Stone-agency: sense, sight and magical efficacy in traditions of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland
This article examines the materiality and mediality of sacred and ‘magical’ stones in Northern European vernacular belief practices (especially Gaelic traditions). In particular, it considers their attribution to specific deities and metaphysical beings, their role in healing rituals and in enabling...
| Published in: | Religion |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic/Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group
[2017]
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| In: |
Religion
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| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Scotland
/ Popular piety
/ Amulet
/ Magic stone
/ Materiality
/ Image prohibition
/ History 1600-1900
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| IxTheo Classification: | AG Religious life; material religion BD Ancient European religions KBF British Isles TJ Modern history |
| Further subjects: | B
vernacular traditions
B Esotericism B spirit-beings B antiquarianism B Gaelic culture B Magic B New Materialism B Vitalism B Amulets B Intersubjectivity B subtle matter B Sight |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | This article examines the materiality and mediality of sacred and ‘magical’ stones in Northern European vernacular belief practices (especially Gaelic traditions). In particular, it considers their attribution to specific deities and metaphysical beings, their role in healing rituals and in enabling humans to perceive metaphysical realms. The paper’s focus - via methodologies and theories recently developed in both religious aesthetics and ‘new materialism’ - is on the materiality and ontology of the objects and the associated visions and the ‘relations’ such stones are understood to have produced. As ‘sites’ of divine agency and efficacy the stones (including orthostats, amulets and prehistoric flints) were imbued not only with spiritual agency, but also placed within an invisible network of relations that linked individuals, non-human animals, the landscape and the metaphysical realms. This panoply of relations is crucial to the aesthetic logic guiding selection and ‘attribution’ to specific deities/spiritual beings. The theoretical framework for this discussion explores the degree to which such material culture can be considered ‘aniconic’ and the attendant conceptualisation of ‘efficacy’ and ‘agency’ as applied to interpreting the religious function of the stones. |
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| ISSN: | 0048-721X |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/0048721X.2017.1294523 |