component (namely “tense” sounds, too loud or, vice versa, too low voice, special intonation or tempo, etc.) plays a significant role; it also identifies vocabulary “serving” for these situations, features of communication acts and “tense” sound functions. Cultural and linguistic traditions of Kostroma region was selected for the research. Field records made in 1975–2003 by the Toponymical expedition of the Ural University were taken as the material for analysis; some other written sources containing local dialects were also involved. The analysis conducted allows concluding that “tense” ritual or magical speech is described mainly using words from the following families of the verbs klikat’ (to shriek), krichat’ (to scream), vopit’ (to yell), revet’ (to cry), vyt’ (to howl), sheptat’ (to whisper). After getting into the ritual field, words with initial “household” semantics obtain special features, which is reflected in their lexical meaning and syntax properties. “Tense” sounds are typical for some family rituals (funeral and prayer for the dead, bachelorette party the day before the wedding, after-wedding viyunishnik (ritual of celebration of a newly wedded couple)) and rituals associated with some calendar dates, such as Egoriev den’ (George’s Day in Spring), Velikiy Chetverg (Holy Thursday), Krestopoklonnaya nedelya (the Adoration of the Holy Cross); it can also be used during verbal magic and sorcery. The identified functions of this sound production method are as follows: emotive, social, apotropeitive, producing, malicious and healing.

ВРЕДОНОСНЫЕ МАГИЧЕСКИЕ ПРАКТИКИ В СОВРЕМЕННОЙ АРМЯНСКОЙ СЕМЬЕ

This article is devoted to the question of place which harmful magical practices occupy in the everyday life of modern Armenia, in particular, in the modern Armenian family. The main source of the research is field work, which was carried out in 2019 in Armenia (Yerevan, Gyumri). Interviews were conducted with informants who had encountered harmful magic or who themselves turned to sorcerers and fortune-tellers. Magical practices common in modern Armenia include fortune telling, healing, and harmful practices. The latter are often a tool for a solution to family conflicts; in interviews about witchcraft, women accused other women – their relatives – of wanting to harm their family. This may be due to the structure of the Armenian family, which remains extended and in which women become competitors with each other, vying for power in the family

Christian criticism of pagan religious and magical practices in Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville – an outline

Christian criticism of pagan religious and magical practices in Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville – an outline

Exploring Gender, Sexuality and Cultural Understanding of Witchcraft in Nora Roberts “Dark Witch”, Melissa de la Cruz “Witches of East End” and Anne Rice “The Witching Hour”

This study explores the complex ways that three well-known novels—Anne Rice's "The Witching Hour," Melissa de la Cruz's "Witches of East End," and Nora Roberts' "Dark Witch"—present gender, sexuality, and cultural viewpoints on witchcraft. Every book is a different fusion of romance, fantasy, and fiction that incorporates witchcraft into a variety of cultural settings. The examination looks at how the writers deal with gender norms in the setting of witchcraft, with a focus on how they represent female protagonists and their autonomy in magical worlds. The study also examines how sexuality is portrayed, looking into how romantic and sexual interactions are portrayed in the context of witchcraft and whether these depictions upend or support conventional standards. A key component of every story is cultural awareness, with an emphasis on the ways in which the writers integrate mythology, folklore, and cultural customs pertaining to witchcraft. The impact of cultural circumstances on the identities and magical practices of the characters, as well as the cultural authenticity and sensitivity with which these elements are portrayed, are all closely examined in this study. This study attempts to provide light on the various ways that modern literature examines and explains gender relations, sexuality, and cultural understanding within the context of witchcraft by contrasting and analyzing these three books. The findings clarify the intricate interactions between fantasy components and actual cultural, gender, and sexual dynamics, adding to the larger conversation on representation and diversity in fiction.

Farewells to the War and Military Magic in the Folklore of the Cossack Period: Relationship with the Funeral Rite

The articleis aimed at the studying the military magic of Zaporizhzhya, Register and Black Sea Cossacks, as well as the rituals associated with their farewell to a land and sea campaigns. Main research methods include descriptive, comparative and comparative-historical ones. The source base is formed with folklore texts of the 16th–18th centuries, in particular, Ukrainian folk dumas, songs, prayers and incantations, as well as ethnographic descriptions of rituals and magical practices related to war. The authoress uses both previously published materials and her own recordings made during the last decade. The theoretical basis for the article consists of the works of predecessors, Ukrainian scientists of the 19th–20th centuries Mykola Kostomarov, Mykola Sementovskyi, Vasyl Myloradovych, Dmytro Yavornytskyi, Kateryna Hrushevska, Prokop Korolenko, and others, who have published a number of primary sources and attempted to analyze them. The scientific novelty of the work concerns the fact that it is the first comprehensive folkloristic study where a comparative analysis of collective and individual magical practices of the Cossack period is carried out. They are supposed to ensure the victory of the Cossack army over the enemy and save the life of every Cossack. All available materials indicate that the ritual of the farewell to war in Cossack times belongs to the rites of passage and is most closely related typologically to the funeral ritual, namely to the symbolic funeral. It duplicates such key elements of the funeral as preparation for death (preparation of new clothes, confession and communion of the Holy Mysteries), a ritualized form of farewell to relatives and the whole community, the use of occasional folklore forms (wishes, blessings, formulas of reconciliation with neighbours), ritual bringing the Cossacks out of «their» cultural space (house, yard, village), mourning a Cossack who goes on a campaign, a joint meal. The same places of farewell also appear: a threshold, a gate, the border of a settlement. Thus, sending off to war can be considered one of the forms of a symbolic funeral.