“To live is to war with trolls.” — Ibsen
Anthropologists tell us that primitive cultures believed art had supernatural properties. Prehistoric tribes thought that striking a drawing of an animal on a cave wall would give them luck in the hunt.
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| Diorama from the Field Museum in Chicago |
Apotropaic images were believed to contain protective magic. Ancient Egyptians believed that images had the power to connect them with the gods, and that carvings in tombs would come alive in the afterlife.
They also believed that a person would be destroyed if his cartouche was obliterated.
It’s a measure of the lasting power and mystery of art that even in modern times, superstitious and ignorant people continue to believe that destroying an image will obliterate their enemies.
the deserts of Syria to the learned halls of Cambridge.
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