A curious charm which was extensively used as an amulet in medieval times consists of five Latin words so arranged that they can be read backwards or forwards and also upwards or downwards. The disposition of the letters is as follows:
s a t o r
a r e p o
t e n e t
o p e r a
r o t a s
This charm has been preserved for us in Greek and Coptic as well as in Roman characters, and examples of it have been found cut in a marble slab above the chapel of St. Laurent at Rochemaur (Ardèche), France, and also in the plaster wall of an old Roman house at Cirncester, Gloucestershire, England. In a Greek manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale, in Paris,[[578]] the Latin words are transliterated and translated as follows:
σάτορ, the sower
ἀρεπο, the plough
τένετ, holds