In the language of Ancient Egypt, the sound of a word had a magical power which complemented its meaning, a view of language which we still retain when we talk of "spelling" a word, or visit a ...

Why do magicians say “hey presto”? Well, as anyone who’s ever had piano lessons will likely know, presto means “quickly” in Italian, and so has long been used by conjurors to draw attention to some ...

In my last article, on the history of magic, I compared magic to religion and science, but without attempting a precise definition of magic. On the assumption that certain entities can exert a hidden ...