Welcome to the Myths of Man

In my other series Alphabet Adventures I explore the dictionary and the words we use to describe our world in this series I intend to explore the stories we have told with them in order to attempt to describe how our world works.

Todays Myth

Abracadabra

Source

Everyone knows magician needs his magic words if he really wants to get stuff done whether its Hocus Pocus, Alakazam, or Abracadabra but have you ever stopped to think about that last one and how it got to be the go to word in a magicians vocabulary for such a long time.

This word is pretty dam old and was once believed to hold some actual power the earliest known example of this one can be found in Liber Medicinalis by Quintis Serenus Sammonicus one of the doctors that accompanied the Roman Emperor to Britain in 208 AD, so yeah pretty old.

At this time Quintis suggested its use an an amulet for use in the driving out sickness and fever the amulet was meant to be inscribed with the word dropping letters to form a triangle as such.

A B R A C A D A B R A
A B R A C A D A B R
A B R A C A D A B
A B R A C A D A
A B R A C A D
A B R A C A
A B R A C
A B R A
A B R
A B
A

One suggestion is that this dwindling of the word was meant to cause the same effect in the fever and cause it to break.

source

Folk Etymologies

These are stories or theories about the origins of a word which have not been verified.

Aramaic Origins.

Before we get into these let me just state that I am no linguistic scholar and Aramaic is really really old 700-900 BC with its own complicated set of rules a word spelt in English may use different characters with similar sounds that totally change its meaning.

Evra K’divra - As far as suggestions go this one just looks right doesn't? If you believe the internet it means something along the lines of "What is said is done" or "I create as the word spoke" likening the healers power to that of god, rather fitting for a magic word isn't it.

The potential Aramaic origins get a little more confusing after J.k Rowlings Harry Potter popularised Avada Kedavra as a curse, the author herself suggested this meant "let the thing destroyed" and claimed it was the origin of abracadabra.

Hebrew

There are two more suggestions as to the origins for this one coming from the Hebrew language but this isn't actually surprising given that there is a strong connection between Hebrew and Aramaic.

The first is from a supposed Jewish cure for fever. Unfortunately I have only one source for this actually being a Jewish cure. The every faithful internet failed me on this one however if it happens to be true you can easily see how the magicians word could have come from such a cure.

Ab Abr Abra Abrak Abraka
Abrakal Abrakala Abrakal
Abraka Abrak Abra Abr Ab

The second is that it is perhaps come from a mimicking or condensing of three separate Hebrew words. Unless a Jewish reader can correct me on this one I'm going to call this one bollocks

Ab - Father
Ben - Son
Ruach HaKo'desh - Holy Spirit

The three words become Abbenrauchhakodesh this feels like it could also be right imagine your a foreigner and heard those words used in prayer or blessing you might be forgiven for having abracadabra be how it came off your tongue. However here is the bollocks part as far as I'm aware there is no trinity in the Jewish faith so I'm not sold on on this explanation for the origins of a word so widely used today.

Well that's it for today if you happen to speak Hebrew and these folk etymologies happen to be a butchery of you language you have my apologies and if you can add anything to help clarify the issues please let me know in the comments.

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Kind Regards

Peter