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Libra Esoterica

Executing Magic in the Modern Era: Criminal Bodies and the Gallows in Popular Medicine

by Francesca Matteoni & Owen Davies

  • First published:
  • 21st century
  • Language: English

Description

Description from Directory of Open Access Books (opens in a new tab)

This book explores the magical and medical history of executions from the eighteenth to the early twentieth century by looking at the afterlife potency of criminal corpses, the healing activities of the executioner, and the magic of the gallows site. The use of corpses in medicine and magic has been recorded back into antiquity. The lacerated bodies of Roman gladiators were used as a source of curative blood, for instance. In early modern Europe, a great trade opened up in ancient Egyptian mummies and the fat of executed criminals, plundered as medicinal cure-alls. However, this is the first book to consider the demand for the blood of the executed, the desire for human fat, the resort to the hanged man’s hand, and the trade in hanging rope in the modern era. It ends by look at the spiritual afterlife of dead criminals.

Provenance

Why this book is in the catalog

Included because retained bibliographic metadata links this work to Afterlife, reincarnation, and near-death experiences, Ritual magic and grimoires, and Witchcraft and folk magic.

  • Ritual magic and grimoires

    Retained metadata contains “Magic” in the title, “Magic” in the description, “Magic” in the subject metadata, and 1 additional metadata match(es).

    • “Magic”· in title
    • “Magic”· in description
    • “Magic”· in subject
    • “Magic”· in edition title
  • Witchcraft and folk magic

    Controlled discovery queries from doab matched “witchcraft”. Retained metadata contains “Witchcraft” in the subject metadata.

    • “witchcraft”· via Directory of Open Access Books
    • “Witchcraft”· in subject
  • Afterlife, reincarnation, and near-death experiences

    Retained metadata contains “afterlife” in the description.

    • “afterlife”· in description

Membership records how this book met the catalog’s discovery criteria — relevance to a tradition, not a judgment of the book’s claims.

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Buy or borrow

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Editions

One edition cataloged here.

Directory of Open Access Books edition

2017—English—Open access

Subjects

6 subject headings

Identifiers & provenance

How this record was assembled, and the authority identifiers it carries.

Identifiers

DOI
DOAB
  • 20.500.12854/47174

Cataloged from

Catalog id
doab:20.500.12854/47174
Edition coverage
Doab source record
Retrieved