Ismen und Armida: Gestalten des Bösen in Tassos Gerusalemme liberata

Abstract

Tasso's epic work is considered to be a literary example of rinascimental dealing with magic. Based on Early Modern explanatory models (Spiritus-theory, Hylemorphism, Actio in distans), the present article understands magic historically as an 〉opportunity to direct〈 By comparing the two pagan-magical characters Ismen and Armida, it illustrates how facets of demonic magic are portrayed in the epic. In the article, the discussion on demonic shaping skills as an instrument of power and means of deceit in the battle against Christians is interpreted as a negotiation of forms and modes of actions of evil, with regard to the demonology of the Malleus maleficarum. On the one hand, the evil appears from a seemingly distant, hegemonic-political aspect. And on the other hand, it is seen from a subtly-deceptive aspect, which causes societal damage at the personal-physiological level. Especially the conception of Armida demonstrates a relational as well as functional interpretation of evil, which makes apparent the Tridentine-counterreformist embedding of the epic.