Dream Divination in the Greco-Egyptian Magical Papyri

Neurobiology and Culture

Abstract

This essay investigates how dream divination in magical papyri from Graeco-Roman antiquity may have functioned for the individual practitioner. Exploring the current neurobiological understanding of dreaming, it shows how these dreams may have been rehearsed, recalled, and structured according to cultural expectations. It also explores in what ways physiological properties of dreaming would allow for a subjective experience, which may have been accepted as real.