A Bit of Magical Archeology
By G. G. Laurens
So-called magical libraries are not rare nowadays, but the bibliography is mostly modern. In general books on Conjuring are text books, there is much sameness and assiduous reading as such becomes monotonous; with few exceptions they were written by men who assumed that past experience in the field has qualified them as pedagogues. Some do not even boast the past experience. The exceptions are refreshing especially when one encounters a work not written in this vein and even more so when the compilation originates from a legitimate historian.
The writer of this essay has spent some leisure hours delving through ancient tomes or through the reprints and translations of such, in search of the concepts of ancient days, endeavoring to penetrate the origin of superstitious customs as well as the secret practices originally resorted to in order to promote them; yea, seeking to comprehend the peculiar state that made possible the popular vagaries and delusions of each historical period; that insight which some medieval writers concealed mystically under the term "Magic," but which we today denominate "Psychology" and "Propaganda." In this maze of chaff real wheat can be gleaned and he has detected thus true historical references to ancient conjurors. As far as Conjuring is concerned it is sincerely to be desired that some competent delver undertake the task of collecting and collating, in one single opus, the historical data thus dispersed. Realizing that unfortunately he is not competent to that worthy mission, the writer cannot resist the fascination of pointing out from time to time some of the gems unearthed, and the present effort is destined to point out one such clue, the quaintest and most enlightening he has stumbled upon so far. Modern Magicians know that there have been ancients, and they refer to them in generalities; glibly they gloss about the ancient Egyptian, Hindoo, Roman, Jewish, Median, Greek, Persian and other sorcerers of antiquity, but those who can quote them by name and point them out by period, fortified by the knowledge of actual sources, are few and scarce indeed. Even among authors on the subject Conjuring only two actual references come to the writer's mind: Eusebe Salverte surely had studied such things from a kindred viewpoint; Henry Ridgely Evans made commentaries of Heron of Alexandria and about the ancient Egyptian priestcraft that proved that he could have said much more. In order to promote research and to find emulators, hence for the good of our Art, the writer does not intend to point out at present the name of the ancient author herein referred to, but he purposes to furnish sufficient clues, so that anyone inclined to emulate, be in position to trace them unerringly and find out more.
A certain ancient writer whose pen is presumed to have been wielded from about A. D. 200 to A. D. 235 is acknowledged to have been a philosopher; leastwise History records that after discipleship under a previous leader, he procureth himself a philosopher's gown, and that thus equipped he proceeded to teach a system of cogitation and to write on this favorite topic. It is also claimed that he was endowed with enough worldly goods to satisfy this inclination without discomfort. Of his writings, certain fragments have been transmitted to us, yet tradition has it that, like the works of so many others, parts had become lost (or deliberately destroyed). In 1842 more writings purporting to emanate from him were restored to posterity; an ancient manuscript having come to light in an old tomb near the monastery of Mount Athos. About this manuscript it is certain that the subject matter refers to the same period and is written in a dialect contemporaneous and colloquial to the previous works. It is surely genuine, for only a man living at that period could have described events with the detail involved, and the heterodoxical views found therein would be as injurious to monkish fabricators as its orthodoxy might appear desirable. In any event our betters have pronounced the find genuine and scientists accept that verdict.
Now the historical period referred to was replete with philosophers, mostly pledged to different tenets, and the following names represent a few of the systems then in vogue: Pythagorians, Platonists, Stoics, Sophists, Gnostics, Aristotelians, Academics, Brachmans, Druids, Esseenes, Naseinians, Manicheans, Marcusites, Basilidians, Docetae, etc. Said author attacks them all. "He who likes me likes my dog" would have been a good motto for him, for forsooth he denounced as heresiarchs all those whose views did not agree with his own system, including, forsooth again, the Chaldeans, Arithmeticians, Astronomers, Sorcerers and Magicians. What he said about the latter was of great interest, for it cannot be gainsaid that this man possessed real insight, nor that he was a competent observer and a clever analyst. He shows familiarity with every subject and describes each minutely. The following facts can be deduced from his writings on magical subjects:
That during his time there were so-called sorcerers and that these were but dishonest conjurors.
That there were also professional conjurors who could perform wonderful feats, but that these did ascribe the effects they produced to the intervention of "daemons."
That there were also professional evocators of spirits who held seances but that they resorted to trickery of the self-same sort as our modern spiritualists and conjurors.
(Of course the term spiritualist is my own, I use it because modern readers would be prone to misinterpret and with the same authority as translators of the Bible. At that time so-called devils, angels, spirits good and ghosts bad were all denominated daemons, t. i.: demons. Knowledge of such etymological evolutions is necessary to interpret ancient writers, but that is not our topic. Suffice it that today the specific daemons referred to in this case are termed "spirits.")
That illusionists of that day made use of assistants, of mechanical accessories and of confederates planted among the audience; that they presented their effects according to preconceived and prepared methods, and under pre-studied conditions.
That there were at that time masters in the science of Astronomy as well as astrological pretenders. What we hear today about the pretended Zodiacal influence over the life of men was known and predicated then in the self-same way. It would really appear that our astrologers have copied their system from his work, but inasmuch as the Le-Normands and Gadburys antedated the finding of these lost manuscripts we find here confirmatory evidence that the ancient Egyptian and Babylonian systems are those propounded at this time and were handed down to us by way of the Etruscans.
That the scientists of his day knew the earth to be a sphere and one of the Sun's satellites; this in spite of Copernicus and Galileo who restored such knowledge fourteen centuries later. He called such beliefs "also heresies." That this author furnishes a wonderfully plausible explanation of the origin of and reason for Mumbo Jumbo incantations and of other queer practices now yet our inheritance from ancient predecessors.
That the science or rather intellectual exercises which later Caballists have denominated Gematria and Sepher Notaricon, and of which much can be studied in the Zohar of the Talmud, was truly the Pythagorian "Arithmeticon." The Ancients called it a magical science, consequently he forthwith relegates it among heresies, in spite of the fact that many examples of this art can be detected in ancient Testament nomenclatures, some even in Revelation; in spite of the fact that magic squares as we now know them constitute a mathematical relaxation and achievement of the highest order. But I am disgressing, let us return to the more elementary magic of our kind:
We learn further as follows:
That sympathetic ink was resorted to for magical performance, the "modi operandi et preastandi" being even more dramatic although similar to present day "spirit writings," second sight a la Fay, etc.
And Alchemy, not to say Chemistry, was not always mere disguised mysticism a la "Turba Philosophorum" as some commentators would lead us to believe; nay, it was sometimes knowledge, for we find here formulae as clear and as simple as modern ones, for instance; how to develop by means of a copperas solution characters previously written upon paper with pure water or with milk and then left to dry; for instance again; how to prepare eggs so as to cause the shells to change color when clandestinely approached near a burning brazier. Incidentally, why did ancient performers make use of tripods and braziers? Because of the mental intoxication resulting from certain incenses and in imitation of sacrificial altars as Ennemoser states? Possibly so, but here is a true exposeur who knows something better: To cause objects faked of wax to melt and thus seemingly vanish! Shade of Dr. Elliot!! A few months before his demise he confided to yours truly in great confidence that he was working out a method to cast hollow billiard balls of wax and parafine with the object of causing their final mysterious disappearance by placing them upon pre-heated table tops. This in 1921. Truly, there is nothing new under the Sun!
Our Ancients had a method of causing the seemingly suicidal decapitation of sheep. In this reference I think that our author misses the mark or has been badly interpreted, for I have heretofore quoted in the M. U. M. actual Egyptian and more ancient proofs of the antiquity of decapitation illusions. With impunity some ancient miracle men could cause their arms and heads to appear as flaming torches; they knew how to plunge their heads and arms in boiling cauldrons; how to dance barefoot on burning coals, etc. The secret of each feat is logically explained although in one case I doubt the likelihood of his explanations.
But incidentally Compeers : Here was a man who devoted a part of his life towards exposing orally and in writing the doings of his contemporary conjurors because, as he saw it, they were sinful and interfered with his philosophy or with his prestige. He could not and would not have exposed things that did not occur; such a procedure would have been as foolish in his day as in ours. Another thought: there were influential exposeurs in the third century of our era, just as there are some at this day. And still Magic flourishes; nay, we still do witness the self-same tricks!
They could cause the self-ignition and combustion of houses and other large objects. Ye gods! He treats this effect as if of ordinary occurrence. Where is our modern enterprise in face of such expenditures and risks? A chapter is devoted to opening and reclosing scaled letters without leaving traces. Did you know they sealed their letters in 200 A. D. ? Another chapter describes how to produce illusive spirits; another is entitled: Mode of managing an apparition, etc. Among subsequent illusions described; the sudden appearance of a skull, its possession by daemons—a talking skull—its dissipation (by heat).
There is more, but space lacks; and then again why rob an anticipating reader of legitimate joy?
Why and how such wonderful references have escaped our modern authors is inconceivable.
Now ye collectors, delvers and collators, tell us the name of this ancient author. Here, like always and elsewhere, the acquisition of knowledge is up to yourselves. Excluding our editors because they are in position to withhold this until fathomed, he who first solves the riddle should be awarded a prize.
Originally published in the M-U-M in Vol. XIII, No. 7, (Whole No. 130) in New York, January 1924.
