History and Practice of Magic
From Tarotpedia
Contents |
[edit] History and Practice of Magic
[edit] Author(s)
- Christian, Paul (pseudonym of Jean Baptiste Pitois)
- Edited and revised by Ross Nichols (1969)
- Translators James Kirkup and Julian Shaw
[edit] Publication details
[edit] date of publication
- 1969
- 1952 (2 vols by The Forge Press)
- 1870
[edit] publisher
Citadel Press (1969)
[edit] Description
The History and Practice of Magic is a massive, poorly-organized hodgepodge of history, speculation and outright fabrication by occult scholar and sometime charlatan Paul Christian (aka Jean Baptiste-Pitois). In an eclectic and idiosyncratic rush of compiled sources and personal anecdote, Christian touches on topics such as talismans, divination, astrology, necromancy, witchcraft, grimoiric spells, Freemasonry and a patchy history of Magic from Ancient civilizations up to his own 19th century. This book was to have enormous influence on Tarot history by referring to the cards as "Arcana" (making Christian the source of this title) and by presenting as historical fact a completely fictional "Egyptian" ceremony involving 22 magical carvings obviously intended to evoke the Trumps... a ceremony oft-referenced by later authors seeking historical support for their own pseudo-Egyptian musings. Christian's elaborate, idiosyncratic system connecting astrology to the Tarot was to influence the Golden Dawn. More significantly, his detailed symbolism in the Trump descriptions had an impact on every occult Tarot that followed, whether Continental or Golden-Dawn-based.
In the 1820s, Christian/Pitois worked alongside Charles Nodier at the Arsenal Libary, famous for its occult holdings, and an early haunt of Eliphas Levi. The group drawn to Arsenal proved to be a driving force in French Romanticism and the French Occult Revival. The History and Practice of Magic is the product of that fertile occult environment. The book was originally published as Histoire de la magie, du monde surnaturel et de la fatalité à travers les temps et les peuples, and the modern English reissue was edited and produced (and supplemented?) by Ross Nichols, one of the founders of modern Druidry.
[edit] Author's comments
In 1833, Christian was given the task of sorting through manuscripts recovered from monasteries and claimed to be making "interesting discoveries daily."
"A NOTE ON ROSS NICHOLS WORK ON GARDNER'S WITCHCRAFT TODAY
Although the publication of The History and Practice of Magic marked the end of the collaboration between Ross and Kirkup, it was followed at once by an intensification of an even more significant literary collaboration between himself and Gerald Gardner. Ross was to help Gardner with his first work of non-fiction on witchcraft. The publisher was to be Riders perhaps thanks to Gerald Yorke, known to both Gardner and Ross who worked for Riders. It was originally titled New Light on Witchcraft, but was re-titled Witchcraft Today, and published in 1954. Iseult Weston, from Spielplatz, describes Gardner as an 'old windbag who talked endlessly'. Ross liked to talk too-my mother recalls long evenings when he and my father would talk late into the night, and when he and I met, I invariably did the listening whilst he did the talking. We can imagine both men-Ross aged 51, Gardner aged 69, spending time together, perhaps through 1953, or earlier, working on the book and talking endlessly about witches, druids, history and occultism.
In the foreword to the book, Gardner says "I wish to thank Mr Ross Nichols, editor of Christian's History and Practice of Magic, for supplying me with supplementary information and for his many useful suggestions and comments." Others have stated that Ross' contribution to the book was substantial."
