MYSTERIES
Mysteries, Magic and Powers of Art
Religious-Artistic-Medical Entities
Photo:
Adherents of a cult of place spirits (kolle) in Agawmeder, photo courtesy of
Jacques Mercier, 1984.
The period of the Christian
Ethiopian state's expansion in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is an
important moment in the construction of modern Ethiopian identities. This era
saw the birth of an indigenous written literature consisting largely of
chronicles of the activities of the Christian missionaries who, moving in the
tracks of the royal troops, converted the pagan population. Ethiopian
hagiographers, while following literary models inherited from Byzantium,
allowed some elements of the preexisting religions to filter through. Among
the most remarkable aspects of these earlier religions was the practice of
prophecy while in trance states. The ceremony would begin with the sacrifice
of a cow. After being anointed with the cow's blood and adorned with its
peritoneum, the priest would step into a fire of wood, and sometimes also of
the cow's bones. There the god would "ride" him, honoring the sacrifice by
protecting him from burns. The god would also speak through his mouth,
prophesying for the congregation, who would ask questions about the future or
about the origin and outcome of an illness.
Power of Secret Names
1. Diagrams from the
Book of Buni, the Geez translation of a version of the "Sun of Knowledge"
(Shams al-Marif), a book attributed to Al-Buni, an Egyptian author of the
thirteenth century. Each diagram containing figures or letters is
accompanied by its method of use. Book of Buni, eighteenth century to
nineteenth century, parchment, 27.5 x 24 cm. Private collection. Photo
courtesy of Guy Vivien
2. Cruciform seal.
The cross is simultaneously Christ's cross and the seal of the Father, given
by the Archangel Michael to King Solomon. From a "Book of Prayers for
Undoing Charms" now in Tigray province, ca. 1750-55, parchment. Photo
courtesy of Jacques Mercier, 1975
Photo:
A rare example of a scroll on which a scribe recopied all of the talismans in
"Solomon's Net," instead of choosing a few of them. The lower motif is the net
in which the demons are caught. Protective scroll, twentieth century,
parchment. 13 x 9.5 cm.
Collection: Musee National d'Art d'Afrique et d'Oceanie, Paris.
Gift of Jacques Mercier. Photo courtesy of Guy
Vivien.
The Ethiopian clerics did not invent the use of secret names, but they do attach a particular meaning to it. According to a priest educated in Tigray, who had just read a great protective book for a person who was ill, "Each of us has two names: the baptismal name and the name our mothers gave us. Like the first of these, the Names are secret. In reading them one comprehends all other books. This book of the Names, however, is entirely medicinal. The scholars have hidden it, so that it won't be known to all. Are the plants known to doctors familiar to all?" Indeed many Ethiopian people do keep their baptismal names secret, lest someone use it to cast spells on them. They are careful not to lend out a scroll on which that name is written. Moreover, this name, being in Geez, is generally not commonly understood, and is different from the second name, which is in the vernacular.