MoreLilith4

In other texts, it says that she watches the pregnant woman most vigilantly and tries to snatch the newborn child from her. Some time before the birth, she appears in the maternity room so as to tear the child from the mother's body. Then she begins to torment the child "now with heat and fire, then with fever and shivering."
Images from a magic conception of the world are the basis of the Babylonian magic and incantation texts against Lamasht�, of which a large number have been preserved. In magic, two elements are almost always combined: on the one hand, the sorcerer-priest - who functions as an exorcist - uses incantations to invoke and conjure the goddess; on the other, certain ritualistic magic practices are involved. That is why, in Babylonia, there was a distinction between shipt� and epesh�, and similarly, in the Greek magic papyri, between logos and pragma.
The magic practices consist mostly in an analogous magic carried out according to precise instructions. Various prescriptions for this are given in the Labart� texts. One, for example, advises making a clay figure of the goddess. Twelve loaves and other foods should then be placed before this figure as sacrificial offerings. The figure of a black dog should be placed before the clay figure. After three days, during which the goddess will leave the body of the person she has bewitched and enter the clay figure, this last should be smashed with a sword and the pieces buried in a corner of the city wall, but not before the whole area has been consecrated with flour water. The provision of a pair of sandals to carry the goddess across the river or the sea is also part of the magic practices, whose aim is to drive away Lamasht� or render her harmless. Other prescriptions recommend the preparation of a ship by the priest, in which a picture of Lamasht�, together with pictures of black and white dogs - animals sacred to Lamasht� - should be placed in the hope that the river will carry the ship, and the goddess, away forever. Other magic practices consist in the making of amulets. These are composed of different-colored ribbons and bands wrapped around precious stones. They were tied round the newborn child's neck, wrists and ankles and were intended to protect it.
Quite specific texts, which the priest recited in an order established by tradition, belong to the invocations and incantations.
In the Babylonian magic and amulet texts, Lamasht� is seldom mentioned by herself. Mostly, she appears with a group of other related gods or demons. In an incantation text against the so-called Uttuke group, it says:
"He, upon whom the evil Uttuk� threw himself,
He, whom the evil Al� suffocated in his bed,
He, whom the evil Etimm� overpowered in the night,
He, whom the evil Gall� threatened,
He, whose limbs the evil Il� tore apart,
He, whom Lamasht� seized and dominated,
He, whom Labash� overpowered,
He, whom Ahhaz� held fast, etc."
Among the demons listed, Uttuk� and Labash� are known to be fever demons, while Etimm� (alternative spelling: Ekimm�) is some kind of spirit of death. Ahhaz� means something like predator, grasper, grabber, while Il� is the general term for a god or devil. However, it is not easy to tell the individual demons in the group apart; indeed, it is not even possible to say with any degree of certainty what sex they are, which points to the archaic character of this image. Some are neither male nor female, some have changed sex over the course of time. Some seem merely to be different sides of the character of Lamasht�.
What makes these incantation texts particularly interesting are two demons who have a close connection with Lilith, namely Al� and Gall�.
Al� was originally an asexual demon, who later took on female characteristics. Al� is a demon without mouth, lips and ears, half man, half devil. At night, he roams the streets like a masterless dog. Then he creeps into people's bedrooms and terrifies them while they sleep. Al� also appears in Jewish texts under the name Ailo. In these, he is one of the secret names of Lilith. However, in other texts, Ailo is described as the daughter of Lilith, who has had a liaison with a man. That demons have sexual relations with men and produce devil children as a result is an idea which occurs in all the Semitic religions. Thus, for example, the pre-Islamic, Arabic, demon literature contains similar liaisons between men and djinn. This idea is also well-known in the Talmud and in Mandaean Gnosticism. Later, too, the notion was taken up in Kabbalistic literature. According to Kabbalistic belief, demons don't actually have a body of their own, because the Sabbath intervened before its creation. They need a human body in order to reproduce. As a result, Lilith uses the drops of sperm which are ejaculated during sleep or marital intercourse so as to:
"...create a body for herself from the sperm which is dropping into the void."

In this connection, G. Scholem refers to a Kabbalistic rite - part of which is still practised today - which was carried out at burials in Jerusalem:
"Ten Jews danced round the dead man and recited a psalm, which was commonly accepted in Jewish tradition as a psalm of protection against demons."
Obviously, what is involved here is an archaic, apotropaic rite, which is directed at those children of the dead man he fathered by a demon. These congregate on the death of their father and demand their paternal inheri-tance. Now and again, they hurl abuse at the dead man's legitimate children or even attempt to attack them physically. This was also the reason why certain 16th-century Kabbalists forbade the sons of the dead man to take part in his funeral.
Another - female - demon of the Uttuk� group, who also has a close connection with Lilith, is Gall�. Occasionally, this name, like that of Uttuk�, is used simply as a general term for all demons, and these are called "evil Uttuke" or "evil Galli":
"Gall�, the spirit that threatens every house,
Brazen Gall�s, seven are they,
They grind the land like flour,
They know no mercy,
Rage at the people,
Eat their flesh,
Let their blood flow like rain,
They never stop drinking blood."
In amulet texts, sometimes it is Lamasht�, sometimes Gall� and sometimes Lilith who is invoked and conjured. Gall� later appeared as Gello, Gylo or Gyllou in Graeco-Byzantine mythology, in which Gyllou has become a child-stealing and child-killing female demon. This figure was also taken up by Jewish mythology, as Gil�. Like Ailo, or Al�, Gil� is also a secret name for Lilith. According to Bernhard Schmidt, belief in the Gylloudes is still fully alive in present-day Greece.
The Babylonian magic spells, which were supposed either to drive away the demons who brought illness or other troubles or to render them harmless, had to be recited in a precise order over the individual limbs of the person who had been bewitched, in order to be effective. This is because demons attack only one particular part of the body at any one time - for example, Uttuk� the shoulder, Al� the breast, Gall� the hand, Assak� the head and Namtar� the throat. Familiarity with the effects of the demons and, above all, knowledge of their secret names, was supposed to protect people from their machinations.