Architectural and Topographical Variations
of Renaissance Ceremonial Magic
A Spatial Approach to the ‘True and Real Sacred Magic’ of
Abramelin
Student: Andrea Franchetto 11763612
Supervisor: Dr Peter J. Forshaw
Second Reader: Dr Marco Pasi
Master Thesis, Research Master Religious Studies
University of Amsterdam
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank my supervisor Dr Peter J Forshaw for his great encouragement in developing and critically reflecting on my ideas. I thank Dr Marco Pasi for agreeing to read this thesis, as well as for his valuable advices. I would also like to thank Dr. Jacqueline Borsje for her help when it was necessary to make important decisions. My gratitude is owed to Dr Emmanouela Grypeou; our dialogue made me reflect more consciously on the methodology and approach to sources. I would also like to thank Dr Egil Asprem for his suggestions in the study of the material-cognitive aspect of ritual space. I thank the Biblioteca Queriniana for letting me have the entire reproduction of the Italian manuscript of the Abramelin. In the same way, I thank the Head Archivist of the Svenska Frimurare Ordens Arkiv & Bibliotek, Ulf Åsén, for giving me access to the Manuscript Magia Divina and allowing the reproduction of the images. I also thank all my classmates; your words and your example have been important for developing greater critical awareness. Last but not least, I thank Davide Giauna for believing in me and for having always been there; without your support this thesis could not have been written.
Table of contents
1 Introduction...7
2 What is the Abramelin?...10
2.1 The Abramelin’s magical system integrating magic, alchemy, and Christian Kabbalah...16
2.2 The intermediary beings of the Abramelin...19
2.3 The locations of the Abramelin...23
3 Theoretical framework...26
3.1 Interdisciplinarity...26
3.2 The problem of ‘space’...27
3.3 The problem of ‘magic’...30
3.4 Ceremonial magic...34
3.5 The aim of a spatial approach to ceremonial magic...36
3.6 Spatial approaches in religious studies...37
4 Spaces and places of ceremonial magic...42
4.1 Domestic places, purifications, and consecrations...42
4.2 Ground circles...45
4.3 A topographical interpretation of the circle...47
4.4 Spatial variations in the Abramelin...48
5 Architectural scale...50
5.1 The type and historical research: a seemingly impossible combination...52
5.2 The architectural typology of the Abramelin...55
5.2.1 The hut...55
5.2.3 Typological continuities and a new architectural model in Duke Charles
of Södermanland’s Magia Divina...62
6 Social scale...67
6.1 A new perspective: heterotopia and its principles...68
6.2 The Abramelin and the semi-public space of Renaissance family houses...73
6.2.1 Private chapels and the organization of the cult...74
6.3 The heterotopia of the Abramelin...77
7 Material scale...84
7.1 Material and cognitive implications...85
8 Discussion...90
9 Conclusion...92
10 Appendix...94
10.1 The astral temple of Abramelin: Aleister Crowley’s spatial innovation...94
10.2 Space in the modern mind...99
List of abbreviations
Abramelin Manuscripts
Br: Brescia, Biblioteca Queriniana, ms. I.V.13, Italian, 17th century.
Wo1: Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Cod. Guelf. 47.13, German, 1608.
Wo2: Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Cod. Guelf. 10.1, German, 17th century.
Dr1: Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek, ms. N111, German, ca. 1720.
Dr2: Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek, ms. N161, German, ca. 1720.
Ox: Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms. OPP.594, ca. 1750.
St: Stockholm, Svenska Frimurare Ordens Arkiv & Bibliotek, ms. 13.106 Mystik, Swedish, 1784.
Pa: Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, ms. 2351, French, 18th century.
Abramelin Printed Editions
GD: Abraham von Worms. The Book of Abramelin. Ed. Georg Dehn. Lake Worth, Florida: Ibis Press, 2015.
RA: Ambelain, Robert. La Magie Sacrée d’Abramelin le Mage. Paris: Bussière, 2013.
MM: Abraham ben Simeon of Worms. The Book of the Sacred Magic of
Abramelin the Mage. Ed. S. L. MacGregor Mathers. New York: Dover
Publications, 1975. Republication of Mathers, S. L. MacGregor. The Book of
the Sacred Magic of Abra-Melin the Mage. London: John M. Watkins, 1956.
JRB: Abraham von Worms, Die heilige Magie des Abra-Melin. Ed. Johann Richard Beecken. Berlin: Verlag Richard Schikowski, 1957.
JI: Abraham von Worms. Das Buch der wahren Praktik in der göttlichen
Magie. Ed. Jürg von Ins. München: Diederichs, 1988.
PH: Abraham von Worms. Die egyptischen grossen Offenbarungen. Köln am Rhein: Peter Hammer, 1725 [around 1800].
Names
1 Introduction
The general aim of this thesis is to investigate theories and methods in the disciplines of the history of religion, architecture, and human geography in order to develop new analytical tools using the concepts of ‘space’ and ‘place’ to study texts concerning magical practices. As concepts, ‘space’ and ‘place’ underwent intense reformulations between the 1970s and 1990s, which freed them from abstract and geometrical definitions and transformed them into categories of human experience and action in society and culture. Hence, they have become fundamental for the humanities, so much so that spatial approaches are part of an ongoing debate within the field of religious studies.1
Firstly, this study presents a spatial methodology for studying magical practices, offering a new perspective on the current debate on spatial approaches within religious studies. Accordingly, this paper explores how space has been conceptualised in the humanities. Furthermore, it discusses how scholars of religion have developed spatial methodologies within their fields of research. At the same time, the theoretical problems related to the topic of this thesis – the historical category of magic – are addressed, with particular attention to the historical context of Renaissance ceremonial magic. Secondly, applying the above methodology, I studied the Abramelin – a text of ceremonial magic to teach the reader how to call and control spirits under the guidance of one’s guardian angel. The earliest known Abramelin manuscript dates to 1608; it is a German copy of a manuscript supposedly from the early 15th century. The Abramelin has been well known
amongst learned magicians since its appearance in Venice in the late 16th century. Its
popularity grew in the 19th and 20th centuries within the practitioners of the Hermetic
Order of the Golden Dawn.
Given that magical praxis consists of embodied knowledge and experiences, studying where and how practitioners perform their rituals in human-built environments sheds light on the relationship between social dynamics and ritual choices, practitioners’ interactions with intermediary beings (e.g., spirits, angels, demons), and altered states of perception. Through Michel Foucault’s concept of heterotopias – enacted utopias and counter-sites ‘formed in the very founding of society’2 – this thesis offers new insight
into the dynamic of inclusion and exclusion regarding magic in Western society.
1 Kilde, ‘Approaching Religious Space,’ 83–201. 2 Foucault, ‘Of Other Spaces,’ 24.
Furthermore, it explores how the relationship between practitioners and intermediary beings (e.g., spirits, angels, and demons) are expressed through the construction of specific spaces. Analysing the typology of these spaces indicates that the interaction with the supernatural can be conceived of in different ways within the broader context of ceremonial magic. This study also examines how the materiality and architectural structure of spatial settings in the Abramelin inform altered states of consciousness and the generation of supernatural awareness. Even though the Abramelin has been one of the most influential texts in the history of Western esotericism, it is still a less commonly studied text. Amongst other widespread texts of ceremonial magic (e.g.,
Clavis Salomonis, Heptameron), the Abramelin emerges as a singular work in terms of
the construction and use of complex and articulated spaces – namely, temporary temples either in the secrecy of a forest or within the privacy of domestic spaces. This thesis aims to demonstrate that the type of location that the Abramelin describes represents a spatial variation in the context of Renaissance ceremonial magic. Indeed, the spaces designed to manipulate the relationship between the practitioner and malevolent spirits are not the typical circles traced on the ground, popular amongst Renaissance ceremonial magic texts, but imitations of Renaissance ideas of the temple.
Thus, the research questions of this thesis can be summarised as follows.
1 What are the spaces and places used by practitioners of ceremonial magic? 2 What are the cultural influences that led to the conception of the architectural typology used to perform ceremonial magic described in the Abramelin?
3 How do the relations between practitioners and their social context influence the creation of the spatial settings described in the Abramelin?
4 How does the materiality of those spaces play a role in the cognitive processes that contribute to an experience of magical efficacy, such as an encounter with a guardian angel and communication with spirits?
In Chapter 2, I contextualise the Abramelin and I present the sources available, focussing, in particular, on an unpublished Italian manuscript from the 17th century. I
discuss the theological conceptions that characterise the Abramelin, the intermediary beings described in the text, and the instructions regarding choosing and setting up the ritual space. In Chapter 3, I elaborate on the theoretical framework of this research. I discuss what it means to develop an interdisciplinary research project and problematise the categories of space and magic. I discuss how the Abramelin is a text that describes a form of ceremonial magic, the purpose of a spatial approach, and the limitations of existing spatial approaches in the field of religious studies. In Chapter 4, I analyse, in detail, the patterns of continuities of spaces and places amongst the Abramelin and other texts of ceremonial magic that circulated in the same cultural context, assessing the
differences with it. In light of the theoretical discussion, in the following chapters, the methodology is presented, applying it directly to the case study of the Abramelin. It is a scalar methodology employed to investigate the ritual at different levels (scales) of spatial analysis: architectural (Chapter 5), social (Chapter 6), and material (Chapter 7). In the last two chapters (8 and 9), I discuss the results obtained, and I formulate conclusions. In the Appendix, I address how Aleister Crowley (1875–1947) adapted the
Abramelin in his magical practice, and I identify the spatial innovations he introduced
2 What is the Abramelin?
The Abramelin is one of the most influential and ambiguous texts on magic. It presents itself as a practical manual written by a certain Abraham ben Simeon ben Judah ben Simeon,3 known as Abraham von Worms (AvW), a Jewish Kabbalist who lived in
Germany, presumably between the 14th and 15th centuries.4 The rituals described in it
serve to call and control spirits under the guidance of the guardian angel. Abraham von Worms writes personally to his son Lamech, giving him both theoretical teachings – about what real magic is and how to unmask false forms of magic – and practical instructions – such as about the process of site selection, ointment preparation, and instruments. In the first two chapters, AvW describes how he learned this form of magic from Abramelin5 an Egyptian Jew, during a long pilgrimage in search of the truth.
The textual transmission is not homogeneous. Main differences exist. The manuscript kept in Paris at the Library of the Arsenal (Pa) dates to the 18th century6 and features
only three books, omitting Book Two that is present in 17th-century versions. This book
concerns the ‘holy things’ that AvW has learned ‘in addition to what was taught by Abramelin’.7 Also, the ritual is shorter in the 18th-century version, 6 months contra 18
months. Many printed editions exist: Peter Hammer’s Die egyptischen grossen
Offenbarungen (PH), is the earliest dating to 1725. Georg Dehn’s The Book of Abramelin (GD), is an edition of the 17th and 18th-century German manuscripts; Robert
Ambelain’s La Magie Sacrée d'Abramelin le Mage (RA) is an edition of the 18th-century
manuscript at the Library of the Arsenal in Paris, which is the same as are Mathers’s
The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage (MM), Johann Richard Beecken’s Die Heilige Magie des Abramelin (JRB), and Jürg von Ins Das Buch der wahren Praktik in der göttlichen Magi (JI). Pa belonged to the private library of Antoine-René
de Voyer d’Argenson (1722–1787), an ambassador in Venice from 1766 to 1769. Together with Amsterdam and Edinburgh, Venice was a city where initiatory manuscripts were copied during the early modern period.8 The manuscript forms the
3 Patai, The Jewish Alchemists, 273.
4 Scholem, ‘Abraham Ben Simeon of Worms,’ 310. 5 ‘Abram Abramolin’ in Br, frontispiece. See figure 1.
6 Dehn states that the manuscript is from 1850–80: GD, xxxvi. Nevertheless, the manuscript ms. 2351 at the Arsenal (Pa) dates to the18th century.
7 GD, 47. 8 RA, 25.
base of the Mathers edition (MM), establishing it as a cornerstone of late modern magical readings. Aleister Crowley based his initiatory practice to obtain ‘Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel’9 on MM.
Pa tells readers that the text was translated from Hebrew to Latin in 1458 in Venice.10
However, proof of the reliability of that date is not possible because the earliest known manuscript, written in German (Wo1), dates to 1608.11 Although, it is certain that the
Abramelin was popular in Venice beginning late in the 16th century,12 evidence exists of
a scattered transmission: there are French, Hebrew, and German manuscripts that extend from the 17th century to the 18th century. Few know of the existence of an Italian
manuscript from the second half of the 17th century (Br).13 This manuscript does not
state that the text is a translation from Hebrew. Gershom Scholem, who knew only the French, Hebrew, and German versions, claimed that the Abramelin was not originally written in Hebrew but in German.14 This Italian manuscript expands horizons regarding
possible paths of transmission. Maria Elena Loda argues that it could be a translation of a lost Latin codex.15 In this thesis I demonstrate that a spatial analysis can offer new
insights into the cultural and geographical context of the Abramelin.
The Italian manuscript belonged to Leopardo Martinengo da Barco (1637 – 1729) and is kept in the Queriniana Library in Brescia. Leopardo was the son of Francesco Leopardo Martinengo (1615–1689), who was a famous nobleman from Brescia whose love for literature, the sciences, and rare books led him to build an enormous library. Leopardo had a great interest in occult sciences and collected in his library more than 100 texts about magic, alchemy, and occult philosophy written between the 15th and 17th
centuries.16 The Legato Martinengo at the Queriniana offers a vast section on alchemy
and magic.17 The alchemical section contains a wide array of works: Geber, Paracelsus,
9 Crowley, (a)Magick, 158.
10 ‘LA MAGIE SACRÉE Que DIEU donna à Moïse, Aaron, David, Salomon, et à d’autres Saints
Patriarches et Prophètes, et qui enseigne la Vraie Sapience Divine, laissée par Abraham, fils de Simon, à son fils Lamech, traduite de l’hébreu, a Venise, en 1458.’ RA, 39.
11 Cantù, ‘Abraham von Worms,’ 135.
12 Barbierato, Nella stanza dei circoli, 80 n.224
13 The only sources that mentioned its existence are Loda, ‘La Magia Sacra Di Abramelin,’ 37–46; Fusari, ‘La ‘Libreria Magica’ Dei Martinenego Da Barco,’ 126; Ferraglio, ‘Biblioteca Magica,’ 17. 14 Patai, The Jewish Alchemists, 276.
15 Loda, ‘La Magia Sacra Di Abramelin,’ 45. 16 Loda, ‘Scire, Audere, Potere, Tacere,’ 28–29.
17 For a complete list of the manuscripts see Ferraglio, ‘Biblioteca Magica,’ 1–20; Fusari, ‘La ‘Libreria Magica’ Dei Martinenego Da Barco,’ 124–31.
Girolamo Ruscelli, Raimundus Lullus, and Giovanni Agostino Panteo (the first who experimented with alchemy and Kabbalah)18 are amongst the names present on the
‘alchemist shelf’.19 In addition to including works by these international figures, the
collection features numerous works by local figures: Giovanni Bracesco,20 an alchemist
and physician who had contacts with the Martinengo family in the 16th century, and
Giovan Battista Nazari, author of Il metamorfosi metallico et humano and Della
tramutatione metallica. The Martinengo da Barco family had continuous contacts with
alchemists and people involved in occult sciences since the 16th century.
Alongside with the Abramelin, we find a 16th-century Italian translation of the Picatrix,
the famous 11th-century Arabic treatise on astral magic and nigromancia. This work,
titled Gl’Esperimenti Magici in ogni Genere, di Gio. Pecatrix, con le Tavole delli
Pianeti, [The Magical Experiments of Every Sort, by Gio. Pecatrix, with Planetary Tables], has multiple Latin translations.21 In addition to cabalistic texts like Cabala
intellettiva (copied by the hand of Leopardo Martinengo); Cabala numerica, Alfabetica Planetaria; and Cabala numerica figurata, et Alfabetica,22 other interesting titles in the
collection belong to the tradition of texts compiled by the functionaries of the Inquisition. Examples include Compendium Maleficarum, written by Francesco Maria Guazzo in 1626, and Jacob Sprenger’s Malleus Maleficarum edition dating from the 1576. The Abramelin at the Queriniana (Br), which dates to the second half of the 17th
century,23 is, along with Wo1, one of the earliest versions of the text, for which there is
still no critical edition.24 Thus, it represents a crucial text to be compared with the
German one from the early 17th century.
The structure of the four books of Br also corresponds to GD according to the contents of each chapter. Both Book One and Book Two are subtitled ‘Della Magia Antica’ [‘Of Ancient Magic’].25 Book One begins with AvW’s dedication to his son Lamech and
18 see Thorndike, History of Magic and Experimental Science, Volume 5, 539. 19 Ferraglio, ‘Biblioteca Magica,’ 9–14.
20 Bracesco dedicated his first edtion of the Espositione di Geber to Bartolomeo Martinengo. See Ferraglio, ‘‘Prete Giovanni de Bressa, alchimista’,’ 61–69.
21 Fusari, ‘La ‘Libreria Magica’ Dei Martinenego Da Barco,’ 128. 22 Fusari, ‘La ‘Libreria Magica’ Dei Martinenego Da Barco,’ 127. 23 Ferraglio, ‘Biblioteca Magica,’ 17.
24 I’am aware of the fact that this manuscript requires competences in palaeography and linguistics of 17th-century Italian language. However, because of the narrow scope of this thesis, that is not strictly
focussed on a philological study of the Abramelin, and its readable handwriting, I will quote and translate directly from the manuscript to which the Biblioteca Queriniana gave me access.
follows the story of AvW’s early years searching for the truth and meeting Abramelin in Egypt. Abramelin taught him ‘la vera, e reale strada, e il dritto sentiero’ [‘the true, and real way, and the right path’].26 It describes other masters he encountered on his
journeys and their erroneous practices; only Abramelin’s teachings are considered effective and safe.
The GD and Br versions differ in the introduction of Book Two. GD begins with a short introduction in which AvW states that his book will present magical teachings that were not taught by Abramelin but that AvW learned from other sources (e.g., ‘the five books of Moses’) or found on his own ‘with or without the use of Kabbalah’.27 In contrast,
Book Two in Br begins straightaway with Chapter 1, ‘Per varie malattie’ [‘For various
diseases’].28 Thirty-four29 short rituals for diverse health problems are listed. All 10
chapters are topic-related. They are fashioned as numbered lists, and each section addresses a specific issue related to the topic of the chapter. For example, Chapter 10 concerns ‘to disappear from the sight of an enemy’30 and ‘to become invisible during the
escape before your enemy’.31
Book Three states, ‘My son Lamech, in this book you will find a complete information
and doctrine, how you and every good man within a year and six months can reach the perfection of the Art.’32 It contains the core instructions regarding the process for
establishing contact with the guardian angel. In Chapter 13, the magician learns ‘Della
Convocatione de Spiriti buoni’ [‘About the Convocation of Good Spirits’],33 and
Chapter 14 informs readers, ‘Della Convocatione, et Congiuratione de Spiriti maligni’ [‘About the Convocation and Conjuration of Malevolent Spirits’].34 This is the most
technical book. The practical issues of the ritual are discussed at length, and locations and spatial arrangements are described in Chapter 11. Interestingly, Book Three seems to stand alone in this work. Indeed, Books One, Two, and Four deal with ‘Magia Antica’
26 Br, fol. 4r – 4v. 27 GD, 47. 28 Br, fol. 62r.
29 GD reports 33 ritual remedies.
30 GD, 101. ‘Per sparire dal viso del tuo nemico,’ Br, fol. 166r. 31 GD, 101. ‘Nella fuga diventar invisibile,’ Br. fol. 167r.
32 ‘In questo libro troverai figliolo mio Lamech una informatione et dottrina plenaria come tu, et ogni
huomo da bene in spatio d’ un anno, et sei mesi può arrivare alla perfetione dell'Arte.’ Br, fol.
173r–v. 33 Br, fol. 149v. 34 Br, fol. 247r.
(‘Ancient Magic’) and are graphically signed with the use of bold capital letters, while
Book Three is not highlighted by any graphic style, and it starts on the same page as the
end of the Book Two. The fourth and final book ‘is the result of the preceding third book’.35 It presents a series of word squares; each one addressing a magical goal.
Figure 1. The frontispiece of the Italian manuscript ms. I.V.13 kept in the Queriniana Library. It reads as
follows: ‘THE TRUE AND REAL SACRED MAGIC with which the ancients did so many and different miracles with the virtue of the Holy caballa. Collected by the most learned Abram Abramolin of Egypt, who, wishing to know this art, crossed the world from youth to old age to know it.’
2.1 The Abramelin’s magical system integrating magic, alchemy, and Christian Kabbalah
The identity of the author is far from clear.36 In fact, we know almost nothing of AvW.
Scholem offers many hypotheses but none are conclusive. He contends that the author was either a Jew of the 15th century or a Christian Kabbalist familiar with the works of
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola and Johan Reuchlin.37 Raphael Patai argues that the
author was a ‘Jewish magus-alchemist who lived in Worms around 1400, wrote in Hebrew, and pretended (or believed himself) to be favoured by God’.38 According to
Patai, AvW’s Jewish identity is confirmed by the lexicon used, characterised by Hebraism, typical phrases and references to rabbinic literature.39 At the same time, Patai
demonstrates that the Abramelin combines alchemy with magic. For example, Chapter 7 of Book Three of Pa presents squares that serve ‘to make the spirit perform all kinds of alchemical works’.40 This feature is also present in Br, which – despite some variations
in the letters of the squares – correspond to the topic of Pa; Br reads ‘De lavori chimici’ [‘Of chemical works’].41
In 1755, Giacomo Casanova (1725–1798), the famous Italian adventurer and librarian of Count Waldstein of Bohemia, was sentenced to the Venetian prison I Piombi because he owned a Clavicula Salomonis (Key of Solomon), a handbook to conjure spirits, along with other illicit magic texts such as the Talismani, Zecorben, Picatrix, and
Cabala.42 Barbierato contends that the Cabala may have been Reuchlin’s De Arte
36 Devon Scott in Tradizioni Perdute claims that the Abramelin is a summa of the Aptocalter, known as The Book of Power, a manuscript from the 11th century, a translation from Greek of an earlier Arabic source. Antonio from Prague would have drawn on the Aptocalter to write the original matrix of the Abramelin. Loda considers this thesis incautious, since the Abramelin is a Kabbalistic text, and its philosophical system cannot forego high middle ages. However, Loda acknowledges that the palindromes and theurgic operation used in the Abramelin correspond with the ones in the
Aptocalter. However, Loda does not provide precise bibliographic coordinates on where this
manuscript is located, but she only states that the occultist Sayed Idries Shah would have found it in a 19th-century English version entitled ‘The Book of Power’. Therefore, all these theses have yet to be demonstrated. See Loda, ‘La Magia Sacra,’ 44.
37 Scholem, ‘Abraham Ben Simeon of Worms,’ 310. 38 Patai, The Jewish Alchemists, 273.
39 Patai, The Jewish Alchemists, 277–80. 40 Patai, The Jewish Alchemists, 280–81. 41 Br, 226v.
Cabalistica or the Abramelin.43 In fact, according to the text, the magic of Abramelin
‘draws its virtue from the ‘Santa caballa’ [‘Holy Cabala’].44
AvW says that magic and Kabbalah are complementary, and he contends that the source of the true and real magic that Abramelin gave him in Egypt was that used by his forefathers, ‘Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Samuel, David, Solomon, and uncountable others’.45 In Chapter 1 of Book Three, AvW claims that wisdom and magic are abused
by the foolish. He metaphorically writes of ‘true Wisdom’ as a ‘poor daughter’ who has been besmirch and defamed.46 Wisdom is the ‘daughter of the living God and the
treasure of his heart’, and she has a sister, ‘God’s Secret’.47 According to AvW, God’s
Wisdom and God’s Secret are magic and Kabbalah, respectively, and both are born from God.48
My son, keep the holy laws of God before your eyes; they should reflect your situation and your life. Through the first tablet, God showed us the holy secret and the Kabbalah; with the other tablet, he gave us the holy Wisdom and Magic that is in these writings.49
The fear of God and righteousness are the foundations of the two tablets.50 Hence the
fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and magic. This passage refers to wisdom and magic as part of a lineage of oral transmission that started with Moses. Furthermore, AvW distinguishes amongst ‘the true Kabbalah, the blended51 Kabbalah, and true
Magic’.52 Blended Kabbalah means magical arts ‘intermingled with holy secrets’.53
An important distinction must be made between Jewish Kabbalah and Christian Kabbalah (often spelled ‘Cabala’). In rabbinical literature, Kabbalah means the oral ‘tradition’ or ‘reception’54 of the revelation of God to Moses on Mount Sinai; Moses
transmitted the teaching to the elders of Israel, and they subsequently transmitted the
43 Barbierato, Nella stanza dei circoli, 80 n.224. 44 Br, 0r.
45 GD, 28; In Br Noah is missing, Br, fol. 31v. 46 GD, 110. 47 GD, 110, 44. 48 GD, 110. 49 GD, 41. 50 GD, 113. 51 ‘mista’ in Br, fol. 185r. 52 GD, 112. 53 GD, 111.
teachings to the prophets, generating a chain of reception.55 Thus, Moses is the first
Kabbalist, and he received the message directly from God. A central aspect of Kabbalah is the revelation of the Name of God, which was made understandable by the Kabbalist. Practical Kabbalah vis-à-vis speculative Kabbalah deals with magical sciences. The boundaries between licit and illicit practices are often blurry, such that practical Kabbalah includes discussions of demonic invocation, necromancy, and sexual magic.56
Christian Kabbalah instead refers to the reception of Jewish thought by Christian humanists such as Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1497) and Johannes Reuchlin (1455–1522). The Christian Kabbalists were in search of an esoteric origin of the Christian religion and they focussed on the power of language, of the word, particularly Hebrew words. The endeavour of their interpretation of antique and medieval texts was aligned to that aim. The result was a syncretistic reading of different traditions. They imagined common ground amongst Jewish Kabbalah, Hermeticism, and Gnosticism, and rooted the esoteric core of religion in Egypt, making Kabbalah an ‘Egyptian doctrine’.57 Christian Platonists interested in Jewish Kabbalah spread across Italy,
Germany, and France.58 For example, Pico della Mirandola heretically contended that
‘no science can better convince us of the divinity of Jesus Christ than magic and the Kabbalah’.59
Andreas Kilcher shows that the conception of magic differs between Jewish Kabbalah and Christian Kabbalah and depends on the treatment of the figure of Moses. According to Kilcher, ‘in the dialectical process of secularisation and of modernity’, the figure of Moses became two-faced.60 On the one hand, there is Moses the prophet of the Sinai
who led the elders of Israel out of Egypt. On the other hand, Moses is imagined as a magician who know Egyptian mysteries. In the case of Moses of the Sinai, a clear distinction is made between an Egyptian identity and an Israelite one, which corresponds to a distinction between Egyptian magic and Moses’s miracles.
Certain indications may suggest that the author of the Abramelin could understand magic from a Jewish perspective.61 First, as shown above, rabbinic literature
55 Kilcher, ‘The Moses of Sinai and the Moses of Egypt,’ 154. 56 Scholem, Garb, and Idel, ‘Kabbalah,’ 666.
57 Kilcher, ‘The Moses of Sinai and the Moses of Egypt,’ 159. 58 Scholem, Garb, and Idel, ‘Kabbalah,’ 672.
59 Scholem, Garb, and Idel, ‘Kabbalah,’ 672.
distinguishes between ‘monotheistic magic’62 and Egyptian sorcery. During his
pilgrimage, AvW meets many magicians in different places around the world. When he arrives in Egypt, he meets the Egyptian master Halimeg, who shows him how to control spirits. Abraham von Worm says that ‘his was not the way of the true magic’ because he worked according to astrological times and ‘never prayed to Adonai, he only called for the devil in cooked-up Chaldaic words’.63 Moreover, once he arrives in the house of
Abramelin, who gives him true wisdom and the secret of Kabbalah, he burns all the magical teachings he has received from the other magicians64 because they are against
God’s law. Additionally, AvW claims that practitioner without Kabbalah ‘let demonic sorcery and godlessness creep into their magic’.65 What is more, AvW stresses that ‘the
true practice of Magical Wisdom’, was passed to him by ‘oral tradition’.66
However, the location of Abramelin in Egypt and the presence of Moses as a magician might suggest that the framework is Christian Kabbalah. The title page of the manuscript in Dresden (Dr2) reads ‘The Mystical Kabbalah of the Egyptians and the Patriarchs’ [‘Cabala Mystica Aegyptiorum et Patriarcarum’],67 revealing the syncretistic
association of Kabbalah with the people of the Nile, which belongs to a Christian model. Moreover, the legacy of Moses in Egypt is embodied in the figure of Abramelin, AvW’s source and part of the lineage of learned magicians. During the first day of the rite for calling malevolent spirits, the practitioner asks God to give him the same power that He gave to ‘Moses, Aaron, and Elijah’.68 This links Moses to the myth of him as a
magician of Egypt. Furthermore, in a note on the margin of Br, we read, ‘Cabala è
Magia’ [‘Cabala is Magic’].69
61 In note 2 of Book One of the GD edition Dehn contends that the use of the term ‘Holy Ghost’ in the sentence ‘The Holy Ghost does not give everyone the honour and duty to be able to learn and experience the important secrets of the Kabbalah, the Law, and the Talmud’, can infer that the author or compiler was a Christian: GD, 6. Br instead read ‘That Holy God, who created all things, does not give to everyone the grace of being able to understand and comprehend and [unreadable] the high mysteries of the Cabala of the Law, and of the Talmuth [Talmud].’ [‘Quel Santo Iddio, che
ha creato tutte le cose non dà la grazia à tutti di poter comprender, et intender e [unreadable] gli alti
misterij della Cabala della Legge, e del Talmuth.’] Br, 1v. 62 Kilcher, ‘The Moses of Sinai and the Moses of Egypt,’ 152.
63 GD, 26. Dehn adopts ‘Adonai’ as a translation of ‘Herr’[‘Lord’], GD, xxiii. However, in Br ‘Adonai’ does not appear.
64 GD, 27. 65 GD, 39. 66 GD, 3. 67 Image in GD, 2. 68 GD, 143. 69 Br, fol. 151r.
2.2 The intermediary beings of the Abramelin
In the context of the vast historical category of Western Esotericism, Egil Asprem classifies the functions of establishing contacts with intermediary beings (e.g., demons, angels, the dead) into four main categories: knowledge, transformation, power or agency, and authority.70 Knowledge means that contact with angels or demons can be
aimed at obtaining greater intellectual knowledge, such as the mastery of science and theology. Transformation means that a personal ascent of the soul to higher spiritual states can be achieved. Power and Agency instead reflect the goal of demonic conjuration; these entities can be constrained to modify natural events and give special powers to practitioners of magic, such as invisibility or the ability to fly. Authority represents the higher hierarchical position in the cosmology of angels and spirits.
In the Abramelin, we can classify three types of intermediary beings with which the practitioner makes contact for different purposes. The guardian angel provides knowledge, transformation, and authority over spirits. Good spirits help during the process, while unredeemed spirits have power and agency. The guardian angel is a central character in the text, and the outcome of the ritual depends on him. The main function of the guardian angel is the transformation of the practitioner’s spiritual state – ascendance to a different state of the soul. However, he also teaches, offering knowledge and wisdom. For example, he gives advice on how to call the good and unredeemed spirits. As AvW tells his son that the lessons he will read in the chapters related to the convocation of spirits ‘are unnecessary because it is what your Angel has told’.71 The good spirits are called during the three days following an 18-month
consecration. During this period, the practitioner ‘perceive[s] a supernatural clarity throughout the prayer room and sense[s] a delightful aroma’.72 Thus, he perceives the
presence of the angels, but he does not talk with them. The only interlocutor is the guardian angel, who appears before the practitioner ‘in its radiance and speaks […] in such friendly and sweet words, beyond what any human tongue could express’.73
Contact with the guardian angel and good spirits is necessary to gain control over the malevolent spirits and obtain power over reality. The unredeemed or malevolent spirits are called in the following three days and appear in a lodge attached to the prayer room. They are commanded by the magician through the use of the magical squares in Book
Four. Due to those signs, they must comply with whatever request the magician makes.
70 Asprem, ‘Intermediary Beings,’ 650–52. 71 GD, 143.
72 GD, 141. 73 GD, 141.
The figure of the guardian angel and the role he plays in the ritual might show that the practice was transmitted in the Christian framework of late medieval theurgy. In particular, the Majorcan hermit Pelagius (d.1480) deserves attention.74 His theurgy deals
with contact with guardians angels. The narrative choices in his works reflect those of the Abramelin. First, he does not hide himself behind pseudo-epigraphic authorities, as is typical of medieval and Renaissance magic (e.g., Solomon, Hermes).75 Second,
Libanius – his disciple – mentions that Pelagius wrote a book on how to invoke both good and bad spirits. Thirdly, the topos of a journey in search of knowledge, landing in remote places, and affiliation with a wise teacher – Libanius visited Mallorca, where he met Pelagius and became his disciple – is similar to the story of AvW who found Abramelin in Egypt becoming his disciple. Three texts by Pelagius deserve attention:
Libellus de proprio angelo [Little book about one’s personal angel]; Peri Anacriseôn,
known as Anacrisis [Interrogation]; and Ars crucifixi [Art of the Crucifix]. In the
Libellus, Pelagius describe the procedures for obtaining a ‘hypnotic anacrisis,’ a
revelation in dreams mediated by ones personal guardian angel.76 After confession, the
adept wears clean clothing and prays in front of the altar. Then, in secrecy, he must go to his bedroom, sprinkle it with holy water and incense it. He makes new devotions at the foot of his bed and goes to sleep. This procedure must be repeated for 27 days. In the next three days, the operation reach its climax, and fasting is increased. The adept must go to his room (or a secret chapel); wash himself; pray; wear new clothes; and draw two concentric circles around his bed, which must be placed in the centre of the space.77 The
practitioner should have prepared sheets of parchment and metal inscribed with angelic seals and must place these under his pillow. Revelation will come while sleeping. The
Ars crucifixi is similar in structure, but uses a ritual tool, a crucifix consecrated by a
priest specifically for that purpose and kept in a wax box under the practitioner’s pillow. Christ then appears during the night to speak with the adept. The Anacrisis is dedicated to Libanius, and teaches how to communicate with one’s personal guardian angel, who appear while one is sleeping. Pelagius stresses the importance of a period of preparation in which the adept should adjust his life, clothing, and words according to the Christian dogmas and restrict social relationships.78 From the point of view of ritual procedures,
there are many commonalities with the Abramelin. First, the Abramelin describes a ritual with a long preparation procedure, 18 months (GD and Br) in which the
74 As suggested by Pasi: ‘Varieties of Magical Experience,’ 154.
75 On the innovative features of Pelagius narrative choices see Véronèse, ‘La notion d’« auteur-magicien » à la fin du Moyen Âge,’ 2–5.
76 Véronèse, ‘Le rêve sollicité,’ 97–98. 77 Véronèse, ‘Le rêve sollicité,’ 97–98.
practitioner prays in front of the altar, incensing his room, washes his body, and dresses adequately, and this process entails a shorter culmination phase (six days) in which fasting and devotional acts are amplified. Second, the Abramelin stresses the importance of regulating one’s life, social affairs, words, and other activities according to religious life. Lastly, both in the Libellus and the Ars crucifixi the ritual is conducted in one’s bedroom. In the Abramelin the practitioner should create an oratorium next to the bedroom.79
Furthermore, it was only during the Council of Trent that the guardian angel was regulated,80 and in 1608, the year in which Wo1 was written, the feast of the guardian
angel and his office entered the Roman Breviary.81 The hypothesis that the figure of the
guardian angel is of Jewish derivation is difficult to confirm because it had different connotations. Guardian angels were associated with the ‘“Irin” (ןי ִריִע, Aram. “watchers”) mentioned in the Book of Daniel (4:10, 14, 20)’,82 angels responsible for
surveillance for God.83 In other cases, they were treated as communitarian angels,
associated with nations and cities.84
2.3 The locations of the Abramelin
Notwithstanding the many correlations between ritual procedures in Pelagius’s magical works and the Abramelin, the preparation of the location differs a great deal. Firstly, the ritual can be performed in two locations: outdoors in a forest or indoors in a private oratorium next to one’s bedroom. In the outdoor scenario, a small hut should be built in the forest, surrounded by a hedge ‘made of flowers, herbs, and shrubbery’85 that should
be divided into an inner part where the altar and the hut are placed and an outer part as a porch. In the case of an indoor practice, the Abramelin gives instructions for a prayer room and, attached to it, a lodge facing North.86 Two windows and a door must open to
the arbour and allow the practitioner to see and control the spirits that appear there. The room should be quadrangular, and the arbour should be ‘open, or have many
79 GD, 124.
80 Mazurek, ‘The Guardian Angel,’ 51. 81 Mazurek, ‘The Guardian Angel,’ 52.
82 Bamberger et al., ‘Angels and Angelology,’ 154. 83 Bamberger et al., ‘Angels and Angelology,’ 154. 84 Bamberger et al., ‘Angels and Angelology,’ 157. 85 GD, 132; Br, 228v–29r; RA, 109–10.
windows’.87 A uniform layer of sand ‘two or three fingers deep’88 should cover the floor
of the arbour, and the chamber should have a wooden floor. An altar is erected in the middle of the room, and its sides should be oriented to the four cardinal directions. It can be made of either uncut stones or elder or pine wood. A ‘lamp made of gold, silver, or glass filled with olive oil’89 must be hung above the altar and turned on during
prayers with incense.90 An incense brazier ‘made from bronze or silver’ must be place
on the altar.91 Secondly, the Abramelin does not require concentric ground circles as are
necessary, for example, around the magician’s bed in Pelagius’s Libellus.
An attentive comparison of the available sources of the Abramelin reveals that even if there are common patterns (e.g., the hut, the prayer room, and the lodge), there are a few differences in how they are arranged. The Italian manuscript (Br) offers more detailed descriptions. Below is a translation of the first part of Chapter 11 of Book
Three:
Chapter XI
Of the election and operation of the place where the spirits are to be called and of the things that belong to it.
This must be done before the beginning of the work, before the first celebration of the feast of Pasah,92 in order that one can immediately begin without impediment and all things be
well prepared and tidy, and in order that this work begin in solitude, one can choose a place that is a beautiful plain, in the middle of which he should erect and builds an altar, and he should erect a hut over it made of beautiful fronds and branches so that rain does not fall upon it, and he should spreads incense around. A hedge, all around the altar and distanced [from the altar] by about seven steps on each side, should be planted of two beautiful and odoriferous flowers, plants, herbs, tender saplings, and greens so that they can divide this piazza in two parts: the interior, where there are the altar and the hut, will be like a temple and an oratorium, and the rest of the piazza will be like a portico or courtyard. However, if you want to start this work in a city, or villa, or home, pay attention to this information. The
87 GD, 132; ‘unroofed or roofed but open’, Br, 229r. 88 GD, 132; Br 230r.
89 GD, 133. Br reads only ‘glass’: Br, 230v.
90 A circular engraving in Heinrich Khunrath’s Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae (1609) depicts his
laboratorium. In the foreground, on the left side, is the oratorium – the ‘domain of the
Christian-Cabalist’ dedicated to prayer. It is represented by a circular tent; a lamp hangs above an altar on which lie books open to pages representing seals and divine words. Behind the lamp, a hanging sign reads ‘so that you do not talk about God without light’ [‘ne loquaris de deo absq lumine’]. See Forshaw, ‘Oratorium—Auditorium—Laboratorium,’ 170–72. The shape of the oratorium is also present in Daniel Mögling’s Speculum Sophicum Rhodo-Stavroticum (1618).
91 GD, 133. Br reads ‘bronze or metal’: Br, 230v. 92 Passover (Passah, Pessach).
oratorium must have at least two windows, one facing east and the other facing west. One side of this room is attached to another place, which is unroofed or roofed but open so that you can look at it in its entirety and enter in the oratorium. I had to break two large windows on the northern side of my oratorium. At the time of the convocation, in order to have a loggia, or free room towards the north, completely unroofed, I broke two huge windows, as you can still see,93 and at the time of spirit convocation, I opened them and
took them away together with the door...I could see them [spirits]…the whole terrace and constrain them without impediments. The oratorium, if possible, should be of rectangular shape,94 without too many angles, and it should also be spotlessly clean and swept, and the
ground, or the floor, should be covered with a good and beautiful wood tablet. In short, all these things and other things should be arranged and prepared so that it can be considered and seen as a superior place..., room of devotion, and oratorium, and not a stable or room for dogs. However, the place of spirits should be, as said above, open or at least widely windowed, and its floor covered with sand uniformly spread and three fingers deep. The altar should be placed in the middle of the oratorium and of the piazza, its four faces directed towards the four parts of the world, its height and size at your discrimination, as better suits the proportions of the place and person. In the country, be it made of uncut stones, in the room, be it made of laurel and fir wood. A beautiful glass lamp filled with olive oil will be raised above the altar; every time you burn incense, you keep it turned until the prayer is over. A bronze or metal thurible is placed on the altar, which must not be moved until the end of the whole work.95
The first element to notice is that only in Br is the planted hedge around the altar circular, and in Br the room is rectangular and not square as in GD. Furthermore, the 18th-century versions divide the space in three areas: an oratorium, a terrace, and a
lodge. The drawings in Magia Divina (St) – the manuscript written by Duke Charles of Södermanland,96 who read Pa, clarify this point. The same tripartite spatial system is
attested to by Crowley, who used MM as a reference. This does not correspond to the indications in the early modern manuscripts. For example, in Br we read about two areas, an oratorium and a lodge. ‘Lodge’ and ‘terrace’ mean the same place, a semi-covered outdoor space adjacent to the oratorium. This type of ritual space is singular in the context of early modern ceremonial magic. In fact, even if it is common in other widely distributed sources (e.g., Peter of Abano’s Heptameron, the pseudo-Solomonic
Clavis Salomonis, Pelagius’s theurgy) for the ritual space to be arranged in domestic
places, those works never mention the division into two parts (i.e., a portico and an inner cell), the search for a lodge, and the placement of the altar in the centre. The
93 Br is the only manuscript in which AvW says to his son Lamech that he can still see the architectural modification he needed to make in their house.
94 I translate ‘dimetro’ [‘made of two measures’] with ‘rectangular’. It is relevant since GD read ‘square’ which, following the logic would means ‘made of one measure’. Cf. GD, 132.
95 Br, 229r–30v.
Abramelin is the only known text to mention a temple-like shape. In this thesis, I try to
answer the question of why. In the following chapters, I argue that these variations are related to the imitation of the typology of the temple.
3 Theoretical framework
3.1 Interdisciplinarity
The term ‘interdisciplinarity’ comes from the Latin inter (‘in between’) and means ‘being in between the disciplines’. The concept implies the possible existence of an ‘intellectual, conceptual and methodological space’ between disciplines that can be investigated.97 Disciplines are reductionist by definition: ‘to know an object through or
via a discipline is to know it reduced to the parameters determined by disciplinary constraints, conceptual, methodological, or theoretical’.98 Each discipline determines the
typology of sources that can be studied, and on the basis of these sources, it elaborates theories used to assess data. In other words, a discipline produces knowledge while seeking scientific objectivity within the constraints of its field and selecting its sources. On the contrary, an interdisciplinary approach should pluralise ‘the sources, perspectives, dispositions, and determinations of knowledge’.99 Moreover, the fact that
an inter100 exists implies a threshold between disciplinary boundaries, such as between
the history of religion, architecture, and geography.
Conducting a spatial analysis of magic necessitates venturing into interdisciplinary territories. Indeed, the disciplines that study space and that have developed ad hoc methodologies to study it are geography and architecture, while magic commonly pertains to the domains of anthropology;101 history of religion (or more generally,
history of ideas);102 and, recently, cognitive studies.103 For example, the study of magic
97 Goldberg and Davidson, ‘Interdisciplinarity,’ 1130. 98 Goldberg and Davidson, ‘Interdisciplinarity,’ 1130. 99 Goldberg and Davidson, ‘Interdisciplinarity,’ 1130.
100 The notion of transdisciplinarity instead implies a different type of endeavour. Transdisciplinarity is a ‘superior stage’ of interdisciplinarity, which means the creation of a new epistemology where the boundaries between disciplines collapse into a new holistic scenario. See Nicolescu, ‘Transdisciplinarity as a Methodological Framework,’ 36.
101 See the participative study of magic by Susan Greenwood: Magic, Witchcraft and the Otherworld; eadem, The Anthropology of Magic. See also Tanya Luhrmann participative study of modern witchcraft: Luhrmann, Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft.
102 See the introduction of the historical category of Western Learned Magic in Otto, ‘Historicising ‘Western Learned Magic’,’ 161–240.
in anthropology has largely focussed on ethnology,104 while the history of ideas analyses
the transmission and reception of concepts, and the philosophical and theoretical framework within the discourse about magic. While the main source of architecture and geography is typically the physical environment in which we live, geographers and architects develop theories to investigate how human actions (technical and conceptual) modify the physical environment. Hence, at the foundation of an interdisciplinary project that studies magic through the category of space, there are important theoretical and methodological concerns due to the ambiguity with which magic and space have been defined respectively in the field of religious studies, geography, and architecture.
3.2 The problem of ‘space’
We have only to look at the entry in the Oxford English Dictionary to get a sense of the complexity of the term ‘space’. The English word was borrowed from French as a variant of espace – originally from the Latin spatium.105 ‘Space’ means ‘period of time,
duration, time, deferment, delay, respite, size, extent (of a place), occasion, opportunity, distance between two points, interval, width, expanse of the air or sky’.106
Furthermore, the concept of space has a long history in philosophical and scientific thinking, and since antiquity, its meaning has undergone many transformations. Plato conceived of space as an immutable and unterminated matter, negation of void.107 In
Aristotle’s view, space has a different nature from bodies: it is a physical entity that contains them and influences their movements, and it is limited to the last sphere of the fixed stars.108 René Descartes (1596–1650), influenced by Aristotle, defined spatium as
an extension – a determination of the material world (res extensa) that is mathematically accessible through geometry.109 Newton theorised it as absolute, something that interacts
103 See Sörensen, A Cognitive Theory of Magic. A mention is necessary for a recent study on the materiality of magic that came out from a conference in 2012 and that saw the contribution of scholars studying magical objects from late antiquity to early modernity. The conference was
Genesis, Dynamics and Mediality of Cultural Figurations at the Morphomata International Center for Advance Study in May 2012 with a publication: Boschung and Bremmer, The Materiality of Magic.
104 See for example De Martino, Il mondo magico, chap. 3. 105 Oxford English Dictionary, ‘Space, n.1.’
106 Oxford English Dictionary, ‘Space, n.1.’
107 Plato develops the problem of space and negation of void in Timaeus, 32c–33d. For more information see: Fronterotta, ‘Luogo, spazio e sostrato ‘spazio-materiale’,’ 7–8; Abbagnano, Storia
della Filosofia, Vol 1, 23–24.
108 Abbagnano, Storia della Filosofia, Vol 1, 167.
with every object without being influenced by the interaction.110 In Newtonian terms,
absolute space is measurable and objective, a result of geometry and mathematical thinking.
A deep theoretical critique of the Cartesian and Newtonian concepts is raised in the disciplines of geography111 and architecture. These disciplines have redefined space to
make it a concept to investigate the relationship between the environment, and human presence and action on it. The concept of ‘space’ appeared in architectural theory only at the end of the 19th century. Its introduction is attributed to a small group of German
thinkers.112 In 1893, the philosopher and psychologist Theodor Lipps (1851–1914), the
sculptor and writer Adolf von Hildebrand (1847–1921), and the art historian August Schmarsow (1853–1936) published three different books on the relationship between art, architecture, and space.113 Until that moment, space had never been theorised as a
fundamental category. Other aspects were important for architects: rhythm, order, volume, and mass.114 These authors used space to theorise about the relationship
between an observer and artwork. Space is the physical medium through which sensory perception is possible. Thus, the body assumed a central role: its movements are the ‘generator’ of space between the object and the subject. An influential contribution on the concept of ‘architecture as space’ is Bruno Zevi’s Saper vedere l’architettura [Knowing How to Look at Architecture].115 Zevi defines space as the void contained by
the mass of architecture or as the void inside the enclosure that architecture creates. In this book, Zevi completes an important and innovative theoretical operation: he re-interpreted the history of architecture from Greek antiquity to modernity studying how the articulations of space or void have changed and been modified throughout history.
110 Abbagnano, Storia della Filosofia, Vol 2, 512.
111 Sociology, too, played a great part in the spatial turn that characterized geography in the 70s and that defined new sub-disciplines like ‘geography of religion,’ whose theoretical concepts have been used by scholars of religious studies to introduce spatial methodologies in the field.
112 Even though, Malathouni has recently proved that the first who used space as a category of architecture was an American theosophist architect Claude F. Bragdon (1866–1946), who already in 1891 used the category of space as ‘a mental properties’ and a ‘physical extension’: Malathouni, ‘Architecture Is the Pattern,’ 554.
113 Theodor Lipps’s Raumästhetik und Geometrisch-Optische Tauschungen, Adolf Hildebrand’s Das
Probleme der Form in der bildenden Kunst and, August Schmarsow’s The Essence of Architectural Creation. See Malathouni, ‘Architecture Is the Pattern,’ 554.
114 English-language architectural literature adopted the concept not early than 1914 with the publication of Geoffrey Scott’s Architecture of Humanism. See Malathouni, ‘Architecture Is the Pattern,’ 554.
115 The book was first published in 1948 and translated into English in 1957 with the title Architecture
In the 1970s’, at the cross-roads of geography, philosophy, and social sciences, a fervent spatial critique took place against absolute Cartesian and geometrical definitions. Space became relational, the product of social interactions. In other words, space was no longer conceived as an a priori location where objects, activities, and people are situated, but as the result of their interactions. The Production of Space (1974) by the philosopher and sociologist Henry Lefebvre established the theoretical basis of this perspective and influenced generations of scholars in diverse disciplines. His thesis is that there are no social phenomena that are not somehow spatialised, for space is produced by social relations and reciprocally influences them. To explain this process of production, Lefebvre contends that three social activities create space, and they depend on social relations. The first category are ‘representations of space,’ which means the conceptual formulations of architects and engineers.116 These are dominant spaces,
expressions of dominant forces, such as political and religious powers. The second activity, ‘spatial practice’,117 is the perceived space. It is the material and sensible
engagement with space. It is both a product and influencer of human activity, behaviour, and experience (e.g., walking on streets, sitting in squares, dwelling in houses, being confined in prisons). The third activity is the appropriation of the dominant spaces via the imagination and symbolic usage, making them ‘spaces of representation’.118 They
generally are underground sites of social life. Space is thus produced in society and is an active component of social life. As long as religions find expressions in social forms, it is possible to study them through space, and this is what scholars of religion like Kim Knott attempt to do, drawing directly on Lefebvre. I present Knott’s approach in the following sections.
The spatial critique of the 1970s’ also meant the problematisation of terminologies that share meaning with ‘space’, such as ‘place’, ‘location’, and ‘locale’. In geography, ‘place’ has been defined as ‘a meaningful site that combines location, locale and, sense of place’.119 ‘Location’ refers to the abstract space of geographical coordinates. ‘Locale’
is instead the material tangibles or imaginary forms of place.120 ‘Sense of place’ is
instead a meaningful dimension associated with a place, namely its subjective and social construction.121 The geographer Yi-Fu Tuan was influenced by this definition and,
drawing on Martin Heidegger and Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology, argues
116 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 33. 117 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 33. 118 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 33.
119 Cresswell, ‘Place,’ 169; Williams, ‘Place in Geography,’ 149. 120 Cresswell, ‘Place,’ 169.
that a subtle difference exists between space and place: ‘Space is more abstract than Place’.122 Space can become a place when we ‘get to know it better and endow it with
value’.123 When space becomes real, its value becomes a ‘concretion of value’, a
palpable object, a ‘tangible construction’124 in which ‘one can dwell’.125 In the last two
decades, the rise of digitally conceptualised spaces, namely, computer-made virtual spaces, has introduced a series of new categories: cyberspace, hyperspace, virtual space, imaginary space, and immaterial space.126 This latest revolution has completely changed
the original notion that the body is the generator of space. Digital space ‘separates the mind from the real body’ and ‘physical distance and orientation lose their significance’.127
Clearly, how we define space informs how we analyse magic. In this thesis, I use the term ‘space’ to refer to abstract conceptualisations, geometrical compositions, and metrical dimensions of the human-built environment where magicians found their locations and locale. However, I use the term ‘place’ to indicate those forms of relationship with space that involve the entanglement of imagination, social relations, and meaning.
3.3 The problem of ‘magic’
The concept of ‘magic’ is more problematic than space in its definition.128 On the one
hand, the meaning of magic changes in primary sources. The term can be used either self-referentially or as a category of exclusion of illicit and deviant practices. The word has its origin in 5th-century BCE classical Greek. The terms mageia, magos and magi
signified the Persian priests and practices that used formulas (epoidai), but they also assumed pejorative connotations, especially in tragedies in which the term magos meant ‘charlatan’.129 Augustine of Hippo (354–430 CE) offered a clear definition and
theological theory about magic. In his view, magic is a real, effective, and illicit practice
122 Tuan, Space and Place, 6. 123 Tuan, Space and Place, 6. 124 Tuan, Space and Place, 6.
125 Tuan, Space and Place, 12. In a similar way the philosopher Jeff Malpas suggests that place depends on subjective experience. See Malpas, Place and Experience, 31–32.
126 Erk and Uluoğlu, ‘Changing Paradigms in Space Theories,’ 17. 127 Erk and Uluoğlu, ‘Changing Paradigms in Space Theories,’ 19.
128 ‘“Magic” has been a term with an extremely versatile and ambivalent semantics: it is the art of the devil or a path to the gods, it is of natural and supernatural origin, a testimony to human folly or the crowning achievement of scientific audacity, a sin or a virtue, harmful or beneficent, overpowering or empowering, an act of othering or of self-assertion’, Otto and Stausberg, Defining Magic, 3.
which ‘pertain[s] to a semiotic system which is essentially a private code [...] to communicate with demons’.130 This definition held until, in the 13th century, magic
entered into a dichotomous relationship with miracles.131 According to Brunetto Latini
(ca. 1220–1294/5), an Italian poet and political thinker who wrote in French and Italian, the art of magic was founded by Zoroaster himself and is linked to an inappropriate, even idolatrous, relationship with demons and the use of words as instruments of power.132 In the early modern period, the complexity and fragmentation of the term
increased with numerous declinations – natural, astral and mathematical, and ceremonial – as attested in the famous encyclopaedic work by Cornelius Agrippa, De
Occulta Philosophia Libri Tres [Three Books on Occult Philosophy].
On the other hand, academic debate on magic as a valid historical category seems to be endless. A continuous problematisation of its definition is on the agenda. Anthropological theories on magic of the 18th and 19th centuries were driven by
evolutionary perspectives and conceived magic as a survivor of primitive thinking, as an erroneous association of ideas. James George Frazer (1854–1941), following this perspective, focussed on the structure of rituals in relation to ideas about how the world functions; magical principles follow the idea that similar or contiguous objects and substances can affect each other. In the evolutionary scheme, magic represents the first stage of evolution, followed by religion, and then science, which is the last stage of human comprehension of the laws of the universe. Against this backdrop, Mauss and Hubert133 claimed that Frazer’s definition of magic overlapped with that of religion and
that to understand magic, we must consider ‘the circumstances in which rites occur’.134
Thus, a first step toward a sociological approach to magic was taken. Magic was defined by the fact that it has no church and its liturgy takes place in isolated and hidden parts of society.135
129 To give clarification of the ambiguity in antiquity of the term magic see Pliny’s position in Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science, Vol. 1, 58–72. See also Bremmer, ‘The Birth of the Term ‘Magic’,’ 1–11. It is clear that magic has a polyvalent meaning according to the scholar dealing with it. In Pliny’s view, magic is related to the ‘virtues of natural objects’ (Thorndike, 65) but never or vaguely related to the ‘use of words’ as instead it comes clear from the Derveni Papyrus, which ascribes to the magi and to mageia the use of epoidai (formulas) to affect
daimones.
130 Fanger, ‘Magic,’ 860–65.
131 Page, Magic in Medieval Manuscripts, 8.
132 Page, Magic in Medieval Manuscripts, 8. In Agrippa, De Occulta Philosophia, 88, the author reports that Zalmoxis and Zoroaster, due to their fame, were considered inventors of magic. 133 Hubert and Mauss, ‘Esquisse d’une Theorie Générale de La Magie,’ 1–146.
