Malocchio, or the Evil Eye, is a curse that can potentially harm or destroy any aspect of one’s life or future prospects. To do so, it uses the deleterious powers of envy projected by a – sometimes – unsuspicious gaze.

Learn more about what the Evil Eye is, and how it’s diagnosed and dispelled by watching this episode.

Hello everyone, I’m Dr Angela Puca and welcome to my Symposium. I’m a PhD and a Religious Studies scholar and this is your online resource for the academic study of Magick, Esotericism, Paganism, Shamanism and all things occult.

This episode has a special companion video, as it is part of a collaboration with my friend and colleague, Dr Andrew Henry, host of the channel Religion for Breakfast. He’s going to address the historical origins and background of the Evil Eye and its meaning, while I will cover the contemporary beliefs and practices around it.

As a Southern Italian, the Evil Eye – or Malocchio, in Italian – is an integral part of my culture and of the folk beliefs of my homeland. I also happen to have studied Folk Italian Witchcraft for my PhD! So, I’ll gladly share what I’ve learned on the field on the matter (Puca, 2020).

This concept of the Evil Eye likely originated in Mesopotamia and then spread to the Greco-Roman world, taking roots in Mediterranean cultures and spreading even further.

The Evil Eye is the belief that someone looking at you with envy or jealousy can bring you misfortune or lead to you losing the thing or object of envy(Gagahan, 2006).The idea of looking at you can be more widely understood as someone focusing their attention on you with malicious intent, envy, or jealousy. That can also happen unintentionally. It is sometimes even believed that it could even be the person afflicted to have brought the Evil Eye on themselves!

Now, let’s address an example of the Evil Eye. Let’s say, for instance, that your colleague gets a promotion and you’re happy for them, but internally or subconsciously, you bear some envy towards them in your heart. There’s a woman in my family who lost her husband about a decade ago, and she believes that the Evil Eye contributed to that tragedy. She kept saying that the other women in the town kept telling her how lucky she was to have a handsome husband who was younger than her.

In a cultural context where people believe in Malocchio, repeating how lucky someone is for any of their life’s achievements or events attracts misfortune and loss because of the jealousy or envy carried within those statements. The belief here is that the feeling of someone else having something you perceive as desirable and lacking in your life almost always underlies envy and concealed resentment.

As Dillion and Mallett explain, anthropologists have identified a few recurring features with regard to the Evil Eye:

● The first is its power comes primarily through or from the eye, with touch or speech, in particular oral praise, as additional powers.

● The second is that the person, animal or object stricken is desirable or of value.

● The third is that its action is typically immediate, though the effects may manifest over time or after some time.

● Also the person cursed by the Evil Eye may not be aware of it or of what caused their affliction.

● Lastly it’s not always preventable. But its effects can be sometimes deflected, or at least one can try or ward off with the aid of the appropriate charms, gestures, amulets, or other apotropaic objects and symbols. (Dillion and Mallett, 2015, p. 90)

Now, I will tackle the contemporary beliefs concerning protecting yourself from the Evil Eye, diagnose whether you have it and dispel its influence.

I’ll first address the cultural-specific beliefs and practices in the Italian folk witchcraft tradition that I systematised in my doctoral research under the label of the Tradition of Segnature. (Puca, 2019) Then I will move on to address the more cross-cultural perspective offered by contemporary Pagans and magic practitioners.

So, in Italian folk magic, the average person can protect themselves from the Evil Eye or try to prevent it, as diagnosing and removing the Evil Eye is usually the prerogative of magic practitioners or witches who have inherited that power through initiation.

PROTECTION AGAINST THE EVIL EYE

In Southern Italy, especially in the Neapolitan area, the most common folk practice to protect against the Evil Eye is the horn – whether it be the amulet or the horns gesture.(Wagner, 1913; Bronzini, 1981; De Martino, 2014; Carignani, 2018)

The horn amulet is called Italian Corno (‘horn’) or Cornetto (‘little horn’). In Neapolitan and similar dialects, it’s also called Cornicello or Corniciell.

In its amulet form, it’s a red coral object shaped like a twisted, hot red pepper. It’s made in a fragile material, such as terracotta (clay) or ceramica (ceramic, pottery). The belief is that carrying it with you will protect you from the Evil Eye, and if it breaks, then it means your amulet worked at deflecting the danger, and you need a new one. In Naples, you will find these horns sold on every corner, but to be an effective amulet, it needs to be gifted by someone instead of buying it for yourself.

The second very common apotropaic practice against the Evil Eye is the horns’ gesture. This is often misunderstood as if the sheer gesture would ward off the Evil Eye, but in the Neapolitan and other Southern Italian traditions, the horns need to be specifically pointed downwards – some say, towards Hell or the Devil – to deflect and channel away whatever it’s been directed at you. Often this is accompanied by the sound “Tie’’ which doesn’t mean anything in Italian and, in Neapolitan, it kind of resembles the sound ‘To you’, which might suggest the intention of returning the Evil Eye back to the sender or to the source of evil itself!

I actually do this gesture all the time. Tie.

I also often use this type of horn, but that’s a metal one. The horn amulet and the horn gesture are the main folk traditions associated with protecting against the Evil Eye.

Other protective folk practices are perhaps more generically aimed at absorbing, warding off or protecting against any harmful occurrence of any nature. These involve using salt in various ways, including being thrown behind one’s back and garlic left hanging to dry out.

DIAGNOSING AND REMOVING THE EVIL EYE

Let’s now discuss how the Evil Eye is diagnosed and removed. I will illustrate a typical Malocchio ritual, as explained by one of my informants during an interview that was part of my doctoral research. This example has been revealed to be representative, albeit variations may be found, of this kind of ritual performed in other areas of the Campania region and often in other Southern regions.

My informant’s family came from a town in the province of Benevento and lived in Napoli, Naples, at the time of our interview. Her grandmother initiated her, who taught her how to diagnose and remove the Evil Eye, the Malocchio. Concerns such as a series of unfortunate events or a persistent headache are believed to be signs of someone having cast the Evil Eye on you.

As my informant explained, performing a ritual to cast the Malocchio on someone is unnecessary, as it is believed in folklore that envy or other detrimental emotions towards a person are sufficient to exert its damaging power. The first part of the Malocchio removal ritual consists of divination to verify whether the Evil Eye affects the person.

The Segnatore or Segnatrice will, in the person’s presence, drip a few drops of extra virgin olive oil into water that had been poured into a plate. If the oil dissolves in water, the person is cursed, whereas if oil and water remain separate, no Evil Eye has been cast. As my informant pointed out, it makes sense because the magical act that causes and reveals the existence of Malocchio is something out of the ordinary. It’s not physically or chemically ordinary that oil dissolves into water, whereas it is natural to have oil and water separated!

In cases where the Malocchio is confirmed, the Segnature will be performed in the form of crosses and secret prayers over the plate containing the dissolved oil. The combined use of symbolic gestures and secret prayers, called Segnature in Italian folk magic, is believed to effectively remove the Evil Eye from the afflicted person. There are, of course, regional variations as to how the Evil Eye is detected and removed. For instance, other informants reported that if the oil collects in the shape of an eye, that would also indicate the presence of the Evil Eye. These practices, as mentioned, involve secret gestures and prayers passed down – usually within the bloodline – that cannot be revealed lest they lose their power.

CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

PAGANS AND CONTEMPORARY MAGIC PRACTITIONERS

Most contemporary Pagans and magic practitioners don’t endorse the view that someone can practice witchcraft only if they had been initiated and, rather, adopt a more eclectic and cross-cultural perspective. This means that when it comes to the Evil Eye, their beliefs and practices will incorporate elements of disparate traditions and add elements from recent developments that emerged from witchcraft and magic-practising communities. For instance, contemporary practitioners incorporate charms and amulets such as the Hamsa or the blue-eyed Nazar amulets from the Arabic and Middle Eastern world.

Another practice found across different cultures that contemporary practitioners incorporate is deflecting envy through touch, prompting compassion or making the other person take part in your fortune or benefit from it. The luck received is often attributed to God or the divine to deflect envy – for the receiver of the compliment – or avoid bringing bad luck to someone you love by unintentional feelings of envy – for the giver of the compliment. Contemporary practitioners would also use different types of magic to ward off the Evil Eye, using rituals not necessarily designed specifically for that purpose.

Examples are using the van-van oil from the Hoodoo tradition to turn bad luck into good ones and purification baths or protection rituals of different types. More generally, purification, protection, return to the sender, banishing rituals, uncrossing and unblocking spells, and rituals to attract good luck are employed and repurposed to dispel the negative effects of what various folk magic beliefs around the world would have called – or indeed still call – the Evil Eye.

Don’t forget to check out the companion video to this one, on the Evil Eye, over on Religion for Breakfast, where Dr Andrew Henry will discuss the origins, etymology, geographical diffusion and potential socio-psychological explanations for the belief in the Evil Eye around the world. Make sure to subscribe to his fantastic channel as well! Dr Henry makes superb academic content to improve everyone’s religious literacy and is brilliant at making complex scholarly notions accessible to the public. So, go check it out now and say hi in the comments on my behalf!

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REFERENCES
Bronzini, G.B. (1981) ‘Malocchio, Invidia, Diagnosi E Terapia Magica Nella Cultura Contadina Lucana Degli Anni Venti’, Lares, 47(2), pp. 265–290.

Carignani, F. (2018) Magia e malocchio. Universita di Pisa. Available at: https://etd.adm.unipi.it/t/etd-08222018-175501/ (Accessed: 1 November 2022).

De Martino, E. (2014) Magic: A Theory from the South – Ernesto de Martino. University of Chicago Press. Available at: https://haubooks.org/magic-a-theory-from-the-south/ (Accessed: 1 November 2022).

Dillion, J. and Mallett, P. (2015) ‘“THE Evil Eye”: LOOKING and OVERLOOKING IN THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE’, The Thomas Hardy Journal, 31, pp. 89–107.

Gagahan, J. (2006) ‘Malocchio Or Evil Eye’, Ambit, (183), pp. 5–8.

Puca, A. (2019) ‘The Tradition of Segnature: Underground Indigenous Practices in Italy’, The Journal of the Irish Society for the Academic Study of Religions, (7), pp. 104–123.

Puca, A. (2020) Indigenous and trans-cultural Shamanism in Italy. Ph.D. University of Leeds. Available at: https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/28331/ (Accessed: 26 February 2022).

Wagner, M.L. (1913) ‘Il Malocchio e credenze affini in Sardegna’, Lares, 2(2/3), pp. 129–150.

Uploaded 2 Nov 2022