The Power of Words

Studies on Charms and Charmings in Europe
Editor: 
James Kapaló
Éva Pócs
William Francis Ryan
ISBN: 
978-615-5225-10-9
cloth
$90.00 / €79.00 / £71.00
Publication date: 
2013
334 pages
Where to buy online: 
Shipping from USA

The research of the folklore genre of charms became extremely dynamic around the turn of the millennium. A number of academic disciplines allied themselves to explore manuscripts healing texts and other textual relics of verbal magic from antiquity and the middle ages. Studying this corpus has shed light on a number of previously unexplored aspects of Eurasian cultures. The authors of the twelve essays in the book, covering a wide geographical and thematic range, include representatives of European ethnology and folklore studies, contemporary and historical anthropology, as well as linguistics, the study of Classical Antiquity, mediaeval studies, Byzantine studies, Russian and Baltic studies. The essays reflect the rich textual tradition of archives, monasteries and literary sources, as well as the texts amassed in the folklore archives or those still accessible through field work in many rural areas of Europe and known from the living practice of lay specialists of magic and healers in local communities, and even of priests.

James Kapaló, Éva Pócs and William Ryan: Introduction

GENRE, CLASSIFICATION, TERMINOLOGY Arne Bugge Amundsen: A genre in the making. The first study of charms in Norway Domhnall Uilleam Stiùbhart : The making of a charm collector. Alexander Carmichael in Uist, 1864 to 1882 Tat'iana Agapkina and Andrei Toporkov: Charm indexes: problems and perspectives Edina Bozóky: Medieval narrative charms Vilmos Voigt: Báj- : The historical development of “charm” terminology in Hungarian

HISTORICAL AND COMPARATIVE STUDIES Lea Olsan: The marginality of charms in medieval England Éva Pócs: Church benedictions and popular charms in Hungary Dániel Bárth : Benediction and exorcism in early modern Hungary Daiva Vaitkevičienė: Baltic and East Slavic charms

CONTENT AND FUNCTION OF CHARMS Emanuela Timotin: The năjit between prayers and charms: A study of the Romanian manuscript tradition Francisco Vaz da Silva : Charming the moon: moon charms for sick children in Portuguese ethnography Maarit Viljakainen : “Dear Merciful Mother”. The Virgin Mary in Finnish and Karelian birth incantations Index

Journal of Folklore Research

The research of the folklore genre of charms became extremely dynamic around the turn of the millennium. A number of academic disciplines allied themselves to explore manuscripts healing texts and other textual relics of verbal magic from antiquity and the middle ages. Studying this corpus has shed light on a number of previously unexplored aspects of Eurasian cultures. The authors of the twelve essays in the book, covering a wide geographical and thematic range, include representatives of European ethnology and folklore studies, contemporary and historical anthropology, as well as linguistics, the study of Classical Antiquity, mediaeval studies, Byzantine studies, Russian and Baltic studies. The essays reflect the rich textual tradition of archives, monasteries and literary sources, as well as the texts amassed in the folklore archives or those still accessible through field work in many rural areas of Europe and known from the living practice of lay specialists of magic and healers... more