Show STILL FAITH IN CURSE POTENCY modern man alan lias has not outgrown old superstition ancient egyptians are acquiring an undeserved reputation for or efficiency in curses remarks science service se rolce the curse of 0 a pharaohs phara tomb Is today spoken of with awe as some thin thing superior and extra sinister in malevolent power but the egyptians were no more given to concocting concoct ing curses than any other people and there Is no reason for singling them out according to dr george S duncan professor of egyptology at the american university dr duncan has made a survey of 0 curses in egypt Baby Babylon lonia la and israel and he reported the results recently before the american oriental society meeting in philadelphia la there are curse verses in the bible mostly in the old testament doctor duncan has counted them again and again bible characters went u up p to a mountain top to be near the source of power and from that high place called down wrath of heaven on evildoers and ebal two peaks came to be associated with such rites was it mountain for blessing and ebal for curses curses were common in babelonia Babylon Baby lonia la reported doctor duncan it was customary to put curses on landmarks and boundary lines so that anyone who interfered with them would be punished there were ware no fences but the people believed that one who broke the property laws would be visited by sickness or other misfortune as a result of the curse the curse was depended on to work whether the law actually caught the offender or not origin of the dependence on curses doctor duncan attributes to old old belief in good and evil spirits in the world prehistoric man far back in the stone age was ridden by superstitions ions lons as be began to put two and two together and saw more than coincidences when evil followed some particular situation in time he began to try to control the powers himself there were always enough misfortunes amali or large happening to any man to prove that he was cursed it if be was gullible enough to believe that prehistoric man was gullible so were the ancient egyptians arid and babylonians so were the people of the mawle ages in medieval england said doctor duncan the clergy went into the fields and invoked blessings on those who regarded the landmarks and curses on those who moved or otherwise transgressed the boundaries centuries later shakespeare wrote 1137 passages dealing with the live topic of 0 curses and ha had one put on his own tomb and has modern man oung outgrown rown his faith in curses as a means to getting what he wants far from it in inpeng pennsylvania a boy shoots a woman because tor for seven years he says she hexed heaed him and cast evil spells |