Animals in magical tradition
Black cats and toads, owls and ravens, hares, moths and phantom dogs: for centuries European culture read in animals the signs of an invisible world. This section of the Symbolic Bestiary reconstructs how certain creatures, real or imaginary, entered the repertory of magic, superstition and demonology. It starts from ancient sources such as Ovid, Pliny the Elder and Petronius and moves on to medieval bestiaries, the witch trials of the early modern age, the prints of Dürer and Goya and Ernesto De Martino's studies of Apulian tarantism. Each entry carefully separates what is documented from what belongs to legend, and gives works, places and dates. You will find no practices to imitate here, but the history of a way of looking at nature: one that turned the call of a bird, the passing of a weasel or the pattern on a moth's back into an omen, a fault or a protection.
The black cat in European belief: from Bastet to the witch trials
From the Egyptian cult of Bastet to the bull Vox in Rama of 1233 and the English trials: how the black cat became an omen of bad luck in Europe.
MAG · N. 002The toad in European magic: poison, stone and the witches of Navarre
Pliny, the legendary toadstone, the dressed toads of the Zugarramurdi trials and Macbeth: the story of an animal both feared and thought precious.
MAG · N. 003Owls: from the wisdom of Athena to the bird of ill omen
The owl of Athens, the funereal owl of Virgil and Pliny, Ovid's striges: why the birds of the night foretold misfortune in European belief and lore.
MAG · N. 004The raven between Apollo, Odin and the Bible: the story of an omen
The raven turned black by Apollo, Odin's Huginn and Muninn, the raven of Noah and of the Roman augurs: a bird poised between prophecy and ill omen.
MAG · N. 005The werewolf in ancient sources: Petronius, Pliny and Lycaon
From the tale of Niceros in the Satyricon to Pliny's scepticism, from Lycaon to the Neuri of Herodotus: the earliest evidence for lycanthropy in Europe.
MAG · N. 006The witch's familiar in English trials of the 16th and 17th centuries
From Chelmsford in 1566 to Pendle in 1612 and the trials of Matthew Hopkins: cats, dogs and toads accused of serving witches in early modern England.
MAG · N. 007The goat and the sabbath: an image from miniatures to Goya
From the scapegoat of Leviticus to the vauderie of Arras, from Baldung Grien and Dürer to Goya's paintings: how the goat became the face of the sabbath.
MAG · N. 008The hare and the transformed witch in the folklore of the British Isles
From Caesar and Boudica to Gerald of Wales and Isobel Gowdie: the hare as sacred animal, omen and shape taken by witches in European folklore.
MAG · N. 009The death's-head hawkmoth: Atropos, Acheron and a skull on its back
The name given by naturalists, the skull pattern, the squeaking cry and the lines of Keats: why the death's-head hawkmoth became an omen of death.
MAG · N. 010The spider and Apulian tarantism: from Baglivi to De Martino
Arachne in the Metamorphoses, the tarantula of Salento, Kircher and Baglivi, the chapel of Saint Paul at Galatina and Ernesto De Martino's classic study.
MAG · N. 011The serpent in Italian folk belief, from the Marsi to Cocullo
The Marsi and the goddess Angitia, the snakes of the Pompeian lararia, the house snake and the snake-catchers' feast at Cocullo: serpents in Italian lore.
MAG · N. 012The cockerel and its crow: herald of day and foe of darkness
Socrates's cock and Peter's, the sacred chickens of Rome, Prudentius, the Ramperto weathercock in Brescia and Hamlet: the crow that drives away the night.
MAG · N. 013The thieving magpie: from Ovid's Pierides to Rossini's opera
The daughters of Pierus turned into magpies, the words learnt in Pliny, the English rhyme and Rossini: the symbolic history of a bird under suspicion.
MAG · N. 014The salamander and fire: from Aristotle to Cellini and Paracelsus
Aristotle and Pliny, the emblem of Francis I, Benvenuto Cellini's tale and the fire spirits of Paracelsus: the salamander between nature and legend.
MAG · N. 015The fox between bestiaries, Renart and Machiavelli: ambiguous cunning
The fox of the Physiologus that plays dead, the Roman de Renart, Dante's Guido da Montefeltro and Machiavelli's Prince: the story of a cunning symbol.
MAG · N. 016The bat: the Minyades, Lucifer's wings and the sleep of reason
The daughters of Minyas punished by Bacchus, Leviticus, Lucifer's wings in Dante and Goya's Capricho: why the bat became a creature of darkness.
MAG · N. 017The black dog and Black Shuck: the Bungay storm of 1577
The black dog of Bungay and Blythburgh in Abraham Fleming's account, the Barghest, the Gytrash of Jane Eyre and Faust's poodle: the dog as phantom.
MAG · N. 018The fly and Beelzebub: the god of Ekron and the lord of the flies
Baal-Zebub in the Second Book of Kings, Beelzebul in the Gospels, Zeus Apomyios at Olympia, Milton and the Dictionnaire infernal: the fly as demonic sign.
MAG · N. 019The basilisk, king of serpents: from Pliny to the cockerel's egg
Pliny's small crowned serpent, Isidore of Seville, the cockerel's egg hatched by a toad and the arms of Basel: the history of the basilisk in the sources.
MAG · N. 020The weasel: Galanthis, Theophrastus and a name not to be spoken
The servant Galanthis turned into a weasel, the superstitious man of Theophrastus, the Physiologus, Eliduc and euphemistic names: the weasel in European lore.