Short answers, pulled from the story.
The English word magic traces its lineage back to the Old Persian term maguš, a designation for a specific priestly class within ancient Persia. Herodotus recorded one of the earliest surviving accounts of these Persian magi in his historical writings during the fifth century BCE.
Defensive magic known as asiputu or massmassut served as incantations intended to alter specific realities in ancient Mesopotamia. The ancient Mesopotamians believed magic was the only viable defense against demons, ghosts, and evil sorcerers who might curse them.
The interior walls of the pyramid of Unas contain hundreds of magical spells running floor to ceiling in vertical columns. These inscriptions are known as Pyramid Texts and were strictly reserved for royalty only until tomb robbers broke into them during the First Intermediate Period.
Pliny the Elder claimed magic had been created by Iranian philosopher Zoroaster and brought west into Greece by magician Osthanes. Laws criminalizing things regarded as magic were introduced within the Roman Empire during the first century CE.
In ancient Egypt, magic personified as the god Heka was an integral part of religion and culture known through substantial textual corpora. The Coptic term hik descends from the pharaonic term heka which had no connotation of impiety or illegality from the Old Kingdom through the Roman era.