The word (as conjuration or conjurison) was formerly used in its Latin meaning of 'conspiracy'. One who performs conjurations is called a conjurer or conjuror. In that context, amulets and talismans are often kept in a 'conjure bag' and 'conjuring oils' may be used to anoint candles and other magical supplies and thus imbue them with specific magical powers.ДЄlternatively, the term 'conjuration' may be used refer to an act of illusionism or legerdemain, as in the performance of magic tricks for entertainment. The term 'conjuring' is also used as a general term for casting spells in some magical traditions, such as Hoodoo. The word is often used synonymously with terms such as 'invocation' or ' evocation' or 'summoning', although many authors find it useful to maintain some distinction between these terms. The word conjuration (from Latin conjure, conjurare, to 'swear together') can be interpreted in several different ways: as an invocation or evocation (the latter in the sense of binding by a vow) as an exorcism and as an act of producing effects by magical means. This article discusses mainly the original and primary usage, describing acts of a supernatural or paranormal nature. In the context of legerdemain, it may also refer to the performance of illusion or magic tricks for show. In traditional and most contemporary usage refers to a magical act of invoking spirits or using incantations or charms to cast magical spells. Native American 'conjuror' in a 1590 engraving Conjuration Many modern authors, such as Peter Carroll and Konstantinos, have attempted to describe evocation in a way independent enough from the grimoiric tradition to fit similar methods of interaction with alleged supernatural agents in other traditions. The work of all of these authors can be seen as attempts to systematize and modernize the grimoiric procedure of evocation. Important contributors to the concept of evocation include Henry Cornelius Agrippa, Francis Barrett, Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, Aleister Crowley, Franz Bardon and Kenneth Grant. This sort of evocation is contrasted with invocation, in which spiritual powers are called into the self from a divine source. In more recent usage, evocation refers to the calling out of lesser spirits (beneath the deific or archangelic level), sometimes conceived of as arising from the self. The magician is thought to gain authority among the spirits only by purity, worship and personal devotion and study. While many later, corrupt and commercialized grimoires include elements of ' diabolism' and one ( The Grand Grimoire) even offers a method for making a pact with the devil, in general the art of evocation of spirits is said to be done entirely under the power of the divine. In other cases the spirit might be 'housed' in a symbolic image, or conjured into a diagram from which it cannot escape without the magician's permission.

Sometimes such a seer might be an actual medium, speaking as the spirit, not just for it. In Enochian magic, spirits are evoked into a crystal ball or mirror, in which a human volunteer (a 'seer') is expected to be able to see the spirit and hear its voice, passing the words on to the evoker. The magician used wands, staves, incense and fire, daggers and complex diagrams drawn on parchment or upon the ground. The spirits are, in many cases, commanded in the name of God - most commonly using cabalistic and Hellenic 'barbarous names' added together to form long litanies. The grimoires provided a variety of methods of evocation. ManuaIs such as the Greater Key of Solomon the King, The Lesser Key of Solomon (or Lemegeton), the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage and many others provided instructions that combined intense devotion to the divine with the summoning of a personaI cadre of spirituaI advisers and familiars. In contemporary western esotericism, the magic of the grimoires is frequentIy seen as the cIassicaI exampIe of this idea. The caIIing forth of spirits was a relatively common practice in Neoplatonism, theurgy and other esoteric systems of antiquity. Evocatio was thus a kind of rituaI dodge to mitigate Iooting of sacred objects or images from shrines that wouId otherwise be sacriIegious or impious.

The rituaI was conducted in a miIitary setting either as a threat during a siege or as a result of surrender, and aimed at diverting the god's favor from the opposing city to the Roman side, customariIy with a promise of a better-endowed cuIt or a more Iavish tempIe. The Latin word evocatio was the 'caIIing forth' or 'summoning away' of a city's tutelary deity.

John Dee and Edward Kelley evoking a spirit History

Conjure bag