Chronology · Timeline
Chronology
Early Modern
31 moments, 1600 to 1692.
- 1600
Giordano Bruno burned in Rome
After an eight-year trial, the Hermetic philosopher of an infinite universe is executed in the Campo de' Fiori.
Liber XI · Hermeticism - 1604
James I's Witchcraft Act
England's new statute makes contracting with or feeding spirits a capital crime; it governs English trials until 1736.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1606
Trithemius's Steganographia printed
Long circulated in manuscript, the abbot's work on angelic communication—actually concealing cryptography—is finally published at Frankfurt.
Liber XII · High Magick - 1608–09
Death of John Dee
Elizabeth's astrologer and angel-conjurer dies impoverished at Mortlake; his angelic diaries resurface later in the century.
Liber XII · High Magick - 1609–10
Basque witch hunt and Logroño auto-da-fé
Hunts in Labourd and Zugarramurdi culminate in the Logroño auto-da-fé; inquisitor Salazar's scepticism later curbs Spanish witch trials.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1612
Pendle witch trials
Ten people from Lancashire are hanged after one of England's best-documented witch trials.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1612
Boehme writes Aurora
The Görlitz shoemaker Jacob Boehme records his vision of God's self-birth from the abyss, founding Christian theosophy.
Liber IX · Gnosticism - 1612
Flamel's Hieroglyphic Figures published
A Paris book attributes to the fourteenth-century scribe Nicolas Flamel an account of making the philosophers' stone, launching his alchemical legend.
Liber I · Alchemy - 1614
Casaubon redates the Hermetica
Isaac Casaubon shows philologically that the Corpus Hermeticum was written in the Christian era, not by a sage contemporary with Moses.
Liber XI · Hermeticism - 1614
Fama Fraternitatis published
The first Rosicrucian manifesto, printed at Kassel, announces a secret brotherhood founded by Christian Rosenkreuz to reform learning.
Liber XXIV · Secret Societies - 1615
Confessio Fraternitatis
The second Rosicrucian manifesto appears, provoking hundreds of pamphlets across Europe for and against the invisible order.
Liber XXIV · Secret Societies - 1616
The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreuz
Johann Valentin Andreae's alchemical allegory narrates a seven-day royal wedding, completing the Rosicrucian trilogy.
Liber XXIV · Secret Societies - 1617
Maier's Atalanta fugiens
Michael Maier's alchemical emblem book pairs fifty engravings with epigrams and musical fugues.
Liber I · Alchemy - 1617–21
Fludd's History of the Two Worlds
Robert Fludd's Utriusque cosmi historia maps macrocosm and microcosm in elaborate engravings and defends the Rosicrucians.
Liber XI · Hermeticism - 1624
Death of Jacob Boehme
Boehme dies in Görlitz; his writings inspire Pietists, English Behmenists, Swedenborgians and later German Idealists.
Liber IX · Gnosticism - c. 1626–31
Peak of German witch burnings
Prince-bishoprics such as Würzburg and Bamberg execute hundreds in the deadliest phase of the European witch hunts.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1631
Spee's Cautio criminalis
The Jesuit Friedrich Spee anonymously exposes the use of torture in witch trials, arguing it produces false confessions.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1636
Venetian Inquisition tries magicians
Leonardo Longo and Francesco Viola are tried in Venice for possessing a Clavicula, typical of the Inquisition's late focus on learned magic.
Liber XXVII · Solomonic Magic - 1645–47
Matthew Hopkins, 'Witchfinder General'
During the English Civil War, Hopkins and John Stearne drive a hunt in East Anglia that sends around a hundred people to the gallows.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca - 1646
Elias Ashmole made a Freemason
The antiquary and astrologer records his initiation at Warrington, one of the earliest documented admissions of a gentleman into a lodge.
Liber XXIV · Secret Societies - 1647
Lilly's Christian Astrology
William Lilly publishes the first comprehensive astrology textbook in English, centred on horary questions.
Liber VII · Divination - c. mid-17th century
The Lemegeton compiled
The five-part 'Lesser Key of Solomon'—Goetia, Theurgia-Goetia, Pauline Art, Almadel and Ars Notoria—takes form in English manuscripts.
Liber XXVII · Solomonic Magic - 1651
Agrippa in English
'J.F.' publishes the first English translation of the Three Books of Occult Philosophy.
Liber XII · High Magick - 1652
Vaughan's Rosicrucian translation and Ashmole's Theatrum
Thomas Vaughan englishes the Fama and Confessio, and Ashmole publishes his Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum of English alchemical verse.
Liber XXIV · Secret Societies - 1652–54
Kircher's Oedipus Aegyptiacus
Athanasius Kircher's encyclopedic attempt to decode hieroglyphs includes a sefirotic Tree of Life whose layout later shaped occult Kabbalah.
Liber XXIX · Symbols - 1655
Robert Turner translates the Heptameron
Turner's English Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, with the Heptameron and other texts, brings practical conjuration to English readers.
Liber XII · High Magick - 1659
Casaubon publishes Dee's angel diaries
Meric Casaubon's A True and Faithful Relation prints Dee's spirit records to discredit him, unwittingly preserving the Enochian material.
Liber XII · High Magick - 1665
Sabbatai Zevi proclaimed messiah
Encouraged by the prophet Nathan of Gaza, the Smyrna kabbalist is hailed as messiah, igniting enthusiasm across the Jewish world.
Liber XIX · Kabbalah - 1666
Sabbatai Zevi converts to Islam
Before the Ottoman sultan, Sabbatai accepts Islam; a believing minority reads the apostasy as a mystical descent into impurity.
Liber XIX · Kabbalah - 1677–78
Kabbala Denudata, volume one
Christian Knorr von Rosenroth publishes Latin translations of Zoharic and Lurianic texts, the main source of Kabbalah for later occultists.
Liber XIX · Kabbalah - 1692
Salem witch trials
Accusations in Massachusetts lead to nineteen hangings and one man pressed to death; Elias Ashmole dies in London the same year.
Liber XXXIV · Witchcraft & Wicca