The belief in the horn as a powerful amulet, especially prevalent in Italy, where is it the custom of the common people to make the sign of the _mano cornuto_ to avoid the consequence of the dreaded _jettatore_ or evil eye, can be traced to the fact that the horn was the symbol of the Goddess of the Moon. Probably the belief in the powers of the horse-shoe had a similar origin. Indeed, it seems likely that not only this, but most other amulets, like talismans proper--as will appear below,--were originally designed as appeals to gods and other powerful spiritual beings.
[1] See FREDERICK T. ELWORTHY'S _Horns of Honour_ (1900), especially pp.
56 _et seq_.
To turn our attention, however, to the art of preparing talismans proper:
I may remark at the outset that it was necessary for the talisman to be prepared by one's own self--a task by no means easy as a rule.
Indeed, the right mental attitude of the occultist was insisted upon as essential to the operation.
As to the various signs to be engraver on the talismans, various authorities differ, though there are certain points connected with the art of talismanic magic on which they all agree.
It so happened that the ancients were acquainted with seven metals and seven planets (including the sun and moon as planets), and the days of the week are also seven.
It was concluded, therefore, that there was some occult connection between the planets, metals, and days of the week.
Each of the seven days of the week was supposed to be under the auspices of the spirits of one of the planets;so also was the generation in the womb of Nature of each of the seven chief metals.
In the following table are shown these particulars in detail:--[1] Used in the form of a solid amalgam for talismans.
Consequently, the metal of which a talisman was to be made, and also the time of its preparation, had to be chosen with due regard to the planet under which it was to be prepared.[1] The power of such a talisman was thought to be due to the genie of this planet--a talisman, was, in fact, a silent evocation of an astral spirit.
Examples of the belief that a genie can be bound up in an amulet in some way are afforded by the story of ALADDIN'S lamp and ring and other stories in the _Thousand and One Nights_. Sometimes the talismanic signs were engraved on precious stones, sometimes they were inscribed on parchment; in both cases the same principle held good, the nature of the stone chosen, or the colour of the ink employed, being that in correspondence with the planet under whose auspices the talisman was prepared.
[1] In this connection a rather surprising discovery made by Mr W. GORN OLD(see his _A Manual of Occultism_, 1911, pp. 7 and 8) must be mentioned.
The ancient Chaldeans appear invariably to have enumerated the planets in the following order: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon--which order was adopted by the mediaeval astrologers. Let us commence with the Sun in the above sequence, and write down every third planet;we then have--
That is to say, we have the planets in the order in which they were supposed to rule over the days of the week. This is perhaps, not so surprising, because it seems probable that, each day being first divided into twenty-four hours, it was assumed that the planets ruled for one hour in turn, in the order first mentioned above.
Each day was then named after the planet which ruled during its first hour.
It will be found that if we start with the Sun and write down every twenty-fourth planet, the result is exactly the same as if we write down every third. But Mr OLD points out further, doing so by means of a diagram which seems to be rather cumbersome that if we start with Saturn in the first place, and write down every fifth planet, and then for each planet substitute the metal over which it was supposed to rule, we then have these metals arranged in descending order of atomic weights, thus:--Similarly we can, starting from any one of these orders, pass to the other two. The fact is a very surprising one, because the ancients could not possibly have been acquainted with the atomic weights of the metals, and, it is important to note, the order of the densities of these metals, which might possibly have been known to them, is by no means the same as the order of their atomic weights. Whether the fact indicates a real relationship between the planets and the metals, or whether there is some other explanation, I am not prepared to say.
Certainly some explanation is needed: to say that the fact is mere coincidence is unsatisfactory, seeing that the odds against, not merely this, but any such regularity occurring by chance--as calculated by the mathematical theory of probability--are 119 to 1.
All the instruments employed in the art had to be specially prepared and consecrated. Special robes had to be worn, perfumes and incense burnt, and invocations, conjurations, _etc_., recited, all of which depended on the planet ruling the operation.
A description of a few typical talismans in detail will not here be out of place.
In _The Key of Solomon the King_ (translated by S. L. M. MATHERS, 1889)[1] are described five, six, or seven talismans for each planet.
Each of these was supposed to have its own peculiar virtues, and many of them are stated to be of use in the evocation of spirits.
The majority of them consist of a central design encircled by a verse of Hebrew Scripture. The central designs are of a varied character, generally geometrical figures and Hebrew letters or words, or magical characters. Five of these talismans are here portrayed, the first three described differing from the above. The translations of the Hebrew verses, _etc_., given below are due to Mr MATHERS.
[1] The _Clavicula Salomonis_, or _Key of Solomon the King_, consists mainly of an elaborate ritual for the evocation of the various planetary spirits, in which process the use of talismans or pentacles plays a prominent part.
