Since the 1913 publication of James A. Montgomery's Aramaic Incantation Texts from Nippur, students of the bowls have used that book as the diving platform from which they enter a deep pool of study, In the intervening years, the body of work on incantation (or magic) bowls has continued to grow. Bowls in several ancient languages have attracted the attention of scholars from a variety of countries and traditions. The result has been the publication of a considerable number of translations of additional texts and fragments. Focusing only on those bowls inscribed in Aramaic and even then, only on the seventy-two extant bowls which could be personally read in photographs or facsimiles, Charles Isbell has, in Corpus of the Aramaic Incantation Bowls, compiled an impressive volume of work. Including the complete original texts, full translations, and annotations, Isbell supplements the text with a glossary of all inscribed words, an index of personal names, and a list of quotations from scripture.

The Aramaic incantation bowls from Sasanian Mesopotamia are the most important source we have for studying the everyday beliefs of the Jewish, Christian, Mandaean, Manichaean, Zoroastrian and Pagan communities on the eve of the Islamic conquests. In A Corpus of Syriac Incantation Bowls, Marco Moriggi presents new editions of forty-nine Syriac incantation bowls that were originally published between 1853 and 2012, with accompanying introductions, translations, philological notes, photographs and glossaries. Furthermore, there is a detailed analysis of the Estrangela and Manichaean scripts as used on the bowls, together with newly drawn script charts. In gathering, organising and updating most of the published Syriac bowls, this book provides a valuable resource for further research into both their language and content. "This volume is a significant contribution to the study of the Syriac incantation bowls, and it should be of great interest to scholars of ‘magic’ in Late Antiquity as well as to those working in Syriac language, literature, and history, since the Syriac incantation bowls are a fascinating—yet often neglected—component of the broader Syriac heritage." - Aaron M. Butts, Catholic University of America,Washington D.C., in: JNES (October 2015) "Moriggi’s new book will no doubt become an essential reference work for all interested in Syriac magical texts from late-antiquity. It is also an important contribution not only to our knowledge of the language of the Syriac incantation bowls, but to the whole field of Babylonian Aramaic (JBA and Mandaic)....Scholars of Aramaic are indebted to Moriggi for making this valuable and rewarding collection available. It is certain to stimulate further interest and discussion in the field." - Ohad Abudraham, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel, in: Orientalia (2015) "The volume certainly makes an enormous contribution to furthering studies on Syriac incantation texts, and more generally on incantation bowls. For any scholar who has an interest in incantation bowls, this work is a ‘mustʼ" - Erica C. D. Hunter, SOAS University of London, in: Orientalistische Literaturzeitung 113.1 (2018)

The corpus of Aramaic incantation bowls from Sasanian Mesopotamia is perhaps the most important source we have for studying the everyday beliefs and practices of the Jewish, Christian, Mandaean, Manichaean, Zoroastrian and Pagan communities on the eve of the Islamic conquests. The bowls are from the Schøyen Collection, which has some 650 texts in different varieties of Aramaic: Jewish Aramaic, Mandaic and Syriac, and forms the largest collection of its kind anywhere in the world. This volume presents editions of sixty-four Jewish Aramaic incantation bowls, with accompanying introductions, translations, philological notes, photographs and indices. The themes covered include the magical divorce and the accounts of the wonder-working sages Ḥanina ben Dosa and Joshua bar Peraḥia. It is the first of a multi-volume project that aims to publish the entire Schøyen Collection of Aramaic incantation bowls.

This book is a unique collection of Jewish magical texts from Late Antiquity. These consist of spells for protection against a wide variety of supernatural entities, demons, ghouls, and ghosts that were thought to be the cause of humanity's misfortunes. Texts in this collection include spells for the protection of the unborn and new-born baby and for warding off afflictions of the region of the head and belly, evil spirits in general, and human enemies. The magic bowls from which the incantations in this book have been transcribed are a form of amulet which was peculiar to the Mesopotamian regions of modern day Iran and Iraq of the fourth to seventh centuries A.D. These magical texts were individually commissioned by people whose names are usually mentioned within the texts. After having been written by sorcerer -scribes on the inside of earthenware bowls these were buried upside down under the floor of the client's house. These texts are an early testament to Jewish magical textual traditions, elements of which can be traced throughout history to modern-day practices. Levene's book makes available new and exciting material from an area of which little has been published so far.

In this volume, the authors assemble a group of Jewish incantation texts which were copied in the Middle Ages and preserved in the Cairo Genizah. Most of these texts, now in Cambridge University Library, are published here for the first time. All the texts are translated and provided with detailed philological and historical commentary, tracing the praxis and beliefs of the Jewish magical tradition of Late Antiquity. Their relation to Jewish legal and mystical teachings is also explored.

This book is a volume in the Penn Press Anniversary Collection. To mark its 125th anniversary in 2015, the University of Pennsylvania Press rereleased more than 1,100 titles from Penn Press's distinguished backlist from 1899-1999 that had fallen out of print. Spanning an entire century, the Anniversary Collection offers peer-reviewed scholarship in a wide range of subject areas.