Indigenous, ethnic and folk religions and spiritual beliefs

Discover the art of spell casting to add some magick to your daily life.

See the history of witchcraft, magic and superstition come to life with this spectacular supernatural book!

*THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER**SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE**A TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES AND BBC HISTORY BOOK OF THE YEAR*'A bona fide historical classic' Sunday Times'Simply one of the best history books I have ever read' BBC HistoryIn the frontier town of Springfield in 1651, peculiar things begin to happen.

This fascinating volume delves into the history of witchcraft and demonology.

From 1400 through 1700, the number of reports of demonic possessions among European women was extraordinarily high.

Many observers of Kenya's complicated history see causes for concern, from the use of public office for private gain to a constitutional structure historically lopsided towards the executive branch.

Who are the familiar spirits of classical culture and what is their relationship to Christian demons?

Before invasion, Turtle Island-or North America-was home to vibrant cultures that shared long-standing philosophical precepts.

This volume is the first comprehensive examination of one of the twentieth century's most distinctive iconoclasts.

Though many practitioners of yoga and meditation are familiar with the Shri Chakra, a sacred diagram, few fully understand the depth of meaning in this representation of the cosmos.

Lightning has evoked a numinous response as well as powerful timeless references and symbols among ancient religions throughout the world.

Winner of the 2014 Mythopoeic Myth & Fantasy Studies AwardAt the heart of the mythology of the Anglo-Scandinavian-Germanic North is the evergreen Yggdrasil, the tree of life believed to hold up the skies and unite and separate three worlds: Asgard, high in the tree, where the gods dwelled in their great halls; Middlegard, where human beings lived; and the dark underground world of Hel, home to the monstrous goddess of death.

Ellen Muehlberger explores the diverse and inventive ideas Christians held about angels in late antiquity.

In this book, Angelika Neuwirth provides a new approach to understanding the founding text of Islam.

Though considered one of the most important informants about Judaism in the first century CE, the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus's testimony is often overlooked or downplayed.

Drawing on two years of ethnographic field research among the Navajos, this book explores a controversial Native American ritual and healthcare practice: ceremonial consumption of the psychedelic Peyote cactus in the context of an indigenous postcolonial healing movement called the Native American Church (NAC).

The Hieroi Logoi (or "e;Sacred Tales"e;) of Aelius Aristides presents a unique first-person narrative from the ancient world-one that seems at once public and private, artful and naive.

The city of Constantinople was named New Rome or Second Rome very soon after its foundation in AD 324; over the next two hundred years it replaced the original Rome as the greatest city of the Mediterranean.

Animal sacrifice has been critical to the study of ancient Mediterranean religions since the nineteenth century.

John Nemec examines the beginnings of the non-dual tantric philosophy of the famed Pratyabhijna or "e;Recognition [of God]"e; School of tenth-century Kashmir, the tradition most closely associated with Kashmiri Shaivism.

Beginning in January 1692, Salem Village in colonial Massachusetts witnessed the largest and most lethal outbreak of witchcraft in early America.

Rufinus' vivid account of the battle between the Eastern Emperor Theodosius and the Western usurper Eugenius by the River Frigidus in 394 represents it as the final confrontation between paganism and Christianity.

Medusa, the Gorgon, who turns those who gaze upon her to stone, is one of the most popular and enduring figures of Greek mythology.

In the first edition of the Bancroft Prize-winning Entertaining Satan, John Putnam Demos presented an entirely new perspective on American witchcraft.

This is a substantially expanded and completely revised edition of a book originally published in 1988 as Maenads, Martyrs, Matrons, Monastics.

Few events in American history are as well remembered as the Salem Witch Trials of 1692.

In the ancient Greco-Roman world, it was common practice to curse or bind an enemy or rival by writing an incantation on a tablet and dedicating it to a god or spirit.

Jarrod L.

An investigation of the multiple meanings and functions of sacrifice in diverse religious texts and practices from the late Hellenistic and Roman imperial periods.

This volume is the first comprehensive examination of one of the twentieth century's most distinctive iconoclasts.

Recent scholarship on ancient Judaism, finding only scattered references to messiahs in Hellenistic- and Roman-period texts, has generally concluded that the word 'messiah' did not mean anything determinate in antiquity.

Norse Mythology explores the magical myths and legends of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland and Viking-Age Greenland and outlines the way the prehistoric tales and beliefs from these regions that have remained embedded in the imagination of the world.

Self-restraint or self-mastery may appear to be the opposite of erotic desire.

John Nemec examines the beginnings of the non-dual tantric philosophy of the famed Pratyabhijna or "e;Recognition [of God]"e; School of tenth-century Kashmir, the tradition most closely associated with Kashmiri Shaivism.

The Western magical traditions are currently undergoing an international resurgence.

The Western magical traditions are currently undergoing an international resurgence.

This is a substantially expanded and completely revised edition of a book originally published in 1988 as Maenads, Martyrs, Matrons, Monastics.

Rufinus' vivid account of the battle between the Eastern Emperor Theodosius and the Western usurper Eugenius by the River Frigidus in 394 represents it as the final confrontation between paganism and Christianity.

Religion is a particularly useful field within which to study Roman self-definition, for the Romans considered themselves to be the most religious of all peoples and ascribed their imperial success to their religiosity.

Recent years have seen a significant shift in the study of new religious movements.

Hailed as "e;a feast"e; (Washington Post) and "e;a modern-day bestiary"e; (The New Yorker), Stephen Asma's On Monsters is a wide-ranging cultural and conceptual history of monsters--how they have evolved over time, what functions they have served for us, and what shapes they are likely to take in the future.

Two Greek cities which in their time were leading states in the Mediterranean world, Selinus in Sicily and Cyrene in Libya, set up inscriptions of the kind called sacred laws, but regulating worship on a larger scale than elsewhere - Selinus in the mid fifth century B.

In the first edition of the Bancroft Prize-winning Entertaining Satan, John Putnam Demos presented an entirely new perspective on American witchcraft.

This is a substantially expanded and completely revised edition of a book originally published in 1988 as Maenads, Martyrs, Matrons, Monastics.

In many of the world's religions, both polytheistic and monotheistic, a seemingly enigmatic and paradoxical image is found--that of the god who worships.

Satanism is a complex phenomenon that has often been the source of controversy across social and rhetorical contexts.

Hailed as "e;a feast"e; (Washington Post) and "e;a modern-day bestiary"e; (The New Yorker), Stephen Asma's On Monsters is a wide-ranging cultural and conceptual history of monsters--how they have evolved over time, what functions they have served for us, and what shapes they are likely to take in the future.

Daughters of Hecate unites for the first time research on the problem of gender and magic in three ancient Mediterranean societies: early Judaism, Christianity, and Graeco-Roman culture.