In Tudor England, the road between arithmetic and the mystic arts is vanishingly skinny. Straddling each worlds is John Dee, an excellent scholar and astrologer whose mind grants him entry to the best circles of energy. Dee navigates the politics of the court docket by making daring prophecies, which win him royal favour. However even appropriate predictions might include a value – and laying declare to the long run is a harmful sport.
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A key supply was The Diaries of John Dee (1998), edited by Edward Fenton. A number of different books had been very helpful:
John Dee’s Conversations with Angels: Cabala, Alchemy and the Finish of Nature (1999) by Deborah Harkness
The Years of the Wizard: The Unusual Historical past & Residence Lifetime of Renaissance Magicians (2025) by Rachel Morris
The Arch-Magican of England (2011) by Glyn Parry
The Secrets and techniques of Alchemy (2012) by Lawrence M. Principe
Prophecy: Prediction, Energy and the Combat for the Future, from Historic Oracles to AI (2026) by Carissa Véliz
The Queen’s Magican: The Life and Magic of Dr Dee (2002) by Benjamin Woolley
The next web sites and articles additionally helped us inform John Dee’s story:
“Phantom being pregnant: The psychological well being situation that mimics a child’s arrival” by Rosemary Counter, Nationwide Geographic (11 September 2023)
“Some Workmen’s Wages in 1588” by Elizabethan.org
“A robotic in Prague and an elixir for Rudolph II” by Habsburger.internet
“John Dee: Elizabethan 007, scientist, magician and spy” by Historical past Further (8 October 2021)
“Nothing However Solitude” by Christopher P. Heuer, Lapham’s Quarterly (14 Might 2019)
“Arithmetic, navigation and empire” by Alex Grover, Royal Museums Greenwich (8 July 2019)
“Martin Frobisher’s North West Passage expedition 1576–78” by Royal Museums Greenwich
“The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth” by A. L. Rowse, Historical past At present (Might 1953)
“Elizabeth I’s Coronation Procession” by Tudor Instances (16 August 2019)
“John Dee and Edward Kelly: By way of a Glass Darkly” by Michael Wilding, The Brazen Head (18 October 2020)
