Incantation bowl

Incantation bowls are a form of protective magic found in what is now Iraq and Iran. Produced in the Middle East during late antiquity from the sixth to eighth centuries, particularly in Upper Mesopotamia and Syria,^[1] the bowls were usually inscribed in a spiral, beginning from the rim and moving toward the center. Most are inscribed in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic.

Scholar John Charles Arnold states the bowls were used as such: "When placed upside down under each corner of a house, demons would follow the inscribed charms that spiraled from the outer rim inward, only to be caught in the center."^[2] They were commonly placed under the threshold, courtyards, in the corner of the homes of the recently deceased and in cemeteries.^[3]

The majority of Mesopotamia's population were either Christian, Manichaean, Mandaean, Jewish, or adherents of the ancient Babylonian religion, all of whom spoke Aramaic dialects. Zoroastrians who spoke Persian also lived here. Mandaeans and Jews each used their own Aramaic variety, although very closely related. A subcategory of incantation bowls are those used in Jewish and Christian magical practice (see Jewish magical papyri for context). The majority of recovered incantation bowls were written in Jewish Aramaic. These are followed in frequency by the Mandaic language and then Syriac. A handful of bowls have been discovered that were written in Arabic or Persian. An estimated 10% of incantation bowls were not written in any real language but pseudo-script. They are thought to be forgeries by illiterate “scribes” and sold to illiterate clients. The bowls are thought to have been regularly commissioned across religious lines.^[4]