Author: Hockley, Frederick

OUT OF PRINT, OUT OF STOCK. This is the first ever printing of Occult Spells, a work that until now has existed only as a manuscript in a private collection. It is part of a rich legacy of carefully written manuscripts, left to the world by the Frederick Hockley (1809-1885), an occultist and Freemason with an interest in Spiritualism who in later life was associated with the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia. Hockley's peers considered him to be one of the great occult scholars of his time: in fact he was held in such high regard by one of the founders of the Golden Dawn, W. Wynn Westcott, that he posthumously claimed Hockley as one of the Order's most outstanding Adepts.

Occult Spells is a sort of esoteric "commonplace book" in which Hockley recorded material on different spells, talismans, charms and such-like that he came across in rare books and manuscripts in the course of his researches. Hockley started compiling the book at about the age of twenty, and added to it throughout his life: he still had it in his possession when he died at the age of seventy-six. The sources that he used ranged from "occult classics" such as Richard Saunders' "Physiognomie, and Chiromancie, Metoposcopie" (1671), John Heydon's "Theomagia, or the Temple of Wisdome" (1663); and Henry Cornelius Agrippa's "Three Books of Occult Philosophy" (1651), to relatively obscure works like Joseph Pettigrew's "Bibliotheca Sussexiana" (1827), and notorious grimoires like the "Petit Albert." The spells and talismans vary as much as his sources: from sublime Enochian invocations, through folk magic, and on into the darker realms of necromancy. Thus it includes charms to determine "the name of the person you will marry" (useful only to virgins!), a quite poisonous-sounding "love powder," talismans for all sorts of purposes, and even a recipe for the creation of a homunculus.

The book includes an Introduction and a typeset transcription of the text of the manuscript, prepared by Silens Manus, a scholar of Hockley's works who has studied literally dozens of his manuscripts. In addition to checking and restoring illegible words or phrases from the original sources that Hockley used, Manus has also added footnotes explaining many obscure terms, plant and deity names and such-like, as well as providing translations of most of the less common non-English phrases and passages that appear in the text. Hockley had also left a number of blank spaces in the text of the manuscript in which he planned to eventually reproduce some of the tables and diagrams in the works from which he quoted. Where possible Manus has included these in the transcription. For those who prefer to consult the manuscript exactly as Hockley wrote it, an exact photographic facsimile, on special coated paper, completes the book.

Occult Spells offers a rare insight into the occult preoccupations of this interesting figure, whose work arguably had a profound effect on the late nineteenth century "Occult Revival."

The book is a high quality sewn hardcover, Small Quarto (8 3/4 x 6 3/4 inches, approx 22.2 x 17.2cm), 208 pages. Edition limited to 500 numbered copies. Black cloth with a gilt sigil stamped on the front cover, and gilt title etc. to the spine. Color frontispiece. The first section comprises a 9 page Introduction, which is followed by a 72 page typeset transcription of the text of the grimoire, with explanatory footnotes, translations of the passages in Latin, etc. etc. The final section is a 120 page facsimile of the original manuscript of the grimoire, printed on special coated paper that gives a photograph like quality to the reproduction.