Description
Book SynopsisFrom binding spells and incantations to curse-writing rituals, magic pervaded the ancient Greek world. In Blood and Ashes provides the first historical study of the development and dissemination of ritualized curse practice from 750-250 BCE, documenting the cultural pressures that drove the use of curse tablets, charms, spells, and other private rites. This book expands our understanding of daily life in ancient communities, showing how individuals were making sense of the world and coping with conflict, vulnerability, competition, anxiety, desire, and loss, all while conjuring the gods and powers of the Underworld. Bringing together epigraphic, literary, archaeological, and material evidence, Jessica L. Lamont reads between traditional histories of Archaic, Classical, and early Hellenistic Greece, drawing out new voices and new narratives to consider: here are the cooks, tavern keepers, garland weavers, helmsmen, barbers, and other persons who often slip through the cracks of ancient
Trade ReviewLamont is an extremely smart and original scholar, who marshals a considerable array of historical, epigraphical, and archaeological sources, and who is not afraid to wrestle with big questions or take on established dogmas in the field of ancient magic. Her eagerly anticipated In Blood and Ashes provides, for the first time, a continuous history of curse-tablets from archaic to late Hellenistic times, beginning in Sicily and Italy then moving eastward to Attica, the Aegean, and beyond-contrary to modern expectations that such ritual technologies generally moved from East to West. * Christopher A. Faraone, University of Chicago *
This engaging and wide ranging book represents the first historical study of curse practices in the ancient Greek world. Lamont thoroughly examines and contextualizes individual curse tablets, provides new insight into their origins, early dissemination, and diverse local characteristics, and demonstrates the importance of these texts for our understanding of Greek religion, literacy and orality, legal institutions, and social history. This impressive and innovative book will be of interest to scholars of classical literature, history, archaeology, and religious studies. * Ivana Petrovic, University of Virginia *
Table of ContentsPreface List of Figures and Credits List of Maps Abbreviations and Conventions Epigraphic Conventions Introduction PART I: The Beginnings of Greek Curse-Writing Rituals 1. Chapter One: Sicilian Beginnings 2. Chapter Two: Why Western Sicily? PART II: The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500-250 BCE 3. Chapter Three: The Spread and Diversification of Curse Practice: Three Case Studies 4. Chapter Four: Athenian Curse Practice PART III: Orality and Text: Curse Practice in the Realm of Binding Spells and Arai 5. Chapter Five: In Blood and Ashes: Curse Tablets and Binding Spells 6. Chapter Six: Public Imprecations and Private Curse-Writing Conclusion Bibliography
