Information from the preamble, more seldom the beginning of the description proper,

Punficatory rituals are the most numerous group among the magical texts; prac

Tices and spells in them were based on analogic magic. Their task was to remove

Contamination resulting from contact wifch beings considered impure, evil sorcery

892

g-od s anger, etc. " This served to deliver the patient from various misfortunes, like

Illness, pestilence, but also the effects of crime, intrigue, slander, witchcraft, and

Defeat on the battlefield.

Cleansing was achieved most offen by bathing, washing or sprinküng with water,

Sometimes with the addition of other substanc.es regarded as having purifying

Properties. ” Water was drawn. from rivers or springe in the course of appropriate

ritual practices." In certain circumstances, the hands were washed with wine. 896

Rituals of Hurrian(-Kizzuwatnean) origin mention ‘water of purification’ (sehelliyais)

wädar / widär) that contained other purificatory suhstances; it was prepared accord-

ing to a special recipe said to be given by the gods.""' 8 The Hurrians also used silver

As a purifying agent, sometimes in combination with the water of purification. 897

B rom Mesopotamia comes a recipe for water taking on magic properties when left on

The roof for the night in Order to “sleep under the stars,” 898 The custom of washing

Torri 2004.

See, in general, Moyer 1969; Wilhelm 1999b.

Haas 2003a: 141ff.

894 Haas 2003a: 146ff.; Strau ß 2006: 34ff.

896 Strau ß 2001; Haas 2003a: 161ff.; Strau ß 2006: 380.

897 Haas 1982: 177{f.; 2008a: 214£f.

898 Haas 2003a: 162f.; Strau ß 2006: 43f.

The Empire Period 163

899

with rain water and dew was adopted from Syria. ‘ Combing out impurities was

900

Also applied, as was rubbing them off the patient and his/her belongings.

After the washing that removed pollution, the patient was sometimes rubbed or

Anointed with clean suhstances intended to fi.ll him/her with cleanliness. A notice-

901

Able mark of this was the replacement of cast-off clothes by a white robe.

An eagerly applied practice was the ritual of passage, The passage between halves

Of a pup or kid (and in the case of a defeated army even a human corpse), 902 through

A gate of prickly branches and between fires burning behind it, was supposed to

903

deliver from impurity and all evil."

In rituals revealing Connections with the Luwian milieu a variety of carriers of

Contamination appear (often confused with substitutes, see below), whose task was

904

to take evil away from the patient and move it to a different place.'' The Biblical

905

scapegoat is a typical carrier.' In Anatolian magic, the goat appears in this role

already in the Old Hittite period (3.1.4),' although on. the pars pro toto principle,

Body secretions, nails, liair and any object, animal or figurine could have acted as

A carrier as well. One of the more frequent practices was waving an object, most

Often an animal, over the patient in the belief that contamination would pass onto it

907

Through contiguity. In keeping with the similia similibus principle, ineantations

accomp ß nying these practices attributed parts of the body of the ill person to corre-

Sponding parts of the body of the animal to which the contamination was to be passed.

908

This spell has Mesopotamian roots and reaehed Southern Anatolia via Syria."

909

Cathartic practices induded action against black magic, “ The destruction of a figu

Rine or vessel representing the soreerer or sorceress meant in the magical sense

Haas 2003a: 145.

Haas 2003a: 730f,

901 Haas 2003a: 614ff.; Strau ß 2006: 137ff.

902 Kümmel 1967: 150f. with references; Beal 1995: 74; Haas 2003a: 545f.

903 Haas 1994a: 898ff.; 2003a: 691ff.; Strau ß 2006: 133ff.

Haas 2003a: 401ff., 539ff.

Leviticus 16, 8-28; cf. Janowski — Wilhelm 1993: 109ff.; Pfeiffer 2001. The earliest textual

Evidence for a goat as a carrier of impurity comes from third millenniu.ni BC Ebla, see Zatelli

With references.

906 Janowski — Wilhelm 1993; Haas 2003h; Strau ß 2006: 13Off.

907 Cf. Haas — Wilhelm 1974: 42ff.: Strau ß 2006: 72ff,

Haas 1971.

909 See now Schwemer 2007a: 255ff. with full discuasion and references. Black magic, or ‘sorcery 5

(Hittite alwanzatar) as one of the oöences which threatened the foundafcional principles of society

Hittite Anatolia

The Empire Period

O4