The Transformations of Magic: Illicit Learned Magic in the Later Middle Ages and Renaissance

Preface

PREFACE Manuscripts of illicit magic present considerable methodological challenges for modern historians. While they may communicate in excruciating detail their constituent operations, they simultaneously give little explicit information about their authors, scribes, and collectors. Because magic texts often claim ancient lineage, they unsurprisingly deemphasize their more modern transmitters ; good counsel would also have suggested the value of anonymity when copying an illicit work. As a result, that someone chose to transmit a magic text tells us that he thought it was worth the effort, but little more. Was the transmitter a practitioner, a kind of antiquarian, or just a slavish scribe copying the next text in a volume? Did he copy it so as to develop arguments against magic, as a kind of curiosity, or just to make money? With few exceptions, what we know about the people behind the letters has been revealed unselfconsciously or inferred from the broader historical context. And, in fact, historians of medieval magic are usually delighted just to find a new manuscript, anonymous or not. In an unusually stimulating seminar with Brian Stock at the University of Toronto, the intellectual spark that gave rise to this study was first struck. I began to wonder what could be learned about medieval magic by focusing on the manuscripts themselves: their mise-en-page, their organization, the works with which they were bound together, and how they were recorded in inventories and catalogues. I was also interested to know whether a broad survey of surviving manuscripts might reveal patterns that could help us understand the intellectual culture surrounding learned magic in the later Middle Ages and Renaissance. This gave rise to my doctoral dissertation and to much of my intellectual production since that time. As in any study of magic, I have had to move well beyond the skeletal evidence this approach provides, but the manuscript of magic and the codex that contains it have remained my intellectual rudders. In this study I do not seek to provide a comprehensive treatment of the traditions of illicit learned magic in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Instead, I follow two principal genres of magic manuscripts, identify some of the defining features of the intellectual cultures they represent, and attempt to draw some general conclusions about the history of magic. Although I believe that x preface this book reflects the spirit of my sources, the rich intellects of my colleagues in the study of this literature continually drive me to recognize the limitations of this project. I also owe each of them a tremendous debt: to Robert Mathiesen for his generosity with his research materials and stability of spirit; to Richard Kieckhefer and Charles Burnett for their sage advice; and to Sophie Page for her incisive critique, for long hours of discussion, and for thinking in ways that I do not. I owe my most significant intellectual debt to my colleague and friend Claire Fanger, who read this manuscript several times, made innumerable suggestions for its improvement, and reviewed my translations and transcriptions. If this project even approaches the high standards she maintains, I will be content . Any remaining errors are my own. I also owe thanks to many others, and the following is not an exhaustive list. This project was supported and nurtured in its early stages by Bert Hall, Joseph Goering, Kenneth Bartlett, and Andrew Hughes. The subsequent advice and expertise of Tom Cohen, Elizabeth Cohen, James Carley, Mildred Budney, Nicholas Watson, Jan Veenstra, Nicolas Weill-Parot, Julien Véronèse, Benedek Láng, Walter Klaassen, and Sharon Wright have been invaluable. Laura Mitchell, Erin Ayles, Winston Black, and Margaret Dore worked tirelessly as research assistants, and Edwin Bezina assisted with my manuscript database. Suzanne Wolk’s editorial skills contributed significantly to the quality of the volume. Finally, members of the Classical, Medieval, and Renaissance Studies Colloquium and the Faculty Research Colloquium of the History Department, both at the University of Saskatchewan, have provided important feedback. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada provided financial support in the form of a Standard Research Grant. The University of Saskatchewan also provided financial assistance in the form of research grants and production costs. The Department of History, out of its own resources, granted me a teaching release that enabled me to devote myself to research. I thank my intellectual and life partner, Sharon Wright, and my children, Jessica, Isaac, and Ahren, for their indulgence at times when they, and not this book, should have been the focus...