Magic was ever-present in the wider Greco-Roman world. Spells and herbs, spirits and gods, curses and blessings, prophecies and oracles, they were all the domain of the magic and crafts of the magician for the people living in the ancient and late antique Mediterranean (1st-7th centuries CE). The people who practiced magic were among the most persecuted communities in the Roman Empire and have often been presented as living on the margin and under secrecy, despised by the cultural elites and politicians of the Roman Empire.

Yet despite all the slander, suspicion, and persecution, magicians were deeply involved in the personal lives of local populations and enjoyed fame and popularity among the laity, earning money from them. By claiming to be a mediator between the people and the gods, they became credible and reliable figures in their communities because the magic they performed was effective, either psychologically or in real life. The magicians listened to the people and established an authoritative image in the minds of those who came to them seeking help.

Moreover, magic in the Greco-Roman context also meant a system of values that the magicians and their believers subscribed to, claiming to access something otherworldly. To be a brilliant magician meant to insightfully exploit one's psychological feelings and offer magic as a spiritual shelter to people who sought love and hate, who desired and wished for more than they already owned, and this was something Alexander of Abunoteichos (105 to 170) was really good at.

Alexander of Abunoteichos was perhaps one of the most famous magicians in the Roman Empire. He was the apprentice of a certain Egyptian physician, a fact that reinforced his reliability as a magician, since Egypt was the land of magic in the popular imagination of the Roman people. This might be a typical stereotype, but it also established his credentials in the business. 'Foreign wisdom' was not accessible to the common populace, and as such, it signified being a learned and credible magician. The Egyptian topes were certainly common; a strange encounter with "learned and aged chief priests who were expert in manifold fields of knowledge" is mentioned by Thessalus of Tralles (De virtutibus herbarum 12 to 28), and Lucian writes about running into someone whose "wisdom was marvellous and he had had the full Egyptian training" (Philopseudes 34).

After his studies, Alexander co-founded an oracle with another person, and together they made not only a fortune but also enjoyed great prestige. He and his oracle were so famous that even the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius (reign 161 to 180) employed him to predict the course of warfare. His prophecy failed, but he was clever enough to offer the emperor a satisfactory answer, as he "was flat enough to adduce the Delphian defense in the matter of the oracle given to Croesus, that the God had indeed foretold victory, but had not indicated whether it would go to the Romans or to the enemy" (Lucian, Life of Alexander, 48).

Before that, when the Antonine plague ravaged the empire between 165 and 180, he sent out oracles and protective verses to many cities, promising that he would himself afford them infallible aid so that none of these calamities should befall them. He also appeared to fail at that because the verse "was to be seen everywhere written over doorways as a charm against the plague; but in most cases it had the contrary result. By some chance it was particularly the houses on which the verse was inscribed that were depopulated" (Lucian, Life of Alexander, 36).

Nonetheless, Alexander's charisma and vague words won a few supporters in Roman high society, enough to maintain his authority among his believers. He died at the age of 70, a respectable age, although he himself predicted that he would live to 150.

Much of what we know of Alexander comes from the biography written by Lucian of Samosata (125 to 180), who was a satirist and rhetorician but openly hostile to religion and superstitions like magic. Lucian mocked the tricks Alexander used on other people and lamented those who fell for them. He wished to present a person who deceived the world, a famous liar whom he would expose. Yet by doing so, he also testified to just how popular Alexander had been during his time.

The harsh words of Lucian did reveal Alexander's deceptive life, but just as the old saying would tell us, Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur ("The world wants to be deceived, so let it be deceived"). The illusion and the very delusional aspect of life are exactly what magicians were trying to exploit. We should not be surprised that many who endured endless suffering and hardship chose to believe them. Across the Roman Empire, many other magicians practiced their craft on a local level: we know neither their names nor the people who sought their help. What we do know, however, is how they practiced magic thanks to the Greek Magic Papyri excavated from the desert of Egypt.

The Greek Magic Papyri (Papyri Graecae Magicae or PGM) is the conventional name given to a collection of magical texts, parts of which were sold to Jean-François Mimaut, French consul in Egypt, in the 1820s, who deposited them in the National Library of France, while other parts to a Giovanni Anastasi, whose collections were acquired by major European muesums like the Louvre and the British Muesum. The translation of the full text started as soon as the papyri arrived at the museums; the current most complete English translation is that of Hans Dieter Betz from the 1980s.

The PGM offers a rare glimpse into the spiritual as well as religious world of Roman Egypt in Late Antiquity. In these texts, the deities of the old Egyptian religion, Greco-Roman pagan gods, and the Christian God are not always the subject of veneration but, instead, are seen as the deliverers of daily wishes, erotic desire, and evil curses. Gods and spirits, when invoked properly and correctly, could bring both fortune and misfortune to the mortals and their world. As a practical handbook, the PGM's approach to magic addresses the problems of its users and provides guidance to the magicians so they may represent themselves as healer, meditator, and intercessor, among other roles, and promote their authority in a monopolised manner via a process that involves both the magician and the powerful beings they invoke.

The PGM is essentially a collection of spells, which also offers instructions on how to cast them: what materials one ought to prepare, which charm to use, and what potential effect it will achieve. To perform a successful magical ritual, knowing the right time, place, mediums, and things to do is essential, but the flexible wording of the texts also invites open interpretation and accommodates various practices, giving magicians options to choose from. Conveniently, this also leaves room for excusable failures.

It likewise explains the contradictory instruction of the same practice: if a ritual at full moon did not accomplish what you desire, then try one more time when the moon is not full: "Do this when moon is in a settle sign…not when it is full…" while in a different copy, it reads "when it is full" (PGM V. 45 to 52). Similarly, when one could not find the right materials, it is also acceptable to find an alternative or use a different method: "But if you can't get hold of an owl, use an ibis's egg and a falcon's feathers" (PGM IV. 45 to 51).

In addition, poetry, meaningless words, and powerful letters also contribute to a magic ceremony. It is quite common to invoke Homer, for example. In order to make someone your friend, one could use: "Let…seize, and lest we become a joy to our enemies" (PGM IV. 469 to 479) Or to restrain anger: "Will you dare to raise your mighty spear against Zeus?'' (PGM IV.467 to 468).

Aside from Homer, repeating vowels (PGM I.15 to 20), palindromes (PGM IV.180 to 4), and Greek letters are also used to create a realm of unfamiliarity. Sometimes other languages were used as well, but translation was unnecessary, since it would have deprived the original words of their power, as explained here:

For terms when they are translated do not always preserve their meaning the same as before; and besides, there are certain idioms with every nation that are impossible to express to another in intelligible speech. Accordingly, though, it may be possible to translate them; they no longer preserve the same force.

(Iamblichus, On the Mysteries of Egypt, 7.5.)

The oral sound effect as well as the visual effect suggest hidden knowledge in the invocation, and such words create a distance beyond one's daily life. One of the things strange words and sounds could accomplish was to summon the attention of the spirits: "Raise up your friends, I beg you, I implore. Thrown me not on the ground, O lords of Gods, O grant me power, I beg, and give to me" (PGM IV. 194 to 7). When begging could not summon the spirits, forceful magic was needed: "Use this for the spell of coercion…but do not use it frequently to Selene/ unless the procedure which you are performing is worthy of its power (PGM IV. 2569 to 2573).

The PGM also made sure the magicians know the most effective spell to perform, as it includes commentary on the quality of the charm, such as "A procedure greater than this one does not exist" (PGM III. 439), or "I have not found a greater spell than this in the world" (PGM IV. 776 to 778), or "Many times have I used the spell, and have wonder greatly" (PGM IV. 790)

Magic was not supposed to be shared with outsiders and could only be passed on to the apprentices or descendants of the magicians. In the PGM, secrecy was repeatedly emphasised:

As I made you swear, child, in the temple of Jerusalem, when you have been filled with the divine wisdom, dispose of the book so that it will not be found.

(PGM XIII. 232 to 234).

Because of the curiosity of the masses they inscribed the names of the herbs and other things…so that they might not practice magic…But we have collected…from many copies…all of them secret.

(PGM XII. 403 to 408)

In this way, secrecy, being the unknown part of the magic, helped construct the image of a group of people able to negotiate with the immortals on behalf of the mortals. Monopoly was necessary not only to avoid completion but also to maintain the sanctity of magic, forbidding others from transgressing the boundary.

It is the exploration and exploitation of the human psyche against the scientific and rational boundaries that defined the PGM, other magical practices, and magicians themselves. They were the helping hand for the drowning as well as the false hope, but this duality is how magicians represented themselves and what gave them power and authority. Claiming to access something otherworldly, magicians created a social class and were defined by their knowledge of magic and control over magical practice.

As magic established itself as an authoritative force in the local societies of the early empire, the successors of Alexander still held social power in Late Antiquity. Yet as both secular and religious authorities adopted a hostile attitude toward magic users, instead of attacking harmful magic, magic itself was rejected. Ritualists and magicians still strived as spiritual mentors in their small communities, but they no longer enjoyed economic success. Even after the spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire, magical practices were still around. Magicians were simply changing the way they conducted rituals, and how they justified such actions, if not already Christianized their practices.