Magical Resistance, Then and Now
Or, Why I Didn't Choose the Hex Life, the Hex Life Chose Me
Rome wasn’t built in a day…but it did burn down in one.1 And that’s not really surprising when you have a city of wood and your technology is fire. Human institutions are equally fragile. What took generations to create and develop and refine can be dismantled in an instant when your government is made of paper and its leaders carry torches.2
I’m going to cover curse tablets, magical amulets, and poppets in depth in later posts, but given the despairing feelings of many on the left and my own impotent rage at the destruction of our (admittedly flawed) institutions, regulatory bodies, and civil rights, I think it is a good time to explore ancient avenues of magical resistance. Read to the end for a modern take on the ancient binding spell.
While the debate around the purpose of witchcraft is ongoing in both practitioner and scholarly circles (was it historically just a way for the disempowered to reclaim some autonomy, or was there more to it?), it is clear that ancient Greeks and Romans both used magic as an outlet when there were few other options and believed such magic got results.
Curse Tablets
Numerous curse tablets sought to bind the tongues of prosecutors and witnesses. Curse tablets, called katadesmoi in Greek and defixiones in Latin, were sheets of lead inscribed with the names of gods to enact the curse, names of the objects of the curse, the desired results, and a variety of drawings and magic words. Once inscribed, the sheet of lead would be rolled and pierced to bind the object of the curse and safeguard the contents “for the gods’ eyes only.”
My favorites are found in John G. Gager’s Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the Ancient World (the following translations are his). The authors seek to prevent the prosecution and witnesses from speaking out against them. These curses got me thinking about certain lawsuits and Supreme Court justices, as well as appointed officials desiring to tear down civil rights…
From 5th-century BCE Sicily, a tablet (Gager 51) is inscribed:
(side A) I inscribe Selinontios and the tongue of Selinontios, twisted to the point of uselessness for them. And I inscribe, twisted to the point of uselessness, the tongues of the foreign witnesses.
(side B) I inscribe Timasoi and the tongue of Timasoi, twisted to the point of uselessness. I inscribe Turrana and the tongue of Turrana, twisted to the point of uselessness for all of them.
Another tablet from Sicily (Gager 49, 6th-century BCE) is corroded, but seems to make the same request:
(side A) The tongue of Euklês and that of Aristophanis and that of Angeilis and that of Alkiphrôn and that of Hagestratos. Of the advocates, of Euklês and Aristophanis, their tongues. And the tongue of …
(side B) and that of Oinotheos and that of … the tongue.
Another tablet (Gager 46), from 2nd- or 3rd-century CE Cyprus, seeks to bind a governor from acting against the author:
Daimones [spirits] under the earth and daimones whoever you may be…take over the voices of my opponents, (I) Alexandros also called Makedonios…namely Theodôros the governor and Timôn…give muzzle to Theodôros the governor of Cyprus and to Timôn, so that they will be unable to do anything against me…
Another curse tablet—this one from Ogden’s Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds number 179, Ogden’s translations—calls upon ghosts to help the author who has been confined in Rome. He curses the whole of Italy, that it be restrained from containing him. Such a curse might be helpful turned against ICE and gates of detention centers (or Guantanamo Bay, WTF).
Restrain Artemidoros the doctor of the Third Praetorian Cohort. The brother of the dead Demetrios is his servant, who now wants to go out to his own fatherland. Therefore do not let him [stop me] but restrain the Italian land, knock out the gates of the Romans…
Amulets
An amulet spell (Ogden 267) similarly aims to ward off lawsuits and evildoers. This one, written from the perspective of both the author and the avenging god, could similarly be turned against ICE and their campaign of harassment against migrants:
I am the great god sitting in heaven, the mobile sphere of the entire universe, Arsenophrephres…let evil manifest itself no more. Send away, send away the lawsuit from Rufina. And if anyone harms me in the future, turn them away.
Kolossoi
Ogden (236) also includes a wax poppet spell (4th century BCE, Cyrene) against those who break oaths, made at the foundation of the settlement. This curse is a useful template against elected or appointed officials who swear an oath to MAGA over country.
They called down curses on those who should foreswear themselves and fail to abide by their oath… They molded wax dolls and burned them while calling down the curse… They prayed that the one who did not abide by these oaths but foreswore himself should melt and dissolve just like the dolls, he himself, his descendants, and his property…
Handbills
Finally, Suetonius (Ogden 294) records a little spell by the astrologers expelled from Rome by the emperor Vitellius in 69 CE. I’m not saying the federal workforce being pressured to resign should respond to the “fork in the road” email with this sentiment, but I’m not saying they shouldn’t…
He [Vitellius] was furious because when he had issued the edict in which he ordered the astrologers to depart from the city and from Italy by October 1, a handbill was circulated that said, “And the Chaldaeans [astrologers] say, for the good of the state, may Vitellius Germanicus cease to exist before that same day.”3
A Binding Spell against Enemies of Democracy
Let’s make our own binding spell against those in the executive and judicial branches threatening to burn down our democracy. There are so many destructive sociopaths taking a sledgehammer to the rights and protections of the American people right now, it’s hard to make a definitive list. But here are some suggestions:
Donald Trump, convicted felon and POTUS
Elon Musk, unelected co-POTUS and head of DOGE
Russell Vought, author of Project 2025 and about-to-be-confirmed head of the Office of Management and Budget
Stephen Miller, miserable person and deputy chief of policy
Mike Johnson, hobbyist porn patrol officer and Speaker of the House
literally anyone in the Trump administration, you can’t go wrong with your picks here
This spell is constructed using “sympathetic magic.” Sympathetic magic works on the principle of correspondence, the idea that magic worked on a person’s name or representative object will affect the person themself: writing a name upside or backwards will confuse the name’s owner, a cord binding the name on paper will bind the name’s owner, crumpling or rolling the name on paper will addle or cripple the name’s owner, freezing the name on paper will freeze out or dull the name’s owner, you get the idea.
So grab a piece of paper. We’ll use the text from Gager 51 as our model:
I inscribe [insert Name A] and the tongue of [insert Name A], twisted to the point of uselessness for them. And I inscribe, twisted to the point of uselessness, the tongues of [insert Name B] and [insert Name C].
I inscribe [insert Name D] and the tongue of [insert Name D], twisted to the point of uselessness. I inscribe [insert Name E] and the tongue of [insert Name E], twisted to the point of uselessness for all of them.
Add a creepy drawing or magic words of your choice.
Now roll or crumple your paper and wind a cord around it nine times, then knot your cord three times (nine and three being magical numbers).
Deposit your curse in a snow-bank or a pan of water (which you will place in the freezer). Leave it to rot outside or get freezer burn (more sympathetic magic!).
Hexed be.4
Well, nine days, but you get my point.
Then again, the paper has always been pretty bad.
They were off by a couple months, but Vitellius did die a nasty death on December 22.
I am not a Wiccan, nor do I subscribe to the Wiccan Rede of “harm none.” The high road is for those with the privilege to take it.
Outstanding article. I am a jar witch but I love the wording!
Dang, girl. I'm THRILLED to see you here! Fantastic title & posts.