Preface

To the Egyptians, a world without magic was inconceivable. It was through magic that the
world had been created, magic sustained the world daily, magic healed when one was sick,
gave when one had nothing, and assured one of eternal life after death.

Egyptians of every social class from the king to the peasant believed in and relied upon magic
in their daily lives. Evidence for this practice comes from the number of amulets and charms
found through excavations, inscriptions on obelisks, monuments, palaces, and temples,
personal and official correspondence, and inscriptions.

Angry deities, jealous ghosts, and foreign demons and sorcerers could cause misfortunes such
as illness, accidents, poverty and infertility. Magic provided a defence system against these
ills for individuals throughout their lives.

Only a small percentage of Egyptians were fully literate, so written magic was the most
prestigious kind of all. Private collections of spells were treasured possessions, handed down
within families. Protective or healing spells written on papyrus were sometimes folded up and
worn on the body.

A spell usually consisted of two parts: the words to be spoken and a description of the actions
to be taken. To be effective all the words, especially the secret names of deities, had to be
pronounced correctly. The words might be spoken to activate the power of an amulet, a
figurine, or a potion. These potions might contain bizarre ingredients such as the blood of a
black dog, or the milk of a woman who had born a male child. Music and dance, and gestures
such as pointing and stamping, could also form part of a spell.

Priests

Priests were the main practitioners of magic in pharaonic Egypt, where they were seen as
guardians of a secret knowledge given by the gods to humanity to 'ward off the blows of fate'.
The most respected users of magic were the lector priests, who could read the ancient books
of magic kept in temple and palace libraries. In popular stories such men were credited with
the power to bring wax animals to life, or roll back the waters of a lake.
The priests’ function was to honour and care for their particular deity and ensure a reciprocity
between that god and the people. Magic in religious practice took the form of establishing
what was already known about the gods and how the world worked.

The priest was the intermediary between the gods and the people but, in daily life, individuals
could commune with the gods through their own private practices.

Healing

Disease was a disruption of the natural order and so, unlike the role of the temple priest who
maintained the people's belief in the gods through standard rituals, the physician was dealing
with powerful and unpredictable forces which had to be summoned and controlled expertly.

Among these were the seers, wise women who could see the future and were also
instrumental in healing. Seers could help women conceive, interpret dreams, and prescribed
herbal remedies for diseases. Although the majority of Egyptians were illiterate, it seems
some people - like the seers - could memorize spells read to them for later use.

Curses

Though magic was mainly used to protect or heal, the Egyptian state also practised
destructive magic.

In major temples, priests and priestesses performed a ceremony to curse enemies of the
divine order, such as the chaos serpent Apophis - who was eternally at war with the creator
sun god. Images of Apophis were drawn on papyrus or modelled in wax, and these images
were spat on, trampled, stabbed and burned. Anything that remained was dissolved in buckets
of urine. The fiercest gods and goddesses of the Egyptian pantheon were summoned to fight
with, and destroy, every part of Apophis. Human enemies of the kings of Egypt could also be
cursed during this ceremony.

One's name was considered one's identity but Egyptians believed that everyone also had a
secret name which only the individual and the gods knew. To discover one's secret name was
to gain power over them. The names of foreign enemies and Egyptian traitors were inscribed
on clay pots, tablets, or figurines of bound prisoners. These objects were then burned, broken,
or buried in cemeteries in the belief that this would weaken or destroy the enemy.

Death

Just as magic was involved in one's birth and life, so was it present at one's departure to the
next world. The dead person's soul, usually shown as a bird with a human head and arms,
made a dangerous journey through the underworld. The soul had to overcome the demons it
would encounter by using magic words and gestures. The Egyptian Book of the
Dead exemplifies the belief in magic at work in the afterlife. The text contains 190 spells to
help the soul navigate the afterlife to reach the paradise of The Field of Reeds, an eternal
paradise which perfectly reflected one's life on earth but without disappointment, disease or
the fear of death and loss. There were even spells to help the deceased when their past life
was being assessed by the Forty-Two Judges of the Underworld. Once a dead person was
declared innocent they became an akh, a 'transfigured' spirit. This gave them akhw power, a
superior kind of magic, which could be used on behalf of their living relatives.

Mummification was practiced in order to preserve the body, so that it could be recognized by
the soul in the afterlife. The last act of the priests at a funeral was the Opening of the Mouth
Ceremony, during which they would touch the mummified corpse with different objects at
various places on the body in order to restore the use of ears, eyes, mouth, and nose. Through
this magical ritual the departed would be able to see and hear, smell and taste, and speak in
the afterlife.

Amulets were wrapped with the mummy for protection and grave goods were included in the
tomb to help the departed soul in the next world. Many grave goods were practical items or
favourite objects they had enjoyed in life but many others were magical charms or objects
which could be called upon for assistance.

Amulets
The word ‘amulet’ has its roots in the Arabic language and it means ‘to bear’ or ‘to carry’,
however, the common word for ‘amulet’ in the dynastic period was mk-t, which means
‘protector’.

Amulets were an important part of ancient Egyptian material culture for millennia. They
invoked the powers of gods, goddesses, and other magical forces. An amulet is a small object
that could be worn, carried, used in necklaces, bracelets, or rings, or offered to a deity
because a person believied that it will magically bestow a particular power or form of
protection. Amulets might be placed among a mummy’s bandages to ensure the deceased a
safe, healthy, and productive afterlife. Because they were desired by people from all social
classes, the materials used to make amulets were quite varied, ranging from costly precious
stones and metals to the much more common and accessible crushed stone or sand.

Symbols and deities generally conferred the powers they represent. Small models that
represent known objects, such as headrests or arms and legs, served to make sure those items
were available to the individual or that a specific need could be addressed. Magic contained
in an amulet could be understood not only from its shape. Material, colour, scarcity, the
grouping of several forms, and words said or ingredients rubbed over the amulet could all be
the source for magic granting the possessor’s wish.

The value of an ancient Egyptian amulet went beyond just the symbolism of what it depicted
— its power would have been “activated” by magical practice. Indeed, many spells recorded
on papyrus include instructions to be spoken over amulets in various forms. Once
“activated,” an amulet would be worn to ensure that its owner continued to benefit from the
magic that it now embodied. Professional magicians with the title of “amulet man” were
responsible for deciding which amulets an individual might require, and presumably for
performing their activation. “Amulet men” are often mentioned in close connection with
physicians, as there was little to no distinction in ancient Egypt between magic and science as
we understand them today. What we might consider to be medical concerns — the promotion
of fertility, for instance, or the prevention of illness or accidents — were addressed by spells
spoken over amulets that could then be worn by the “patient.” Such recitations often referred
to mythology, associating the person for whom the amulet was intended with gods who had
power over hostile forces or who were said to have been healed of injury.
In the ancient times priests recited prayers and verses to strengthen the amulets with super
natural powers.

Egyptians also used papyrus sheets to record and write down spells, or supernatural words of
power. Which is probably much older than inscribing them over the amulets.

The scarab

A scarab is a unique insect that influenced the entire Egyptian civilisation for many thousands
of years. It was one of the most popular ancient Egyptian amulets.

Scarabs were used as pieces of jewellery, commemorative items and seals, and magical
amulets offering protection and good fortune. The scarab was also associated with
mummification because the pupae of a scarab beetle resembles a mummy. The Egyptians also
saw that the beetle would dig a shaft into the earth to bury their eggs, and the baby scarabs
would later emerge from the earth. They associated this with the shaft leading into the burial
chamber from which the reborn spirit would emerge.

Early Egyptians also believed that scarabs represented and symbolised the germs of life,
while the ball of scarab eggs signified the appearance of the sun itself. God Khephra made
the Sun to roll across the sky and this act of rolling was synonymous with the rolling actions
of the scarab. Thus, the name kheper means ‘the one who rolls over and over again’. To the
ancient Egyptians god Khepri, Ra as the rising sun, was often depicted as a scarab beetle or
as a scarab beetle-headed man. The ancient Egyptians believed that Khepri renewed the sun
every day before rolling it above the horizon, then carried it through the other world after
sunset, only to renew it, again, the next day.

On the other hand, Egyptians believed that dead human body contained germs of life, which
they invoked by reciting special prayers on the day of the funeral. In this aspect, the ball of
eggs and the idea of dead body are almost identical. As the scarab provided potential life and
energy to the eggs, Egyptians believed it was the symbol of the god Khephra, who also
provided life to the deceased body with words of power.
Eye of Horus

Eye of Horus was a powerful symbol of protection in ancient Egypt also known as the "all
seeing eye". The symbol was frequently used in jewellery made of gold, silver, lapis, wood,
porcelain, and carnelian, to ensure the safety and health of the bearer and provide wisdom
and prosperity.

The Eye of Horus was believed to have healing and protective power, and it was used as a
protective amulet. It was also used as a notation of measurement, particularly for measuring
the ingredients in medicines and pigments. The symbol was divided into six parts,
representing the shattering of Horus' eye into six pieces. Each piece was associated with one
of the six senses and a specific fraction.

According to Egyptian myth, Horus lost his left eye in a struggle with Seth. The eye was
magically restored by Hathor, and this restoration came to symbolize the process of making
whole and healing. For this reason, the symbol was often used in amulets.

Ankh

Ankh is one of the most recognizable symbols from ancient Egypt, known as "the key of life"
or the "cross of life", and dating from the Early Dynastic Period. It is a cross with a loop at
the top sometimes ornamented with symbols or decorative flourishes but most often simply a
plain gold cross. The symbol is an Egyptian hieroglyph for "life" or "breath of life" (`nh =
ankh) and, as the Egyptians believed that one's earthly journey was only part of an eternal
life, the ankh symbolizes both mortal existence and the afterlife.

The ankh came into popular usage in Egypt during the Early Dynastic Period with the rise of
the cults of Isis and Osiris.

By the time of the Old Kingdom the ankh was well-established as a powerful symbol of
eternal life.

The loop over the tau-cross could stand for the Sun, for Heaven and Earth as the macrocosm
and for man as the microcosm. It is generally interpreted as a symbol which expresses the
reconciliation of opposites of the integration of active and passive qualities. The loop itself is
the perfect symbol of what has neither beginning nor end and stands for the soul which is
eternal because it has sprung from the spiritual essence of the gods.

Amulets by Michael Howes (Robert Hale & Company, 1975)

Amulets of Ancient Egypt by Carol Andrews (British Museum Press, 1994)

Egyptian Magic by E.A. Wallis Budge (Wings Books, 1991)

Egyptian Symbols by Heike Owusu (Sterling, 2000)

Magic in Ancient Egypt by Geraldine Pinch (British Museum Press/University of Texas

Press, 1994)

Witchcraft, Magic and Divination in Ancient Egypt by JF Borghouts in Civilizations of the

Ancient Near East edited by JM Sasson (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1995)