I can’t quite remember when I first heard about the Emerald Tablet. It might have been when I was searching grimoires, or possibly when thumbing through one of the hundreds of research books I’ve looked at over the years, but it has fascinated me ever since I first heard about it.

The Emerald Tablet is a thick slab of green emerald or crystal (depending on which legend you are reading) on which is enscribed the secrets of all alchemical knowledge. It was reported to have been fashioned by Thoth/Hermes Trismegistus himself, who is a legendary synthesis of both the Egyptian god, Thoth and the Greek god, Hermes.

Thoth is the god of learning and scribes, the god who gave wisdom to man, so it makes sense that he would have carved this tablet. He was also the god who gave magic to mankind, so clearly it is in keeping with his reputation to share alchemical knowledge with humanity.

There is some disagreement, however, as to whether alchemical knowledge was ever truly supposed to turn lead into gold, or whether it was always intended more as a philosophy or a spiritual process to help us move our thoughts onto a higher, less physical plane of existence.

Personally? I vote for both, that the alchemical knowledge contained in the tablet is both practical and spiritual.

Some legends say that the tablet was one of the most widely copied texts in the Alexandrian Library, and that when it was destroyed in the 4th century, it was spirited away into the desert, where it remains hidden.

Or did, until it ended up in the Museum of Legends and Antiquities’ basement. ☺

Below is Sir Isaac Newton’s translation of the Emerald Tablet (via Wikipedia, but confirmed through a number of other sources as well.)

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Hello all!

I hope everyone is so quiet because they have their nose buried in a good book!

My travel plans are firming up, and the information on where I’ll be talking and signing in May is trickling in. Two firm dates are:

Tuesday, May 18,  10:30 a.m.   Politics and Prose, Washington DC

Thursday, May 20,  6:00 p.m. Wellesley Booksmith, Wellesley, Massachusetts

And lastly, for those of you who just can’t enough about Egyptian magic, I blogged over at The Enchanted Inkpot this week, talking about that very thing!

In THEODOSIA AND THE EYES OF HORUS, Theo once again visits the British Museum. I thought you guys might be interested in seeing some historical pictures of the British Museum circa 1906. Not only is it a place Theo visits, it was also my model for her parents’ Museum of Legendds and Antiquities.

This is the Reading Room. For a long time, this was the only place scholars could find the preeminent works on archaeology or ancient Egypt.

These next two pictures are pictures of the actual display rooms. I think it’s interesting to see how much they made use of natural light back then, when electric light had only just begun to come into widespread use.

And lastly, this is a picture of how I envision the family’s sitting room there in the museum.

I think I’ve talked here before (and if I haven’t, I should!) about how a lot of what we think of as magic today, was actually part of Ancient Egypt’s religion. There are a number of terms I use in the books, that I thought I’d explain a little more in depth here, especially those having to do with the magic and curses Theo deals with.

The Egyptians idea of a soul actually included three parts; ba, ka, and akh.

The ka was the divine life force that each person possessed. The ka didn’t have a personality, per se, but very much needed a physical body to inhabit. This is why mummification was so important to the ancient Egyptians—they needed a place for their ka to live once they had died. All the food and objects left in their tombs were for the ka to use.

The ba was the part of the soul that held the person’s personality. It was the ba that journeyed to the Egyptian Underworld and risked being overcome by Underworld demons and dying a second time. If the ba failed in its journey through the Underworld, it died for a second, final time.

However, if the ba survived the journey through the Underworld, it was transformed into an akh, a spirit who lived with the gods and might even have some small powers of its own.

The ba that did not survive the Egyptian Underworld became restless and unhappy. These were called mut, and are a large part of what Theodosia has to deal with in her work with curses.

Hm. Maybe I should do an entire glossary for the books. There are an awful lot of unfamiliar or unusual words having to do with ancient Egypt in the book.