S2 Ep20: Episode 20: Witch Bottles and Obsidian Mirrors

Check us out at thepastandstuff.com for images of the historical artifacts we discuss and our blog.

In this first episode of Season two, we are gearing up to Halloween. In Stuff in the News this week Ashley talks about NYC Mayor Eric Adams taking bribes from Turkey to not acknowledge the Armenian Holocaust. While, Tracey's Stuff in the News concerns mummies and skeletons, not the Halloween yard decorations, but actual Stone Age mummies and skeletons, and how researchers have been thinking about a system to name them other than dehumanizing numbers. In her piece of stuff this week Ashley's discusses Witch bottles, probably the most numerous, or at least most recognizable and extant anti-witch devices usually from the Early Modern period, but the example she uses is from as late as the American Civil War in the nineteenth century. Tracey's Piece of Stuff in an obsidian mirror from Aztec Mexico, used for divination or scrying, but also worn in ritual costumes, as well as being a facet of the god Tezcatlipoca, or the "Lord of Smoking Mirrors."

Ashley’s Stuff in the News:
Michele McPhee, “Feds: NYC Mayor Eric Adams Took Bribes From Turkish Official To Ignore Armenian Genocide,” Los Angeles Magazine, September 26, 2024, https://lamag.com/news/feds-nyc-mayor-eric-adams-took-bribes-from-turkish-official-to-ignore-armenian-genocide.
Sean Mathews, “First Stop Istanbul’: Mayor Eric Adams Accused of Taking Bribes to Do Turkey’s Bidding in New York City,” Middle East Eye, September 26, 2024, https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/first-stop-istanbul-eric-adams-did-turkeys-bidding-armenian-genocide-and-un-compound-federal.

Tracey’s Stuff in the News

Chemnitz University of Technology, “Archaeologists develop system to produce unique names for skeletons and mummies,” accessed October 1st, 2024 at https://phys.org/news/2024-10-archaeologists-unique-stone-age-skeletons.html

Tracey’s Halloween History

History.com editors, Halloween 2024, updated Oct 3, 2024, accessed Oct 3rd, 2024 at https://www.history.com/topics/halloween/history-of-halloween

Joshua J. Mark, “History of Halloween,” Oct 21, 2009 accessed October 3, 2024 at https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1456/history-of-halloween/


Ashley’s Piece of Stuff:
Sarah Bahari, “Why Are Magic ‘Witch Bottles’ Used for Spells Washing Up on Texas Beaches?” NBC, November 27, 2023, https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/texas-news/why-are-magic-witch-bottles-used-for-spells-washing-up-on-texas-beaches/3397188/.
Phil Gast, “Artifact Found at Civil War Site May Be a ‘Witch Bottle’ Used to Ward Off Evil Spirits. Really.” CNN, January 27, 2020, https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/25/us/witch-bottle-virginia-civil-war-trnd/index.html.
Simon Ingram, “Witch Bottles’ Filled with Nails and Teeth Were Once Thought to Heal the Cursed,” National Geographic, September 24, 2024, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/witch-bottles-rituals-superstition-17th-century.
Samir S. Patel, “Opening a Witch Bottle,” Archaeology Magazine, 2009, https://archive.archaeology.org/online/features/halloween/opening_witch_bottle/.
Mark Price, “Eerie ‘Witch Bottles’ Are Washing Up along Gulf of Mexico. It’s Best Not to Open Them.” Fort Worth Star Telegram, November 20, 2023, https://www.star-telegram.com/news/state/texas/article281997308.html.
Thwaite, Annie. “What Is a 'Witch-Bottle'? Assembling the Textual Evidence from Early Modern England.” Magic Ritual Witch 15, no. 2 (Fall 2020): 227-251.

Tracey’s Piece of Stuff

Stuart Campbell, Elizabeth Healey, Yaroslav Kuzmin, and Michael Glassock, “The Mirror, The Magus and More: Reflections on John Dee’s Obsidian Mirror, “ Antiquity 2021, pp.1547-1564

Emiliano Gallaga and Marc G. Bliney, Manufactured Light: Mirrors in the Mesoamerican Realm, University of Colorado Press, 2016.

Marc N. Levine and David M. Carballa, Obsidian Reflections: Symbolic Dimensions of Obsidian in Mesoamerica, University of Colorado Press, 2014.

Guilhem Olivier, Mockeries and Metamorphoses of an Aztec God: Tezcatlipoca “Lord of Smoking Mirrors” University of Colorado Press, 2008.

Karl A. Taube, “The Iconography of Mirrors at Teotihuacan,” in Janet Catherine Berlo ed. Art, Ideology, and the City of Teotihuacan: A Symposium at Dumbarton Oaks, 8th and 9th October 1988, Washington D.C. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collections and Trustees of Harvard University, pp.169-204

Nicholas J. Saunders, “A Dark Light: Reflection on Obsidian in Mesoamerica,” World Archaeology 33 (2001), pp.220-236.

Paul F. Healey and Marc G. Blaney, “Ancient Maya Mosaic Mirrors: Function, Symbolism, and Meaning,” Ancient Mesoamerica 22 (2011), pp.229-244.

Wikipedia, Mirrors in Mesoamerican Culture accessed Oct 1st, 2024 at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirrors_in_Mesoamerican_culture

Wikipedia, Obsidian, accessed Oct 1, 2024 at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsidian

Wikipedia, Tezcatlipoca, accessed Oct 1, 2024 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tezcatlipoca