DISCOVERY 



99 



associated with a known quantity of the primary 

 radio-element. If the weights of both and the period 

 of one is known, then, as was mentioned above, the 

 period of the other may be simply calculated. In 

 this way the period of uranium has been obtained. 



The commonest method, however, is to measure 

 the radio-activity of a preparation at intervals in a 

 special apparatus called an electroscope. From these 

 observations it is not difficult to evaluate the half- 

 value period or the period of average life. This is the 

 chief method of measuring the periods of those bodies 

 that lie between a few minutes and a few years, the 

 majority of the radio-elements. 



REFERENCES 



Radio-active Substances and their Radiations. By Sir E. Ruther- 

 ford, LL.D., F.R.S. (Cambridge Univ. Pres.s, 1913, i6s.) 



Radio-activity and Radio-active Substances. By J. Chadwick 

 M.Sc, PhD. (Sir Isaac Pitman Sons, Ltd., 1921, 2s 6d.) 



Horse-Racing and Magic 



under the 



Roman Empire 



By W. R. Halliday, B.A., B.Litt. 



Professor 0/ Ancient History in the Uniuersity of Liu^rpool 



Among the recoi-ds of antiquity preserved in the great 

 collections of Greek and Roman inscriptions there is 

 a series of very human documents. The writing, with 

 which they are covered, betrays as a rule their humble 

 origin. They frequently contain mistakes of grammar 

 and spelling, and the latter, upon occasion, throw an 

 interesting light upon the pronunciation of their day. 

 These documents consist of smaU sheets of lead 

 inscribed with magical spells which have been inserted 

 into graves or nailed to the walls of tombs. 



Whether this practice was of oriental origin is not 

 certainly known. It took firm root in Attica in the 

 fourth century B.C., and spread thence with Athenian 

 trade to Italy. The Romans adopted the superstition 

 and carried it into the provinces of the West. In 

 Roman Africa, the home of Apuleius (born about .\.d. 

 125), the author of The Golden Ass, who was himself 

 put upon trial upon the charge of magical practices, 

 this, like all other magical arts, found a congenial soil. 

 The African temperament, alike in literature, philo- 

 sophy, and religion, was naturallyinclined toexuberance 

 and mysticism, an influence from which the Christian 

 Fathers of African origin are not e.xempt. It is from 

 this province that the document before us derives ; 

 it was found in the tomb of an imperial official near the 

 site of Roman Carthage. It consists of a small sheet 



of lead roughly 5 1 inches long ; a series of cabalistic 

 signs are inscribed round the borders, within which is 

 WTitten the Greek text. 



The object of placing spells of this character in 

 graves or of nailing them to the walls of tombs was 

 to open up direct communication with the powers of 

 the nether world. Sometimes the spirit of the dead 

 man, whose grave is utilised, is itself compelled by the 

 magic of the great names to carry out the terms of 

 the spell. Another similar African inscription of the 

 third century thus begins : "I conjure you, whoever 

 you are, spirit of the dead man." A favourite place 

 for the deposition of spells affecting the games was the 

 spoliarium, or mortuary in which the dead bodies of 

 gladiators were laid. 



The inscription opens with a series of "words of 

 power " : Semesilam damatameneus lesnnallelam' laikam 

 ermouhele iakoub ia ioerbeth iopakerbeth eomilthaheth 

 allasan. Mystic words of invocation are a common 

 feature of these conjurations. They are equally fre- 

 quent in the magical papyri of the third and fourth 

 centuries after Christ, and in the superstition of 

 mediaeval Europe. In magic a natural premium is set 

 upon the strange and the unknown, which itself has an 

 impressive because unintelligible sound, significance, 

 or appearance. The general characteristics of such 

 formulae, whether they are found in the classical 

 inscriptions or in the records of English folk-lore, are 

 fairly uniform. Some are taken from foreign or strange 

 religions. The magical inscriptions and papyri for 

 this purpose drew largely upon the religions of the 

 Jews and the Egyptians. Thus in the formula before 

 us we have la and Iakoub ; and forms of lahwe and 

 El, the two names of the Deity in the Old Testament, 

 are favourites both by themselves and in their com- 

 pounds. Thus another formula opens, lao El Michael. 

 Other formulae consist of corruptions of names or words, 

 e.g. the mediaeval hocus pocus, which is an ignorant 

 corruption of the words of the Mass, hoc est corpus 

 meum, "this is my body." Of this kind is damata- 

 meneus, which appears to be a corrupt form of Damna- 

 meneus, who was one of the pygmy magicians (Idrean 

 Dactyls) of ancient Greek folk-lore. Other formula, 

 again, are simply arbitrary gibberish, sometimes an 

 arrangement of mystic letters, as for instance a com- 

 bination of the vowels which was very popular (e.g. 

 eueuicBeia oeianiuaieo 1) or sonorous nonsense words 

 which often have an oriental or Egyptian looking 

 termination in heth or oih. Compare, for example, the 

 formula of an English charm against thieves quoted by 

 Reginald Scot, which rans: "Drochs myroch esenaroth 

 betu baroch ass maaroth. ' ' ^ 



1 In the magical papyrus discussed by Dieterich, Eine 

 Mithrasliturgie, p. 4. 



- Scot, The Discovery of Witchcraft, Booke XII, cap. 18. 



