Wills's Lucky Charms #13: THE ABRACADABRA

This is one of 50 trading cards depicting amulets and talismans published in England during the 1920s by W. D. & H. O Wills, makers of Wills's Cigarettes. For a full list of cards in the set, see Wills's Lucky Charms #0: Introduction.

1920s-era cigarette trading card art and text:

THE ABRACADABRA

One of the most famous of all talismans, and used
as a magical formula by the Gnostics in Rome for
invoking the aid of beneficent spirits against disease,
misfortune and death. Sammonicus, the celebrated
Gnostic physician, instructed that the letters of this
magical triangle which he used for curing agues and
fevers, were to be written on paper, folded into the
shape of a cross, worn for nine days suspended from
the neck, and, before sunrise, cast behind the patient
into a stream running eastward. It was also a most
popular charm in the Middle Ages. During the Great
Plague, 1665, great numbers of these amulets were
worn as supposed safeguards against infection.

COMMENT

From a simple metal chain is suspended a copper inverted equilateral triangle surmounted by a stylized floral design and terminating in a finial ball at the bottom. Inset into the triangle, which forms a bezel around it, is a triangular carved piece of white stone on which the following letters are engraved:

A B R A C A D A B R A
B R A C A D A B R
R A C A D A B
A C A D A
C A D
A

The abracadabra formula is often encountered today as a sort of "Hey, presto!" cry made by stage magicians while performing sleight of hand. This is far from its original use as a charm of magical protection, when the subtraction of letters was intended to bring about the waning of a long fever.

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