Occultural Decadence: Ventriloquism as a form of Necromancy

The Church does not deny that, with a special permission of God, the souls of the departed may appear to the living, and even manifest things unknown to the latter. But, understood as the art or science of evoking the dead, necromancy is held by the theologians to be due to the agency of evil sprits...

The Catholic Encyclopedia

A practice that has endured through the years is Necromancy, or divination by communication with the head. Necromancy means literally 'divination of the dead' and one of its principal aims is to discover the future. The belief that dead increases a man's powers, especially his prophetic faculties, is the basis of necromancy. The Old Necromancer would invoke or claim to possess the spirit from the dead within him, and through the spirit is able to tell the future. It is from the practice of necromancy that ventriloquism finds its origins. 

The beginnings of ventriloquism can be traced back to the magical practices of ancient priests, as magic was a form of prayer to the ancient people; a way of communicating and gaining power from the gods, like necromancy. The name is derived from the Latin for to speak from the stomach i.e. venter (belly) and loqui (speak). 

This imposture of speaking in the belly hath been often practiced in these latter days, in many places, and namely in this island of England, and they that practice it do it commonly to this end, to draw many silly people to them, to stand wondering at them, that so by the concourse of people money may be given to them, for they by this imposture do make the people believe that they are possessed by the devil speaking within them and tormenting them, and do by that pretense move the people to charity, to be liberal to them. 

The illusion of the talking figure relies upon the basic movement of the mouth, which when moved in conjunction with the ventriloquial voices gives the appearance of speaking. Mimicry is the root of the practice. Based upon the fact that the ear experiences great difficulty determining the exact source of sound that it hears. the ventriloquist takes advantage by mimicking near and distant sounds, while misdirecting the auditor.  

Magic depends heavily on mimicry. Campanella and Urban VIII constructed an imitation sky in their sealed room. The magician tortures or kills an animal in a ceremony of hatred as an imitation of the action of the force he is trying to arouse. When a magician musters the full power of his will and acts in a certain way, he believes that he causes the forces of the universe outside him to act in the same way. This is an extension of the rule of 'as below, so above'. As the magician behaves 'below' so will the forces of the universe behave 'above'. 

Mimicry alone is not enough. Imitating the action of a force arouses it to act in the way which it was imitated, but to direct it at a particular victim there must be a link between the spell and the victim, otherwise the force will not hit the intended target. The link may be created simply by words, by saying that the grain is the victim's bones and the bay-leaves his flesh, or by making a doll which is a miniature replica of him, or by working on a part of his body or his clothes or something which has been closely connected with him.

In Outside the Circles of Time, Kenneth Grant explores the idea of 'magical mannikins', as he calls them. "The magical mannikans, or dwarf dreamers, are identical with the 'wee folk', the little men of fairy lore, who were the projections of mediaeval magicians essaying the Great Work, i.e., the interpretation and exploration of the aethyrs... Being unversed in modes of magical interpretation, they describe their experiences in terms reminiscent of those were 'taken by the faeries', or who experienced intercourse with diabolical entities, including the Devil himself. Innumerable well testified accounts of physical possession by demons, erotic encounters with the devil, and sexual intercourse with incubi and succubi are extant. The reason is not far to seek. The sexual trance is the basis of certain kinds of perichoresis which occur when other worlds, other dimensions interpenetrate each other, often causing a disruption or hiatus in the consciousness that experiences them.

This form of magick involves the use of the mouth and the tongue, the two eyes of the waking state and their complimentary dream eye. The mouth is dual as the uterus of the Mother, and the utterer of the Word (logos) of the Father. Their fusion engenders the magical child (the Daughter, who represents the reified yet original Nothing) in the particular form desired by the magician." 

A grim Scottish method of finding out whether someone who is ill will recover or not establishes a magical link by the force of words alone. Dog two holes in the ground. Call one 'the living grave' and the other 'the dead grave'. Fetch the sick man and put him on the ground between the holes, without telling him which is which. If he turns his face to the living grave he will recover, if to the dead grave he will die. The sensations of the sick man who believes in this test can be imagined. It may have worked efficiently in many cases because of the psychological effect on the patient who discovere that he was bound to get well or doomed to die. Because of the very nature of magic, trickery was inevitable and clever magicians took advantage of the superstitions of ignorant people. 

In the reign of Augustus Ceaser, emerged Christianity, a religion that showed no tolerance for occult practices or divination. However, somehow the magical practices continued to thrive. St. Clement wrote "the ventriloquists are still held in honor by many," and he placed them in high regard alongside other religious peoples. Not all shared in this opinion, however, as St. Gregory believed that ventriloquist diviners were possessed by demons, whether or not it was a mere vocal deception.

"it is foolish and childish, to think that God, as the ventriloquists formerly called Eurycleans, and now Pythonists, should hide himself in the bodies of the prophets, using their mouths and voices as instruments to speak with, for this was done by turning their voices down their throats.

The first of this sort was one Eurycles, of whom Aristophanes (g) makes mention; and the Scholiast upon him says, that he was a ventriloquist, and was said by the Athenians to prophesy by a "demon" that was in him, when it was only an artificial way of speaking; Tertullian affirms he had seen such women that were ventriloquists, from whose secret parts a small voice was heard, as they sat and gave answers to things asked: Caelius Rhodiginus writes, that he often saw a woman a ventriloquist, at Rhodes, and in a city of Italy his own country; from whose secrets, he had often heard a very slender voice of an unclean spirit, but very intelligible, tell strangely of things past or present, but of things to come, for the most part uncertain, and also often vain and lying; and Wierus relates of one Peter Brabantius, who as often as he would, could speak from the lower part of his body, his mouth being open, but his lips not moved, whereby he deceived many by this cunning; and there was a man at court in King James the First's time here in England, who could act this imposture in a very lively manner (h): but now whether the spirit that was in this maid was a cheat, an imposture of this kind, is not so easy to say; it seems by the dispossession that follows, that it was a real spirit that possessed her; though some think it was no other than a deluding, devilish, imposture:"

This continued on until the 13th and 17th centuries, and all records were released of divine ventriloquism during this time. In the late 16th century ventriloquism made a turn around in England and emerged as a form of entertainment. In Austria, in 1750, a new dimension was added as Baron von Mengen began using a small doll figure in which he installed a moving mouth. By moving the mouth and synchronizing these movements with the ventriloquial voice, he gave the effect that the doll itself was talking. 

In the 18th and 19th centuries, ventriloquism and magicians began to make a comeback, as ventriloquism became a popular form of entertainment. At the turn of the 20th century, many still misunderstood ventriloquism as a supernatural gift that enabled the ventriloquist to "throw his voice". Many definitions of this term are put out into the discourse of the modern era. Ventriloquism is defined as "not merely making one's voice appear from nowhere-- he means the word to designate all forms which may be taken by sourceless, or disassociated or displaced voices, along with the various explications of such voices." So not only is ventriloquist the popular form of entertainment once seen on the small stages of vaudeville, but also any other form of disembodied voice. An academic definition used to-day of ventriloquism is a general term for "any variety of speaking for or through a represented other." So, in other words, a secretary for a large company would, in modern times, be a form of ventriloquism. President Obama, speaking on behalf of America, would also be a ventriloquist in terms of this definition.

The arch-sorcerer begins his final conjuration. They hack off the goat's head, slash a gaping cavity in the belly of the corpse and thrust the head of the goat onto it. Other parts of the goat are pushed into the corpse's mouth. This is the identification of the corpse and goat. Suddenly, one of the assistants flings himself on to the two carcasses, tearing them with his teeth and lapping the blood. He is the weakest of the group and it is through his mouth that the dead man's spirit, now demon-inspired, will speak. He sits up, his face beaming with delight, and answers their questions rapidly and commandingly.