How to Throw A Curse Like A Romano-British Woman

It’s the lesson you never knew you needed 😂 – but it’s also a step toward authentic, woman-centred British history.

Hello and happy Thursday to you,

Last week, I introduced you to some of the earliest examples of woman-centred British history. Dating from the Roman occupation (43 AD – 410 AD), these examples are useful but not entirely without problem. Ideally, we want to build a woman-centred history from sources that were written *by* women, not *about* women.

With that in mind, let me introduce some of the earliest British sources that were written *by* women. These are the Romano-British curse tablets from the 3^rd and 4^th centuries – give or take a century or two. You may already be familiar with these wonderful curse tablets, especially if you’ve ever visited the city of Bath.

Plenty of Romano-British women threw curses, but before we delve into the how and why, there are a few things you need to know.

First: remember that this is the pre-Christian period in Britain. There’s no organised Church; this is the era of polytheistic ‘paganism(s).’ We know a lot about Roman paganism, but way less about the native Brits because they didn’t write down their beliefs and practices. As we might expect, centuries of Roman colonisation brought some spiritual merging and crossover – the extent to which we’ll probably never truly know.

Second: cursing was not unique to women. Men cursed, too, and nor was cursing reserved for certain social classes, occupations, nationalities or ethnicities. Clearly, cursing was part of the fabric of everyday life. While it might seem witchy to us, people who threw curses were not considered ‘witches.’ There was nothing ‘wrong,’ immoral or illegal about this activity.

Third: The curse tablets found from this period were not public property. They were private prayers, written by a wronged individual seeking divine justice.

So, now that we’ve got the basics down, meet Saturnina, a 3^rd-century Romano-British woman, who is going to show us exactly how to throw a good curse.

Step One: Be Wronged

Tempting as it might be, you just can’t throw a curse willy-nilly. This is serious stuff. In Saturnina’s case, an unknown culprit stole a piece of linen cloth, but anything of value to you. A ring, a beloved scarf, a bangle, a stash of coins. If it’s valuable to you, its theft is absolutely curseworthy. And it doesn’t matter if you don’t know who took it from you.

Step Two: Get Your Skates On

If you want a curse that hits, you’re gonna need to get yourself to a temple. Saturnina went to the temple at Uley in Gloucestershire, but around 140 Romano-British temples have been found so far, so you’ve got choices, dearest reader.

What Uley temple might have looked like.

Step Three: Don’t Forget Your Offering

You can’t expect a deity to mete out divine justice for free. Come on now. Saturnina pledged a third-part of her beloved linen cloth. Three was a lucky, spiritual number, so choose a third of an object that matters to you.

Step Four: Choose the Right Equipment

You’ll need a piece of lead and an etching tool to write out your cursey prayer. (Maybe not lead, though. Let’s not poison ourselves 😂). Don’t worry if you can’t write, you can ask a temple priest to do it for you.

Step Five: Know Your Deity

Now, Saturnina first addressed her curse to Mars-Silvanus and then realised she’d got the wrong guys. Silvanus was the god of woods, uncultivated lands, protector of cattle and destroyer of wolves. Maybe Saturnina was a farmer. Mars makes sense, too. A god of war sounds ideal for vengeance. No worries, though. She simply crossed out the wrong names and carried on.

Uley was, in fact, the home of Mercury, whose devotional statue has since been recovered by archaeologists. Mercury was a deity associated with communication, commerce, financial gain and travellers (among many things). Maybe Saturnina intended to sell that piece of linen cloth which is why she felt so wronged by its theft. Or maybe she just looked up at that big statue and got the wrong guy. We all make mistakes, right?

Step Six: Mean Business

Let me inspire you by sharing the words written nearly two millennia ago by Saturnina:

Let him who stole it (the piece of linen cloth) not have rest before/unless/until he brings the aforesaid things to the aforesaid temple, whether he is man or woman, slave or free.

She gives a third part to the aforesaid god on condition that he exact those things which have been aforewritten. A third part from what has been lost is given to the god Silvanus on condition that he exact this, whether (the thief) is man or woman, slave or free…

It looked like this:

Interesting that she gave payment to Silvanus and not Mercury, right? Was it a typo, was this common practice, or was she indeed a farming woman? Many questions, dear reader.

Step Seven: Deliver Your Curse

Last but by no means least, drop your tablet into the temple waters. Rest knowing that the deity will administer divine justice to you.

We don’t know if Saturnina ever got her linen cloth back (minus a third, obvs) or if the culprit ever got a night’s rest again. As for Saturnina, I have no doubts that she slept soundly that night.

Until next time,

Kaye x