Victorian folklore and folk magic

Frederick Thomas Elworthy

1830 – 1907

Frederick Thomas Elworthy was an English philologist and antiquarian based in Wellington, Somerset, whose landmark study The Evil Eye (1895) drew on extensive travel and collection to provide the most comprehensive Victorian survey of apotropaic magic, amulets, and the belief in the evil eye across Mediterranean and European cultures. He assembled one of the finest collections of protective charms and amulets in existence, bequeathed to the Somersetshire Archaeological Society. His rigorous ethnographic approach to protective folk magic made The Evil Eye a standard reference for scholars of amulet tradition and popular occult practice.

Folk magic protectionFolk MagicEuropean folklorefolk customsComparative MythologyAnthropologyAmulets and charmsProtective amuletsFolklore StudiesFolklore & SuperstitionProtective magic

Works in the Archive1 volume

The Evil Eye

The Evil Eye

1895

Intermediate

Related Authors

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim1486–1535Renaissance occult philosophy and ceremonial magicEdward B. Tylor1832–1917Cultural anthropology and animism theory

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