DEFIXIO

Defixiones or Curse tablets

The name of the offender was written on the tablet with details of the crime. Then it was dedicated to a god who was called upon to punish the offender, usually in a very unpleasant way

The completed tablet was then fastened to a tomb with a long nail or folded up and thrown into a spring or well

Over 300 have been found in Britain mainly directed at thieves

This one says:

‘Docilianus, son of Brucerus, to the most holy goddess Sulla. I curse him who stole my hooded cloak, whether man or woman, whether slave or free, that … the goddess Sulis inflict death upon .. and not allow him to sleep or children now or in the future, until he has brought my hooded cloak to the temple of her divinity’

Sometimes magic and apparently meaningless words like BESCU, BEREBESCU were added to increase the effect

Some were very simple; others like this very eloquent:

‘may burning fever seize all her limbs, kill her soul and her heart. O gods of the Underworld, break and smash her bones, choke her, let her body be twisted and shattered - phrix, prox’

This is the ‘Vilbia curse and is one of the most famous found in Bath. It is written backwards to

increase the mystery of the curse• It reads:

• May he who has stolen my Vilbia from me dissolve like water. May he who has devoured her be struck dumb whether it be Velvinna or Exsuperius or Verianus … (there follows a list of 6 suspects)