Amulet is an object worn or carried on the person in the belief that it will bring good luck or ward off evil. It represents a kind of personal magic--often sympathetic or imitative magic. Used frequently to protect persons or livestock specifically against magical attack (for example, the evil eye), amulets may be thought of as counter magic.
Some anthropologists differentiate between magic and religion. Whereas magic operates automatically and impersonally, religious practices such as prayer and sacrifice are effective only contingently, as appeals to higher powers. In anthropologist Br…
