John Dee
1527 – 1609 English mathematician, astrologer, occultist, royal adviser
Elizabeth I's astrologer and magus, who chose her coronation date, coined 'British Empire', and sought divine knowledge through Kabbalah and angelic magic.
- Religion
- An outwardly conforming Christian whose real devotion was to a Hermetic and Kabbalistic quest for divine knowledge. From 1582 he pursued 'angelic conversations' with the scryer Edward Kelley, recording a revealed angelic language now called Enochian. He drew openly on the Christian Kabbalah, believing its combinations of names and numbers could reach the mind of God.
- Affiliations
- Elizabeth I's astrological and scientific adviser. A central figure of Renaissance Hermeticism and Christian Kabbalah, later claimed (without firm evidence) as a forerunner by Rosicrucian and esoteric traditions.
John Dee was the most learned Englishman of his age and the truest bridge between science and magic. He advised Elizabeth I, and by astrology chose the date of her coronation. He assembled the largest library in England, tutored the navigators of the age, and coined the phrase 'British Empire' to argue for English expansion across the seas.
His religion was inseparable from his magic. Steeped in the Hermetic revival and the Christian Kabbalah, he believed the sefirot, sacred names, and numbers could unlock God's design, and from 1582 he and Edward Kelley recorded what they took to be dictation from angels in the Enochian tongue. In his letters to the Queen he signed himself with two circles and an elongated seven, a private cipher meaning 'for your eyes only' that later inspired the 007 of fiction. In the Armada year of 1588, when storms scattered the Spanish fleet, some at court credited the 'Protestant Wind' to Dee's art.
Connections
- associate of Elizabeth I — Her astrologer and adviser; chose her coronation date and counselled her on empire and navigation.
- associate of Francis Drake — Dee tutored and advised the Elizabethan navigators on the mathematics of exploration.
- influenced Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa — Dee owned and drew heavily on Agrippa's Occult Philosophy.
- influenced Ian Fleming — Bond's 007 descends from Dee's cipher to Elizabeth I: two circles 'for your own eyes' and an elongated seven meaning 'for your eyes only'.
- influenced Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers — Adapted Dee's Enochian magic for Golden Dawn ritual.
In the timeline
- 1558 Accession of Elizabeth I chose the coronation date by astrology
- 1558 John Dee, astrologer to Queen Elizabeth I central figure
- 1564 John Dee publishes Monas Hieroglyphica central figure
- 1577 – 1580 Drake's circumnavigation of the globe advised the navigators
- 1583 John Dee leaves England for the continent central figure
- 1588 Defeat of the Spanish Armada royal adviser; credited by some with the 'Protestant Wind'