Magick

Combining powerful imagery of artworks and ritual objects with insightful analysis and expertly written text, Magick tells the visual story of the magical arts. Magic appears in every era and culture, from 30,000-year-old wands unearthed in Wales to talismanic daggers of India and the horseshoe charms still worn across Europe. This eye-opening book explores the rich visual and material culture of magic in all its diversity and power, from personal superstitions and protective marks to cunning folk, enchanted grottoes, mystical spellbooks and secret ceremonies. After a concise introduction that outlines what we mean by ‘magic’, the author investigates the magical arts in three broad sections: Low Magic, High Magic and Alternative Magic. Each section reveals not only the practices themselves but how magicians and ritual specialists have shaped society across time. Spellbinding images of grimoires, spirit beings, esoteric diagrams and evocative artefacts – amulets, crystals, magic mirrors and more – bring these traditions to life, their symbolism decoded in vivid detail. Key magicians, rituals and enchanted landscapes are also profiled. Readers will discover how everyday magic worked in pre-industrial Europe, what a visit to a cunning-woman or wise-man entailed, and how mesmerists, mediums and other modern practitioners forged new magical traditions. Wide-ranging and accessible, this book traces the evolution of magic from ancient worlds through the ages of science and technology to today’s landscape of intuition, doublethink and conspiracy.