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An inscription recounting the oath taken by Greek settlers at the foundation of a colony at Cyrene shows how closely cuneiform and Greek texts can be compared for magical practices. Similar spells are known from the Neo-Assyrian treaties and incantation series Maqlû. Because certain religious, ritualistic, and magical types of expression were shared, it is not surprising that the accompanying imagery has features in common.
SAA 2 6.89 (Assyrian treaty of Esarhaddon):
Just as an image of wax is burnt in the fire and one of clay dissolved in water, (so) may your figure be burnt in the fire and sunk in water.
Maqlû 2.146-157:
Just as these figurines melt, run, and flow away, so may sorcerer and sorceress melt, run, and flow away.
KAI 222 (Aramaic treaty text of Sfire):
As this wax is consumed by fire, thus … PN shall be consumed by fire.
Oath of the Cyreneans:
‘ … they moulded wax images and burnt them while they uttered the following imprecation, all of them, having come together, men and women, boys and girls: ‘May he, who does not abide by this agreement but transgresses it, melt away and dissolve like the images, himself, his seed, and his property.’
Sources (list of abbreviations) (source links will open in a new browser window)
Cyreneans, Oath of the
KAI 222 (Aramaic treaty text of Sfire)
Maqlû 2.146-157
SAA 2 6.89
Bibliography
| Burkert 1992, 67-68 | Burkert, Walter. The Orientalizing Revolution. Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Archaic Period. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press 1992. |
| Dalley and Reyes 1998, 100 | Dalley, S. and A. T. Reyes. “Mesopotamian Contact and Influence in the Greek World.” In: S. Dalley (ed.). The Legacy of Mesopotamia. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1998, 85-124. |
Amar Annus
URL for this entry: http://www.aakkl.helsinki.fi/melammu/database/gen_html/a0001142.php
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