Politics and Celestial Spirits in the 16th Century: the Connection between Imperial Apology and Radical Angelical Magic in John Dee’s Practices
Abstract
This work proposes to study the relationship between two prominent elements of John Dee’s (1527-1608/9) work: his role as an apologist at the court of Elizabeth I, and his unique esoteric practice of angel invocation. Although both facets have already received attention from specialized historiography and have been explored to some degree of depth, these analyses have been conducted in isolation. This paper examines the political representations present in the (alleged) conferences with celestial spirits. To this end, the manuscript diaries of Dee (BL, Sloane MS 3188) in which he recorded the supposed conversations with celestial entities, are considered as the main source.Downloads
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