NEW ARRIVALS
[CROWLEY, Aleister] The Book of the Goetia of Solomon The King, Translated Into the English Tongue By A Dead Hand (1970, Ram Importer)
[CROWLEY, Aleister] The Book of the Goetia of Solomon The King, Translated Into the English Tongue By A Dead Hand (1970, Ram Importer)
Full title: The Book of the Goetia of Solomon The King, Translated Into the English Tongue By A Dead Hand and Adorned With Divers Other Matters Germane, Delightful To The Wise. The Whole Edited, Verified, Introduced and Commented by Aleister Crowley
Translated by S.L. MacGregor Mathers
New York: Ram Importer, Inc., 1970. First Edition Thus. Hardcover. Quarto. 66 pages. Bound in black boards with elaborate gilt lettering to front. No lettering to spine. Illustrated with sigils and seals. A couple of very tiny corner bumps. Frontispiece showing sigils and seals has a printing error showing one bold “sigil” overlapping onto one of the sigil seals (see photo). This seems to have been in all copies of this Ram Importer edition. A near fine copy, issued without dust jacket. An exceedingly scarce edition!
This volume is the first near-facsimile of Crowley's original work from 1904. It predates both the 1976 Equinox Bookstore edition and the 1989 Magickal Childe edition.
The Goetia contains descriptions and evocations of 72 demons. This version is based on manuscripts from the British Museum, with additions by Crowley, including a Preliminary Invocation drawn from Goodwin's Fragment of a Graeco-Egyptian Work upon Magic, and the essay ‘The Initiated Interpretation of Ceremonial Magic.’ It is not a faithful edition of the source manuscripts but contains several innovations, including some evocations in Enochian written by Crowley. In his introduction, Crowley argues that the work of demonic evocation is merely a form of psychological self-exploration. This translation of the First Book of the “Lemegeton” was done, after careful collation and edition, from numerous MSS. in Hebrew, Latin, French and English by G.H. Fra. D.D.C.F (MacGregor Mathers), by the order of the Secret Chief of the Rosicrucian Order. According to Crowley, Mathers, as original translator and editor, “had completed his work so efficiently that very little was left for me to do beyond undertaking the business transactions connected with it, reading the proofs, and deciphering, with transliteration from the Enochian characters, the “Angelic” version of Perdurabo, from the priceless MS. entrusted to me.” The Goetia contains descriptions and evocations of 72 demons. This version is based on manuscripts from the British Museum, with additions by Crowley, including a Preliminary Invocation drawn from Goodwin's Fragment of a Graeco-Egyptian Work upon Magic, and the essay The Initiated Interpretation of Ceremonial Magic. It is not a faithful edition of the source manuscripts but contains several innovations, including some evocations in Enochian written by Crowley. In his introduction, Crowley argues that the work of demonic evocation is merely a form of psychological self-exploration.
This copy is from the collection of Thelemic author Robert C. Stein (1931 – 2024), who wrote "The Mystery of the Letters and The Tree of Life" and other works. Stein was a Professor Emeritus of Biology in the New York State University System, whose involvement in the study and practice of Thelema spanned three decades and travels in five continents.