The Magical Universe: Everyday Ritual and Magic in Pre-Modern Europe [Paperback]

Stephen Wilson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 16, 2004

The universality of the magical beliefs which have existed throughout Europe from the time of the Romans to the present has been hidden by a focus on the sensational aspects of magic, and on witch trials in particular. The Magical Universe shows how magical beliefs and practices permeated all aspects of work and of family life, and profoundly influenced the approach of men and women to health and healing, birth, marriage and death. Magic offered the hope of protection in a dangerous and uncertain world, if the correct rituals were observed. Magical beliefs borrowed from and were incorporated in church rites. Such beliefs, shared by the powerful as well as the poor, lasted remarkably late in many rural areas and have still not completely vanished.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"In the world we have lost, everyday life was suffused, governed and given meaning by ritual magic. Stephen Wilson portrays that enchanted world with a bold vision and a sure touch."--Literary Review
"Packed with curiosities, and it is a feat of scholarly gathering comparable to Keith Thomas's ground-breaking Religion and the Decline of Magic."--Daily Telegraph

Book Description

The universality of the magical beliefs which existed throughout Europe from the time of the Romans to the present has been hidden by a focus on the sensational aspects of magic, and on witch trials in particular. The Magical Universe shows how magical beliefs and practices permeated all aspects of work and of family life, and profoundly influenced health and healing, birth, marriage and death. Magic offered the hope of protection in a dangerous and uncertain world, and magical beliefs were borrowed from and incorporated in church rites. Such beliefs, shared by the powerful as well as the poor, lasted remarkably late in many rural areas and have still not completely vanished.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 592 pages
• Publisher: Hambledon & London (July 16, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1852854456
• ISBN-13: 978-1852854454
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #657,978 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining, Everlasting Magic!, April 4, 2001

By 

R. Hardy "Rob Hardy" (Columbus, Mississippi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Magical Universe: Everyday Ritual and Magic in Pre-Modern Europe (Hardcover)

It is a complicated and unpredictable universe out there. Chance and chaos seem to rule much of everything, and even when we think we have control, we often fool ourselves into thinking we really have more than we do, or that we have any at all. The feeling of being in control, however illusory, is what has been harnessed by magical beliefs that have been found in all societies. In _The Magical Universe: Everyday Ritual and Magic in Pre-Modern Europe_ (Hambledon and London), Stephen Wilson, a British historian, has compiled a monumental collection of magical beliefs and practices that shows how they affected almost all aspects of society, including doctrinal religion. Every page is filled with odd practices that some community has at some time thought would decrease the chaos in the world.

Wilson has tried to lay out his encyclopedic work in logical fashion, with one chapter on livestock, another on conception and pregnancy, another on illness, and so on. Within each chapter, though, is a grab-bag of folk belief, with every page having its share of surprising beliefs. Take sex, for instance. Sex had plenty of its own associated magic, as can be imagined when people understood nothing about genetics and about the menstrual cycle. Impotence was often addressed by magic means because it was so frequently imposed on men by witches. The witches' main time of instilling such a curse was at the wedding itself, perhaps by secretly tying knots which symbolized sexual frustration. The prevention of such curses was commonsensical: the couples would deliberately avoid them by having sex before the wedding. In parts of France, if the impotence took hold, the couple would be put into a barn, striped naked, tied to a post and whipped. Having enjoyed this frolic, the "therapists" would untie them, given them food, and leave them to enjoy the night. Standing stones from prehistoric societies were found all over Europe, and were, by the descendants of those who had erected them, thought to be fertility aids. Women touched, bestrode, and rubbed on them, sometimes in groups as a pilgrimage. When such stones were incorporated into the architecture of churches, their function as fertility talismans continued, to the distress of some clergy. The cult of St. Leonard flourished in Limoges, and focused on a large bolt ("the bolt of St. Leonard") in the church door there. A woman would move the bolt in and out to banish sterility.

These descriptions show a theme that rises throughout this book. Wilson did not set out to write a comparative study of superstition and religion, but the two are interconnected in every chapter. While the organized church often tried to keep separate from magical practices, or to suppress them, the two spheres eased the same doubts and engendered the same feeling of control. Many priests frankly practiced magic and spells, and did ritual healings. The host was treated with utmost care, but it could be cheeked and furtively removed from the church for magic purposes, such as helping in battles or detecting an unfaithful spouse. It is no wonder that magic and religion were inextricably linked.

This impressive book is crammed with facts, many of them amusing. The author, however, has the view that such magical thinking is no longer part of our modern world, and this is simply not true. One can turn on Pray TV to see preachers casting out devils and doing healings. The head of the PTL club thinks he can divert hurricanes. We have Viagra now to help with erectile dysfunction, but the Web and newspapers are full of ads for herbal remedies for the problem. Thousands of people believe they are regularly abducted by flying saucers. We may no longer think that a baby's intelligence can be improved by application of blood or spittle, but we just know that Einstein had more brain cells in his mathematical area, and every now and then the newspapers have a story about the gene that carries genius. This book wonderfully illustrates the magical universe of the past, but we have not taken ourselves from it yet.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Catalogue of Folk Magic, June 18, 2006

By 

Neutiquam Erro (Isles of Llyonnesse) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Magical Universe: Everyday Ritual and Magic in Pre-Modern Europe (Paperback)

The world is a strange and terrifying place in which arbitrary events often determine our happiness and even survival. While modern medicine, adequate food supplies and stable governments have done much to decrease random pain and suffering in this era, it was not always so. This book details medieval man and woman's attempts to control the forces of nature that acted on and in their everyday lives.

The book catalogues the magical practices and beliefs of the unpriveleged classes. Ritual magic of the more scholarly kind, a la Nostradamus, is mostly untouched. We are instead treated to an exhaustive treatment of the folk magic and religious beliefs which governed every aspect of lower class lives. The five sections of the book deal with agriculture, the human life cycle from conception to death, disease and healing, divination and signs and finally magical elements. The latter two sections are fairly brief while the bulk of the book treats the human life cycle.

My primary complaint about the book is that the author injects very little in the way of analysis. Instead a long list of detailed practices related to a given topic - for example christening - is presented. While the lack of analysis prevents the book from becoming a controversial diatribe, it also makes it read like one long review paper and leaves more questions than answers. Why, for example, did certain places seem plagued by werewolves, while others had witches or vampires as boogie men? What are the origins of the lucky numbers 3 and 7? How are ancient religious ideas (Roman, Celtic, Norse) involved in folk magic? This concentration on factual detail - the myriad ways of avoiding the evil eye, for example - leaves a very erudite book feeling just a little shallow. It's as if the author spent his whole life collecting anecdotes but never looked for overarching themes.

That said, I would strongly recommend this book as a scholarly resource for sociologic studies of medieval thought. It contains extensive reference notes and a very deep bibliography as well as a fine index. The enormous depth of detail might also be useful to those interested in the history of medicine or the medieval church. Finally, the book's wealth of anecdotes is a treasure trove for those who like to go to dinner parties and drop lines like "Did you know that the fifth consecutive child of the same sex was considered a werewolf in medieval Portugal."

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great read, February 25, 2003

By 

Brian Vanlandingham (Raleigh, NC USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Magical Universe: Everyday Ritual and Magic in Pre-Modern Europe (Hardcover)

I fascinating study of premodern European folk traditions. The author avoids the all to common tendancy to fill his descriptions of folk practices with modern polemics. The author has no political ax to grind, other than reintroducing us to our ancestors. One comes away with a sense of how far we have come in the modern world, and also a sense of sadness at how much we have given up.