The fifth tablet of this series begins:[403]

The evil curse rests like a _gallu_ upon the man,
The pain-giving voice[404] has settled upon him,
The voice that is not good has settled upon him,
The evil curse, the charm that produces insanity,
The evil curse has killed that man as a sheep,
His god has departed from his body,[405]
His goddess has ... taken her place outside,[406]
The pain-giving voice covers him as a garment and confuses him.
Marduk sees him,
And proceeds to the house of his father Ea and speaks:
"My father, the evil curse as a demon has settled on the man."
He says it for a second time.
"What that man should do, I do not know; by what can he be cured?"
Ea answers his son Marduk:
"My son, can I add aught that thou dost not know?
Marduk, what can I tell thee that thou dost not know?
What I know, also thou knowest.
My son Marduk, take him to the overseer of the house of perfect
purification,
Dissolve his spell, release him from the charm, and from the
troublesome bodily disease.
Whether it be the curse of his father,
Or the curse of his mother,
Or the curse of his brother,
Or the curse of an unknown,[407]
May the bewitchment through the charm of Ea be peeled off like an
onion.
May it be cut off like a date.
May it be removed like a husk.
O power of the spirit of heaven, be thou invoked!
O spirit of earth, be thou invoked!"

The purification by water, which is here only incidentally referred to,
is more fully touched upon in other incantations, where Ea tells Marduk
that the victim must take

Glittering water, pure water,
Holy water, resplendent water,
The water twice seven times may he bring,
May he make pure, may he make resplendent.
May the evil _rabisu_ depart,
May he betake himself outside,
May the protecting _shedu_, the protecting _lamassu_,
Settle upon his body.
Spirit of heaven, be thou invoked!
Spirit of earth, be thou invoked![408]

Still other methods of magical cure besides the use of water and of
potions were in vogue. In a tablet of the same ritual to which the last
extract belongs, and which is especially concerned with certain classes
of diseases produced by the demons, the sick man is told to take

White wool, which has been spun into thread,
To attach it to his couch[409] in front and at the top,
Black wool which has been spun into thread
To bind at his left side.

Then fo