#nippur

With but a portion of incantation bowls officially registered as archaeological finds, kept in museums and universities, there are estimated to be thousands more bowls in private collections of antiquities around the world. Incantation bowls have been an invaluable source for studying the beliefs and customs of those who used them, and they provide a glimpse into the history of magic within Judaism.

'Beyond what these bowls tell us about Jewish magic, about what these communities were doing at the time, they answer bigger cultural and historical questions around inter-religious context. [...] This environment is far richer than anyone could imagine.' -Simcha Gross (The Story the Bowls Tell, Michele W. Berger)

What are incantation bowls?

Incantation bowls are a form of magic most commonly used to repel, trap, and/or bind demons, spirits, or malevolent entities, though bowls have also been discovered bearing inscriptions detailing curses, counter-curses, and even love spells.

'The incantation bowls belong, with few exceptions, to one very specialized form of magic. They spontaneously suggest the art of "bowl magic," which, in various forms, is spread over the world, and which has a straight genealogy from Joseph's drinking cup to the spinster's teacup of our own day.' -Professor James A. Montgomery (Aramaic Incantation Texts from Nippur)

They were first discovered by archaeologists in the mid-19th century. You'll also hear them called Babylonian incantation bowls, magic bowls, demon bowls, and even sometimes Moses bowls. Incantation bowls were used during Late Antiquity (3rd - 7th century CE, with the majority of the bowls hailing from the 5th-7th century) within the Near East, particularly throughout Mesopotamia.

Incantation bowl from Nippur inscribed in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, discovered 1888-1889 and photographed circa 1913; courtesy of the Pennsylvania University Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology

While incantation bowls are not exclusively Jewish, the majority of those discovered are — featuring depictions and/or descriptions of Jewish demons or spirits (though drawings are found only on some incantation bowls, not on all), invocations of Jewish angels, use of vowel permutation representing epithets of the Jewish g-d, and Jewish language, Hebrew square-script and Jewish Babylonian Aramaic in particular, a language most commonly identified with the Babylonian Talmud, the Targum Onkelos (the Aramaic translation of the Torah), and Gaonic (post-Talmudic) literature.

'In the mid-19th century, we begin to unearth incantation bowls that name the clients who purchase the bowl, their problems, their families. These people invoke various powerful forces and deities to resolve a variety of issues, offering a literary corpus that provides a new perspective.' -Simcha Gross (The Story the Bowls Tell, Michele W. Berger)

Much of our knowledge of Jewish incantation bowls comes from the study of surviving bowls from Babylon, the majority of which were uncovered in the Jewish diasporic settlement in Nippur, where nearly every home excavated was found to have incantation bowls buried in, around, or beneath them.

'...the number of bowls found in controlled archeological excavations does suffice to formulate some general conception of their geographical and chronological distribution and of the modes in which they were put to use, and the texts and drawings found upon the bowls themselves provide abundant information about the clients who ordered them, about the bowls’ aims, and about the cultural world of the scribes who produced them.' - Professor Gideon J. Bohak (Ancient Jewish Magic: A History)

'Hebrew bowl' of ceramic and ink, featuring images of at least one demon (possibly two demons, though James A. Montgomery suggested it could depict a demon and the sorcerer) surrounded by seven lines of Hebrew Aramaic text; courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology.

There are those who diminish the importance of incantation bowls not only in their archaeological significance but also in what they can reveal about Jewish custom in Late Antiquity, those who see their magical association as a mark of unsophistication. On this matter, Simcha Gross, assistant professor of Ancient Rabbinics in the Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations Department at the University of Pennsylvania, had this to say in The Story the Bowls Tell:

'We’re finally beginning to move past this idea that magic is strange, this separate domain of life. [...] We’re also beginning to better understand that previous ideas that assumed that the bowls represent the interest of a lower, popular, or non-elite class of Jews [...] simply do not hold; the bowls were a surface on which scribes from a range of social, educational, and religious background wrote incantations.' 

How were they made?

Ceramic incantation bowl uncovered in Nippur, featuring an image of a demon in chains surrounded by text in Aramaic, 400-700 CE; courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology &Anthropology.

The Babylonian incantations bowls were earthenware - ceramic or clay. The text and imagery were added to the surfaces of the bowls in ink. Many of the bowls are believed by archaeologists to have been wheel made. The bowls would likely have been commissioned, with scribes and/or magicians working to craft these bowls for paying customers. Inscriptions often included scriptural quotes, quotes from rabbinic texts, curses, counter-curses, spells, and listed epithets of g-d and/or names of angels, with some of the bowls also featuring figures introduced from other cultures through proximity of settlement, trade, and political or cultural impact.

'Some of the Aramaic incantation bowls contain deities, formulae, and spells whose origins go back to older Babylonian magic and religion.' -Professor Gideon J. Bohak (Ancient Jewish Magic: A History)

Discovered bowls have been of varying shape and size, so there seems to be no particular rules as to the depth or width an incantation bowl should be, though most of them have been repeatedly compared by experts to 'the size of the average cereal bowl.'

Ceramic incantation bowl uncovered in Nippur, 400-700 CE; courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology &Anthropology.

While some bowls may have been made specifically for the purpose of supernatural and magical protection, Professor Gideon J. Bohak suggests that plain bowls were also bought at market and taken to a scribe or magician, who went on to craft the magical work on the bowl they'd been given.

How did they work?

Incantation bowls can be described as a form of amulet. Amuletic magic has been used for means of protection throughout Jewish history and is discussed in the Talmud. The spells featured on most of the bowls are apotropaic — protective magic used to ward off evil, harm, or suffering. In the case of those incantation bowls intended to serve the purpose of protection, they're specifically designed to protect persons or households from evil or evil entities. They typically specify which demon or spirit they're intended to guard against, though they could also be used to protect against sorcery, illness, disease, evil eye, or general evils as well. The intended recipients of this supernatural protection are also almost always named in the spells.

Incantation bowls were commonly placed beneath homes or at the corners of homes, beneath specific rooms (such as bedrooms to ward off a nightmare-inducing demon), within courtyards, and even within cemeteries with the aim of protecting these areas from demonic or malevolent entities.

'When found in controlled excavations, the bowls are most commonly found in upside-down position (a fact which incidentally helped protect the texts and drawings, which are usually written on the bowls' inside) within the premises of a dwelling, or under the thresholds, or in a cemetery, or in a large group of bowls in one location (perhaps the atelier which produced them).' -Professor Gideon J. Bohak (Ancient Jewish Magic: A History)

It's said that by reading the text of the inscriptions, demons would become trapped. The demon or spirit would start reading from the outermost ring of text and move inward (the text was most commonly inscribed in a spiral pattern), and by the time they finished the text nearest the center of the bowl, they’d be trapped inside the vessel.

'The bowls were buried upside down under the floors of houses in strategic locations — under the door sills, in the corners of rooms— likely to protect against evil demons' -Richard Zettler, archaeologist and curator-in-charge of the Near East section at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology (The Story the Bowls Tell, Michele W. Berger)

'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.' -Dr. John Charles Arnold (The Footprints of Michael the Archangel)

Other means of trapping demons by use of incantation bowl have been found. For example, there have been instances of two bowls having been glued or bound together, rim-to-rim, facing inward. Sometimes the space within the two bowls would contain items (Hilprecht notes broken eggshells being discovered within some) that served to further strengthen the protective properties of the work.

To protect against sorcery, evil eye, or malicious magic sent one's way, the bowls could be used either to trap the workings inside and strip them of their strength and power or to return the magic to its sender, redirecting any magical harm back to whomever performed or wished such magical works against you.

Not all incantation bowls served as means of protection. Indeed, some have been discovered to feature healing spells, curses, counter-curses, and, though rarely, love spells.

'Most of the inscriptions are of domestic character, being made out for a married couple, their children, their house, and their property, cattle, etc. Frequently it is the wife and mother who procures the charm, with or without reference to the husband. In many of the inscriptions there is special intention against the evils that disturb the domestic sexual life.' -Professor James A. Montgomery (Aramaic Incantation Texts from Nippur)

the Inscriptions

Many of the registered bowls, unfortunately, have partially or majorly ineligible inscriptions, due to damage, aging, fading of the ink, or the quality of the inscription. Some techniques, such as multispectral imaging, have been used in recent years to enhance the texts, which has helped with some of the difficulties researchers were previously facing in deciphering some of the bowls. Dedicated professionals and scholars, such as James A. Montgomery, are to thank for earlier knowledge on the inscriptions and what we can glean from them about the Jewish people's use of incantation bowls in Late Antiquity.

Incantation bowls were inscribed in a variety of languages. Less than half of all discovered bowls bear Mandaic or Syriac scripts, with a small handful of bowls having been inscribed in a form of Pahlavi script or in a form of Arabic. The overwhelming majority of discovered bowls, though, were inscribed in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, as showcased on far more than half of the published bowls.

The most common form of writing found on incantation bowls is Aramaic square-script.

'The bowls written in the square script [...] contain many biblical verses (usually cited in the Hebrew original, but sometimes in an Aramaic Targum) and many specifically Jewish terms, concepts, and stories; a few even cite passages from the rabbis’ Mishnah.' -Professor Gideon J. Bohak (Ancient Jewish Magic: A History)

Several of the bowls feature liturgical or scriptural references, as well as quotes from Jewish prayers. The use of scriptural quotes was (and still is) believed to evoke supernatural protection, and scholars say that the use of rabbinic texts on some bowls demonstrates that there was a belief that rabbinic texts are sacred enough to do the same. In fact, as Dr. Avigail Manekin-Bamberger points out in Naming Demons: The Aramaic Incantation Bowls and Gittin, one incantation bowl quotes Mishnah Zevahim 5:3, and in leading into that reference you'll find inscribed 'בשום' (meaning 'in the name of'). 'בשום' would typically be used when invoking divine forces such as deities or angels, and to use that term before quoting or citing a piece of text implies that the text itself has some level of supernatural power, enough to, in this case, grant one protection.

Not only were religious and rabbinic texts and references put to use in the inscriptions, but so were legal formulae and terminology. Some inscriptions are written up similar to contracts, establishing set rules as to what powers (with the intention of limiting said powers to render them useless) a demonic force, magical work, or ailment will have on a client, and doing so in a strict, legal tone.

The use of legal formulae also demonstrates the belief that the supernatural realm and its inhabitants were, at least to some extent, bound by the same laws and expectations as we are as natural, mortal beings. On this, Dr. Abigail Manekin-Bamberger says in Seder Mazikin: Law and Magic in Late Antique Jewish Society, "Just as there are expectations that humans will obey the human legal system and the systems of enforcement, so too one can subdue and restrain demons. Because the legal system is the central institution for dealing with infractions of the law on the human side, it is not surprising that this same system is used in the war against demons."

Some bowls feature extremely detailed inscriptions, naming those they're intended to protect, from whom the protection is needed, and the specific capabilities of said demon or curse that the client wishes to be prevent. One example of a wonderfully detailed incantation (used to protect a client and his wife from Lilitu, Liliths, or Lilith Demons) translation (by Professor James A. Montgomery) can be found below —

Hebrew bowl used to protect from Lilitu, courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology.

This the amulet of Ephrâ bar Šabôrdûch, wherein shall be salvation for this Ephrâ b. Š. and also for this Bahmandûch bath Samâ, that there be for them salvation, namely for this Ephrâ b. Š. and for this Bahmandûch b. Š. Amen, Amen, Selah. This is an amulet against the Liliths that haunt the house of this Ephrâ b. Š. and this Bahmandûch b. Š. I adjure you, all species of Liliths in respect to your posterity, which is begotten by Demons and Liliths to the children of light who go astray: Woe, who rebel and transgress against the proscription of their Lord; woe, from the blast fast-flying; woe, destroying; woe, oppressing with your foul wounds .... , who do violence and trample and scourge and mutilate and break and confuse and hobble and dissolve (the body) like water; woe, …. ; and where you stand, and where you stand (sic) fearful and affrighted are ye, bound to my ban, — who appear to mankind, to men in the likeness of women and to women in the likeness of men, and with mankind they lie by night and by day. With the formula, TWM Š'Š GŠ GŠK have I written against thee, evil Lilith, whatsoever name be thine. We have written. And his name shall save thee, Ephrâ, forever and ever.

As mentioned before, protection from demonic forces, such as the Lilitu specified and described in the above inscription, was a common purpose of the crafting or commissioning of incantation bowls. Lilitu are mentioned again, along with demons in general and some demonic epithets, in the bowl just below, for which the translation has also been included (as found in Montgomery's seminal work Aramaic Incatation Texts from Nippur.)

Hebrew bowl from Nippur of ceramic and ink, courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology &Anthropology; featured in Montgomery's Aramaic Incantations from Nippur (see below).

The text has been translated :

This bowl is designated for the sealing of the house and the wife and the children of Dinôi bar Ispandarmêd, that there remove from him the Tormentor and evil Dreams. The bowl I deposit and sink down, a work which has been made like that which Rab Jesus bar Peraḥia sat and wrote against them, — a ban-writ against all the Demons and Devils and Satans and Liliths and Latbe which are in the house of Dinôi b. I. Again, he wrote against them a ban-writ which is for all time, by the virtue of 'TMDG, Atâtôt Atôt, within T (?), Atôt Atôt the name, a writing within a writing. Through which (words) were subjected heaven and earth and the mountains; and through which the heights were commanded; and through which were fettered Arts, Demons and Devils and Satans and Liliths and Latbê; and through which he passed over from this world and climbed above you to the height (of heaven) and learned all counter-charms, a ruin into destruction, and [...] to bring you forth from the house of Dinôi b. I., and from all that is in his house, I have dismissed you by the ban-writ. And charmed and sealed and countersealed is it, even as ancient runes fail not, and (like) ancient men who are not. Again: charmed and sealed and countersealed is this ban-writ by the virtue of YHYHYHYHYH, THTH, THTH, A'. Amen, Amen, Selah. Sealed and protected are the house and dwelling of Dinôi b. I. from the Tormentor and evil Dreams and the Curse. And sealed and protected be his wife and son from the Tormentor and evil Dreams and Curse and Vows and .... Hallela, Amen.

The charms utilized on the above bowl are, as we learn from the translation, attributed to Rab Jesus bar Peraḥia, also referred to as Joshua ben Peraḥia on other incantation bowls, who was a magician and one of the Zugot, a scholar who received and handed down Jewish law and tradition.

'Several of the Nippur texts contain magical formulas worked in the name of Rabbi Joshua ben Perahia (Syriac, Rab Jesus bar P.), who is none other than one of the early Zugoth or Pairs who handed down the Tradition from the Great Synagogue to later ages. Whether this magical tradition concerning the venerable Joshua be authentic may be dubious; but the case is illustrative of the tendency in magic to appeal to ancient great masters of sorcery, and to use their names as though their full powers were possessed.' -Professor James A. Montgomery (Aramaic Incantation Texts from Nippur)

You'll find that a few rabbis feature, mentioned by name, on some of the other incantation bowls, either as clients who have commissioned the bowls themselves and seek their protective powers or as authors of the magical formulae put to work on the amulets. The latter of these two rabbinical groups were typically rabbis believed to have been magical workers themselves, to have harnessed some level of supernatural ability, and who were thought to be capable of the exorcising of and protection from demonic and evil forces.

And, as mentioned before (and as can only be expected), the invoking of divine names and epithets and the names of angels is also found within the incantations of the bowls, such as in the bowl translated (by Montgomery) below. Angelic names were commonly highlighted in some way, be that with an underscore, a line above the name, or the name circled, as you may notice within the inscription below.

Hebrew bowl from Nippur made of ceramic and ink; courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology.

Notice that this bowl also features text on its exterior side. The text is translated as follows:

Interior of the bowl -

Closed are the mouths of all races, legions and tongues from Bahmandûch bath Samâi. And the angel Raḥmiel and the angel Ḥabbiel and the angel Ḥanniniel, these angels, pity and love and compassionate and embrace Bahmandûch b. S. Before all the sons of Adam whom he begat by Eve, we will enter in before them; from their clothing they will clothe her and from their garments they will garb her, the garment of the grace of G-d. With her they will sit, on this side and on that, driving away (demons?), as is right. In the name of Yhwhin-Yah, El-El the great, the awful, whose word is panacea, this mystery is confirmed, made fast and sure forever and ever.

Exterior of the bowl -

Hark a voice in the mysteries! Hark the voice of [...], the voice of a woman, a virgin travailing and not bearing. Quickly be enamored, be enamored and come Ephrâ bar Šabôrdûch to the marrow of his house and to the marrow of Bahmandûch b. S. his wife; as (she was) a virgin (?) travailing and bearing not, so (may she be) fresh myrtle for crowns. Amen, Amen. And made fast and sure is salvation from Heaven for Bahmandûch b. S. A preparation (?) …. leaven, press it (?) …. Amen, Amen, Selah. Salvation and peace from Heaven, forever and ever and ever.

The above inscription is an example of incantation bowls not only being used as a means of protection against demons, with this bowl seeming to feature a charm for a woman to prevent barenness and encourage love from her husband toward her.

When incantation bowls feature imagery or drawings (these are almost always found at the center of the bowls, with the spiraling text leading inward toward these images), they commonly depict specific demons, who are often chained or bound in some way, demonstrating the aim of trapping the demon or rendering them powerless. Sometimes, depictions of the client themselves or the scribe or magician are featured on the bowl.

Some bowls also feature texts of an exorcistic nature, such as Psalms frequently used to expel demons or spirits. One unique formula of spell well-attested within published incantation bowls is that of an anti-demonic magical get (or bill of divorce). The writ of divorce would specify a separation from the demons or spirits that had become attached to an individual, their family, or their place of residence. Some such incantations specifically contain the words 'divorce document' or 'writ of divorce'.

One such bowl, translated by Dr. Dan Levene, reads:

This is a divorce writ for the Lilith that curses which I have written for Imi daughter of Qaqi and any name she has.  May you be healed, may you be protected, may you be saved ... from every evil strong powerful spirit, from active sorcerers, from spells of ZNY the singer prostitute, and the Lilith, and the curse, which is killing children that are hers, children of her (female) neighbor. That if you are permitted and have power over yourself (to be with) any person that you may desire, for I have written to you a deed of divorce, a writ of dismissal from this Imi daughter of Qaqi (and) any name that she has…

Incantation bowls seeking to provide supernatural protection to livestock would feature images of the animals one wanted to protect, and bowls crafted with the goal of protecting one from dangerous animals, such as certain snakes, would bear an image of said beast.

Some inscriptions bore renditions of word-triangles (a custom in Jewish magical praxis that came from Greko-Egyptian magical influence throughout Jewish regions). When featured on incantation bowls, they are written in straight line form, however, instead of in their usual triangular form. These would typically feature words (or vowel permutations) listing or describing an ailment or evil of some kind, with one letter being removed each time the word is written, until there is but one letter left, thereby symbolically removing or warding off the ailment or evil from whomever the spell is meant to protect.

'Hebrew bowl' of ceramic and ink; courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology.

The text on the bowl pictured above is described thusly in the University of Pennsylvania Museum catalogue, "This bowl was prepared to protect Abuna bar Geribta and Ibba bar Zawithai from a series of evil forces, and its writer drew his power from the garment of Hermes and the Creator of heaven and earth. He threatened the destructive forces with the curses of the Leviathan and Sodom and Gemorrah. The circular format of the text is normal for magic bowls, but the presence of an illustration is unusual, though not unique. The figures are not labelled, and their identities and purposes are not certain. J.A. Montgomery, who first published the Nippur bowls, suggested that the figure with the bound feet is a demon and that the other figure is the sorcerer."

The Importance of Incantation Bowls

'The study of Babylonian incantation bowls has occupied scholars since James Alan Montgomery’s publications of bowls from the region of Nippur in 1913. They have been of particular interest to scholars in recent years, both because the corpus contributes relatively new and unexploited sources for the study of ancient religion, and because the bowls provide access to harder-to-access and thus understudied realms of life, not least the fears and concerns of everyday people who worried about their physical safety, health, livelihoods, love interests, childbirth, and families.' -Sarit Kattan Gribetz (in her review of Seder Mazikin: Law and magic in Late Antique Jewish Society)

And the study of these bowls also serves as a boon to the study of early rabbinic literature:

'The texts written upon the bowls constitute the only Jewish epigraphic material that survives from Babylonia at the time of the editing of the Talmud (the earliest evidence of copied Talmudic texts are from the mid-eighth century), so they are of considerable importance to the study of rabbinic literature.' - Dr. Avigail Manekin-Bamberger (Naming Demons: The Aramaic Incantation Bowls and Gittin)

Indeed, the wonders and mysteries of incantation bowls are still being uncovered today by dedicated archaeologists, researchers and scholars, and experts in ancient languages of the Near East, and there are still many questions to be answered. One large-scale project is underway at the University of Pennsylvania, aiming to better study the inscriptions featured on the bowls in their collection, as well as to create an open database showcasing the published incantation bowls around the world, accessible to all who should wish to learn about the bowls and enjoy their many offerings to our understanding of Jewish magic as well as Jewish life in Late Antiquity. I, for one, am very much looking forward to the day such a monumental project is "completed."

The significance of these incantation bowls and similar relics of Jewish magic throughout history cannot be overstated. It is through studying such matters that we can better connect with and understand those who have gone before us, as well as, perhaps, renew customs and practices, many of which Jewish practitioners will likely find to be beautiful, comforting, and empowering, that were once a part of Jewish life that have sadly been forgotten by the majority of us.

If this piece, as verbose and perhaps overly detailed as it may be, can ignite for even just one reader an interest in the magical world of Jewish incantation bowls and the beautiful history told through them, then I feel I've done my bit, and all the books checked out, bought, repeatedly poured over, and painstakingly analyzed will have certainly been worth it.

SOURCES & FURTHER READING:

'A Corpus of Magical Bowls: Incantation Texts in Jewish Aramaic from Late Antiquity' - Levene, Dan; Dr.

'Amulets and Magic Bowls: Aramaic Incantations of Late Antiquity' - Naveh, Joseph; Prof. & Shaked, Shaul; Prof.

'Ancient Jewish Magic: A History' - Bohak, Gideon J.; Prof.

'Aramaic Incantation Bowls' - Gordon, Cyrus H.; Dr.

'Aramaic Incantation Bowls in Museum Collections, Vol. I: the Frau Professor Hilprecht Collection of Babylonian Antiquities' - Ford, James Nathan; Dr. & Morgenstern, Matthew; Prof.

'Aramaic Incantations from Nippur' - Montgomery, James A.; Prof.

'Corpus of Aramaic Incantation Bowls' - Isbell, Charles D.

'Divorcing Lilith: From the Babylonian Incantation Bowls to the Cairo Genizah' - Levene, Dan; Dr. & Bohak, Gideon; Prof.

'the Footprints of Michael the Archangel' - Arnold, John Charles; Dr.

'Incantation Bowls & Embodied Knowledge' - Dalton, Krista; Dr.

'Jewish Magic in Late Antiquity' - Schwarz, Michael D.; Dr.

'Mesopotamian Magic: Textual, Historical, and Interpretive Perspectives' - Abusch, Tzvi; Dr. & van der Toorn, Karel; Prof.

'Naming Demons: the Aramaic Incantation Bowls and Gittin' - Manekin, Bamberger, Avigail; Dr.

'Seder Mazikin: Law and Magic in Late Antique Jewish Society' -Manekin-Bamberger, Abigail; Dr.

'the Story the Bowls Tell' - Berger, Michele W.