Some medieval #magic. (Bonus: Look closely and you can see parchmenter’s tool marks in the upper left and lower right quadrants). #Manuscripts #parchment

Related trivia time!

Kieckhefer (1998) gives a few accounts of medieval #manuscripts believed to be “infected with #demons” …

For instance, the canonization proceedings for Archbishop Antoninus¹ (‘https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐜" title="Ameise" aria-label="Emoji: Ameise">’) of Florence (d.1459) told how he once sought a haircut from a barber-surgeon (‘https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="💈" title="Barber-Pole" aria-label="Emoji: Barber-Pole">’) who had a reputation for healing the sick …

[¹ source of much of the #misogyny in Malleus maleficarum, btw

Learning that this gift was attrib. to a book which https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="💈" title="Barber-Pole" aria-label="Emoji: Barber-Pole"> owned, https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐜" title="Ameise" aria-label="Emoji: Ameise"> asked to see the tome, discerned that it was demonic, & so seized & burned it. As the book burned it sent up a terrifying cloud of black smoke due to the demons trapped within it …

Similarly, Michael Scot (d.1232) wrote of a grimoire inhabited by spirits which, when the book was opened, called out solicitously to the would-be reader, asking what they sought.

[Ngl, I’m envious of that book’s owners. Research librarians take note
(¬､¬)

I hope that one escaped unscathed, and now whispers contentedly to itself in some repository, at last enjoying cosy retirement. (Everyone deserves a decent retirement).

And shame on https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐜" title="Ameise" aria-label="Emoji: Ameise"> for burning a book at all, but especially for doing so when its demons were at home, *inside it*. How rude. https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😒" title="Unerfreutes Gesicht" aria-label="Emoji: Unerfreutes Gesicht">

For Kieckhefer, these tales are interesting for several reasons including that they seem to “express obsessive anxiety about the book itself as an object invested with a kind of negative sacrality”—an intriguing idea. https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🤔" title="Denkendes Gesicht" aria-label="Emoji: Denkendes Gesicht">

(Maybe. Or maybe they really were infested. In the image at the top of this thread, are those ‘tool marks’ really tool marks, or are the demons just marking their territory? https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😜" title="Winking face with tongue" aria-label="Emoji: Winking face with tongue">)
#MakeYourDemonsHappy_BuyAScratchingPost https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐱" title="Katzengesicht" aria-label="Emoji: Katzengesicht">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😈" title="Lächelndes Gesicht mit Hörnern" aria-label="Emoji: Lächelndes Gesicht mit Hörnern"> #YouHeardItHereFirst