Pócs Éva (szerk.): Magyar ráolvasások II.

Angol nyelvű összefoglalás /Hungarian Incantations/

HUNGARIAN INCANTATIONS This collection of texts represents that layer of Hungarian incantations which was mostly collected during the 19th and 20th centuries. This volume contains both published and archival materials. Incantations can be collected from the peasantry, mostly from memory, but sometimes even in actual practice, to this day. The first Hungarian incantation text was recorded in the 15th century. Following this there are about 150 texts from the period of the 16th to 18th century. These are partly texts which had been taken down by priests or monks /some of them in Latin/. Most of the incantations from this period are benedictions or blessings which were formerly accepted or half-accepted by the Church. These survived longest among monks, although at the same time they were also used by peasant healers. Certain historical data indicate that until the 18th century the nobility also used incantations. Some of their handwritten prescriptions show common features with the later peasant texts, as well, but their links with the above mentioned semi-religious text are more important. As it is shown by recent data the genre of incantations is only thriving among the peasantry in the last two centuries. The folk practice of earlier centuries has to be guessed at from these texts. There are no records of the orally handed down pre-19th century texts. Nevertheless it is easy to distinguish a group of texts with religious topic in the rich material collected during the past two centuries, which must have reached the peasant healers from the priests and monks.