I’ve become quite obsessed with Greek curse tablets. I am curious about the cultural matrix in which the practice is embedded (When is it called for? What class of professionals serviced the demand? What assumptions are being called upon to make the practice plausible?) as well as the language of the formulae of curse and countercurse. Anyone else interested? I’d love to hear from any other ενθουσιαζωνοι? (Did I get the Greek right?)
I’m no specialist, but have a general interest in magic. You’ll find answers to your many questions in Jessica Lamont’s recent book In Blood and Ashes (OUP 2023), essentially the first hsitorical investigation of Greek curse practices, and the older volume Magika Hiera.
Scholars are currently editing specimens both new and old from Corinth for the IG project. Curbera’s volume Defixiones Atticae just appeared in that series.
Latin texts have been gathered in Sanchez-Natalias’ Sylloge of defixiones from the Roman west, in two volumes. (The group at Zaragoza to which she belongs has been working on curse tablets and magic for some time.) And we now have Roger Tomlin’s long awaited edition and commentary of the tablets recovered from the Roman temple of Mercury in Uley (OUP 2024).
Wonderful. I’m on it. Thanks!