Hocus-pocus

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Hocus pocus , also hocus pocus fidibus, is a spell whose Latin- sounding words have no concrete meaning. It is a new creation from the 17th century.

Etymological theories

The origin and origin of the term hocus-pocus are not known. However, there are many theories about it.

Hoc est (enim) corpus meum

A widespread theory - and can also be found in etymological dictionaries - sees a connection with Holy Mass in the Catholic Church. The priest speaks during the conversion as part of the establishment report the words Hoc est enim corpus meum , "This is my body." What is meant is the body of Christ . People who didn't understand Latin might only hear something like hocus-pocus .

Others suggest in this context, a corruption of the liturgy by parts of the Reformation churches that have sought to replace the Latin in church services by the respective national language. In a parody of John Tillotson , Archbishop of Canterbury , from 1694 it says: “In all probability those common juggling words of hocus pocus are nothing else but a corruption of hoc est corpus, by way of ridiculous imitation of the priests of the Church of Rome in their trick of transsubstantiation. "

Hax, pax, max, deus adimax

The etymological dictionary by Wolfgang Pfeifer describes, according to the work of Friedrich Kluge, a presumable connection with another magic formula that may have been used since the 14th century and is documented for 1563: "Hax, pax, max, deus adimax."

Hocus pocus iunior

Since the 17th century (for the first time in 1624) the magic formula has been recorded (initially in England) as “hocas pocas” and “hocus pocus”. In particular the book Hocus Pocus Junior , published in London in 1634 . The anatomy of Legerdemain. by Elias Piluland (copy of the original edition in the Bavarian State Library in Munich) refers to “hocus pocus filiocus”, which is still used in long form, especially in Sweden and Denmark. Junior or filiocus then does not denote the son of God, but the son of the sleuth. The Latin "hocus" means "hoax" in English and means joke, joke or joke. And “hocas pocas” means something like “pocket player”. This is why special forms such as "hockesbock", "okesbockes" and "oxbox" can be explained.

In the time of King Jacob, a magician is said to have called himself “The Kings Majesties most excellent Hocus Pocus” and used the spell “Hocus pocus, tontus talontus, vade celeriter jubeo.”. Thomas Ady says in A Candle in the Dark (1655, copy in the Bavarian State Library, Munich): “I will speak of one man […] that went about in King James his time […] who called himself, The Kings Majesties most excellent Hocus Pocus, and so was he called, because that at the playing of every trick, he used to say, Hocus pocus, tontus talontus, vade celeriter jubeo, a dark composure of words, to blind the eyes of the beholders, to make his trick pass the more currantly without discovery, because when the eye and the ear of the beholder are both earnestly busied, the trick is not so easily discovered, nor the imposture discerned. "

literature

The book by Elias Piluland was translated into German by Henry Dean as early as 1667 , under the title Hocus Pocus or Pocket Player, in which the art of playing outside the pocket is clearly described; also explained with beautiful figures that an ignoramus could fully learn the same art after less practice. In German appeared (among other things) around 1675 the text Machiavellian Hocus Pocus or Statistisches Taschen-Gauckel- und Fren-Spiel by the Jean-Potagic thousand-artist, Mons. Courtisan. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe used the term Hockuspockus for a rite, namely a candle consecration in the Sistine Chapel .

Figurative sense

In a figurative sense, hocus-pocus is also understood as a fuss about undetectable deeds.

Web links

Wiktionary: Hocus pocus  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Karlheinz Deschner : Is church abuse even possible? , printed in topless , Rowohlt Verlag 1997, ISBN 3-499-60705-0 .
  2. Wolfgang Pfeifer : Etymological Dictionary of German. dtv Verlagsgesellschaft , Munich 1998, ISBN 978-3-423-32511-0 .
  3. ^ Friedrich Kluge , Alfred Götze : Etymological dictionary of the German language . 20th edition. Edited by Walther Mitzka . De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1967; Reprint (“21st unchanged edition”) ibid 1975, ISBN 3-11-005709-3 , p. 314.