In Blood and Ashes: Curse Tablets and Binding Spells in Ancient Greece 9780197517789, 9780197517802, 0197517781

Table of contents :
Cover
In Blood and Ashes
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
Preface
List of Figures
List of Maps
Abbreviations and Conventions
Epigraphic Conventions
Introduction: Magic and Curses in Ancient Greece
PART ONE: The Beginnings of Greek Curse- Writing Rituals
1. Sicilian Beginnings
2. Why Western Sicily?
PART TWO: The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500–250 bce
3. The Spread and Diversification of Curse Practice: Three Case Studies
4. Athenian Curse Practice
PART THREE: Orality and Text: Curse Practice in the Realm of Binding Spells and Arai
5. In Blood and Ashes
6. Public Imprecations and Private Curse-​Writing
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

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In Blood and Ashes

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In Blood and Ashes Curse Tablets and Binding Spells in Ancient Greece

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JESSICA L. LAMONT

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Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2023 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data Names: Lamont, Jessica L., author. Title: In blood and ashes : curse tablets and binding spells in ancient Greece / Jessica L. Lamont. Description: New York, NY, United States of America : Oxford University Press, [2023] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022029978 (print) | LCCN 2022029979 (ebook) | ISBN 9780197517789 (hardback) | ISBN 9780197517802 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Incantations, Greek. | Blessing and cursing—Greece—History—To 1500. Classification: LCC BF1558 .L36 2023 (print) | LCC BF1558 (ebook) | DDC 133.4/4—dc23/eng/20221103 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022029978 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022029979 DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.001.0001 Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America

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To Jaime

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Contents

Preface

ix

List of Figures

xiii

List of Maps

xix

Abbreviations and Conventions

xxi

Epigraphic Conventions

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Introduction: Magic and Curses in Ancient Greece

1

PART ONE: The Beginnings of Greek Curse-​Writing Rituals

1. Sicilian Beginnings

19

2. Why Western Sicily?

55

PART T WO : The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500–​250 bce

3. The Spread and Diversification of Curse Practice: Three Case Studies 4. Athenian Curse Practice

81 134

PART THREE: Orality and Text: Curse Practice in the Realm

of Binding Spells and Arai 5. In Blood and Ashes

191

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Contents

6. Public Imprecations and Private Curse-​Writing

224

Conclusion

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Notes

267

Bibliography

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Index

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ix

Preface

This book began as a small side project, a matter of transcribing some inscribed tablets one summer in Athens. What drew me in deeper were the voices that these objects capture, and their potential for expanding modern understandings of daily life, religion, and social history in Classical antiquity. The project presents a broad set of narratives: readers encounter an amphora seller and barber in the Athenian Agora, a helmsman transporting enslaved persons in the northern Black Sea, a wealthy sponsor of choragic competitions in coastal Sicily, and a female garland weaver in Roman Corinth. This book illuminates how individuals were managing conflict, competition, and vulnerability in ancient Greek communities, and engaging with the gods, the dead, and the Underworld in rites meant to change the present and future course of events. This project has been a joy to research and write, and has left its author with many debts of gratitude along the way. The first round of thanks goes to the institutions that have funded this work financially, especially Yale University and the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Gratitude for fellowship support extends to the National Endowment for the Humanities (2018–​9), the Phi Beta Kappa Society (Mary Isabel Sibley Fellowship in Greek Studies, 2019), the German Archaeological Institute (Berlin, summer 2022), the Fondation Hardt pour l’Étude de l’Antiquité Classique (2017) and, over several years, Yale’s Morse Faculty Fellowship program, Griswold Research Grant program, and Hilles Publication Fund. It is a pleasure to thank colleagues in the Department of Classics at Yale University for their support and encouragement over the past six years: you’ve all provided an inspiring, sparkling intellectual community that has pushed me to become the best version of my academic self. Thank you to my fellow ancient historians: Joe Manning, Andrew Johnston, and Noel Lenski. I am excited for this book to sit alongside yours, and to add a new research dimension to our vibrant Ancient History cohort. Thank you too to Emily Greenwood

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Preface

(now at Harvard), Chris Kraus, and Kirk Freudenburg, who as departmental Chairs have provided much support and assistance along the way. It was also under Yale’s roof that some great friendships have been forged: thanks to Andrew Johnston, Laura Nasrallah, Luke Bender, Arnaud Besson, and especially Giulia Oskian, friend and co-​adventurer extraordinaire, for your kindness, humor, and company. I am grateful to have discussed ideas and chapter drafts over the years with colleagues and friends, whose feedback or other forms of support have helped shape the present volume: Celia Sánchez Natalías, Andrew Ward, Daniel Ogden, Chris Atkins, Susan Rotroff, Bob Lamberton, Chris Kraus, Alexey Belousov, Madalina Dana, Irene Polinskaya, John Camp, Daniel Schwemer, Angelos Zarkadas, Jenifer Neils, Joseph Day, Silvia Montiglio, Gareth Schmeling, Laura Garofalo, Dustin Dixon, Sarah Derbew, Aspasia Efstathiou, Sylvie Dumont, and Craig Mauzy. The volume’s cover was designed by Case Jernigan, and most maps were created by Joe Morgan: thank you both. We come now to the deepest strata of gratitude—​those scholars, mentors, and friends whom I have been exceptionally lucky to have chanced upon in life, and whose support, time, and guidance have sustained me throughout this project: Chris Faraone (without whose work and input much of this project would have been unimaginable), Denise Demetriou (wonderful friend and patient mentor), Alan Shapiro, Ivana and Andrej Petrovic, Sarah Morris, and Jaime Curbera (whose generosity, thoughtfulness, and brilliance have taught me much about curse tablets, and who has improved many aspects of this book with his drawings and feedback). Thank you: I am so grateful to each of you for your kindness and company. I am also lucky to be able to thank some dear friends, who, existing outside the orbit of my work life, have enriched and preserved me over the years. Thank you for standing by my side, and for your love, humor, encouragement, patience, and positivity, from my senior thesis to the day that this book was published: Leigh Tally, Christina Brown Paluvai, Jed Talvacchia, Jonathan Welle, Dan Irish, Hannah Ayers, Summer Marion, Kelley Quinn, Samantha Fien-​Helfman, Amber Roberts, Michael Woolslayer, Lisa Tullo, Bryan Terrill, and Rosh Patel. Finally, I am so grateful to my parents, Eric and MaryLaura, and to the rest of my family, Caleb (Cay-​Cay), Maureen, Raul, Diego, and Liz, for your company and support. Georgia Bountouraki: you are more than a friend and have been present from the beginning of this project, and offered so much help and good cheer along the way, from the Blegen Library to the Outer Hebrides. Lastly, and most importantly, to Miguel: thank you for living with this project and all of its

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Preface

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highs and lows, and for your endless positivity, humor, patience, and goodness over the years. You have sustained me through everything, and made the journey itself so pleasant. Our son Jaime, to whom the book is dedicated, entered the world midway through this project, and has immensely enriched the lives of all surrounding him ever since.

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List of Figures

I.1

I.2

I.3

I.4

I.5

1.1 1.2

1.3

View of the Parthenon from the Propylaea, Athens, 1805 Simone Pomardi (1757–​1830) Sepia, 21 5/​8 × 29 1/​8 in. The Packard Humanities Institute VEX.2015.1.30. Image courtesy of Packard Humanities Institute. Drawing of curse tablet I.2 (DTAud 49), early third century bce. Athens National Archaeological Museum, Inv. 9331. Drawing by J. Curbera. Drawing of a bound, nailed, and decapitated lead effigy, fourth or third century bce, ht. 6 cm, once in the private collection of Richard Wünsch (after drawing in Wünsch 1902). Four views of the lead curse effigy of Theophrastos (a–​d) and lead collar once around the neck of the effigy (e), early fourth century bce, figurine ht. 10.2 cm, Vitsi necropolis, Paros (roof-​tile grave). Paros Archaeological Museum B 5984, excav. 1983. Photograph by author. Drawing of lead curse tablet HA26825 from Himera (WS 1507), in which a recumbent Echekrateia is depicted as bound and overcome by Menekrates. Drawing by author, from Brugnone, Calascibetta, Vassallo 2020, 107, Fig. 21. Tablet 1.1 (CDS 20), A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. no. 42568. Drawing by J. Curbera. Map of Selinous with Gaggera Hill (left), Modione river, central acropolis (lower center), the eastern hill (right), Manuzza necropolis, and Buffa necropolis (upper right). Map from A. Mazza 2021, Fig. 2. Tablet 1.2 (CDS 15). From Selinous’s Buffa necropolis, c. 500 bce. A. Salinas Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42578. Photograph from T. Sommerschield 2019, 489, Fig. 1. Drawing by J. Curbera.

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11 20

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1.4

1.5

1.6

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1.8

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1.10 2 .1 2.2 3.1 3.2

3.3

3.4

3.5 3.6

List of Figures

Tablet 1.7 (CDS 26). From region of the Malophoros Precinct, 500–​450 bce. A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. No. 42564. Drawing from Gabrici 1927, 393, Fig. 184. Tablet 1.9 (CDS 14). Purportedly from Selinous, 500–​450 bce. Würzburg, Martin-​von-​Wagner Museum, Inv. K2099. Drawing from Curbera 1999, 166. Plan of Demeter Malophoros sanctuary, Campo di Stele, Zeus Meilichios shrine, and Hekate shrine on Selinous’s western Gaggera Hill. From Gabrici 1927, Pl. 2. (a) Twin Stele in Greek and Punic Style from Selinous’s Campo di Stele, c. 600 bce; A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. No. 5686. After Gabrici 1927, Pl.28.3. (b) Campo di Stele from the south, Selinous’s western Gaggera Hill. Photograph from Stallsmith 2019, Fig. 5. Tablet 1.10 (CDS 21). From region of the Malophoros and Meilichios Precincts, early fifth century bce. A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. No. 42567. Drawing from Gabrici 1927, 388, Fig. 181a–​b. Tablet 1.13 (CDS 24), 475–​450 bce. A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42566. Drawing of CDS 24 by J. Curbera. Tablet 1.14, Sicily, fifth century bce. Yale University, Beinecke Library Inv. 1242. Photograph by author. Map of Sicily. Map created by Joseph Morgan. The Getty Hexameters (SEG 64.830), Getty Museum, Malibu 81.AI.140.2. Open Content Program. Map of southern Italy and Sicily. Map created by Joseph Morgan. Tablet 3.1 (Petelia 2, Crawford 2011). From Petelia, Lucania (Italy), c. 300 bce. Museo Archaeologico Nazionale di Crotone. Drawing of tablet from McDonald 2015, 159. Petelia Gold Tablet, with an Orphic inscription and the pendant case that contained it. Late fourth century bce. British Museum 256193001, © The Trustees of the British Museum. Tablet 3.2 (Laos 2, Crawford 2011). From Laos, Lucania (Italy), 330–​320 bce. Reggio Calabria, Museo Nazionale 24/​10/​05 (MHC, UR). Drawing of tablet from Murano 2013, 256 Tav. XX. Tablet 3.3 (Lilybaeum, Sicily), late third century bce. Museo Baglio Anselmi, Marsala, Inv. 1647. Drawing from Jordan 1997a, 393. Map of the northern Black Sea (by author).

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3.7

3.8 3.9

3.10

3.11 3.12 3.13 4.1

4.2

4.3

4.4

4.5

List of Figures

Tablet 3.4 (DefOlb 14), 400–​375 bce. Archaeological Museum of Odessa (Ukraine), Inv. 44409. Drawing and photograph from Belousov 2020, Fig. 24, 25. Tablet 3.5 (DefOlb 2, DTAud 88), 400–​350 bce. Olbia. Photograph from Petropoli 1894, no. 29, tab. VI. Ceramic Curse Bowl 3.7, 400–​350 bce. Large tumulus, necropolis of Olbia. State Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia: Ол. 3802. Photograph and drawing from Polinskaya 2021, 145, Fig. 2. Tablet 3.9 ( Jordan 1997b, 217; DefOlb 21), fourth century bce. Necropolis of Olbia. Drawing by N. E. Макаренко, in Shkorpil 1908, no. 3. Map of the northwest Aegean and the Kingdom of Macedon. Map created by Joseph Morgan. Tablet 3.13 (Curbera and Jordan 2003, no. 5,), fourth century bce. Makrygialos cemetery, plot 480. Drawing by J. Curbera. Tablet 3.16 (Curbera 2017, no. 6), third or second century bce. Boeotia. Drawing by J. Curbera. Pair of cast-​lead curse effigies, depicting Semiades and Mynno; inscriptions read “Semiades has been bound” (Σημιάδης καταδέδεται), and “Mynno has been bound” (Μυννώ καταδέδεται). Recovered from a low, tumulus-​like mound adjacent to a Classical offering trench in Athens’ Kynosarges cemetery. Photograph from Th. Eliopoulos 2021, 58, Fig. 5. Long lead curse band wrapped around the abdomen of infant (HA 9906), found in early fifth-​century grave (T. W156) in Himera. Photograph from Brugnone, Calascibetta, and Vassallo 2020, 102, Figs 7–​8. Tablet 4.1 (Curbera and Lamont 2023, no. 1), later fifth to early fourth century bce. Found beneath floor of Tholos, Athenian Agora; Athenian Agora Inv. IL 669. Photograph by C. Mauzy, drawing by J. Curbera. Tablet 4.2, fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 48), in shaft grave with sarcophagus, at fingertips of skeleton’s left hand. Drawing by J. Curbera. Tablet 4.3, c. 410–​400 bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 10), embankments of Hegeso and Potamian Districts. Drawing by J. Curbera.

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107 117 119 127

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4.6

4.7

4.8

4.9

4.10

4.11 4.12

4.13

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List of Figures

Tablet 4.5, early fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 8), embankments in region of Potamian and Hegeso precincts. Photograph from DAI Athens, Kerameikos Archaeological Museum. Drawing by J. Curbera. 156 Tablet 4.6 (Curbera and Papakonstantinou 2018, no. 1), early fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 24–​42), precinct south of the Sacred Way, Grave SA 40. Drawing by J. Curbera. 158 Grave of Lissos, Kerameikos cemetery, c. 410–​390 bce. (a) Archaeological cross-​section of graves, and (b) photograph of grave of Lissos, from DAI Athens, Kerameikos Archaeological Museum. 159 (a) Lead coffin encasing effigy from grave of Lissos, Kerameikos Archaeological Museum, Inv. IB 5. Kerameikos, fill above graves of Lissos and Eupheros. Photographs from Stroszeck 2019a, and DAI Athens, Kerameikos Archaeological Museum. (b) Inscribed lead sheet and effigy against Theozotides and others (Tablet 4.7), Kerameikos Archaeological Museum, Inv. IB 3. Drawing by J. Curbera. 161 Tablet 4.8, fourth century bce. Found in Sanctuary of Palaimon-​Pankrates, near Ilissos River. Plato’s Academy Inv. D 17801. Photograph by J. Vanderpool; drawing by J. Curbera. 165 Crossroads enclosure and well. Drawing from Athenian Agora Excavations. 167 Tablet 4.9 (Curbera and Lamont 2023, no. 4), c. 350 bce. Found in Crossroads Well ( J 5:1), Athenian Agora Inv. IL 1713. Photograph by C. Mauzy; drawing by J. Curbera. 168 (a) Typical Attic pyre deposit, Pyre 7, 375–​350 bce, Rotroff 2013, 110: Plates, skyphoi, cup-​skyphos, lebes, ribbon-​handled plate, bowl, lopadion, chytridion, plate, lekanis, saucers, lopadion lid. Photograph by C. Mauzy, Athenian Agora Excavations. (b) Typical Attic pyre deposit, Pyre 7, 375–​350 bce, Rotroff 2013, 110: shown in situ in Room 2 of the Classical Commercial Building, just north of Agora square. Photograph courtesy of Athenian Agora Excavations. 171 (a, b) Tablet 4.10 ( Jordan and Rotroff 1999, 148), late fourth century bce. (c, d) Domestic structure and probable pyre chytridion in which 4.10 was deposited on lower slopes of Areopagus, probably a private house. Athenian Agora Inv. IL 1504. Courtesy of Athenian Agora Excavations. 173

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4.15

4.16

5.1

5.2

5.3

C.1

C.2

C.3

C.4

List of Figures

Curse 4.11 (Lamont 2021a), c. 300 bce. Found in Athenian Agora excavations, Classical Commercial Building. (a) Excavation of Agora Inv. P35446: chytra in situ in Room 6 of Classical Commercial Building. (b) Chytra curse assemblage. (c) Chicken bones found inside nailed chytra (d) Drawing of text Groups I (Vertical List of Names), II, III: Underside of Agora Inv. P35446 (drawing by A. Hooten, with additions by author) (e) Small bronze coin on iron nailhead (Agora IL 2010). Tablet 4.10 (Curbera 2016a, no.1), 400–​350 bce. Athenian Kerameikos, graveside offering pit in Eckterrasse. Photograph courtesy of Kerameikos Archaeological Museum, Inv. IB 25. Drawing by J. Curbera. Tablet 5.2 (Lamont 2021b, no. 2), c. 375 bce. Athens, Agios Ioannis Rentis: Pyre-​grave enclosure. Piraeus Archaeological Museum, Inv. ΜΠ 11949. Photograph and drawing by author. Tablet 5.3 (Lamont 2021b, no. 3), c. 375 bce. Athens, Agios Ioannis Rentis: Pyre-​grave enclosure. Piraeus Archaeological Museum, Inv. ΜΠ 11950. Photograph and drawing by author. Tablet 5.6 (DTWünsch 108), later fourth century bce. Attica. Athens National Archaeological Museum. Drawing by J. Curbera. (a) Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore on slopes of Acrocorinth. Photograph courtesy of Museum of Ancient Corinth, American School of Classical Studies. (b) Plan of Room 7, Building of the Curse Tablets (Building K) in the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore. Drawing by D. Peck, courtesy of Museum of Ancient Corinth, American School of Classical Studies. Curse tablets C.1, lead tablets cursing Karpime Babbia; Corinth Museum, MF 1969 294/​5. Photograph by I. Ioannidou and L. Bartzioti; drawing by R. Stroud 2014, 198, Fig. 10.8, courtesy of Museum of Ancient Corinth, American School of Classical Studies. Curse Tablet C.2 (Bevilacqua and Colacicchi 2009, Side A), c. 50–​100 ce. Via Ostiense, Rome: found in a region of graves, near via Benedetto Bompiani. Drawing and photograph from Bevilacqua 2009, Fig. 1. Curse from the spring of Anna Perenna in the form of a wax anthropomorphic figurine wrapped in the coils of a serpent. Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Roma, Inv. number 475550. Photograph courtesy of C. Sánchez Natalías, from Sánchez Natalías 2015, 198, Fig. 1.

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C.5

List of Figures

Late Antique Latin curse against a veterinarian named Porcellus, with a sketch of the victim bound (“mummified”) beneath the invoked deity, from whose head snakes radiate. Bologna 1 & 3: Photograph and drawing by C. Sánchez Natalías. 263

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List of Maps

Map of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, with major regions and places mentioned in the text. Map created by Joseph Morgan Map of Sicily (Figure 2.1). Map created by Joseph Morgan Map of southern Italy and Sicily (Figure 3.1). Map created by Joseph Morgan Map of the northern Black Sea (Figure 3.6, by author) Map of the northwest Aegean and the Kingdom of Macedon (Figure 3.11). Map created by Joseph Morgan

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Abbreviations and Conventions

In general, I prefer Greek spellings of places, authors, and personal names (especially in transcriptions and translations from inscribed texts), except in cases in which the Latinized spelling is more established or feels less awkward (hence Kerameikos, Hekate, but also Cassander, Corinth, etc.). In translations of Greek inscriptions, some of which are given here in English for the first time, I have tried to stay close to the Greek while still remaining intelligible to a wider readership (ἐΣκαμβωνιδῶν, “of the deme Skambonidai”). The few unaccented Greek personal names are names with two attested but gender-dependent accentuations, and I omit accents so as to not exclude either possibility. For abbreviations of ancient authors and their works, please refer to The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 4th ed. (2012), edited by S. Hornblower, A. Spawforth, and E. Eidinow; for journal abbreviations, see L’Année Philologique; other abbreviations used are listed below. Agora XII Agora XV Agora XVI Agora XXI Agora XXIX

Agora XXXIII AIO

Sparkes, B. A., and L. Talcott. 1970. Black and Plain Pottery of the 6th, 5th and 4th Centuries B.C. Princeton, NJ. Meritt, B. D., and J. Traill. 1974. Inscriptions: The Athenian Councilors. Princeton, NJ. Woodhead, A. G. 1974. Inscriptions: The Decrees. Princeton, NJ. Lang, M. L. 1976. Graffiti and Dipinti. Princeton, NJ. Rotroff, S. I. 1997. Hellenistic Pottery: Athenian and Imported Wheelmade Tableware and Related Materials. Princeton, NJ. Rotroff, S. I. 2006. Hellenistic Pottery: The Plain Wares. Princeton, NJ. Lambert, S., ed. Attic Inscriptions Online. https://​www. atticinscriptions.com/​.

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APF ARV2 BAPD CDS CGRN

CEG CIG CMAwR CVA DefOlb DTAud

DTM

DTWünsch EA EBGR FGrH GHI GHI GVCyr

Abbreviations and Conventions

Davies, J. K. 1971. Athenian Propertied Families, 600–​300 B.C. Oxford. Beazley, J. D. 1968. Attic Red-​Figure Vase-​Painters. 2 vols. Oxford. Beazley Archive Pottery Database. http://​www.beazley. ox.ac.uk. Bettarini, L. 2005. Corpus delle defixiones di Selinunte. Alessandria. Carbon, J. M., S. Peels, and V. Pirenne-​Delforge. A Collection of Greek Ritual Norms, Liège. http://​cgrn.ulg. ac.be. Hansen, P. A. 1983. Carmina Epigraphica Graeca. Berlin and New York. Boeckh, A., ed. 1828–​43. Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum. 4 vols. Berlin. Abusch, I. T., and D. Schwemer. 2011–​20. Corpus of Mesopotamian Anti-​witchcraft Rituals. Leiden and Boston. Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum. Belousov, A. 2020. Defixiones Olbiae Ponticae. Moscow. Audollent, A. 1904. Defixionum tabellae quotquot innotuerunt tam in Graecis Orientis quam in totius Occidentis partibus praeter Atticas in C.I.A. editas. Paris. Blänsdorf, J. 2012. Die Defixionum Tabellae des Mainzer Isis-​und Mater Magna Heiligtums: Defixionum Tabellae Mogontiacenses. Mainz. Wünsch, R. 1897. Defixionum Tabellae Atticae. Berlin. Epigraphica Anatolica Chaniotis, A., et al. 1987–​. Epigraphical Bulletin for Greek Religion. Jacoby, F. 1923–​. Fragmente der griechischen Historiker. Berlin. Osborne, R., and P. J. Rhodes. 2018. Greek Historical Inscriptions: 478–​404 B.C. New York. Rhodes, P.J., and R. Osborne. 2007. Greek Historical Inscriptions, 404–​323 BC. Oxford. Greek Verse Inscriptions of Cyrenaica.

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HPN IG IGASM IGDOP IGDS IPArk IvO Kerameikos XIV K-​A Kropp LfgrE LGPN

LSAM LSJ

LVG ML

NGSL NTDA

Abbreviations and Conventions

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Bechtel, F. [1917] 1982. Die historischen Personennamen des Griechischen bis zur Kaiserzeit. Halle. Inscriptiones Graecae. 1873–​. Berlin. Arena, R. 1989. Iscrizioni greche arcaiche di Sicilia e Magna Grecia. Milan. Dubois, L. 1996. Inscriptions grecques dialectales d’Olbia du Pont. Genève. Dubois, L. [1989] 2008. Inscriptions grecques dialectales de Sicile. Genève. Thür, G., and H. Taeuber, eds. 1994. Prozessrechtliche Inschriften der griechischen poleis: Arkadien. Wien Dittenberger, W., and K. Purgold. 1896. Die Inschriften von Olympia. Olympia 5. Berlin. Kovacsovics, W. K. 1990. Die Eckterrasse an der Graberstrasse des Kerameikos. Berlin. Kassel, R., and C. Austin, eds. 1983. Poetae Comici Graeci. Berlin and New York. Kropp, A. 2008. Defixiones: Ein aktuelles Corpus lateinischer Fluchtafeln. Speyer. Snell, B., et al. 1955–​. Lexikon des frühgriechischen Epos. Fraser, P. M., and E. Matthews, eds. 1987–​2005. A Lexicon of Greek Personal Names I (1987); II (1994); III A (1997); III B (2000); IV (2005). Sokolowski, F. 1955. Lois sacrées de l’Asie Mineure. Paris. Liddell and Scott, Greek-​English Lexicon, 9th ed., rev. H. Stuart Jones. 1925–​40; Suppl. by E. A. Barber and others, 1968. P. Radici Colace, Lexicon Vasorum Graecorum, Vols. 1–​5, 1992–​2005. Pisa. Meiggs, R., and D. Lewis. [1969] 1988. A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions to the End of the Fifth Century B.C. Oxford. Lupu, E. 2005. Greek Sacred Law: A Collection of New Documents. Leiden. López Jimeno, M. A. 1999. Nuevas tabellae defixionis Áticas. Amsterdam.

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NGCT OGS PA PGM P. Oxy. RIG RE

SECir

SEG SGD

SGDI SM Syll3 TDSG Tod UPZ

Abbreviations and Conventions

Jordan, D. 2000. “New Greek Curse Tablets (1985–​2000).” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 40: 5–​46. Masson, O. 1990. Onomastica Graeca Selecta I–​II. Kirchner, J. 1901–​3. Prosopographia Attica. Berlin. Preisendanz, K., and A. Henrichs, eds. 1973–​4. Papyri Graecae Magicae: Die Griechischen Zauberpapyri. Stuttgart. The Oxyrhynchus Papyri. 1898–​. London. Recueil des inscriptions gauloises. I–​IV, París 1985–​98. Pauly, A., G. Wissowa, et al., eds. 1893–​1980. Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft. Stuttgart. Oliverio, G., G. Pugliese Carratelli, and D. Morelli, eds. “Supplemento Epigrafico Cirenaico.” ASAA 39/​40 [1961/​ 1962] (1963) 219–​375. Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum. 1923–​. Leiden. Jordan, D. 1985. “A Survey of Greek Defixiones Not Included in the Special Corpora.” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 26: 151–​97. Collirz, H. 1884–​1915. Sammlung der Griechischen Dialekt-​ Inschriften. Göttingen. Daniel, R., and F. Maltomini. 1990–​2. Supplementum Magicum. Cologne. Dittenberger, W., ed. 1915–​24. Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum, 3rd ed. Leipzig. López Jimeno, M. A. 1991. Las tabellae defixionis de la Sicilia griega. Amsterdam. Tod, M. N, ed. 1946. A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions to the End of the Fifth Century BC. Oxford. Wilcken, U. Urkunden der Ptolemäerzeit 1 (1922–​7), 2 (1957).

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Epigraphic Conventions

The inscriptions in this book reproduce the conventions of the cited edition. Many texts were edited by using the Leiden Conventions, a system of markers or sigla used to indicate the condition of an epigraphic text and the emendations or restorations made by an editor. A general overview of these epigraphic conventions is provided here, though readers should consult the given edition in individual cases. My intent in supplying Greek text is to allow a closer engagement with particular features of the language, usually without providing new editions myself. As possible, I have selected recent editions that were produced by autopsy (see discussion in Chapter 4 of the new edition of Attic curse tablets, IG II/​III3 8, Curbera forth., and its consultation here for select texts). Readers wishing to delve more deeply into earlier bibliography should consult the cited reference edition; for reasons of space and broader readability, earlier editions have been omitted for most inscriptions, but, when other readings are discussed, bibliographies are provided in footnotes. Siglum [αβ] {αβ} 〈αβ〉 (αβ) ⟦αβ⟧ α̣β̣ αβ

[.c.3. .] ...

Meaning Letters restored by editor as having once been inscribed, but now lost Superfluous letters added erroneously by scribe and excised by editor Letters added by editor that the scribe has either omitted, or for which he erroneously inscribed other letters Letters that complete words left out of, or abbreviated by, the text Letters deliberately erased in antiquity Letters of which sufficient traces remain to print them in the text but not enough to exclude other possible readings Letters seen by an earlier editor but no longer visible Lost letters approximating the number of dots for which no restoration is proposed Lost letters for which the editor proposes a number but no reading

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—​ v vacat +​ +​ →← \ /​ a ? ΒΑΔΓ

Epigraphic Conventions

Lost letters of an uncertain number One uninscribed letter-​space The remainder of the line has been left uninscribed Traces of letters visible, but impossible to recognize what they are Denotes the direction in which each line of text runs Letter inserted by scribe Indicates uncertainty in text Letters intentionally scrambled by scribe

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Map of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, with major regions and places mentioned in the text. Map created by Joseph Morgan.

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1

Introduction: Magic and Curses in Ancient Greece

In 1805 ce, Edward Dodwell and the artist Simone Pomardi traveled across the Ottoman-​controlled Greek mainland producing a series of chronicles, watercolors, and drawings of landscapes dotted with classical ruins (Figure I.1).1 In the captive Greek countryside, Dodwell saw the grandeur of a far nobler past: I beheld the native soil of the great men whom I had so often admired; of the poets, historians, and orators, whose works I had perused with delight, and to whom Europe has been indebted for so much of her high sentiment, and her intellectual cultivation. I gazed upon the region which had produced so many artists of unrivalled excellence, whose works are still admired as the models of perfection, and the standards of taste.2 Dodwell’s work fueled the appetites of European philhellenes, and breathed new life into a classical revival eager to celebrate these “models of perfection.” Yet while drawing an ancient tomb outside of Athens’s city walls, Dodwell chanced upon two women whose actions struck him as quite removed from the “intellectual cultivation” of Greek antiquity: While I was drawing the outside of this sepulchral chamber, two Turkish women arriving seemed much disconcerted at my presence. . . . One of the women then placed herself on the outside for fear I should intrude, while the other entered; and after she had remained there about ten minutes, they both went away together; warning me at my peril not to enter the cave! The Greek who was with me said he was certain they had been performing magic ceremonies, as the cavern was haunted by the Μοιραι, or

In Blood and Ashes. Jessica L. Lamont, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.003.0001

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Figure I.1  View of the Parthenon from the Propylaea, Athens, 1805 Simone Pomardi (1757–​1830). Sepia, 21 5/​8 × 29 1/​8 in. The Packard Humanities Institute VEX.2015.1.30. Image courtesy of Packard Humanities Institute.

Destinies: nothing would have tempted him to enter, and when I was going in, he threw himself upon his knees, entreating me not to risk meeting the redoubted sisters; who he was confident were feasting on what the Turkish women had left for their repast.—​I found in the inner chamber a small feast, consisting of a cup of honey and white almonds, a cake, on a little napkin, and a vase of aromatic herbs burning, and exhaling an agreeable perfume. . . . When I returned from the sepulchre, I found the Greek pale and trembling, and crossing himself very frequently. When he saw that I had brought out the contents of the feast, he told me he must quit my service, as he was confident that I should shortly experience some great misfortune for my impiety in destroying the hopes and happiness of the two women, by removing the offerings they had made to the Destinies, in order to render them propitious to their conjugal speculations. I gave the cake to the ass, who had brought my drawing apparatus; and by whom it was devoured without any scruples; but unfortunately, as we were returning home, this animal, with a perversity not unusual in his restive race, ran away braying and kicking till he broke my camera obscura in pieces.

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I collected the fragments as well as I could; while my Greek, who was quite sure that the accident was owing to my intrusion into the cave, triumphed in his predictions!3 The loss of his camera obscura notwithstanding—​and in 1805, this was no small expense—​Dodwell readily spurned the women’s belief in what he termed “Magic Ceremonies,” along with the distress of his Greek assistant. Yet Dodwell would have been troubled to learn that the ancient Greeks—​whose ruins he devoted his life to documenting, with their “high sentiment” and standards of taste—​were quite accomplished at performing spells, curses, and secret graveside rites of their own. In fact, throughout the Classical period, Greeks from all walks of life trafficked in “magic” with some frequency. By the 1840s, just over a decade after Dodwell’s death, scholars would come to grapple with the emergence of a number of so-​called curse tablets from across the Mediterranean.4 Broadly defined, curse tablets are small, thin sheets of lead inscribed with maledictions, spells, and prayers against rivals, lovers, wrongdoers, or otherwise threatening persons. Material remnants of ancient curse rituals, over 2,000 such tablets are known today from antiquity. These objects were deposited in graves, chthonic sanctuaries, wells, and other underground locales, sites that practitioners understood as conduits to the Underworld. Curse-​writers could invoke the likes of Hermes, Hekate, Persephone, and Demeter—​subterranean deities known for traversing the worlds of the living and the dead (see, for example, tablets 5.1–​5.6, discussed in Chapter 5)—​hoping to harness these powers and bring them to bear against mortal opponents. Though the great majority of curse tablets were composed in Greek and Latin, curse practice was adopted in the late Classical and Hellenistic periods by the communities with whom the Greeks came into contact, from Punic residents of Carthage to Oscan groups of southern Italy.5 The Romans later spread the technology well beyond the Mediterranean basin, facilitating through army and empire the adoption of curse-​writing rituals across the frontier provinces. Investigating the development and dissemination of ritualized cursing across the Mediterranean, this book provides a history of curse practice—​alongside that of binding spells, incantations, and other ritual phenomena—​in Greek antiquity from c. 750 to 250 bce. While such rituals may not accord with Dodwell’s exalted view of Greek culture, they greatly expand our understanding of daily life in ancient communities, and provide rare insights into how individuals were making sense of the world and coping with conflict, vulnerability, competition, anxiety, desire, and loss. Curse tablets in particular document persons who often slip through the cracks of traditional histories, enabling us to approach antiquity through a broader lens: here are cooks (tablet I.1), tavern keepers (tablet 5.1), garland weavers (tablet 7.1),

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helmsmen (tablet 3.10), and barbers (tablet 4.1). These objects enrich our view of the classical past, populating the Greek world with a more inclusive group of narratives than otherwise afforded by literary sources. Consider, for example, the following curse, which was inscribed on a lead tablet in Attica soon after 300 bce. These were the years in which Athens was reeling from decades of war, shifting alliances, and the sieges of Alexander’s Successors. Historical narratives from this period have long been dominated by the clashes of Cassander and Demetrius Poliorcetes, Lachares’s tyranny, and other vying armies and political factions. Yet this tablet unlocks a different sort of history, providing a new sense of what can be studied and known about this period. The text offers a glimpse of professional cooks on the eve of a trial, shedding light on a little-​ known subculture within the early Hellenistic city. Tablet I.1. Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8 no. 346 (prev. DTAud 49) Athens: provenance unknown, probably from a grave End of fourth/​early third century bce Athens National Archaeological Museum, X 9331 (Figure I.2) 1    καταδῶ Θεαγένην    γ̣λ̣ῶ̣τταγ καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ λόγον ὃμ μελετᾶι· καταδῶ δὲ καὶ Πυρρίου `μαγείρου´ χεῖρας

`[κ]αὶ πόδας´ [γλ]ῶτταγ καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ λόγον ὃμ με–​ λετᾶι ⁞ καταδῶ δὲ κα[ὶ Π]υρρίου γυναῖκα ⁝ γλῶτταν καὶ ψυχήν ⁝ καταδῶ δὲ [κ]αὶ Κερκίωνα τὸμ μ[ά]γει–​ ρον καὶ Δόκιμον μάγειρον γλῶτταγ καὶ ψυ-​ χὴν καὶ λόγον ὃμ μελετῶσιν· καταδῶ δὲ καὶ Κινέαν γλῶτταν καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ λόγον ὃν συμ-​ 10 μελετᾶι Θεαγένε[ι· κα]ταδῶ δὲ καὶ Φ‵ε′ρεκλέους [γ]λῶτταγ καὶ ψυχὴν [καὶ μ]αρτυρίαν ἣ Θεαγέ[νε]ι μαρτυρεῖ ⁞ καταδῶ δ[ὲ καὶ] Σεύθου γλῶτταγ καὶ ψ̣υ–​ χὴν καὶ λόγον ὃμ μελ̣ετᾶι καὶ πόδας καὶ χεῖρας, ὀφθ̣αλμοὺς κα[ὶ στόμα] ⁞ καταδῶ δὲ καὶ Λαμπρίου 15 γ[λ]ῶτταγ καὶ ψυχὴν [vv κα]ὶ λόγομ ὃμ ελε{λει}τᾶι, χεῖρας, πόδας, ὀφθαλμοὺς κ[αὶ vvv] στόμα ⁝ τούτους ἅπαντας καταδῶ, ἀφανίζω, κα[τvvvvvvv]ορύττω καταπαττα–​ λεύω· καὶ ἐπὶ δικαστηρ[vvvvvί]ου καὶ παρὰ διαιτητεῖ εἰάν τι ποιῶσι μηθα–​ 20 μοῦ φαίνεσθαι μήτε̣ ἐ[ν] λόγωι μήτ᾿ ἔρ-​ γωι.

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I bind down Theagenes, his tongue and soul and the speech that he is planning! And I bind down the hands of Pyrrhias the cook, and his feet and tongue and soul and the speech he is planning. And I bind down the wife of Pyrrhias: her tongue and soul. And I bind down Kerkion the cook, and Dokimos the cook, their tongue and soul and speech that they are planning. I bind down Kineas, his tongue and soul and speech that he is planning with Theagenes. And I bind down Pherekles, his tongue and soul and the proofs that he gives as evidence for Theagenes. And I bind down Seuthes, his tongue and soul and the speech that he is planning and his feet and hands, eyes and mouth. And I bind down the tongue of Lamprias, and his soul and the speech that he is planning, his hands, feet, eyes and mouth. All of these persons I bind down, I make disappear, I bury, I nail down! If in court or before the arbitrator they make any counterclaim, let them seem to be of no account, neither in word nor in deed!

Figure I.2  Drawing of curse tablet I.2 (DTAud 49), early third century bce. Athens National Archaeological Museum, Inv. 9331. Drawing by J. Curbera.

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The primary target of this curse was a man named Theagenes, who, ahead of a trial in the Attic law courts, was “bound down” together with his co-​speakers, witnesses, and wider legal support network.6 The looming lawsuit seems to have been occasioned by a conflict between cooks, μάγειροι. The mention of an arbitrator suggests that a final chance at arbitration remained, but the cursing of speeches indicates that both parties expected the dispute to advance to trial, and were actively preparing for that outcome. During the anxiety-​ridden lead-​up to trials, as evidence was gathered, witness testimony planned, and preliminary hearings attended, Athenians with resources might hire a speechwriter, seeking every possible advantage in the judicial process. This habit is well studied.7 What is less well known is that they might also seek supernatural assistance, as someone did here, by performing a binding curse against opposing litigants.8 Indeed, many of the oldest Greek curse tablets were occasioned by conflicts in the law courts; for the ritual’s first 200 years, these objects were very often deployed in contexts of litigation. Several individuals cited in tablet I.1 seemingly refer to real, historic chefs known from later Attic comedy, which could satirize cooks and cooking schools.9 The ancient equivalent of the “celebrity chef ” was something of a stock character in early Hellenistic comedy, caricatured as cheeky, thrifty, boastful, and highly competitive.10 The professional chef, or mageiros, worked with a train of pupils and underlings, and could hold the groups for whom he cooked in awe.11 Seuthes (I.1, line 12), preparing for a grand dinner in a play by Posidippus, was likened to a brilliant, terrifying general entering battle.12 Lamprias (I.1, line 14), the protégé of another famous mageiros, was singled out in an early third-​century drama by Euphron for perfecting the recipe for black broth soup.13 And in Lucian’s day, Pyrrhias was still remembered in Athens as a renowned chef (Men. 15, Πυρρίαν τὸν μάγειρον; cf. I.1, lines 3, 5). Read alongside Middle and New Comedy, this curse tablet provides access to the robust, competitive, and sometimes conflicting networks within which professional cooks could operate in ancient Athens. After this malediction was inscribed, the tablet was folded and pierced five times with a nail. The nailing ritually echoed the binding or restraint of the named individuals (“all of these persons I bind down, I make disappear, I bury, I nail down!”; I.1, lines 16–​18).14 What happened to the tablet, its user hoped, would befall the targets themselves. Next, the inscribed, nailed tablet would have been deposited underground, probably in a conveniently sited tomb, though in this case the object’s provenance was not recorded. Possibly the pouring of libations, the recitation of the malediction or related spells, and other graveside rites would have attended the tablet’s burial. Recent finds from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis suggest that some curse tablets were buried during graveside funerary banquets, along with the consumption or libation of aromatic wine, or together

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with the pulverization of potions that might include bark, roots, and other organic materials.15 On the whole, curse tablets carried a variety of inscribed texts, and were seemingly composed by both ritual professionals—​figures like the so-​called sorcerer (goēs), seer (mantis), collecting priest (agurtēs), and practitioner of mageia (magos), all of whom might claim expertise in the crafting of spells and curses—​ and, once the ritual had been popularized, by amateur practitioners. There was little homogeneity across or within these groups,16 and the ritual objects created by these individuals document a range of literacies and written competencies. Some practitioners employed punctuation and neat margins to structure their texts, which unfold in clear, confident hands. Other texts are sloppily inscribed and rife with misspellings. Distilling information about these ritual “freelancers” proves difficult,17 not only because of the sparseness of our sources, but also on account of their biased nature: these practitioners are described primarily by their business rivals and opponents, such as physicians and philosopher-​intellectuals. Plato, for example, envisioned penalties for ancient curse casters that differed according to their status (Leg. 933e): death could be pronounced for the ritual professional, he writes, while the courts could exercise discretion in the case of amateurs.18 Already by the fifth century, the words magos and agurtes were used synonymously with terms meaning “quack” and “charlatan.”19 Nonetheless, it seems clear that many of these individuals would have identified as religious practitioners in possession of specialized knowledge or expertise in various types of rites,20 whether pertaining to incantations, sacrifices (often distinct from the standard animal sacrifice), libations, purifications, divination, pharmaka (drugs and/​or spells), dream interpretation, funerary rituals, or foreign and initiation-​ based mystery cults.21 Not a few of these figures would have been itinerant, like many other practitioners during the fifth and fourth centuries—​including rhetoricians, artists, doctors, and craftsmen. Tied to the sale of ritual goods and services, “wandering priests and seers” (ἀγύρται δὲ καὶ μάντεις) could promise those wishing to harm an enemy “to hurt them, just or unjust alike, at little expense by certain bringings-​against and bindings-​down (ἐπαγωγαῖς τισιν καὶ καταδέσμοις), persuading the gods, as they say, to do their bidding” (Pl. Resp. 364b–​c). This passage contains one of very few links connecting katadesmoi—​which could here refer to both binding spells and inscribed curse tablets—​to living, breathing entrepreneurs in Classical Athens, and sheds some light, however dim, on the mechanisms by which incantations and curse-​writing rituals could spread within Greek communities. Able to channel and persuade the gods with their specialized knowledge, these agents were well-​established fixtures of the ancient city. For individuals and households, they fueled a popular demand for ritual intervention and assistance in any number of

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circumstances. Such specialists played an important role in early Greek curse practice, and help account for the ritual koine that spread across the Mediterranean by the fourth century bce.

Curse Effigies Conceptually similar to the curse tablet was the curse effigy (κολοσσός, Rachepuppe, formerly the “voodoo doll”), another material manifestation of curse rituals that physically represented the targeted individual(s) (Figures I.3, I.4).22 Curse effigies also sought to control, incapacitate, harm, or otherwise influence targeted persons, from legal opponents to love interests. No fewer than 133 curse effigies are known from Classical antiquity, of which some 50 were made of lead.23 Effigies were also fashioned from bronze, clay, flour, wool, and wood, and literary and epigraphic texts make clear that the ritual use of wax dolls was especially common in the ancient Greek world.24 In the fifth century bce, a fragment of Sophocles’s Root-​Cutters describes the melting of such a doll with fire (F 536 TrGF), while in the early fourth century, Plato refers to “molded wax figurines” (κήρινα μιμήματα πεπλασμένα) placed at doors, crossroads, and the tombs of ancestors, as well as the unease felt by passersby upon viewing these objects.25 In later poetry, Theocritus’s Simaetha prays that Delphis, now a distant lover, melt with love for her just as she

Figure I.3  Drawing of a bound, nailed, and decapitated lead effigy, fourth or third century bce, ht. 6 cm, once in the private collection of Richard Wünsch (after drawing in Wünsch 1902).

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melts a wax effigy (Theocr. Id. 2.28–​29): “Just as I melt this wax doll with the help of the goddess, so too may Delphis of Myndos at once be melted by love!” Unlike lead figurines, wax effigies seldom preserve in the archaeological record, though some were certainly used in combination with inscribed lead tablets in Athenian curse rituals, as were effigies made of wood and clay.26 By the late fifth and fourth centuries bce, curse effigies were deposited in contexts similar to those of curse tablets, with graves the most common sites of burial.27 Also like inscribed tablets, curse effigies were manipulated and mutilated in ways meant to reciprocally bind, restrain, or damage the signified person(s): the figurines were often twisted, nailed, or shackled before deposition; several were punched through with nails; and at least one effigy was beheaded (Figure I.3).28 The verbal idiom of binding was visually conveyed through the twisting back of the arms or head, the bending back of legs, and the application of fetters around the neck, wrists, or ankles. Many of these features are evident in a decapitated lead effigy from Athens (Figure I.3), in addition to a cast-​lead effigy from the Cycladic island of Paros (Figure I.4). Effigy I.2. Lamont 2021d 10.2 cm tall, 3.1 cm from shoulder to shoulder Vitsi Nekropolis, Paroikia: roof-​tile grave Early fourth century bce Paros Archaeological Museum, B 5984 (Figure I.4a–​e)

Figure I.4  Four views of the lead curse effigy of Theophrastos (a–​d) and lead collar once around the neck of the effigy (e), early fourth century bce, figurine ht. 10.2 cm, Vitsi necropolis, Paros (roof-​tile grave). Paros Archaeological Museum B 5984, excav. 1983. Photograph by author.

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Inscribed Text: Text runs down back of left leg: Θεώφραστω

Theophrastos

Text runs down back, from left shoulder blade to top of buttocks: Θεώφ̣[ρασ]τ̣ω Theophrastos Text on back of head: –​ΩΣ

–​os

Buried during the fourth century bce in a small tile grave, likely that of a child, this lead effigy was pierced with seven iron nails: one through the mouth, one through each eye, three through the skull, and one through the anus. The figurine’s arms were twisted behind the back; the hands were pinched together, as though bound at the wrists. A lead shackle restrained the neck, further signaling the subjugation and restraint of the target’s person. The effigy’s back side carries three inscriptions naming the curse’s target, a man called Theophrastos. The incision, repeated nailing, and shackling of the effigy aimed to ritually bind and incapacitate Theophrastos, and to assert control over him. The object’s deposition in a grave was probably meant to deliver the effigy to the powers of the Underworld, who would accordingly bring the curse against Theophrastos to pass. The elaborate and costly manufacturing process required a high degree of technical expertise, which suggests that this effigy was produced by a professional ritual practitioner. In I.2 above, the inscribed name Theophrastos signals that the lead figurine sought to represent that man specifically. Other fifth-​and fourth-​century effigies carry multiple inscribed names, indicating that the figurine did not necessarily represent a single victim so much as the ritualized act of binding one’s enemies.29 And just as some curse effigies were inscribed with text, curse tablets could also carry images. This is now attested in an early curse tablet from Sicilian Himera, recovered in a grave of early fifth-​century date. Interpreted as an erotic attraction curse, the tablet contains a sketch of a recumbent woman named Echekrateia beside a man named Menekrates, who cast the spell to subdue Echekrateia and to draw her to him (Figure I.5).30 As with curse tablets, what befell the effigy was meant to befall the victims themselves, a popular form of sympathetic magic.31 In some regions, curse tablets and effigies were employed in tandem, and their early use appears to have developed in parallel. In Athens, for example, which has yielded an abundance of curse assemblages in secure archaeological contexts, no lead effigies are known to predate Attic curse tablets. Rather, effigies appear alongside tablets in some of the oldest Athenian curse assemblages, serving the same function materially or visually as the inscribed tablets did textually. In fact,

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Figure I.5  Drawing of lead curse tablet HA26825 from Himera (WS 1507), in which a recumbent Echekrateia is depicted as bound and overcome by Menekrates. Drawing by author, from Brugnone, Calascibetta, Vassallo 2020, 107, Fig. 21.

Attic practitioners could combine curse tablets and effigies in the same binding ritual, and the two modes of cursing otherwise overlap in various ways: some lead effigies from graves of the Kerameikos were enclosed in coffin-​like lead containers that resembled curse tablets, for example. Another Attic practitioner fashioned a simple effigy out of a flattened piece of lead, and then inscribed it with a curse text as though it were a tablet.32 It is clear that in Athens, effigies were used in curse-​ writing rituals to bind enemies by around 400 bce, roughly the time in which the earliest Attic curse tablets emerge. Still other communities of practice, like those on the Cycladic islands of Paros, Keos, and Delos, may have preferred the use of effigies over tablets when casting curses, as these sites to date have yielded exclusively (Paros, Keos) or primarily (Delos) curse effigies from the fourth century bce on.33 Yet in the city that has yielded the oldest Greek curse tablets to date, Selinous in southwest Sicily, curse effigies are largely unknown. Early Sicilian curse-​writing rituals seem to have been performed without the fashioning of effigies, and curse tablets assert a written self-​awareness.34 Thus, although effigies were certainly used in Greek rituals prior to the advent of curse practice—​the Foundation Oath of Cyrene, for example, documents the melting down of wax effigies in a ceremony that may date back to the seventh century bce (SEG 9.4; ML 5)35—​it is not evident that such effigies were used to restrain or incapacitate the actions, speech, or tongues of opponents, and were not buried in sites associated with the Underworld. Furthermore, the handful of twisted bronze effigies from Arcadia that were once attributed on stylistic grounds to the Archaic period almost certainly date from no earlier than the fourth century bce on the basis of manufacture techniques and (then unavailable) comparanda recovered in the past 100 years.36 As small, uninscribed bronzes found outside of archaeological contexts, they lend no clarity to the question of the antecedents of inscribed curse tablets.37 Curse-​writing rituals only emerge once literacy had become more

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widespread in the early Greek world, and many of the oldest curse tablets were occasioned by conflict in the law courts—​institutions that were themselves evolving alongside the growing use of writing, and that were assuming a more prominent role in the adjudication of conflicts in late Archaic poleis. In broad strokes, I.1 and I.2 demonstrate how curse tablets and effigies could work in practice, shedding valuable light on conflict, competition, legal institutions, onomastics, ritual, and writing habits in ancient Greek communities. These objects offer rare insights into the public and private lives of individuals from around 500 bce through Late Antiquity and beyond, illuminating the interplay of ritual and conflict-​management strategies among citizens and the enslaved, men and women, pagans and Christians. Providing the first historical study of curse practice in the ancient Greek world, this book uses such objects to open new areas of research within the fields of Greek social and cultural history, unveiling the lives, beliefs, and practices of individuals and groups that have often been hidden from view. The project documents the cultural pressures that drove private cursing: situations of anxiety, uncertainty, antagonism, and vulnerability. And, as importantly, it reveals the ways in which individuals worked to negotiate with the world (here in the literal sense) “underground”—​conjuring the powers of the Underworld, and calling upon the dead to aid and restrain the living. That said, it can still be a challenge to extract these histories, especially as curse tablets and effigies regularly name the individuals being cursed, but only rarely the agents who inscribed or commissioned the objects. This can make it difficult to discern who in the ancient world deployed these rites. Yet since there must have been considerable interaction between the curse-​writer and the target(s) of the curse in order for conflict to develop, in most cases we can make educated, if uncertain, inferences about the curse-​writers themselves. In many instances it is probably “safe to assume,” as David Jordan wrote, “that when a man is cursed, it is by social, political, and economic peers.”38 Many early curse tablets document conflicts between persons of considerable means and resources, including wealthy and prominent citizens who sponsored liturgies, served as financial guarantors, or funded choruses in the fifth and fourth centuries bce. In nearly all regions, evidence undermines the once-​popular notion that curse practice was the last resort of the poor, the destitute, the rabble. Curse rituals, and the conflicts that they document, seem to have first been used by the elite, but with time came to implicate individuals of all social and legal backgrounds, from affluent citizens to craftsmen and enslaved persons. Studying ancient magic thus means studying a cross section of Greek society, as well as interactions that cut across social hierarchies, such as relations between elite male citizens and craftsmen or sex workers.39 Thanks in part to lead’s preservation rate in the archaeological record, curse tablets and effigies serve as material informants for private curse rituals. Other

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rites, however, remain less accessible to us in the present day. As ephemeral speech acts, the majority of spells, charms, and incantations have been lost. The manipulation of animals and other organic materials in magical rituals is also understood to have been widespread in antiquity, but such assemblages are subtle and difficult to discern materially. Fortunately, our knowledge of these rites has been changing in recent years with advances in systematic archaeology, which reveal the use and abuse of foxes, frogs, chickens, and other animals as Greek and Roman curse effigies.40 These animals were dismembered, bound, and/​or buried in rites meant to analogically incapacitate their human targets. While several chapters of this book focus primarily on curse tablets and effigies, I incorporate discussions of ritual speech and organic materials in curse practice wherever possible, leveraging epigraphic, literary, and archaeological evidence to assemble a broad historical overview.

Placing Magic and Chapter Overview The study of ancient magic, to the extent that it has occurred at all, has held a contentious place within the fields of classics, ancient history, and religion. First, many sources that do describe private rites tend to show bias, portraying magic as something practiced by out-​groups or “others,” whether Dodwell’s Ottoman women, Theocritus’s Simaetha (and her Assyrian stranger), or Lucan’s Erictho. Moreover, magic sits uncomfortably in post-​ Enlightenment perceptions of Classical Greece, especially of democratic Athens. Further, meaningful study of curse rituals is relatively new: the first Greek curse tablets were published only shortly before the mid-​nineteenth century ce, while the name given to these inscribed objects has varied over time and space (as have understandings of how the tablets functioned, and their relationship to other modes of cursing).41 The publication in 1897 by Richard Wünsch of a large corpus of Attic curse tablets (defixiones) and effigies (DTWünsch, Defixiones Tabellae Atticae) was followed in 1904 by that of Auguste Audollent (DTAud, Defixiones Tabellae); both corpora brought hundreds of curse texts to the world of classical scholarship, presenting defixiones as written curses within the wider realm of magic practice. But a certain embarrassment attended these objects in academic circles. Wünsch himself downdated several obvious fourth-​century texts into the third or second centuries bce—​perhaps an effort, conscious or subconscious, to stave off the ignobility of irrational magic from Classical Athens.42 And it was not only curse tablets that brought unease to the field: Graf notes how, when leading a Heidelberg seminar on the Greek Magical Papyri, Albert Dieterich “felt obliged to conceal the object of his Summer seminar in 1905 on the magical papyri under the less provocative title of ‘Selection of Greek papyri.’ ” Of these same magical texts, Ulrich von

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Wilamowitz-​Moellendorff remarked, “One day I heard a great scholar deplore the discovery of these papyri, which robbed antiquity of the distinguished luster of classicism.”43 Only since the 1980s have scholars started to recognize the great historical and linguistic value of these documents. The works of David Jordan, Jaime Curbera, Roger Tomlin, Paolo Poccetti, Christopher Faraone, Francisco Marco Simón, Richard Gordon, Daniel Ogden, Celia Sánchez Natalías, and others have shown how these rituals illuminate language, prosopography, religion, and aggressive competition in Classical antiquity. Christian Habicht, Esther Eidinow, and Zinon Papakonstantinou have also used curse tablets as historical documents, showing their importance for the study of politics, risk, emotion, and Athenian litigation—​revealing too how curse rituals coexisted with the teachings of Socrates and Euripidean tragedy. These practices were grounded in worldviews in which ritual speech and action were understood to achieve real goals and assuage real fears. While different persons would have understood such rituals to function in different ways, few in antiquity would have thought deeply about what constituted “magic,” or whether and how it was a phenomenon separate from religion. In the words of Robert Parker, “magic differs from religion as weeds differ from flowers, merely by negative social evaluation.”44 Ancient communities, like modern ones, understood these categories differently among themselves. Nevertheless, theoretical frameworks for Greek magic abound, as do historiographies of the term’s use in scholarly discourse (from Frazer through Lévy-​Bruhl, Mauss, and Tambiah), in addition to attempts to define magic and the Greek term μαγεία with good scholarly precision.45 Rather than rehash these well-​trodden overviews, many of which necessarily end inconclusively or on a note of aporia, I take as a given that magic in the Greek and Roman worlds is best approached in modern scholarship from an etic perspective, in relation to specific practices and discourse within particular (and now distant) cultures.46 As a set of practices that made perfect sense to the ancients, rites employing curses, spells, and incantations were often “marked with regard to [their] efficacy, [their] aims . . . or the style of the performance itself,” Radcliffe Edmonds recently wrote.47 Accordingly, I use the word “magic” flexibly, multidirectionally, and with a critical awareness of the term’s heterogeneity and changing ideological baggage both in antiquity and in the history of classical religion and anthropology. As a domain of social experience, magic still provides a useful if heuristic category for historical inquiry, especially when pursuing social and cultural studies of the Greek world from c. 750 to c. 250 bce. Yet beyond this Introduction, the book has little need for the term “magic”. I engage less with that general category of scholarly discourse than with particular types of private, widespread practices with outcome-​driven goals, all of which are grounded in regional and historical contexts: curse-​writing rituals, early Greek

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Introduction

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binding spells and incantations, rites centered upon the creation and manipulation of effigies, whether of metal, wax, or living animals, etc. To track how these practices changed and endured over time and space, no single approach can yield fruitful results. This book is accordingly interdisciplinary in scope, meaning that some chapters examine the historical milieux of the communities in question, while others are more archaeological, drawing conclusions about these rituals on the basis of excavation reports. Some chapters will appeal more to epigraphists and students of religion, and still others, by way of incantations and binding spells, to scholars of hexameter verse and early Greek poetry. Indeed, one aim of this project is to bring different subfields together in discussion around these ritual objects, as disparate approaches are required to interrogate material that is at once textual (even hexametrical), material, performative, ritual, and archaeological in nature. This project thus unfolds in three parts, each of which contains two chapters. Part I, “The Beginnings of Greek Curse-​Writing Rituals,” investigates the practice’s emergence in the Greek cities of western Sicily. The oldest known curse tablets hail from Selinous and date from around or soon after 500 bce, though the recent recovery of 54 tablets from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis significantly expands the early Sicilian corpus.48 By the mid-​fifth century, curse practice had spread to the nearby coastal poleis of Camarina, Acragas, and Gela. Chapter 1 discusses the language, themes, formats, and contexts of these tablets, thereby familiarizing readers with the oldest known Greek curse assemblages. Chapter 2 examines the historical questions of why and how Greek curse practice developed, considering potential Near Eastern antecedents and the geopolitical, social, and economic factors that contributed to the ritual’s emergence in Sicily around 500 bce. In addition to the fact that curse-​writing rituals first appear in Sicilian Greek communities, with texts composed in the Greek language and script, much of what made the ritual Greek was the judicial contexts in which curse tablets were first employed: these objects emerge firmly within the competitive, aristocratic ethos of the late Archaic polis, wielded by elites in the courts of law. Part II, “The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500–​250 bce,” investigates the dissemination and diversification of curse-​writing rituals from the late sixth through mid-​third centuries bce, providing fine-​grained studies of the practice across different regions. Chapter 3 traces the ritual’s development across the Italian mainland, the northern Black Sea, and the Kingdom of Macedon. The practice was adopted by Oscan-​speaking groups of southern Italy in the later fourth century bce, by which time curse tablets had already appeared across the northern Black Sea and the Aegean. The ritual’s presence in Macedon during the first half of the fourth century suggests that Philip II, Alexander III, the Macedonian nobility, and their core soldiery grew up in communities familiar

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with curse practice; this marks a key development in the ritual’s later spread to the eastern territories conquered by Alexander and his Successors, including Egypt. Chapter 4 then provides an overview of Athenian curse practice from the late fifth through early third centuries bce. Over 500 curse tablets and a dozen curse effigies are known from Athens alone, where the practice’s presence from c. 400 bce to 400 ce allows for a detailed study of change over time in a single polis. I survey the language and themes employed by Attic curse-​writers, and explore why curse production emerged and intensified in Athens when it did. Part II demonstrates that overall, though some regionalisms and local preferences are evident, parallels from geographically disparate areas point to a shared ritual tradition by the fourth century bce. This koine stretched from the central to eastern Mediterranean and north to the Black Sea and Cimmerian Bosporos. These ritual objects illuminate the mechanisms by which technologies and skill sets migrated over time and space, and the conditions that allowed for their transmission, appropriation, and adaptation across communities of practice. The book’s third and final part, “Orality and Text: Curse Practice in the Realm of Binding Spells and Arai,” examines the remnants of ritual speech preserved in Greek curse tablets. If not lost altogether, performative traditions of oral incantations, spells, and public arai prove largely evasive in extant literary sources. On occasion, curse tablets can capture these varying influences, again enriching the material available for reconstructing ancient traditions of magic and cursing. Across the millennium that these rituals were performed, curse inscriptions exhibit great variation: some adopt the form of private epistles, while others resemble commercial receipts or civic inscriptions. Two important groups of curse tablets are those that carry the influence of binding incantations, which once circulated orally and in dactylic hexameter (Chapter 5), and curse tablets that echo public arai, curses openly pronounced in sacred and civic fora, and which were often attached to oaths (Chapter 6). Examining the traditions that could influence curse-​writers, these chapters provide a bridge from inscribed curse tablets to otherwise lost strands of ancient ritual speech. The book concludes with an overview of curse practice in communities of the Roman Empire, highlighting recent discoveries and the ways in which they nuance our understanding of social history centuries after the emergence of curse-​writing rituals in the late Archaic period.

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PART ONE

The Beginnings of Greek Curse-​Writing Rituals Part I of this book, “The Beginnings of Greek Curse-​Writing Rituals,” investigates the emergence of curse-​writing in the Greek cities of western Sicily. The oldest known curse tablets come from Selinous and date from around or soon after 500 BCE, though the recent recovery of 54 tablets from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis significantly expands the early Sicilian curse corpus. By the mid-​fifth century, curse practice had spread to the nearby coastal poleis of Camarina, Acragas, and Gela. Chapter 1 discusses the language, themes, formats, and contexts of these tablets, thereby familiarizing readers with the oldest known Greek curse assemblages. Chapter 2 examines the historical questions of why and how Greek curse practice developed, considering potential Near Eastern antecedents and the legal, geopolitical, social, and economic factors that contributed to the ritual’s emergence in Sicily around 500 bce.

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Sicilian Beginnings

Introduction On April 8, 1915, excavations in a sanctuary on the outskirts of Selinous, a city on Sicily’s southwest coast, yielded a peculiar discovery: a small lead disc inscribed on both sides with Greek text, dating from soon after 500 bce (Figure 1.1).1 The circular tablet carried a judicial curse, a private malediction meant to influence the outcome of a trial that was unfolding in the city’s law courts. The spiral-​form text cursed three individuals: Selinontios, Timaso, and Tyranna. It also cursed their tongues, and the tongues of their supporters. Here the “tongue” (γλο͂σα) was shorthand for the opponent’s speech or testimony in court, something which brought the curse commissioner considerable anxiety. Why curse in court? Much was at stake: in any trial, the wealth and reputation of both litigant and defendant, as well as that of their families, their supporters, and the witnesses called upon to testify, all hung in the balance. Whatever conflict occasioned the lawsuit would have exposed individuals to public scrutiny and private gossip, as relationships, expenditures, and family histories were spilled open on trial. The curse, someone hoped, would incapacitate and undermine the opposing litigant and his supporters: Tablet 1.1. CDS 20 (=​Bettarini 2005, no. 20) Selinous, region of Malophoros and Meilichios precincts (Comparetti 1918, 193–​197) Early fifth century bce Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42568 (Figure 1.1)

In Blood and Ashes. Jessica L. Lamont, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.003.0002

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recto

4 5 Σελινντιος2 [κ]α̣ὶ ℎα Σελινο3ντίο̄ γλοσ ͂ (σ)α ἀπεσ τραμ(μ)έν’ ἐπ’ ἀτλ είαι τᾶι τέ|̄ ν|ο̄ν| 6 7 8 ἐν|γράφο̄ καὶ τον͂ ξένο̄ν συν δίϙο̄ν τὰς γλσ(σ)ας ἀπε στραμ(μ)ένας ἐπ’ ἀτε9λείαι τᾶι τέν̄ ο̄ν 10 ἐνγρά̣φο̄

verso

2 3 Τιμασι καὶ ℎα Τιμασος͂ γλοσ ͂ (σ)α [ἀ]πεστραμ(μ)έ ναν ἐπ’ ἀτελείαι τᾶι τέν̄ ο̄ν̣ ἐγράφο̄ 4 Τυρρανὰ καὶ ℎα [Τυρρ]ανᾶς γλοσ ͂ (σ)α [ἀπε]στρ αμ(μ)έναν ἐπ’ ἀτελείαι τ[ᾶι τ]έν̄ ο̄ν̣ ἐγ[ράφο̄]| πάντο̄ν

Selinontios and Selinontios’s tongue, twisted back to the point of their unfulfillment, I inscribe, and I inscribe the tongues of the foreign advocates, twisted back to the point of their unfulfillment! Timaso and Timaso’s tongue, twisted back to the point of their unfulfillment, I inscribe, and I inscribe Tyranna and Tyranna’s tongue, twisted back to the point of unfulfillment—​of all of them!

Figure 1.1 Tablet 1.1 (CDS 20), A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. no. 42568. Drawing by J. Curbera.

Through the act of inscribing text (ἐνγράφο̄), the curse aimed to “twist” or “turn back” (ἀπεστραμμένα) the victims’ tongues, a means of confounding (ἐπ’ ἀτελείαι) an opponent’s speech in court. The text itself had been contorted into a spiral on the verso, such that writing and reading the curse required the physical twisting of the lead disc, echoing the “twisting” of the targets’ tongues.2 We know little about the conflict that occasioned this curse, aside from the fact that it stemmed from a trial in Selinous’s lawcourts, targeted a sizable group of the opposition’s supporters, and cited two women by name. Who were the

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“foreign advocates” and from where did they hail? Does the cursing of Timaso and Tyranna, and both of their tongues, suggest that women could testify at trial in Selinous? How was an individual like Tyrrana, whose name signals some sort of relationship with Etruria or Etruscan groups, connected to Selinontios and to the commissioner of the curse—​and what was the nature of the conflict that brought them all together in court?3 The answers have been lost to history, but the object itself, among the oldest known Greek curse tablets, provides meaningful glimpses of interactions in western Sicily in the early fifth century bce. Although new finds can always challenge and change our current understandings of early Greek curse practice, all evidence suggests that curse-​writing rituals began in western Sicily during the late sixth century bce, and quite probably in the city of Selinous in particular. In seeking to understand the origins of a practice that would eventually sweep the ancient Mediterranean, Black Sea coast, and European mainland, the book’s first two chapters contextualize curse-​ writing rituals in the communities in which the practice developed. This chapter introduces readers to the language and depositional contexts of the oldest Greek curse tablets, and presents common themes that feature therein; a wide selection of tablets are surveyed, from relatively discursive maledictions like that against Selinontios (tablet 1.1), to simple lists of names and even fragmentary texts. This material informs later discussions of the history of curse practice in Selinous, Sicily, and the wider Mediterranean (and beyond), especially how these rituals came to evolve over time and space.

States of Evidence No complete corpus of Sicilian curse materials exists, despite the fact that over 65 curse tablets and effigies were known from Sicily by the year 2000 ce, and many more have emerged since then; a conservative estimate might place the total number around 130.4 Further, extant editions of Sicilian curse tablets are partial or defective.5 Curbera’s catalogue remains invaluable for accessing this material (1999), as do the surveys of Jordan (1985b, 2000a)—​though none of these provides edited Greek texts, or includes recent discoveries.6 One major addition to the Sicilian curse corpus has been the discovery in Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis of 54 curse tablets of fifth-​century date, including a “group of about 40 laminae bent and stuck on the ground with an iron nail running through them.”7 To date, only two Himeran curse tablets have been published, but the fact that all emerged in well-​documented mortuary contexts suggests that they will greatly enrich our knowledge of early curse-​writing rituals. Indeed, this chapter will not contain the final word on Sicilian curse practice, as new finds continuously change the state of our understanding.

2

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Owing to the fragmented nature of the textual editions, a situation complicated by the number of unprovenanced curse tablets in private collections, this important body of Sicilian material remains poorly studied, especially in Anglophone scholarship. Furthermore, these objects have been discussed primarily as epigraphic texts, informants for early Megarian and west Greek dialects or archaic scripts, for example, rather than as ritual objects that circulated within living, breathing Greek communities. Dozens have emerged without archaeological provenance, which makes them difficult to source, date, and study historically (a problem by no means unique to the Sicilian material). That said, we possess a formidable body of data in the tablets themselves: these objects bear witness to manipulation, folding, and rolling, and, most valuably, they document individuals, legal institutions, deities, writing habits, and ritual in western Greek communities during the late sixth and fifth centuries bce. While both this and the following chapter engage with objects from across Sicily, they are primarily grounded in materials from Selinous for several reasons: a recent edition of Selinountine curse tablets exists; Bettarini examined the tablets himself, and drew upon onomastic, prosopographic, and dialectic comparanda in composing his Corpus delle defixiones di Selinunte (henceforth CDS [2005]). Bettarini’s editions are given here, with readers referred back to his 2005 volume for earlier bibliography. Selinous has also yielded the oldest known curse tablets, and the practice was widespread in the community, attested in three disparate regions by the mid-​fifth century bce. Finally, the archaeological contexts of some early Selinountine curse tablets are known, if only in a general sense, and, at the time of writing, more than half of all published Sicilian curse tablets come from Selinous.8 These data are and shall remain significant, even once discoveries from Himera’s western Buonfornello necropolis allow us to expand the discussion to Sicily’s northern coast, and compare dozens of curse tablets recovered in secure funerary contexts (some of which may even prove contemporary with the early Selinountine materials).9

Early Curse Tablets from Selinous The oldest Greek curse tablets are dated on the basis of writing style (boustrophedon), script, spelling, patterns in dialect (the appearance in Selinous of Ionicisms after the mid-​fifth century, for example), and letter forms: imprecise but still useful dating criteria. The chronologies assigned below should therefore be understood as approximate, but representative of scholarly consensus10 (though my own impression is that the oldest Selinountine curse texts date from the early fifth century bce). In general, I follow the dates given by Bettarini (2005), though chronologies provided by other editors are taken into account and, when

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different from Bettarini’s assessment, a consensus date is given.11 Dates from well before 500 bce, for example, “550 bce” or “first half of the sixth century bce” are generally considered too early by scholarly consensus.12 That said, we cannot assume that we have found the absolute earliest curse tablet(s), nor that the practice arose ex nihilo in the years after 500. It is likely that the ritual was gestating during the final years of the sixth century, and had taken firm shape by the early fifth century, as suggested by the diversity and discursivity of Selinountine curse texts at this time, in addition to certain features of the script (the relative infrequency of digamma, for example). It is of course possible that older curses were written upon perishable materials such as papyrus, wax, clay, leather, or wood, and would have been pronounced orally. These issues are addressed elsewhere, but, for now, we shall examine patterns within the evidence available to us: the inscribed tablets themselves.

Mortuary Contexts and Curse Themes The oldest Greek curse tablets hail from Selinous’s Buffa necropolis.13 The Buffa region was located east of the river Modione, north of Selinous’s central acropolis and the eastern hill on which Temples E, F, and G were built (Figure 1.2). Buffa supported a cemetery, the tombs of which held pottery from the late seventh through fifth centuries bce;14 at least five curse tablets dating from c. 500–​450 bce emerged from this necropolis (CDS 15–​19). In no instance do we know precisely where within the necropolis the tablets derived—​whether in or outside of graves, inside funerary vessels or on the person of the corpse, what sorts of tombs were preferred for deposition, etc. We can speak only to a general mortuary context, and comparative material from elsewhere in fifth-​century Sicily. The oldest curse tablets from Camarina and Acragas, which date from the mid-​fifth century bce, also emerge in funerary contexts; so too the newly unearthed tablets from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis. Early Sicilian curse tablets thus share a mortuary component: they were often (but not exclusively) deposited in graves at the conclusion of the ritual process. Several themes emerge in late Archaic/​early Classical curse tablets from Selinous’s Buffa necropolis: (1) calls for the ἀτέλεια or “unfullfillment” of victims’ “deeds and words,” (2) the cursing of tongues, (3) lists of names, and (4) the use of “writing” verbs (γράφω and compounds) to curse victims. The presence of several of these themes in early curse tablets suggests that an economy of ritual language was already in use in Selinous by the beginning of the fifth century bce. Some expressions likely circulated orally before their commitment to lead, while others, such as the maledictions that use γράφω as curse verb, can only have developed in tandem with written curse practice.15

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Figure 1.2  Map of Selinous with Gaggera Hill (left), Modione river, central acropolis (lower center), the eastern hill (right), Manuzza necropolis, and Buffa necropolis (upper right). Map from A. Mazza 2021, Fig. 2.

Ἀτέλεια: “Unfulfillment” of Deeds and Words Let us survey the curse tablets from Selinous’s Buffa necropolis, beginning with one of the earliest, 1.2.16 This boustrophedon text was inscribed on a thin lead sheet, which was then folded over at least six times; the composer intended the malediction to be fully shut off from view: Tablet 1.2. CDS 15 Selinous, Buffa necropolis c. 500 bce Antonino Salinas Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42578 Boustrophedon, sinistrorsum first line (Figure 1.3a, b) 1 ]κοι ℎότ[ι] κα λε̄ΐε̄ι ἀτέλε-​ ← στα καὶ ἔ̣ργα καὶ ἔπεα [μ-​ →

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5

ε]ν̣ καὶ Σικανᾶι ἀτέλε-​ στα vacat καὶ ἔργα καὶ ἔπε[α ℎό-​ τ]ι κα λε̄ΐε̄ι

25

← → ←

For [—​]ko, whatever he wants, let both deeds and words be unfulfilled, and unfulfilled also for Sikana, her deeds and words, whatever she wants! (a)

(b)

Figure 1.3 Tablet 1.2 (CDS 15). From Selinous’s Buffa necropolis, c. 500 bce. A. Salinas Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42578. Photograph from T. Sommerschield 2019, 489, Fig. 1. Drawing by J. Curbera.

Here the “deeds and words” (ἔργα καὶ ἔπεα) along with the wishes (ℎότι κα λε̄ΐε̄ι) of two individuals are rendered ἀτέλεστα, “unfulfilled” or “incomplete.”17

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Variations on the expression “let whatever s/​he wants, both deeds and words, be unfulfilled!” (ὅτι κα ληΐῃ ἀτέλεστα καὶ ἔργα καὶ ἔπεα), are already attested by the late sixth century bce, and probably circulated orally prior to this time.18 Also of interest is the female name Sikana, which could point to some relationship with the island’s native Sikanian groups (though names formed on ethnics were common in Sicily: cf. Σελινόντιος and Τυρρανά in 1.1; Λεϝκανᾶς in a grave stele found north of Selinous, c. 600 bce, IGDS II 20; Φοῖνιξ in 1.11).19 Thucydides confirms that the male version of this name, Sikanos, was held by an elite Greek citizen—​ an elected general, no less—​in fifth-​century Syracuse (6.73.1); Sikana could just as easily have been a member of the Selinountine elite. While such names cannot be understood to indicate an individual’s origins, they do signal an awareness of or (claimed) connection to those groups or places, and thereby reveal the presence of mobility and cultural exchange in western Sicily at this time.20 The real bite of the curse lies in the call that deeds and words be ἀτέλεστα, “unfulfilled,” “incomplete,” or “unaccomplished.” Emphasized in tablets 1.1 and 1.2, the concept of ateleia (ἀτέλεια) appears to have been significant in early Sicilian curse rituals, and was otherwise widespread in early Greek thought.21 A derivative of the adjective ἀτελής, which already occurs in Homer (Od. 17.546), ateleia by the fifth century bce also carried the sense of an exemption from tax or a legal dismissal from a charge (Hdt. 1.192, 2.168, 3.91; Lys. 32.24). The word ἀτέλεια is in fact first documented in Selinountine curse tablets, and probably signals the term’s use in a judicial sense in the sixth-​century law courts; the noun τέλος, for comparison, is employed to signify a “judicial decision” in tablet 1.14 from fifth-​century Sicily, with legal parallels in Aeschylus (ἀναμένω τέλος δίκης “I await the decision of the trial,” Eum. 243) and Plato (τὸ δὲ τέλος κρίνειν πάντων τῶν τοιούτων ἐκεῖνο τὸ δικαστήριον “that this court makes a judgment of all these sorts of cases,” Leg. 6.768b). As noted above, the term ateleia can be understood in the sense of unfulfillment: a calling down of incompletion and ineffectiveness upon an opponent, especially a rival’s speech or testimony in court, with the resulting loss of the lawsuit. This was likely the meaning of the term in legal contexts: it referred to the “unfulfillment” or loss of a trial in the courts. But the concept of ateleia was also apt for rituals that involved the dead, especially the graves of those who had died somehow inconclusively or unfulfilled. This could include the tombs of aoroi (ἄωροι), individuals who died unseasonably or prematurely (often infants, children, and women who perished before/​during childbirth), and those who perished without telē, proper burial rites or initiations.22 The term’s polyvalence likely appealed to curse practitioners, who could exploit ateleia to different ends within the ritual. Quite possibly here, in the necropolis, the ritual was understood to involve a type of analogical magic rooted in a play

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on the call for legal ateleia, and the condition of the deceased beside whom the tablets were buried (ἀτέλεστοι). Just as the denizens of the cemetery had, in death, come to naught (whether by unfulfillment, ineffectiveness, or lack of burial rites), so too would the victims’ deeds and words at trial come to naught. Finally, though impossible to prove in the absence of well-​documented findspots, there is some chance that the graves containing these tablets had been selected by curse practitioners because of characteristics of the deceased held therein. Fifth-​century parallels from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis show that, of some 10,000 excavated graves, only a few were chosen for the deposition of curses, including the graves of a child no older than six years, a baby less than one year, and a striking female burial that attracted 47 lead curse tablets; certainly the children, and possibly also the woman, were considered aoroi, and their graves held special appeal for ritual exploitation.23 Another early curse from Selinous’s Buffa necropolis concludes by calling down ateleia onto the target, demonstrating that several of the oldest Greek curse tablets shared the goal of inducing ἀτέλεια in opponents, of causing an enemy’s affairs to go unfulfilled: Tablet 1.3. CDS 17 Selinous, Buffa necropolis (Brugnone 1976, 81–​3) 500–​450 bce Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42580 1

Χάμις ἐπέχ̣ο̄ κα νόσο̄ ῥοπᾶι ἐπ’ ἀτελείαι ℎο-​ τ̣[ι] κα[․․]ε̣[․․]ο̣ντι.

l.4: Arena, IGASM I² 66, ἐ[ν] κα [λέ]ε̣[ν λ]ντι. Chamis I hold in the sinking-​balance of disease (i.e., decline induced by disease), and in ateleia, whatever [they want]!24 The importance of ateleia to early Greek curse rituals is also evident in the concept’s emergence in the regions to which the practice spread during the fifth century, beginning with other coastal Sicilian cities. Thus a curse tablet attributed to the Gela region reads (1.15, B lines 4–​5): “I register all choragoi for unfullfillment (ἐπ’ ἀτελεία) in words and deeds.”25 Buried in the necropolis of Cumae in the Bay of Naples, another Classical curse tablet also calls for the ateleia of opponents’ words and deeds:26

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Tablet 1.4. SEG 4.93 Cumae necropolis (Bay of Naples, Italy) Fifth century bce Naples Archaeological Museum  

1

τὰ Ὀδο̄ρίδος καὶ Ἄσρο̄νος ἀτε{δ}λέα {ἀτελέα} καὶ ἔπεα καὶ ἔργα ναι τὰ Ὀδο̄ρίδος καὶ Ἄσρο̄ος ναι, καὶ ἴ τις πρὸ ἐκέ-​

 

5

νο̄ν ἄλλος διαλέγετ-​ ται, πτας ἐντοῦθε κατ̣.

Let the affairs of Odoris (Oporis) and Asron (Akron) be unfulfilled, and the words and deeds of Odoris and Asron, and let whoever else speaks on their behalf [be unfulfilled], I inscribe them all here!27 The composer of 1.4 used a model very close to that of several early Selinountine curse tablets. It seems that the ritual’s spread from Sicily to the Italian mainland, a topic further discussed in Chapter 3, included the use of ateleia in legal curse contexts. A curse tablet from Classical Athens (DTAud 68; see Chapter 4) similarly asks that “words and deeds” (ἔπη καὶ ἔργα) go “unfulfilled” (ἀτέλεστα). The Attic text draws an explicit comparison (ὡς, οὕτως) between the unfulfillment of the opponent’s words and deeds and the ἀτελής-​corpse with which the object was buried.28 A curse tablet from a fourth-​century grave in Sikyon similarly hinges upon the concept of ateleia, “Whatever Phryna is saying, make it unfulfilled (ἀτέλεσστα), either by word or by deed (αἴτ’ εἔπει αἴ[τ]ε ἐρέγοι),”29 suggesting again that calls for “unfulfillment” were at the heart of many early curse rituals, and spread alongside the practice from Sicily to the Italian and Greek mainland during the Classical period. Finally, the centrality of ateleia to early curse-​writing rituals is intimated by the term’s use in Aeschylus’s Eumenides, a drama broadly concerned with justice, vengeance, and the transition from blood-​guilt vendetta to law court arbitration. The chorus of Erinyes mentions ateleia in a difficult passage concerned with the murder of kinsmen (Eum. 361–​6): “Being eager to relieve everyone of these concerns, I bring it about by my efforts that the gods have immunity (ἀτέλειαν) from them so that they do not even have to go to an inquiry (εἰς ἄγκρισιν).”30 Here ateleia carries the legal sense of “exemption” or “immunity” from an obligation; some early judicial curse tablets may have played with this meaning in analogically

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calling down ateleia (“unfulfillment”) on opponents at trial. Aeschylus does not use the term elsewhere in his extant tragedies: ateleia is found only here, soon after the Erinyes’s famous “binding hymn” (ὕμνον δ’ ἀκούσῃ τόνδε δέσμιον, line 306; ὕμνος ἐξ Ἐρινύων, δέσμιος φρενῶν, lines 331–​2). Faraone (1985) has demonstrated that the Erinyes’s binding song reflects an incantation meant to bind the wits of an opponent in court; the mention of ateleia within this same choral ode, spoken by the blood-​guzzling Erinyes ahead of a trial, could suggest that the term formed an integral part of oral judicial binding spells, and featured prominently in the late Archaic and Classical law courts. This would explain the importance of ateleia in the oldest Greek curse tablets, most of which were themselves linked to litigation.

Targeting the Tongue and Punctuation Like calls for ateleia, the cursing of an opponent’s tongue was also a recurring theme in early Greek curse rituals.31 By targeting the tongue, practitioners aimed to suppress threatening, potentially damaging speech, as in this tablet, one of the oldest to have been definitively occasioned by litigation: Tablet 1.5. CDS 16 Selinous, Buffa necropolis (Brugnone 1976, 73–​9) c. 500–​480 bce Boustrophedon; text begins sinistrorsum. Opisthographic. Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42579 recto 1

5

τὰν Ε[ὐ]κλέος γλο(͂ σ)σαν κ αὶ τὰν Ἀριστοφάνιος καὶ τὰ̣ν Ἀνγείλιος κα-​ ὶ τ[ὰν] Ἀλκ[ί]φρο̣νο[ς] κ-​ αὶ τὰν Hαγεστράτο̄· το-͂ ​ ν συνδίϙο̄ν τον͂ ̣ [Ε]ὐ[κ]λί-​ ος κα[ὶ τ]ο ͂ν̣ Ἀριστοφάνε-​ ος [τὰς γ]λ[(σ)σ]ας κα[ὶ τ]ὰν [․․․․]λ[․]ονος [γλο (͂ σ)σαν]

← → ← ← → ← → ← →

verso 10  καὶ τὰν Ο[ἰ]νο̣[θ]έ̣ο̄ καὶ τ    ὰν Α̣[․․․γ]λ̣ο[( ͂ σ)σ]αν

→ ←

A: The tongue of Eukles and that of Aristophanes and that of Angeilis and that of Alkiphron and that of Hagestratos. The tongues of the advocates, that of Eukles and of Aristophanes. And [the tongue] of [——​]l[-​]‌onos. B: And that of Oinotheos and of A[——​], the tongue.

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This text displays the variation found in early curse tablets from the Buffa necropolis: the tongues of no fewer than seven individuals are cursed, in addition to the tongues of unnamed sundikoi (σύνδικοι), advocates at trial or one’s broader legal support network.32 Verbs in tablet 1.5 are conspicuously absent; possibly a curse verb was recited orally or, more likely, the verb was assumed and obviated by the act of writing, as many fifth-​century Sicilian curse tablets employ compounds of γράφω as primary curse verbs (καταγράφω, ἐνγράφω, discussed below). Like tablet 1.1, which also curses an opponent’s advocates in court (σύνδικοι, συνδίϙοι), tablet 1.5 suggests that early fifth-​century litigants could mobilize a network of supporters at trial. The presence of this group in court was understood to significantly help the litigant, and posed a real threat to the opposition (this must have proven particularly nerve-​wracking if an opposing support network included persons of wealth or prominence—​magistrates, priests, or even foreign dignitaries). Another early fifth-​century curse tablet, assumed by Bettarini and others to have come from Selinous (CDS 13), curses the tongues of the supporters of Mestor in court. The composer of CDS 13 “writes down” (καταγράφο̄) the tongues of his opponent’s supporters so that each “will not help Mestor” (ℎὸς με̄δὲν Μέ̄στο̄ρι ὀφε̄λεσεῖ) at trial: “I write down the tongue of Eukles, the son of Adeimantos, so that he will not help Mestor. I write down the tongue of Simias, the son of Mikythos, so that he will not help Mestor . . . ” (CDS 13, lines 1–​6). Here, too, the marshalling of a network of supporting allies at trial was an important part of the legal process, and points to the wide reach of Selinous’s law courts by 500 bce. The cursing of tongues in tablets 1.5, 1.1, and CDS 13 also reveals the anxieties in the judicial process that surrounded speech, which might range from witness testimony to damaging gossip in the local community. Another curse tablet that targets tongues purportedly emerged in Selinous’s Manuzza necropolis. Published by Bettarini in 2009, the object documents yet another mortuary space used by Selinountine curse practitioners by 450 bce:33 Tablet 1.6. Bettarini 2009, 142 Selinous, Manuzza necropolis c. 450 bce 34 Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. No. 45425 Fragment A 1 ..]ΛΟΣΣΑΙ[ -​ το̄ [κ]αὶ Σελ̣ι[̣ ν-​ -​ συ̣κλέος[ -​ α[.]‌ρος καὶ [ 5 -​ ο Πυ̣ρρία καὶ [

Fragment B 1 ]ο [Η]ύψ[ι-​ ]ΟΣ[.]‌ΚΛ[ ]ιχα[.]‌ΟΡ[ ]ΑΣ[. .]ΝΟΣ[ 5 ]Μ[. . .]Τ̣ΑΣ[      ]Ρ̣Ο[

Fragment C 1 -​ ΟΛΟΣΣ[..]ΟΔΕ[ -​ ΣΣ< γλ[οσ͂ ]σαν̣[    vacat

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This fragmentary curse cited at least two tongues (γλ[οσ͂ ]σαν, Fr. C line 2; Γ]ΛΟΣΣΑΙ, Fr. A line 1), alongside personal names: Pyrrhia, ypsios or Hypsis, and perhaps Sosikles.35 Among the peculiarities of this Manuzza tablet is the analphabetic sign ἐ̣νκαταγρά{ο}φο̄ πὰρ τὰν ℎαγνὰν θεὸν τὰ ψυχὰν αὐτο͂ν· τὸν Φονικος ℎυιὸν το͂ Καιλίο̄ καταγράφο̄ πὰρ τὰν ℎαγνὰν θεόν. Ἀπελος Λυκίνο̄, Λυκῖνος Πύρ(ρ)ο̄, Ναν(ν)ελαιος, Ἐϙοτις Μάγο̄νος, Ηαλος Πυκελείο̄{ν}, Ῥομ ͂ ις Καιλ-​ ίο̄{ν}, Ἀπελος ℎο Φοίνιϙος, Τιτ(τ)ελος Φοίνιϙος, Ἀτ(τ)ος Ναυεριάδα, Τιτ(τ)ελος Ναν(ν)ελαίο̄{ν}, Σαρις Ῥόμιος.

15

I register Apelos, son of Lukinos, beside the Holy Goddess, along with his soul and might, and Lukinos, the son of Halos, and his brother. And beside the Holy Goddess, this one, Nauerotos, the son of Halos, and Botulos the son of Tamiras, and their sons, and Saris and Apelos and Rhomis the son of Kailios, beside the Holy Goddess, and their sons and Saris the son of Purrinos and Purros the son of Purros, beside the Holy Goddess, and the sons of Rhotulos, of Purros, beside the Holy Goddess, and their power and tongues! Plakitas the son of Nannelaios and Halos the son of Pukeleios, I register their soul and their power beside the Holy Goddess! Kadosis the son of Matulaios, and Ekotis the son of Magon, I register the soul of these men beside the Holy Goddess. And this son of Phoinix the son of Kailios, I register beside the Holy Goddess.

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Apelos, son of Lukinos, Lukinos son of Purros, Nannelaios, Ekotis, son of Magon, Halos, son of Pukeleios, Rhomis, son of Kailios, Apelos, son of Phoinix, Tittelos, son of Phoinix, Attos, son of Nauerids, Tittelos, son of Nannelaios, Saris, son of Rhomis. The first 16 lines of this lengthy curse are broken into eight sections, each of which is introduced with the phrase “[I register] before/​beside the Holy Goddess” ([καταγράφο̄] πὰρ τὰν ℎαγνὰν θεόν). The repetition of τὰν ℎαγνὰν θεόν would have given the curse an incantatory, prayer-​like feel, while the registration of victims “before,” “beside,” or “in the presence of ” (πάρ) a divine witness signals influence from the legal process; quite probably this “Holy,” “Pure,” or “Great” (ℎαγνά) Goddess was understood as the divine agent responsible for enacting the curse. Compounds of γράφω again form the operative curse verbs: “I write down” (καταγράφο̄) is thrice employed (lines 1, 11–​12, 15), and “I engrave, register” (ἐνκαταγράφο̄) appears once (line 14). In line 16 a solid line was drawn, effectively dividing the curse into two parts; the first section (lines 1–​16) is more discursive, carrying all verbs and references to the Holy Goddess, while the second (lines 16–​19) contains only names and patronymics written in succession. Most individuals named in the second section also appear in the first, but some, like Attos and Tittelos, are cited for the first time. Who was this unnamed Holy Goddess? The site of deposition renders Demeter Malophoros one candidate, though William Calder and others have suggested that Pasikrateia, the Selinountine equivalent of Persephone, was the intended recipient (a fourth-​century Orphic-​Bacchic gold lamella from Thurii uses ἁγνή as an epithet of Persephone).85 The ambiguous title “Holy Goddess” may point to the fluidity of divine identities within the precinct, with some Greeks recognizing Demeter or Persephone, and non-​Greeks, Phoenicians or Elymians, for example, understanding a goddess of Levantine or local Sicilian character. Another curse tablet from the Malophoros precinct, CDS 1 from the early fifth century bce, begins with the same ambiguous invocation: θεά, “Goddess,” which Bettarini interprets as Persephone.86 CDS 1 is the oldest curse to invoke a deity in the vocative (θεά), and the entreaty occupies the entire first line of text. Tablet 1.11 also curses kin groups. The text refers to seven separate families, probably groups of fathers, sons, and brothers who served as litigants and witnesses in a lawsuit, perhaps in an inheritance dispute.87 These families were likely among Selinous’s powerful gentilician groups, who cooperated and competed with one another for influence in the late Archaic city (see Chapter 2). The onomastics are also of interest: the text targets several individuals bearing non-​Greek names.88 These are the only attestations of the name ῎Εκοτις/​Ἐϙοτις (lines 13, 17), the origins of which are unclear; the man’s father bears the Semitic

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name Μάγων, and may himself have identified as Phoenician.89 Onomastics also suggest that native Sicilian and Etruscan/​Italic individuals were involved in the conflict: Titelos is probably a local Sicilian name, appearing in Elymian graffiti and an inscription from Hellenistic Segesta; Rhomis was an Etruscan-​Italic name, as was Kailios (Καιλίο̄ν, cf. the Etruscan Caile and Latin Caelius), Pukeleios (Πυκελείο̄, cf. the Latin Puculeius/​Buculeius), and Matulaios (Ματυλαίο̄, cf. the Latin Matellius and the Etruscan Matulna).90 Meiser has even suggested that this curse is representative of “a fundamentally non-​Greek environment,” and that the text features “a conflict between Elymian and Greek syntax—​perhaps because the writer of the text was not a Greek native speaker.”91 The convergence in Selinous of these individuals—​at least some of whom were likely non-​Greek—​reveals one way in which the city served as an important zone of cultural contact in the central Mediterranean, connecting Greeks with persons of possible Phoenician, Etruscan, Italic, and native Sicilian origin, and adjudicating the conflicts that arose between them.

Textual Distortion Curse tablets from the Gaggera Hill also engage with the materiality and form of the inscribed text—​scrambling and twisting letters, and reversing syllables in personal names—​with the intent of analogically confounding the victim himself. Consider tablet 1.12, which contains a list of continuous names, most of which were written retrograde (the characters, however, face toward the right). Tablet 1.12. CDS 25 Selinous, region of the Malophoros and Meilichios precincts (Gabrici 1927,   394–​5 n.17) c.450 bce 92 Text mostly retrograde (letters dextrorsum) Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. 42562 1

Πίθο̄ν Γοργίας Πυθόδρος Δε̄ΐα̣ς Χίμρος Φιλόλεο̄ς Ἀκρ̣οικι Σελινι

← ←

Philoleos, Chimaros, Deias, Pythodoros, Gorgias, Pithon. Selinoi, Akroikoi93 Striking in this curse is the deliberate distortion of text: not only were individual names inscribed backward, from right to left (hence line 2 reads ΙΟΚΟΙΡΚΑ

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ΙΟΝΙΛΕΣ), but some syllables within the names were inverted.94 The scribe incised ΝΟΘΠΙ for ΠΙΘΟΝ (Πίθον), ΣΑΓΙΡΟΓ for ΓΟΡΓΙΑΣ (Γοργίας), and ΙΟΚΟΙΡΚΑ for ΑΚΡΟΙΚΟΙ (Ἀκρ̣οικόι?). Here is an early form of sympathetic

magic: what befell the inscribed text (distortion, scrambling) would afflict the targets themselves.95 It should be noted that one of the two published curse tablets from Himera’s Buonfornello necropolis also exhibits textual distortion. Buried in a grave of early fifth-​century date, the object carries a list of personal names—​ many of which have the letters of the first syllable inverted.96 Thus Silanos is cursed on Side A, but his name (Σιλανός) was inscribed as ΙΣΛΑΝΟΣ (line 1); on Side B, Σίμος was written as ΙΣΜΣΟ (line 5), with the characters in both syllables shuffled, and so on. Early curse tablets from both Selinous and Himera therefore played with the materiality of written text: inverting, twisting, and deforming letters to analogically confound the targets. The very shape and form of the writing were drawn into the ritual process in a way that added significance to the text itself, reaching beyond the semantic meaning of the words alone. The ritual analogy depended on the written text for efficacy. Textual distortion is found in another tablet from Selinous’s Gaggera precincts, on which 18 names were written backward (though individual characters face toward the right). There is little agreement among editors about the transcription of this difficult text, so scrambled are the names across and between lines. Tablet 1.13. CDS 24, IGASMG I² 69 Selinous, region of the Malophoros and Meilichios precincts (Gabrici 1927,   392–​3 n.15) c. 475–​450 bce Text backward; characters face toward right Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo: Inv. 42566 (Figure 1.9) 1

εἶεν ἐξόλειαι καὶ αὐτο͂ν καὶ γενεᾶς· Νίκυλλος Καπόσο̄, Δένδιλος Μάμονος, Αἴνο̄ν Βλ̣έπονος, Ξένιος Ἀπόντιος Ηε̄ρακλείδας, Σαῦρις, -​ανις Ἄθ-​Ταμμάρο̄ Hε̄ρακλείδας, Ῥας Φαρμαυα, -​ν

5

Δίο̄-​Πιάκιος, Πιθθίας, Χαίο̄ν, Μαμμαρειι -​τα Ζοζ̣-​, Ἀγάθυλλος Ξένιος Hε̄ρακλείδας, -​τος Σύνε-​Ξένο̄νος.

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l.1: the text is that of IGASMG I² 69 (=​Arena 1996, cf. Jeffery 1955, 73 n.3); Bettarini 2005, 125 (CDS 24) restores ἐπ̣ὶ ἐξο̄λ̣είαι καὶ αὐτον͂ καὶ γενεᾶς. Let there be utter destruction both of these men and their kin! Nikullos the son of Kaposos, Dendilos the son of Mamon(?), Ainon the son of Blepon, Xenios the son of Apontis of the Herakleidai, Sauris, Athanis the son of Tammaros of the Herakleidai, Ras Pharmaua (?), Dion the son of Piakis, Pitthias, Chaion son of Mammareios(?), Zoita (?), Agathullos son of Xenios of the Herakleidai, Sunetos the son of Xenon.

Figure 1.9 Tablet 1.13 (CDS 24), 475–​450 bce. A. Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum, Palermo, Inv. 42566. Drawing of CDS 24 by J. Curbera.

My translation gives a general sense of the curse, but is uncertain in several places.97 Here the names of all victims were disfigured by the reversal of letters. Hence in the first line of text, which otherwise runs from left to right, the name Νίκυλλος is written in reverse as ΣΟΛΛΥΚΙΝ; in the second line, Καπόσο̄ is spelled ΟΣΟΠΑΚ, and so on. Just as the letters have been reversed and contorted, so too did the scribe intend for the victims to be confounded. A growing familiarity with writing surely catalyzed the experimentation with textual distortion observed in tablets 1.12 and 1.13, and endowed written curses with still greater ritual efficacy: the text itself could now enact powerful change. Tablet 1.13 also cursed family and gentilician groups, opening with a call for the total destruction of the named individuals and their kin. Several patronymics are given, and two members of the same family are cursed, likely father and son: Agathullos son of Xenios and Xenios son of Apontis. The curse also associates three individuals, Xenios, Athanis, and Agathullos, with

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a particular gentilician group, the Heracleids (Hερακλείδας), a clan found in other early curse tablets from Selinous.98 The presence of three members of an elite family in this curse led Arena to propose that the curse was occasioned by a political dispute, which was unfolding in the lawcourts at the time (1986, 115). Aside from curse tablets, gentilician names are rare in private Sicilian texts, according to Cordano; their use is otherwise confined to public documents, employed toward political and administrative ends.99 Here the citation of the genos may have aimed to confer civic authority on the text (Bettarini 2005, 127), and, like so many early Selinountine curse tablets, should be understood within a judicial framework. Further discussed in the following chapter, the presence of the Heracleid genos intimates that it was Selinous’s elites who first used curse tablets. Theirs were the fiscal and material interests at stake in the law courts.

Destruction Clauses: The Public Curse One final aspect of tablet 1.13 proves significant: the curse calls for the total destruction of the named individuals and their families.100 This construction was drawn from imprecations in the public realm, from sacred and civic curses (arai) that hinged upon phrases of “destruction” like εἶεν ἐξόλειαι or ἐξώλης.101 Such arai were often appended to oaths, and are revisited in this book’s final chapter as another example of how oral formulae were used—​and thereby preserved—​in some curse-​writing rituals. I note in brief that phrases like εἶεν ἐξόλειαι καὶ αὐτο͂ν καὶ γενεᾶς bolstered private curses with an official, authoritative air, and veiled the ritual in the language of codified, civic discourse. Such language may even have been used in judicial oaths in Selinous’s lawcourts. The deposition of tablet 1.13 in a sanctuary, furthermore, may suggest that it was understood as an appeal to the precinct’s deities to avenge a perceived injustice or wrongdoing, perhaps even the breach of an oath that had used similar language. Demeter was, after all, a deity by whom oaths were sworn. The influence of public arai on private curse-​writing rituals is evident in two other Sicilian curse tablets. First, a similar phrase of destruction appears on a later, fourth-​century curse purportedly from the region of Camarina. Now in a private collection, SEG 47.1439 lists the names of several individuals (Δεινίας, Πολλίας, et al.), and concludes, “Destroyed (are) these men!” (ἐξόλης οἵ).102 Second, a curse tablet of unknown provenance emerged in the Schøyen collection in 2014, and now resides in Yale University’s Beinecke Library. The script and Doric West-​ Greek dialect intimate Sicilian origins and a fifth-​century date.103 The 10-​line text combines a number of familiar themes to create a powerful judicial curse and, interestingly, calls down destruction on opponents with a historical or mythological analogy:

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Tablet 1.14. Jordan, Rocca, Threatte 2014 Sicily Fifth century bce Yale University, Beinecke Library 1242 (Figure 1.10) 1

hο̄ς Ὄλτις ἐς τέλος ἰασα ἀπλετο, τς ῾Ράτο̄ν ἀτέλεστ᾽ ἀγορεύεν, τὸν καὶ Κέλο̄ν καὶ ἐς ἔπεα καὶ ἔργα ἐν τᾶι δίκαι. hο̄ς ἀτέλεστος

5

Ὄλτις ἀπλετο ἐς τέλος ἰασα, τς Μύσκελος ἀτέλεστ᾽ ἀ δκαι καὶ ἐς ἔπεα καὶ ἔργα ἐν τᾶι δίκαι. hο̄ς Ὄλτις ἀτέλεστος ἀπλετο, hο̄ς Λ-​ έπτο̄ν ἀτέλεστ᾽ ἀγορεύον. με̄δὲ-​

10

ν hανύοι ἐν τᾶι δίκαι.

As Oltis, going toward telos,104 was destroyed, so let Rhaton fruitlessly plead, him and Kelon, both in words and deeds in court. As Oltis, atelestos, was destroyed going toward telos, so let Myskelos fruitlessly in court, both in words and deeds in court! As Oltis, atelestos, was destroyed, so too may Lepton, pleading fruitlessly, be unfulfilled in court!

Figure 1.10 Tablet 1.14, Sicily, fifth century bce. Yale University, Beinecke Library Inv. 1242. Photograph by author.

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This judicial curse thrice notes that it was to take effect “in court,” ἐν τᾶι δίκαι, and targets the “words and deeds,” ἔπεα καὶ ἔργα, of four men (῾Ράτον, Μύσκελος, Λέπτον, and Κέλον/​Καικελος). Through the ἀτέλεστος/​ἀτέλεστα analogy, the curse demands that their lawsuit come to naught. Intriguingly, the scribe refers to an incident in which Oltis “was destroyed, being at/​g oing toward (ΙΑΣΑ) telos;”105 this repeated reference carves the curse into three discrete units, with ἐς τέλος probably referring to the verdict (as culmination) of the trial. The Oltis paradigm may refer to a notorious episode in which a man was ruined at the conclusion of a trial—​something about which everyone talked within the community. Alternatively, it may be mythological, referring to “a small local historiola.”106 The verb ἀπόλλυμι is common in public curses, and suggests that either this private ritual drew language from civic and sacred arai, or perhaps that Oltis’s destruction had taken the form of a damning public curse.

Conclusions and Apellis’s Choregoi Curse This chapter has surveyed the earliest Greek curse tablets, which at the time of writing hail from Selinous and date from around or soon after 500 bce; the future publication of some 54 Himeran curse tablets will provide a roughly contemporary corpus with which this Selinountine material can be compared. The majority of fifth-​century Sicilian curse tablets were composed on account of litigation, and it seems that conflict in the law courts played a significant role in driving early curse-​writing rituals. The surveyed tablets exhibit great variety in terms of language, themes, the formatting of text, and physical shape. Compounds of γράφω were used to “write down” or “register” victims; the tablets also made use of diacritical marks, abbreviations, the assignment of text to columns, and ground lines. These factors underscore the “textual” nature of many early Selinountine curse tablets, with ritual efficacy hinging upon the act of inscribing text on lead. That said, some Selinountine curse tablets do record spoken formulae, including destruction clauses known from public arai; they also call down “unfulfillment” (ἀτέλεια) upon victims, and demand that deeds and words come to naught (ἔργα καὶ ἔπεα . . . ἀτέλεστα). The targeting of victims’ tongues was another popular theme, along with the “twisting” or “turning back” (ἀπεστραμένα) of the tongue.107 Finally, the distortion of text in early curse tablets from Selinous and Himera analogically represented the confounding of the victim himself; this too marked a significant stage of written literacy, and an awareness of the text’s material properties. Absent from the majority of published fifth-​century Sicilian curse tablets are the “binding” verbs δέω and καταδέω.108 On the basis of current evidence, it seems unlikely that early Selinountine curse tablets were referred to

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as κατάδεσμοι: the concept of binding is simply not visible in the practice, as best we can tell, in Selinous by 500 bce.109 The absence of the binding idiom may also help account for the absence of curse effigies, none of which are attested alongside the oldest Selinountine curse tablets. Nor have any lead figurines been reported alongside the 54 curse tablets from Himera, though one of the tablets carries a drawing of its intended target, a woman named Echekrateia, which may have served as a visual analog akin to a bound effigy (Figure I.5).110 In fact, only two curse effigies are known from Sicily, neither of which was recovered in context, and only one of which has been dated. The first was made of lead, and the incision of 10 names on the figurine’s chest has led scholars to date the object to the late fifth or early fourth century bce; often described as “demonic” in appearance, the effigy’s head and feet are twisted behind its back, with arms upraised.111 The second bound effigy was made of bronze and purportedly recovered in Sicilian Naxos, though its date of manufacture is unknown.112 From Selinous and Himera, curse-​writing rituals spread to other coastal Sicilian cities, appearing in Acragas, Camarina, and Gela by c. 450 bce. While many of the above-​surveyed themes spread with the practice, the ritual was also put to new uses, and was utilized to address new types of interpersonal conflicts. This is well illustrated by a curse tablet of mid-​fifth century date, tablet 1.15. The tablet’s provenance is unknown but, according to the dealer from whom the object was purchased, it purportedly came from a grave in southeastern Sicily. Scholars have long accepted an origin in the Gela region on the basis of dialect, onomastics, and script. The opisthographic lead tablet is remarkable for several reasons, not least the fact that it carries both a curse and a financial receipt; the receipt had been given to a man named Apellis, who later reused the tablet for the writing of a curse.113 The receipt (Side A) was inscribed in the so-​called blue alphabet, whereas the curse (Side B) was composed in the red alphabet; as the former came to replace the latter in southeastern Sicily around 470 bce, Jordan used this date as a terminus post quem for Side A.114 Tablet 1.15. Jordan 2007 Sicily: Gela Region? c. 475–​450 bce University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill: Rare Book Room

1 (Hand II)   (Hand I)

Side A [Μ]ύσκον Δάμιος τοῦ Κοβέτου· vacat c. 7 [Δ]εμόκριτος ἐφίετο Ἀπέλ̣ιλν ἐνγυάσασθαι· vacat c. 4 [hά]μα δὲ ἔφα εἴμειν. κατελάζετο τὸν Λεοντίνον ξέ-​ [νον] Μύσκονα ἐν τᾶι πλατεία⟨ι⟩ θοκέοντα. Σ-​ vacat c. 4

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[ΣΣ?] ἀργυρίον ἔχον hῖκε βοο͂ν τιμάν. οὐκ ἐπρίατο [δὲ·] ποτ᾿ Ἐνπεδοκλεν͂ Μνασιμάχου ποτεν⟨έ⟩θετο· vacat c. 2

(Hand II)

γενέσθο ἐν[γ]υάσασθαι vacat c. 20

  vacat 1

5

10

Side B (I) Τ̣ύχα· (II) Ἀπέλλις ἐπὶ φιλότατι τᾶι Εὐνίϙο ⟨-​⟩ μεδέν’ [Ε]ὐνίϙο σπευ-​ ͂ δ[αι]ότερον ἐμεν μεδὲ φιντίονα, ἀλλ’ ἐπαινε͂⟨ν⟩ καὶ ἑϙόντα κἀεϙ-​ όντα καὶ φιλετᾶν· (III) ἐπὶ φιλότατι τᾶι Εὐνίϙο ἀπογαράφο τὸ-​ ς χοραγὸς πάντας ἐπ’ ἀτελεία⟨ι⟩ κἐπέον καὶ ἔργον καὶ τ-​ ὸς παίδ{ι}ας {ἀπὸ} τένον καὶ τὸς πατέρας κἀπρακτίαι κἐν ἀγο͂-​ νι κἐχθὸς ἀγόνον οἵτινες μὲ παρ’ ἐμ’ ἀπολείποιεν· (IV) Καλεδίαν [ἀπογ]αράφο ἀπ’ Ἀπέλλιος καὶ τὸςς τενε͂ι πάντας ἐπὶ μεσοτέρ-​ [ο -​-​ca. 3-​] ἐντάδα· (V) Σοσίαν ἀπογράφο ἀπὸ το͂ καπελείο Ἀλκιαδᾶν ἐπὶ τᾶ-​ [ι Μελ?]ανθίο φιλότατι· (VI) Πυρία⟨μ⟩, Μύσσκελον, Δαμόφαντον καὶ τὸν [-​-ca. ​ 4-​-​]ον ἀπογράφο ἀπὸ τομ͂ παιδον͂ καὶ τομ͂ πατέρον καὶ τὸς ἄλλ-​ [ος πά]ντας οἵτινες ἐντάδε ἀφικνοίατο, μεδέν’ Εὐνίκο σπευδαιό-​ [τερο]ν γενέσθαι μέτ ἄνδρεσι μέτε γυναίκεσσι. (VII) ὁς οὗτος ⟨ὁ⟩ βόλ̣ιμος, τὸς ΤΕ-​ [-​-​ca. 5-​-​-​]Ο̣ΔΙΑ̣Ι̣ΤΙΜΑΝ ἐρύσαιντο Εὐνίκοι ἀὲ νικᾶν παντε͂. (VIII) ἐμ βολύμοι̣ ἐπ̣-​ [ὶ φιλ]ότατι τᾶι Εὐνίκο γάρφο.

A (Trans. D. Jordan 2007) (Hand II) Myskon (son) of Damis the (son) of Kobetos. (Hand I) Demokritos asked Apellis to be guarantor. And at the same time he (sc. Apellis) said he was. He (Apellis?) found the proxenos of the (people of ) Leontinoi, Myskon, sitting in the plateia. He came having three(?) staters of silver, (as) cattle price. He did not buy, however: with Empedokles son of Mnasimachos he made a deposit. (Hand II) Let this be the guarantee. B (Trans. from P. Wilson 2007, slightly adapted) Fortune! Apellis, for love of Eunikos 〈prays〉 that no one be taken more seriously or be more popular than Eunikos but that all praise and admire him both willingly and unwillingly! (III) On account of love of Eunikos, I write down all the choragoi so that they be unfulfilled both in word and deed, along with their sons and fathers; and so that they fail both in the contest and outside the contests–​–​whoever does not leave him (sc. Eunikos) with me. (IV) I write down Kaledias to keep him apart from Apellis, and all those

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(??) in between there and here. (??) (V) Sosias I write down, the one from the shop of the Alkiadai, because of his love of [Mel]anthios. (VI) Puria〈s〉 Musskelos, Damophantos and the[ir chorag]os I write down, along with their sons and fathers, and all the others who arrive here. May no one be taken more seriously than Eunikos either among men or women! (VII) As this lead, so [ . . . ] may they support Eunikos to be victorious always everywhere. (VIII) On the lead for love of Eunikos I write! The tablet was first used as a receipt for a man named Apellis, who served as guarantor for a costly transaction involving the purchase of cattle (Side A).115 One copy of the receipt was filed in a public archive, while the other was given to Apellis as proof of transaction.116 Sometime thereafter, Apellis repurposed the receipt to inscribe a curse against the rival choregoi of a man named Eunikos. Of the curse, Peter Wilson wrote (2007, 351), [t]‌his lead tablet opens a (small, dirty and broken) window onto the festival culture of a Greek community in mid-​fifth century Sicily, almost certainly that of the flourishing city-​state of Gela at its height. It gives evidence of a festival there that had choral contests, perhaps of some scale, and hints at the mechanics of their operation. It is unclear whether the choragoi cursed by Apellis served as liturgists, and thereby financed choral performances (like Athenian choregoi), or if these Sicilian choragoi were the leaders, trainers, or poets of a dramatic chorus. Considering the wealth of Apellis, a man able to serve as guarantor for the purchase of livestock (Side A), the former scenario seems probable, and Apellis himself may have sponsored the chorus in which Eunikos performed.117 Whatever the case may have been, Apellis turned to curse-​writing rituals to undermine rivals seemingly in a choral competition (ἀγο͂νι).118 Apellis writes that he is cursing “on account of love for Eunikos” (ἐπὶ φιλότατι τᾶι Εὐνίϙο, lines 1, 3, 14), for whom he demands success in the contest. The term φιλότας suggests, in my opinion, erotic intimacy between the two men, and the tablet can certainly be considered an amatory “relationship” curse as much as a competitive curse against public performers. Tablet 1.15, together with the recently published Himeran curse tablet from the early fifth century (Figure I.5 in the Introduction),119 documents how erotic entanglements could drive curse-​ writing rituals from soon after the practice’s emergence in Greek Sicily. Reading Apellis’s imprecation against the broader backdrop of Selinountine curse tablets also allows us to observe the familiar application of ἀπογράφω,

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“I write down,” in the cursing of opponents. Here too “words and deeds” were registered for “unfulfillment”: ἐπ’ ἀτελεία⟨ι⟩ κἐπέον καὶ ἔργον. Yet the text calls attention to the fact that it was inscribed on lead (βόλ̣ιμος . . . ἐμ βολύμοι), and is the earliest curse to do so, to the best of my knowledge. An important (regrettably lacunose) formulation is evident in lines 12–​13: ὁς οὗτος ⟨ὁ⟩ βόλ̣ιμος, τὸς ΤΕ[ca. 5]Ο̣ΔΙΑ̣Ι̣ΤΙΜΑΝ ἐρύσαιντο Εὐνίκοι ἀὲ νικᾶν παντε͂. The clauses hinge upon a ὁς οὗτος . . . τός construction, the thrust of which lies in an analogy to the lead medium upon which Apellis was writing (ὁς οὗτος ⟨ὁ⟩ βόλ̣ιμος). Jordan never published an English translation, but Wilson, drawing upon the earlier edition of Dubois, suggested that the lines had the following sense: “Just as this lead (sc. effectively drew the τιμά of the guarantee that was inscribed on the other side of the tablet), so may the Enodiai draw out the τιμά of those men (sc. the rival choragoi and their supporters listed in the defixio).”120 Wilson’s reading is convincing, regardless of whether Ἐνοδιαί is restored, and suggests that the scribe was forging an analogy between the financial receipt on the recto, which registered the transaction’s tima (“value, worth”), and the curse inscribed on the verso, which aimed to draw out the tima of Eunikos’s rivals. Apellis’s malediction articulates another mechanism by which curse practice was understood to operate; so too does it document other conflicts in which the ritual was applied: choral competitions and erotic entanglements. Tablet 1.15 also demonstrates how curse practice had spread across Sicily’s southern coast by 450 bce, and provides a rare glimpse of the individuals writing curses at this time. Apellis was a wealthy citizen, with the resources to sponsor a costly commercial transaction (Side A), and able to finance a dramatic chorus (Side B). This latter point is revisited in the following chapter, which situates early Greek curse practice in its social, economic, and historical contexts.

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Why Western Sicily?

Introduction Though some 45 curse tablets are known from Selinous, no tablets of Archaic date are known to have come from Megara Hyblaia, the city that (co-​) founded Selinous in the mid-​seventh century bce, nor from Megara, the founding metropolis (“mother city”) of Megara Hyblaia on the Greek mainland.1 Nor have early Greek curse tablets emerged in the poleis that founded Himera, Acragas, or Camarina.2 The appearance of curse-​writing rituals in Selinous and other Sicilian poleis therefore cannot be traced back to practices known from the cities that established these colonies: in other words, the ritual does not appear to have traveled to Selinous with settlers from the mother city. Rather, the phenomenon seems to have developed independently in the western frontiers of Greek Sicily. The ritual’s beginnings are probably to be found in the evolution of Selinous itself, and possibly also of Himera. Of course, new discoveries can always change this narrative but, at the time of writing, both the abundance of physical evidence and its early date point strongly, and likely unequivocally, to a Sicilian origin for Greek curse-​writing rituals. Dozens of fifth-​century curse tablets recently uncovered in Himera strengthen the suggestion that Sicily was the epicenter of the practice’s development, as does subsequent evidence from the networks along which the ritual disseminated. From western Sicily, curse-​ writing rituals spread during the fifth century bce to other coastal Sicilian poleis and to the Bay of Naples; in the following century, curse practice is attested in the Oscan towns of southern Italy, Punic Carthage, and even Massalia on the Gulf of Lyon (France) and Emporion in coastal Iberia. Sicily sits at the heart of this geographic nexus, and was the common denominator linking these central and western Mediterranean communities. If curse practice had developed elsewhere, we might expect a different path of transmission by the fourth century

In Blood and Ashes. Jessica L. Lamont, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.003.0003

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bce (and here, in my mind, the adoption of curse-​writing by Oscan-​speaking groups of southern Italy is particularly telling). The abundance of early Selinountine and Himeran curse tablets and the objects’ fifth-​century appearance in the Sicilian cities of Acragas, Camarina, and Gela raise historical questions about why the practice began when and where it did. Scholars have long attributed a role to Phoenician groups in the ritual’s beginnings, but, finding no obvious evidence for the inheritance of a Phoenician ritual by Greek practitioners, I suggest instead that a combination of factors in western Sicily sparked the creation of new rites and technologies, among which were curse-​ writing rituals. Rather than a direct transfer of curse practice from Phoenician to Greek groups (indeed, no Phoenician curse tablets are known from Sicily), there was a mixing of different cultural ingredients into new ritual recipes within this frontier community. Curse tablets emerge firmly within the aristocratic ethos of the late Archaic city-​state, often in legal contexts among competing elites, with texts composed in the Greek language and script. While previous scholarship has associated the early use of curse tablets with Selinous’s lower classes, I show that it was actually the city’s Greek, aristocratic gene—​powerful, wealthy, and literate, with great resources at their fingertips—​who first deployed curse-​writing rituals in the courts of law. These were the families with much at stake at trial, and the resources to procure and produce the objects surveyed in Chapter 1. This chapter concludes by reflecting upon broader Sicilian epigraphic habits in the late sixth and fifth centuries bce, especially the incision of ritual texts on lead. On the whole, it seems that a constellation of factors was in place in western Sicily by 500 bce that allowed for the emergence of curse practice: robust courts of law, cross-​ cultural exchange, converging ritual spaces, powerful aristocratic families with sharp rivalries, a ready supply of lead, spreading literacy, and a vibrant “epigraphic habit” that manifest in the writing of texts on lead and other media.

The Phoenician Factor? Western Sicily was a vibrant zone of cultural contact that had been supporting interactions between Greeks, Phoenicians, native Sicilians, Sardinians, North African and Italic peoples since the beginning of the first millennium bce. Even Greek identity was fluid and heterogenous in this region, with Greek-​speakers ascribing to more than one “hellenicity,” to borrow the term of Jonathan Hall.3 Selinous could proclaim its “Greekness” with the construction of a treasury in the panhellenic sanctuary of Olympian Zeus, yet also ally with the Carthaginians at the battle of Himera, fighting against other Sicilian Greek poleis in 480 bce. Greek residents of Selinous could variously affiliate with Megara Hyblaia,

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Megara, possibly Sparta or Cnidos, Doric Sicily, or Greek Sicily, in addition to espousing a strong local identity at the city-​state level.4 Phoenician identity was similarly complex in this region. The term “Phoenician” is here used to refer to the West Semitic speaking groups of coastal Sicily, specifically those peoples living in and around the sites of Motya, Soluntum/​Solous, and Panormus (Figure 2.1), though the word is of Greek, rather than Semitic, origin. Greeks used the term to describe residents of the coastal region of southern Syria and Lebanon, but the inhabitants of Syria-​Palestine never referred to themselves as Phoenicians.5 In the Levant, a patchwork of individual city-​states, including Tyre, Sidon, Byblos, and Akko, shared the Canaanite language and a common material culture, but had competing trade interests that impeded interregional state formation.6 These cities were not centrally governed, and harbored no coherent collective identity.7 The city-​state, not the broader region, was the locus of ethnic identification. As Josephine Quinn writes, “there is no good evidence in our surviving ancient sources that these Phoenicians saw themselves, or acted, in collective terms above the level of the city or in many cases simply the family.”8 Such cautions apply all the more in western Sicily, where, by the fifth century bce, the distant mother city (if the concept existed at all) would have been Carthage, rather than the cities of the coastal Levant.

Panormus

Himera

Segesta Motya Lilybaeum

Rhegium

Soluntum

Poggioreale Selinous

Acragas

Leontini Megara Hyblaea Syracuse

Gela Camarina

0 12.5 25

50 Kilometers

Figure 2.1  Map of Sicily. Map created by Joseph Morgan.

Sources: Esri, USGS, NOAA

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Carthage gained independence from Tyre in the sixth century bce, and thereafter assumed control of Phoenician settlements in the west.9 Carthage, writes Taco Terpstra, eventually became “the heart of a naval empire controlling Spain, Sicily, Sardinia and stretches of the North African coast,” usually referred to, in a useful if artificial shorthand, as the “Punic” world. While the two regions, east and west, remained in contact, they “had become culturally and politically distinct.”10 The term “Phoenician” overlooks these diasporic movements and fragmented histories, projecting a broad, cohesive, and externally defined identity on the Semitic-​ speaking groups of western Sicily. Thucydides claimed that Phoenicians had settled throughout the island prior to the arrival of Greek settlers (6.2.6), at which point these Semitic groups withdrew to the western enclaves of Panormus, Motya, and Soluntum—​yet the absence of Phoenician material culture in Sicily prior to Motya’s foundation in the eighth century poses a challenge to this account.11 Initially the trade in metals with nearby Etruria and Sardinia may have attracted these settlers, rather than trade with Sicily proper; this could help explain the Phoenician presence on Sicily’s western and northern coasts, directly along the commercial routes that linked Carthage to Phoenician settlements in Sardinia and Spain, and the metal-​rich Etruscan communities of the Italian peninsula.12 Recent scholarship has also presented Phoenician Sicilian settlements in terms of local production, arguing that an important economic driver at Motya and elsewhere may initially have been agricultural exploitation (a model familiar from neighboring Greek settlements).13 Phoenician groups were well established in western Sicily by the sixth century bce, and interacted often with indigenous Sicilians and Greeks. By the subsequent century, Sicilian Phoenicians had adopted the cult of Demeter and Kore from the Greeks with whom they were in contact; the worship of these goddesses in the Punic communities of Sicily, Sardinia, and Ibiza was partially assimilated with that of the Carthaginian Tanit and Egyptian Isis, female life-​g iving deities connected with prosperity and fertility.14 Some Greeks probably also chose to reside in Motya, as shown by the presence of Greek marble statuary, inscribed pottery, and funerary stelai on the Sicilian coast opposite the small island;15 that Greeks elected to live alongside Phoenicians in Soluntum, in northwestern Sicily, has been confirmed by recent excavations in Soluntum’s necropolis.16 And if western Sicily was a region of cultural exchange, Selinous in particular shows evidence for interaction between Greek and Phoenician groups, especially in terms of ritual.17 The Meilichios, Malophoros, and Triolo Nord precincts on Selinous’s Gaggera Hill developed alongside varying degrees of Phoenician influence,18 and here location proves significant: the Gaggera Hill was one of two regions in which curse-​writing rituals first appear at Selinous.

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The current scholarly consensus maintains that Phoenicians brought Levantine and ultimately Near Eastern rituals to the Greek communities with whom they were in contact, such that curse practice followed a trajectory similar to that of the Phoenician alphabet, adopted and adapted by the Greeks.19 Curse tablets as we now know them, this thinking goes, developed “under the influence from Carthaginians . . . in Sicily, most likely in Selinuntum with its very mixed population,”20 but “the ancestor of the curse tablet probably derives from the Assyro-​Babylonian world.”21 In other words, the Phoenicians were intermediaries, themselves employing Neo-​Assyrian/​Babylonian rites that were learned perhaps when the Syro-​Palestinian coast came under Assyrian rule in the reign of Tiglath-​pileser III, or when these Levantine cities subsequently passed to Babylonian control in the sixth century bce.22 Scholars arguing that Greek magic had roots in the Assyrian and Babylonian worlds rely upon the Phoenicians as a cultural “bridge” through which ritual technologies were transferred.23 But there are some problems with the hypothesis that Phoenicians served as mediators or conveyors of Near Eastern influence.24 First, earlier Assyro-​ Babylonian rituals do not, on the whole, align precisely with Greek curse-​writing practices as they emerge in Selinous. There are some similarities, to be sure, but many ancient and modern cultures have independently developed ritual practices that involve the use of spells, incantations, figurines, nails, animals, and other materia magica; such rites seem to be cross-​cultural, ubiquitous, and deeply human, and in this sense we need not expect external influence for the emergence of curse rituals in the Greek world. That said, some Assyrian ceremonies did call for the manipulation of small figurines in connection with anti-​witchcraft rituals; these involved the inscription of spells on dolls, the recitation of incantations over them, the burning or melting of figurines, and the deposition of magical objects in walls.25 Perhaps more notable is the common “binding” idiom used in both Assyrian and Greek curse traditions, though here too it is difficult to know whether the “bound enemy” motif had broad appeal in so-​called slave societies in which bound, fettered captives were a social reality, and physically articulated a power hierarchy through their “bound” status. Further, according to instructions in Assyrian ritual texts, figurines of adversaries (in overtly aggressive rites) or of sorcerers and witches (in defensive rites) were routinely inscribed;26 the Assyrian Maqlû also mentions the placement of such figurines in graves, and the use of pieces of hair or threads from the victim’s clothing in countercharms. Daniel Schwemer has shown that the ritualized burial of figurines of adversaries, and their transfer to the netherworld—​even conveyed by the ferryman of the dead—​was an established practice in the Neo-​Assyrian world.27 In the case of such “enemy figurines,” however, the emphasis lay on the crushing of the effigy beneath the heel, which analogically enacted triumph over an opponent or,

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alternatively, endeared oneself to the gods, and thus found favor with the authorities before whom the agent and adversary were competing.28 In Assyria, spells and incantations were also inscribed on figurines, but these objects were apotropaic or protective in nature,29 employed in exorcisms, defensive spells, and healing incantations.30 Assyrian spells also sought to silence or restrain the target’s tongue (e.g., “I have seized your mouth, I have dried out you[r]‌tongue. . . . I have opened your mouth, I have torn out the tongue from [your] m[outh], so that you are not able to slander me”), and contained rites to overcome a male enemy and opponent in court (bēl dabābi).31 Finding meaning in these similarities (that is, positing influence) proves difficult, however, as more interdisciplinary work must be done between Assyriologists and Hellenists to probe the extent of these parallels, and to develop a methodology for determining whether and when such parallels signal influence, and then, whether the influence is direct or indirect. Whatever similarities they may share, none of these rites resembles the incision, nailing, and burial of a lead curse tablet in contexts of litigation. Further, there is no evidence for the Phoenician adoption of these Assyro-​Babylonian practices, which means that a crucial link in the supposed chain of transmission, from Assyria to Greek Sicily via Phoenicia and Carthage, is invisible or absent. In fact, Hélène Sader has recently concluded from decades of excavations in the Levant that Phoenician groups regularly rejected, rather than embraced, Assyrian culture. Sader writes that members of Phoenician coastal cities “refused to be incorporated into the Assyrian cultural sphere,” and that Phoenicians displayed their opposition to Assyrian rule by way of “cultural resistance . . . by refusing to adopt Assyrian ways and by keeping their religious beliefs intact and free of any Assyrian influence.”32 While Phoenician religion and cult in the coastal city-​ states of the Levant gravitated toward Egyptian and (later) Greek religion, it “remained almost impervious to all others. This is particularly striking when considering Assyrian culture and religion, with which Phoenicia was in close contact for centuries but which left absolutely no trace in religious culture.”33 This may be too extreme a conclusion, as first-​millennium Assyrian āšipūtu (the craft of ritual-​ driven healing, exorcism, incantation, spell-​casting) texts were found in Hama (Hamath) in central Syria, and at least one Aramaic inscription from the eighth century bce speaks favorably to Assyrian overlordship.34 Ultimately the absence of extant written traditions allows us to say very little about Phoenician responses to Assyrian rule, let alone about Phoenician beliefs, religion, and ritual practice. What is clear, however, is that curse tablets are unknown from the Levantine city-​states of Tyre, Byblos, and Sidon during the early Iron Age, and they do not appear in inland centers like Mari or Qatna.35 A few scholars have entertained the possibility that one Punic curse tablet found in a Carthaginian grave may date from as early as the sixth century bce (DTAud 213), but the object’s provenance

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is confused, and on paleographic grounds the text has been dated to the fourth or third century bce (the communis opinio).36 Rather than providing a Semitic antecedent for Greek curse tablets, the Punic curse seemingly documents the adoption of curse-​writing rituals by Carthaginians during the late fourth or third century bce, the same time at which Oscan and probably Iberian groups took up the practice. Further, where the Phoenician settlements of western Sicily are concerned, even in well-​excavated sites like Motya, no Punic curse tablets of any date have been found.37 Phoenician inscriptions from sixth-​century Sicily tend to be brief and straightforward—​stamp seals on jars, short graffiti on ceramic, grave stelai, blocks inscribed with Phoenician letters, etc.38—​and lack the discursivity seen in ritual texts like tablet 1.1 (see Chapter 1), for example. Indeed, the dearth of preserved texts from Phoenician Sicily raises questions about Phoenician epigraphic habits in general, and casts doubts upon the notion of a direct written-​ritual transfer from Sicilian Phoenicians to Greeks during the sixth century. What’s more, Phoenicians seldom used lead as a writing support.39 Greek communities in Sicily, by contrast, frequently used lead to record receipts of sale, legal documents, ritual texts and sacred regulations, civic records, and more, all of which situate the beginnings of curse-​writing rituals within the Sicilian Greek milieu. The earliest curse tablets were composed on lead in the Greek language and script, with no code-​switching or West Semitic loan words found therein; the earliest curse tablets employ thoroughly Greek concepts (e.g., ἀτέλεια) in contexts of litigation, and, by the early fifth century bce, appear mainly in the Greek cities of coastal Sicily. Thus with regard to the emergence of Greek curse-​ writing rituals, the long-​assumed role of Phoenician mediators is neither obvious nor clear, despite long upheld assertions that “Near Eastern influence on Sicily via Carthage seems impossible to overlook and very plausible.”40 Curse practice is better understood, then, as an effectively Greek ritual technology that developed in pace with the law courts in late Archaic Sicilian poleis, in a fertile area of cultural exchange. Far from the motherland, these Sicilian apoikiai and diasporic settlements fostered interactions between diverse groups of peoples, many of whom had large mobility networks; such communities were often catalysts for innovation. New environments and neighbors also created new needs, so to speak, from ritual technologies to forms of communication and conflict management. For example, Sader notes that “there is no evidence in Phoenicia for tophets, the cemeteries dedicated to the burial of cremated infants, one of the markers of the Phoenician settlements in the central Mediterranean. This raises the issue of the origin of this tradition, which cannot be sought in the motherland.”41 The development of the tophet in the central Mediterranean, and not in the Levant, offers a parallel

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for how ritual phenomena and cultural practices could emerge within diasporic communities, and differ significantly from practices in the homeland. New environments required adaptation, and generated innovation among individuals living far from home, especially when residing alongside different cultural groups. Indeed, Phoenician influence is evident in cult on Selinous’s Gaggera Hill, from the twin stelai in the Campo di Stele, which “combine the flat inscribed Punic stela with the Greek figural tradition,”42 to architecture and cult installations within the Triolo Nord temple.43 Within these precincts, curse rituals were perhaps as intelligible and appealing to Phoenician groups as they were to Greeks. A tablet like 1.11 (CDS 23), which was deposited in the Malophoros sanctuary and repeatedly registers its targets “before the Holy Goddess” (πὰρ τὰν hαγνὰν θεόν), employs titulature that would have been meaningful to West Semitic speakers; so too CDS 1 from the Malophoros precinct, which opens with the invocation θεά, “Goddess,” another form of divine invocation found in Canaanite inscriptions. For comparison, the Punic DTAud 213 from Carthage addresses the mother goddess as “Mistress Hawwat Goddess Queen.”44 Faraone, Garnand, and López-​Ruiz discuss the visibility of female, maternal, and royal goddesses addressed with deferential invocations like “Lady” or “Goddess” in Canaanite vows and dedications (2005, 184–​6): it has long been known, for example, that the later Greek practice of addressing gods as “Lady” (Kyria) and “Lord” (Kyrios) was imported from the Phoenician/​Punic world. Also notable is the peculiar use of the words “God” or “Goddess” in the invocations. . . . Such deferential forms of address do occur frequently, however, in the Phoenician and Punic world. The most common forms are “God” (᾽el) and “Lord” (᾽adon, ba῾l) for gods, “Mistress” (‘adt, ba῾lat, the feminine forms of the words for “Lord”) and “Lady” (rabbat) for goddesses and rarely perhaps “Queen” (mlkt) . . . it should be clear that the parallels between the Canaanite and Greco-​Roman curses are compelling, and the evidence of the titulature points to Canaanite influence. Under this rubric, tablets 1.11 and CDS 1 from Selinous’s Malophoros precinct may point to Canaanite influence, or, at the very least, would have been intelligible to Sicilian Phoenicians by 500 bce, as they were to Selinountine Greeks.45 The omission of the goddess’s name leaves open the possibility that different groups understood “the Holy Goddess” (τὰν hαγνὰν θεόν) in terms of their own religious traditions.46 Greeks, Phoenicians, and Elymians overlapped in this diverse corner of Sicily, which encouraged polytheistic ritual syncretism. This was the environment that gave rise to curse practice.

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There is thus no “smoking gun” that points to Phoenician antecedents for Greek curse-​writing rituals, and the absence of early curse tablets from Phoenician Sicily and the Levant leaves the argument vulnerable, at best. One wonders if, built into the belief that Greek curse tablets had Eastern origins, there weren’t some (conscious or subconscious) Orientalizing assumptions that sought to distance Classical Greece from “black magic.” Regardless, no epigraphic breadcrumb trail leads from Selinous and Himera to the Phoenician cemeteries of Motya or Tyre, or further still to Babylon or Ninevah. That said, it is possible to illuminate the broad social and geopolitical milieu in which curse-​writing rituals developed: the multicultural communities of western Sicily, where the practice found use in the late Archaic courts.

Legal, Geopolitical, Social, and Economic Developments One aspect of what made early curse-​writing Greek was the judicial contexts in which curse tablets were first employed: curse practice developed alongside Selinous’s early law courts, probably together with the growing use of writing therein. The intensification of curse practice in the early fifth century bce documents competition and power struggles among Selinous’s elites, much of which played out at trial in the courts; it was these families, I suggest, who first used curse-​writing rituals to protect and advance their own legal interests in the law courts. Curse practice was firmly situated within the competitive, aristocratic ethos of the late Archaic city-​state, and in this capacity too it can be understood as a Greek phenomenon. In order to examine the beginnings of Greek curse-​ writing rituals, we turn to the sociopolitical developments of Selinous, during (primarily) the sixth and fifth century BCE, as this was seemingly the soil in which the practice first took root. Selinous was probably founded around 628 bce by settlers from Megara Hyblaia, with an oikist (the leader of the founding expedition) named Pammilos from the (grand)mother city of Megara; upon the city’s foundation, land was allotted, shrines dedicated, and laws set out.47 Well-​situated at a Mediterranean crossroads, Selinous occupied three hills separated by river valleys, and came to encompass a sizable inland territory of some 1,500 square kilometers.48 By the early sixth century bce, Selinountine territorial encroachment had led to tensions with inland indigenous communities, though the extent of aggressive expansion outside Selinous’s immediate chora was not uniform, and remains debated in modern scholarship.49 Over time, wealth was generated through the control of land, labor, and trade in agricultural surpluses, primarily wheat. The

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arrival of new settlers in the city likely created social and legal hierarchies and tension with the earliest colonists, the latter of whom held the most (and best) land.50 The Selinountines may well have used violence to forcibly acquire native labor in agricultural production, as an initial abundance of arable land shifted the basis of wealth to one’s ability to control labor.51 Phoenician settlers of Motya, Panormus, and Soluntum could provide a check on the power of Selinous and, in moments of Greek overexertion, relations between the groups could turn hostile.52 Epigraphic sources suggest that by the late seventh century bce, even within the first generation of settlement, Selinous was expanding to the northwest, into indigenous territory.53 Excavations at the site of Montagnoli (east of Selinous, on the Belice River) have uncovered evidence for the destruction of a native Iron Age settlement around this time; soon after, the site shows signs of Greek material culture and building activity, which probably indicates the appropriation of land by Greek settlers.54 In the early sixth century, the nearby indigenous town at Castello della Pietra, some 12 kilometers distant, was also supplanted by a Greek settlement,55 and by the mid-​sixth century, Greek expansion had penetrated into Segestan territory, near the site of Poggioreale.56 In addition to the epigraphic and archaeological evidence for Selinous’s activities north of its immediate hinterland,57 literary sources tell a similar tale. Evidence for conflict between Greek, Phoenician, and native groups is preserved in Diodorus, who describes a shadowy event triggered by early Selinountine expansion during the first half of the sixth century bce (5.9.1–​5). According to Diodorus, an oikist named Pentathlos led a colonizing expedition with Greek settlers from Cnidos and Rhodes to the promontory of Lilybaeum in western Sicily (Diod. Sic. 5.9.2–​3): Then they sailed in the company of Pentathlos to the regions around Lilybaeum in Sicily and found the Segestans and Selinountines at war. They were persuaded by the Selinountines to fight with them in battle, losing many men in the war, among whom was Pentathlos himself. As a result, the survivors decided to return home again, since the Selinountines had been defeated. A version of this same episode is recounted by Pausanias (10.11.2–​3) who, citing the earlier Sicilian historian Antiochos, adds that the Phoenicians fought alongside the Elymians against the Greeks of Selinous. That tensions between Phoenicians, native Sicilians, and Selinountine Greeks continued in the mid-​ sixth century is suggested by the construction of fortifications in all three territories, and a contemporary Selinountine epitaph commemorating the death of “Aristogeitos, the son of Arkadion,” a Greek who perished “under the walls of

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Motya.”58 The driving factor behind much of this conflict appears to have been Selinous’s expansion, likely motivated by the desire for agricultural farmland, timber, and human labor—​some of which was appropriated from the natives who had long inhabited the region.59 Over time, wealth became concentrated in a powerful landowning aristocracy, which defined culturally as Greek and probably included descendants of the first waves of colonists from Megara Hyblaia and Megara (those with initial access to land allotments, kleroi). Selinous’s elites used Greek cultural practices like the symposium, shared cultic rites, and intermarriages to gain political clout and cultivate alliances; as Stefania De Vido has shown, these were the subtle ways in which Selinous’s aristocracy engaged and allied with elites in neighboring Phoenician, Segestan, and Greek Sicilian communities.60 These wealthy Selinountine gene comprised the city’s ruling minority, dominating political decisions and steering affairs toward their interests, despite sharp inter-​family rivalries and occasionally divergent views on foreign policy.61 It was probably they who, within a few generations of the city’s foundation, oversaw Selinous’s urbanization program—​with its mighty temples and civic spaces—​ and orchestrated expansion to subsume a vast agricultural chora, a coastline with ports, and inland riverine waterways. As in other Archaic Greek poleis, the status of these elites was subject to constant fluctuation, especially with waves of subsequent settlers—​some of whom brought new wealth or influence, and attained positions of prominence in the city, but lacked access to significant landholdings. These wealthy landowners, who included the hippeis, or horse-​ owning “knights,” also comprised the formidable Selinountine cavalry, which participated in military campaigns and, in 480 bce, pledged support to Hamilcar and Carthage in the battle of Himera.62 Pro-​Carthaginian elites—​Selinountine citizens with Punic kinship ties, guest-​friend relations, or trade connections—​no doubt officiated this alliance on behalf of Selinous, which pitted Selinountine Greeks against other Sicilian Greeks. Foreign interactions within this settlement, perched as it was beside Phoenician and Elymian neighbors, were complex, but these groups could and sometimes did cooperate with one another.63 Historians have suggested that the mid-​sixth century saw something of a pro-​Punic shift in Selinountine foreign policy, with Selinous gravitating toward communities against whom it once had fought. The shift may be attributable to the rapid expansion of Acragas, which inspired a reshuffling of alliances and territories in western Sicily.64 Tyranny also gripped Selinous, as it did other Greek poleis during the sixth century, but recent scholarship presents these tyrannies as relatively dilute and short lived.65 Herodotus mentions the tyrannical coup of a Spartan named

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Euryleon (c. 515–495 bce) who had survived the failed colonization expedition of the Spartan prince Dorieus—​the charasmatic brother of King Cleomenes (Hdt. 5.42–​46).66 Many Spartans who sailed under Dorieus were chopped to bits in Sicily by Phoenicians and Segestans, but Euryleon gathered the survivors and, “having freed the Selinountians from Peithagoras the mounarchos,” assumed the role of tyrant of Selinous.67 Herodotus notes that Euryleon ruled for only a short time before the Selinountians rose up and slew him on the altar of Zeus Agoraios (Hdt. 5.46.2, Antonetti 2009), an event that must have triggered not a few anxieties about bloodshed and miasma within the community. We thus encounter at least two Selinountine tyrants in the later sixth century, Peithagoras and Euryleon, both of whom were deposed by force, and one of whom was foreign; a much later reference in Polyaenus (1.28.2) to the tyranny of Theron, son of Miltiades, may speak to an even older period of one-​man rule in Selinous.68 Aristocratic groups had the most to lose from one-​man rule, and it is possible that, in the case of Euryleon, competing elites had united to depose the Spartan autocrat. Selinous’s formidable, dynamic aristocracy could certainly work in both antagonistic and cooperative ways.69 A fragmentary bronze tablet from the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia, IvO 22 (IGDS 28), documents one such process of political reconciliation, while intimating the bitter stasis and hostility that had previously gripped the city. The text has been dated to the late sixth or early fifth century bce—​possibly soon after Euryleon’s seizure of power and concurrent with Selinous’s earliest curse tablets—​and records a sort of amnesty, a sworn bilateral agreement, that seemingly restored Selinountine exiles (φυγόντες) back within the city.70 The inscription makes clear that by the latter decades of the sixth century, Selinous suffered from internal stasis that included the exile of some political factions and the appropriation of their land. Attempts at restoring and reintegrating these exiled groups were underway in Selinous by the early fifth century; the return of exiles is also known from this time, or a bit later, at Himera and Messana, suggesting that this measure was employed by ruling groups in other Sicilian poleis to diffuse opposition and concentrate power or resources.71 The lacunose IvO 22 refers to a body of magistrates called αἰσιμνᾶται, known from Megara Nisaea and its apoikiai to have held judicial and administrative functions, and perhaps also some sort of council, court, or ad hoc tribunal, a hαλία. It also mentions an oath that allowed for the exiles’ return to Selinous and for the restoration of confiscated assets (χρέματα), probably in the form of landholdings. De Vido and others have convincingly suggested that the stasis was caused by Selinous’s oldest landholding gene—the first waves of settlers—​and other, newer groups within the community who wanted more influence in civic administration and property holdings.72 The reconciliation decree was probably

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a power-​sharing mechanism intended to resolve civic strife and mitigate whatever tensions threatened the political body after Euryleon’s overthrow.73 During the late sixth century, Selinous underwent a turbulent period of one-​man rule, stasis, and internal transformation in which the city’s ruling aristocracy was reconfigured. Power, property, and movable wealth all changed hands more than once. Gentilician competition, stasis, land appropriations and restorations, exilings, disenfranchisement, and reconciliation were rife in the late Archaic city, and these conflicts provide the historical backdrop against which early curse practice emerged. The crises that engulfed the polis during the late sixth century bce were, of course, not unique to Selinous; aristocratic rivalries, expulsions, and civic strife are known from other Greek poleis of the late sixth century, from Sicily to Athens and well beyond.74 Stasis is therefore not a sufficient historical criterion to explain why Greek curse practice emerged in Selinous, though it accounts for the property and wealth disputes, political tensions, and elite competition that drove the city’s early law courts.75 Some have attributed the early traffic in curse tablets to Selinous’s lower classes,76 but all evidence suggests that the city’s powerful elites—​wealthy, competitive, literate, and rhetorically savvy—​were the ritual’s first practitioners. Theirs were the financial, civic, and material interests at stake in the law courts; they held the lion’s share of resources in the city, and had the most to lose in litigation disputes. Competition between such elite litigants fueled demand for early curse-​writing rituals; professional curse practitioners must have targeted and circulated among these groups during the lead-​up to trials. It is likely that the legal disputes documented in the earliest Selinountine curse tablets stemmed from matters of property seizure, repatriation, civic or political disenfranchisement, exile, and homicide, all of which are independently attested in the sixth century bce and discussed above. Recall, for example, tablet 1.13 from c. 475 to c. 450 bce (see Chapter 1), deposited in the region of the Malophoros and Meilichios precincts. The curse calls for the total destruction of several men and their kin (γενεᾶς), and cites members of the same family group, including a father and son: Xenios son of Apontis and Agathyllos son of Xenios (cf. CDS 12.8–​9, which cites two brothers). Tablet 1.13 also associates three victims, Xenios, Athanis, and Agathyllos, with a particular gentilician group, the Heracleids.77 Members of this patrilineal kin group claimed descent from a common ancestor—​in this case, Heracles—​and were also venerated in cult within the community in the Meilichios precinct’s Campo di Stele.78 This prominent clan was targeted in other Selinountine curse tablets, some of which were surely judicial in nature, illuminating the power and wealth of the family within the early Classical city.

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The presence of such elites in early Selinountine curse tablets—​especially considering that gene names rarely appear in contemporary private inscriptions—​ suggests that aristocratic agents and interests drove the creation of some of these ritual texts. Members of these kin groups claimed descent from a common ancestor, and expressed in-​group solidarity through ritual in the Meilichios precinct, and presumably also in family plots of the Buffa necropolis—​the versatile, converging spaces in which curse tablets first appear. Evidence from elsewhere supports the association of early curse-​writing rituals with elite rivalries and competition. One of two recently published curse tablets from Himera cites individuals belonging to the highest strata of the population on the basis on onomastics, according to the editors: a woman named Echekrateia was the recipient of the attentions of one Menekrates, who performed a curse ritual to attract and subdue her (Figure I.5 in the Introduction).79 Recall too the early choregos curse from Gela, composed by the affluent male citizen Apellis (tablet 1.15). Apellis possessed enough wealth to serve as guarantor for the costly purchase of cattle, and also sponsored a chorus in a civic dramatic festival. Highly literate, this curse composer was undoubtably a member of the city’s elite, and supported the interests of elites from other Sicilian poleis. These are the sorts of individuals who appear in connection with the oldest Greek curse tablets. Back in Selinous, the wealth and power of these elite families increased alongside the city’s prosperity and growth during the sixth and fifth centuries bce. Marconi and Ward estimate that Selinous’s urban center supported upward of 9,900 inhabitants in its heyday, with many thousands of additional rural-​dwellers spread throughout the hinterland.80 The city’s wealth and strong, centralized administration are evident in its monetization by 550–​530 bce.81 Together with Himera, Selinous was among the first Sicilian poleis to mint silver coinage.82 The persons who oversaw the striking of coinage were likely also involved in the city’s building programs—​large, civic-​facing projects that could now be financed liquidly.83 In addition to wealth and a centralized administration, this technology required access to a steady silver supply, to then be transported and struck into coin; some scholars have sourced this metal to mines in Spain, Sardinia, and Corsica, which again opens space for trade with Phoenician groups.84 The first two Sicilian poleis to mint silver coinage were thus directly sited on lines of exchange between Carthage, Etruria, and Sardinia, and bordered the Phoenician communities of Panormus, Soluntum, and Motya in northern and western Sicily. Further, lead itself was a byproduct of silver smelting, and the ability of Selinous and Himera to import silver may have afforded these communities additional access to lead, which was put to use as a writing medium by the later sixth century bce. In any case, curse-​writing flourished in Selinous for much of the fifth century, throughout the decades in which Athens

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emerged as a major player on the island and became increasingly entwined in the affairs of Selinous, Segesta, and other Sicilian cities. Athens’s presence in Sicily afforded numerous occasions for exchange and interaction and, for Athenians abroad in Sicily, this may well have included exposure to curse-​writing rituals. Throughout these decades, Selinous’s continued expansion triggered further conflict with Segesta (in the early fifth century, it is worth noting that there was a fundamental shift in indigenous settlement patterns, thought to signal the nucleation of Segestan identity).85 By 415 bce, Thucydides writes that the Segestans (6.6.2) “had gone to war with their Selinountine neighbors over questions of marriage and disputed territory, and Selinous had procured the alliance of the Syracusans, and pressed [S]‌egesta hard by land and sea.”86 Getting the worst of it, Segesta sought assistance from the most powerful Greek cities in Sicily—​Syracuse and Acragas—​and also asked Carthage to intervene against Selinous, but was dismissed by all. Segesta then famously sent an embassy to Athens asking for an alliance (Thuc. 6.6.2). And the rest, as they say, is history: tempted by the mirage of wealth, the Athenians sailed to Sicily under the pretext of aiding Segesta against its Selinountine oppressors in 415 bce. Athenian aggression galvanized many Sicilian poleis to unify under the leadership of Syracuse. Selinous contributed cavalry to the Syracusan cause (Thuc. 7.1.5), and Athens’s expedition was met with crushing defeat in 413 bce in the harbor and quarries of Syracuse. Athens’s failed Sicilian expedition meant that Segesta had lost a powerful ally, and Selinous’s expansion into Segestan territory resumed unchecked. Desperate, Segesta submitted itself to Carthage as a dependency—​an act that finally drew Carthage into the conflict on Segesta’s behalf.87 Selinous proved unable to withstand the vast resources of Carthage, and Diodorus reports that after the nine-​day siege in 409 bce, some 16,000 Selinountines were killed, 5,000 taken prisoner, and 2,600 fled east to Acragas (13.57–​8). Survivors were permitted to return home, but now that the city had become a Punic holding, they had to pay tribute to Carthage (Diod. 13.114.1). The fortunes of Carthaginian-​ held Selinous waxed and waned over the following centuries, but the city never regained its previous prominence. Nor did the powerful Greek families who had steered the city’s affairs from the seventh through late fifth centuries bce recover their former social and political clout under Punic rule. The final chapter in Selinous’s history concludes roughly a century and a half later when Carthage, alarmed by Rome’s expansion, relocated Selinous’s inhabitants en masse to Lilybaeum (Diod. 24.1.1).88 That curse-​writing rituals were sustained by some portion of Selinous’s Greek community is suggested by the handful of Greek curse tablets that emerge in graves at Lilybaeum soon after the city’s relocation in the mid third-​century bce.89

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Throughout the decades in which Selinous had prospered as a Greek polis, especially between the late sixth century and 409 bce, so too did curse-​writing rituals; after the Carthaginian conquest overshadowed Selinous’s Greek institutions, curse-​writing appears to significantly decrease. This lends support to the notion that early curse practice was primarily a Greek development. The ritual proliferated during the years in which Selinous was an autonomous and thriving polis, free from tyranny and Punic rule, with robust courts of law and competing Greek elites. Power and wealth were concentrated in the hands of the landholding aristocracy. These competing families, who jockeyed with one another for clout, would have been the first to deploy curse practice in court to edge out rivals: early curse-​writing was an elite phenomenon. The targeting in an early curse tablet of individuals belonging to the prominent Heracleid genos, for example, which also received cult in the Campo di Stele, supports this hypothesis (tablet 1.13 in Chapter 1). Such elites comprised the communities of practice within which curse rituals were commissioned and performed. Their social networks, active at the local and supra-​local levels, formed the nodes through which early curse-​writing rituals unfolded and spread across Greek Sicily, traveling from Selinous to the cities of Himera, Gela, Camarina, and Acragas by the mid-​fifth century bce. Especially in late Archaic Selinous, where the ruling elite defined culturally as Greek, curse practice helped enable processes of becoming within the community. Ritual became a central, physical element that engaged and shaped individual and group identity, and curse-​writing was used to advance private interests in the law courts. Rather than simply reflecting it, curse-​writing rituals likely helped constitute Greek elite identity in the practice’s early years.

Epigraphic Habits and Ritual Concerns The appearance of Greek curse tablets around 500 bce and the ritual’s subsequent fifth-​century proliferation correspond with a general increase in Sicilian inscriptions during these same years, a sign that written literacy was well established within these communities at the time, and played an important role in the practice’s development. The evidence points to what Ramsay MacMullen, in a study on the spread of Latin inscriptions in the Roman Empire from the first to third centuries ce, called the “epigraphic habit.”90 MacMullen focused on the production of Latin inscriptions in the non-​Roman communities with whom the Romans came into contact. Drawing upon the earlier work of Mócsy—​which demonstrated that the inscribing of stone epitaphs was a custom adopted and diffused through Roman contact91—​MacMullen showed that epigraphic production was controlled by a sense of audience, and was culturally, rather than linguistically, determined (thus more Roman than Latin). This framework helps

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explain discrepancies in regional writing habits across early Greek poleis as well. Consider the example of Sparta: though the most formidable Greek polis during the Archaic period, and arguably throughout the fifth and early fourth centuries bce, Sparta did not rely in any meaningful way on written text, in either public or private contexts.92 Remarkably few dipinti, inscribed gravestones, graffiti, and stone inscriptions have emerged from Sparta, and official state documents inscribed on stone are almost entirely absent.93 Spartan civic life was conducted without great reliance upon the written word. This was decidedly not the case in the poleis of Sicily, where the written word appears to have flourished by the early fifth century bce in both public and private contexts. Texts inscribed in the Selinountine Greek script had been visible throughout the sixth century, especially on stelai in the Buffa necropolis and Meilichios precincts, the first sites in which curse tablets were deposited. Early curse-​writing mirrors broader Selinountine epigraphic habits in that some texts, for example, were written boustrophedon (a style of writing in which alternate lines of text were reversed from right to left or left to right: see tablets 1.2, 1.5). By the mid-​fifth century, the written word could be found throughout the city, in public inscriptions, private dedications, ritual purity texts, contracts, and legal communications. The inhabitants of Selinous were writing early and often, and in different contexts on different media—​including lead. The broader epigraphic record in sixth-​century Sicily displays a similar pattern. Greek stone inscriptions increase across the island from the seventh through fifth centuries bce; these texts congregate in coastal urban centers, especially Selinous, though these data are almost certainly skewed by the uneven distribution of systematic excavations.94 Greek curse-​writing thus mirrors wider epigraphic tendencies in Selinous and other Sicilian cities. These patterns undermine the notion that ritualized cursing emerged on account of political and social unrest in sixth-​ century Selinous, unless the practice of writing itself can be shown to correspond to periods of political or socioeconomic turbulence. Significant too was the Sicilian proclivity for inscribing text on lead prior to 409 bce: lead was used as a writing support for financial receipts, civic documents, temple archives, and ritual texts throughout the fifth century. In fact, the three Sicilian cities that have yielded 10 or more curse tablets of fifth-​century date—​Himera, Camarina, and Selinous—​were actively inscribing other texts on lead during this period. Examples abound: Himera yielded a lead tablet that likely records communications concerning a lochagos (λοχαγός), a military squadron commander, named Dieuches; the tablet dates from 475–​450 bce and may refer to two individuals and one gentilician group.95 Another Himeran lead tablet of fifth-​century date carries an early attestation of the Ephesia Grammata, a series of magic “nonsense” words intended to ward off harm: ἄσκι, κατάσκι, λίξ/​αἶξ, τϵτράξ, δαμναμϵνϵύς, αἴσιον/​αἴσια.96 This document demonstrates that by the

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early Classical period, the incantation had already entered written transmission in Himera.97 Further, dating from the first half of the fifth century bce, over 150 lead tablets containing civic records have emerged from the temple of Athena at Camarina,98 revealing that individuals in Camarina were also accustomed to writing text on lead by the fifth century. These epigraphic trends parallel the contemporary development of curse-​writing rituals in both cities. Selinous proves no exception to these trends: among Selinous’s numerous lead texts is the so-​called Lex Sacra of Selinous ( Jameson, Jordan, Kotansky 1993; CGRN 13), which dates to the mid-​fifth century bce at latest,99 contemporary with early Selinountine curse tablets. Concerned with propitiatory rites and vengeful spirits, the text describes rituals used for purification. The tablet reveals that pollution, especially pollution caused by bloodshed, was understood to linger in the community for a long time; purificatory rites performed in atonement might occur years after the polluting event, and worked to assuage anxieties surrounding miasma, malevolent spirits, and chthonic deities. Such concerns are well represented in the Gaggera precincts—​at least relative to other Greek poleis—​and some scholars have asked whether there was a connection between the Lex Sacra’s rites and the dozens of contemporary curse rituals performed in the Gaggera precincts. Still other scholars have contextualized the Lex within the turbulent period that followed the collapse of Euryleon’s tyranny. The Lex may have been set up within the sanctuary of Meilichios, to whom two purificatory sacrifices within the text were prescribed.100 The tablet implicates Zeus Eumenes, the Eumenides, and the “pure and impure Tritopatores” (lines 10, 13). The second column of text describes rites for ridding oneself of an elasteros, a vengeful ghost-​like spirit associated with the dead and the Underworld, a spirit that could haunt and hound individuals in an Erinyes-​esque way (trans. from CGRN 13B.1–​13):101 [If a] person, [a homicide] (wishes) to purify himself from elasteroi (spirits), having made a proclamation from wherever he wishes, and in whatever year he wishes, and in whatever [month] he wishes, and on whatever day he wishes, having made a proclamation in whatever direction he wishes, he shall purify himself. The one hosting him shall give [the homicide] (the necessary things) to wash himself and something to eat and salt; (5) and having sacrificed a piglet to Zeus, he shall go away (from the one hosting him), and turn around, and he shall be spoken to, and take food, and sleep wherever he wishes. If someone wishes to purify himself with respect to a foreign or ancestral (elasteros), either heard or seen or any whatsoever, he shall purify himself in the same way as the homicide when he purifies himself from an elasteros. (10) Having sacrificed an adult animal on the public altar, he shall be pure. Having marked a boundary with salt and

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having sprinkled around with a gold (vessel), he shall go away. Whenever one needs to sacrifice to the elasteros, sacrifice as to the immortals. But one shall slaughter down towards the earth. The inscription reveals that residents of Selinous were concerned with potential harm from supernatural powers (elasteroi) around the Gaggera precincts, and prescribed purificatory rites to offset the dangers posed by them. Strikingly, the purification required from both a homicide and an elasteros was one and the same, suggesting that, in the first half of the fifth century, homicide was understood to unleash miasma by way of avenging, ghost-​like spirits (cf. Aeschylus’s Eumenides). One wonders whether some early Selinountine curse tablets stemmed from homicide trials in the late Archaic law courts: did early curse-​writers attempt to take justice “into their own hands” by invoking the powerful dead and chthonic deities to punish wrongdoers at trial? If so, curse practice may have helped mediate the transition by which legal arbitration came to supersede blood-​fued vendettas surrounding homicides.102 Another connection between the hounding elasteroi and the contemporary, proximate traffic in curse tablets was proposed by the first editors of the Lex Sacra, who suggested that the Lex aimed in part to cleanse the community from both the “miasma arising from deaths and perhaps from ineffective funerary rites for those dead,” as well as from the heavy traffic in curse-​writing rituals: “While curse tablets are not mentioned in the lex sacra,” the editors note, “their quantity at Selinous, and in particular in the Campo di Stele, suggests that the deliberate manipulation of miasma by means of them may have been one of the reasons why the law was written.”103 If this notion is correct, the Lex provides a rare glimpse of how curse-​writing rituals were understood to harm individuals and the broader community within Selinous: these rites, some of which may have been occasioned by homicide disputes in the courts, harnessed elasteroi, miasma, and the dead to bring maledictions to pass.104 The perceived ability of curse practice to manipulate the supernatural and inflict harm upon members of the community contributed to social anxieties, which in turn required strategies for purification (hence the ritual instructions on the Lex Sacra).105 Selinous’s Lex Sacra is thus significant for the history of early curse practice in at least two ways: from an epigraphic perspective, it shows that the community was committing ritual texts to lead (probably) in the Gaggera precincts by 450 bce; still more revealing is the light that the document sheds on ritual anxieties in the early fifth-​century city, including those triggered by elasteroi and homicides. Ritual, pollution, and the supernatural were alive and well in Selinous, and this too provided fertile soil in which early curse-​writing rituals could take root. Finally, another ritual text of fifth-​century date, the Getty Hexameters (Figure 2.2), includes incantations meant to protect its users—​individuals,

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Figure 2.2  The Getty Hexameters (SEG 64.830), Getty Museum, Malibu 81.AI.140.2. Open Content Program.

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households, and even the city itself—​from various dangers, including “powerful pharmaka” (πολυφάρ[μακα, line 50).106 Identifying as “sacred verses” and “immortal verses” (lines 2, 7), these performative hexameters confirm that individuals in Selinous had a predilection for committing ritual texts to lead by the fifth century bce. The Getty Hexameters also reveal that the city had multiple strategies for combating harmful spirits and spells, perhaps even those triggered by curse-​writing rituals. Rituals concerned with incantations, pollution, purification, and the supernatural were relatively robust in the Greek West by this time, and this, along with a vibrant epigraphic habit that favored the writing down of text on lead, helps contextualize the development of curse practice in Greek Sicily.107 These communities appear to have been particularly attentive to spells, pharmaka, elasteroi, and chthonic deities—​or at least, more evidence survives to document these concerns here than in other poleis—​and they were inscribing various texts on lead in the same years that curse-​writing rituals came to proliferate.

Conclusions Current evidence suggests that Greek curse-​writing developed in the city of Selinous during the late sixth century bce, in the presence of Greeks, Phoenicians, native Sicilians, and other ethnic groups living, mingling, and interacting together, including at sites of ritual convergence like the Gaggera precincts. Such overlapping spaces encouraged the creation of new ritual traditions and technologies. Curse-​writing rituals emerged amidst the perfect storm of historical factors: cross-​cultural exchange, adaptation strategies forged in new environments, robust courts of law, powerful aristocrats with sharp rivalries, a ready supply of lead, spreading literacy, concerns about harmful rites and supernatural agents (from pharmaka to elasteroi), and an active “epigraphic habit” that manifested in the writing down of various texts on lead during the sixth and fifth centuries bce. Curse-​writing rituals emerge in connection with elite competition in the courts of law, and opposing litigants are well documented in early curse culture. For powerful Selinountine aristocrats with sharp family rivalries—​surely the agents who first employed curse tablets in litigation contexts—​curse practice may even have helped ease the transition away from an older era in which blood feuds could mar power struggles, to a system in which conflicts were adjudicated at trial. In their calls for ateleia and the twisting back of tongues, and their deposition in graves and chthonic precincts, curse rituals retained some of the vituperative aggression of earlier vendettas; yet as late Archaic poleis worked to heal social tensions and unite the civic body, the courts became powerful instruments of mediation. The oldest lead curses evolved alongside the late sixth/​early

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fifth-​century courts, and seemingly parallel the growing use of writing therein. As literacy spread, litigation processes adopted more scripted communications and procedures, such as the written registration of witnesses and testimony. Early curse-​writing may even have been understood as a private ritual extension of legal practice, with a boost of supernatural assistance. Selinountine curse tablets document reactions to juridical processes, and drew upon the same legal language—​hence opposing litigants were “inscribed,” “written down,” or even “registered before the Holy Goddess.” In this sense, curse-​writing rituals truly came to be a Greek development, not only inscribed in the Greek language and script in Sicily’s Greek cities, but also first deployed within the courts—​a branch of the polis concerned with the enforcement of civic order. Early curse-​writing was thus firmly situated within the competitive, aristocratic ethos of the late Archaic city-​state.108 Finally, while this history has focused upon developments in Selinous, Selinous may be representative of broader processes of interaction, mediation, and adaptation across other Sicilian communities, including Himera, which has also yielded Greek curse tablets from the early fifth century bce.109 Bordering the Phoenician settlement of Soluntum (Figure 2.1), Himera hosted many of the same cultural processes observed in Selinous. The polis served as an important node in exchange networks connecting Tyrrhenian regions to the wider Mediterranean, as attested by over 2,000 Archaic and Classical amphorae from the Levant, Greek Aegean, Etruria, Campania, and the Phoenician-​Punic settlements of Spain, Sardinia, North Africa, and Sicily—​all of which emerged in secondary use contexts in the city’s necropoleis.110 Scholars have ascribed an emporion-​dimension to Himera on the basis of material evidence for extensive trade activity.111 Cross-​ cultural interactions are also evident in Himeran cult, with recent scholarship linking the “A and B sacella of the so-​called ‘temenos of Athena’ . . . and the cult of Aphrodite armed” in Himera’s upper city with Phoenician-​Cypriot cult antecedents.112 Pro-​Punic policy in Archaic Himera is suggested by the guest-​friendship between Terillos, the tyrant of Himera, and Hamilcar (Hdt. 7.165). Himera had also secured a silver supply that allowed for the early minting of coinage around 550 bce. Burials in the necropolis of neighboring Soluntum, furthermore, demonstrate that Phoenician, Greek, and indigenous groups all resided together in that city, even sharing a common portion of the necropolis—​though they retained distinct burial traditions.113 Thus Selinous may not have been entirely unique in western Sicily in regard to early curse-​writing rituals. Like Selinous, settlements at Himera and Soluntum bear witness to pulsing networks of exchange, all of which worked to bridge cultural difference and forge new traditions in the central Mediterranean by the fifth century bce. Western Sicily harbored all of these social, economic, demographic, and technological developments, and

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this enabled the emergence of curse-​writing rituals. The first segment in the history of Greek curse practice is thus set in Sicily, but this is only the beginning of a much longer, richer story. During the fifth and fourth centuries bce, curse-​ writing rituals would spread to both Greek and non-​Greek communities of the Mediterranean and Black Sea, from Oscan Italy to the Crimean Peninsula and beyond.

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PART TWO

The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500–​250 bce Part II of this book, “The Early Spread of Curse Technologies, 500–​250 bce,” investigates the dissemination and diversification of curse-​writing rituals from the late sixth through third centuries bce, providing fine-​grained studies of the practice across different regions. Chapter 3 tracks the ritual’s development across the Italian mainland, the northern Black Sea coast, and the Kingdom of Macedon; Chapter 4 then provides an overview of Athenian curse practice from the late fifth through early third centuries bce.

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The Spread and Diversification of Curse Practice Three Case Studies

Introduction The fifth and fourth centuries bce witnessed large-​scale movements of peoples around the Mediterranean as Greek, Persian, Carthaginian, and Macedonian armies clashed; alliances were forged and reshuffled; and vast geopolitical boundaries were reconfigured. Some prosperous Greek cities like Himera were destroyed and never reinhabited, while others, such as Selinous, lost autonomy to larger imperial powers like Carthage.1 Demographic and economic pressures drove Greek mercenaries deep into the Persian Empire, while the growing need for grain, timber, and other resources led cities like Athens to expand their influence into the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. Greek communities were connected over vast distances by networks of trade and communication; this led to the diffusion of various cultural forms and skill sets, such that the history of curse practice followed these lines of movement and exchange. By the fourth century bce, curse-​writing rituals had spread from Selinous, Himera, and other coastal Sicilian poleis to much of the Greek and Greek-​ adjacent world, including the Italian mainland, the northern coast of the Black Sea, and the Kingdom of Macedon. Across such distant and disparate regions—​ these chosen with an eye toward long-​term historical developments—​much about curse practice remained consistent.2 In all three areas, curse tablets exhibit common themes, contexts of use (legal disputes), and sites of deposition, which point to a shared set of ritual practices. But fine-​grained study across regional corpora shows that there were localisms too, which reveal the influence of new practitioners with different needs, backgrounds, and intentions. Such objects provide new

In Blood and Ashes. Jessica L. Lamont, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.003.0004

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insights into gender dynamics, legal institutions, and the ways in which individuals coped with competition and vulnerability in communities with otherwise few non-​elite historical narratives. Considered together, these three case studies allow for the observation of trends and regional differences across contemporary bodies of text, while illuminating the breadth of the ritual’s appeal within a century and a half of its emergence in Sicily. This chapter begins in the central Mediterranean, with a section analyzing the spread of curse-​writing rituals from coastal Sicily to the Greek and Oscan communities of the Italian mainland (Figure 3.1). Greek cities in Sicily and Italy served as entrepôts through which the ritual passed to indigenous Oscan groups of Apulia and sites further north. Oscan individuals first utilized curse practice in legal contexts, and the earliest Oscan curse-​writers were heavily influenced by Greek traditions, from the deposition of tablets in tombs to the cursing of victims’ tongues. The adoption of curse-​writing rituals by Oscan speakers during the fourth century bce signals the practice’s growing appeal among non-​ Greek groups, and Oscan communities eventually helped spread the ritual to Latin speakers of the Italian peninsula. Yet the emergence of Latin curses from Lilybaeum, the Iberian peninsula, and Delos suggests that transmission to Latin-​speaking communities was nonlinear, and came about gradually in different regions through recurring interactions between Greek, Oscan, and Latin groups. Shifting east, the chapter’s second section illuminates the emergence and proliferation of curse-​writing rituals in the Greek cities of the northern Black Sea. The Black Sea was connected to the Aegean and broader Mediterranean by well-​traveled maritime trade routes, and the economies of Pontic poleis revolved around regional and long-​distance commerce. The majority of known Pontic curse tablets come from the Black Sea’s northern coast—​an area that for our purposes encompasses the poleis between Histria (Istros) in the west and Gorgippia in the east, including those of the Bosporan Kingdom in eastern Crimea and the Taman Peninsula (Figure 3.6). Corresponding roughly to the modern shorelines of Ukraine and Russia, but including Histria in eastern Romania, this stretch of coast has yielded some 75–​80 curse tablets, the majority of which date to the fourth century bce and were occasioned by litigation. The third part of this chapter explores the emergence of curse practice in the northern Aegean, especially within Macedonian urban centers. No fewer than 11 curse tablets have been reported from the necropoleis of Pella and Pydna alone (Figure 3.11); all of these had been deposited in graves and the majority were, again, occasioned by litigation. Macedon’s rapid expansion over the course of the fourth century brought many neighboring settlements under the control of Philip II. Several of these sites have also yielded curse tablets of fourth-​century date: Akanthos (5 tablets), Arethousa (at least 1 tablet),

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Cumae

Metapontum

Laus

Sybaris Thurii Petelia Croton Teuranus Ager

Himera

Messana Rhegium

Locri

Selinous Acragas

Leontini Gela

0 25 50

100 Kilometers

Syracuse

Sources: Esri, USGS, NOAA

Figure 3.1  Map of southern Italy and Sicily. Map created by Joseph Morgan.

Oraiokastro (1 tablet). Curse-​writing rituals were well established in Macedon by the time that Alexander came to conquer the vast Persian-​held territories, including Egypt, and the practice was further disseminated by his soldiers and Successors. On the one hand, Macedonian curse tablets espouse familiar themes: they target tongues, arrange text into columnar lists of names, and employ the verb καταγράφω (“I write down”) to curse victims. Yet Macedonian tablets also provide evidence for the diversification of curse-​writing rituals over time. Though litigation still provided the occasion par excellence for curse practice, by the fourth century bce, within both Macedon and the wider Greek world, more curse rituals were used to address relationship anxieties and erotic desires. In addition to illuminating networks of mobility and exchange in the northern Aegean, these objects shed new light on ritual, gender dynamics, and even female agency in the Kingdom of Macedon during the fourth century bce, a period long dominated by the military and political histories of Philip II and Alexander III.

Oscan Italy and the Italian Mainland Some two decades ago, an inscribed lead band emerged in the necropolis of ancient Petelia, a coastal Lucanian city near the toe of southern Italy (Figure 3.1).3

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Curse-​writing rituals had been performed in nearby Sicily since c. 500 bce, and this object dates from nearly two centuries later, inscribed toward the end of the fourth century. Its text is arranged into four columns separated by vertical lines, the first three of which carry lists of names in Greek characters; the fourth column, also inscribed in the Greek script, contains a curse addressed to Hermes of the Underworld: Tablet 3.1. after Petelia 2, Crawford 2011 Petelia, Lucania (Italy) c. 300 bce Museo Archaeologico Nazionale di Crotone (Figure 3.2)

Figure 3.2 Tablet 3.1 (Petelia 2, Crawford 2011). From Petelia, Lucania (Italy), c. 300 bce. Museo Archaeologico Nazionale di Crotone. Drawing of tablet from McDonald 2015, 159.

   Col. I ΚΑϜΝΟΤΟ ΣΤΑΤΙΟ ΠΑΚϜΙΩ ΚΑΙΙΩ

  

   Col. ΙΙΙ ΑϜΕΣ ΑΥΔΑΙΣ ΝΟϜΙΟ ΑΛΑΦΙΩ ΜΙΝΑΟ ΣΚΑΦΙΡΙΩ

   Col. ΙV Π(?) ΑϜΕΛΙΟΣ ΝΟ(ϜΙΣ) ΜΟ[-​c.5-​]ΝΣ ΕΤ ΚΗΣ ΟΥΣΟΣ ΑΡΑΞ Μ[Ι]ΝΑΣ ΜΙΝΑΣ ΚΑΡΙΣ ΤΑΠ(?) ΠΙΣΠΙΤ Ι(ΝΙ)Μ ΣΟΛΛΟΜ ΗΣΟΥ δέκεο hερμᾶ χθώνιε

ΠΑΚΟΛ ΣΤΑΤΙΕΣ ΜΑΡΑ(Σ) ΣΤΑΤΙΕΣ

ΒΑΝΤΙΝΩ ΚΩΣΣΑΝΩ

Col. ΙΙ ΓΝΑΥ(Σ) ΣΤΑΤΙΕΣ ϜΙΒΙ(Σ) ΣΤΑΤΙΕΣ ΕΜΑΥΤΩ ΣΤΑΤΙΩ ΜΙΝΑΔΟ ΚΑΙΔΙΚΩ ΤΡΕΩ ΑΥΔΑΟ ΜΙΝΑΣ ΚΑΙΔΙΚΙΣ

ταῦτα καὶ κάθεκε αὐτε͂ι

Col. IV.3: καριστα[δ] πισπιτ ιμ σολλομ ησου(μ)4 (Murano 2012, 2013, no. 13)

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Caunota Statia (?), Paquia Caedica (?), Pacul Statius, Marus Statius, Gnaeus Statius, Vibius Statius, Emauta Statia, Minata Caidica, Trebia Audaea, Minatus Caedicius, Auesius Audaeus, Nouia Alfia, Minata Scafiria, Bantina Cosana, P. Auelius, No. ???, and (?) Ces, Usus, Arax, Minatus, Minatus. Carius, ???, whoever also (is) of (=​associated with) all of them (=​esú(m)), receive (them), Hermes of the Underworld, these things also keep here! (Trans. Crawford 2011)5 At first glance, this text resembles the early Selinountine curse tablets examined in Chapter 1. Inscribed on lead in Greek letters, the curse opens with a list of names in the nominative; several individuals share gentilician names, identifying with the same family or kinship group. But in fact, the curse is not Greek, or at least not entirely Greek. The majority of text was composed in the Oscan language of southern Italy, though using the Greek script. The first three columns contain lists of indigenous Oscan names; though I provide a more conservative reading, some scholars have discerned in the fourth column an Oscan wish-​or curse-​formula with a subjunctive verb: “may any one of all these [people] be punished/​cursed!” (καριστα[δ] πισπιτ ιμ σολλομ ησου(μ)).6 While editors differ on the transcription and interpretation of this Oscan line, all agree that in the concluding sentence, the curse switches from Oscan (underlined below) to Greek:7 πισπιτ ι(νι)μ σολλομ ησου | δέκεο hερμᾶ χθώνιε | ταῦτα καὶ κάθεκε αὐτε͂ι . . . whoever also is associated with all of them (or, “whoever else (is acting on behalf ) of all of them,” trans. McDonald 2015, 159), Hermes Chthonios, receive these (names) and keep them here! The final clause commands Hermes Chthonios to “receive” (δέκεο, cf. Attic δέχου) and keep, presumably in the Underworld, the individuals named above. Why did the scribe code-​switch from Oscan to Greek at the curse’s conclusion?8 Possibly he associated the god Hermes with the Greek pantheon, and elected to use Greek as the proper language of divine invocation. The switch may also suggest that the composer knew the ritual formula in Greek, and chose to preserve its original language rather than translate it into Oscan9—​much like the traditional Latin names of prayers and liturgies are still maintained today in Roman Catholic church services. Oscan-​speaking groups in southern Italy were among the first non-​Greeks to adopt curse-​writing rituals, seemingly as early as 330 bce, and this bilingual text is part of a rich and growing corpus of Oscan curse tablets.10 Francesca Murano’s Le tabellae defixionum osche (2013) documents some 14 Oscan curse tablets dating from the fourth to early first centuries bce; eight were composed in the Greek

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alphabet (or an adapted form thereof ), five in the “national” Oscan alphabet, and one in the Latin alphabet.11 These numbers will continue to rise, as newly discovered tablets from Calabria and elsewhere in southern Italy are unrolled and published.12 The majority of Oscan curse tablets hail from funerary contexts, interred in tombs like so many of their Greek counterparts. Some have also emerged from sanctuaries or precincts associated with ceremonial structures; for example, a fourth-​century Oscan/​Greek tablet from Roccagloriosa was deposited near a building seemingly related to the worship of gentilician figures, sacra gentilicia.13 Taken as a group, these curse tablets provide compelling evidence for Greek-​ Oscan language contact from the fourth through third centuries bce, and document the features of Greek curse rituals that were seized upon by non-​Greek practitioners—​elements that must have been understood as quintessential to the practice, such as the cursing of tongues and use in judicial contexts. Though many fourth-​century Oscan curses were modeled on Greek antecedents and first appear in the Greek script,14 some exhibit idiosyncrasies that are not found elsewhere in Greek or (later) Latin texts; these epichoric traditions reflect the infusion of local practice, or some blending of Greek and Oscan ritual. In this same period, Oscan communities were adopting other private Greek rites as well; the site of Petelia, for example, from which tablet 3.1 emerged, has yielded the

Figure 3.3  Petelia Gold Tablet, with an Orphic inscription and the pendant case that contained it. Late fourth century bce. British Museum 256193001, © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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so-​called Petelia Gold Tablet from the late fourth century bce (Figure 3.3).15 This thin, inscribed gold sheet carries an Orphic-​Bacchic ritual text meant to help its bearer navigate the Underworld, a “passport for the deceased” (Totenpässe) for use in the afterlife. Considered together with Oscan curse tablets, the Orphic-​ Bacchic gold tablet also documents the demand in Oscan communities for Greek ritual practice, which operated through the incision of text on a metal sheet, and bore some connection to the gods, the grave, and the Underworld. One could address anxieties about death and the afterlife; the other, the problems of the present, such as a looming trial in the law courts. The spread of curse practice to Oscan Italy during the fourth century bce is not surprising: distances from Sicilian poleis were short, and the regions had long-​ standing ties of trade and communication. In fact, a Greek curse tablet from the necropolis of Cumae (1.4, DTAud 302) demonstrates that the ritual was already present on the Italian mainland as early as the fifth century, if confined to Greek settlements around the Bay of Naples. In the southern Italian peninsula too, fourth-​century Greek curse tablets have emerged in sound archaeological contexts at Metapontum and Teuranus Ager, where Oscan speakers were also known to have been present.16 The ritual’s spread was not linear: it arrived in the southern Italian peninsula as a result of many waves of interactions between Greek and Oscan speakers, some of whom probably were bilingual and had been living side by side for generations (indeed, in Bruttium [Calabria], Messana, Lucania, Samnium, and as far north as Campania [Cumae], both Greek and Oscan were spoken).17 Curse-​ writing rituals thus reached Oscan communities on several fronts: from the Greek cities of Sicily and Magna Graecia to the Central Oscan enclaves around the Bay of Naples—​namely, Cumae and broader Campania—​and also through the bilingual Greek-​Oscan settlements of southern Italy and Sicily (Messana, Calabria, and Lucania). From these Oscan settlements, the practice would travel north to the Latin and Etruscan enclaves of the Italian peninsula, such that, while the earliest South Oscan curses show direct evidence for contact with Greek, later Central Oscan tablets reveal contact with Latin-​speaking groups.18

Lists of Names Dating from 330–​320 bce, one of the oldest Oscan curse tablets was recovered in a chamber tomb at Laos (southern Italy) in 1963. Sited in the city’s western necropolis, the tomb contained a rich mortuary assemblage both Oscan and, to a lesser extent, Greek in character: interred were a man, woman, and horse, along with a gold diadem, a panoply, “Samnite” belt buckles, a strigil manufactured at Praeneste bearing a Greek stamp, and other grave goods.19 Like its Greek predecessors, this early Oscan curse carried a list of names.

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Tablet 3.2. Laos 2, Crawford 2011, 1344-​47 330–​320 bce Reggio Calabria, Museo Nazionale 24/​10/​05 (MHC, UR) (Figure 3.4) (a)

(b)

Figure 3.4 Tablet 3.2 (Laos 2, Crawford 2011). From Laos, Lucania (Italy), 330–​320 bce. Reggio Calabria, Museo Nazionale 24/​10/​05 (MHC, UR). Drawing of tablet from Murano 2013, 256 Tav. XX.

   Side A 1 μαραειν v γαϝιν οϝι(ν) σαβιδι(ν) νοψιν νοψιν vac μεδεκον ϝαρ(ιν) ϝαριε(ι)σ οψιον 5 σπεδι(ν) vac νοψιν ϝιβιν vac σαβιδιον μαραειν vac μεδεκον λοικιν ϝιβιν σπελιν

Side A, down right-​hand margin 1 στατιν οψιον μεδεκον ϝιβιν βοφ{+​}ονι[ν]

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   Side B 1 νοψ(ι)α(ν) ϝαριαν ϝιβιαν σπελ(ι)αν μεδεκαν αραδιαν (Anonymous curses) Maraeus Sabidius; Gaius Nopsius; Ouius Nopsius, the magister; Varus, son of Varus, Opsius; Spedius Nopsius; Vibius Sabidius, the magister; Maraeus Spelius; Lucius Statius; Vibius Opsius, the magister; Vibius Bufonius; Numeria, Varia, Vibia Spelia, the ??? magistra. (Trans. Crawford 2011, 1346) Editors have interpreted the text’s format and even its underlying language in very different ways. It was once suggested that this should be read as a Greek text, since it was inscribed in the Greek script and contains other Greek features, but Poccetti and Crawford have convincingly argued that the language underpinning this curse is Oscan (μεδεκον, for example, is an Oscan word).20 McDonald writes that the syntax may suggest that the text was “written in the context of very strong social pressure from Greek, which was beginning to affect the naming system used in the area,” and that the curse may even have been “intended as a mixed-​language text.”21 Or perhaps the curse-​writer was an Oscan speaker, but curse practice was still perceived as culturally “Greek” at the time, and the scribe thus drew strongly upon Greek morphology.22 Side A contains both horizontal-​and vertical-​running text, the latter squeezed into the remaining space on the right margin; it is ultimately uncertain how the names on the right should be integrated within the main text.23 Both male and female names are present, with praenomina, nomina, and the occasional filiation (“Varus, son of Varus, Opsius,” A, line 4).24 The male names, Crawford writes (2011, 1345), are organized into “three groups of three each, with μεδεκον at the end of each group, then a single name as an afterthought . . . the female names seem to be those of three sisters with the same nomen.”25 What occasioned this curse is not obvious, but several of the named individuals were clearly related to one another, and it is plausible that the object was created on account of a legal dispute. The list of names was a common form of early Oscan curse (cf. Laos 3, Crawford 2011, 1348–​9), based on a popular Greek type.

Targeting Tongues and Judicial Curses When curse-​writing rituals spread from Greek Sicily to Oscan Italy, they seemingly did so in association with litigation. Judicial curses are well represented in the Oscan corpus, with four out of 14 tablets clearly occasioned by legal

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proceedings, and several others probably, though not explicitly, stemming from lawsuits. As had been the case in Greek Sicily, Oscan judicial curses sought to suppress opponents’ speech at trial. Cursing a rival’s verbal faculties, one Oscan text demands “may the tongues of them all be rigid” (pus ol(l)u(m) solu(m) fancua(s) recta(s) sint) and “may the breath of them [all] be dry!” (pus flatu(s) sic(c)u(s) ol(l) u(m) sit).26 Paralyzed tongue and gasping breath would indeed render testimony unconvincing, if not impossible, in court—​and so one’s opponent would be incapacitated at trial.27 Another Oscan judicial curse asks that its victims “be able neither to say nor to speak” (nep deíkum nep fatíum pútíad); a third targets the speech, deeds, and tongue of its victim “(I curse) the actions, the speeches of that man, the deeds, the tongue!” (aginss urinss úlleis fakinss fangam).28 McDonald has shown that Oscan curse tablets carry further echoes of legal language, including the following:29 1. the repeated use of nep, “not,” and synonyms such as fatíum/​deíkum, “say/​ speak” (Cp 36); 2. the piling up of attributes without conjunctions, e.g., “the actions, the speeches of that man, the deeds, the tongue, the strengths, the life, the ability, the spirit, the age, the wealth” (aginss, urinss úlleis, fakinss, fangvam, biass, biítam, aftiím, anamúm, aitatúm, amirikum, Cm 13); and 3. the imitation in curse tablets of the conditional structure employed in legal texts, such as “if one should not give, may he be torn by his (Cerberus’s) sharp bite” (svai: neip: dadid lamatir: akrid eiseis dunte[d]‌, Cp 37/​Capua 34).30 Like their Greek predecessors, early Oscan curse tablets were occasioned by litigation, and drew upon legal terminology. Oscan curses also exhibit aspects of prayer/​wish formulae, binding language, and similia similibus expressions, all of which are found in earlier and contemporary Greek curse tablets. Poccetti and Lazzarini have connected the appearance of Oscan curse tablets to the adoption of a polis-​style system of political organization, which included law courts like those in cities of the Greek west. In fourth-​century Oscan communities, curse practice may thus reflect the presence of new, Greek-​influenced administrative institutions, namely the courts of law31—​and alongside the courts came novel ritual mechanisms for manipulating legal power.

Ritual Transmissions: Greek, Oscan, and Latin Curses of the Italian Mainland After 300 bce, as Poccetti and others have pointed out, bilingual Greek-​Oscan curse tablets disappear from the Oscan communities of southern Italy, and persist in the Oscan language alone.32 By the second century bce, Oscan-​speaking

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persons in sites further north were writing curses, and Latin and Etruscan residents of central Italy, drawing on Oscan models, were also writing curses to manipulate fate and undermine opponents.33 We have seen that the multilingual settlements in southern Italy and Campania supported interactions between Greek and Oscan speakers, and that these exchanges included the transfer of ritual goods and services (such encounters must have transpired in northeast Sicily too, where Oscan speakers were also present in Greek communities). Vitellozzi notes that such regions played “a major role in the diffusion of Greek epigraphic models throughout the Etruscan, Sabellic, and Latin areas” of Italy, with inscriptions clustering along nodes of early Greek colonization in Magna Graecia.34 The adoption of curse-​writing rituals within South and Central Oscan communities, followed by Latin and Etruscan communities further north, illuminates how the practice came to cross-​cultural and linguistic boundaries. In addition to forming their own corpus of important texts—​one of the richest sources of the Oscan language, with “50 per cent of all the names attested in South Oscan. . . found in curses”—​Oscan curse-​writing rituals also helped diffuse the practice to neighboring Latin and Etruscan communities.35 This transmission was certainly underway by the second century bce; a Latin curse tablet from these years emerged in Pompeii, and an Etruscan curse from the second century bce emerged in Populonia, Etruria.36 While South Oscan communities associated magic with Greek ritual practice—​and created curse tablets drawn from Greek precedents—​Latin communities may initially have connected magic with Oscan ritual practice (cf. Roman associations of divination with Etruscan groups).37 Adams writes (2003, 145), [o]‌nce bilingual Oscan speakers had begun to draw heavily on the form of Latin official phraseology, they were succumbing to the dominance of Latin culture. . . . But curse tablets add a different dimension to the picture. Here the imitation seems to operate in the reverse direction, no doubt because of the potency of Italian regional magic in the sub-​culture of regions in which Latin and Italic existed side by side. Oscan communities played an important role in the transmission of curse-​writing rituals to Latin groups of the Italian mainland, but they were by no means the sole mode of diffusion. Indeed, we need not expect a simple or linear route of dissemination, especially by the third and second centuries bce. One of the oldest curse tablets carrying Latin, for example, also carries Greek—​but no Oscan—​text. Dating to the later third century bce, tablet 3.3 comes from Lilybaeum, in Western Sicily, the broader region in which Greek curse-​writing rituals emerged in the early fifth century. The opisthographic tablet was found in the city’s necropolis and is bilingual in the sense that it was incised

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in Greek on Side A, and both Greek and Latin on Side B—​a rarity among curse tablets and Sicilian inscriptions more generally, which again points to the multilingual environments in which curse rituals were spread. The Greek curse was created on account of a looming trial, while the tablet’s back side contains Roman names composed in Latin characters, alongside another Greek text. Tablet 3.3. A: Jordan 1997a, 395–​6; B: Brugnone 199738 Lilybaeum, Sicily Late third century bce Museo Baglio Anselmi, Marsala, Inv. 1647 (Figure 3.5a, b) A.1 ← καταδέω Ζωπυρίωνα τᾶς Μυμβυρ παρὰ Φερσε-​ ← φόναι καὶ παρὰ Τιτάνεσσι καταχθονίοις καὶ παρ’ ἀ-​ ← π[ε]υ̣χομένοισι νεκρ̣οῖς. vac. {ἐς τοὺς ἀτελέστους} καὶ παρ-​ ← ὰ [ἱ]αρίαις Δάματρος παρ’ ἀπευχομέ[ν]α[ισ]ιν. vac. 5 ← Καταδέω δέ νιν ἐμ βολίμωι α[ὐτὸν καὶ νοῦ]ν ← αὐτοῦ καὶ ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ ὡς μὴ δύν[αται ἀντία] ← λαλῖν̣. vac. Καταδέω δέ νιν ἐμ βολίμ̣ωι, Σ[-​max.ca. 5-​] ← [․]․ΥΝ, [α]ὐτὰν καὶ νοῦν καὶ ψυ̣[χὴν αὐτᾶς̣]

1 3

1

5

B (Right Side) ← [καταδέω] δὲ ὅπως ← [μὴ δύνανται] ἀντία ← [λέγειν] μτε πο[ιεῖν] B (Left Side) → ] Iunius ] Septumius C ∙ Acinus M ∙ An(n)ius L ∙ Umbonius M ∙ Nautius M ∙ Rustius L ∙ Nautius Umbonia

A.3: Brugnone 1997/​1999 gives π[ρ]ιχομένοισι νεκύοις for φρικομένοισι, from φρίσσω “I shiver.”

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A.4: See Curbera 1997a for ἱ]αρίαις =​ ἱαρείαις, the Erinyes as “priestesses of Demeter,” cf. Eur. Or. 261, where the Erinyes are called ἐνέρων ἱέρειαι; contra Brugnone 1997/​1999, where παρὰ [ὠ]αρίαις =​ ἀωρίαις, “abnormal, bad seasons” relating to Demeter. Side A (Greek): I bind down Zopyrion, son of Mumbur, alongside Persephone and alongside the subterranean Titans and alongside the abominating dead, among the unfulfilled and alongside the priestesses of Demeter [and] alongside the abominating ones! I bind him down in lead, him and his mind and his soul, so that he is not able to speak in opposition! I bind her down in lead, S[———​]YN, her, and her mind, and her soul! Side B.1–​3 (Greek): [I bind him down] in such a way that [he is neither able to speak] nor create opposition. Side B.4–​12 (Latin):39 [ . . . ] Iunius, [ . . . ] Septumius, C(aius) Acinus, M(arcus) ∙ An(n)ius, L(ucius) ∙ Umbonius, M(arcus) ∙ Nautius, M(arcus) ∙ Rustius, L(ucius) ∙ Nautius, Umbonia. (a)

(b)

Figure 3.5 Tablet 3.3 (Lilybaeum, Sicily), late third century bce. Museo Baglio Anselmi, Marsala, Inv. 1647. Drawing from Jordan 1997a, 393.

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This bilingual lead tablet carries the names of Roman individuals inscribed in Latin, and a more discursive binding spell written in Greek; Latin and Greek share the same surface on Side B, though the texts need not be contemporary. In the editio princeps, Brugnone suggests that the Romans named on the verso were those who supported Zopyrion as legal supporters (σύνδικοι) or witnesses (μάρτυρες). The Latin text contains a list of names that adhere to Roman naming conventions. The nomen is always inscribed in full; a conventional praenomen precedes the nomen for six individuals, and at least some of these persons were members of the same family or clan. Brugnone notes that the absence of cognomina should suggest a date before the second century bce, when the inclusion of the third name became more commonplace in epigraphic documentation.40 This curse tablet is revisited in Chapter 5, but, for now, suffice it to note that the provenance is geographically significant: the presence of Latin demonstrates that ritual exchange was occurring between Greek and Latin speakers outside the Italian mainland, in western Sicily, and thus without Oscan mediators. This must represent another avenue through which curse-​writing rituals reached Latin-​speaking communities: interactions between Greeks and Romans living or traveling abroad in multicultural settlements like Lilybaeum. Lilybaeum was a cosmopolitan crossroads community populated by Greek, Punic, and Latin groups.41 By the late third century bce, mobility and migration would have easily facilitated such exchanges outside the Italian peninsula. This was another way in which Latin speakers came to adopt curse practice, complementing the ritual’s diffusion through Oscan communities on the Italian mainland. This same phenomenon is evident still further afield. Poccetti has convincingly suggested that the Aegean island of Delos served as a node of transmission for early Latin curse practice—​that the ritual was observed and adopted from Greek practitioners there, in the central Aegean.42 The idea is appealing, as Delos was a great facilitator of exchange between diverse, highly mobile communities even before the island was established as a free port of trade by Rome in 167 bce. Among these groups were Greeks, Romans, and Punic-​ Phoenicians; Oscan families from Campania are also known to have been active in the Delian slave trade (the Granii, Sehii, and the Cluvii from Capua, for example).43 The recovery on Delos of a curse inscribed in archaizing Latin from the second half of the second century bce (Kropp 10.1/​1) may suggest that early Latin curse practice developed in the wake of such exchange between Greek-​and Latin-​speaking groups in the Hellenistic period.44 As in Lilybaeum, Delos may also have played a role in the transmission of curse-​writing rituals to Latin groups of the Italian mainland, as another site where Greek and Latin speakers were living, trading, and worshiping together in close proximity.

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The oldest Latin curse tablets therefore come not from Rome, but from multilingual “third-​party” locales like Sicily, the Bay of Naples, Delos, and even Roman Spain (the region of Cádiz/​Corduba and, later, Barchín del Hoyo).45 Such sites facilitated multiethnic communication and the transmission of ritual technologies, and should be considered side by side with (more proximate) Oscan Italian communities as catalysts of exchange between Greek-​and Latin-​ speaking groups. On the whole, the emergence of Oscan curse tablets in the fourth century bce signals the ritual’s spread from Greek Sicily to the Italian mainland, and then on to the non-​Greek groups of the Italian peninsula. This is a significant development in the ritual’s history, and speaks to the broad appeal of curse practice from the fourth century bce onward. Curse-​writing rituals spread across the kaleidoscopic networks that linked Greek and Oscan groups, and then across still others that connected Oscan and Latin communities, and Latin and Greek enclaves—​ both in the Italian mainland and farther afield (Sicily, Delos, and even the Iberian peninsula). Curse practice was already present on the Italian mainland by the fifth century bce, as attested by tablet 1.4 from the necropolis at Cumae; the tablet’s reference to the ateleia of words and deeds betrays close Sicilian models, and documents ritual mobility between Sicilian poleis and the Greek communities on the Bay of Naples. The adoption of these rituals by Oscan communities was one way in which the practice transpired to Latin-​speaking groups of the Italian mainland by the second century bce. Yet the appearance of tablets carrying Latin text at sites like Lilybaeum, Delos, El Portal (Cádiz), Corduba, and Barchín del Hoyo suggests that transmission was nonlinear, and occurred gradually through interactions of various Greek-​, Oscan-​, and Latin-​speaking groups over time and space. And while curse-​writing rituals were spreading to Oscan communities in the fourth century bce, it seems that they were also adopted by Iberian groups in the region of modern Spain; in this instance too the ritual spread through exchange between diverse groups of people in a multiethnic port of trade (Emporion).46 Against this historical backdrop were also various forms of spoken curses, which have left little trace in the material record; the Twelve Tables, for example, explicitly forbade the use of curses in early Roman society, and these maledictions were probably oral in nature.

Curse Tablets from the Northern Black Sea Even before Oscan groups in southern Italy were inscribing curses on lead, Greeks on the northwestern edge of the oikoumene (the inhabited world) had established curse-​writing rituals along the Black Sea coast. The majority of published Pontic

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curse tablets come from the northern coast of the Black Sea, an area that for our purposes encompassed the Greek cities between Histria (Istros) in the west and Gorgippia in the east, including those of the Bosporan Kingdom in eastern Crimea and the Taman Peninsula (Figure 3.6). Subsuming the shores of modern Ukraine, (partially) Russia, and eastern Romania (Istros), this stretch of coast has yielded some 75–​80 curse tablets to date. We are thus dealing with a large body of documentary evidence spread over a vast coastal area. The Black Sea was connected to the Aegean and broader Mediterranean by well-​trafficked maritime routes, and the economies of Pontic poleis revolved around regional and long-​distance commerce. Unlike the regions previously studied—​ Selinous, Himera, Oscan south Italy—​ north Pontic communities could sit hundreds of miles apart from one another. A journey from Histria to Olbia to Pantikipaion, for example, would have required multi-​day voyages that could have been undertaken only at certain times of year along navigational routes that followed two counterclockwise currents.47 This immense geographic zone can hardly be considered a monolithic entity (“the northern Black Sea coast”). That said, north Pontic Greek cities were often in contact with one another; they shared trade interests, religious cults and calendars, political institutions, and, as many were apoikiai of Miletus, a common Ionian metropolis and dialect (Histria, Tyras, Berezan, Olbia, Pantikapaion, etc.).48 Pontic poleis were bustling with Greeks of different origins and dialects, including Greeks who had been born in the north Pontic; Greeks who might

Figure 3.6  Map of the northern Black Sea (by author).

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identify with Miletos, the leading colonizer in the area; Greek settlers from other parts of the Black Sea or eastern Aegean (such as Lesbos and Teos); and Greeks with ties to mainland cities like Athens or Megara.49 Many non-​ Greeks also lived within these poleis, and passed as itinerants through these ports. Each Pontic city interacted differently with inland indigenous groups, local non-​Greek populations whose numbers dwarfed those of the Hellenic coastal dwellers.50 Indeed, the initial success and long-​term sustainability of Greek settlements in the northern Black Sea depended upon their ability to maintain relationships with these native groups. For example, early Greek settlers at Berezan, Olbia, and Histria adopted indigenous architectural forms, constructing underground dug-​out houses meant to combat the winter cold, and used local handmade pottery in addition to Greek wheel-​made imports.51 Curse-​writing rituals in the northern Black Sea reinforce the demographic complexity of these cities, and highlight the blending of local traditions of ritual knowledge. North Pontic curse practice also reveals the important role played by the law courts in adjudicating disputes, at least some of which were commercial in nature. The prosperity of north Pontic poleis—​especially the cities of the Bosporan Kingdom during the late fifth and fourth centuries bce—​was grounded in the trade in wheat, fish, and enslaved persons. Commerce was fundamental to north Pontic economies: material remains continuously reaffirm this, from ancient grain warehouses in the lower Scythian steppes, to a sunken Greek trading vessel preserved off the Bulgarian Black Sea coast.52 Dense webs of commercial networks created groups of mobile, literate, Greek-​speaking merchants whose interests are captured in private letters, receipts, financial documents, and, by the early fourth century, in curse tablets.53 Curse-​ writing rituals seem to have reached the North Pontic region through contact with Athens (Miletus founded the great majority of Greek cities in the northern Black Sea, but the practice is currently unattested there, and in Ionia more broadly, at this time). A survey of curse tablets from the northern Black Sea reveals parallels with traditions found elsewhere in the Mediterranean, especially in Attica, and provides evidence for wider Pontic networks of mobility and exchange. Such similarities allow us to consider the mechanisms by which ritual traditions and skill sets spread to the frontiers of the Greek-​speaking world, and to analyze the conditions that catalyzed their adoption there. Again, this region of the northern Black Sea (Histria through Gorgippia) has yielded no fewer than 75–​80 Greek curse inscriptions to date; this conservative estimate includes curse assemblages from regional corpora (DefOlb =​Belousov 2020; IGDOP =​Dubois 1996), combined with recent “one-​off ” publications from Pontic sites, and also tablets

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that have been unearthed but not yet unrolled or published.54 The total is surely much higher than this, but the proliferation of metal-​detector-​wielding “treasure hunters” has catalyzed the illicit removal of many lead tablets, the majority of which pass unreported and unpublished.55 The fate of many of these objects is now unknown in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 ce. Of this diffuse corpus of north Pontic curse tablets, most date from the fourth century bce, and the majority with recorded provenance come from graves.56 A handful of unpublished Olbian lead and ceramic curses have also emerged in a shrine of fourth-​century date adjacent to the city’s necropolis, suggesting that chthonic precincts appealed for the deposition of curses at Olbia as elsewhere. As in Selinous, all tablets in which the circumstances of composition are known are judicial in nature, stemming from trials or legal disputes. Yet again, where there are robust law courts, there are curse tablets in the classical Greek world, and early Greek curse-​writing rituals were most often used to address litigation disputes. Themes within north Pontic curses are also familiar, and include lists of names (sometimes arranged into columns), the targeting of tongues and faculties of speech, textual distortion, the use of γράφω and compounds, and language drawn from public arai. New themes also emerge, such as the invocation of the corpse with which the tablet was interred, and an emphasis on the act of burial. While the majority of north Pontic curse texts were inscribed on lead, several were written on ceramic bowls, lids, and sherds. The use of local ceramics as a medium for curse-​writing and the deposition of these objects in necropoleis document a regional adaptation of curse practice in certain north Pontic communities (Olbia and, on the west Pontic coast, Apollonia).57 The practice of writing private text on terracotta reflects broader regional epigraphic habits, evidenced by the corpus of commercial letters, many of which were also inscribed on ceramic.58 Some 35 private correspondences have emerged from the north Pontic coast, the oldest of which date to the mid-​sixth century bce.59 These lead and ceramic texts bear witness to various sorts of regional interaction and exchange: the seizure and return of goods and property (especially slaves), nonpayment of debts, household eviction, the provision of ownership records, relations between Greeks in urbanized port cities and indigenous groups of the Pontic interior, and more. These commercial letters demonstrate that written literacy and social proclivities for incising text—​that is, a form of epigraphic habit—​were established in the northern Black Sea for well over a century by the time that curse-​writing rituals emerged in the region.60 This helps to explain why curse practice took root so seamlessly, and so vibrantly, along the northern Black Sea coast, becoming widespread by the fourth century bce. Many north Pontic Greeks, especially persons involved in trade, possessed some degree of

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functional literacy, and were long accustomed to writing private texts on lead sheets and ceramic sherds.61 When a new, written ritual technology emerged that promised to further private interests and impede opponents, Greeks of the northern Black Sea readily adopted the practice.

Lists of Names Of the curse tablets known from the northern coast of the Black Sea, the majority—​some 35–​40 tablets—​come from the city and chora of Olbia (Figure 3.6). Founded by Milesian settlers on the southern banks of the Bug river, the city was well-​sited as a hub for trade between interior Scythian settlements and Greek communities of the Black Sea and Aegean.62 Olbia has also yielded the region’s oldest curse tablets, which date from around or soon after 400 bce.63 While such claims to age and corpus size may reflect nothing more than Olbia’s long history of systematic excavation, it is clear that Olbia was particularly abreast of broader Greek cultural trends, from Orphic sects to schoolboy exercises in the Ilias parua (the latter of which preserve the oldest recorded version of a circulating literary text).64 In this sense, curse-​writing rituals were yet another expression of Hellenic cultural identity in these frontier settlements. Alexey Belousov’s recent edition of Olbian defixiones includes 25 curse texts (2020, DefOlb), most of which comprise lists of names (12 curses) and elaborations thereon.65 One such curse tablet is 3.4 below, composed soon after 400 bce. The text was incised on a thin rectangular lead sheet, folded once horizontally, and deposited in a grave in the city’s necropolis.66 Like many Olbian curses, the tablet carries a list of names: Tablet 3.4. DefOlb 14 Olbia, Grave 400–​375 bce Archaeological Museum of Odessa, Ukraine, Inv. 44409 (Figure 3.7) 1

Εὄβο̄λος Μοιραγόρ̣εω̣, Δωριεὸς : Νυνφοδώρο̄, Ἀπολλωνίδης Τιμοθ̣έο̄, Ἀπατριος Ὑπανίχ̣ο̄,

3

Ἰητρόδωρος Ἑκατοκ̣λέος : καὶ τς αὀτῶι συνιό-​ ντας πάντας.

Eobolos son of Moiragores, Dorieos son of Nymphodoros, Apollonides son of Timotheos, Apatοrios son of Hypanichos, Ietrodoros the son of Hekatokles, and all those who go along with him [Eobolos]!

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Figure 3.7 Tablet 3.4 (DefOlb 14), 400–​375 bce. Archaeological Museum of Odessa (Ukraine), Inv. 44409. Drawing and photograph from Belousov 2020, Fig. 24, 25.

This Olbian curse lists five Greek names in the nominative case, all of which are accompanied by patronymics. The curse’s judicial nature is suggested by the concluding clause “and all those who go along with him.” The precise meaning of συνιόντας is unclear, but the term probably refers to the supporters and witnesses of the opposing litigant at trial—​a vernacular expression signaling one’s legal entourage.67 Preceding this phrase and forming the core of the curse is a simple, continuous list of individual names. Another early Olbian curse, recovered in the late nineteenth century ce, contains a columnar list of names; tablet 3.5 curses eight men whose names were arranged into a stark column of text, though the final name runs in an upward direction (here the tablet has been rotated 90 degrees to utilize vacant space for incision, and additional characters may also be present). After the names were incised, the tablet was folded once horizontally and pierced with a nail. Tablet 3.5. DefOlb 2 Olbia; Originally in the Collection of I.K. Surutschan Early fourth century bce (Figure 3.8) 1

Ὄ]λυμπο̣[ς Ξένων Ἀθην̣όδωρο̣ς Ἀθήναιο̣ς

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Παυσαν[ί]ας Δημήτρ[ι]ο[ς] Ἄ̣σκιος

  

at right, running upward

↑ Ἱπποκλῆς

Olympos, Xenon, Athenodoros, Athenaios, Pausanias, Demetrios, Askios, Hippokles

Figure 3.8 Tablet 3.5 (DefOlb 2, DTAud 88), 400–​350 bce. Olbia. Photograph from Petropoli 1894, no. 29, tab. VI.

This name list does not betray the circumstances that occasioned the curse, but the fact that the tablet was pierced with a nail suggests that the composer was familiar with the nonverbal rituals that accompanied curse practice—​especially as employed in Attica by 400 bce. Tablets 3.4 and 3.5 are representative of many regional Pontic curses that carry simple lists of names.68

Targeting Tongues, Textual Distortion, Public Arai At Olbia and elsewhere in the northern Black Sea, wherever discernible, curse tablets were occasioned by judicial disputes. In this they resemble the oldest tablets from Sicily and Oscan Italy, and suggest that curse-​writing rituals found first and frequent use in the courts of law. Curse practitioners from north Pontic poleis, again like those from Sicily and Oscan Italy, also aimed to suppress speech or testimony in court by cursing the verbal faculties of their opponents, whether co-​speakers, jurors, or witnesses. Curse bowl 3.7 (below), for example, unearthed in 1912 in the necropolis of Olbia, binds the tongues of opposing litigants and witnesses at trial (καταδέω γλώσσας ἀντιδίκων καὶ μαρτύρων). The tongue again appears as the object of a curse in DefOlb 13 (IGDOlbia 108), which targets τὴν γλῶσσαν of one victim, in addition to τὴν δύναμιν, the “power” or “strength” of

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another.69 The notion of silencing the opposition is expressed in another way in a fourth-​century curse from Nikonion, a Milesian polis southwest of Olbia on the banks of the Dniester estuary. Published by Belousov in 2018, the curse lists 21 men in the nominative case, and concludes (B.12–​14), “let all of them become voiceless!” (τούτο[υς] γενέσ[θα]ι ἀφόν[ου]ς).70 Pontic curse-​composers also made use of textual distortion when writing maledictions, demonstrating an awareness of ritual practice developed in central Mediterranean communities a century prior. Consider tablet 3.6, deposited in the necropolis of ancient Chersonesos in the southwestern Crimean Peninsula: Tablet 3.6. DTAud 92 Fourth or third century bce Chersonesos, found in a tomb Hermitage Museum, Russia    Col. I 1 Βίττα[λ]ος Βακίων Ζωγέν[η]ς τιρακη ..... 5 . . . . . Βακίων

   Col. II τούτων τὴν ἐργασίην [ἐναν]-​ τ]ίαν γίνεσθαι καὶ ζόης καὶ βίου μὴ ὄναιντο Αἶσα ἀναιροῦσι κἀ[δι]κοῦσι

[. . . . . . . . . . . . ἄ]φρονε[ς] μή [τ]ις αὐτοῖς εἴη πη κτῆσις [ἀλλ’] ἀπολλύο[ι]ντο [κα]ὶ πα[ῖδες] αὐτοῖς

Column I: Bittalos, Bakion, Zogenes, TIRAKE(?) . . . Bakion. Column II: Let the work of these men come to be against them, and may their livelihood and life bring no profit. Destiny: they destroy and they are unjust . . . out of their minds! For them may there be not any possessions, but may they and their children be destroyed! With text arranged into two columns, 3.6 targets at least five individuals (six, if there happened to be two men named Bakion). The names are in the nominative case, and four have been scrambled; as in 1.14 (CDS 25) and 1.15 (CDS 24) from fifth-​century Selinous, the scrambling of text was meant to analogically muddle and disorient the individuals named on the tablet. After showering maledictions on the targeted individuals—​cursing their work, livelihood, and life—​the second column of text concludes with a familiar call for the targets’ utter destruction (ἀπόλλυμι), root and branch: “may they and their children be destroyed!” This damning phrase was drawn from the realm

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of public arai, and may suggest that here the ritual was understood as a private form of civic curse. The framing of the targets in the previous line as overreaching and unjust (ἀναιροῦσι κἀ[δι]κοῦσι) likely served to justify this call for their obliteration: these were just desserts.71 The influence of public arai on private curse tablets was observed in early Sicilian texts, such as 1.15, which demands a similar destruction for its victims (εἶεν ἐξόλειαι καὶ αὐτο͂ν καὶ γενεᾶς). At opposite ends of the Greek oikoumene, curse-​writers were utilizing the authoritative language of public arai to curse private opponents; here too practitioners infused curse texts with phrases found in the dominant civic culture. The relationship between such curse tablets and public arai is revisited in the book’s final chapter.

Verbs of Binding and Writing As in Greek Sicily and Oscan Italy, north Pontic curse-​writers expressed maledictions in terms of their own actions, using performative first-​person verbs of binding and writing. First, the verbs δέω and καταδέω were deployed in north Pontic curses by the early fourth century, with the goal of “binding” or “binding down” an opponent. Hence 3.7, mentioned above, opens with the binding verb καταδέω, which is used to restrain the tongues of opposing litigants and witnesses at trial: Bowl 3.7. Polinskaya 2021 C1, 14472 Early fourth century bce Large tumulus, necropolis of Olbia State Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia: Ол. 3802 Text inscribed in spiral on bottom of ceramic cup (light-​yellow clay) (Figure 3.9) Outer circle: Καταδέω γλώσσας ἀντιδίκων καὶ μαρτύρων, Τελεσικράτεος καὶ παί-​δων Middle circle: Τελεσικράτεος, Ἄγρωνος, Ἱππονίκο̄, Ἀρτεμιδώρο̄, Ἀχιλλοδώρου Inner circle: καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους τοὺς μετ’ {αοτα} αὀτοῦ πάντας.

I bind down the tongues of my court opponents and the witnesses, of Telesikrates and of the slaves—​of Telesikrates: of Argon, of Hipponikos, of Artemidoros, Achillodoros. And all the others who are with him! Here the curse-​writer used the binding verb καταδέω to restrain the tongues of opponents in court. We shall see in the following chapter that compounds of δέω are employed early and often in Attic curse tablets. Yet they are absent from fifth-century Selinountine texts; this may point to the influence of Athenian ritual traditions in the north Pontic by the early fourth century. The medium,

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Figure 3.9  Ceramic Curse Bowl 3.7, 400–​350 bce. Large tumulus, necropolis of Olbia. State Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia: Ол. 3802. Photograph and drawing from Polinskaya 2021, 145, Fig. 2.

however, is of local flavor, and reflects the influence of regional practice and magical knowledge. This curse was written in black ink on the interior of an unglazed bowl of yellow Olbian fabric, with text arranged in a spiral of three concentric circles (though the third circle runs counterclockwise). As Irene Polinskaya has shown, the bowl was then deposited in the topsoil of a large tumulus in Olbia’s necropolis, west of the city’s southern citadel.73 Other Olbian curses on ceramic bowls suggest that this was a regional practice,74 which also found expression at Apollonia Pontica on the west Pontic coast, and perhaps elsewhere in the region. In these and other curses, Belousov has discerned an Olbian preference for rounded supports, having examined “four spells on ceramics. . . peculiar not only due to the material they are inscribed on, but also because of their round shape, as the majority of known Greek magic spells are written on lead plates of rectangular shape.”75 Some of these ceramics include drawings of human heads in profile, and were accompanied by magical symbols, letters, words, and personal names; while not all of Belousov’s objects are overtly magical in nature, some surely were, and these belong to an Olbian tradition that blended foreign ritual formulae (καταδέω γλώσσας, for example) with local rites and epigraphic habits.76 With regard to curse verbs, some north Pontic practitioners also used γράφω to target rivals. The notion of “writing” or “registering” one’s opponents as a means of cursing them is attested in the oldest Greek curse texts, first appearing at

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Selinous in the late sixth century and probably reflecting the growing use of writing in legal contexts, as discussed in Chapter 1. A mid-​fourth-​century curse from the necropolis of Histria (Istros), located on the mouth of the Danube on the Romanian coast of the Black Sea, uses γράφω to curse five men.77 Specifically, the scribe “write(s) the name” of each target, explicating how the practice was understood to have worked: it hinged upon the incision of individual names on lead: Tablet 3.8. Avram, Chiriac, and Matei 2007, 390, no. 1 360–​350 bce Histria, purportedly from the necropolis Private Collection of I. Matei 1

5

Γράφω Διογένεος ὄνομα το͂ Ὀνομάστο̄ (καὶ) λόγο̄(ς) τς ἐκείνο̄ καὶ Ἀ(γαθή)νορο(ς) ὄνομα το͂ Διονυσοδώρο̄ καὶ λόγο̄ς καὶ δύναμιν καὶ Ἱέρηκος Λύκ(ε)ω καὶ Ἀρήτο̄ Λύκεω καὶ Πυθοκλήιδεω το Ξενοφάντο̄ καὶ τῶν συνεπιόντων μετὰ Διογένε[ος] το͂ Ὀνομάστο̄ παρ᾽ Ἀρι(σ)τόβο̄λον

I write the name of Diogenes, the son of Onomastos, and his speeches, and the name of Agathenor son of Dionysodoros, and his speeches and his power, and that of Hierex the son of Lykes, and of Aretos the son of Lykes, and of Pythokleides son of Xenophantos, and of those going together with Diogenes the son of Onomastos, (I write/​enroll them?) beside Aristobolos. This curse opens with γράφω, the only proper verb in the text. While we have encountered γράφω and its compounds in the earliest Sicilian curse tablets, here further emphasis is added to the curse-​writing process by two references to the “name” of the victim (ὄνομα lines 1, 2). This strikes me as both formulaic, reflective of litigation procedure (“I register the name of so-​and-​so”), and highly cognizant of the materiality of the script—​the act of writing text has taken on a ritual performativity, with γράφω ὄνομα serving as the act that brings the curse to pass. The verb καταγράφω also appears twice in a recently published curse tablet from the chora of Olbia, while at least one unpublished tablet from Olbia uses the verbs καταγράφω and ἐνγράφω to curse opponents.78 The presence of γράφω and compounds in north Pontic curses speaks to the influence of traditions found elsewhere in the Mediterranean, if not the presence of a wider ritual koine already by the fourth century bce. The primary victim of this Histrian curse was Diogenes, the son of Onomastos. Diogenes is cited twice, and was surely the main opposing litigant at trial. Four other men are named with patronymics, including two brothers named Hierex

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and Aretos; sons of Lykes, these brothers again reveal the prominence of family groups in fourth-​century litigation. Avram et al. suggest that they, along with Agathenor and Pythokleides, were scheduled to testify in support of Diogenes. To cover all bases, the scribe also cursed an anonymous “catch-​all” group of opponents: those “going together with” (συνεπιόντων) Diogenes, probably his co-​advocates, witnesses, or supporters at trial. The editors rightly connect the participle συνεπιόντων with the expression found in 3.4 above, which curses “all those who go with [Eobolos]” (τὸς αὀτῶι συνιόντας πάντας).79 That this expression occurs in two judicial curses from Histria and Olbia may point to a regional colloquialism, used in the fourth century bce to refer to one’s legal entourage at trial. Histria and Olbia were well connected along wider lines of trade and communication in the northwest Black Sea; both poleis were settled by Milesians, and shared kinship ties and cult traditions. Such connections, especially the grounding of both cities’ economies in regional commerce, cultivated a basic degree of literacy among mercantile groups; these persons could adopt and spread colloquial language, and texts written by such individuals often exhibit cross-​linguistic features like idioms and vernacular expressions.80 The use of συνεπιόντων and συνιόντας in these two texts may capture one such phrase, and reflect the type of “pragmatic” or “mercantile” literacy that was widely established along the Pontic coast by this time.81 Finally, Diogenes and his supporters were registered παρ᾽ Ἀρι(σ)τόβολον.82 The sense of the preposition here is ambiguous, but πάρα with the accusative usually evokes the quasi-​legal phrasing in which curse victims are registered or consigned “in the presence of,” “before,” or “beside” a powerful agent, such as a deity.83 Who was Aristobolos, the man with or beside whom the targets were registered? Avram et al. suggest that Aristobolos was the name of the corpse with which the tablet was deposited; Aristobolos was thus a nekydaimon, the spirit of the deceased and a denizen of the Underworld who acted “as a magical intermediary” in cursing Diogenes and his supporters.84 Of course, more prosaic explanations cannot be ruled out: Aristobolos may have been an individual active in the litigation process, perhaps another supporter of Diogenes or even an arbitrator or official associated with the trial (one might expect a verb nearer to παρ᾽ Ἀρι(σ)τόβολον if Aristobolos was indeed the name of the deceased).

Addressing the Corpse and Verbs of Burying If tablet 3.8 did invoke the corpse with which it was buried, it was not unique in doing so. Other curse tablets from the northern Black Sea also appear to address the deceased, and this may reflect a regional understanding that curse-​writing rituals sought to harness the powers of the dead with which tablets were interred.

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In 3.9, an early Hellenistic curse tablet from an Olbian grave, the corpse, or the spirit linked to the body of the deceased at the grave, was meant to bring the curse to pass: Tablet 3.9. Jordan 1997b, 21785 Necropolis of Olbia, found in a tomb Fourth century bce (Figure 3.10) 1

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[Ὥ]σπερ σε ἡμεῖς οὐ γεινώσκομε-​ ν, οὕτως Εὔπο[λ]ις καὶ Διονύσιος, Μακαρεύς, Ἀρι[σ]τοκράτης κα Δημόπολις, [Κ]ωμαῖος, Ἡραγόρης, ἐπ᾽ [ὁκο]ῖον πρᾶγμα παρα-​ γείνονται, κ[α]ὶ Λεπτίνας, Ἐπικράτης, Ἑστιαῖος, ἐπ’ ὅ τι πρᾶγμα [παρα]γείνονται, ἐπ’ ὅ τι-​ να μαρτυρίην (sc. παραγείνονται), ο[ὗ]τοι [?]‌ΝΩΗ̣Σ̣ΑΝ[?]. {Ὥ[σπε]ρ ἡμεῖς σε} [Ἢ]ν δέ μοι αὐτοὺς κατάσχῃς καὶ κ̣[ατα]λάβῃς, ἐὼ δέ σε τειμήσω καί σο̣[ι] ἄριστον δ[ῶ]ρ-​ ον παρασκε[υῶ].

Figure 3.10 Tablet 3.9 ( Jordan 1997b, 217; DefOlb 21), fourth century bce. Necropolis of Olbia. Drawing by N. E. Макаренко, in Shkorpil 1908, no. 3.

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Just as we do not know you, so too let Eupolis and Dionysios, Makareus, Aristokrates and Demopolis, Komaios, Heragoras, at whatever lawsuit they are present, and Leptinas, Epikrates, Hestiaios, at whatever lawsuit they are present, at whatever taking of evidence (sc. they are present), let them . . . { Just as we you} . . . And if you restrain and hold down these men, I shall indeed honor you and shall prepare for you the best of offerings!86 This judicial curse is lacunose in several places, its meaning opaque. Nonetheless, the “you” (σε, σοι) addressed throughout the text probably refers to the corpse, an entity admittedly unknown to the scribe.87 The curse offers a quid pro quo, a bribe of sorts: should the deceased “restrain and hold down” the named individuals (κατάσχῃς καὶ καταλάβῃς)—​just as the deceased himself is restrained and held in the grave or Underworld—​so too will the scribe “honor” the daimon and prepare for him the best offerings in return.88 Drawing on notions of sacrifice and divine reciprocity, the text reveals some mechanisms by which the curse was understood to have worked, namely that the deceased could incapacitate the targets by virtue of his status as a nekydaimon. An agent of the Underworld, he could take hold of (καταλάβῃς) and debilitate the living by means of restraint (κατάσχῃς). The text concludes with a vow to honor the nekydaimon and prepare an offering if the curse is brought to fruition, in language that recalls traditional prayer and votive practice. These were surely enticing terms for the anonymous corpse: a spot of supernatural intervention in the litigation process, in exchange for honor and a dedication! As noted by Bravo, Gager, Johnston, and others, this curse is significant because here the deceased—​understood as a formidable and dangerous subterranean power—​was the agent enacting the curse, not merely a conduit or messenger to Underworld deities below.89 The notion that the deceased was responsible for enacting the curse is present in another tablet from the necropolis of Pantikapaion, a Milesian apoikia on the Crimean side of the Bosporan Kingdom. Unearthed in 1906, the opisthographic tablet was folded and pierced by two nails. Tablet 3.10. Pharmakowsky (AA) 1907, 12690 Pantikapaion, necropolis Fourth century bce Kerch Historical-​Archaeological Museum

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Side A, Col. I

Side A, Col. II

Side A, Col. III

1  κατορύσσω Νευμήνιον

1  καὶ παρὰ Δήμη-​

Text destroyed

καὶ Δήμαρχον καὶ Χαρίξενον

τρα χθονίαν καὶ

καὶ Μοιρικῶντα καὶ Νευμήνιον

παρ’ ἥρωας χθονίους

τὸν κυβερνήτην κ[αὶ] Ἀρίσταρχον

τούτων μηδεὶ[ς] θεῶν

5  παρ’ Ἑρμᾶν (χ)θόνιον καὶ Ἑκάτα[ν] χθονία[ν]

109

5  λύσιν ποιήσαιτο μη-​ δὲ δαίμονας

καὶ παρὰ Πλούτωνα χθόνιον

τούτων μήτε μαιήτας

καὶ παρὰ Λευκ(ο)θέαν χθονίαν

παραιτήσαιτο

καὶ παρὰ Φερσεφόναν χθονίαν

μηδὲ μηρία τιθ(έ)ντες

καὶ παρὰ Ἀρτέμιδα στροφαίαν

Side B, Col. I 1  κατορύσ(σ)ω Ξενομένην καὶ τὰ ἔργα Ξενομένους καὶ παίδων τῶν Ξενομένους περὶ Ἑρμᾶν (χ)θόνιον καὶ παρ’ Ἑρ-​ 5  μᾶν (χ)θόνιον καὶ παρὰ Πλουτοδό-​ ταν χθόνιον καὶ παρὰ Πραξιδί-​ καν χθονίαν καὶ πα(ρὰ) Φερσεφόναν

Side B, Col. II 1  [—​ —​ —​ —​ —​] [—​ —​ —​ —​ —​] [—​ —​ —​ —​ —​]

Side B, Col. III Text destroyed

παρὰ ἥρωας

5  χθονίους καὶ παρὰ Δήμητρα χθονίαν

[—​ —​ —​ —​ —​ —​]

χθονίαν· τούτων μὴ λύσιν γενέσθαι Ξενομένῃ μὴ αὐτῷ μὴ τέκνοις μὴ γυναικί.

Side A, Col. I I utterly bury Neumenios, and Demarchos, and Charixenos, and Moirikon, and Neumenios the helmsman, and Aristarchos in the presence of Hermes Chthonios and Hekate Chthonia, and in the presence of Pluto Chthonios and Leukothea Chthonia, and in the presence of Persephone Chthonia, and in the presence of Artemis Strophaia.

Side A, Col. II Also in the presence of Demeter Chthonia and the Chthonic Heroes: May none of these gods release (this curse), nor the daimones, not even if Maietas asks this as a favor, nor if they set up (offerings of ) thigh bones!

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Side B, Col. I I utterly bury Xenomenes, and the works of Xenomenes, and the slaves of Xenomenes, near Hermes Chthonios, and in the presence of Hermes Chthonios, and in the presence of Ploutodotos Chthonios,

Side B, Col. II . . . in the presence of the Chthonic Heroes and Demeter Chthonia . . .

in the presence of Praxidika Chthonia, and in the presence of Persephone Chthonia. From these gods let there be no release for Xenomenes, not for him, nor for his children, nor for his wife.

This curse addresses Hermes, Hekate, Pluto, Leukothea, Persephone, Ploutodotos, Praxidika, Demeter, and the Heroes as chthonic divinities.91 Artemis Strophaia, the “twister,” and a group of anonymous daimones are also called upon to bring the curse to pass. Perhaps the daimones referred to the spirits around the grave in which the tablet was deposited, and the mention of Maietas in the second column (Side A) may also relate to the object’s mortuary context. Taken as a proper name, it is likely that Maietas—​capable both of cursing the targets and also releasing the targets from the curse—​referred to the corpse with which the tablet was buried.92 Here too we see the commingling of curse terminology with the language of public ritual, namely the sacrifice to Maietas of a proverbial (fat-​wrapped) thigh-​bone—​famous since Homeric times as the sacrifice par excellence. The text vehemently urges against the loosening of the curse (οὐδέ, μηδείς, μηδέ), even under the most tempting of circumstances: neither if Maietas begs it as a favor, nor if portions of thigh meat are offered in sacrifice. The placement of the tablet beside the corpse, seemingly understood as the agent capable of enacting the curse, extended the metaphor that the victim was to be rendered ἄθυμος—​ineffective, lifeless, and inert.93 In addition to its reference to the corpse with which the tablet was buried, 3.10 captures a vignette of social and commercial relations within the living city of Pantikapaion. Though Pantikapaion was a Milesian (Ionian) colony, the text exhibits some Doric features (e.g., Ἑρμᾶν, Ἑκάτα[ν], A.I.5). That a bustling port of trade like Pantikapaion hosted Greek speakers of different dialects is not surprising; nor is the presence of a helmsmen like Neumenios in such a commercial haven unexpected. In addition to mention of a ship captain, the reference to the slaves of Xenomenes (παίδων τῶν Ξενομένους, B.I.3) suggests that this curse was concerned with commercial matters, probably maritime trade and

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the property at stake in the ship’s cargo, especially enslaved persons. For comparison, two lead letters from Pantikapaion and the nearby site of Myrmekion, located just four kilometers northeast of Pantikapaion, also refer to cargoes of slaves, sizable monetary sums, a helmsman, and his ship.94 These private correspondences document the importance of maritime commerce for Greeks of the Crimean peninsula, illuminating port environments in which enslaved persons, textiles, wood, and fish were assembled for export, and large amounts of money traded hands. Business transactions, especially involving the lucrative traffic in enslaved persons, could come to conflict over ownership claims, debts, and seizures of property.95 These disputes could result in trial in the law courts, and it is likely that 3.10 was occasioned by such a commercial conflict. This would explain the cursing of the helmsman Neumenios, in addition to the works and slaves of Xenomenes. A dispute grounded in maritime commerce would also contextualize the presence of the sea goddess Leukothea; to the best of my knowledge, this is the only curse to invoke Leukothea, a deity popular in the port cities of the Black Sea.96 The presence of the goddess who aided sailors in distress in a text citing a helmsman and slaves—​deposited in the commercial city of Pantikapaion—​could intimate that the curse itself stemmed from a commercial, maritime conflict. One final aspect of 3.10 that deserves mention is the curse verb κατορύσσω, “I bury down/​I utterly bury.” The targets are buried in the presence of or beside (παρά) chthonic deities, just as the tablet itself was buried in a subterranean grave. Much like the invocation of the corpse, this choice of verb was related to the tablet’s deposition: here the final stage in the ritual process, the burial of the tablet, effected the curse. This concluding act may have held special significance in Pantikapaion and other north Pontic cities, where private texts (personal letters, commercial inventories, business receipts) had been committed to lead and ceramic for well over a century by the time that curse-​writing rituals reached the Black Sea. Yet never before were lead tablets inscribed and then buried—​and buried beside a corpse, no less. Perhaps it was the underground deposition of inscribed tablets that struck practitioners as particularly novel or significant, and this may explain the emphasis on burial (κατορύσσω, invocation of the deceased) within some Pontic texts. Indeed, the verb κατορύσσω is found in two other Crimean curse tablets, both of which emerged from the chora of ancient Chersonesos and are roughly contemporary with 3.10 from Pantikapaion. The circumstances surrounding the recovery of these tablets are murky; Vladimir Stolba’s thorough editio princeps states that they emerged “by chance” in 2012 in the region of an ancient farmhouse north of Mar’ino (Dzhan-​Baba), in the Chernomorskoye district of western Crimea.97 The texts were inscribed by the same hand, and have been dated

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between 320 and 270 bce on the basis of letter forms. The first tablet is ovoid in shape and sloppily incised; it was neither folded nor pierced by a nail: Tablet 3.11. Stolba 2016, no. 1 Chora of Chersonesos, “ancient farmhouse” 320–​270 bce Private collection of Sergey Zagorny 1

upside down

Αριακον τὸν Αρσατειος καὶ τοὺς ὀρφανιστὰς κατορύσσω vacat Αρι()

I bury Ariakos, the son of Arsates, and the orphanistai. Ari(). Here the agentive verb κατορύσσω is used in the same sense as in 3.10. Again, the final depositional act, the burial of the tablet underground, synecdochally stands in for the broader curse ritual. This same verb is found in the second curse tablet, which purportedly emerged less than one meter away from the first: Tablet 3.12. Stolba 2016, no. 2 Chersonesos, “ancient farmhouse” 320–​270 bce Private collection of Sergey Zagorny 1

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← Ματαν κατοράξαι̣[τε] ← καὶ τοὺς αὐτᾶι συµπρ̣[άσ]-​ ← σοντας καὶ Δάµαρχον [τὸν] ← Γοργύθου ἐπίλαπτον ← ποιήσαιτ̣ε τοια̣[ύ]τ̣ας ← καὶ Ἀρι̣[σ]τ̣οµ̣[ένην τὸ]ν̣ Διονυ-​ ← σίου κα[ὶ τοὺς ἄλλους πά]ν̣τας.

May you bury Mata, and those cooperating with her, and make Damarchos, the son of Gorgythos, incapable of such (cooperation), and Aristomenes, the son of Dionysios, and all the others! Like 3.10 from Pantikapaion, the scribe understood the burial of these tablets to have “activated” the spells. While κατορύσσω is found in a handful of other curse

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tablets from outside the Crimean peninsula, it often occurs within “a magic formula,” Stolba notes.98 Thus two fourth-​century Attic curses read καταδῶ ἀφανίζω κατορύττω καταπατταλεύω (“I bind down, I make disappear, I bury down, I nail down”; DTAud 49), and καταδῶ, κατορύττω, ἀφανίζω ἐξ ἀνθρώπων (“I bind down, I bury down, I make disappear from men”; Curbera and Jordan 2008), with the latter formula inscribed as a heading across the top of the tablet.99 Yet seldom is κατορύσσω used so starkly, as the sole and primary verb of cursing, as in these three Crimean texts. Again, we may be observing a regional trend, popular in Greek cities of the Crimean peninsula, whereby the act of burying the lead tablet was understood by some practitioners to enact the curse. Indeed, in a practice so decentralized as ritualized cursing, we must allow for fluidity in terms of “belief ” in how the tradition worked, and the mechanisms by which the curse was brought to pass. We know of some common ingredients—​the naming of targets, the role of the dead and chthonic powers, the burial of the object underground—​but the recipe by which a curse was accomplished varied between practitioners over time and space. Two additional features of 3.11 and 3.12 from Chersonesos shed light on the individuals implicated in regional curse practice, and the occasions on which one might craft a curse. First, the presence of persons named Ariakos, Arsates, and Mata may provide new evidence for cross-​cultural interactions between Greek and non-​Greek individuals in the Crimean peninsula.100 Ariakos and Arsates are, Stolba writes, Iranian names, which find parallels in commercial letters from the region; already by 550–​500 bce, a lead letter from Berezan mentions a merchant with the Persian name Matasys, who had seized and enslaved a Greek named Achillodoros (Dana 2021 no. 25). Stolba also suggests that the non-​Greek feminine name Mata in 3.12 may be Anatolian in origin.101 North Pontic port cities were communities in which Greeks, Scythians, Persians, Thracians, and still other groups mixed and interacted, often through networks of commerce, trade, and intermarriage.102 Finally, tablet 3.11 illuminates some social and political structures in place in Chersonesos of which we would not otherwise have known. In lines 3–​4, the curse-​writer “buries” a group of orphanistai (ὀρφανιστὰς κατορύσσω). On the basis of contemporary Athenian evidence, Stolba suggests that these orphanistai were magistrates who oversaw epitrophoi, guardians of underage boys whose fathers had died.103 Boards of orphanistai are known from elsewhere in the Pontic region around this time, including Histria and, slightly later, Selymbria.104 Tablet 3.11 demonstrates that by the early Hellenistic period, Chersonesos also had in place an institution that looked out for vulnerable citizens—​boys without living fathers. The relationship between the orphanistai, Ariakon, and the curse-​writer is unclear in this text, but it is possible that

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a legal dispute occasioned the curse, perhaps a lawsuit over the status or treatment of orphans and their property, or the epitrophoi tasked with overseeing their interests until they came of age. Let us now summarize our findings. Stretching from Histria in the west to Gorgippia in the east, the north Pontic coast has yielded some 75–​80 inscribed curses. Curse-​writing rituals were established in Olbia around or soon after 400 bce; from Olbia alone, around 35–​40 curses are known, and most of these date to the fourth century bce. In addition to lead, Olbian practitioners used ceramic media for curse-​writing; several texts were composed in spiral form, and could even include sketches of the victims. By the early fourth century, curse practice had emerged in other north Pontic poleis, from Histria to Nikonion to the cities of the Cimmerian Bosporus. As in Selinous, the ritual was distinctly Greek in these multiethnic communities: curses were composed in the Greek language, Greek deities were invoked, and the ritual was put to use in the law courts—​ thoroughly Greek institutions in this area. This was a common thread linking the earliest Sicilian, Oscan, Pontic, and probably Iberian curse tablets: across these regions, curse-​writing rituals were used to influence legal outcomes in the courts. In the port cities of the Black Sea, many of the conflicts documented by curse tablets were likely commercial in nature, occasioned by quarrels over sea-​bound cargoes, property, or status claims. Such disputes would have been adjudicated in the courts, one factor that helps account for the region’s many judicial curses. In terms of ritual practice, depositional patterns generally mirror those of Sicily, Oscan Italy, and Attica in that the majority of Pontic curse assemblages with documented provenance emerged in graves; several from Olbia were also deposited in a shrine located near the necropolis. Pontic curses carry themes found in older curse tablets from Sicily and Athens, including lists of names (sometimes arranged into columns), the targeting of tongues and faculties of speech (“may they become voiceless!”), the scrambling of text to analogically confound targets, γράφω and compounds, and the language of public arai. Yet variations on curse practice as it was known in the fifth century are also present. Curse texts from the Black Sea seem less interested in the materiality of the lead supports; rather, several focus on the burial of the tablet—​suggested by κατορύσσω as the curse verb, and the invocation of the corpse with which the tablet was interred—​as if the deposition was the most significant part of the ritual process, and the mechanism through which the curse was accomplished. I have proposed that this, along with the incision of curses on ceramic media, can largely be explained by regional epigraphic habits. The adoption of curse-​writing rituals across the northern Black Sea was probably driven by Athenian mediators, as the first north Pontic curse tablets

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appear in Olbia a generation or two after the oldest Athenian ones, and contact between the two regions is well documented during these years. Pericles’s Pontic expedition brought Athens’s navy to the Black Sea already in the 430s (Plut. Per. 20.1–​2); then, in 424 bce, the general Lamachos sailed at the head of an Athenian fleet to exact tribute from Heracleia Pontica (Thuc. 4.75.1–​2). Pontic cities first appear in an Athenian decree from 425/​4 bce concerning the reassessment of tribute in the Delian League, under the rubric “poleis from the Euxine” (πόλες ἐκ το͂ Εὐξσείνο, IG I3 71). The relevant lines are unfortunately lacunose but, of some 40 entries under the heading of “Euxine poleis,” Heracleia Pontica, Apollonia, Tyras, and probably Nikonion and Patrasys can be discerned; David Braund has argued that Olbia must also have featured therein.105 Considered together with the Athenian Coinage Decree, a copy of which stood in the agora at Olbia (as one fragment came from there: IG I3 1453, GHI 155), it seems likely that the Pontic littoral felt the economic and commercial influence of Athens during the later fifth century, however diffusely. By the fourth century, private ships laden with cargo regularly sailed between Athens and the Bosporan Kingdom.106 Athenian influence in the region is also visible materially by this time. Olbia imported Attic terracotta figurines throughout the fourth century bce, the time by which a Dionysia festival and theater are also attested within the city.107 Attic-​made Kerch ware proliferated in north Pontic cities (including Pantikapaion, whence the name) between c. 375 and 330/​20 bce—​ contemporary with the acme of regional curse production. It is tempting to also find evidence of Athenian influence in the Olbian insistence on the exchange of coinage, and in the habit of inscribing ceramic sherds for civic ostracism at Chersonesos during the fifth century bce.108 Finally, and perhaps most significantly, the trade in foodstuffs continuously brought Athens to the north Pontic coast in the later Classical period. The northern Black Sea was not only a source of slaves and saltfish, but it was also Athens’s primary grain exporter by the fourth century; great quantities of grain passed through the communities of the northern Black Sea en route from the Scythian steppes to the Hellespont and Aegean. Trade with north Pontic cities, especially those of the Bosporan Kingdom, had some influence on Athens’s domestic and foreign policy at this time. Athens’s political elites controlled grain imports by the fourth century, and aided Bosporan aristocrats in consolidating regional rule. In return, Athens accrued privileges in the acquisition of Bosporan grain, as much as 400,000 medimnoi in annual imports by some estimates.109 The Athenian presence in the northern Black Sea was extensive during the later fifth and early fourth centuries, and curse-​writing rituals surely followed alongside these lines of trade and communication.

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Macedonian Curse Tablets μὴ γὰρ λάβοι ἄλλαν γυναῖκα ἀλλ’ ἢ ἐμέ, [ἐμὲ δ]ὲ συνκαταγηρᾶσαι Διονυσοφῶντι καὶ μηδεμίαν ἄλλαν.

Let him take no other woman, other than me, and let me grow old beside Dionysophon, and never another! (3.15, lines 4–​5) Such was the plea of a vulnerable woman in Pella, the capital of Macedon, during the fourth century bce. Tormented by rivals for a man named Dionysophon’s affections, she turned to a relatively new practice to take control of a bad situation: ritualized cursing. Few narratives collapse the time and distance separating Greek antiquity from the present quite like this text, with the palpable envy of a woman anxious about the loss of a lover. This inscription hails from the heart of ancient Macedon, a region typically associated not with female heartache—​nor with non-​elite voices of any sort, for that matter—​but with powerful kings and military conquests. Well before Philip II marched into southern Greece, curse-​writing rituals had taken hold in Macedonian urban centers, but they have received scant scholarly attention. This section examines the spread of curse practice to Macedon during the first half of the fourth century bce, as the ritual’s adoption in the north Aegean forms an important chapter in the history of early curse practice. These objects present new and different histories to consider, revealing a more expansive sense of what might be known about fourth-​century Macedon, and the Kingdom’s broader engagement with Greek culture.110 Macedon had long consumed Greek culture in various forms. By the late fifth century, King Archelaus had invited Greek poets and artists to the Macedonian court, including the tragedian Euripides and the painter Zeuxis; Attic pottery was imported in large quantities to Macedonian urban centers, and the kingdom was very receptive during these years to new Greek cults and deities.111 During the first half of the fourth century bce, curse-​writing rituals had been adopted by both men and women in the Kingdom of Macedon, which means that Philip II, his son Alexander III, their court, and soldiery grew up in communities familiar with the practice.112 When Alexander conquered the Achaemenid Empire, his troops would have taken knowledge of the practice with them. This helps situate the dissemination and hybridization of the ritual technology within the eastern territories conquered by Alexander decades later, including Egypt. Roughly a dozen curse tablets are known from Pydna and Pella alone—​ two cities in the Macedonian heartland (Figure 3.11)—​and all of these were

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Figure 3.11  Map of the northwest Aegean and the Kingdom of Macedon. Map created by Joseph Morgan.

recovered in secure mortuary contexts. Macedonian curses carry familiar themes: they target tongues, arrange text into columnar lists of names, employ the agentive verbs καταδέω and καταγράφω to “bind down” or “write down/​register” victims, employ destruction clauses drawn from public arai, and invoke the corpse with which the tablet was buried. Most surviving Macedonian curses relate to litigation, but 3.15, excerpted above, provides evidence for the diversification of curse-​writing rituals over time. Though legal disputes still provided the occasion par excellence for curse practice, by the fourth century bce, more men and women were turning to these rituals to address intimate relationships and erotic appetites, trying to take control of precarious interactions and emotional or social vulnerability.

Curses from Pydna: Content and Context We begin with an overview of curse tablets from the Macedonian heartland, that is, from the urbanized centers controlled by Macedon prior to the territorial conquests of Philip II. Situated in antiquity on the Thermaic Gulf near the border

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with Thessaly (Figure 3.11), the city of Pydna was already under Macedonian rule by the reign of Alexander I in the early fifth century (Thuc. 1.137.1). Its coastal location ensured an influx of mainland Greek culture via poleis in the Chalcidic peninsula and points further south, in addition to unwanted Athenian attentions on the eve of the Peloponnesian War; during the war, Pydna was caught between sides. In 432 bce Athens’s efforts to quell the revolt in nearby Potidaia led to the unsuccessful siege of Pydna (Thuc. 1.61); then, in 410 bce, Pydna sought independence from Archelaus, who subsequently besieged the city with assistance from Athens’s navy. Following the city’s recapture, Archelaus relocated Pydna’s inhabitants 20 stadia inland in an attempt to sever Greek influence from the Thermaic Gulf; upon the death of Archelaus, the city may have reclaimed its coastal site and autonomy.113 The city and port vacillated between independence and Macedonian control until the 360s, when the crisis of regnal succession afforded an opportunity for Athenian intervention under the general Timotheus. Pydna’s ties to Athens proved short lived, however, as Philip II retook the city in 357 bce; it would remain under Macedonian control until the Roman conquest.114 Pydna has yielded six lead curse tablets of fourth-​century date, all of which emerged in excavations of the Makrygialos cemetery between 1994 and 1997 ce;115 the texts were admirably published by Curbera and Jordan in 2003. At least three Pydnan curse tablets were occasioned by lawsuits, and possibly all six were judicial in nature. The tablets document 66 individuals, several of whom bear characteristically Macedonian names (Ἀμύντας, Ἅρπαλος, Κτολέμμας). Onomastics associated with the region of Thrace, and possibly also with Epiros and Thessaly, are evident in the texts.116 Local linguistic features are present in the Pydna curse tablets, such as the πτ → κτ shift in proper names (such as Κτολέμμας), though these occur beside Attic-​Ionic forms like the pronoun ἐκεῖνος and the conditionals εἰ and ἄν.117 All six Pydnan curse tablets were deposited in graves, and carry familiar themes: simple lists of names (three tablets), the targeting of victims’ tongues, and verbs of writing and binding down. These themes suggest that practitioners in Pydna were drawing from a common pool of expressions, formats, and formulae when writing curses, and applying these to local persons and affairs. The following curse demonstrates how several of the above themes could be combined into a powerful spell meant to influence a trial in Pydna’s law courts: Tablet 3.13. Curbera and Jordan 2003 no. 5 Makrygialos cemetery, plot 480 Fourth century bce Thessaloniki Archaeological Museum (Figure 3.12)

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The Spread and Diversification of Curse Practice

Col. 1 1

Παυσανίας, Ἱππίας, Λυγκωρίτα, Σιμμίας, Τρόχας, Κρατεύας, Αἴολος, Γε․μας, Ἀμηρύγκας, Ορωιδυος, Λιμναῖος, Θεόπροπος, Ἀρύββας,

5

Φίλιππος, Μένυλλος, Ἄσανδρος, Φιλώνιχος, Κτολέμμα, Λόκρος, Ἄλκιμος, Ἀμύντας, καὶ ὅσ̣τ̣ις Σιμμίαι

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Col. 2 8

καὶ Τρόχαι {συν} καὶ Κρατεύαι καὶ Παυσανίαι σύνδικο̣[ς]. 10 καταγράφω τὰς γ[λ]ώσσας ἐκείνων πάντων ἀνδρῶ̣[ν].

Pausanias, Hippias, Lynkoritas, Simmias, Trochas, Krateuas, Aiolos, Gemas, Amerynkas, Oroiduos, Limnaios, Theopropos, Arybbas, Philippos, Menyllos, Asandros, Philonichos, Ktolemmas (=​Ptolemmas), Lokros, Alkimos, Amyntas, and whoever is with Simmias, and (with) Trochas and Krateuas and Pausanias as a co-​litigant. I write down the tongues of all of these men!

Figure 3.12 Tablet 3.13 (Curbera and Jordan 2003, no. 5,), fourth century bce. Makrygialos cemetery, plot 480. Drawing by J. Curbera.

Many features of this curse are, by now, familiar. Across two columns of neatly incised text are 21 male names in the nominative case. The term sundikos betrays the object’s judicial nature, and several onomastic and linguistic features characterize the text as Macedonian (for example, the names Ἀμύντας, Κρατεύας, and Πτολέμμας, with Πτολέμμας spelled Κτ-​).118 Yet at the text’s conclusion, the curse-​ writer uses a compound of γράφω to register the tongues of the named individuals (καταγράφω τὰς γ[λ]ώσσας), language found more than a century earlier in Selinountine curses. The verb καταγράφω is also employed in a curse tablet from Arethousa, a site in western Thrace conquered by Macedon during the fourth century bce,119 in addition to 3.15 from Pella, further discussed below. The use of such expressions against opposing litigants was surely the result of a rapidly spreading ritual koine, here manifest in the northern Aegean.

120

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Another tablet from Pydna’s Makrygialos cemetery can be seen to elaborate on the list-​of-​names curse format. Individual names (and the text as a whole) were arranged into columnar lists, though 3.14 begins and concludes with slightly more discursive maledictions. After incision, the tablet was punched with four nails, suggesting that the practitioner was also familiar with the ritual actions that accompanied curse-​writing. Tablet 3.14. Curbera and Jordan 2003, no. 6 Makrygialos cemetery, plot 480, “north of Tomb 224” Fourth century bce Thessaloniki Archaeological Museum     Col. 1 1

5 11

καταδεσσμεύω τὰς γλώσσας Χωροτίμο, Διονυσίο, Ἀμδ̣ώκο Ἀρισστίωνος, Πρωτοχάρεος, Ἀμυντίχο, [τ]ι̣λέγε[ι]ν μήδ[ε —​—​—​]

    Col. 2 7 καὶ εἴ τις ἄλλος

10

τι μαίνεται ἐχθρὸς [μ]ὴ δυνάσσθω ἀν-​

I bind down the tongues of Chorotimos, Dionysios, Am(a)dokos, Aristion, Protochares, Amyntichos, and if some other enemy somehow rages with madness, let him not be able to speak out against me, nor . . . Also occasioned by litigation (ἀντιλέγειν), 3.14 employs the verb μαίνεται,120 while the agentive curse verb καταδεσσμεύω is found in other fourth-​century curse tablets from Athens, Oropos, and Euboea.121 The duplication of sigma before consonants (καταδεσσμεύω, Ἀρισστίωνος, δυνάσσθω) and the use of πέρ for περί is commonly found in Macedon, while other forms, like the conditional εἰ, conform to the Attic-​Ionic koine.122 In cursing the tongues of opponents in court, this text also drew upon a fixed cache of ritual formulae, a strand grounded in the notion of “binding” as cued by the verb δέω rather than καταγράφω (δέω was especially common in fourth-​century Athens). The language and depositional contexts of Pydnan curse tablets suggest that the ritual’s adoption was likely the result of a popular, rapidly spreading practice that took root across the Aegean and wider Mediterranean during the fourth century bce—​in the cities of Macedon, as in those of the northern Black Sea and the Italian peninsula.

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A Pella Curse Tablet: Erotic and Relationship Curses The recovery from Macedonian Pella of Greek curse tablets pre-​dating 350 bce strengthens the idea that a koine of ritualized cursing was well established across the Aegean by this time. Sited some 50 kilometers north of Pydna, Pella sat at the head of the Thermaic Gulf on a navigable inlet, and served as a strategic port of trade for the Macedonian interior. Pella probably came under Macedonian rule in the wake of the Persian Wars, assuming “allied” status under the control of a Macedonian governor; the city was established as the capital of Macedon by the late fifth century, and quickly grew thereafter into a major commercial, artistic, and economic center.123 Pella’s acropolis was capped not by temples, as in contemporary Greek poleis, but by a monarch’s sprawling palace and administrative complexes. The urban center saw the birth and reign of Philip II and his son Alexander III, both of whom grew up in a city familiar with curse practice. As Macedonian rule expanded during the second half of the fourth century, the soldiers and Successors of Alexander would have brought curse-​writing rituals with them to the frontiers of the Hellenic oikoumene and beyond. No fewer than five curse tablets are known from Pella, all of which emerged in the city’s necropolis.124 The discovery of curse tablets in the Macedonian heartland in 1986 was quite exciting, carrying as it did important historical and linguistic implications. Prior to the publication of 3.15, there was considerable debate as to whether the people of ancient Macedon were predominantly Greek-​ speaking: this inscription lent conclusive support to the notion that Macedonian was indeed a variety of the northwest Doric dialect.125 And there is an equally significant but little-​discussed cultural component: the five curse tablets from Pella reveal that Macedonians were fluent in Greek social and ritual practices well before Philip’s conquests exposed the Kingdom to wider influences from the southern Greek mainland. Along with the participation of Macedonians in the Olympic Games, the private performance of curse-​writing rituals provides another piece of evidence for Macedonian “Greekness” by the early fourth century bce. The so-​called Pella curse tablet, 3.15, is the most famous Macedonian curse tablet—​but it is also the only curse tablet from Pella that has been published to date (four other curse tablets from this necropolis have been reported, but remain unpublished). Tablet 3.15 was deposited in an inhumation burial dating from 380–​350 bce, and had probably been placed in the corpse’s extended right hand, as it was recovered beside the skeleton’s right thigh bone. When opened, the text took scholars by surprise: the voice was that of a woman, the context that of an intimate relationship. The curse might be called “erotic,” as it was created on account of an emotional, sensual entanglement between two or more persons.

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The text bears witness to the anxieties and vulnerabilities that could surround sexual relationships in fourth-​century Pella. Tablet 3.15. Voutiras 1998 Pella, found in grave beside skeleton’s right thigh bone 380–​350 bce 1

[Θετί]μ̣ας καὶ Διονυσοφῶντος τὸ τέλος καὶ τὸν γάμον καταγράφω καὶ τᾶν ἀλλᾶν πασᾶν γυ-​ [ναικ]ῶν καὶ χηρᾶν καὶ παρθένων, μάλιστα δὲ Θετίμας, καὶ παρκαττίθεμαι Μάκρωνι καὶ [τοῖς] δ̣αίμοσι. καὶ ὁπόκα ἐγὼ ταῦτα διελξαιμι καὶ ἀναγνοίην πάλε̣ιν ἀνορξασα [τόκα] γ̣ᾶμαι Διονυσοφῶντα, πρότερον δὲ μή· μὴ γὰρ λάβοι ἄλλαν γυναῖκα ἀλλ’ ἢ ἐμέ,

5

[ἐμὲ δ]ὲ συνκαταγηρᾶσαι Διονυσοφῶντι καὶ μηδεμίαν ἄλλαν. ἱκέτις ὑμῶ γίνο-​ [μαι· Φίλ?]αν οἰκτίρετε δαίμονες φίλ[ο]ι, ΔΑΓΙΝΑΓΑΡΙΜΕ φίλων πάντων καὶ ἐρήμα· ἀλλὰ [-​-​-​]α φυλάσσ̣ετε ἐμὶν ὅ[π]ως μὴ γίνηται τ̣α[ῦ]τα καὶ κακὰ κακῶς Θετίμα ἀπόληται. [-​-​-​]․ΑΛ [-​-​-​]․ΥΝΜ․․ΕΣΠΛΗΝ ἐμός, ἐμὲ δὲ [ε]ὐ[δ]αίμονα καὶ μακαρίαν γενέσται. [-​-​-​]ΤΟ[․]. [-​-​-​] .[․․].․Ε․ΕΩ[]Α․[․]Ε..ΜΕΓΕ[-​-​-​]

I register the consummation and the marriage of Thetima and Dionysophon, and of [Dionysophon and] all the other women, of both widows and maidens, and especially Thetima, and I give (this) over to Makron and to the daimones. And if ever I were to unfold and read these things again after digging (this) up, only then should Dionysophon marry, never before! Let him not take another woman, other than me, and let me grow old beside Dionysophon and never another. I become your suppliant: take pity, dear daimones, for [Phil?]a, [as I am bereft?] of all my loved ones and abandoned. But guard this for me lest these things happen, and may evil Thetima be destroyed evilly! . . . but let me become fortunate and blessed! This curse carries themes both familiar and novel as it strives to preserve the author’s relationship with Dionysophon, and to undermine that between Dionysophon and a woman named Thetima. Tablet 3.15 opens with the familiar verb καταγράφω, here used to “register” the “consummation and marriage” (τὸ τέλος καὶ τὸν γάμον) of Dionysophon and Thetima. As objects of the curse verb, these nouns refer in some capacity to marriage and sexual intercourse; γάμος can mean both “marriage” and “wedding,” but also refers to a sexual union, while τὸ τέλος could signal various “culminating” acts that result in a “fulfillment,” here

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probably the consummation of marriage, or the intercourse that would follow.126 The joining of Dionysophon and Thetima in marriage and in bed brought great distress to the curse-​writer, perhaps a woman named Phila (the name “Phila” has been restored in the lacuna in line 6, and is understood to refer back to the female composer; regardless of whether this restoration is correct—​and while Phila is a familiar Macedonian name, its presence here is far from certain—​we shall refer to the curse-​commissioner as Phila for ease of discussion, and in keeping with previous scholarship).127 Phila’s anxieties permeate the curse with a discursivity that feels intimate. In spite of herself, she asks that no other woman comingle with Dionysophon, whether widow or virgin, and that no one apart from Phila herself grow old with Dionysophon. At no point is Dionysophon explicitly disparaged. Thetima, however, is forcefully cursed: the text bids in the subjunctive, “may evil Thetima be evilly destroyed!” (καὶ κακὰ κακῶς Θετίμα ἀπόληται, line 7). We have encountered similar language in curse tablets from Sicily and the northern Black Sea, where the verb ἀπόλλυμι is used to call down destruction on opponents. Expressions like κακὰ κακῶς ἀπόληται are common in sacred and civic arai; so too is the closing phrase ἐμὲ δὲ εὐδαίμονα καὶ μακαρίαν γενέσται found in blessings, used to wish well on those who acted decorously and upheld their vows. The conclusion of 3.15 suggests that the author perceived herself as having been wronged, perhaps by Thetima and a philandering (but still desired) Dionysophon. Phila employs supplicatory language, identifying as a ἱκέτις or “suppliant” before daimones. She uses ritual formulae drawn from public arai to call down ruin upon the woman with whom she was vying for Dionysophon’s attentions—​while asking blessings for herself. Καταγράφω also stands as a primary curse verb, while the invocation of daimones and Makron, presumably the corpse with which the tablet was buried, recalls contemporary curses from the north Pontic coast. And so while this curse may in some sense “comprise [ . . . ] an outburst of emotional pleading” and a “mixture of very personal language,”128 it also ascribes to established curse motifs that, by this time, were part of a spreading ritual koine. One clause that is without parallel in other epigraphic texts, however, is the συνκαταγηρᾶσαι phrase (line 5), which could suggest that Phila felt real tenderness toward Dionysophon. Yet in a world where many women were required to have a male guardian or kyrios, “affection” could be bound up with anxieties over financial security, protection, and status vulnerabilities. The fourth-​century oikos was a “thoroughly patriarchal institution,” Erika Weiberg notes, participating in a hierarchy that subordinated women, children, and enslaved persons to the male head of household, who could use or allocate their labor as he saw fit.129 Still, the loss or absence of a kyrios could present a woman like Phila with a world of difficulties. Contemporary evidence from Athens suggests that, if Dionysophon was in fact Phila’s husband and kyrios, she would have much to

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fear from losing him. Though 3.15 is lacunose in line 6, the text appears to ask the daimones to “take pity” on Phila, as she is now “abandoned” and bereft of “all loved ones.” If Phila was without other male family apart from Dionysophon—​ father, brother, uncle, son—​there would have been no one to provide for her as kyrios. Attic oratory documents the plight of women whose kyrios had died or was absent for an extended period of time. Lysias’s Against Diogeiton (Lys. 32), for example, notes how a well-​off citizen named Diodotus had arranged for a will, estate, dowry, and investments to be overseen in his absence by his brother Diogeiton (also his wife’s father). Diodotus was killed while campaigning overseas, yet his widow and her children were not provided for as planned. Rather, Diogeiton left his brother’s widow (his own daughter) impoverished and vulnerable for years. So too her children: “it was pitiful to see how they suffered from the blow: the poor wretches, turned out of doors, they wept aloud and besought me not to allow them to be deprived of their patrimony and reduced to beggary . . .” (Lys. 32.10). Under pressure to support herself and any dependents, the absence of a male guardian could also force an abandoned woman like Phila to pursue manual labor. Demosthenes’s Against Euboulides describes the plight of Nikarete, a citizen woman whose husband’s absence left her without a means of supporting herself and her two children; confronted by poverty, Nikarete was forced to take up the job of a wet nurse (Dem. 57.42). Because this profession was associated with enslaved persons and foreigners, Nikarete found herself the subject of gossip and slander; her situation only worsened, along with that of her children, when her civic status was called into question. Nikarete’s son, in fighting in court for his own citizenship, would later recount how other Athenian women found themselves in similar circumstances, compelled to toil as wet nurses, wool workers, and fruit pickers (Dem. 57. 45). Such were the difficulties that might confront a woman, even a female citizen from an affluent family, when abandoned by her husband. The circumstances were significantly worse for noncitizen women. A prosecution speech from fifth-​century Athens recounts how the female παλλακή, or “concubine, mistress,” of a citizen named Philoneos could, somewhat suddenly, be thrown into a brothel (πορνεῖον) when her kyrios tired of her; a noncitizen woman could thus go from living and traveling with a male citizen like Philoneos, who provided for her, to being trafficked for sex as a prostitute (Antiph. 1. 14, 17).130 And it was in such situations that women, vulnerable and helpless at the hands of the men around whom their lives revolved, might resort to curse rituals (3.15), or, in the case of Philoneos’s mistress, to love potions or other pharmaka.131 The plights of Diodotus’s widow, Nikarete, and Philoneos’s pallake offer insights into the sorts of fiscal and social security that male relations—​quite possibly a man like Dionysophon—​could provide a woman in the fourth-​century Aegean. To be

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without a kyrios was to be ever vulnerable. Phila’s identification in tablet 3.15 as ἐρήμα, “deserted,” and bereft “of all loved ones” may intimate that more than love was at stake in this situation. If the loss of Dionysophon entailed the forfeiture of a male provider, Phila may have feared impending poverty, menial labor, or fluctuations in civic status. Such anxieties drove Phila to seek supernatural intervention and commission 3.15, much as similar vulnerabilities drove other women in the fourth century to deploy love philtres and pharmaka.

Erotic Curses Tablet 3.15 belongs to the broader category of what might be called “erotic” curses: curses occasioned by sexual relationships, infidelities, amatory anxieties, and erotic appetites—​“love” is seldom the right word. This grouping follows Audollent’s category of amatory curses (1904, DTAud), a classification that has generally persisted in modern scholarship, if with some terminological reshufflings.132 Scholars have further divided erotic curses into two groups: “separation” curses, which aimed to drive apart two individuals, and “attraction” curses, which sought to draw a desired (but aloof ) individual to the curse-​writer. Allowing for porosity within these categories, 3.15 fits within the former group of “separation” curses, as it sought to terminate Dionysophon’s relationship with Thetima—​to separate the two from each other (though implicit, of course, was also the desire to attract Dionysophon). Tablet 3.15 can be situated alongside roughly a dozen other separation curses from Macedon, Athens, and Boeotia, the majority of which date to the fourth and third centuries bce.133 Such rituals were performed by both men and women and, in seeking to prevent intimacy, marriage, and affection, took various approaches to breaking apart the relationships of others. We can compare 3.15, Phila’s curse from Pella, with that of another woman from fourth-​century Athens, who employed a curse-​writing ritual to retain the attentions of a man named Aristokydes. Like Phila, the composer of DTWünsch 78 sought to prevent Aristokydes from engaging in sexual intercourse with other women (seemingly hetairai) and also with boys.134 Whereas Phila cursed “the marriage” (τὸν γάμον) of Dionysophon and Thetima, the Attic text concludes with the verb γῆμαι (γαμέω), which can refer to both marriage and intercourse; it was likely intended in the latter sense here, and coarsely, with marriage not the act in question: “let him never fuck another woman or boy!” (μήποτ’ αὐτὸν γῆμαι ἄλλην γυναῖ μηδὲ παῖδα). The object παῖδα can indicate “youth,” “boy,” “girl,” and/​or “slave”; here it likely refers to a young boy or slave, as the term designates a category separate from γυναῖκα. Enslaved persons in Greek antiquity were subject to numerous physical and emotional abuses, and the rape of household slaves by the male head of household is referenced flippantly and often in fifth-​and fourth-​ century Attic literature. Greek sexuality did not follow a male/​female gender

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binary, but mirrored the kaleidoscopic array of erotic entanglements and power relations in the ancient city, which in this period often crossed gender boundaries: male-​female (with female astai, hetairai, pallakai, et al.), erastes-​eromenos, citizen-​slave, citizen-​metic, and more.135 DTWünsch 78 shows that Phila was not alone in her anxieties, and documents how the various sexual opportunities available to men in the Classical city could drive women to curse-​writing rituals. The curse preserved in 3.15, by which Phila sought to drive Thetima (and others) away from Dionysophon, can also be compared with an erotic curse tablet from Boeotia:136 Tablet 3.16. Curbera 2017, no. 6 Boeotia Third or second century bce Athens National Archaeological Museum Inv. 9363 (Fig. 3.13) Side A 1 παρατίθεμαι Ζο-​

5

10

ίδα τὴν Ἐρετρικήν, τὴν Καβειρᾶ γυναῖκα, τῇ Γῇ καὶ τῷ Ἑρμῇ· τὰ βρω-​ τὰ αὐτῆς, τὰ ποτά, τὸν ὕ-​ πνον αὐτῆς, τὸν γέλωτα, τὴν συνουσίην, τὰς κραυ̣γὰς αὐτῆς κὴ τὴν πάροδον αὐ-​ [τ]ῆς, τὴ αἰδών, τὸ πυγίον,   τὸ φρνημα αὐ̣τ̣ῆς̣ -​-​-​τῇ Γῇ

Side B 1

5

καὶ τῷ Ἑρμῇ· τὴν περιπάτησιν αὐτῆς̣, [ψυ]χήν, μέλεα, ἔπεα, ῥήμα-​ ⌈παρὰ τῷ Ἑρμε[ῖ]⌉ τὰ καὶ μ{μ}νείαν, γνώμας, κραυγάς, γέλως, νεῦρα, πόδας· παλλακίδας Παντόκλεαν καὶ Θεόκλειαν, [Ε]ὐτέλειαν [κα]ὶ Μένυλλαν

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Ἡδῆαν Ἑρμεῖ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​καὶ Ἑρμεῖ –​—​Μένυλλ[αν–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ Παντόκλεαν.

A: I deposit Zois the Eretrian, the wife of Kabeiras, to Gaia and Hermes, that which she eats, that which she drinks, her sleep, her laughing, her sexual intercourse, her shouts and her parodos, her shame, her little ass, her thoughts [ . . . ] to Gaia! B: And to Hermes [I deposit] her walking, her soul, her limbs, her words, her comments and memory, opinions, shouts, laughing, tendons, feet [ . . . ]. The concubines Pantokleia and Theokleia, Euteleia and Menylla, Hedeia, to Hermes [ . . . ] and to Hermes [ . . . ] Menylla, Pantokleia.

Figure 3.13 Tablet 3.16 (Curbera 2017, no. 6), third or second century bce. Boeotia. Drawing by J. Curbera.

Here we encounter Zois: a despised, envied Euboean woman likely living in mainland Boeotia.137 Zois may have been the wife (γυναῖκα) of a man named Kabeiras, though other relationships can be imagined (pallake, hetaira). Here the curse-​writer “gives over” (παρατίθομαι) Zois to two chthonic deities, Gaia and Hermes. What follows is a detailed, tormented recollection of Zois’s body, gestures, and habits—​including many erotic features that appear to have consumed the curse-​writer. Particularly notable is the flagging of Zois’s “intercourse” (συνουσίην, A line 7), her “entrance,” possibly a slang term for the vagina

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(πάροδον, A line 8),138 and her “little ass” (πυγίον, A line 9). Eidinow describes the effects of this objectification, which both trivializes and erotically empowers Zois (2007, 221): “Nothing about Zois’ sexuality remains hidden: the list provides a display of objects, and reduces her to the sum of her explicit parts.” Zois may well have been a hetaira or pallake, especially as other pallakai are cited on Side B. Before mention of sexual intercourse, and Zois’s “entrance” and “little ass,” reference is first made to her eating and drinking (τὰ βρωτὰ αὐτῆς, τὰ ποτά)—​sympotic activities par excellence, which may point to Zois’s role as a hetaira.139 Jealousy, and the precarity of the author’s own relationship, likely drove the performance of this curse ritual, and scholars have suggested that the composer was “the other woman,” envious of “a happier rival.”140 Composed by individuals in Macedon, Athens, and Boeotia, erotic “separation” curses were not uncommon by the fourth century bce, and document the popularization and diversification of curse rituals over time and space. Indeed, Phila’s curse against Thetima and Dionysophon appears less of a unicum, and more a prevalent means of redress for those dealing with relationship crises—​ including women, who had less control over their sexuality than men. These tablets capture moments in which a rival’s body is fixated upon, instances in which the commissioner miserably envisions the intimacies that transpire between lovers, which could escalate from tender caresses to the culminating act of intercourse. These curse practitioners were consumed by relationships of which they were not a part, and understood curse-​writing as a means of redress, a ritual solution that might bring change and relief. Curse-​writing was not limited to rites that sought to undermine the intimacies of others. By the late fourth century, another form of amatory curse, referred to as an ἀγωγή/​ἀγώγιμον spell in later magical papyri, sought to attract desired persons to the commissioner.141 These erotic attraction spells, as Faraone has demonstrated, had oral antecedents, several of which are preserved in literary sources. Pindar’s Aphrodite teaches Jason how to draw Medea to him with an iunx spell (Pind. Pyth. 4.213–​19), while Theocritus’s Simaetha performs a series of attraction spells to restore the affections of the negligent Delphis (Theocr. Id. 2).142 Erotic attraction spells had been integrated with curse-​writing rituals by the fourth century bce at the latest but, arguably, two earlier examples are now known from fifth-​century Sicily: the curse of Apellis, which is also a choragic competition curse (1.15 in Chapter 1), and a newly published curse tablet from Himera, which the editors convincingly argue concerns a relationship between a man named Menekrates and Echekrateia, the woman he sought to dominate (see Figure I.5 in the Introduction).143 The majority of attraction spells committed to lead and papyri media were ones in which the composer was male and the victim was female. Scholars have noted how these documentary

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sources contrast with the literary evidence, which instead portrays aggressive and lecherous female practitioners—​figures like Circe, Simaetha, Erictho, and Pamphile—​casting erotic spells over helpless male victims.144 Gender hierarchies could permeate the cultural imaginary, but curse tablets bear witness to the many occasions on which men privately performed rites to attract women. One such curse tablet was buried in the necropolis of Akanthos, a Greek city on the Athos peninsula in the eastern Chalcidic peninsula (Figure 3.11). Akanthos was conquered by Philip II in the mid-​fourth century, after which the polis was joined to Macedon proper. The curse below dates to the period in which Akanthos was under firm Macedonian rule, and is one of five curse tablets that have been recovered from the city’s necropolis: Tablet 3.17. Jordan 1999, 122 Necropolis of Akanthos Late fourth century bce Thessaloniki Archaeological Museum Inv. I.160.79/​1987 Side A 1 Παυσανίας Σίμην τὴν Ἀν-​ 7

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Ταῦτα δεὶ μηδεὶς ἀναλύσαι ἀλλ’ ἢ Παυσανίας. φιτρίτου καταδεῖ, μέχρι ἂν Παυ-​ σανίαι ποήσῃ ὅσα Παυσανίας βούλεται. Καὶ μήτι ἱερείου Ἀθηναίας ἅψασθαι δύναιτο, μήτηι Ἀφροδίτη ἱλέως αὐτῇ εἴη, πρὶν ἂν Παυσανίαν ἐ̣ν̣σχῇ Σίμη·

Side B i.  Earlier text(?) 1 Μελίσσης Ἀπολλωνίδος ii.  Curse 2 Παυσανίας καταδεῖ Αἶνιν. Μήτι ἱερ-​ είου ἅψασθαι δύναιτο μήτε ἄλλου ἀγα-​ θοῦ ἐπήβολος δύναιτο γενέσθαι, πιρὶν 5 ἂν Παυσανίαν ἱλάσηται Αἶνις· vacat Ταῦτα δε[ὶ] μηδεὶς ἀναλύσαι ἀλλ’ ἢ Παυσανίας.

A: Pausanias binds down Sime, the daughter of Amphitritos, until she does for Pausanias whatever Pausanias wants. And may she not be able to touch a victim sacrificed to Athena, nor may Aphrodite be propitious to her, before Sime clings to Pausanias! And let no one other than Pausanias undo these things.

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B: Of Melissa of Apollonia. Pausanias binds down Ainis. Let her not be able to touch a sacrificial victim nor be able to be the recipient of any other good, until Ainis is propitious to Pausanias. And let no one other than Pausanias undo these things. This late fourth-​century curse was composed by a man named Pausanias, who binds down at least one, but probably two, women across the tablet’s two sides: Sime and Ainis.145 Like 3.15 from Pella, Pausanias’s narrative betrays a concern for the period of efficacy, the time span for which the spell would hold effect; the terms provide that no one be able to release the binding other than Pausanias himself. Pausanias also draws upon and inverts standard sacrificial ritual to craft a powerful curse: he asks that Sime and Ainis be unable to fulfill certain ritual obligations, namely that they “be unable to touch a sacrificial victim” (μήτι ἱερείου ἅψασθαι δύναιτο), unless each succumbs to Pausanias’s demands. Implicit is the idea that Sime and Ainis would become offensive to the gods, perhaps inspiring divine wrath or displeasure, lest they do as Pausanias bids. Forms of this ultimatum, that the victims do as the curse-​writer commands or else they will risk divine offense, occur too in fourth-​century curses from the northern Black Sea, which are also framed in relation to the language of sacrifice (3.10, “May none of these gods release [this curse], nor the daimones, not even if Maietas asks this as a favor, nor if they set up [offerings of ] thigh bones!”) That Pausanias threatens Sime and Ainis with divine disfavor should they repel his advances is an inversion of divine-​ human reciprocity as it relates to gift-​giving and sacrifice. Pausanias’s intentions toward both women appear to have been sexually motivated. Pausanias demands that Sime do whatever and as many things as he wants, and that Sime “embrace” or “cling to” Pausanias (ἐνσχῇ).146 Pausanias desired Sime, and sought to drive her to him by way of ritualized cursing. Provocative, if difficult to substantiate, are Eidinow’s musings on the status of Sime and Pausanias, and the nature of their relationship (2007, 217): If [Sime] was a sex-​worker who was not living in a stable relationship, [Pausanias] could presumably have negotiated a price for her, rather than go to the trouble of writing a curse. But she may have been owned by a violent pimp who would seek payment, or perhaps Pausanias could not afford her, or, of course, there is the possibility that whatever her status or price, Pausanias’ fantasy of her surrender dictated such a method [ . . . ]. Winkling this woman out of seclusion by supernatural means would enable satisfaction of his appetites on a long-​term basis, while lessening the chance that Sime might have reported his action to her husband (and Pausanias suffered the consequences).

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While we do not know Sime’s civic status, or her relationship to Pausanias (or to other men, for that matter), Eidinow’s colorful portrait reminds that curse rituals could stem from a variety of emotional and sexual entanglements. Curse-​writing provided a socially contained, performative forum in which individuals could address their appetites and frustrations, and some scholars suggest that these texts speak more to the psychological state of the (often male) commissioner than to that of their unknowing targets. Winkler argued that the process of composing an attraction spell offered real remedy for someone plagued by feelings of desire, lust, and envy. The tormented lover, forsaken or unnoticed by the object of his affection, would gain some relief in envisioning his own passions transposed onto his beloved throughout the ritual process: the feelings that he wanted her to suffer were, in fact, those that he himself was feeling.147 Thus Pausanias’s careful attention to the details of his interaction with Sime, such as Sime’s envisioned “embrace,” betrays his obsessive mental state. Yet in airing and transferring his desire onto the object of his suffering through the curse-​writing ritual, possibly he felt some respite. Previous scholarship has grappled with the question of why these erotic or relationship curses “begin to appear” in the fourth century bce,148 sometimes aligning erotic curse tablets like 3.15 and 3.17 with a “shift in attitudes to female sexuality during this period.”149 Drawing upon contemporary representations of women in vase painting scenes, some have argued for a visual shift and intensification in embodiments of “female eroticism,” and correlated the genre of amatory/​ relationship curses with an increase in depictions of Eros in material culture.150 While some of these curses do offer glimpses of women asserting control over areas of their lives in which they feel threatened (3.15), they also provide evidence for the social constraints in place over women, who comprised the majority of the victims of these aggressive rituals. A less dramatic explanation may lie simply in the growing popularity of curse practice (and literacy) during the fourth century bce, which was accompanied by a diversification in the ritual’s application over time. Indeed, the decades that witnessed the proliferation of erotic curse tablets correspond with years in which the overall numbers of curse tablets increase significantly. The expansion of our data set, in other words, may account for what appear to be the “beginnings” of erotic curse tablets. Erotic incantations were circulating orally, after all, by at least the mid-​fifth century bce (Pind. Pyth. 4.213–​19, with Faraone 1993b). Further, I argued above that hints of eroticism were already evident in curse tablets from the mid-​fifth century; tablets 1.15 and one of the two new curse tablets from Himera (see Figure I.5 in the Introduction) suggest that the appearance of more explicitly erotic curses in the fourth century was a more gradual development that unfolded in stages, rather than reflecting a sudden shift in attitudes toward female sexuality after the Peloponnesian War.

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This, combined with the popularization and diversification of the ritual over time, better explains fourth-​century erotic curse tablets like 3.15–​3.17. The fortunes of the Kingdom of Macedon varied greatly over the first half of the fourth century bce: invasions by neighboring tribes rendered its borders chronically unstable, and a flurry of short-​lived monarchs undermined the solidification of Macedonian power in the northern Aegean. The accession of Philip II changed this trajectory, catapulting Macedon to a position of prominence in the Greek mainland and Thrace. Prior to Philip’s sweeping reforms, curse-​writing rituals were already being performed in the capital city of Pella, and the practice continued to flourish during the decades in which Macedon was expanding and urbanizing. No fewer than 11 curse tablets have been reported from the necropoleis of Pella and Pydna, seven of which have been published; most of these stem from judicial disputes. By the mid-​fourth century, Philip’s conquests brought many neighboring cities under Macedonian control, several of which have also yielded curse tablets: Akanthos, Arethousa, and Oraiokastro. Familiar themes emerge in Macedonian curse tablets: texts target victims’ tongues, assume the form of columnar name lists, and deploy verbs like καταγράφω and καταδέω to “register” and “bind down” opponents. Though litigation still provided the occasion par excellence for curse practice, by the fourth century more individuals were turning to ritualized cursing to address erotic interests and intimate relationships. Curses like that of Phila (3.15) shed new light on non-​elite Macedonians, revealing a form of redress open to women “abandoned” and “bereft of all kin,” as Phila writes. Anxieties grounded in financial security, physical labor, and civic status could drive women to ritualized cursing, particularly when they perceived themselves as vulnerable within a dependent relationship. Tablet 3.15 is one of only a handful of texts, furthermore, that document the dialectic form of northwestern Greek in use “on the ground” in fourth-​century Macedon; its discovery helped confirm the hypothesis that the language spoken in Macedon was indeed a form of Doric Greek. Less remarked but as important is the fact that curse-​writing rituals help define Macedon as culturally Greek, too. The spreading koine of curse practice had reached Macedon by the fourth century bce, as it had the Black Sea, Oscan Italy, and elsewhere in the Mediterranean, like Carthage and the Iberian peninsula. Macedon proves a particularly important region for which to establish an early history of curse-​ writing rituals, as the practice would spread to the Near East and Egypt in the wake of Alexander’s conquests. That curse practice was well established in the centers from which so many Macedonians would set out helps explain one mechanism by which the practice came to proliferate in the Hellenistic eastern

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Mediterranean. Macedon’s territorial conquests opened up a region into which Hellenic culture, including curse practice, could take root and flourish. Alexander’s expansion of the Greek oikoumene would eventually lead to a fruitful mingling of Greek and local ritual practices in regions such as Egypt, where compilations like the Greek, Egyptian, and Coptic Magical Papyri speak to the richness of blending magic traditions.

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Introduction The emergence of curse-​writing rituals in Sicily, Cumae, Oscan Italy, the northern Black Sea, and Macedon documents the practice’s rapid spread and broad appeal by the fourth century bce. Themes present in the oldest Selinountine curse tablets appear in these other regional corpora—​whether calls for ateleia (“unfulfillment”) or the cursing of deeds, words, and tongues—​suggesting that early Sicilian practice influenced the ritual’s development elsewhere in the Mediterranean. The practice’s transmission was gradual, the result of multiple interactions in different contact zones over many years. This all holds true for another region to which curse-​writing spread in the Classical period: Attica. Writing in the first quarter of the fourth century bce, Plato gives some sense of the traffic in magical goods and services in Athens, including the role of ritual professionals in the casting of spells. Plato notes that “collecting priests and seers” (ἀγύρται δὲ καὶ μάντεις) claimed the ability to manipulate enemies “through certain incantations and bindings-​down” (ἐπαγωγαῖς τισιν καὶ καταδέσμοις, Pl. Resp. 364c).1 This is one of very few literary references to the practice of magic in Classical Greece, and quite probably the noun καταδέσμοις, “bindings-​down,” refers to the curse rituals documented by lead curse tablets.2 This reference, in addition to a remark about the unease felt by passersby upon seeing “molded wax images” placed at doorways, crossroads, and the tombs of ancestors (Pl. Leg. 933b), gestures to the prominence of curse rites in fourth-​century Athens. Indeed, if Greek curse practice began in Sicily, a major subsequent development in the ritual’s history must be set in Athens, the city from which well over 500 Greek curse tablets have emerged to date. Unlike the regions previously examined, roughly a dozen curse effigies have also been found in Athens, along with other ritual assemblages that made use of animals, all of which underscore the robust and diverse nature of curse ceremonies in

In Blood and Ashes. Jessica L. Lamont, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197517789.003.0005

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the ancient city. The abundance of curse materials recovered in situ in recent decades allows Athenian curse practice to be framed in terms of ritual continuity over the longue durée; for example, some 180 objects unearthed in the regions of and between the Kerameikos and the Agora document the enactment of curse rituals at graves, wells, fountains, houses, and workshops from the late fifth century bce through the late Roman period. On the whole, this rich data set allows us to observe the scale and variability of the practice, and how it came to change over time in a circumscribed region. After surveying the state of the evidence, this chapter examines the oldest known Attic curse tablets and effigies, and charts a chronology for the practice’s development in Athens. Using prosopographic, archaeological, and linguistic evidence as dating criteria, I suggest that Athenian curse-​writing rituals can be firmly detected only in the later fifth century, and not by 460–​450 bce, as is regularly claimed. The ritual’s transmission to Athens may have initially occurred outside the Attic mainland, possibly adopted by Athenians abroad in Sicily or elsewhere, or brought to Athens by non-​Attic practitioners. As with the adoption of curse practice among Oscan-​and Latin-​speaking groups, the ritual’s spread to Athens was nonlinear, and transpired along a multiplicity of channels. The growing popularity and diversification of the practice throughout the fourth century is also discussed, as Attic curse rituals came to assume new forms and depositional contexts by this time. The chapter concludes by surveying the language used by Attic curse-​writers, and exploring why curse production emerged and intensified when it did in Athens.

States of Evidence: Ancient and Modern Wherever they have been discovered, curse tablets offer intriguing clues about daily life in antiquity: curse tablets from the Crimean city of Chersonesos, for example, reveal the robustness of the law courts and document the presence of magistrates responsible for overseeing the guardianship of orphans (see tablet 3.11 in Chapter 3). Yet we know so little about life within this Pontic city during the fourth century that we cannot attach these details to evidence that would help construct a broader historical narrative. Athens, however, is a different case entirely. The wealth of contemporary literary and epigraphic sources allows us to study inscribed Attic curses with a rare degree of detail. Many thousands of Athenian individuals are known by name, and many of these names are further linked with patronymics and/​or demotics. Brought to bear on Attic curse tablets, these prosopographic data help generate fine-​grained histories of conflict within the ancient city. The same goes for institutions referred to in Athenian curse tablets, in addition to the language and grammar found therein.

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By the early twentieth century ce, scholars had begun linking persons named in Attic curse tablets with individuals known from historical sources and public inscriptions: the Phocion cursed in DTWünsch 24 was shown to be the famous general and statesman whose life was biographed by Plutarch; both Callias and Hipponicus, cursed in DTWünsch 65, served for life as dadouchos or “torchbearer” from within the Kerykes clan, a group long prominent in the Attic polis.3 DTWünsch 103 cursed wealthy trierarchs and other Athenian naval officials active in 323/​2 bce, and so on.4 Historians and epigraphists have continued this line of inquiry in the present day, using curse tablets to document popular unrest or resistance toward figures like Lycurgus, Xenocles of Sphettos (one of the wealthiest men of his time and a close friend of Lycurgus, active in public life for some four decades), Hypereides the orator, and other prominent men from the time of Philip II, Alexander III, and the Lamian War.5 Another tablet from a well in the Kerameikos curses the Macedonian king Cassander, in addition to Demetrios of Phaleron, and two of Cassander’s generals, Pleistarchos (Cassander’s brother) and Eupolemos (SEG 30.325); the curse was composed by a staunch anti-​Macedonian, and dates from 317 to 307 bce, the tumultuous decade in which Cassander, his regent Demetrios of Phaleron, and, eventually, Demetrios Poliorcetes all vied for control of Athens. Other fourth-​century Attic curse tablets engage with the world of the Assembly and the law courts: here are the eloquent statesmen, the proposers of civic decrees, the opponents of Macedon and her sympathizers, and those with the resources to hire speechwriters once litigation proceeded to trial.6 It is impossible to discuss Athenian curse tablets without the early corpora of Richard Wünsch (DTWünsch), Erich Ziebarth, and Auguste Audollent (DTAud). Published in 1897, 1899/​1934, and 1904, respectively, these compendia present hundreds of inscriptions and, over time, helped carve out a place for the study of curse tablets within the discipline of Classics. Yet unlike curse tablets purchased at market, those recovered in situ can be dated with greater precision, and used to illuminate the broader rituals in which the incision of text formed but one part. Recent discoveries will, in the years ahead, afford a deeper understanding of Athenian curse rituals. Over 50 curse tablets from the Athenian Agora have been published in the past year alone, the vast majority of which were found in wells. Some 30 date from the Roman Imperial period (c. 100–​250 ce), and cite dozens of athletes, women, and enslaved persons. Cursed here are Hermianos the long-​distance runner from Pergamon, Eutyches the grammarian from Smyrna, Miltiades the trumpet player from Laodikea, Eutchianos the wrestler, and Zosimos the basket maker; we also encounter Nike the seamstress, anxious about a lawsuit concerning herself and Amerimnos the slave.7 These objects contribute much to the prosopography, onomastics, and social history of Roman Athens.

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A further 24 curse tablets of fourth-​century bce date were also recently published; found in three sites in the western half of the Agora, these objects demonstrate how curse-​writing rituals evolved, diversified, and intensified in the late Classical period.8 Just outside the city walls in Athens’s Kynosarges cemetery, furthermore, excavations undertaken in 2001 ce recovered a pair of cast-​lead figurines from a low, tumulus-​like mound adjacent to a Classical offering trench. These effigies had been bound together, back to back, and inscribed with a simple binding spell: “Semiades has been bound” (Σημιάδης καταδέδεται), “Mynno has been bound” (Μυννώ καταδέδεται, Figure 4.1).9 With these brief binding spells, the objects combine the textuality of curse tablets with the embodied physicality of ritual figurines. Nine lead curse tablets were recovered nearby and probably also date to the fourth century bce; the density of curse tablets and effigies in this relatively small plot signals a concentration of private ritual activity in the area.10 As spectacular was the recovery in June 2016 of some 30 new curse tablets from Well B34 in the Athenian Kerameikos.11 The tablets were dated on the basis of coins and ceramics to the decades between 320 and 260 bce, a period in which it was previously thought that Attic curse-​writing rituals had fallen into decline.12 Once published, these objects will further enrich our data set, while shedding precious light on the rites that could attend the deposition of curse tablets and effigies. Other assemblages from graves in the Kerameikos reveal that Athenian practitioners could deposit curse tablets together with effigies made of wood or clay, in addition to perforated discs, wooden poles, gaming pieces, and even a bent miniature lead sword.13 Such findings unveil the presence of other rites and materials, apart from the inscribed lead tablet, within the broader curse ceremony. The sites selected for the deposition of curse assemblages can also refine our understanding of the rituals themselves. During the Classical period, practitioners sought out the graves of biaiothanatoi, persons who met particularly violent ends, in addition to the tombs of aoroi, individuals who died “unseasonably,” before their time.14 Such vicious or untimely deaths appealed for the enactment of curses, as the souls of these persons were deemed restless, volatile, and particularly ripe for ritual exploitation. These curse tablets can then be compared with those found at the fingertips of the corpse,15 or contrasted with tablets like 4.8 below, found not in a grave but in the Attic shrine of Palaimon-​Pankrates.16 Such is the light that context can shed on curse tablets and effigies. As new Attic curse assemblages continue to emerge,17 some lacunae left by the early corpora of Wünsch, Audollent, and others can gradually be filled. Finally, an important new edition of all known Athenian curse inscriptions is forthcoming as a supplement of Inscriptiones Graecae;18 it both updates the older corpora of Wünsch, Audollent, and Ziebarth, and includes all discoveries made since then from across Attica. Filled with valuable new readings, drawings,

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Figure 4.1  Pair of cast-​lead curse effigies, depicting Semiades and Mynno; inscriptions read “Semiades has been bound” (Σημιάδης καταδέδεται), and “Mynno has been bound” (Μυννώ καταδέδεται). Recovered from a low, tumulus-​like mound adjacent to a Classical offering trench in Athens’ Kynosarges cemetery. Photograph from Th. Eliopoulos 2021, 58, Fig. 5.

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and photographs, Curbera’s magisterial corpus corrects previous inaccuracies,19 provides sounder chronologies for the objects, and consolidates many prior editions of Attic curse tablets, thereby making the texts more accessible for future study. To the extent possible, some new editions of Attic curse texts are provided here (Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8), with a reference also to the older editions currently available for consultation (e.g., “prev. Peek 1941, no. 3”). The abundance of recent discoveries from systematic excavations, combined with Curbera’s new edition of Attic curse tablets, means that the time is ripe for a re-​examination of Athenian curse-​writing rituals, and a historical synthesis of the practice.

Whence Attic Curse Tablets? Curse-​writing rituals appear in Attica decades after their emergence in Sicily, and timeline alone suggests that the Athenian practice had Sicilian antecedents. Some Athenian individuals probably learned curse-​writing abroad in Sicily and, over time, brought the ritual back with them to the Attic mainland. Several factors support this hypothesis, including parallels in the language, context, and formatting of early Athenian and (older) Sicilian curse tablets. In terms of morphology, some Attic texts target victims’ tongues and souls, use γράφω and compounds to curse opponents, and a small handful invoke the concept of ateleia. Consider the language of the following Athenian curse tablet of fourth-​century date (Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8 no. 385; prev. DTAud 68 B lines 12–​15):20

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[ὡς] οὗτος ἐν̣[ταῦ]θα ἀτελὴς κεῖτα[ι, οὕ]–​ [τως] ἀτέλεστα εἶναι Θεοδώραι πάντ[α] [κα]ὶ ἔπη̣ καὶ ἔργα τὰ πρὸς Χαρίαν καὶ π̣ρὸς [τὸς] ἄλλος ἀνθρώπος· καταδῶ Θ̣ε[ο]δώρ–​

Just as this (sc. corpse) lies here ateles, so too may all the things of Theodora be atelesta, and her words and deeds with respect to Charias and other men! Here the “unfulfillment” or ateleia of the corpse is projected onto the victim’s person and affairs. The analogical application of ateleia (ἀτελής, ἀτέλεστα), especially in regard to the victim’s words and deeds (ἔπη καὶ ἔργα), recalls older Selinountine curses from the late sixth and early fifth centuries bce (see tablets 1.1–​1.4 in Chapter 1), and demonstrates that the concept spread alongside the practice from Sicily to Attica (that said, ateleia-​curses do not enjoy the popularity in Attica that they did in Selinous). The oldest Athenian curse tablets, like earlier ones from Selinous, Himera, Acragas, and Camarina, also exhibit textual

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distortion (the reversal and scrambling of text), and were often deposited in graves at the ritual’s end. Early Athenian curse-​writing rituals were likewise used to address conflicts that had progressed to trial in the law courts. The distinctive shapes of several early Attic curse tablets—​namely the long, thin lead bands resembling shackles, meant to analogically “bind” their victims (see tablet 4.2 below)—​are now known to resemble at least one older Sicilian band from Himera. Recovered in an early fifth-​century Himeran grave, the inscribed band had been wrapped around the abdomen of the buried infant (Figure 4.2); it provides another Sicilian precedent for an early Attic practice, at least in terms of curse tablet shape.21 Among the new Himeran materials are also dozens of curse tablets that had been ritually nailed, another practice embraced by later Attic practitioners; this too signals the adoption of an older Sicilian ritual by Athenians. This is not to say that there were not significant differences between the early Sicilian and Athenian practice: there certainly were (the deities invoked and the prominence of δέω, for example). But thematic, ritual, and depositional parallels, from language to tablet shape to ritual nailing and mortuary deposition, point strongly to Sicilian influence on early Athenian curse practice. How to account for transmission? In the years between the Sicilian emergence of curse-​writing rituals and the practice’s appearance in Athens, it is likely that some Athenians were exposed to curse-​writing in Sicily proper. Thucydides is explicit about extensive Athenian involvement in Sicily and southern Italy during the 430s and especially the 420s bce, as are Diodorus and Plutarch. Supplementing these accounts are several inscribed decrees that reveal Athens’s engagement in the affairs of Magna Graecia from the 430s onward.22 Much

Figure 4.2  Long lead curse band wrapped around the abdomen of infant (HA 9906), found in early fifth-​century grave (T. W156) in Himera. Photograph from Brugnone, Calascibetta, and Vassallo 2020, 102, Figs 7–​8.

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Athenian activity in Sicily was tied to Athens’s geopolitical interests and imperial ambitions; interactions ranged from joint military undertakings, like the attack on Inessa by Athens and her Sicilian Greek allies, to the Athenian-​led foundation of Thurii in southern Italy in the 440s.23 Formal diplomatic ties are also attested in the forging of alliances, oaths, and treaties between Athens and cities in Sicily and southern Italy from the 430s onward, which included the sending of Athenian embassies to Sicily, and the reception of embassies from various Sicilian polities in Athens.24 Already by 427 bce, Athens had sent 20 ships to Sicily to aid her Ionian allies, namely Leontini, and also the Doric city of Camarina (Thuc. 3.86). Athens’s alliance with Camarina was still active by 415 bce, when Camarina entertained Athenian emissaries during the Sicilian Expedition (Thuc. 6.75.3, 6.82.1, 6.87). Athenian engagement with Camarina may be especially significant for the transmission of curse practice, as the ritual was well established in Camarina by the mid-​fifth century.25 In addition to the mobility of individuals, both goods and skill sets were also in circulation between the Greek west and the Attic mainland during these years. Consider the arrival in Athens of Gorgias at the head of a Leontine embassy requesting Athenian protection against Syracuse in 427 bce; Gorgias brought with him the techne of rhetoric, which would subsequently transform Athenian oratory.26 Curse-​writing rituals can be seen as just one of several technologies that moved from the Greek west to the Attic mainland during the fifth century. The historical circumstances were ripe, in other words, for the dissemination of curse-​ writing rituals between Athens and Magna Graecia by the 420s bce. Two recently published curse tablets suggest that curse-​writing rituals may also have found their way to Attica by way of intermediary communities of practice. First, a curse tablet dating from between 430 and 385 bce was recovered in a shaft grave on the island of Aigina (5.7; see Chapter 5).27 Folded and pierced with a nail, the majority of the text is in the Doric dialect (e.g., ματέρα, ταν, νικάσαιμι, A lines 1, 2, 8), though the name Hephaistos (Ἕφαιστος, A line 1) is Attic-​Ionic. Side B targets co-​advocates (B4, τὸς συνδίκος) and refers to a μέτοικον (B3), suggesting that the curse was judicial in nature. Aigina was an Athenian cleruchy by 431 bce, which means that if an upper chronology is accepted, the object would be among the earliest curse tablets known from the broader sphere of Athenian influence (indeed, the text’s reference to the binding of Prometheus poses a tempting connection to Prometheus Bound, the production of which many scholars now date to the 430s bce).28 While 5.7 is the only known Aiginetan curse tablet, its date makes it important for charting the early history of curse-​writing rituals in Attica. The object raises the possibility that ritual diffusion was mediated to some degree through intermediary practitioners like those from Aigina, who engaged in trade and seafaring across the Mediterranean, and whom Athens came to dominate in the second half of the fifth century. Aigina was a powerful

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commercial state, involved in trade that spanned from Naukratis in the Nile Delta to Sicily and Etruria by the sixth century bce; tradition holds that the first Greek coins were struck on Aigina during the Archaic period and, already by the sixth century, 81 Aiginetan silver staters appear in a coin hoard from Selinous, raising the possibility that Aiginetan merchants were present in southwest Sicily by this time.29 Just as the transmission of curse practice to Latin-​speaking groups of the Italian peninsula may have unfolded along several fronts, so too might this have been the case in Athens by the late fifth century bce —​from Athenians abroad in coastal Sicily, to Aiginetan intermediaries. Curse-​writing rituals likely found their way to Attica through a multiplicity of channels, all of which eventually funneled back to Athens proper. A second, fragmentary curse tablet that emerged in the heart of the Athenian Agora, buried beneath the floor of the Tholos, may also point to the role of non-​ Attic practitioners in the ritual’s establishment in Athens. Tablet 4.1. Curbera and Lamont 2023, no. 1 Found beneath the floor of the Tholos Later fifth to early fourth century bce Athenian Agora Inv. IL 669 (Figure 4.3a, b) –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ 1

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–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​hο | –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​ικ̣λες͂ , –​c.4–​ν · hο –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

fr.a

[–​–​–​–​Ἀ]μειψίο : Π[ρ]ομέν[ες –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​]

–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

[–​–​–​–​θ]εμις, Μενοκ[λ]ες͂ hο πε–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

–​–​–​νν–​–​–​

–​–​–​–​–​–​αρ̣ τος, Εὐμένε[ς], Βόεθος, Ὄνιππο[ς –​–​–​]

–​–​–​με–​–​–​

[–​–​–​γλο]͂ τταν καὶ ψχὲ[ν] Βοέθο, Εὐεθί[δες –​–​]

–​–​–​ιαν–​–​–​

–​–​–​–​–​–​Εὔθιππος, Ὀνᾶς [ἀ]μφορεύτε̣[ς, –​–​–​–​–​]

–​–​–​–​ε–​–​–​

–​–​–​–​–​–​ανο, Σαύρον, Ὀρθ[οκ]λες͂ ναυπεγ[ός, –​–​]

–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

[–​–​–​–​–​h]εδεῖα, Μύστε, hυπε[ρ]βάτας . –​–​–​–​–​ 10

[–​–​–​–​Ἰδο]μενέα κουρέα –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​νανον–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

-​ikles . . . of Ameipsias: Promenes . . . -​themis, Menokles the . . . -​artos, Eumenes, Boethos, Onippos . . . the tongue and soul of Boethos, Euethides . . . Euthippos, Onas the amphora-​maker . . . of -​anos, Sauron, Orthokles the shipbuilder . . . Hedeia, Myste, Hyperbatas (or, “the transgressors”) . . . Idomeneus the barber . . .

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(a)

(b)

Figure 4.3 Tablet 4.1 (Curbera and Lamont 2023, no. 1), later fifth to early fourth century bce. Found beneath floor of Tholos, Athenian Agora; Athenian Agora Inv. IL 669. Photograph by C. Mauzy, drawing by J. Curbera.

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This fragmentary tablet preserves 22 names, at least some of which are non-​ Attic in origin. Occasionally the text mentions the targets’ professions: cursed were Onas the maker of amphoras, Orthokles the shipbuilder, and a barber (lines 7, 8, 10)—​another glimpse of persons often hidden from ancient historical narratives. The cursing of the “tongue and soul” (γλοτ͂ ταν καὶ ψχέν) recalls formulae found in earlier tablets from Selinous and Cumae, and the script contains features that are unusual in Athenian inscriptions: rounded alpha; V-​shaped upsilon; use of Η for /​h/​(lines 1–​2 hο; line 9 hυπερβάτας), of Ε for η (lines 5–​6 Βόεθος; line 6 ψυχέν; line 8 Ὀρθοκλε͂ς, line 9 hέδεια and Μύστε), of Ο for both the inherited long ο (line 8 Σαύρον), and, except for κουρέα in line 10, the long closed /​o/​ (line 6 Βοέθο; line 3 Ἀμειψίο). These features had once led scholars to suspect an early fifth-​century date for the tablet, but what appear to be Archaic elements are simply non-​Attic features, all of which are compatible with a date in the later fifth or early fourth century bce.30 Further, the script shows affinities with Kirchoff ’s “red” alphabet type, especially that used in the island of Euboea and its various colonies (including those in Sicily and southern Italy), again intimating the role of non-​Attic practitioners in the ritual’s Attic beginnings. This object may be among the oldest curse tablets known from Attica, but it does not yet belong to a community of Athenian practitioners. The composer himself came from elsewhere and was versed in traditions of curse-​writing; with no hesitation, the tongue and soul are cursed and names are listed, including those of several foreigners. The tablet helps us see how the ritual became established in the Attic mainland: not only did Athenians abroad in Sicily likely observe curse rituals there by the 430s and 420s bce, but practitioners also moved around, and tablet 4.1 was probably composed by one such individual, who learned to write outside of Athens proper. The tablet may point to the indirect avenues by which curse practice was established in Attica, and the role of non-​Athenian practitioners in the ritual’s adoption in the final decades of the fifth century. In sum, early Attic curse tablets recall older Sicilian ones in terms of language, form (long, thin bands of lead), accompanying ritual practice (nailing, burying), contexts of use (lawsuits), and sites of deposition (graves). Curse practice may well have been observed and adopted by Athenians abroad in Sicily, and subsequently brought from the Greek west to the Attic mainland over the course of the fifth century. That the ritual was simultaneously spreading along other nodes of transmission—​in “intermediary” locales outside Athens proper—​is suggested by the early curse tablets from Aigina and the Agora’s Tholos (5.7, 4.1). Alongside the movements of professional ritual practitioners, a nonlinear path of dissemination is indeed what we might expect for a practice that transpired outside the public eye, and was not overseen by the state, priesthoods, or any other centralized officiating body.

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Dating: Early Curse Chronologies This brings us to the thorny issue of dating Athenian curse tablets and effigies, especially the oldest from the fifth and early fourth centuries bce. Some of my conclusions run counter to current orthodoxy, which holds that the oldest Athenian curse tablets date from c. 460–​450 bce.31 Using tablets recovered in secure archaeological contexts, I suggest instead that Attic curse-​writing rituals are only evident in the final decades of the fifth century—​years that found Athens in quite different circumstances than in 460 bce. Whenever possible, prosopography, morphology and script, and archaeological context are used as dating criteria. Seldom can any one of these factors yield a precise date in itself but, when applied in combination, chronological contours can become clearer. First, prosopography: Athens is rich in onomastic data, and numerous tools exist to aid in prosopographic inquiry.32 That said, this is often the least accessible means of dating a curse text, as it requires the availability of external, chronologically secure onomastic data, which can be paired to an individual cited in a curse text. The inclusion of patronymics and demotics helps facilitate prosopographic dating, as in the above example of Aristophon of Azenia.33 Rare names are particularly useful, such as the Θέελλος cursed in a mid-​fourth-​ century tablet from the Athenian Agora, a curse that quite probably targets Θέελλος the eponymous archon of 350/​1 bce (this is, otherwise, the sole attestation of the name).34 Valuable too for prosopographic dating are clusters of names, such as references to the circle of Macedonians in SEG 30.325 from Well B1 in the Kerameikos. The prominence of the general Pleistarchos in the curse (named first, and probably again at the tablet’s bottom, upside down) may point to a period in which Cassander’s brother loomed large in Athenian affairs—​ perhaps during Pleistarchos’s occupation of Oropos in 313 bce (Diod. 19.77.6). But prosopographical dating has its limits. In addition to the general infrequency with which inscribed names can be firmly linked with known historical personas, seldom does prosopography allow us to date the object precisely within the floruit of a named individual. Statesmen like Aristophon of Azenia, for example, had a long life in the public eye; active for decades, their citation within a curse can rarely provide an absolute date. Grammar and script can also provide useful information for dating. Athens has yielded an abundance of inscriptions on stone, ceramic, and lead media, which allows the written conventions of curse tablets to be compared with contemporary decrees, graffiti, grave stelai, and votive dedications. Leslie Threatte’s volumes on the grammar of Attic inscriptions demonstrate how certain phenomena were common at particular times but infrequent in others.35 Thus

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morphological variation in the dative plural might help date a text (-​οισι or –​ οις), as can differences in script and phonological changes, such as the writing of the genitive singular as –​O versus –​OY; the latter form occurs infrequently before c. 375 bce, but by c. 330–​320 bce, the use of –​OY came to eclipse –​O in Attica.36 In proper names—​the words most commonly found in curse tablets—​a shift can be observed in Attic stone inscriptions after c. 360 bce in which the accusative ending in –​ν is common for s-​stems. These spelling practices do not differ significantly from those in contemporary lead inscriptions (for example, Ἐπιτέλην and Εὐμήδην in an Athenian curse tablet from c. 350 bce).37 The Attic adoption of the Ionic alphabet also affords a chronological benchmark for dating many civic and some private inscriptions, however loosely.38 These parameters provide chronological guidance but, as Threatte himself cautioned, are imprecise and “probably in most cases not methodologically sound” when applied in and of themselves.39 Many orthographic phenomena occur over a long period of time, and provide only broad contours for dating rubrics. Thus morphology and phonology can signal that a curse contains conventions common in the early fourth century bce, and not the early fifth century, but cannot independently bestow absolute dates. Threatte’s work is also based primarily on civic stone inscriptions, which often document linguistic innovation later than other types of documents. This leads to the third dating criterion: archaeological context. Curse assemblages recovered in secure contexts greatly enhance our understanding of the broader ritual processes in which the tablet took part, and curses found in closed deposits can indicate the time and circumstances of interment. Yet archaeological context cannot always establish a tablet’s date. Some curse tablets were, quite simply, buried in older tombs.40 Many, because they were buried deep underground in antiquity, emerge in stratigraphically older levels, in contexts that predate the tablets themselves (such as 4.1 from the Agora’s Tholos, and 4.11 from the Agora’s Classical Commercial Building). In such cases, archaeological context can provide the terminus post quem for a curse tablet, but not its absolute date; the date of the grave, structure, or stratum thus does not necessarily signify the date of the inscription. The opposite scenario is also attested, where older curse tablets emerge in chronologically later contexts, sometimes seeing reuse along the way.41 These chronological disparities between a tablet’s date of incision and date of deposition reveal the potential challenges of dating a curse solely on the basis of archaeological context. These ritual objects could live complicated lives, sometimes experiencing a multiplicity of uses and depositions en route to their final burial place. The soundest approach for dating curse assemblages is therefore a combination of methods that draws upon prosopography, language and script, and archaeological context, and allows for wider confidence intervals in assigning dates.

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With this groundwork in place, let us examine the purported oldest Athenian curse tablets. Current orthodoxy holds that the earliest Attic curse tablets date from 460–​450 bce, a chronology that hinges upon two curse tablets excavated in 1935 ce by Karl Kübler in the Kerameikos, published by Werner Peek in 1941.42 Our understanding of the beginnings of Athenian curse practice has depended on the dating of 4.2 below, considered the “oldest dated” curse tablet in the Kerameikos.43 Tablet 4.2. Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8 no. 309 (prev. Peek 1941, no. 3) Kerameikos Inv. IB 48 Found at fingertips of skeleton’s right hand; shaft grave with wooden sarcophagus Fourth century bce44 (Figure 4.4)

1

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10

15

20

Side B

Side A

‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ιτην‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ κατα[δῶ‒ ‒ ‒]την[. .]χεαν καταδῶ· καταδῶ Στέφαν–​ ο̣ν Πολυα̣ρά̣[το] παρὰ Φερσε[φ]‒ [ό]νει κ̣αὶ Ἑρμ̣ε͂ι· Θ̣ε̣ό̣θ[εμι]ν κα‒ τ̣αδῶ· Ἡγέμαχον [Φα]ν‒ οστράτο καταδ[ῶ]· [κατα]δῶ Εὔκλειαν [τὴν θε]ρ̣άπαιναν̣ [τ]‒ ὴν Δημοκράτους· κ‒ αταδ̣ῶ Εὐκλείας ψ‒ υχὴν καὶ τὴν γλῶ[τ]‒ αν τὴν Εὐκλεία[ς] καταδῶ παρὰ Φ̣ε‒ [ρ]σεφόνει καὶ [Ἑρμ]‒ [ε]ι· ͂ κατα̣δέω YL^ . [..] τὴν Δημοκρά[τ]‒ [ους] καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ [γλῶταν]· καταδ̣[ῶ] ‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒ [. . καὶ ἔ]π̣ε̣α̣· Φ̣ι̣λ̣ο[στ]‒ ράτην καταδῶ· vac. [κ]αταδῶ Ἀριστοβούλ‒ η̣ν̣ τὴν παλακὴν

        vacat

80

85

καταδῶ Θεαγγε–​ [λί]δην Παιονίδην̣· καταδῶ Πείθ̣α̣ν̣–​ δρον Παιονίδ̣η̣ν, καταδῶ τὴ̣ν̣ vvv ψυχὴν τὴ̣ν Πειθ–​ άνδρο· κ̣[αταδῶ . .] [. .] Π̣α̣ιονίδ̣η̣ν.̣ [κ]–​ [ατ]α̣δῶ̣ –​–​–​–​–​ –​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​–​

148

Figure 4.4 Tablet 4.2, fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 48), in shaft grave with sarcophagus, at fingertips of skeleton’s left hand. Drawing by J. Curbera.

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καὶ ψυχὴν τὴν Ἀρι‒ στοβούλης· καταδῶ Χ‒ αρίαν τὸν Φειδιάδο καὶ ψυχὴν τὴν Χαρίο‒ υ καὶ γλῶταν τὴν Χα‒ ρίου· καταδῶ Ἀμειν[ο]‒ νίκην τὴν Χαρίου̣ ἑ‒ ταίραν· καταδῶ π̣αρὰ Φερσεφόνε̣‒ ι Ἀμεινονίκην· [κ]‒ αταδῶ καὶ ψυχὴν [τ]‒ ὴν Ἀμεινονίκη[ς] καὶ γλῶταν καὶ ἔπ‒ η̣ καὶ ἔργα τὰ Ἀμεινονίκη[ς]· [κ]αταδῶ καὶ ‒ ‒ ‒vestigia‒ ‒ ‒ ‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒‒ ΟΣ Χ̣αρίαν κατα‒ [δ]ῶ· Ἀμεινονί‒ κην καταδ[ῶ]· [Τι]μόθεον κα‒ ταδῶ Παιονίδ‒ ην καὶ γλῶτα‒ ν τὴν Τιμοθ‒ έο· Μνήσιππ‒ ον καταδῶ καὶ τὴ‒ ν ψ̣υχὴν τὴν Μν‒ [ησ]ίππο· καταδῶ [Μ]νησίαν [Πα]ιονίδην· κ[α]‒ [ταδῶ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒] [‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ κατ]‒ [α]δῶ Πλαν‒ [γ]ῶνα Μνησ‒ ίου ἀδελφήν· καταδέω Κάλλ‒ ιππον τὸν Πλα‒ νγῶνος ἀδελφ‒ όν· καταδῶ ψυ‒

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χὴν τὴν Καλλ‒ ίππο καὶ χεῖρα‒ ς τὰς Καλλίππο, καταδῶ Ἐργασ‒ ίονα [κ]αὶ Πύ[θ]–​ ιον θεράποντ‒ α καὶ ψυχήν [τ]ὴν Ἐ̣ργασίωνο[ς] καὶ [γ]υνὴν τὴν Ἐργασίω‒ νος καταδῶ. vacat

A: . . . [I bind] down . . . I bind down. I bind down Stephanos the son of Polyaratos before Persephone and Hermes. I bind down Theothemis. Hegemachos the son of Phanostratos I bind down. I bind down Eukleia the servant of Demokrates, I bind down Euklea’s soul and the tongue of Euklea, I bind (these) down before Persephone and Hermes. I bind down . . . the one of Demokrates and the soul and tongue. I bind down . . . and words. Philostrate I bind down. I bind down Aristoboule the pallake and the soul of Aristoboule. I bind down Charias the son of Pheidiades and the soul of Charias and the tongue of Charias. I bind down Ameinonike the hetaira of Charias, I bind down before Persephone Ameikonike. I bind down both the soul of Ameinonike and her tongue and words and deeds, the ones of Ameinonike I bind down. I bind down also . . . I bind down Charias. I bind down Ameinonike. I bind down Timotheos the Paionidaian [demes-​man] and the tongue of Timotheos. Mnesippos I bind down and the soul of Mnesippos. I bind down Mnesias the Paionidaian. . . . [I bind down] . . .I bind down Plangon the sister of Mnesias. I bind down Kallippos the brother of Plangon. I bind down the soul of Kallippos and the hands of Kallippos, I bind down Ergasion and Pythios the servant and the soul of Ergasion and the wife of Ergasion I bind down. B: I bind down Theangelides the Paionidaian. I bind down Peithandros the Paionidaian, I bind down the soul of Peithandros. I bind down . . . the Paionidaian. I bind down . . .

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Inscribed on a lead band resembling a shackle, tablet 4.2 aimed to “bind” and immobilize its many victims.45 The scribe took great efforts to conform the text to the thin lead strip; this required incising over 80 lines of text vertically, with rows constantly truncated by the medium’s narrow margins, often mid-​word. Consistent with its shape, 4.2 employs the verb καταδῶ, “I bind,” no fewer than 30 times (cf. early Selinountine curse tablets, in which δέω is not present). The curse is lengthy and repetitive: καταδῶ formulaically binds various persons, souls, tongues, words, and deeds, before Persephone and Hermes. Τhe “mistress” or “concubine” of Aristoboulos is also bound (A line 23), along with Charias’s hetaira (A lines 29–​31); a sister, brother, and wife are also cursed (A lines 58, 61–​2, 71), in addition to a servant (A lines 68–​9). Several individuals are associated with the deme of Paeonidae (Παιονίδης, lines 75, 77, 81), located north of Acharnae at the base of Mount Parnes. The tablet’s manner of deposition was striking: it was found at the fingertips of the skeleton’s right hand, revealing that the conclusion of the ritual process involved tucking the object into the palm of a corpse.46 This placement led the excavator to assume that the tablet was interred with the deceased at the time of burial. The burial in turn was dated on the basis of a grave good: a black-​g laze lekythos dated stylistically to the mid-​fifth century.47 Peek himself was reluctant to assign the text such an early date,48 but was assured by the archaeologist Kübler that the grave and curse tablet must date from the same time, as Kübler “expressly excludes the possibility that the tablets may have later been buried in long-​standing graves,” Peek writes (1941, 93). Because of the dating of the lekythos (and accordingly the grave), tablet 4.2 and the beginnings of Athenian curse practice were dated to 460–​450 bce. This same date was assigned to a second curse tablet from a grave located some four meters to the northwest;49 this second tablet curses several of the same individuals from the deme of Paeonidae, and must be contemporary with 4.2, as Peek rightly noted.50 The use of the lekythos to date tablet 4.2 and the beginnings of Athenian curse practice might seem relatively sound if a date of 460–​450 bce did not conflict so sharply with the text itself, which displays features of Attic writing from roughly a century later. Peek accepted Kübler’s dating of tablet 4.2 with some hesitance, and maintained a prosopographical identification with a secretary of the Boule from the mid-​fourth century bce. In the decades since the tablet’s discovery, other epigraphists have pointed, for example, to the “exclusive use of EI for [e•], preference for OY . . . both EI and HI for ηι, Εὐκλείας ~ Εὐκλέας,”

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noting that the “regularity with which fourth-​century writing practices are followed . . . is unparalleled to a disconcerting degree.”51 I would add that the scribe’s facility with civic abbreviations in the second curse tablet (Peek 1941, no. 6), inscribing ΠΑΙ as shorthand for the demotic Παιανιεύς or Παιονίδης, is also more characteristic of fourth-​century epigraphic conventions. And so we have a conflict between different dating criteria. Some have argued that the lekythos used to date tablet 4.2 could have been in use for decades before it was interred as a grave good, a suggestion that could reduce the chronological disparities between text and context.52 Yet the text of the curse still suggests that it was interred later, as late as the mid-​fourth century, when other graves were dug in this same district—​several of which yielded curse tablets of mid-​fourth-​century date.53 While the grave can here provide a terminus post quem for tablet 4.2, it cannot soundly date the object and, with it, the beginnings of Attic curse practice. Aside from the methodological problems that accompany the dating of these objects, other implications of a mid-​fifth-​century date for the beginnings of Attic curse practice should give historians and epigraphists pause. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, of course, but it is surprising that we cannot forge prosopographic connections for persons targeted in Attic curse tablets before, say, 415 bce (4.5–​4.7).54 If curse-​writing rituals had indeed taken root in Athens by 460 bce, one might expect to encounter at least one factious statesman, demagogue, archon, choregos, oligarch, or general from the decades between 460 and 415 bce; Aristophanes and Thucydides provide no shortage of evidence for antagonism, conflict, and competition within the city during these years. It is also striking that so few extant curse tablets were composed in the Attic alphabet; if Athenian curse-​writing began in earnest by 460 bce, we should expect more than a small handful of surviving tablets (e.g., 4.3, 4.4) to employ the Attic script. But they do not. Most early Athenian curse tablets use the Ionic alphabet without hesitation. That said, we cannot assume that we have found the oldest Attic curse tablets, or that our current understanding will remain unchanged as new discoveries are made. The recent recovery of curse assemblages from the polyandreion of the Lacedaemonians in the Kerameikos, a mass burial dating from 403 bce, may further illuminate the Attic practice in its early years.55 On the whole, while there is evidence for oral binding spells in Athens by the mid-​fifth century bce, there is no clear attestation of curse-​writing rituals until the century’s final decades, by 415–​400 bce or thereabouts.56 This later timeline would downdate the ritual’s adoption to the decades after which Athens was most active in the affairs of Sicily

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and southern Italy, as discussed above. It would also situate the emergence of curse-​writing alongside broader trends in Athenian epigraphy, literacy, logography, and the expanded use of writing in the Attic law courts.

Early Attic Curse Tablets What, then, are the oldest manifestations of curse-​writing rituals in Attica? Some early if complicated examples were introduced above: 4.1 from the Agora’s Tholos is an early curse tablet from Athens, as is 5.7 from Aigina. But script and dialect suggest that both texts were composed by non-​Athenians, and 5.7 comes from outside the Attic mainland. This section presents six additional Attic curse assemblages that emerged in archaeological contexts dating from the late fifth or early fourth centuries bce (4.3–​4.8), all of which display grammar and syntax consistent with this time. In several cases, prosopography can further buttress this dating, lending new insights into Attic society in the wake of the Peloponnesian War. These are currently among the oldest curse materials known from Attica. In the same publication as 4.2 above, Peek dated two other curse tablets from the Kerameikos to the second half of the fifth century bce, and these tablets do indeed provide early evidence for Attic curse-​writing rituals.57 Inscribed in the old Attic alphabet, 4.3–​4.4 emerged just north of the Street of the Tombs, in the “fourth-​century embankments of the Hegeso and Potamian districts,” not far from 4.2.58 Despite the objects’ recovery in fourth-​century fill, Peek dated the tablets to the second half of the fifth century bce—perhaps thinking that the tablets were churned up from elsewhere in the construction of the fourth-​century embankment. Jeffery and Guarducci supported this chronology on the basis of language and script.59 A date of around 410–​400 bce would accommodate both text and context (Hegeso’s grave stele is traditionally dated to 410–​400 bce, and the construction of its embankment could be roughly contemporary with the creation of the precinct itself ). Tablet 4.3. Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8 no. 341 (prev. Peek 1941, 89, no. 1) Kerameikos: Embankments of Hegeso and Potamian Districts c. 410–​400 bce Text retrograde Kerameikos Archaeological Museum Inv. IB 10 (Figure 4.5)

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Λυσανίας ἐκ το͂ ἀργυ-​ ← ροκοπίο φυσετὲς καὶ αὐτὸς καὶ ἑ γυνὲ κ̣αὶ τὰ χρέματα καὶ ℎότι ἐργά-​ ζεται καὶ τὰ χ̣ ρέματα καὶ χε̣͂ρ̣ε̣ς̣ καὶ πόδε[ς] κα[ὶ νο͂]ς, κεφαλὲ Ο̣Ι̣ΝΑΝΘΕΜΥ[̣ Ρ]ΡΙΝΕ TΕΣΜΙ̣Ε̣ΡΑΣ. vacat

Lysanias the blower from the silver-​mint, both he himself and his wife and his possessions, and whatever work he does, and his possessions and hands and feet and mind, head—​–​

Figure 4.5 Tablet 4.3, c. 410–​400 bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 10), embankments of Hegeso and Potamian Districts. Drawing by J. Curbera.

This tablet was found together with another, 4.4, which targets the same metallurgist in the same language and hand: Tablet 4.4. Curbera forthcoming, IG II/​III3 8 no. 342 (prev. Peek 1941, 90, no. 2) Kerameikos: Embankments of Hegeso and Potamian Districts c. 410–​400 bce Kerameikos Archaeological Museum Inv. IB 11

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[Λ]υσ̣αν[ί]ας [φυσ]ετ(ὲς) ⋮ [ἐ]κ̣ το͂ ἀργυροκ̣οπ̣[ί-​ ο κ]αὶ γυνὲ ἀυτο͂ v[κα-​ τα]δ̣έω καὶ ℎότι v ἐρ̣γάζεται καὶ ℎότι πράσει καὶ ℎότι διαχ̣[ει-​ ρί]ζεται καὶ ℎό[τι —​—​] [․․․]ει καὶ [․․․․]ιν —​—​ —​—​— —​—​— —​—​—​

Lysanias the blower from the silver-​mint, both he himself and his wife, I bind whatever he works on and whatever he does and whatever he operates and whatever . . . and . . . Among the oldest Athenian curse tablets, these objects document rituals undertaken against a skilled craftsman named Lysanias, who worked as a “blower” (φυσετές) in a smithery that produced silver, likely the nearby state mint in the Agora.60 Whoever commissioned these curses seems to have been part of that world too, since he was familiar with Lysanias’s line of work and his wife. These carefully inscribed retrograde texts suggest that the scribe was well versed in curse-​ writing (Figure 4.5); he was able to incise words backward, with the goal of analogically confounding and reversing Lysanias’s person and affairs. Tablet 4.3 contains no verbs, but 4.4 deploys a form of δέω to restrain and incapacitate Lysanias, and thereby prevent him from opposing or challenging the curse-​ commissioner in any way. The adjectival form of the word was already in use before the mid-​fifth century, when Aeschylus’s Erinyes sang a “binding hymn” over Orestes to bind his wits on the eve of a trial: ὕμνον τόνδε δέσμιον, ὕμνος ἐξ Ἐρινύων δέσμιος φρενῶν (Aesch. Eum. 306, 331–​2).61 The noun κατάδεσμος was also used by Plato in the earlier fourth century to describe one ritual service offered by “collecting priests and seers” (ἀγύρται δὲ καὶ μάντεις, Resp. 364b–c). While absent from the earliest Selinountine curse tablets, forms of δέω and καταδέω lie at the conceptual heart of curse-​writing rituals in Classical Athens, it seems, from the beginnings of the practice. Other Attic curse practitioners targeted individuals known from the speeches of Lysias and Andocides, some of whom first emerge in connection with the profanation of the Mysteries and the Mutilation of the Herms in 415 bce, and were later involved in lawsuits around 400 bce. Consider 4.5, an oval, “tub-​shaped” tablet from the Kerameikos with a curse inscribed on its interior. The lead piece may have been intended to hold an effigy, but, after the edges were folded in, it was used as a support for a curse text; perhaps it once contained a wax, wood, or clay curse effigy, which has since deteriorated. Tablet 4.5 emerged in the same part of the Kerameikos as 4.3 and 4.4, which was probably a locus of early Attic curse practice among a kin group.

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Tablet 4.5. Peek 1941, no. 4 Found in embankments in the region of the Potamian and Hegeso precincts Early fourth century bce62 Kerameikos Archaeological Museum Inv. IB 8 (Figure 4.6) 1

5

Πυθέας Πύθιππος Ἡγέστρατος Σμιδυρίδης ὁπόσοι ἰσιν ἀντίδικοι Εὐόπηι μετὰ Πυθέο.

Pytheas, Pythippos, Hegestratos, Smi(n)dyrides, as many court-​opponents as there are for Euopes, together with Pytheas! (a)

(b)

Figure 4.6 Tablet 4.5, early fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 8), embankments in region of Potamian and Hegeso precincts. Photograph from DAI Athens, Kerameikos Archaeological Museum. Drawing by J. Curbera.

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In the fourth line, this curse cites one Smindyrides, a name rarer than those of the other victims.63 More striking still is the fact that another, contemporary judicial curse targeting a man named Smindyrides emerged nearby in the Kerameikos; the second column of tablet 4.6 below also cites Smindyrides, whose name is twice written backward and, in the opening line, marked off with a scribal diple. Tablet 4.6. Curbera and Papakonstantinou 2018, no. 1 Precinct South of the Sacred Way, Grave SA 40 Early fourth century bce Kerameikos Archaeological Museum Inv. IB 24–​42 (Figure 4.7) Col. I

Col. II

1  κ̣[αταδέω Ν]ΟΡΩΔΟΝΗΘ[Α] [πρὸς τὸ]ν Ἑρμῆν τὸν Ἐρι[όνι]-​ ον κα[ὶ π]ρὸς τὴν Φερσ[εφό]-​ νην καὶ [πρ]ὸς τὴν Λή[θην] 5  [κα]ὶ νον͂ αὐτο ͂ καὶ γλῶσαν κ[αὶ [ψυχ]ὴ̣ν καὶ ἔργα τὰ πρὸς ἡμᾶ-​ [ς ἐπι]β̣ο̣ λ̣ εύει καὶ τὴν δίκην [βλάβη]ς̣ τὴν ΟΡΩΔΟΝΗΘΑ̣ [τὴ]ν [πρὸς] ἡμᾶς δικάζεται.

[κ]αταδέω ΝΗΔΙΡΥΔΝΙΜΣ:< πρὸς τὸν Ἑρμῆν τὸν Ἑριόνιον καὶ πρὸς τ[ὴ]ν Φερσεφόνην καὶ πρὸς τὴ̣ν̣ [Λ]ήθην καὶ νον͂ αὐτο ͂ [κ]α̣ὶ̣ γλῶσαν καὶ ψυχὴν αὐτο ͂ [καὶ τὰvvv ἔρ]γα τὰ πρὸς ἡ-​ μᾶς̣ ἐ̣π[̣ ιβολvvv]εύει καὶ τὴν δίκην β̣λάβ̣[ης vvvv] τὴν ἡμῖν ἐ-​ π[ι]φέρε[ι] [ΣΗ]ΔΙΡΥΔΝΙΜΣ.

Col. III καταδ[έ]ω ΝΗΗΝΕ̣ΡΙ πρὸς τ̣[ὸν] Ἑρμῆν τὸν Ἐριόνιον καὶ [π]-​ ρὸς τὴν Φερσεφόνην καὶ [π]-​ ρὸς τὴν Λήθην καὶ νον͂ αὐ-​ τῆς καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ γλῶσαν καὶ ἔργα τὰ περὶ τῆς πρὸς ἡ-​ μᾶς δίκης λέγει, καταδέ-​ ω ἅπαντ’ αὐτῆς: κταδέ-​ ω {δεω} δὲ καὶ τὸς μάρτυ-​ ρας αὐ̣[τ]ῶν ἅπαντας καὶ τὸν [πολ]έμαρχον καὶ τὸ δικαστ̣[ήρι]ον τὸ το ͂ πολεμάρχο πρὸς τὸν̣ [Ἐ]ρ̣ιούνιον Ἑρμ̣ῆ̣ν̣ καὶ πρὸς τὴν Φερσεφόν[ην] καὶ πρὸ̣ς̣ τ̣ὴν̣ Λήθην, κα[τ]αδ[έω] κα̣ὶ [συδίκ]ος ἅπαντας τὸς με-​ {ε}τ᾽ ἐκε̣[ί]νων καὶ ἅπα[ν]τας -​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​-​

Col. I: I bind down Athenodoros before Hermes Eriounios and before Persephone and before Lethe, both his mind and tongue and soul and the deeds which he is plotting against us, and the dikē blabēs of Athenodoros which he brings to court against us. Col. II: I bind down Smindyrides before Hermes Eriounios and before Persephone and before Lethe, both his mind and tongue and his soul and the deeds that he is plotting against us, and the dikē blabēs which Smindyrides brings against us.

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Col. III: I bind down Eirene before Hermes Eriounios and before Persephone and before Lethe, both her mind and soul and tongue and deeds, the ones that, concerning the lawsuit, she says with respect to us: I bind down everything of hers! And I bind down all of their witnesses, and the polemarch and the court of the polemarch before Hermes Eriounios and before Persephone and before Lethe, and I bind down all the supporters with them and all. . . .

Figure 4.7 Tablet 4.6 (Curbera and Papakonstantinou 2018, no. 1), early fourth century bce. Found in Kerameikos (Inv. IB 24–​42), precinct south of the Sacred Way, Grave SA 40. Drawing by J. Curbera.

Dating from around 400 bce, tablets 4.5 and 4.6 both curse Smindyrides in the context of litigation. As scholars have pointed out, Smindyrides is also the name of an individual accused of profaning the Mysteries and mutilating the herms in 415 bce.64 Andocides notes that Smindyrides fled the city soon after his name was given to the Council (And. 1.16), but these tablets suggest that he had subsequently returned to Athens—​probably after the Amnesty of 403 bce— and, by the early fourth century, introduced a lawsuit for damages (δίκη βλάβης) in the courts. Tablet 4.6 also demonstrates how some early Attic curse-​writers drew authority from civic lists and decrees: the near-​stoichedon text unfolds in three neat columns, and makes use of punctuation and diacritics (: and