Final Examination

Discuss whether the procedures in the three following texts are magical. Under what definitions might each be considered magic? What particular features of each of these procedures might qualify or disqualify these as magic? Discuss with reference to the definitions of magic in the modern scholarly and ancient sources we have read in this semester.

The purpose of the assignment is for you to demonstrate your familiarity with and understanding of the primary texts and secondary interpretations we have studied, particularly the varieties of ways in which magic is defined. While you should discuss the specific features of these spells in terms of the broader context of magical practices in the ancient Mediterranean world, please avoid vague and sweeping generalizations. Please assume that your reader has a good general background in the subject of ancient magic but is perhaps excessively skeptical of any claims you might make about these particular spells. Specific evidence and careful argumentation are the best ways to convince your audience.

Your commentary should be 5-7 pages of printed text, given a double-spaced document with reasonable font and margins (e.g., this document is Palatino 12 pt. with 1" margins). Please proofread your papers carefully to ensure that they are free from annoying typographical, spelling, and grammatical errors. You should cite the parallels according to the bibliographic form, abbreviations and conventions used in Gager. Ancient primary texts should be cited by the number in the collection and line number or book, chapter, and section numbers (e.g. PGM XVI. 1-15 or Iamblichus, De Mysteriis, VII.3), whereas modern secondary material should be cited by page number (e.g., Graf, Magic in the Ancient World, pp. 13-22 or Smith, J.Z., "Trading Places," p. 16).

The final exam is due in my office no later than 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, May 15, although seniors will have to turn theirs in by the May 12 deadline for senior work. Any late assignments will be penalized by one grade for each 24 hour period they are late (including weekends). Extensions are negotiable only if you discuss the situation with me no less than 24 hours in advance.

1. On these conditions a sworn agreement was made by those who stayed there and by those who sailed to found the colony [of Cyrene], and they invoked curses against those transgressors who would not abide by it - whether those settling in Libya or those who remained. They made waxen images and burnt them, calling down the following curse, everyone assembled together, men, women, boys, girls: "The person who does not abide by this sworn agreement but transgresses it shall melt away and dissolve like these images - himself, his descendants and his property; but those who abide by the sworn agreement - those sailing to Libya and those staying in Thera - shall have an abundance of good things, both themselves and their descendants." (Marble Stele from Cyrene, dating from 4^th century BCE)

2. Request for a dream oracle: Write on a strip of tinfoil, and after crowning the strip of foil with myrtle, set up the censer. Then make a burnt offering of frankincense and carry the leaf of metal around the vapor while saying: "Lords, gods, reveal to me concerning the NN matter tonight, in the coming hours. Emphatically I beg, I supplicate, I your servant and enthroned by you." Then place the piece of foil under your pillow, and, without giving answer to anyone, go to sleep after having kept yourself pure for 3 days.

Formula to be written: "MOU AMOU AU IAO ABARBARASA AIO BAOA CHPHENOURIS AOB AMO ADONAI OIG IIII OTHTHOUO AORCHA ARORCHA CHAXYNNERE MADAA OOO OOO OOA." Write it with a copper stylus.

3. The sulfurous [theiodês] is mastered by the sulfurous – Nature delights and conquers and dominates nature. Just as a human is composed of elements, so also is copper; and just as a human is composed of liquids and solids and pneuma, so also is copper. (Pneuma is a cloud, as Apollo says in his oracles: "and pneuma darker, wet, unmixed.") … Copper is cooked with sulfur, reheated with natron-oil, and cleaned off; and repeating these steps many times it becomes fine shadowless gold. And god says this: "Let everyone know by experience that heating the copper with sulfur does nothing; but if you heat the sulfur alone it not only makes copper shadowless, but also turns it toward gold." God granted me this, to know that copper is first heated with sulfur, then the metal of Magnesia [one of various lead alloys] is; and the vapor streams forth until the sulfurous escapes with the shadow, and it becomes shadowless gold.

(please check your references!)