Wednesday, February 08, 2023

 

Crop Protection

Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum 44-859, an inscription from Sidi Kaddou, Tunisia (2nd/3rd century AD), tr. Roy Kotansky, Greek Magical Amulets, Part I (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1994), p. 53:
(Magic signs) Oreobazagra Oreob[azagra] Abrasax Machar Semeseilam Stenachta Lorsachthē Koriauchē Adōnaie, sovereign (4) gods, hinder, turn aside from this property and from what is growing on it — in the vineyards, the olive-groves, in the seeding places — hail over the produce, grain-rust, fury (8) of Typhonian winds, a swarm of harmful locust, so that none of these pernicious things touch this field nor any of the produce in it; (12) but guard them altogether unharmed and uncorrupt, as long as these stones engraved with your sacred names (16) are here lying about the land.
Greek text from Kotansky, p. 52:
(Magic signs) Ορεοβαζαγρα, Ορεοβ[αζαγρα],
Αβρασαξ μαχαρ Σεμεσειλαμ στεναχτ[α],
λορσαχθη κοριαυχη Ἀδωναῖε, κύρ[ιοι]
θεοί, κωλύσατε, ἀποστρέψατε ἀπὸ τοῦ[δε]        4
χωρίου καὶ τῶν ἐν αὐτῷ γεννωμένω[ν]
— ἐν ἀμπέλοις, ἐλαιῶσιν, σπορητοῖς τόπ[οις] —
καρπῶν χάλαζαν, ἐρυσείβην, ὀργὴ[ν]
τυφώνων ἀνέμων, κακοποιῶν        8
ἀκρίδων ἑσμόν, ἵνα μηδὲν τῶν λ[υ]-
μαιωτικῶν τῶνδε ἅψηται τοῦ-
δε τοῦ χωρίου καὶ τῶν ἐν αὐτῷ [κ]α[ρ]-
πῶν πάντων· ἀσινεῖς δὲ αὐτοὺ[ς] καὶ ἀ-        12
φθόρους πάντοτε συντηρήσατε,
ἕως ἂν οἵδε λίθοι γεγραμ-
μένοι τοῖς ἱροῖς ὑμῶν ὀνόμα-
σιν ὑπὸ γῇ πέριξ κείμενοι        16
        ὦσιν.
The stone:
See Francisco Javier Fernández Nieto, "A Visigothic Charm from Asturias and the Classical Tradition of Phylacteries Against Hail," in Richard L. Gordon and Francisco Marco Simón, edd., Magical Practice in the Latin West: Papers from the International Conference held at the University of Zaragoza, 30 Sept. - 1st Oct. 2005 (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 551-599 (at 561-562).



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