Incantation

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An incantation is the words spoken during a Ritual, either a hymn, Chant or Prayer invoking or praising a deity, or in Magic, occultism, Witchcraft with the intention of casting a spell or an object or a person. The term derives from Latin incantare (tr.), meaning "to chant (a magical spell) upon," from in- "into, upon" and cantare "to sing".

In medieval literature, folklore and fairy tales, enchantments (from the Old French word enchantement) are Charms or spells. The term was loaned into English since around AD 1300. The corresponding native English term being Galðr|galdor "song, spell". It has led to the terms enchanter and enchantress, for those who use enchantments.

Structure

Incantations display several of the features of the oral traditions, including repetition, a strong reliance on performative language and composition. The earliest incantations in English are probably the Old English metrical Charms. Written in Anglo-Saxon these charms are difficult to differentiate from the riddles and other short poems of the corpus of Old English poetry. However, they do rely strongly on metaphor, a relatively rare device of Anglo-Saxon poetry (except, of course, in the form of kenning), and one that may be universal to the genre of incantation.

A cursory examination of a cross-cultural selection of incantations reveals a few similarities.

• Most incantations are metrical in one of several poetic forms of the language in which they are written. Some use an unusual verse form. Prose incantations are rare.
• Almost all incantations invoke the aid of a divine or semidivine being, or some other spiritual entity.
• Information packing in incantations is extremely tight. Sometimes, metaphors are difficult to understand, either because they are deliberately meaningless, or, more likely, because the author intended the metaphor to carry more semantic weight than usual.
• Many incantations contain nonsense words. These words may be mantras, "barbarous words" (in Greek incantations, often badly transliterated Hebrew), or strings of vowels or other non-linguistic sounds called vocables.
• Most incantations seem to require some sort of physical action by the reciter in order for the performative act of the incantation (i.e., the act of Magic) to work. These actions may be described as part of the Charm. In some instances, it is difficult to tell if the description of the actions is also to be incanted as part of the charm.

Almost no formal study has been done on the literary qualities of incantation, despite abundant theory in related areas.

Some collections of charms

• The Old English Metrical Charms
• The Carmina Gadelica, a collection of Gaelic oral poetry, much of it charms
• The Atharva Veda, a collection of charms, and the Rigveda, a collection of hymns or incantations

See also

• Carmen, the term for an Ancient Roman incantation
• Mantra
• Prayer
• Galdor
• Spell
• Geas
• Sain
• WiccanWeb Chants Collected and maintained by Achriel