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Daemonologie: A Critical Edition. Expanded. In Modern English with Notes
At a time when news of strange sicknesses, sudden deaths and a widespread interest in witchcraft was discovered in the kingdom, a response to the pandemic was published in a dissertation written by King James. This dissertation provided the public with special knowledge regarding the history, practices and study of magick but also included the differences between ancient Witchcraft, Necromancy, Sorcery and the magick arts with all the sub categories and derivatives. This dissertation not only explains in detail the history and practices of ancient witchcraft but takes care to educate the reader of the various forms and workings of the infernal order of demons; detailing the demonology of Satan, Spectra; evil spirits, Ziim, Iim, Incubi, Succubi, faries, brownies, familiar spirits and even further elaborates on the daemonic and demoniac sufferings of haunting, obsession and possession. This work became the inspiration of Shakespeare's Macbeth and even became a "how to" witch-hunter's manual that was studied and used by the infamous Matthew Hopkins who within just 2 years launched a series of witch hunts that resulted in the executions of an estimated 300 witches. The first publication of his work included a case study of how King James himself partook in a witch trial during the year 1591 that uncovered a plot to sabotage his wife, the Queen of Scots and overthrow the throne of Scotland with the use of satanic rituals and animal sacrifice. This dissertation titled Dæmonologie was published in 1597, prior to the first publication of the King James Version of the Bible in 1611 and shows how the Original Hebrew of the Biblical Old Testament had contained within its verses the names of demonic or angelic entities that instead appear as animals in all the Greek and Latin translations from which the KJV derived. This edition of Dæmonologie has been fully transcribed, edited and translated into modern English. It is further annotated with explanatory notes, definitions and also expanded with more content and contains discovery from more witch trial records that took place during the reign of King James, not previously published in the original.
The content is as
Book I. - The Description of Magic.
Division of the Arts
Etymology. The Difference Between Necromancy & Witchcraft.
Rudiments & Devil’s School. Division of Astrology
The Use of Charms. Forms of Circles & Conjurations
The Devil’s Contract in Two Parts. Miracles of God vs Devil.
Book II. - The Description of Sorcery & Witchcraft.
Biblical Proof vs Imagination & Myth.
Etymology of Sorcery. The First path of Apprenticeship
Division of a Witch’s Actions. Adoration of their Master
Method of Transportation & The Illusions of Satan
The Curse & Remedy of Diseases
Least and Most Subject to Harm.
The Appearance of a Devil (Demonic Forms)
The Times and Forms a Devil Appears. / Denial
Book III. - The Description of the Spirits.
The Four Principle Kinds.
Spectra. Method of Avoiding Their Trouble.
Obsession & Possession.
On Daemoniacs and the Possessed
Incubi & Succubi
Faries
Of the Trials and Punishments of Witches.
Witch
The North Berwick Witch Trials & the Death of Dr. Fian. Where an infamous group of witches (approximately 200) testified to plotting against the throne of Scotland and a satanic sacrificial ritual was performed to as an attempt kill the Queen of Scots, wife of prince James.
The Discovery of the Witchcraft of Joane Flower and her daughters Margret and Phillip Flower that describes peculiar events revolving around the sudden and mysterious death of the honorable Frances, Earl of Rutland and all the examinations and confessions of the witches in Leicestershire that were used as evidence in the trial that took place during King James' reign of England.
The content is as
Book I. - The Description of Magic.
Division of the Arts
Etymology. The Difference Between Necromancy & Witchcraft.
Rudiments & Devil’s School. Division of Astrology
The Use of Charms. Forms of Circles & Conjurations
The Devil’s Contract in Two Parts. Miracles of God vs Devil.
Book II. - The Description of Sorcery & Witchcraft.
Biblical Proof vs Imagination & Myth.
Etymology of Sorcery. The First path of Apprenticeship
Division of a Witch’s Actions. Adoration of their Master
Method of Transportation & The Illusions of Satan
The Curse & Remedy of Diseases
Least and Most Subject to Harm.
The Appearance of a Devil (Demonic Forms)
The Times and Forms a Devil Appears. / Denial
Book III. - The Description of the Spirits.
The Four Principle Kinds.
Spectra. Method of Avoiding Their Trouble.
Obsession & Possession.
On Daemoniacs and the Possessed
Incubi & Succubi
Faries
Of the Trials and Punishments of Witches.
Witch
The North Berwick Witch Trials & the Death of Dr. Fian. Where an infamous group of witches (approximately 200) testified to plotting against the throne of Scotland and a satanic sacrificial ritual was performed to as an attempt kill the Queen of Scots, wife of prince James.
The Discovery of the Witchcraft of Joane Flower and her daughters Margret and Phillip Flower that describes peculiar events revolving around the sudden and mysterious death of the honorable Frances, Earl of Rutland and all the examinations and confessions of the witches in Leicestershire that were used as evidence in the trial that took place during King James' reign of England.
187 pages, Paperback
Published May 14, 2016
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* They are officially published under that name
* They are traditional stories not attributed to a specific author
* They are religious texts not generally attributed to a specific author
Books whose authorship is merely uncertain should be attributed to Unknown.
See also: Anonymous
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 14, 2024
I thought I knew this book as a major influence on Shakespeare's Macbeth. It isn't.
Written as a sort of Socratic dialogue between a slightly dim Philomanthus and a know-it-all Epistemon, it goes through a pick'n'mix of out-of-context Bible quotes to prove the different types of witches, sorcerers, necromancers and demons. Epistemon appears to know what he's talking about, but it would really only convince you if you were already convinced.
Witches are more often women, because women are weaker than men. Yeah, right, cause men never complain when they're giving birth.
James stated he was writing it to refute Reginald Scot's The Discovery of Witchcraft, but that book is much more erudite, knowing both the Bible and classical authors in much more detail. Whether that persuades you more is up to you, but this is shoddy scholarship, even for the 1590s.
The last quarter is called News from Scotland, which gives details of the North Berwick Witch Trial. By sexual humiliation of women, and kicking a headteacher of a school until he confesses, they get confessions that they christened a cat, tied dead parts of a man to his body, and threw the cat in the sea. This caused a storm, which (didn't) kill King James and Queen Anna.
They burnt the witches.
The influence on Shakespeare is negligible.
Written as a sort of Socratic dialogue between a slightly dim Philomanthus and a know-it-all Epistemon, it goes through a pick'n'mix of out-of-context Bible quotes to prove the different types of witches, sorcerers, necromancers and demons. Epistemon appears to know what he's talking about, but it would really only convince you if you were already convinced.
Witches are more often women, because women are weaker than men. Yeah, right, cause men never complain when they're giving birth.
James stated he was writing it to refute Reginald Scot's The Discovery of Witchcraft, but that book is much more erudite, knowing both the Bible and classical authors in much more detail. Whether that persuades you more is up to you, but this is shoddy scholarship, even for the 1590s.
The last quarter is called News from Scotland, which gives details of the North Berwick Witch Trial. By sexual humiliation of women, and kicking a headteacher of a school until he confesses, they get confessions that they christened a cat, tied dead parts of a man to his body, and threw the cat in the sea. This caused a storm, which (didn't) kill King James and Queen Anna.
They burnt the witches.
The influence on Shakespeare is negligible.
December 16, 2022
Interesting and bemusing at the same time. Overall, I do like how the formatting tries its best to keep historical, but it more often than not looks like a poorly photocopied workbook in the process. There are some misprints, but nothing that cuts off any text.
As far as the original author's thoughts are concerned, it reads very much like an arrogant frat student who just discovered science. (Wrongly, of course) There's footnotes for the more complex words and references but I certainly wouldn't start here.
As far as the original author's thoughts are concerned, it reads very much like an arrogant frat student who just discovered science. (Wrongly, of course) There's footnotes for the more complex words and references but I certainly wouldn't start here.
October 24, 2024
Interesting read for sure, albeit a bit dry (which makes sense given the topic)
March 30, 2021
Not one to go for if you want an easy read.
An interesting historical document.
An interesting historical document.
December 27, 2017
Very interesting content but the style and kindle formatting of this work made it very difficult to comprehend.
On the good side, the content was extremely interesting. Most interesting was the work by King James VI/I from the early 17th century addressing fascinating topics such as descriptions of magic, witches, demons, etc. written from the perspective of the times using the Bible as well as logic of the time to define and explain these phenomena. The latter portion of the book was a series of summaries of case testimony, etc. from proceedings against folks accused of witchcraft. This was not quite as interesting though fascinating in its own right.
But, this book was nearly impossible to read. To his credit, the author did provide a lot of very useful footnotes explaining things and attempted to express things in more modern terms. But the sentence structure of the time seems to have been to write the longest sentences with the most commas, semi-colons, and colons possible. To exacerbate this problem, in the Kindle edition for some reason the word spacing started to deteriorate (not the author's fault) in the second case summary and never recovered. As a result you are stuck attempting to make sense of sentences like, "These examinations and some others were taken and charily preserved for the contriving of sufficient evidences against them, and when the Judges of Assize came down to Lincoln about the first week of March, being Sir Henry Hobert, Lord chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and Sir Ed: Bromleyone of the Barons of the Ex c hequer, they were presented unto them, who not only wondered at the wickedness of these persons, but were amazed at their practices and horrible contracts with the Devilto damn their own souls: And although the Right Honorable Earl had
suffi c ient grief for the loss of his Children; yet it was no doubt the greater to consider the manner, and how it pleased God to inflict on him such a fashion of visitation: Besides, as it amazed the hearers to understand the particulars, and the circumstances of this deviilishcontract, so was it as wonderful to see their desperate impenitency, and horrible di s traction, according to the rest of that sort, exclai m ing against the Devil for deluding them, and now breaking promise with them, when they stood in most need of help." [Phew!]
Although it would subtract from the period feel of the work what is needed is a version of this in contemporary English or at least in more contemporary sentence structure.
On the good side, the content was extremely interesting. Most interesting was the work by King James VI/I from the early 17th century addressing fascinating topics such as descriptions of magic, witches, demons, etc. written from the perspective of the times using the Bible as well as logic of the time to define and explain these phenomena. The latter portion of the book was a series of summaries of case testimony, etc. from proceedings against folks accused of witchcraft. This was not quite as interesting though fascinating in its own right.
But, this book was nearly impossible to read. To his credit, the author did provide a lot of very useful footnotes explaining things and attempted to express things in more modern terms. But the sentence structure of the time seems to have been to write the longest sentences with the most commas, semi-colons, and colons possible. To exacerbate this problem, in the Kindle edition for some reason the word spacing started to deteriorate (not the author's fault) in the second case summary and never recovered. As a result you are stuck attempting to make sense of sentences like, "These examinations and some others were taken and charily preserved for the contriving of sufficient evidences against them, and when the Judges of Assize came down to Lincoln about the first week of March, being Sir Henry Hobert, Lord chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and Sir Ed: Bromleyone of the Barons of the Ex c hequer, they were presented unto them, who not only wondered at the wickedness of these persons, but were amazed at their practices and horrible contracts with the Devilto damn their own souls: And although the Right Honorable Earl had
suffi c ient grief for the loss of his Children; yet it was no doubt the greater to consider the manner, and how it pleased God to inflict on him such a fashion of visitation: Besides, as it amazed the hearers to understand the particulars, and the circumstances of this deviilishcontract, so was it as wonderful to see their desperate impenitency, and horrible di s traction, according to the rest of that sort, exclai m ing against the Devil for deluding them, and now breaking promise with them, when they stood in most need of help." [Phew!]
Although it would subtract from the period feel of the work what is needed is a version of this in contemporary English or at least in more contemporary sentence structure.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews