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| King Tut's burial mask |
Harry Potter can do magic, why not you? If you were living in Ancient Egypt you were believed to be able to do magic, especially if you were a priest. Magic was a very real force to Ancient Egyptians. Today magic is by and large dismissed as a farce and sometimes even sacrilegious, but to the Ancient Egyptians it was a part of everyday life and was very important. Religion and magic were intertwined to the Egyptians. Magic permeated the very culture of Ancient Egypt and was used in many areas of life such as healing, preserving the dead, protection, dream interpretation, religious ceremonies and even controlling/influencing the gods.
I would like to examine how and why this magical notion came to be of so high regard in the Ancient Egyptian culture.
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| Ancient Egyptian magical wand |
Magic as defined by merriam-webster is "the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces". While there are many uses of magic to the Ancient Egyptians I will highlight a few of the more interesting ones to better get an idea of the culture revolving around magic in Ancient Egypt.
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| wand inscription detail of a dangerous protective being |
Magic was used in protection. A specific example of this is that magic wands may have been used to draw a protective circle around a woman giving birth to fight off evil spirits. The wands were engraved with dangerous beings used by the magicians to ward off the evil spirits.
Another interesting and important use of magic was in burial/the afterlife. Egyptian mummies were buried with protective amulets and papyrus with spells on them. Priests casts spells throughout the mummification process to ensure a safe passage. The Egyptians believed that the human soul needed to pass certain tests and trials that would try their knowledge of spells in order to guarantee safe passage through the underworld. Magic spells were also needed for Judgement Day.
While the Egyptians believed that all people and deities had the ability to use magic to varying degrees, priests were the main users of magic. In this aspect religion and magic were heavily intertwined because many religious ceremonies and rituals relied on the use of magic. Religious knowledge (and thus inherently magical knowledge) was passed down orally within the family before writing became popularly used. Since only a small minority of Ancient Egyptians were fully literate the most highly revered form of magic was written. Personal collections of spell books were of great value and were handed down within the family. The vast majority of magic practiced was passed on orally however partly due to the overall lack of rigid structure to Egyptian religion.
I believe this is a main reason for magic's heavy influence on the culture. Since magic itself is very mystical it is hard to formally teach it within a educational institution. This is why magical knowledge transmission thrives within a culture and orally. I suppose it is also easier to maintain the mystical, mysterious and supposed power of magic alive when only a small percentage of the population can fully read and write and actively "used" magic. There was probably not a lot of questioning done by the average citizen as to whether or not magic was real because of this atmosphere. I also think this is why magic does not thrive within our modern society. Especially in western culture eduction and access to information is prevalent as well as a habit of testing, proving, doubting and skepticism.
I think you make a good point about knowledge institutions controlling information about magic and limiting the most revered elements to those who could read and write. I think this created a division in the people. Obviously the literate class was educated through writing, maybe we can return to this later in the semester when we get to that unit. But the illiterate populace was primarily influenced by prevailing attitudes and most likely anecdotes and spell tips from friends and relatives. This type of education would fall under the classification of folk knowledge and probably evolved differently than the more institutionalized priestly version.
ReplyDeleteSadly what Alicia talked about is something that continues today. Some people, because of lack of education still have deep rooted mythical beliefs. We all actually do, to some extent or another. What happens is that we look at people who believe in something that we dont and they become an object of ridicule for their ignorance instead of just teaching them about it. It makes people afraid to learn more and ask questions for fear of looking dumb.
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting point about how the literate (most likely upper class) people were able to pass on this type of folk knowledge. I think today people probably turned to ignorance and mocking because they were afraid to subject themselves to humiliation and the fear of looking dumb as mike said.
ReplyDeleteAre magic and religion really separate for the Ancient Egyptians? From an anthropological perspective, they are pretty similar, but maybe I will comment on that later....
ReplyDeleteI like Alicia's comment, on the selectivity of knowledge and how and who it is shared with. This idea was kind of explored in the intro to our class book, and I thought it was interesting then how they commented on the varying degrees of selective-ness that exist in different knowledge institutions. In some ways, the teaching of magic had to have some sort of structure or institution or it would have been able to be restricted so much. I think folk knowledge is one of the less restrictive types of knowledge, but there are still boundaries to it. Things like location, social ties (or the lack there of), and different social values all effect how folk knowledge is shared.
I enjoyed this post, especially in light of the fact that I've kind of had Egypt on the brain since we watched the Nibley biopic. I also thought it was interesting that you talked about how for the ancient Egyptians, religion and magic were two strong elements of life that were very much tied together. That seems pretty natural to me. I mean, I believe that everyone who has died will someday come back to life, and that I can do something (pray) and find out things (revelation). That seems pretty magical.
ReplyDeleteI also have really enjoyed reading what everyone else had to say about the interaction of written knowledge and folk knowledge in this situation. Pretty cool. I liked what Alicia said about limiting certain elements of knowledge to those who could read and write and who had access to the written materials. I wonder if the reverse isn't also true: do you think that people ever limit knowledge to a select group by choosing not to write it down? I mean, other than when CEOs are colluding illegally or something.
I think so Lauren. Think about the Masons and alchemists and shamans. They know things that are important and other people would be interested in if it were more readily available. Some of the groups write nothing down and transmit it all orally and others tightly control who has access to the information they do record.
ReplyDeleteAlso having just completed a capstone paper I would say with definity that i fervently with that the information I needed had been recorded. Although that was simple sloppiness on the side of the researchers and not intent to occlude access to their information.
But there are researchers who publish in obscure journals so that other institutions can not patent the information because it is in the public realm but they also cannot easily make the same product because the description is in Finnish.