AMULETS AND TALISMANS 297
a great poet, a master of language with creative skills who
knows how to use various modes of speech effectively. His
objective is to appeal to his audience. Thus, for instance, in
3:3–6 and 3:8 he utilizes a series of rhetorical questions, a
most effective device since its function is to emphasize, and
it is stronger than a direct statement. Amos’s use of figurative
language enables him to describe the disaster he encounters
in concrete terms; see, for example, his use of simile in 2:13
and 3:12.
The Book of Amos is divided into four main parts: (1)
the superscription plus the chain of oracles against the na-
tions, including Judah and Israel (1:1–2:16); (2) a series of
speeches (chaps. 3–6); (3) the vision accounts (7:1–3, 7:4–6,
7:7–9; 8:1ff., 9:1ff.); and (4) a prophecy of salvation (9:11–
15). It has been suggested that the first three visions are
Amos’s call and should be placed at the beginning of the
book. In the vision (8:1ff.) of the basket of summer fruit
(keluv qayits), the word summer (qayits) is a pun on the word
for “destruction” (qets), which symbolizes the end of Israel.
This wordplay may shed light on the psychology of prophet-
ic revelation, in which the viewing of an object of daily life
is interpreted in a vision or dream as a symbol. The series
of vision accounts is interrupted by a biographical account
(7:10–17), which reports on the conflict between Amaziah,
priest of Bethel, and Amos, in which the priest demands that
Amos go to Judah. In response to the question of why this
account was inserted among the visions, scholars have sug-
gested that the conclusion of Amos’s attack on Amaziah, “Is-
rael shall surely go into exile away from its land” (7:17), cor-
responds to the vision “The end has come upon my people
Israel” (8:2) and that an editor, who some forty years later
witnessed the exile of the priest of Bethel and his people by
the Assyrians, inserted his account of this event as a sign of
prophetic fulfillment.
Nineteenth-century scholarship assigned most of the
material in the Book of Amos to Amos himself (except, per-
haps, the prophecy of comfort at the end of the book). Cur-
rent scholarship, however, is more skeptical and suggests a
lengthy and complex redactional history. It has long been ar-
gued that the book’s conclusion (9:11–15), a prophecy of
comfort focusing on the house of David (and not on the
northern kingdom or its rulers), reflects a later period. The
prophecy against Judah in 2:4–5, which is foreign in its con-
text, is also considered to be late. Recent scholarship has been
attempting to organize the editorial layers in order according
to the occurrence of political developments. Wolff has sug-
gested that six stages of redaction took place, with the first
three stages in the eighth century: the collection of the ora-
cles in chapters 3–6 (the words of Amos himself); the incor-
poration of the oracles directed against the nations at the be-
ginning of the book and the visions at the end of the book;
and the insertion of the prose account of the Bethel episode.
In the fourth stage, in the time of Josiah, the doxologies
(hymns) were added, as well as an elaboration of Amos’s cri-
tique of Bethel and the local cult corresponding to Josiah’s
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION
reform (cf. 2 Kgs. 23:15). Later there was a fifth, Deuterono-
mistic, redaction, which occurred in the exilic period and
added the oracles against Tyre (1:9–10), Edom (1:11–12),
and Judah (2:4–5). Finally, there was a postexilic redaction
that added themes of salvation and eschatology so that the
book would conclude on a positive note. Another suggestion,
by Coote, is that the Book of Amos is the product of three
stages of redaction: (1) the words of judgment by Amos de-
livered against the ruling class; (2) the period of Judah’s re-
form, which added oracles of reinterpretation concerning the
possibility of repentance; and (3) another series of reinterpre-
tations for Judahites who were in exile or who had returned
to the homeland.
These theories of redactional history are nonetheless
speculative, since they consider certain thematic develop-
ments or changes in the genre of prophetic speech to be indi-
cations of later accretions. They assume that changed histori-
cal conditions led to new theological interpretations. This
notion of systematic change and reinterpretation may be
challenged, however, in light of Amos’s intention to appeal
to his audience, which required stylistic and emphatic variety
as well as sensitivity to the audience’s mood. He may some-
times have called for repentance or perhaps delivered an ora-
cle of salvation based upon his overall religious worldview.
Still, this does not mean that Amos was the sole author of
the entire book. There may have been specific insertions
(e.g., 5:13), which, however, do not imply a systematic edito-
rial process.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Coote, R. B. Amos among the Prophets. Philadelphia, 1981.
Kapelrud, Arvid S. Central Ideas in Amos. 2d ed. Oslo, 1961.
Mays, James Luther. Amos: A Commentary. Philadelphia, 1969.
Wolff, Hans Walter. Joel and Amos. Edited by Dean McBride and
translated by Waldemar Janzen. Philadelphia, 1977.
New Sources
Hasel, Gerhard F. Understanding the Book of Amos: Basic Issues in
Current Interpretations. Grand Rapids, Mich., 1991.
Hayes, John Haralson. Amos, the Eighth-Century Prophet: His
Times and His Preaching. Nashville, 1988.
Polley, Max E. Amos and the Davidic Empire: A Socio-historical Ap-
proach. New York, 1989.
Rosenbaum, Stanley Ned. Amos of Israel: A New Interpretation.
[Louvain, Belgium] Macon, Ga., 1990.
Watts, John D. W. Vision and Prophecy in Amos. Macon, Ga.,
1997.
YEHOSHUA GITAY (1987)
Revised Bibliography
AMULETS AND TALISMANS. An amulet is an
object, supposedly charged with magical power, that is car-
ried on the person or displayed in a house, barn, or place of
business in order to ward off misadventure, disease, or the
298 AMULETS AND TALISMANS
assaults of malign beings, demonic or human. A talisman is
an object similarly used to enhance a person’s potentialities
and fortunes. Amulets and talismans are two sides of the
same coin. The former are designed to repel what is baneful;
the latter, to impel what is beneficial. The employment of
both (which is universal) rests on the belief that the inherent
quality of a thing can be transmitted to human beings by
contact.
The choice of objects used as amulets and talismans is
determined by several different criteria. They may be (1) of
unusual form, such as perforated stones; (2) rare, such as
four-leaved clovers; (3) medicinal herbs or flowers, such as
mugwort (thought to ease childbirth) or various kinds of feb-
rifuges; (4) parts of animals exemplifying certain characteris-
tics (for example, of a hare for swiftness or a bull for
strength), or deemed potent in protecting from attacks by
those animals; (5) relics of holy or heroic persons, or even
dust from their graves, regarded as imbued with those per-
sons’ “numinous” charisma; (6) figurines of gods and god-
desses; (7) models of common objects to which a symbolic
significance is attributed, such as miniature ladders exempli-
fying the means of the soul’s ascent to heaven; (8) exotic ob-
jects of foreign provenience, which are held to contain pow-
ers not normally available in a given society. The color of an
object may also be decisive, on the basis of “like affects like”;
a red stone, for instance, may be thought to relieve bloody
flux or menstrual disorders and a yellow stone, to ward off
jaundice. Ubiquitous also are models of the male and female
genitalia, to increase procreation and sexual pleasure, and
threads, to bind evil spirits.
Nor is it only in material things that magical power is
thought to reside. Since, in primitive thought, the name of
a person is not a mere verbal appellation but an essential
component of his being (like his shadow or voice), that of
a god or demon written on a slip or engraved on a gem or
a medallion can serve as an effective amulet or talisman. Sim-
ilarly, a text relating some feat or special benefit, especially
the discomfiture of a demon, dragon, or monster, associated
in traditional myth and folklore with a god or hero, may be
regarded as charged with the power that accomplished that
deed, so that to carry such a text on one’s person transmits
that power and perpetuates it. Scrolls or scripts containing
excerpts from scriptures accepted as divinely inspired and
therefore instinct with the divine essence, or (in medieval
Christian usage) copies of letters said to have fallen from
heaven are likewise favored.
Sometimes, however—especially when an amulet is di-
rected against human rather than demonic enemies—the
procedure adopted is not to enlist the influence and charisma
of gods or “numinous” objects but to scare potential attack-
ers by exhibiting in houses statuettes or figurines of mon-
strous, terrifying creatures. The Babylonians, for instance,
fashioned models of the head and body of the grim demon
Pazuzu, and one form of Greek amulet was the head of a gor-
gon whose eye could petrify would-be assailants.
Of salient importance is the material out of which an
amulet or talisman is made, since the magic power is inher-
ent in, not merely associated with, the object itself. Gems
have to be of substances and colors believed to convey quali-
ties efficacious for particular needs and written texts have to
be inscribed on specified skins and in special inks or
pigments.
Amulets and talismans borne on the person take the
form of ornaments—brooches, lockets, pendants, seals, and
sachets. Indeed, it is maintained by several authorities that
what came eventually to be mere decorations were originally
designed for protection.
A cardinal feature of amulets in many cultures is that
they are esoteric and although, to be sure, they are often ex-
hibited in full view on the walls of rooms and buildings,
when they are carried on the person it is often a requirement
that they must not be revealed to anyone except to the one
who uses them on a specific occasion, to the magicians who
make and dispense them, and to the hostile beings against
whom they are directed. For this reason they are commonly
concealed in the clothing or tucked away in bags or small
cases. Moreover, in the case of written texts, they frequently
employ cryptic alphabets or are couched in gibberish (known
as ephesia grammata—perhaps a distortion of aphasia gram-
mata, i.e., “unutterable letters”), supposed to be the scripts
and languages of gods and demons. (These can sometimes
be identified as genuine ancient scripts and tongues garbled
in the course of the ages.) Signs of the zodiac and conven-
tional symbols of constellations and metals also appear, be-
cause such signs are, like names, part and parcel of what they
represent and because the inherent properties of constella-
tions and metals are believed to control human fate and for-
tune. Common too are permutations of letters spelling out
in esoteric fashion the words of the text. Thus (to use English
equivalents) z will substitute for a, y for b, and so forth. In
much the same way, the initial or final letters of words in a
scriptural verse will be used instead of writing it out in full,
and in alphabetical systems (like Hebrew) where each letter
also possesses a numerical value (i.e., a = l, b = 2, etc.), a com-
bination of letters that add up to the same total as those of
the word intended—a device known as gematria (probably
a distortion of the Greek grammateia)—is employed. (The
Library of Congress possesses the manuscript of a complete
Hebrew Bible so written as a manual for the preparation of
amulets!) A further device is the use of magical squares, each
vertical column and each horizonal line of which adds up to
the same sum, and all of them together spelling by gematria
the name of God or of a protective angel.
The esoteric character of amuletic texts, it may be
added, is matched in oral spells by having them recited in
a whisper or crooned in a low voice. Indeed, this is the prima-
ry meaning of the term incantation.
Written amulets frequently express their numinous
character by beginning with the words “In the name of [this
or that god]” (e.g., the Arabic Bismillah, “In the name of
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION

God, the Merciful, the Compassionate”) and by being inter-
spersed with religious signs (e.g., the cross, swastika, or shield
of David), and their efficacy is increased by marks or letters
(ss or kh) indicating that their recitation is to be accompanied
by hissing and spitting to ward off demons. They also feature
strings of vowel letters standing cryptically for the powers of
angels or planets. Sometimes too the power of a written amu-
let is conveyed not simply by wearing it but by immersing
it in water that is then drunk.
Amulets and talismans seem to have been in use even
in prehistoric times, for cowrie shells, celts, arrowheads, and
stones buried with the dead (a practice surviving throughout
the ages) were evidently intended to protect them in the af-
terworld. Amuletic too were the pictures of eyes painted on
prehistoric walls and monuments; these represented the
providential vigilance of benevolent gods or spirits, counter-
ing the evil eye of the malevolent demons.
It is obviously impossible in the space of this article to
describe in detail the whole host of amulets and talismans
current all over the world. We shall therefore confine our-
selves to representative examples of the principal types drawn
from various cultures ancient and modern.
Historically, the oldest amulets came from Egypt. Dat-
ing as far back as the fourth millennium BCE, these take the
form of images and figurines made of faience, feldspar, car-
nelian, obsidian, jasper, and the like wrapped in the bandages
that swathed mummies. Each limb of the corpse had its ap-
propriate amulet, usually placed over it. In addition to figu-
rines of gods and goddesses there are miniature hearts, eyes
of Horus, frogs, ladders, and steps. The eyes of Horus (usual-
ly a pair), made of gold, silver, lapis lazuli, hematite, or por-
celain, represented the all-powerful might and watchfulness
of that god and were worn also by the living to bring health
and protection. The frog, emblematic of teeming abundance,
symbolized life in the broadest sense, including resurrection
of the body. The miniature ladder stood for the means of as-
cent to heaven. Miniature ladders are still set up beside graves
by the Mangors of Nepal, and a ladder made of dough was
traditionally placed next to coffins in some parts of Russia.
One recalls also Jacob’s ladder in the Bible (Gn. 28:12) and
the reference to the same notion in Dante’s Paradiso
(21.25ff.)
Ubiquitous also was the familiar ankh. What it actually
portrays is uncertain; some say it represents a combination
of the male and female genitalia and hence (eternal) life. It
was carried also in the right hand of deities, where, of course,
it was not amuletic but a symbol of immortality. Scarabs (a
species of beetle) were also interred with the dead. This par-
ticular type of beetle, one that continually rolls pellets of
dung until they become larger and larger, symbolizes the pro-
cess of continuous creation.
Mention should be made also of the so-called Horus
cippi, stelae or plaques inscribed with legends of that god and
portraying him standing on, or beside, serpents he had van-
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION
AMULETS AND TALISMANS 299
quished. A Canaanite version of this myth has recently been
recognized in a Canaanite magical text from Ras Shamra
(Ugarit) in northern Syria. The cippi were displayed to ward
off malign spirits.
Other ancient Near Eastern amulets, common among
the Babylonians, Assyrians, Canaanites, and Hittites, take
the form of cylinder seals, usually made of diorite or hema-
tite, engraved with mythological scenes depicting the dis-
comfiture of demonic monsters by gods or the vanquishing
of the formidable Huwawa, guardian of the sacred forest of
cedars, by the heroes Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Sometimes,
too, pictures of men supplicating gods, the beneficent sun
rising between mountains, or a goddess bountifully pouring
water from two jugs are featured. In interpreting these
“mythological” amulets it is important to bear in mind that
the scenes depicted may be simply mythologizations of gen-
eral principles. Thus the goddess who pours water may be
simply an illustration of bountiful profusion. Often, indeed,
the basic meaning may be elicited by matching the glyptic
portrayal with a corresponding verbal metaphor.
Another popular Mesopotamian and Canaanite amulet
was a plaque portraying the ravages and eventual dispatch of
a demonic hag or wolf who stole newborn babes. This has
analogues in many parts of the world, for example, in Arme-
nia, Ethiopia, and the Balkans, and especially in a Jewish
charm, the so-called Kimpezettl (a Yiddish distortion of the
German Kindbettzettel, “childbirth note”), in which the bel-
dam is identified with Lilith.
Despite the monotheistic orientation of the writers of
the Old Testament, amulets seem to have been used by the
masses in ancient Israel. The prophet Isaiah castigates
women who wore charms (3:20), and a silver amulet in-
scribed with the words of the Priestly Blessing (Nm. 6:24–
27) and purportedly dating to the sixth century BCE has been
found in Palestine. On the other hand, a figurative reference
to amulets in Deuteronomy 6:8 was later taken literally and
led to the modern Jewish practise of affixing to doorposts a
small cylinder (mezuzah) containing excerpts from the Pen-
tateuch and of wearing phylacteries (tefillin) on the brow and
arm at morning prayer.
More modern Jewish amulets are the hexagram, fanci-
fully termed the shield, not star, of David. This, however,
is simply a Judaized version of a magical symbol of disputed
meaning that is widely used elsewhere. Its counterpart is the
equally universal pentagram, known to Jews as the seal of
Solomon. Common too are metal amulets in the shape of
the divine hand (likewise fairly universal), often engraved
with the letter h, an abbreviation of JeHovah. A favorite writ-
ten amulet is a strip of paper on which is inscribed the legend
“Abracadabra” (variously interpreted) in a series of lines, each
of which has one more letter cut off at the end, so that the
whole forms an inverted triangle ending with the single letter
a. In recent times a further popular amulet is a golden pen-
dant or brooch shaped in the form of the letters of the He-
brew word h: ai (“life, living”).
300 AMULETS AND TALISMANS
Of special interest is a class of gems or semiprecious
stones (sard, beryl, chalcedony, onyx, etc.) found mainly in
Egypt of the Greco-Roman period (but later also in other
lands), featuring fantastic images—often part human and
part animal—of Egyptian and other gods accompanied by
magical inscriptions such as the mysterious “Ablalhanalba,”
which is said to be a distorted palindrome of the Hebrew
phrase “Av lanu [Aram., lan] attah,” “Thou art a father to
us.” Prominent among the deities depicted is a certain Abrax-
as (or Abrasax), who is an important figure in the teachings
of the Gnostics. These have therefore been termed Gnostic
amulets, but the attribution is increasingly questioned by
modern scholars. When these amulets came to be current in
Christian circles the mysterious name Ablalhanalba was ex-
plained as equivalent by gematria to Jesus.
In many countries, written amulets are more common
than any other. Among Muslims, for instance, the most pop-
ular type is a small case containing excerpts from the QurDān
or a list of the ninety-nine epithets of God. The Copts use
pictures illustrating the defeat of a monster by Saint George
of Lydda, and the Ethiopians, scrolls relating the praises of
the Virgin Mary, or grotesque representations of the divine
eye or face. This, however, by no means precludes the use
of ornamental amulets. Christians most often carry minia-
ture crosses or crucifixes, but equally common is the written
legend “Sator Arepo,” which is really “Paternoster” spelled
cryptically.
The Japanese use, besides relics, two forms of amulet
that deserve mention. One of these is an image, painted on
pillows, of an animal who swallows bad dreams. The other
amulet is a pair of dead sardines affixed to a stick of holly
at the entrance to a house to keep away noxious spirits at the
annual festival of Setsubun. (This finds a parallel in the use
of garlic elsewhere.)
The use of colors in amulets is influenced also in medi-
eval magic by the belief that they carry the charisma of the
sun, moon, and the seven planets. Thus, yellow stones
(amber, topaz) bear the “influence” of the sun; whitish stones
(diamond, mother-of-pearl), of the moon; red stones (ruby),
of Mars; green stones (emerald), of Venus; black stones (jet,
onyx, obsidian), of Saturn; and so forth. Moreover, each
stone “controlled” a specific condition. Agate, in Italy, is
deemed efficacious against the evil eye, and in Syria against
intestinal disorders. Crystal cures dropsy and toothache; dia-
mond neutralizes poisons and also averts thunderstorms.
Furthermore, gems promote human passions and affections.
Beryl gives hope; carbuncle, energy and assurance; ruby,
love; and of coral it is said that it fades when a friend dies.
There is also a stone for every month, and these are often fea-
tured in brooches inscribed with zodiacal signs portraying a
person’s horoscope.
Lastly, with regard to the use of exotic objects as amulets
and talismans, a curious fact is worth mentioning. Many
years ago the present writer had occasion to examine a num-
ber of ceremonial costumes worn by African shamans and
found that several of them included a pouch worn on the
breast. Opening these, he discovered that their contents con-
sisted mainly of European hairpins, scissors, cigarette butts,
London omnibus tickets, and similar foreign paraphernalia
deemed magical.
Like myths and popular tales, the actual forms of amu-
lets migrate from one culture to another as the result of trade
relations, conquests, importation of captives, intermarriage,
voyages, and the like, but new meanings are then read into
them in order to accommodate them to the beliefs and tradi-
tional lore of those who adopt them. Thus (as we have said)
the hexagram became to Jews the shield of David, the cross
to Christians a symbol of Christ, and the dung-rolling beetle
(heper) to the Egyptians the emblem of the creator god Hep-
era and the pellet as the orb of the sun that he rolled across
the sky. It is necessary, therefore, in interpreting these vehi-
cles of magic, to get behind such particular local explanations
of them and to attempt to recover their underlying, sublimi-
nal significance. This approach, however, is inevitably
fraught with the perils of subjectivism and has led, indeed,
to any number of psychological fantasies and absurdities. But
abusus non tollit usum; a spurious coin does not invalidate
currency, and the basic nature of amulets will never be un-
derstood unless the attempt is made to do so.
SEE ALSO Images; Relics; Stones.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
For English readers the most serviceable survey and discussion is
E. A. W. Budge’s Amulets and Talismans (reprint, New Hyde
Park, N.Y., 1961), originally entitled Amulets and Supersti-
tions. Useful also is Frederick Thomas Elworthy’s The Evil
Eye (New York, 1970), although this work tends at times to
go too far afield and to indulge in untenable theories. C. W.
King’s The Gnostics and Their Remains, Ancient and Mediae-
val, 2d ed. (London, 1881), gives a good survey of the
“Abrascas” and kindred amulets, but it is a bit antiquated in
its interpretations. Arabic amulets are treated fully in Edward
W. Lane’s classic An Account of the Manners and Customs of
the Modern Egyptians, 5th ed. (New York, 1973), and in Ed-
mond Doutté’s Magie et religion dans l’Afrique du Nord (Al-
giers, 1909). Jewish amulets are discussed in Joshua Trach-
tenberg’s Jewish Magic and Superstition (1939; New York,
1982).
New Sources
Blair, Nancy. Amulets of the Goddess: Oracle of Ancient Wisdom.
Oakland, Calif., 1993.
Fulghum, Mary Margaret. “Coins Used as Amulets in Late Antiq-
uity.” In Between Magic and Religion. See pages 139–147.
Lanham, Mass., 2001.
Leland, Charles Godfrey. Etruscan Roman Remains and the Old Re-
ligion: Gods, Goblins, Divination and Amulets (1892). Lon-
don and New York, 2002.
Tambiah, Stanley J. Buddhist Saints of the Forest and the Cult of
Amulets. Cambridge, U.K., 1984.
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION