Writing sometime in the eighth century BCE, Homer describes Achilleus' vow not to eat or
drink until he kills Hektor (Iliad 19.205-10). 1 In the first century CE, according to the Acts of�…

This fragmentary leaf from a papyrus codex preserves, in part or in full, six separate recipes
for magical spells, separated from one another with horizontal lines that run the full width of�…

Among the extant Coptic texts of ritual power are several texts from the British Library
(London Oriental Manuscript 6794; 6795; 6796 [several leaves]) that were parts of a portfolio�…

INTRODUCTION y subject is a medieval handbook of ceremonial magic, titled Liber sacer
sive juratus, that is, the Sacred or Sworn Book.(For brevity we shall call it the Sworn Book.)�…

The rites, practices, and texts collected by the mysterious UR group for the use of aspiring
mages.• Rare Hermetic texts published in English for the first time.• Includes instructions for�…

This volume contains a series of provocative essays that explore expressions of magic and
ritual power in the ancient world. The essays are authored by leading scholars in the fields�…

The text to be treated here belongs to the still very rare category of Old Akkadian
incantations. It was published for the first time by IJ Gelb in 1970 as MAD V no. 8 1. Since its�…

VERY serious biblical scholar today is well aware of the prominent r61e which fertility and
sex enjoyed in the religions of the ancient Near East. I One of the principal tasks which the�…

There is probably more rubbish believed and written about Magical Rituals than any other
subject. From the wildest guesswork and the most fertile imaginations, magical rituals and�…

Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of sexual love, is a figure of unmis-takable potency. She
inspires that inescapable desire in humans which recognizes the boundaries neither of�…