Lesser-Key-Of-Solomon

INTRODUCTION
XU!
unfortunately,incomplete, makes arbitrary rearrangements in the text, has many
careless mistakes, and omits all ofBook 5. It is dated January 18, 1686.
Sloane 3825 is cataloged as Treatise on Magic and includes two articles,
]anua Magica reserata (fol. 1 ff.) and Clavicula Solomonis, The Little Key of
Solomon (fol. 100r ff.). Carefully written and legible, it is also a more complete
and internally consistent text. It has the most consistently reliable
readings of the available manuscripts as well and is interesting in that it
contains a shorter version of The Notary Art, to which has been added the
remaining portions as found in Robert Turner's translation.U
Sloane 3648, a collective codex, also contains pieces of Agrippa and
Parace1sus. This manuscript also dates from the 17th century and was apparently
used by the writer of Sloane 2731. It is carelessly written, with
poorly executed drawings.
I have followed Sloane 3825 for this edition, except for the Ars Notoria.
For the latter, the manuscripts are clearly dependent on Robert Turner's
translation. I have therefore used his 1657 printed edition as my primary
source. Variants from other manuscripts are noted in square brackets [].
Also in square brackets are the folio numbers from Sloane 3825. I have
resisted the temptation to modernize the language.
Goetia
PARTS OF THE LEMEGETON
Goetia is a Greek term more or less synonymous with magic, but with negative
connotations, as distinguished from the more elevated Theurgia ("working
of a god"). The compiler of the Lemegeton certainly recognized this
distinction. The first book, Goetia, corresponds closely with the catalog of
demons published by Johann Weyer as Pseudomonarchiadaemonum, included
as an appendix to his De Praestigiis Daemonum (1563).12Weyer referred to
his source manuscript as Liber qjJiciorum spirituum, seu Liber dictus Empto.
11 Robert Turner ofHolshot,AnNotoria: the NotoryArtofSolomon, shewing the cabalistical
key ofmagical operations, the liberal sciences, divine revelation, and the art ofmemory.
Whereunto is added an Astrological Catechism, fUlly demonstrating the art ofJudicial
Astrology ... Written originally in Latine [byApollonius, Leoultius, and others. Collected)
and now Englished by R Turner, Filomathes. (London: 1657)
12 For example, the edition published at Basileae: Ex Officina Oporiniana, 1583. Unfortunately,
Pseudomonarchia daemonum was not included in the recent edition published
as Witches, Deoils, andDoctors in the Renaissance by George Mora et al. (Tempe,
Arizona: Medieval & Renaissance texts and studies 1998). Note that Weyer discusses
Goetia and Theurgia in Book II, chapter ii.