Curses … In the minds of a person of the not too distant past (and of many of our contemporaries), this is something terrible, dooming to torment and death. And what do modern scientists and magicians think about the effectiveness of curses?
Curses are a special type of spells that cause accidents, illnesses, harm people and even bring them to death. They are the most dangerous form of witchcraft, have been known for thousands of years and are found throughout the world.
Who is subject to this sorcery?
It is believed that any person can send a curse, simply with a feeling of anger (hatred) expressing a wish that trouble should happen to someone. However, as the researchers found, the strength of the curse actually depends on the physical condition and social status of the curse.
Curses have great magical power and therefore are more dangerous when they are sent by people with religious or political authority, or representatives of the lowest strata (homeless people). For example, the “siloviki” include, for example, priests, priests, or members of royal families; people using magic are sorcerers and witches; people who cannot otherwise take revenge are poor, sick or dying.
The curses of the dying have the greatest impact force, since all the vital energy of the curse falls on the cursed.
The centuries-old experience of mankind shows: if the victim knows that she was cursed, or believes that she is doomed to death, then the effectiveness of the curse is greatly enhanced, since in this case the person himself helps to bring his own death closer! The victim makes it easier for the destructive "virus" or "death program" to work. The reliability of this method is confirmed by the practice of Australian Aboriginal sorcerers, well studied by Western scientists - ethnographers, psychologists, etc.
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Many magicians and sorcerers argue that the curse works just as effectively when the victim is unaware of the magical death sentence imposed on him. Here the question is already more controversial, since it is difficult to find out whether a curse was imposed, or the sorcerer simply attributed to himself the misfortune that happened to the person. As the reader understands, scientists do not set up experiments of this kind because of their immorality and criminal nature. And if someone does them, then the results of the experiments remain secret.
However, among the people, the belief in curses is widespread - punishment by attracting supernatural forces. Moreover, in equal measure it can be both light and dark forces. The former carry out a curse to punish a sinner or a villain, the latter, on the contrary, bring evil to innocent people.
History can give a lot of examples when, under the influence of curses, whole families died out - and, as is typical, rich merchants and industrialists, but it cannot prove that it was the curses that caused the death of these people. We can only say that it is very similar to the action of a curse (as people understand it).
The problem, however, is that a curse cannot be “filed to the point” -it is not a stab, a shot, or a poison. Moreover, many cases are known when ordinary bandits were hiding under the guise of magicians (and even now they are hiding). They receive an order to kill with the help of witchcraft, but in reality they liquidate the victim using one of the known physical methods. And the customer believes that the victim threw herself under the train (although she was actually pushed), fell out of the window herself (although she was thrown out of it), etc. At a time when the belief in the supernatural is great, as, for example, now in Russia, the number of such cases increases significantly.
Witch's kitchen
Probably the most commonly used negative enchanting method is cursing with a figurine or portrait of the victim. Even in ancient India, Persia and Egypt, wax figurines were common, which continue to be used to this day. These figurines can also be made from clay, wood, or stuffed with soft matter (rag dolls). Wax images are often covered with paint or hung with something that has an energetic connection with the victim - pieces of nails, hair or pieces of clothing. Then this figure is burned in the fire, and when it melts, the victim suffers from pain, and when it completely disappears, the person dies.
The ancient Egyptians often used wax images of Elep, a demon who was the enemy of the sun. The magician wrote his name in green on the figure of the victim, wrapped it in papyrus and threw it into the fire. While the statuette was burning, the sorcerer struck it four times with his left foot. Then the ashes of the burnt figure were mixed with excrement and again thrown into the flames to achieve the complete destruction of the cursed enemy.
Sometimes, as an alternative to incineration, needles, spikes or even knives can be stuck into the figures. Images can also be replaced by the hearts of animals and people. Hearts and bodies of animals or other objects that quickly decompose, such as chicken eggs, are buried in the ground, and a curse is pronounced so that the victim will die as soon as the object rotts.
Another group of curses is associated with stones. In medieval Ireland, for example, "cursed stones" were rounded cobblestones that were stroked and rotated from right to left, while pronouncing the proper words of curse over them. It is often believed that precious and semi-precious stones also have the ability to convey all kinds of misfortunes. For example, the famous Hope diamond, bought by King Louis XIV in 1668 from a French traveler
Tavernier, as legend has it, was cursed because all of its subsequent owners quickly fell ill, experienced disillusionment with life and soon died while still young. The ominous theme of cursed gems has found its reflection in literature. Thus, the English writer Wilkie Collins turned the tragic story of a huge yellow diamond stolen from India into a fascinating detective novel called "Moonstone".
Curses can lie not only in stones, but sometimes in completely unexpected objects. In the 20th century, for example, the car of the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, who was killed with his wife in 1914 in the Bosnian city of Sarajevo, gained ominous fame. This event served as the last impetus for the outbreak of the First World War, and it turned out that about a dozen subsequent owners of the car died or were seriously injured in accidents while driving it!
Very often stories about curses are associated with ancient mirrors, and this is not surprising, since polished surfaces were widely used in magic, and in addition, they store the energy memory of many generations of people and are a kind of "corridor between dimensions."
That is why it is customary to curtain mirrors in a house where someone has recently died, since the astral body of the deceased is able to drag the living into its world through the mirror surface. It is believed that a mirror will accumulate negative energy in itself if, for example, its owner is a sadist or a maniac, or the mirror “saw” how the murder takes place. Now in Europe, according to reports, there are at least two damned mirrors that have caused a series of unexplained deaths of their owners. A similar story was masterfully presented in one of his stories by the "king of horror" Stephen King. In it, some people saw in an ancient mirror a certain Reaper - a creepy figure in a black hoodie with a hood, after meeting with whom these people disappeared forever.
A lot of mysterious stories about mystical misfortunes are undoubtedly connected with the history of Ancient Egypt. It is believed that one of the most famous local curses is "the revenge of the mummy of Pharaoh Tutankhamun." When the English Lord Carnarvon and archaeologist Howard Carter unearthed his underground tomb in 1929, in one of the rooms they found a clay tablet with a formidable inscription, which read: "Death will cover with its wings anyone who will disturb the peace of the Pharaoh!"
Six months later, Lord Carnarvon died from an infection brought into his body as a result of a mosquito bite. In addition, the seven main participants in the excavation also died a sudden and rather strange death, which allowed the English press to loudly announce the so-called curse of Tutankhamun.
It is also interesting that the plate described above was never photographed, and soon it mysteriously disappeared from the collection of finds of the expedition! By the way, a similar story happened in modern Poland, when fourteen scientists died, who opened the tomb of King Casimir IV (XV century). True, here the whole thing turned out to be a deadly poisonous mold that covered the monarch's sarcophagus and affected the respiratory tract of a person. At least that's what scientists say.
But where did this mold come from in the tomb of King Casimir?..
In fact, no one can say for sure why the researchers in Egypt and Poland died - natural or supernatural.
In Europe, in particular in Great Britain, France and Spain, there are also many legends about curses sent to entire families, especially ancient and aristocratic ones. One of the worst such misfortunes was the childlessness or death of the heirs of the family, as a result of which the whole family could cease to exist. While poison and dagger are likely to have played a major role in such stories, people believed that curses were sent by powerful witches and sorcerers.
They sent diseases that affected the surname "up to the tenth generation" (now they would be called genetic), made it difficult to intercourse in various ways - extinguished desire, hindered erection and even "deprived men of a penis"! The "removal" of male genitals by a witch was explained as a deception of the senses, although the people said that a witch could take this organ away physically. For example, a rejected mistress could turn out to be a witch and utter a curse that made her lover believe that he had lost a penis, so much so that a man could not see and feel it!
One medieval story, attributed to a French Dominican monk, tells of a certain young man who came to confession and convinced his confessor that he had lost a member when he abruptly took off his clothes. The priest could hardly believe his eyes. Later, the young man convinced the witch who sent the damage to remove the curse from him, and his penis returned to its place.
In the Spanish and German Inquisition documents concerning sexual curse trials, it is reported that some witches collected male organs that had been torn away by magic and stored them in boxes, where they wriggled, crawled and ate grains of corn and oats. The Hammer of the Witches, for example, tells of a man who lost his penis and came to the witch with a request to return it back: “She told the injured man to climb a certain tree and said that he could take from a nest in which there were several male members, whatever he likes. But when he chose the biggest one, the witch said that this one cannot be taken, since it belonged to the parish priest."
- There is a powerful telepathic or hypnotic effect. It is it that explains all the tricks of witches and sorcerers, says D. Valiente, a British researcher of folk magic. - Today, with the help of special drugs, you can make a person see something different. But in the Middle Ages it was the use of one or another technique of mental influence. If we take into account the widespread use of magic at that time, as well as such qualities of human nature as vindictiveness and envy, it turns out that in most cases people sent curses (or paid witches for it) on their closest neighbors and competitors. And the tribunals of the Inquisition used accusations of curses for their own purposes, as one of the reasons for the persecution of heretics, pagans and political opponents of the church.
As for modernity, in the many traditions of the neo-pagan craft of witches, the practice of sending curses contradicts the ethics and laws of witchcraft. In general, for all current sorcerers, the Law of Brotherhood directly says: "Except for harm, do whatever you want." In accordance with the principles of the Brotherhood, modern witches should use their powers for good, help people and exist in harmony with nature.
However, in the cultures of many peoples and tribes, such an ethical framework is not defined and there is no prohibition on curses. Therefore, they still remain in the arsenal of sorcery and are used against people.
For example, sorceresses belonging to popular cultures such as Italian shears, Mexican bruchs and Dutch brauhers from Pennsylvania believe that one should never forgive their enemies, but, on the contrary, must be destroyed with the help of carefully induced enchantments. Many peoples of the East, Australia and South America also adhere to the "eye for an eye" principle. Their sorcerers, for example, are able to send curses back, "against the tide", forcing those who send them to die from them.
However, there are many means of protection against curses - but this is a topic for a separate conversation, to which we will definitely return.
Stanislav GORYAINOV