THE ARCANE PAGANISM OF CELESTINA: PLUTONIC MAGIC VERSUS SATANIC WITCHCRAFT

IN

TRAGICOMEDIA DE CALIXTO Y MELIBEA

Abst rac t

Magic and Witchcraft are two distinct and mutually exclusive esoteric pursuits, the onebeing ritualistic and the other religious. After defining each and tracing their histories, thedistinction is applied to Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea in order to rectify the tradi-tional conception of Celestina as a witch in the popular sense of a person who has made apact with Satan and is thus empowered to affect human life through supernatural means.But Celestina’s “power” derives from a different source. Based upon the internal evidenceof words and rites, Celestina is now revealed as a practitioner of Magic, the object of herincantations being the pagan Pluto and not the Christian Satan.

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Magic and Witchcraft have two very different venues and are whollydistinct. The difference is quite marked, Magic being ceremonial andWitchcraft religious. In the former, the magician seeks personal empow-erment through ritual practices prescribed in what came to be known asgrimoires, among the most famous being the Clavicle (or Key) of Solomon,1

esoteric texts which contained invocations, Words of Power, patterns ofcircles to be inscribed on the ground with esoteric formulae, and descrip-tions of objects to be used in the conjuration, that would enable theindividual to control the will of others or affect cosmic forces via theservices of supernatural beings. As in the case of a Prospero,2 the magicianuses but does not worship the supernatural entity called upon to serve.

Witchcraft, on the other hand, encompasses a variety of ancient worshiptraditions founded on the male and female principles in Nature.3 In Europe,these were deified as the Horned God (the Greek Pan, the Celtic Cernunnos,e.g.) and the Goddess (the Greek Diana and Hecate, the Anatolian-RomanCybele, e.g.), whose symbol is the crescent Moon.4 They and the cele-brants of their rites, as in Thessaly, predated Christianity by thousands ofyears. As it grew in influence, the Church largely ignored witches andtheir cult because Witchcraft was seen for what it was: the remnant of anon-hierarchical pagan religion which posed no threat. But in the laterMiddle Ages syncretism had confused classical and Christian concepts.5 Notleast among these was the association of benevolent pagan deities with saintsand the affiliation of gods deemed sinister with the Devil and his cohorts.Thus the positive aspects of the Goddess under her many guises weresubsumed in the Virgin Mary, as her “Litany” reveals; the Horned God ofthe witches became associated with the Christian Satan, who soon wasvested with the physical aspects – the goat’s horns, tail, and cloven hoofs

Neophilologus

82: 221–233, 1998. 1998 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

– of the satyr-god Pan. Such was the fate of the old deities before themight of the new religion.

The distinction between Magic and Witchcraft had been a clear one inantiquity. However, the long-established separation of the two also becameblurred in the European Middle Ages with Christianity’s evolving viewthat all non-conforming systems of belief and ritual practices that it foundto be noxious were under the aegis of Satan. Christianity saw fit to inter-pret both traditions as evil. Witchcraft came to be the term used for whatis in fact the heretical practice of Satanism, which seeks to elevate (somesay restore) the Lord of Darkness to the highest position in the pantheon,no doubt under the influence of Zoroastrian Dualism. The accepted ideabecame that the witch served the Christian personification of Evil, the Devil,to whom he or she had made a religious (albeit heretical) commitmentthrough a professio tacita or a professio expressa.6 The medieval witchwas believed to be in thrall to her deity, the Satan who rebelled against God;consequently, he or she had chosen to follow the path of heterodoxy andhad to be punished as a heretic by the Holy Office of the Inquisition. It isdue to this Satanic association that the King James Bible self-servinglyexhorts English Christians: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (Exodus22:18).7

Similarly, the search for knowledge (i.e., power) by magicians cameto be associated by the Church with the Devil and it was held that theconjuror’s ability to alter the normal state of things came through a demonicpact, often signed in blood. The most notable of such cases is that ofFaust.8 Such a crossover associating their practices with Satan through ademonic pact that empowered magician or witch to seek supernaturalalliances not only erased the line between Magic and Witchcraft in theMiddle Ages, affecting subsequent conceptions of the two, but it forced bothinto the realm of Christian demonology. Thereafter, the confusion wasuniform throughout society at all levels.

The secular, that is non-religious work which is arguably most repre-sentative of the confusion of Magic and Witchcraft, with the attendantmisconception of demonic inspiration, in fifteenth-century Spanish litera-ture is the Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea, attributed through as acrosticto Fernando de Rojas. The Celestina, as it is generally known after its centralcharacter, is a novelesque drama (dramatic novel, according to some) firstpublished in 1499 (but probably composed before 1492)9 in sixteen actsas Comedia de Calixto y Melibea, with twenty-one acts in its 1502 version,wherein Calixto’s unbridled love for Melibea and later hers for him formthe basis for the plot. Such love is defined in the Malleus Maleficarum:“Philocaption or inordinate love of one person for another can be causedin three ways. Sometimes it is due primarily to a lack of control over theeyes; sometimes to the temptation of devils; sometimes to the spells ofnecromancers and witches with the help of devils” (176). This process of

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philocaption10 is presented in terms of occult operations at the hands ofCelestina, who brings about its illicit fruition and, ultimately, the tragicdemise of the principal players.

These events are brought about by the machinations of Celestina. AsSempronio reveals to Calixto in the first act, the old crone possesses a broadrange of natural talents and practices esoteric arts – “Días ha grandes queconozco, en fin de esta vecindad, una vieja barbuda que se dice Celestina,hechicera, astuta, sagaz en cuantas maldades hay” (59). In the same act,Pármeno adds his own description of her other doings, detailing how shetakes in sewing, runs a house of ill repute, repairs the often lost virtue ofsupposed virgins, acts as a midwife and concocts all sorts of medicines,cosmetics and potions, all of her services being available at a price to a largeand eager clientele from all social classes. Pármeno also refers to her as “unpoquito hechicera” (68), to which he adds at the end of his description:“Y todo era burla y mentira” (71).

But Celestina is more than a mere alcahueta, a love broker who is “unpoquito behcicera”. An informed, unbiased reading of her conjuration andstatements pertinent to her arcane work reveals that she is a practitionerof the ancient arts of Magic who follows pagan traditions while actingthe proper Christian. But although Celestina serves the needs of society quiteopenly, such is not the case with her occult operations. She may be thoughtof as a witch by those who, like Pármeno and Sempronio are incapableof properly defining her occult practices, but her rituals are centered onMagic and not on the popular misconception of Witchcraft as worship ofSatan.11

The crafty Celestina may function in society under the guise of a devoutChristina, but she has, in fact, no orthodox identity. This is proved beyondhearsay by her actions, most notably in the third act,12 where, in the privacyof her house, Celestina looks to gather the ingredients that she will requireto perform her magical conjuration. Calling to Elicia, one of her prosti-tutes, who is with Sempronio, she bids her:

Pues sube presto al sobrado alto de la solana y baja acá el bote de aceite serpentino, quehallarás colgado del pedazo de la soga que traje del campo la otra noche cuando llovía y hacíaoscuro. Y abre el arca de los lizos y hacia la mano derecha hallarás un papel escrito con sangrede murciélago, debajo de aquel ala de drago al que sacamos ayer las uñas. Mira no derramesel agua de mayo que me trajeron a confeccionar. . . . Entra en la camara de los ungüentos,y en la pelleja del gato negro, donde te mandé meter los ojos de la loba, le hallarás. Y bajala sangre del cabrón y unas poquitas de las barbas que tú le cortaste (109).

As her words make clear, Celestina’s pharmacopeia is replete with ingre-dients for hechicería, i.e., sorcery, as traditionally conceived.13 But perhapsmore often than not, as will be the case here, the services she providesthrough her pharmacopeia are aided by her conjurations of supernaturalforces. And such a magical operation as she is about to perform can be

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conducted only when she is alone. Thus, when Elicia takes Sempronioupstairs, Celestina proceeds to her task. Employing the concoctions shehad sent Elicia to fetch, Celestina begins the thaumaturgic rite, a summoningof the being whose aid she will seek: not the Devil of Christian traditionbut a deity out of classical Greek belief. Her conjuration is of Pluto, Lordof the classical Underworld:

Conjúrote, triste Plutón, señor de la profundidad infernal, emperador de la corte dañada,capitán soberbio de los condenados ángeles, señor de los sulfúreos fuegos que los hirvientesétnicos montes manan, gobernador y veedor de los tormentos y atormentadores de laspecadoras ánimas, regidor de las tres furias. Tesífone, Megera y Aleto; administrador de todaslas cosas negras del reino de Stigia y Dite, con todas sus lagunas y sombras infernales, ylitigioso caos: mantenedor de las volantes arpías, con toda la otra compañía de espantables,y pavorosas hidras; yo, Celestina, tu más conocida clientula, te conjuro por la virtud yfuerza de estas bermejas letras; por la sangre de aquella nocturna ave con que están escritas;por la gravedad de aquestos nombres y signos que en este papel se contienen; por la ásperaponzoña de las víboras de que este aceite fue hecho, con el cual unto este hilado, vengassin tardanza a obedecer mi voluntad, y en ello te envuelvas y con ello estés sin un momentote partir, hasta que Melibea, con aparejada oporrtunidad que haya, lo compre y con ello detal manera quede enredada que, cuanto más lo mirare, tanto más su corazón se ablande aconceder mi petición, y se le abras y lastimes de crudo y fuerte amor de Calixto, tanto que,despedida toda honestidad se descubra a mí y me galardone mis pasos y mensaje. Y estohecho, pide y demanda de mí a tu voluntad (110).

Hers is both a conjuration and an exhortation. She addresses Pluto througha lengthy litany of titles that demonstrates the result of the syncretic processwhich integrates his pagan aspects and those later associated with theChristian Devil.14 But it is her command of a deity, something that a witchwould neither have the audacity nor the power to undertake, that distin-guishes the ritual as Magic.15 Her functioning as a magician can be seenin her empowerment by the use of a grimoire when she addresses Pluto “porla virtud y fuerza de estas bermejas letras” (110).

And if her final statement seems akin to a witch’s offering of herselfto Satan, a comparison would be lame at best. Since Celestina is addressinga pagan rather than a Christian deity, there is no pledging of her soul toeternal damnation. The deity that Celestina deals with is the pagan Plutonot the Satan of Christianity, thus Celestina’s statement, in keeping with hertradition, is a formulaic offer of her services to Pluto – a quid-pro-quo.For her, there is no Christian damnation in the picture. Nor does her offeringqualify as a professed demonic pact in the traditional sense of that enteredinto by Theophilus16 or by Faust17 because it has none of the hereticalformulas or public acts of blasphemy (the osculum infame, trampling onthe Cross, abjuring Baptism, the promissory document signed in blood, e.g.)that Christian tradition associates with such demonic deeds of gift. Norare there any indications of rites of submission extraneous to the actionof the Tragicomedia.18 Internal evidence discloses that Celestina themagician is learned enough in the magical arts to summon Pluto and to

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manipulate the chthonian deity by having him entwine himself in the threadintended for Melibea.19

Pluto, also referred to as Hades in antiquity,20 is the Olympian whowith his brothers Zeus and Poseidon divided the kingdom of Kronos, theirfather, when they defeated him. Pluto/Hades, who then came to rule theearth and all within it, thereafter, with the complicity of Zeus, took themaiden Persephone/Kore while she was gathering flowers and by force madeher his consort. Thus arose the seventh-century B.C.E. myth of Demeter’ssearch for her lost daughter and the agreement brokered by Zeus forPersephone’s return to her mother but only if the daughter spent a thirdof the year in the Underworld due to having eaten there a pomegranateoffered by Pluto. Demeter, who had avenged herself by keeping the grainhidden so that it would not grow during her daughter’s absence, restoredthe earth’s productivity. The myth tied the death of the fields in winter toPersephone’s descent into the Underworld and the rebirth of nature to herresidency in the land of the living each spring and summer. The fructifi-cation of the land, a cyclical process, was seen as a double rite of passage.The telluric myth was sanctified in the Eleusinian Mysteries.

Celestina’s desire is to promote Calixto’s cause by leading Melibea toher own rite of passage – deflowering –, aptly invoking the selfsamePluto/Hades who had caused the death of Persephone’s virtue. And, to assurea satisfactory end to her demand of Pluto, the crone adds her own wordsof power to the formulaic invocation:

Si no lo haces con presto movimiento, tendrásme por capital enemiga; heriré con luz tuscárceles tristes y oscuras; acusaré cruelmente tus continuas mentiras; apremiaré con misásperas palabras tu horrible nombre. Y otra y otra vez te conjuro. Y así, confiando en mimucho poder, me parto para allá con mi hilado, donde creo te llevo yo envuelto (110–111).

The tone of Celestina’s words at the end of the third act gives a differentcast to her role vis-a-vis Pluto. In threatening the Lord of the Underworldshe is, in effect, showing the self-assurance of one who is in control (“con-fiando en mi mucho poder”). Celestina’s conjuration and subsequent attitudetowards the deity she invokes show her in the guise of potent magician,not subservient witch.

In order to understand Celestina’s power and daring in this scene it isnecessary to envision the setting for her incantations and the accoutrementsthat accompany them. Little or much can be made of the staging of theconjuration scene. The dramatist does not give stage directions to indicatehow the scene is to be set – the reader knows only that the locale isCelestina’s house –, nor how the elements used in the conjuration are tobe employed or manipulated – we know the things she employs but not theirmagical meaning in this context –, nor how the conjuration is to be intoned.Perhaps because the reader of his era knew how such things were done,Fernando de Rojas felt no need to explicate them in his text. In modern

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times, when the practices once called Magic or Witchcraft are no longerso intrinsically related to daily life, interpretative decisions as to how ritualsin old works are to be performed on a stage are left up to the reader’simagination or the director’s imperatives.

This conjuration scene should be imagined as a ritual of Magic –with robe, wand, grimoire, and magic circle (as distinguished from theparaphernalia of witchcraft employed by the Three Weird Sisters inShakespeare’s Macbeth) – in order to give an informed reading of thescene and to extract from Celestina’s conjuration (her Words of Power)its full potential for theatrically.

Celestina’s is a subtle magic, neither showy nor pretentious but highlypersonal. She keeps the magical operations she performs private, discreetlyavoiding calling on her supernatural connection when people are around.But when alone, she loosens the bonds of propriety and addresses Pluto withfamiliarity, showing her control over the deity by words that empowerher. It is important, therefore, to convey her power and control over a super-natural being in visual, theatrical terms: through setting, lighting, costuming,props and ritualized action. Since the dramatist has not given stage direc-tions to achieve this end, it is up to the reader to introduce the stage businessnecessary to elicit the full theatrically of the scene.

Once alone, Celestina would enter her secret chamber. Magical tradi-tion has it that such were usually caves or other places set apart from pryingeyes.21 Since Celestina is clearly in her house, it would be fitting that shehave a secret entrance to her domain; this could be accessed by liftingsome floorboards that give access to a subterranean chamber. Lighting alantern, she would descend some rickety stairs (that provide appropriatecreaking sounds), and enters the dark confines of her magical laboratory,a setting replete with ominous retorts, grimoires full of magical lore andincantations, and other tools of her magical trade. The area must be largeenough to accommodate a magic circle, which is to be drawn on the flooreach time a ritual is to be performed. But here there are to be none of theobjects associated with witchcraft – the cauldron, the broomstick – thoseare things that belong in the upper world, that of her attic, where she hadinstructed Elicia to find the ingredients she required. This nether place iscloser to the underground realm of Pluto and dedicated to Celestina’smagical operations, not to witchcraft.

Upon reaching the chamber, Celestina should regale her body with thetrappings of her calling: she should don the robes of the magician, put onthe headdress that vests the head with uncommon intuition, and grasp thewand or staff that will extend her power beyond her person into the darkrealm of Pluto. This done, she must proceed to make the circle on the groundby standing at its intended center22 and tracing its circumference with herwand or staff, all the while murmuring a formulaic chant from one of hergrimoires; once within the circle, she will be protected from the potential

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harm caused by a spirit brought unwillingly to her presence. It is onlyafter these preparations that Celestina can proceed to vocalize the incan-tation that will evoke the Lord of the Underworld, Pluto. This is the centralmoment of the magical work and Celestina’s incantation must be performedwith a heightened, hierophantic voice and ritualized gestures that such adaring action requires.

The conjuration scene is larger than life and must be presented as such.It must be highly stylized through setting, lighting, and costuming, for itis ritual; the conjuration itself must be accompanied by sounds and musicthat enhance its supernatural nature; the presence of Pluto must be mademanifest through ambience that suggests rather than defines – the deity mustnot be visible. . . . Brought together, elements of light and shadow, colorand sound enhance a scene of inherent unreality – or antireality – which,in turn, heightens theatrically.

It is only fitting that Celestina the magician, not the witch of popularmisconception, be given a proper interpretation during the one scene inLa Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea in which she allows herself to beseen in the performance of her secret calling. The scene, properly staged(or imagined), would be one of high theatricalism.

Once these magical preparations and rites are over, Celestina proceedsto test her empowerment. Her first visit to Melibea takes place in thefourth act and the crone is encouraged by the virgin’s gracious reception.But later, when Melibea recognizes Celestina for what she is and rantsagainst her for promoting Calixto’s cause, the alcahueta resorts once moreto her sinister ally, calling Pluto in an aside: “¡En hora mala acá vine, sime falta mi conjuro! ¡Ea, pues! Bien sé a quien digo. ¡Ce, hermano, quese va todo a perder!” (128). Pluto is now addressed as “hermano”, againshowing that she is dealing not with a deity whom she worships, but withone she is used to dealing with, her “hermano” in the practice of Magic.That she is pleased with Pluto’s final assistance can be seen at the startof the fifth act, when, having left Melibea’s walled garden retreat, Celestinasoliloquizes:

¡Oh, diablo a quien yo conjuré! ¿Cómo cumpliste tu palabra en todo lo que te pedi? Encargo te soy. Así amansaste la cruel hembra con tu poder y diste tan oportuno lugar a mi hablacuando quise, con la ausencia de su madre. . . . ¡Oh serpentino aceite! ¡Oh blanco hilado!¡Cómo os aparejasteis en mi favor! (140).23

Pluto having “got rid” of Melibea’s mother, Alisa, something that Celestina’smuch-touted rhetorical skills could not have brought about,24 the old crone’smutterings shows that even the experienced magician can be elated over theefficacy of her conjuration. In the eyes of Celestina, Pluto had accomplishedthe opportune exit of Melibea’s mother by causing the illness that calledAlisa to her sister’s bedside. He did, indeed, give Celestina the opportu-nity that she had asked for towards the end of the third act, as she recognizes

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later in an aside: “Por aquí anda el diablo aparejando oportunidad, arreciandoel mal a la otra” (118), using “diablo” not in the sense of identifying Plutowith the Christian personification of evil but as a usage of classical origin– “diablo” (from the Latin diabolus and Late Greek diabolos) and“demonio” (from the Greek daimon). Such terms have been misread as sup-portive of Celestina’s involvement with the Christian Devil. At best theyare employed in the sense of the popular parlance of the era, in the socio-religious context in which she lives, and in order to better communicatewith the Christian audience or reader for whom the work is intended,Christians who did not believe in Pluto but knew with certainty that theDevil existed.

The total fulfillment of her Plutonic conjuration with the illicit sexualunion of Calixto and Melibea through philocaption further attests toCelestina’s powers – both occult and psychological. She has served societywell once more, as well as Pluto has served her: “Así amansaste la cruelhembra con tu poder” (Act V, 140). Despite her success, Celestina doesnot flaunt her magic; indeed, she does not mention it at all to others, pre-ferring anonimity in this regard – keeping secret the most important elementin her life. She appears to accept society’s stigma as witch rather thanpromote herself as one belonging to a non-Christian magical tradition. Itmay be that her decision is founded on practicality, for society needs theservices of an alcahueta and an hechicera, both of whom are embodiedin Celestina and publicly known. Her persona as magician, however, shechooses to keep private and therefore is not evident as are her other facets:indeed, in Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea there is only one ritual ofMagic – the conjuration in the third act – and that may indicate that suchpractices are reserved for the most difficult cases – those that Celestinacan only resolve through magical intervention.

But despite the successful conclusion of the Calixto – Melibea affairin their illicit union, Celestina’s achievement as intermediary and magicianis marred by the deaths of the lovers and by the avarice of Calixto’s servants,who expect to share in the reward their master has given the crone. In acttwelve, when Celestina reneges on her promise, Sempronio cannot restrainhis ire and, egged on by Pármeno, attacks her with his sword. As he woundsher fatally, the servant shouts out her sentence of infernal damnation.Hedging her bets even at the end (or is she acting the Christian to theend?), Celestina screams for confession. But death has her in its grip andshe dies at the hand of her former accomplice while Elicia looks on.Celestina expires before anyone can bring a priest to her side, or Plutocan rescue her.

Celestina conjured the pagan Pluto, Lord of the classical Underworld,but in the eyes of Sempronio her soul will dwell with the damned inSatan’s Hell. It is ironic that despite her craftiness in Magic, Celestina

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has no precognition of the tragic events her liaison with Pluto will cause,including betrayal by her god in abandoning her at the moment of mortaldanger, as he had done with Doña Claudina. Or is it that the Lord of theUnderworld has extracted a price for his magical services, calling inCelestina’s earlier offer at the end of her conjuration (“Y esto hecho, pidey demanda de mí a tu voluntad” (110), by claiming her for his netherkingdom?

Despite the Church’s misappropriation of ideas that by Rojas’ time hadled to the conflation of Magic and Witchcraft, a reading of Tragicomediade Calixto y Melibea informed by the fundamental distinctions betweenthe two practices divulges the intent of the author(s) to present Celestinain two opposing ways – as the populace misinterprets her calling, i.e., seeingher as a worshipper of the Christina Devil, versus her secret identity asmagician who calls upon the services of the pagan Pluto – the first throughthe statements of Sempronio, Pármeno and Melibea, and the second throughCelestina’s words and actions in the conjuration scene (Act III) and in therevelations to Pármeno regarding her training at the side of Doña Claudina:“Pues entraba en un cerco mejor que yo y con más esfuerzo; aunque yotenía harto buena fama, más que ahora” (176). The magic circle was theprotective barrier used by magicians against potential harm by the other-wordly spirits they conjured. Further on, Celestina herself distinguishes whatshe and Doña Claudina did from the popular misconception termed witch-craft when she explains to Pármeno what took place one of the times hismother was arrested:

Y aun la una le levantaron que era bruja porque la hallaron de noche con unas candelillascogiendo tierra de una encrucijada, y la tuvieron medio dia en una escalera en la plaza,puesto uno como rocadero pintado en la cabeza (178). . . . Y más que, según todos decían,a turto y sin razón y con falsos testigos y recios tormentos la hicieron aquella vez confesarlo que no era (179).

Like her mentor Doña Claudina, Celestina is taken by society for whatshe is not. But rather than a devotee of Satanic Witchcraft whose soulwill pass into Hell, Celestina is a practitioner of Plutonic Magic and isthus exempt from the punishment meted out to Christian heretics. Instead,her afterlife will be spent in the Underworld under the rule of the selfsamePluto she had conjured and threatened.

The Pennsylvania State University ROBERT LIMA

N346 Burrowes BuildingUniversity Park, PA 16802 USA

The Arcane Paganism of Celestina 229

Notes

1. This magical treatise, although it purports to be from the time of the Hebrew kingand contains much late Jewish lore, is of medieval origin, i.e. fourteenth or fifteenth century.Other famous grimoires are The Grimorium Verum (1517) and The Gerimoire of PopeHonorius (Rome, 1629). There is also the Lesser Key of Solomon or Legemeton, earliesttexts of which date from the seventeenth century.

2. See Shakespeare’s The Tempest (c. 1611) and the Peter Greenaway – Sir John Gielgudfilm, Prospero’s Books, for aspects of Magic as empowerment through the use of grimoires.Faust too, before he signs the demonic pact, is drawn to the power-giving books that the magi-cians Valdes and Cornelius have brought for his instruction (Scene 1).

3. On the universality and forms of this type of worship, see Murray’s two books andthat by Hughes. In the English-speaking world, the term “Wicca” is used to denote the religionof Witchcraft; its practitioners frequently refer to it as “The Craft”.

4. The Moon’s crescent is also symbolic of horns, as can be seen on the headbandworn by the Goddess in many of her manifestations.

5. Christianity developed many of its tenets and dogmas from Judaic and other MiddleEastern religions, among them Zoroastrianism, with its central doctrine of dual powers ofLight (Ahura Mazda) and Darkness (Ahriman), Mithraism, and Gnosticism.

6. See Lima, chapter III.7. The translation is erroneous on two counts. First, the modern term “witch” is not

what the Bible uses but how the translator chooses to interpret such terms as “necromancer”,“soothsayer”, “seer”, etc.; the true translation would be: “Thou shalt not permit a necromancerto live among you”. Second, by deleting “among you”, the translator has changed the importof the exhortation in the original and given Protestant witch-finders the authority to executethose deemed to have practiced what the authorities considered to be the worship of Satan.Yet again, the Bible was misused as a tool of power, in this case to purge undesirable elementsfrom society.

8. For a discussion of the Faust tradition and its interpretations in dramatic literature,see Lima, chapter III.

9. The date of composition is obviously earlier, as ascertainable by Sempronio’s state-ment “Granada may be captured” (Act III, Scene 1). The official capitulation of Granadato King Fernando and Queen Isabel occurred on January 2, 1492, when they entered theAlhambra. The siege of Granada had taken eleven years.

10. See Armas on this subject.11. The confusion is not so much in the text as in the way the text has been misinter-

preted as regards the meanings of the terms “Magic” and “Witchcraft”. The vast majorityof those who have studied the work use the terms interchangeably, unwittingly followingthe self-serving practice of the Church since the Middle Ages. Such is the case with Lidade Malkiel’s treatment of Magic in Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea as Devil-oriented.Even Russell, in an otherwise astute rendering of the topic, discusses Magic exclusively inthe context of Satanism.

12. Numerologists may find significance in the conjuration occurring in Act III, for Threewas a number of great import in the symbology of occultism, as a reading of Cirlot andBiedermann will verify.

13 On potions, cures, herbs and other elements employed by Celestina in her hechicerías,see Laza Palacios, especially the Glossary. Compare Celestina’s list with the ingredientsused by the Weird Sisters in Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Macbeth (c. 1606).

14. Many of these titles are due to the process of syncretism which, by the fifteenthcentury, had taken characteristics of figures from classical antiquity and added them tothose of Christian times. One such case pertinent here is that of the ChristianSatan/Lucifer/Devil, who was personified with the goat’s horns, cloven hoofs and lascivi-

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ousness of Pan and given the place of Pluto/Hades as ruler of the Underworld, which cameto be called Hell after the Nordic deity.

15. In Act VII, Celestina tells Pármeno that she learned her esoteric lessons from hismother, Doña Claudina, proceeding to laud her skills and detail their joint practices, includingthe use of the magician’s circle when conjuring the denizens of the supernatural world.Although such a circle is not referred to in Celestina’s conjuration in Act III, its presence maybe implied since it was common knowledge that it was always used in such operations.

16. See Rutebeuf, Miracle de Théophile.17. See Marlowe’s and Goethe’s treatments of the demonic pact.18. Russell, following numerous critics (from Menéndez Pelayo and Bataillon to more

recent writers), errs in two ways in referring to the attempted conquest of Melibea throughphilocaptio when he states that Celestina did so through the “pacto con el demonio hechopor Celestina” (243). In fact, there is no demonic pact of any kind in the Tragicomedia,only a verbal statement made by Celestina at the end of her conjuration, as would anyoneto someone who has performed a service or done a favor; furthermore, there is no assentfrom the second party, for there is no Devil involved. Russell and others err also by refer-ring to Pluto as “el diablo” or “el demonio”, which is an inexplicable transposition of thepagan god who rules the classical Underworld to the Devil, who rules the Christian Hell.There is no evidence in the text to warrant either interpretation.

19. Thread, according to the cabbalistic text known as the Sepher ha-Zohar (Book ofSplendor, sometimes called Enlightenment) is a symbol of the connection between differentplanes; here, as the skein which Pluto inhabits, it ties the physical world of Melibea andthe supernatural plane of the classical deity. The cabbalistic symbolism is particularly germanein the Spanish context because the Sepher ha-Zohar is a compilation by the thirteenth-centuryscholar Moses de León of the teachings on the Pentateuch by Rabbi Simeon bar Yohai, asecond-century Tanna. Also known as The Mildrash of Rabbi Simeon bar Yohai, the Zoharcirculated in manuscript form from the thirteenth century until its publicaton in 1558. Theauthor(s) of the Tragicomedia de Calixto y Melibea may have read this text in manuscript.Russell (260) sees the coiled thread as a symbolic snake, making the association becausehe, like previous critics, sees Pluto as the Devil, whose original manifestation was as theEdenic serpent coiled around the Tree of Knowledge.

20. According to Bernstein, who is using Burkert, Greek Religion (200) as his source,“In Hesiod there can be no confusion between Hades and Pluto, yet as time wore on, thesefigures fused: Hades as lord of the dead became associated with the earth as storehouse ofseed; Pluto as a personification of Plenty (that is seed and produce in an agricultural society)took on attributes of rulership” (39). Bernstein goes on to say: “The Homeric Hymn to Demeterhelps explain this overlap between the underworld as grave (necropolis, city of the dead,catacomb) and granary, the connection between the inner earth and the fertility of its surface,the relationship of Hades/Pluto, Persephone, and Hecate” (39).

21. See the numerous plays listed under the “Cave of Salamanca” motif in Lima, “Dramaof the Occult: A Bibliography of Spanish and Latin American Plays”, Dark Prisms, p. 160.

22. In some traditions, the magician draws the circle while standing outside its confines,leaving a “gate” through which to enter; this opening is closed once the magician is inside.

23. Other editions have variants in punctuation and spelling, as in this part of the text.Criado de Val renders it: “¡O diablo a quien yo conjuré; cómo cumpliste tu palabra en todolo que te pedí! En cargo te soi. Assí amansaste la cruel hembra con tu poder i diste tan oportunolugar a mi habla cuanto quise, con la ausencia de la madre. . . . ¡O serpentino azeite! ¡O blancohilado! ¡Cómo os aparejastes todos en mi favor!” (119). Martín de Riquer (291) has thesame punctuation but uses “Oh” instead of “O”.

24. It has become fashionable of late to consider Celestina less an hechicera than a rhetori-cian, promoters of this view seeing the seduction of Melibea to the life of sin as the resultof the crone’s art of persuasion through words rather than as the outcome of her art in

The Arcane Paganism of Celestina 231

arcane operations. While it is self-evident that Celestina is a gifted verbalizer on behalf ofCalixto’s passion as well as a masterly user of indirection and intrigue, the modern interestin the rhetorical devices she employs in winning over Melibea’s sympathy to the suitor’splight are now being put forward as the real (some say sole) reason for her success inopening the damsel to seducton. Among others who hold this interpretation: Charles F. Fraker,“Declamation and the Celestina”. Celestinesca Vol. IX, No. 2 (1985), pp. 47–64 and “Rhetoricin the Celestina: Another Look”. In Karl Hermann Korner and Dietrich Briesemeister (Eds.),Aureum Saeculum Hispanum. Beitrage su Texten des Siglo de Oro (Weisbaden: Franz Steiner,1983), pp. 81–90; Edward H. Friedman, “Rhetoric at Work: Celestina, Melibea and thePursuasive Arts”. In Ivy A. Corfis and Joseph T. Snow (Eds.), Fernando de Rojas and“Celestina”: Approaching the Fifth Centenary (Madison: The Hispanic Seminary of MedievalStudies, Ltd., 1993), pp. 359–370; Otis Handy, “The Rhetorical and Psychological Deflorationof Melibea”. Celestinesca, Vol. VII, No. 1 (1983), pp. 17–27; Erica Morgan, “RhetoricalTechnique in the Persuasion of Melibea”. Celestinesca, Vol. III, No. 2 (1979), pp. 7–18;Olga Lucía Valbuena, “Sorceresses, Love Magic, and the Inquisition of Linguistic Sorceryin Celestina”. PMLA, Vol. CIX, No. 2 (March 1994), pp. 207–224. It must not be forgotten,however, that Rojas’ work has to be considered first and foremost in the context of its ownperiod, wherein supernatural operations by magician or witch were held to be efficaciousby the majority of the populace on all social levels, as witnessed by the scope of the Inquisitionin Catholic Europe and the Americans, as well as that of the subsequent Witchcraft Panicthat gripped much of Protestant Europe and the English colonies in the New World. Thefact is that in the context of the work, Celestina herself attributes her powers to a super-natural agency while her employer and his lackeys – not to mention the entire populace whichhas dealt with her – believe her to be able to affect the natural world through unnaturalrites.

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Armas, F. A. “La Celestina: An Example of Love Melancholoy”. The Romanic Review 66.4(1975): 288–295.

Bernstein, Alan E. The Formation of Hell. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1993.Biedermann, Hans. Dictionary of Symbolism. Cultural Icons and the Meanings Behind Them.

New York: Facts on File, 1992.Burkert, Walter. Greek Religion: Archaic and Classiccal. London: Basil Blackwell/Cambridge:

Harvard UP, 1985.Cirlot, J. E. A Dictionary of Symbols. New York: Philosophical Library, 1962.Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. Faust. Trans. Charles E. Passage. New York: Bobbs-Merrill,

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& Windus, 1991.The Holy Bible. The Authorized King James Version. New York: Abradale Press, 1959.Hughes, Pennethorne. Witchcraft. London: Longman’s, 1952.Laza Palacios, Modesto. El laboratorio de Celestina. Málaga: Instituto de Cultura, 1958.Lida de Malkiel, María Rosa. La originalidad artística de “La Celestina”. Buenos Aires:

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