4

Magic

Along with the times of transition that occur in the life of a human being, there are other critical
situations that necessitate a ritual effort—for example, to insure protection against an extraordinary
threat or to exert extraordinary influence upon other people. In contrast to rites of passage, we call this
kind of ritual effort sorcery or magic. The modern German word for “magic” is Zauber, from Old High
German zoubar. The original meaning of the German word Zauber can still be discerned from its Old
English cognate,

zauber, meaning "magic, sorcery" from Old High German zoubar. (Germ.)

tēafor, which designated “red coloring, ochre, red chalk,” or “ointment.” (O.Eng)

permissible, or white, magic (Old Icelandic galdr, “screaming, incantatory magic, sorcery”)

impermissible, or black, magic (Old Icelandic gandr, “magic stave, sorcery, witchcraft”; or seiðr, “cord,
fetter, sorcery”)

This points to the practice of staining runes that have been carved for magical ends with blood or some
red substance (ersatz blood) in order to properly make the rune magic effective. Socially speaking there
is a distinction between permissible, or white, magic (Old Icelandic galdr, “screaming, incantatory magic,
sorcery”), and impermissible, or black, magic (Old Icelandic gandr, “magic stave, sorcery, witchcraft”; or
seiðr, “cord, fetter, sorcery”). In impermissible magic the ritual effort is ultimately aimed at the malicious
harming of another person. I will not draw a fundamental distinction between sorcery and magic. Those
who wish to distinguish the two might regard magic as a specific technology of which sorcery (but also
any other ritual) avails itself. Here I present the following categories: incantatory magic, rune magic,
death magic, divinatory magic, cursing magic, and destructive magic. Cursing magic and destructive
magic are categorized as impermissible sorcery (black magic). The other types fall into this category only
when they are employed for malicious ends. At the time of Tacitus (ca. 100 CE) women were considered
by the Germanic peoples to be especially talented in magic.1

Incantatory Magic

A fundamental assumption of magic is that the spoken word itself has innate power to “evoke”*48 and
produce what it expresses. Exactly for this reason the correct word must be uttered. (A slip of the tongue
ruins a magical effect or directs the effect back against the one who has misspoken.) Formulaic types of
speech and singing strengthen the magical power of the word.

This example of incantatory magic comes from an eleventh-century Old English manuscript. The charm
itself may be considerably older—certainly the underlying ideas are, for they reach back to