Rowan & Pine: A Feminist Folklore & Mythology Podcast - Episode Twenty-Nine： Greco-Roman Witchcraft - We love scary b＊tch＊s!

00:00:00.000 Magic differs from religion as weeds differ from flowers. Merely by negative social evaluation. Robert Parker.

00:00:14.000 Welcome back everybody. Hi everyone. Did you miss us when we took our birthday break? For our birthday? I like saying our birthday. Our birthday. So do I. It's like I'm talking to my brother as well because that's what we say. We say our birthday.

00:00:28.760 so you've always just shared a birthday yeah i share my birthday with a lot of people

00:00:33.000 especially because my husband's birthday is three days after mine and now my brother-in-law's

00:00:40.820 girlfriend her birthday is two days after mine so we just had a really big celebration the other

00:00:47.980 day it's just a big old house of capricorns yikes yikes just kidding we are the best astrological

00:00:54.980 sign thank you yeah we're the best at everything if you're new here hello uh we might have some

00:00:59.720 new listeners from the all kill and no filler facebook group i know a lot of you guys who

00:01:04.540 listen to that podcast uh we're kind enough to check out our podcast so hello we're not as funny

00:01:12.740 as those people but we'll try they're professional comedians emily we can't compete with that

00:01:17.380 and to our one what is it lithuanian listener who are you where are you please reveal yourself

00:01:24.260 hello hello our gender neutral lithuanian listener we hope you're staying warm it is

00:01:30.200 really snowy in ireland right now which is cool i went out for a crunch crunch earlier

00:01:35.040 i really like going out there when the snow is crunchy yeah so do i some people hate that sound

00:01:41.380 and i love that sound the best sound ever very satisfying making me feel like i'm living in

00:01:47.060 fargo i've been asking emily a lot of questions about minnesota because of fargo and she keeps

00:01:51.780 reiterating to me that fargo is not in minnesota it's not in minnesota they keep referring to it

00:01:58.740 as being in minnesota it's not for some reason um it's just funny because it's like a role reversal

00:02:04.940 of when emily is watching dairy girls and asking me questions about dairy and the north of ireland

00:02:13.620 in general so now she's getting it all back about uh the midwest so yeah because what did you say

00:02:19.620 do people say commode yeah they keep referring to go to the toilet as opposed to you gotta use

00:02:23.680 the commode and um emily's like yeah we don't do that yeah no i told neve the only place i ever

00:02:29.840 heard it was when i was in the hospital and they had like a little like a little bucket on like a

00:02:36.060 cart like an actual rolled it in like they're like do you need the commode and i was like sure

00:02:41.920 all i know is i have to poop myself so what did we say about personal stories

00:02:49.420 here i go again

00:02:51.500 oh my goodness we're emily and neve we overshare yeah yeah so that is emily and i am neve and we

00:03:00.020 are ronan pine and oh my god i'm so excited for you our listener because we are about to start

00:03:06.700 a whole series the thickest series of them all the thickest with two c's possibly a third c

00:03:14.160 maybe a queue actually yeah i think there's a queue in this it's so thick maybe maybe maybe two

00:03:20.420 yeah our series is on witchcraft you're gonna get a lot of like nice big fat juicy episodes

00:03:27.900 is this getting very visceral i don't know we're gonna take a little hop skip trip around the world

00:03:34.500 and uh look at witchcraft and how you can interpret witchcraft and magic and cunning and

00:03:43.600 insert word here for whatever sort of folk healing remedy for all different sorts of cultures and

00:03:51.840 we're going to go way back through to ancient history because we're giant nerds and we've been

00:03:57.240 sending each other screenshots of old books and talking about oh my god i find this quote isn't

00:04:03.620 this cool and it genuinely is cool so um if you're a big nerd about witchcraft you're in the right

00:04:08.160 place not even like hashtag witches of instagram we're talking about the history of it yeah and

00:04:15.600 and basically what's been really funny is that neve and i have been talking about it and sharing

00:04:21.560 what we found and our sources and all that stuff and we were like should we just become

00:04:26.700 like a witch historian podcast because there's so much out there and it's all so interesting

00:04:32.780 and there's so much more than the salem witch trials right but that's going to be a later

00:04:36.800 episode because we can't do one on this if we don't talk about witch trials but it's not just

00:04:41.860 going to be salem right we'll talk about some other trials and um witch hunts that we're going

00:04:47.160 on eye-opening it's fascinating it's depressing it's a lot of the things do we have any housekeeping

00:04:55.000 before we get into it housekeeping oh yeah we got who sent us that really lovely message do you want

00:05:02.740 to give them a little shout out we can hold please it might encourage more lovely messages

00:05:07.880 i'm not sure how to pronounce their name it is either nish or niche n-i-s-h new friend of the

00:05:16.400 podcast so thank you nish slash slash niche that's so lovely to let you took the time to send us such

00:05:22.740 a nice message we're not going to read now because nobody cares but us but we do care it was such a

00:05:26.860 great message and i opened it right as we were just about to record and i read it to neve

00:05:32.320 and we both were just like

00:05:34.120 aww we were expecting it to go

00:05:36.440 the complete opposite way we thought it was

00:05:38.320 going to be a criticism but it

00:05:40.300 wasn't it was the nicest message ever

00:05:42.140 when you see like a block of text or a paragraph you're like

00:05:44.320 oh no

00:05:44.660 what is this yeah when it's like I'm

00:05:47.740 five episodes in and I really like you it's like

00:05:50.220 uh

00:05:50.680 yeah

00:05:54.200 we're going down

00:05:55.880 but thank you so much and that's

00:05:58.460 setting us up for our new

00:05:59.800 little series

00:06:01.280 sorry to anybody who isn't interested

00:06:03.480 in witchcraft

00:06:04.400 but you can speed listen when we're done

00:06:07.500 yeah you also might

00:06:09.600 be tuned out of our episodes

00:06:11.400 for like six episodes

00:06:13.380 and we're very sorry but also not sorry

00:06:15.360 because we wanted to do this

00:06:16.600 and also then when it's done

00:06:19.620 it's done and then we'll go

00:06:21.500 into a lot of other stuff we've got a few

00:06:23.300 requests for episodes on deck already

00:06:25.620 from real life people

00:06:27.520 as if everybody else isn't real

00:06:29.740 people in our in our real life just a bunch of fake people and also discord also small plug to

00:06:37.820 discord go hang out there because it's really cool and we post yeah there a lot it's a fun

00:06:43.660 little community so far emily would you like to get us started i would like to get us started

00:06:49.840 while we can't exactly pinpoint the very moment someone decided they would use objects plants

00:06:56.260 animals, or words in rituals that would later be called witchcraft, we can search far back in

00:07:02.000 history and try to piece together ancient practices that were later deemed to be witchcraft.

00:07:07.060 We can also look back in history to find out when the negative attitudes towards witchcraft began

00:07:11.840 and why women were the main focus of the violence. For this series, I would like to quote one of the

00:07:18.340 articles I read that defined what a witch means. Quote, a person, especially a woman,

00:07:23.400 claiming are popularly believed to possess magical powers and practice sorcery end quote

00:07:29.700 there is nothing more terrifying than a powerful woman don't i know it yeah we are just burdened

00:07:36.340 with glorious purpose that's that i'm really sorry that is a quote from loki from the marvel

00:07:42.480 movies but i i say that often i'm just burdened with glorious purpose you took it yeah that's

00:07:47.540 hilarious it's like i wouldn't know that because i don't watch yeah i could have gotten away with

00:07:51.280 that but i feel like somebody would have ratted me out to you and be like you know she didn't make

00:07:54.680 that up neve stealing neve is being sued by disney and um oh no that's the last thing we

00:08:02.240 there are no more episodes rodent pine has disappeared so many ancient cultures have

00:08:06.940 female figures that are characterized as witches a witch might not be who a person is but is in

00:08:13.320 fact a culture of construction it was almost always a woman who uses magic or sorcery to 0.91

00:08:18.940 accomplish goals or afflict evil witches in the ancient world as well as the modern world were

00:08:24.720 the embodiment of male fear about powerful women and women's sexuality as we said yeah in this

00:08:32.460 episode i'll be covering the ancient greek and roman witches and witchcraft the interesting

00:08:36.860 thing about the difference between roman and greek witches is that roman witches were depicted as

00:08:41.740 old scary and incredibly powerful women while the greek witches were depicted as young beautiful

00:08:48.060 seductresses and they were also women that's interesting society difference like yeah because 0.97

00:08:55.740 the cultures are usually people talk about them being so similar and like as we always say the

00:09:01.360 romans borrowed a lot from the greeks when they were forming their belief system so um but it does

00:09:06.180 get into a little bit more why potentially roman women were seen as worse than greek women okay 1.00

00:09:13.020 Or witches, anyway. 0.74

00:09:14.680 Okay.

00:09:15.320 So Greek society, as well as many other societies, are patriarchal.

00:09:19.880 If women were not controlled by men, the men believed that the women were capable of evil.

00:09:24.700 Because we are.

00:09:25.340 In the Greco-Roman world, the belief in magic was universal.

00:09:28.540 When there were natural disasters, it was believed that it was caused by a witch practicing black magic.

00:09:34.700 In Greek literature, there are stories of women engaging in witchcraft as far back as Homer, who was born in the 8th century BC.

00:09:41.280 for instance hecate was the greek goddess of witchcraft and magic a distinguishable 1.00

00:09:46.460 characteristic of greek witches was that they were very sexual and predatory cersei for example in 1.00

00:09:52.380 her pursuit of odysseus turned his men into swine and then kept him as a prisoner on her island 1.00

00:09:57.340 like many other witches she engaged in pharmacone which was the making of bruise and potions i know 0.99

00:10:04.780 these are supposed to be villainous traits but i can't help but be like good for her good for her

00:10:10.240 i know i'm like these are all bad things oh in my head we're not meant to turn them into swine

00:10:18.800 oh yeah we're not meant to take prisoners on our island but like what why else would you have an

00:10:26.100 island yeah lounging and potion making is just come on yeah have you ever seen me at a cocktail

00:10:33.300 bar come on it's potions when i was a little kid there was this um it wasn't really like a pothole

00:10:41.320 it was just kind of like a divot in like the street on like the curb behind my house and

00:10:47.400 every time after it rained it would be like this big puddle and like i my friends and i would like

00:10:53.080 throw sand and leaves and all that stuff and then like pretend that we were witches making potions 0.98

00:10:58.500 yeah i think that's like so a vital part of the female experience like if you identify as female

00:11:06.320 you have made a like a rock potion at some point in your life yeah with some sticks and leaves yeah 0.80

00:11:13.140 stuff like that i don't know what the guy equivalent of that is maybe like a digging a

00:11:19.020 hole roman empire boys do love to dig a big hole especially at the beach we're just breaking things

00:11:27.300 oh yeah actually yeah all the little boys i know are just like obsessed with breaking things i'm 0.98

00:11:32.100 like what is wrong with you i i have a fucking 38 year old husband who loves to break um ice 0.98

00:11:40.580 and puddles it's like if he sees one he just can't help 38 something like that is he 1.00

00:11:45.340 he's turning 39

00:11:48.960 but like when we go outside getting in the car i'm like where did you go and he's found a puddle

00:11:56.700 to like stick his heel in and he's like oh it's just so satisfying i'm like okay we're late but

00:12:02.660 fine yeah we're late get in the car um lamia is another witch from greek mythology who became a

00:12:09.900 child-eating monster after hara killed her children okay this pattern beautiful name sorry lamia

00:12:16.440 lamia that's a beautiful name why did she says i called it for my baby why does she have to be a 0.98

00:12:20.820 child-eating monster yeah that sucks by the way i'm not pregnant she's just she's talking about 1.00

00:12:25.520 a hypothetical baby just in case anybody thought that was a slip through you start getting 0.94

00:12:30.700 congratulations messages you're like what's happening it's like once you get married if

00:12:34.300 there's any sort of like ewan made like an offhand comment in front of his aunt one day and she was

00:12:39.280 like in the middle of running across the room to hug me i was like no no no no no oh no or like if

00:12:46.120 you god forbid like turn down a drink yeah sorry i interrupted okay you were talking about child

00:12:52.080 eating yeah no worries so the pattern continued on in tales and lore of witches we have even

00:12:59.060 spoken about it in other episodes where in a more modern take on witchcraft women are accused of

00:13:04.720 using dead babies body parts to practice their magic oh you might recall like why wouldn't you

00:13:10.700 recycle yeah reduce reuse recycle yeah the romans took witchcraft and sorcery very seriously

00:13:18.060 In the Law of the Twelve Tables, the casting of spells which harmed crops, cattle, and persons were prohibited.

00:13:25.420 Witchcraft was a capital crime in the Roman world, and witches could be burned or buried alive.

00:13:30.760 Many witches in the Roman world were associated with poisons. 0.72

00:13:34.460 Women who made potions or perfume, as Cersei did, could be condemned as witches. 0.99

00:13:39.300 Witch? Perfume? Come on! 1.00

00:13:41.640 My god. Also-

00:13:43.320 You can't make perfume? 0.67

00:13:44.540 Side note, I heard today that it's like a thing to put perfume on your ankles. 0.91

00:13:48.060 for what purpose seduction you putting your ankles up by people's faces or yeah yeah

00:13:55.420 because i saw i saw this like me but he was like oh when you thought you were afraid to make make

00:14:02.220 a move and then you realize she put perfume on her ankles because like you know what she thought it

00:14:07.040 was going to be a sure thing like i've never heard of this not a waste i like to smell my own perfume

00:14:12.080 i can't smell it down there yeah you're just bending over yeah doing like yoga poses

00:14:20.220 my god when you said that all i could think of was that like

00:14:24.100 the christian bale like american psycho thing like where it's like the legs are just like up

00:14:30.300 back to um the witches yeah the potions curse tablets were also very common in ancient rome

00:14:39.900 there's a large collection of curse tablets over 2 000 of them from across the mediterranean

00:14:45.560 spanning a millennium they are the best evidence we have of the practice of magic being used from

00:14:51.300 5th century bce to 5th century bc curse tablets also called bear with me i couldn't find

00:14:58.440 pronunciation on that um defixionis i'm not sure well done i'm gonna say that was perfect

00:15:05.800 I'm just going to call them curse tablets, but they're thin pieces of metal, mostly made of lead

00:15:11.320 or pewter, inscribed with a spell or hex designed to curse a lover, rival, or wrongdoer, etc.

00:15:17.940 The messages were addressed to spirits or the gods with hopes that they would help punish the victim

00:15:22.500 by binding or restricting them using supernatural powers. The process involved writing the victim's

00:15:28.800 name on a thin sheet of lead along with varying magical formulas or symbols, then burying the

00:15:33.980 tablet in or near a tomb a place of execution or a battlefield to give spirits of the dead power

00:15:40.640 over the victim oh sometimes the curse tablets were even transfixed with various items such as

00:15:47.500 nails which were believed to add magical potency oh wow so that sounds like the equivalent of you

00:15:54.620 know when people make like witch bottles and like bury them in like a graveyard or in the corner of

00:15:59.080 somebody's house or oh cool i didn't know that they were this hardcore still exist yeah right 0.99

00:16:07.120 some curse tablets showed that wives who felt threatened by their husbands slave women would

00:16:11.960 resort to practicing secretive magic because the roman law was not on their side depictions of roman

00:16:17.980 witches as stated before are very telling of how men thought of powerful women at the time

00:16:23.160 they thought they were horrific ugly and void of innocence women's names were found on just 0.62

00:16:28.700 about all of the cursed tablets what is interesting is that even on the tablets in which the dispute

00:16:34.360 is between two men a woman's name will still be present on the tablet which makes me wonder if

00:16:40.820 they hired a witch oh oh my god she's like signing her at work best job ever right be like a witch 0.87

00:16:49.700 hit woman you'd be like there is this guy at work who is so annoying and you're like say say less 0.95

00:16:57.900 say less i got this yeah so do you know what kind of curses they were were they like was it like you 0.66

00:17:04.960 know itchy curses or like you know death curses or yeah they don't say exactly what the curses were

00:17:12.160 but they do talk about the difference between the greek and roman um curse tablets which i'll get

00:17:17.860 into in a little bit the author of the book witchcraft and magic in europe ancient greece

00:17:22.900 in rome valerie irene jane flint points out that on the tablets most women are addressed by their

00:17:29.000 matronymic names as opposed to their patronymic names which was customary at that time there

00:17:35.600 isn't any agreed upon explanation as to why they use their names that way but there are a couple

00:17:40.120 of theories one is that the custom could have been borrowed from ancient egyptian or babylonian

00:17:46.380 custom that used maternal lineage as a way to properly identify someone secondly it is theorized

00:17:52.680 that using a mother's name would help the curse's accuracy and potency which i think is super cool 1.00

00:17:58.680 yeah you gotta channel all that feminine energy into it yeah i was like fuck you women and what 1.00

00:18:05.780 was that word again did you say matrilineal name because i want to steal it i want to use that 1.00

00:18:10.040 matronymic matronymic yeah instead of patronymic so that's like your yeah like your female lineage

00:18:20.080 name for my episode i was looking through like other sources and actually it might have been

00:18:26.320 it's right like norse lineage because i was looking a little bit into that and they were

00:18:30.420 talking about how they would use like the mother's name in ancient times because it was a lot easier

00:18:37.800 to attribute a baby to its mother than its father right it's like they know who birthed it you

00:18:44.720 definitely knew who birthed the child that's the way it should be yeah you don't know who the sperm

00:18:48.660 owner was flint also thinks that the wide use of the metronymics is an indicator that cursing was

00:18:55.140 a quote particularly female thing or perhaps it was an attempt to attribute cursing as a feminine

00:19:01.440 instrument we like poisons and curses what can i say we're we're non-confrontational but very

00:19:11.280 efficient like a poison you can administer it and then leave right you know same with a curse

00:19:18.380 you don't have to hang around watch all the the crap that happens yeah or the the whole thing 0.99

00:19:25.360 about how women will poison you and they'll take care of you while they do it oh does your head 1.00

00:19:31.440 hurt would you like some tylenol are you are you pissing blood we better get you to the doctor 0.74

00:19:38.300 but later yeah just in a day or many hours from now yeah we would make good witches i mean we 0.55

00:19:46.480 are witches so it's just i'll take it after especially after all the research and stuff

00:19:50.740 like that yeah i'm like yes i'm a witch i will own that title now the difference between greek

00:19:57.320 and roman cursed tablets is pretty intense the greek seemed to be a little nicer because judging

00:20:03.280 by the inscriptions on the cursed tablets they only wanted to inhibit their rivals while the

00:20:08.620 romans wanted to completely obliterate their rivals for example an archival record of 130

00:20:14.900 ancient tablets from the Sacred Springs at Bath shows messages from concerned Roman occupants of

00:20:21.120 Acquiae Solis. Demanding retribution for theft was common, and curses were written back to front

00:20:27.180 with harsh, analogous formulas exhorting, quote, death, destruction, and ruin upon their targets.

00:20:34.020 A lot of the curse tablets involved Roman wives and their husbands' slave women. Roman law did

00:20:39.000 not see slave women as equals, so if a man were to have sex with his slave woman, it was not viewed 0.97

00:20:44.520 as adultery because of this women did not feel that they had any protection against their husband

00:20:49.800 sleeping with another woman so they turned to magic this gave them the power did what did the

00:20:56.580 man write these laws do you think the man wrote these we know the man wrote these laws you know

00:21:03.280 just this whole like loophole on adultery you know it's it's different because i own her you know

00:21:10.000 she's not a full person right and if you are listening to this podcast and you haven't caught 0.99

00:21:14.700 on yet we consider ourselves a feminist podcast i don't know if anybody could have not got that

00:21:21.220 like if they've listened to anything before of us yes and maybe not a feminist podcast but i think

00:21:26.600 it happens when you are hosted by two people who are for women's rights and also studying witchcraft

00:21:33.000 you you can't not be a feminist and study and read about all of this yeah looking back at all

00:21:37.660 of this stuff it really makes sense that women did turn to witchcraft for so many things yeah

00:21:44.660 and when you think about it like witchcraft is pretty hard to I know like as we will see in

00:21:50.720 later episodes people try to attribute it to people that maybe had nothing to do with whatever

00:21:56.360 happened but it's very hard to pin the crime on of like witchcraft on people right unless they're

00:22:03.240 like I don't get the whole signing tablets but maybe if it's like you're outsourcing the witchcraft

00:22:07.600 that's why i suppose you would have to find the tablet to prove that like a curse was put upon you 0.86

00:22:14.260 yeah or you would have to have that sort of evidence so like when you're a woman who is

00:22:21.260 essentially like the property of a man and you have something that's happening and you like feel

00:22:27.900 like compelled to right the wrong that's been done against you i can see why witchcraft would

00:22:33.640 be the one because it's it's less confrontational you can sort of do it and hope for the best

00:22:39.280 rather than like outright you know attacking him or you know attacking her or whatever yeah it may 0.86

00:22:47.780 be and like it's a lot more subtle yeah it's subtle and like like it talks about is like women

00:22:52.440 didn't have like power in any way they couldn't go to like a court of law or something like that

00:22:58.820 and claim any of these things because it didn't really matter they didn't matter yeah for curse

00:23:05.620 tablets and other magic acts there were more magic acts to counteract say a curse for example

00:23:11.440 amulets were one of the most common protections in the graco-roman world most amulets were made

00:23:17.440 with cheap materials sometimes even beetles but precious stones were believed to have more

00:23:23.120 efficacy so many amulets have been found over the years that it led historians to believe that they

00:23:28.800 had purpose and weren't just ornamental. Amulets are often abbreviated forms of the formulas found

00:23:35.020 in the extant magical papyri. Surprisingly, some of the papyri and old magical texts survived,

00:23:43.020 even though the ascendants of Christianity had Paul the Apostle convince a bunch of Ephesians,

00:23:48.760 or Ephesia being a city in ancient Greece, to bring their magical books out and burn them.

00:23:54.460 The texts of the Greek magical papyri are often written as we write a recipe.

00:23:59.900 Take the eye of a bat, for example.

00:24:02.600 So in other words, the magic requires certain ingredients,

00:24:06.140 much as Odysseus required the herb moly to defeat the magic of Circe.

00:24:10.460 But it is not just as simple as knowing how to put a recipe together.

00:24:14.300 Appropriate gestures at certain points in the magical ritual are required to accompany the ingredients.

00:24:20.360 Different gestures, it would seem, produce various effects.

00:24:23.860 A magical ritual done in the right way can guarantee the revealing of dreams and the talent of interpreting them correctly.

00:24:31.140 In other cases, certain spells allow one to send out a demon or demons to harm one's enemies or even to break up someone's marriage.

00:24:38.980 I love this.

00:24:41.240 This is so cool.

00:24:42.360 I know.

00:24:43.160 Because you know when you see like in TV and film when there's like say a witch or whatever or a wizard and they're like making all the gestures and stuff.

00:24:52.140 you think that's just for like dramatic effect but i love that that is actually written into

00:24:56.540 the recipe of the spell yeah that like you know you have to like open your palms or whatever it

00:25:02.520 is that's so cool just kind of um my own sort of i don't know if i'd call it research but just like

00:25:10.480 about like magic rituals and stuff like that it is so interesting how a lot of them are a whole

00:25:17.160 body thing which includes you know movement of your arms and your legs um the direction that

00:25:24.720 you're facing your voice chanting all that kind of stuff i think it's so cool and you can see why

00:25:32.020 like modern like wicca is so intertwined with like mindfulness practices yeah like meditation

00:25:39.260 and stuff because it's all about checking in with your body and you know really thinking about like

00:25:43.700 where your energy is focusing your energy like opening your heart or opening like your mind or

00:25:51.140 letting yourself be grounded in the earth or like feeling which parts of your body are touching the

00:25:57.980 earth and all of that yeah well and even it's cool that's revived and i even think about how

00:26:03.060 it's come into play in like organized religion like catholicism is so big with all the like

00:26:09.400 holding the thing up in the air and like i didn't grow catholic so i don't know exactly what they're

00:26:19.320 saying it's 100 true yeah like when they're blessing the i keep it i'm so sorry i'm gonna

00:26:26.560 say it uh haunted bread when they're blessing the communion that that is that is from blind

00:26:34.900 boy boat club who has podcast it's amazing check it out um if you don't know it but he refers to

00:26:41.240 it as haunted bread and he almost got cancelled for it but it's just the funniest phrase I've

00:26:45.560 ever heard it is that it's good um I say that as somebody who's raised Catholic yeah like when

00:26:50.720 they're doing the blessing like the priest literally has to hold his hands up I'm holding

00:26:54.420 my hands up like palms towards myself and then like for like another line in the prayer they have

00:26:59.960 to like put their palms out and it's all you know recalling the last supper and all of that so

00:27:04.880 and that's actually written into the prayer books that the priest is actually working from

00:27:09.040 right that they change every now and then for some reason when i go back to mass after a few

00:27:13.240 years i'm like oh they changed the words of that okay why it isn't that funny that you would know

00:27:18.280 that they changed the words because everything is so um i didn't grow up regimented yeah and just so

00:27:26.320 like when you grow up in that faith you grow up knowing okay now this happens and now that happens

00:27:33.460 And now they say this exact phrase and now we repeat it back and all that kind of stuff.

00:27:38.460 One of the weirdest experiences I ever had was I didn't grow up saying the Lord's Prayer and to hear like an entire large group of people all reciting it at the same time and they know like when to pause and like all that stuff.

00:27:54.000 I was like, I panicked.

00:27:58.340 I was like, I'm in a cult.

00:27:59.520 I'm in a cult.

00:28:00.820 Yeah.

00:28:01.860 It's funny.

00:28:02.460 It's funny, like, I don't know if I've mentioned this before.

00:28:05.840 Like, first of all, knowing, like, when, like, when things, certain things happen during

00:28:10.160 mass, a lot of that for me is because I was an altar girl, like, an altar server.

00:28:14.900 My husband was an altar boy.

00:28:17.420 Yeah.

00:28:18.040 You had to know, like, when you had to go light the candles or, like, you had to know

00:28:21.740 when you had to do all of the different parts of mass.

00:28:23.780 You're like, okay, now's my cue.

00:28:25.540 Pretty much.

00:28:26.300 Like, I know when to ring the bell, like, when he, like, holds up the haunted bread.

00:28:30.000 and um so that like that is like a big part of that but just when you say that when there's

00:28:36.240 people all like reciting the lord's prayer i have this memory of funnily enough i was studying

00:28:41.640 the romans when i was in school so i'm talking like primary school elementary school age i

00:28:47.440 remember them talking about how long the empire had lasted and like the religions that they had

00:28:54.420 before christianity and that like for thousands of years that people had believed this and they

00:28:59.340 were talking about like you know what you know the religious rites were like and you know the

00:29:03.460 the chanting and all of that and I remember going to mass that Sunday and standing there

00:29:08.240 and just thinking well like people believe that for thousands of years yeah and this has only

00:29:14.000 been around for two thousand years yeah I was like and everybody's just chanting I remember going

00:29:19.960 oh this is just like that yeah and that was sort of the start of it for me um the start of what

00:29:28.340 the start of going I don't know if I believe all this as you and I have talked about before like

00:29:34.640 we I still respect religion and I still think that it brings great value to people's life and

00:29:41.360 we know that like on a psychological level being part of something and all reciting something or

00:29:48.360 singing something together just makes you feel good and makes you feel like you belong and it

00:29:52.000 makes you feel like you connect with people right and if that's what you like to do then good for

00:29:55.900 and the ritual is important to people and um no doubt it helps your anxiety if you're somebody

00:30:02.240 who is able to to tell yourself i trust god and i know that god will handle this that that's gotta

00:30:10.020 help that's why i'm crippled by my anxiety yeah what a lovely notion like that would be great to

00:30:17.280 have comfort same but instead i'm just like wow everything sucks and uh this is great but yeah 0.98

00:30:25.240 no anytime we shit on religion it's the bad people it's not the good people it's the institution 0.98

00:30:31.340 and the bad people if you're using it to try to tell other people how to live their lives 0.99

00:30:37.940 boo we didn't make it to episode 29 29 without um people knowing what our views are on religion

00:30:47.800 yeah but back to ancient greek and rome magic tools were also incredibly common in magic rituals

00:30:56.020 the tools were just as important as the magic and as the incantations and spells that were

00:31:01.760 repeated for each ritual a magic kit dating back to around the third century was found in the

00:31:07.280 ancient city of pergamon in anatolia the find consisted of a bronze table and a base covered

00:31:12.840 with symbols a dish also decorated with symbols a large bronze nail with letters inscribed on its

00:31:19.360 flat sides two bronze rings and three black polished stones inscribed with the names of

00:31:25.400 supernatural powers classical greece i know i'm just like oh i want it ah classical greece had

00:31:34.960 three men who are all referred to as theos aner or a divine man the first was orpheus the mythical

00:31:44.240 creature was said to have been the father of melodious songs he was also described by gleek

00:31:50.060 playwright gleek he's gleek he really loved the show glee by ryan he was also described by

00:31:59.760 greek playwright aeschylus as he who had hailed all things by the rapture of his voice this

00:32:07.040 suggests that there was the belief in the efficacy of song and voice in magic orpheus however is best

00:32:13.600 known for his descent into the underworld to bring back his wife eurydice the second divine

00:32:18.860 man is pythagoras famous mathematician and philosopher just interrupt like the whole if he

00:32:24.440 wanted to he would if he's not willing to go into the underworld to bring you back dump him girl

00:32:30.000 he's just not that into you yeah the legends are full of men that'll do this stuff like you can't

00:32:36.660 even get a text back yeah and other men are going into the underworld okay the second divine man is

00:32:43.660 pythagoras famous mathematician and philosopher his magical acts include being seen at the same

00:32:50.540 hour in two cities a white eagle permitting him to stroke it a river greeting him with the words

00:32:57.400 hail pythagoras sounds like somebody's full of themselves predicting that a dead man would be

00:33:03.700 found on a ship entering a harbor predicting the appearance of a white bear and declaring it was

00:33:09.440 dead before the messenger reached him bearing the news biting a venomous snake to death or in some

00:33:15.560 versions driving a snake out from

00:33:17.580 a village. These stories

00:33:19.580 also hint at Pythagoras being one of

00:33:21.540 these quote-unquote divine men.

00:33:24.100 His ability to control

00:33:25.740 animals and to transcend space

00:33:27.740 and time, showing he has been touched

00:33:29.620 by the gods. Okay, as somebody

00:33:31.580 who was terrible at moths, fuck 1.00

00:33:33.480 Pythagoras. I don't like him. Yeah, just 1.00

00:33:35.700 go to hell. What was 1.00

00:33:37.780 that about the white bear? He found a dead

00:33:39.700 polar bear. Is that what he's trying to say?

00:33:41.580 Oh no, there's a polar bear. He predicted

00:33:43.800 the appearance of a white bear.

00:33:45.560 And then he declared that it was dead before the messenger reached him to bring the news.

00:33:50.760 I don't fully understand what that means.

00:33:53.100 He just says, oh, yeah, there's a white bear.

00:33:55.060 Okay, the white bear's dead now.

00:33:56.780 I don't know. 0.99

00:33:58.080 I'm color bullshit. 0.99

00:33:59.140 Yeah. 0.99

00:33:59.720 Special Pythagoras.

00:34:01.580 Yeah, we just don't like him because of math.

00:34:03.840 The third and final divine man is Empedocles.

00:34:07.400 It was said that he was able to rejuvenate the old, heal the sick, summon the dead, and influence the weather.

00:34:14.380 After Empedocles, the amount of magical gifts one has begins getting less and less in the literature.

00:34:20.980 Normally, people are only given one supernatural power as opposed to many, like Empedocles, Orpheus, and Pythagoras.

00:34:27.980 Plato reflects such an attitude in his laws, where he takes healers, prophets, and sorcerers for granted.

00:34:34.920 He acknowledges that these practitioners existed in Athens, and thus presumably in other Greek cities,

00:34:40.900 and that they had to be reckoned with and controlled by laws.

00:34:44.940 But one should not be afraid of them.

00:34:46.940 Their powers are real, but they themselves represent a rather low order of humanity.

00:34:53.760 What bothers me is that these men are not painted in a negative light for their magic,

00:34:58.940 but women who practice magic were.

00:35:00.720 It was always assumed that women who practice magic were evil 1.00

00:35:04.420 and needed to be punished for their magical practice. 0.93

00:35:07.620 Some Latin sources refer to women who engaged in necromancy, and even some who were believed to be shapeshifters.

00:35:14.920 There were both male and female witches or magicians in Rome, and they were often persecuted for casting spells on the emperor.

00:35:22.200 As Pliny the Younger, who was a lawyer, author, and magistrate of ancient Rome, wrote,

00:35:27.560 Everyone was afraid of witches and their spells.

00:35:30.280 romans began the first known witch hunts in the imperial period long before the christians began

00:35:36.260 burning witches so he's like invented it first we like invented you like no we did it first

00:35:41.820 that's that's such a good point that like yeah when the men do it it's just like um it's like 0.89

00:35:47.220 oh they're magical like an act of war divine yeah and um yeah when women do it it's just like 0.95

00:35:53.700 oh they're just vengeful and it's just because they're scorned lovers or it's whatever they're 1.00

00:35:58.580 trying to seduce you they're trying to play tricks they're trying to it's nerdy like a

00:36:03.920 it's like infantilizing yeah women as well it's like they're only doing it for like selfish little 0.88

00:36:10.760 shitty reasons whereas when men do it it's probably justified and there's probably some

00:36:16.560 noble purpose behind right like it's very grand and it's very yeah they're way more important and 1.00

00:36:21.940 they're way more like people look up to them and stuff like that whereas with women it's like no 0.98

00:36:26.780 that's black magic and sorcery and they're terrible people and they make perfume and how 1.00

00:36:31.640 dare they yeah and it's it's interesting that like even as far back as then and then it just

00:36:37.180 it's as we're going to see in the episodes coming up like it's just going to get repeated and

00:36:41.580 repeated and repeated it's frustrating i feel like this is all the equivalent of like oh she's

00:36:46.640 the crazy ex-girlfriend yeah the roman depictions of witches were often depicted as motivated by

00:36:53.820 spite and malice. Horace, a Roman poet, describes two witches with pale skin, long nails, and long 0.82

00:37:01.380 unruly hair. They're shown burying a wolf's head under a full moon to conjure the dead and to make 0.77

00:37:07.160 them do their bidding. Okay, that's metal as fuck. I know. I was like, and what's the problem here? 1.00

00:37:12.080 I love wolves, but that is so cool. It died of natural causes, Niamh. Another Roman depiction

00:37:17.380 of a witch is in the Farsalia by Lucan. Pretend I'm pronouncing that right if I'm not. I don't 0.94

00:37:23.200 think i found pronunciation on this the witch's name is eric though in this epic she murders

00:37:28.900 people and desecrates their corpses she is also shown terrorizing the spirits in the realm of the 0.99

00:37:34.540 dead by screaming down the throats of corpses on earth also metal as fuck holy shit more roman 1.00

00:37:41.300 depictions of witches were of the strix or owl witches they were women who embodied the screams 1.00

00:37:47.520 of birds of ill omen abducted children and replaced them with straw dolls as well as devour 0.92

00:37:53.280 the flesh of children for anybody who listens to last podcast 0.76

00:37:58.180 and this is why the roman witches were depicted as ugly old and nasty is because they did way more

00:38:13.740 metal things for lack of a better word whereas the greek witches were more like do you like my 0.84

00:38:21.120 perfume want to come to my island yeah baby girl witchcraft hashtag girl magic you notice like

00:38:27.540 the ultimate villainization of a woman is always when she i'm not saying this is completely wrong 0.94

00:38:34.900 but when she targets children yeah because anything that's like if you're not maternal

00:38:40.940 and you aren't interested in inhabiting that role in your existence it's a sign of almost

00:38:48.280 like psychopathy it's like if you're not you don't want to be a mom you don't want to like

00:38:52.660 nurture children you don't want to play that role in your life then there must be something

00:38:57.900 fundamentally wrong with you and there must be something that you you're like two steps away

00:39:03.360 from like slaughtering people yeah like inflicting horrible injuries yeah and all of that and the 0.96

00:39:10.040 people i know in my life who are women who have decided they don't want children whenever they

00:39:16.040 tell people that people are like oh no you'll change your mind what can't you yeah why why do

00:39:23.460 we need women to have children sort of like that trope of like oh she's the old woman old creepy

00:39:28.620 woman down the street she lives alone she never had kids that whole trope that's kind of like the 0.97

00:39:34.760 scariest to people for some reason there's no way she could have led a fulfilling life because 1.00

00:39:39.880 she didn't do that traditional thing yeah or is like you're hearing more and more women now who 0.97

00:39:45.080 are like in their 50s and 60s going like I'm really glad I didn't have kids or you know I'm

00:39:49.520 really glad that it didn't happen for me like maybe I like I thought at the time like I should

00:39:54.100 have done it or like I was debating about it but like when I look back now I see the life that I

00:39:58.700 I have and I can't imagine it with kids yeah and then like you know there are plenty of people who

00:40:03.340 have kids who should not have had them right and that they should they should have like maybe

00:40:07.540 thought about it a little bit more if they were you know in a position to choose and to think

00:40:12.240 about it yeah it's like the scariest thing like i said at the start it's the scariest thing is a 1.00

00:40:16.640 woman who has power and also has that like self-knowledge and self-confidence to know that 1.00

00:40:22.820 like she doesn't want to be a wife and a mother yeah or she doesn't want to be a mother or she 1.00

00:40:29.580 doesn't want to be a wife maybe she wants to be a mother and not a wife just just with anything

00:40:32.940 i saw a really good good i saw a really good quote about raising your daughters to not be

00:40:40.240 people pleasers and to be assertive and to have somebody know that truly no means no i'm saying

00:40:47.240 no i do not want you to do xyz and it feels it doesn't mean try harder right doesn't mean try

00:40:53.640 again it doesn't mean keep asking yeah and that's what i feel like so many people if there is an

00:40:58.700 assertive woman they don't like it because it's not what young girls are socialized to be men are

00:41:05.660 rewarded rewarded for persistence and doggedness whereas when women do it it's nagging yeah and 0.99

00:41:11.640 it's whiting and it's well like not and if they're assertive they're a bitch if they tell you no it 1.00

00:41:19.100 means like you said keep trying it's it's so frustrating and yeah i feel like we've gone off 0.99

00:41:25.040 on a little bit of a tangent but i feel like it's a very it's it's related in the sense that the way 0.99

00:41:30.740 that women have been villainized over centuries of time for for the stupidest shit to be quite 0.98

00:41:38.220 honest and a lot of times these are like especially it's like triple fold for like 1.00

00:41:43.320 marginalized women or like women who maybe didn't come from the right family or don't look the right

00:41:48.800 way or maybe they're disabled or they're not conventionally attractive or whatever it is

00:41:57.140 and it's always in a way sometimes it's these women who maybe are practicing some form of 0.95

00:42:04.260 witchcraft because they're free from being slotted into that role of being like the beautiful

00:42:11.700 wife and mother and like the perfect accessory to whatever man has decided to put her on his shelf

00:42:17.680 yeah or is like you know everybody makes fun of now it's like oh it's always like the you know 1.00

00:42:23.640 the fat queer women who are like the most vocal feminists yeah because maybe they don't give a 1.00

00:42:28.840 fuck right they don't like have to rely on or they don't have to worry about like what men think of 1.00

00:42:34.360 them and the male gaze and they've heard and they've heard your shit and they're sick of it 0.99

00:42:38.080 it makes me think of how we talked about the difference in depictions of greek witches versus 0.99

00:42:45.360 roman witches and can you imagine if sort of like the old hag was a temptress and the seductress and

00:42:53.460 stuff like that and like she was trying to be sexual and things like that people be like oh my 1.00

00:42:57.640 god ew and so like god forbid it's like unthinkable yeah the scream of a bunch of centuries yeah she 1.00

00:43:05.940 probably made an even better witch because she was older she had all this time to gather knowledge 1.00

00:43:10.100 and hone her craft she was wise she didn't give a shit about men anywho in the first century bc 0.99

00:43:17.740 so many associated cersei with magic that witches were also called cercian by the fifth century 0.95

00:43:23.540 a long lasting tradition started in which witches were associated with a certain area of greece

00:43:29.620 called thessaly the earliest record we have of this association is in aristophanes clouds in

00:43:35.340 which the character strepsiades talks about having a thessalian witch quote draw down the moon so

00:43:42.920 that he didn't have to pay interest on his old debts the author of the book drawing down the

00:43:47.680 moon magic in the greco-roman world radcliffe g edmunds the third says jesus aristophanes joke

00:43:56.460 about the thessalian witches drawing down the moon shows that he expected his audience to

00:44:01.700 understand the reference to know stories about thessaly about the strange women there and about

00:44:07.400 their strange powers clearly by the 5th century bc thessaly and the women there had gained a

00:44:13.240 reputation for magic and witchcraft the quote-unquote joke continued on for centuries

00:44:18.500 marshall references a thessalian wheel to draw earthward the moon which he elsewhere calls a

00:44:25.160 colchian wheel colchian that sounds very like italian yeah it's up to pasta connecting the

00:44:33.320 historical region of thessaly with the region most associated with witches in myth is anybody

00:44:38.180 else picturing a wheel of cheese i'm gonna get a nice wedge of colchian put it over the pasta

00:44:45.600 be gorgeous i don't know what accent that is i apologize to multiple people she's trying to do

00:44:52.940 the new yorker ericto previously mentioned was said to be a thessalian it was said that her

00:44:59.940 quote tread blights the seeds of the fertile cornfield and her breath poisons air that before

00:45:05.400 was harmless and that she was capable of raising army of the dead it said had she tried to raise 0.99

00:45:11.240 up the whole army on the plain and make them fight again the laws of erebus would have yielded to her

00:45:16.640 and a magnitude brought up by stygian avernus by the power of the fiend would have taken the field 0.99

00:45:24.140 oh my god she's like the morrigan hell yeah she can raise the dead from like the battlefield 1.00

00:45:29.660 and i love that that like her breath would like poison the air that's just yeah she's cool as 1.00

00:45:36.060 fuck these are they're all cool yeah aside from the pretty pretty witches i don't like them 0.99

00:45:41.240 pretty witches they're like mean girls listen cersei you might be all cute and young and 0.99

00:45:48.560 whatever i mean you didn't know you know they're cool too but like i have an appreciation for 1.00

00:45:55.080 these metal as fuck witches yeah the scary bitches i like the scary bitches we love scary 1.00

00:46:01.800 bitches we love scary bitches at roman and pine witches are figures that are representations of 1.00

00:46:08.460 marginalization in greek and roman literature they were almost always depicted as being women 1.00

00:46:14.160 these women were not fully enfranchised in the greco-roman culture they had to cast spells and 0.93

00:46:20.000 use curse tablets in attempt to feel any form of control in the case of thessaly it was women who 0.74

00:46:26.280 lived in peripheral areas this made them sort of foreigners people who were different even to this 0.98

00:46:32.780 day people fear the unknown others who are not like them yeah those women on the fringes 0.64

00:46:38.860 they're the dangerous ones because they don't need your acceptance because they've never had 1.00

00:46:43.700 it they're the scary bitches yeah all right should we jump into creature council yes 1.00

00:46:50.220 let's do it neve i believe you believe that you had a question yes 1.00

00:46:56.000 okay I went into the wrong chat

00:47:01.020 I have way too many 1.00

00:47:02.360 whatsapp chats with bitches in the title 1.00

00:47:04.280 I'm just saying 1.00

00:47:05.620 I have like four

00:47:08.500 like is this me

00:47:10.660 am I the problem

00:47:12.280 am I the drama

00:47:13.620 okay this question comes from

00:47:16.620 haunted in Highgate

00:47:18.060 and that's with a question mark

00:47:20.440 after it so this is

00:47:22.340 do they eat haunted bread

00:47:24.000 well there's a very good cemetery in high gate i'm saying very good like it's it's a cemetery

00:47:29.600 but like you know it's interesting anyway wonderful wonderful cemetery five stars on yelp

00:47:35.880 so haunted and high gate asks what can i do about my boyfriend who keeps ghosting me so much he

00:47:43.120 might actually be a ghost or maybe he's just afraid of commitment question mark okay

00:47:48.460 Cupid

00:47:54.220 Cupid oh my god 1.00

00:47:56.380 I always stick the landing when I'm trying to get in here 1.00

00:48:01.220 Okay so you got a boyfriend

00:48:04.100 And he keeps ghosting you

00:48:07.180 Well this is a new invention

00:48:09.780 Like I never knew about ghosting

00:48:12.300 Not before these times

00:48:14.440 And then you all got your smartphones

00:48:16.340 and y'all got your e-mails and your text messages

00:48:20.580 and people just ain't got no manners no more.

00:48:24.600 Back then, it used to be, 0.98

00:48:26.500 bow and arrow, little shot to the butt, 0.97

00:48:29.540 then everybody's getting along. 0.99

00:48:31.800 You know what I mean?

00:48:32.880 Eh, you know what I mean.

00:48:35.860 You got this boy and he ain't texting you back.

00:48:38.740 You gotta ask him for a little bit more respect.

00:48:41.080 You gotta tell him,

00:48:41.960 hey, there's four and a half billion other boys out there

00:48:45.920 that i could be with and i don't need to be with you okay if he doesn't start showing you a bit 0.75

00:48:49.820 more respect you just cut him loose i could probably fly him up to a cliff for you i don't 0.87

00:48:53.760 know get back to me see what he says don't be taking no ghosts here ghosts are for dead people 0.81

00:48:58.480 although if you want to hook up with a ghost i know a really nice guy really really nice

00:49:02.020 and then he turned into the new york woman who was trying to set her son up her daughter

00:49:08.540 i know a really nice guy thank you cupid that was very enthusiastic kind of creepy why is the baby

00:49:14.340 so interested in sex we don't know yikes also cupid where are you from i found him outside an

00:49:21.380 italian restaurant from queens no i think so he just had the look you know well i really hope 0.58

00:49:28.060 that was cupid otherwise it's somebody's son and people might call the police on me haunted in

00:49:33.760 highgate question mark i hope that answers your question you gotta get a little bit more respect

00:49:39.120 from your ghosting boyfriend or else cupid will set you up with an actual ghost if you want

00:49:43.640 that could be fun that would be fun i would date a ghost for a day would you date a ghost for a day

00:49:49.120 they wouldn't leave wet towels on the floor there's a lot to be said okay and on that note

00:49:55.540 i'm emily and i am neve and thank you for tuning in for episode 29 of the roan and pine podcast 0.94

00:50:02.640 the beginning of our broomstick ride around the world witches witches bitches we hope you enjoy

00:50:09.220 this series that's coming up 1.00

00:50:11.140 because we're excited about it

00:50:12.940 we promise we'll make it as fun and as

00:50:15.260 interesting as we possibly can

00:50:16.960 and hopefully you'll hear some stuff you haven't

00:50:19.320 heard before so give it a chance

00:50:21.080 alright thanks everybody

00:50:22.960 thank you join us next time

00:50:25.160 and we're going to

00:50:27.020 the land of the celt

00:50:28.080 okay thanks guys 0.99

00:50:30.500 fuck yeah folklore 0.99

00:50:32.440 fuck yeah folklore 1.00

00:50:34.020 bye 1.00

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Rowan & Pine: A Feminist Folklore & Mythology Podcast - January 24, 2024

Episode Twenty-Nine： Greco-Roman Witchcraft - We love scary b＊tch＊s!

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