Tag: The Enchanted World

Odin, father and chief of the Norse gods, passed on his knowledge of magic and rune-lore to poets, sorcerers, sages and other especially favored mortals. The runes in his gift constituted an alphabet for writing. But they were far more than mere symbols: Initiates knew them as actual sources of power—tools and weapons of wizardry.

Those who understood the secrets of the runes knew the proper figures to inscribe on a sword to protect its owner in battle, or which runes to carve on a tombstone to keep evil spirits at bay. The cunning of some runemasters ran so deep that their inscriptions could even control the dead, preventing a restless corpse from rising and wandering, or causing a hanged man to walk and speak.

But men of such prodigious power inspired more fear than admiration in Europe’s dark ages of rival cults and warring tribes. Kings and priests looked upon them with suspicion. In some lands the very possession of a tablet filled with wonder-working runes became a punishable crime. Adepts were burned to death, and their knowledge disappeared with them. In the remotest regions, their carved stones survived as objects of mystery and menace. But the real power of the runes was lost forever.

— The Secret Arts, Chapter 1

Insatiable in their lust for knowledge, the practitioners of magic yearned to see beyond the tangible world, to learn the secret laws that governed the fates of souls and nations. In every age, scholars sought to piece together fragments of these hidden truths, and to grant themselves a kind of immortality by preserving their hard-won discoveries for adepts as yet unborn.

Their messages took different forms. Fragile baked-clay tablets bore cuneiform impressions made with reed pens when the clay was new and soft. Carved hieroglyphic charms were sealed in the changeless air of Pharaohs’ underground tombs. Shreds of papyrus lay deep under hot sands that over the centuries crept whispering away, revealing the scrolls finally to the eyes of mystified herdsmen. Tall sentinel stones inscribed with spidery runes wept with the gentle rain that soaked the hillsides where they stood. Heavy volumes with black-lettered pages were chained out of sight in monastic libraries. Encapsulated in silent characters, the words waited, charged with arcane powers.

To those adventurers who would crack their codes, the chroniclers passed on a caveat: The secrets of the universe were not lightly disclosed, any unworthy soul who probed too deep risked an unspeakable fate. Yet the lure of knowledge often overcame the dictates of caution.

— The Secret Arts, Chapter 1

When the first sorcerer lifted his voice in a chant to weave a spell, he discovered the potent magic of music. In the sinuous melody that charmed serpents, in the pulsing rhythm of the rainmaker’s dance, spellcasters harnessed music to control the lowliest creatures of the earth and the mightiest elements of the heavens. Humans could also be enchanted into sleep, love, battle, even death, by secret harmonies played on certain instruments. So entwined were the magical and musical arts that scholars who needed words to describe the dreaded work of sorcery found them in the language of music. The words enchantment and incantation came from the Latin cantare, to sing, while the word charm was derived from the Latin for song, carmen.

— The Secret Arts, Chapter 3

In a world so shifting and uncertain, it is not surprising that great store was set on all things that were not clearly one thing or another. At the inbetween places—rivers and borders—and at all edges, verges, brinks, rims, fringes, and dividers, anything might happen, and chaos could be loosed upon the world. It made no difference whether these were borders of space or of time. Caves, the thresholds between open air and the solidity of earth, were often entrances to the world of spirits. Wells linked the visible world with subterranean realms and had an innate enchantment that might give awareness of the future or restore the dead to life. In the space dividing foam and water or bark and tree, devils could be confined by those who knew how. Dawn and dusk were magical times, for they divided the fundamental elements of existence: night from day, darkness from light, the period when evil was abroad from the time when it was banished to its secret sanctuaries.

— Wizards and Witches, Chapter 1

To accomplish his mysterious purposes, a wizard would arm himself with an understanding of all the interwoven occult disciplines. But before he could put this knowledge into practice, he also required an arsenal of implements to enhance his powers and protect him in his dealings with spirits and demons. Robe and headdress, sword, dagger, and wand were the foremost tools of his trade. With these and the arcane knowledge enshrined in his library of manuscripts, charts, and books, the priest of the night could span the abyss between the seen and unseen worlds.

White, not the black of fairy tales, was the proper color for a wizard’s robe. Cornelius Agrippa, the German scholar whose celebrated Occult Philosophy became a textbook for 16th-century [C.E.] mages, said the wizard should dress in a gown of the finest linen, covering the whole body from head to foot, close-fitting and tied only with a girdle. Buckles and buttons would obstruct the free flow of supernatural energy. The headdress, whether tall or flat, pointed or round, should also be white, with YHVH, the Hebrew name of God, embroidered on the front. Both robe and headdress should be adorned with sacred emblems—stars, pentacles, and circles.

Once equipped with headdress and robe, the wizard’s most vital task was to forge a sword and dagger. This operation was best conducted when the moon was rising in the sphere of Jupiter, planet of good fortune and success. The mage would then burn incense of ambergris and peacocks’ feathers, saffron, aloe wood, cedar, and lapis lazuli—the scents associated with Jupiter—and chant in the name of God, heaven, and the stars to infuse his weapons with mystic strength.

Only then could the wizard prepare his wand, the most precious of all the magic implements. A slim wooden rod, some twenty inches long, the wand was ideally cut from a solitary bush that had never fruited. On the first night of the new moon, in the hour before dawn, the magician should dip his knife in blood. Facing the eastern horizon, he should cut the shoot with a single stroke of his dagger then peel its soft green bark in the first rays of the reborn sun. The three sacred instruments—sword, knife, and wand—should then be wrapped in a silken cloth until they were required.

Delicate though it seemed, the slender wand was by far the most formidable weapon in the sorcerer’s arsenal. With it he could summon spirits, cast spells, or wreak destruction; he could make objects disappear, or reveal to the naked eye things that were otherwise invisible. If he were a beneficient practitioner, he might use the wand to liberate the victims of dark forces from the curses laid upon them….

— The Secret Arts, Chapter 7