Christian Otto I The Peculiarities of Sigil Magic:Historical and Experimental Perspectives

Pondering the Peculiarities of Sigil Magic:

Bernd-Christian Otto

Center for Advanced Studies: “Alternative Rationalities and Esoteric Practices from a Global Perspective”,

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg

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So-called “sigil magic” is one of the most widespread and straightforward practices in modern Western ritual magic. It was invented by Austin Osman Spare in the early 20th century (Spare, 2008/1913) and revived from the 1970s onwards, first through Kenneth Grant (Grant, 1972) and thereafter through Chaos magicians such as Peter Carroll (Carroll, 1978) or Ray Sherwin (Shervin, 2005/1978). Today, sigils figure prominently in fantasy literature, movies, serials, comics, and computer games, hence representing an important facet of modern occulture; and they continue to function as important ritual tools for a large number of practitioners. But how do sigils allegedly work? That is, how do they, according to practitioners, change the course of future live events by “bending” the probability of unlikely things to happen?

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Bernd-Christian Otto is a scholar of religion working at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität (FAU) Erlangen-Nürnberg in Bavaria, Germany. Otto’s research focuses on magic and esotericism, where he combines different methodologies such as conceptual history, discourse analysis, ritual studies, participant observation, and practitioner-scholarship. He is one of the founding members of the Center for Advanced Studies ‘Alternative Rationalities and Esoteric Practices from a Global Perspective’ at FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg (http://www.cas-e.de ), and he is co-founder and scientific director of the Research Network for the Study of Esoteric Practices (http://www.rensep.org ).

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Published on October 11, 2026

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