• Coptic Curses

    Coptic Curses III: “You will shatter the face of so-and-so!”

    This week’s post takes a deep dive into a curse from Kyprianos, our database of Coptic magical texts, by returning to a manuscript already discussed in a previous post: P. Heidelberg inv. Kopt. 681 is a sheet of parchment, cut into a long rectangle measuring 29.5cm by 10.9cm. As introduced in the post Coptic Amulets II: Sending an angel to give grace, this sheet is a formulary – a manuscript containing one or more spell(s) with formulas to be filled in, rather than an activated text – containing the name of the person who would benefit from, or be cursed by, the spell. The flesh side of the parchment, the…

  • News

    Names of Thrones: Koptische Überlieferungen zu den 24 Presbytern der Johannes-Apokalypse

    Am 6. Februar 2020 begrüßen wir unseren dritten und letzten Gast des Semesters in der Seminarreihe Magic and Religion in Coptic Textual Culture am Lehrstuhl für Ägyptologie Würzburg, gefördert vom Universitätsbund. Prof. Dr. Sebastian Richter ist Professor für Ägyptologie mit dem Schwerpunkt Koptologie am Ägyptologischen Seminar der Freien Universität Berlin und Akademieprofessor der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. In der Vision des Gottesthrons in Kap. 4-5 der neutestamentlichen Offenbarung des Johannes figurieren “24 Älteste (presbyteroi)”. Wie so viele Details des Throns und seiner Entourage, so hat auch das Motiv der Ältesten seine Wurzeln in jüdischen Überlieferungen. Und wie zahlreiche Motive aus dem Bilderschatz der Johannes-Apokalypse, so hat auch das jener 24…

  • Case Study

    Bricks of birth: “The names of the three bricks upon which Mary gave birth”

    The National Library in Vienna houses a unique document – a fragmentary sheet of paper from the 11th century CE Vienna Nationalbibliothek K 10335 Pap, containing the following short magical text:  “The names of the three bricks upon which Mary gave birth: Akramak, Ouaramak, Akr…”  Why is this text so interesting? It seems to attest to the use of birth bricks in 11th century Egypt, and their association in Egyptian Christianity with the birth of Jesus. The tradition of using birth bricks is attested in pharaonic Egypt in two different contexts – in the funerary domain, and in the domain of childbirth. In 2001, the American Egyptologist Josef Wegner discovered…