Fetal Spells and Satanism
Phil Harland, Assistant Professor in the Religion Department of Concordia University, Montreal maintains an excellent blog called “Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean”. While his emphasis is Christian and Jewish social groupings in the ancient Greco-Roman world, he often finds time to write on subject matters that would be of interest to modern Pagans as well.
First he has an excellent series of posts entitled “History of Satan”, the most recent of which looks at the Satanic panic of the 70s and 80s.
“The fact that this was indeed a conspiracy theory arising out of certain peoples’ worldviews and not reality is now widely recognized. What is particularly interesting is the manner in which stereotypes of the dangerous “other” which have a very long history – including the trio of human sacrifice, cannibalism, and sexual perversion – play a key role in this incident as well. Back in Roman times, for instance, the early Christians were accused by outsiders of engaging in precisely these three activities, as were other marginalized or foreign groups in antiquity. Similar dynamics of marginalization and demonization were also at work in the late medieval and early modern witch hunts.”
Secondly he brought my attention to a journal article on the use of “fetus magic” in Roman Egypt. Apparently an aborted or miscarried fetus was an “unclean” object that could be effectively used in a binding spell.
“Horion’s not-so-friendly neighbours – the family of Julius – had on more than one occasion robbed Horion’s family of their harvest and had ensured that their thieving action would not be stopped by using magic. Not once, but twice, the neighbours had thrown an aborted or miscarried fetus (brephos) in order to “surround [the Horion family] with malice” and create a binding spell that would ensure that noone would stop them – apparently with success to the point of Horion’s petition for Roman action.”
Proving once more that the ancient world was stranger and more complex than we could have ever suspected. Definitely a blog to keep an eye on.
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