Salome on Ice: A Case of a Rare Latvian Fever Charm

Pp. 29-35

Abstract

Published in 1881, a Latvian fever charm featuring maidens dancing on ice serves as a source for research into three directions of verbal charm scholarship. It marks the north-western border of transmission of certain motifs found in the charm, which date back to the first half of the first millennia A.D. It also allows the transformation of these motifs to be tracked adapting to religious and magic traditions en route from Syria through Byzantines and Western Slavonic regions. Last of all, it illustrates mechanical dissemination of a charm text, related to institutional practices of the discipline during the interwar period.