num_pages: 368
description: In a culture where the supernatural possessed an immediacy now strange to us magic was of great importance both in the literary and mythic tradition and in ritual practice. Recently ancient magic has hit a high in popularity both as an area of scholarly inquiry and as one of generalpopular interest. In Magic Witchcraft and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds Daniel Ogden presents three hundred texts in new translations along with brief but explicit commentaries. This is the first book in the field to unite extensive selections from both literary and documentary sources.Alongside descriptions of sorcerers witches and ghosts in the works of ancient writers it reproduces curse tablets spells from ancient magical recipe books and inscriptions from magical amulets. Each translation is followed by a commentary that puts it in context within ancient culture andconnects the passage to related passages in this volume. Authors include the well known (Sophocles Herodotus Plato Aristotle Virgil Pliny) and the less familiar and extend across the whole of Greco-Roman antiquity.
language: English
title: Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A Sourcebook
publisher: Oxford University Press