''Monas Hieroglyphica'' (or ''The Hieroglyphic Monad'') is a book by

John Dee John Dee (13 July 1527 – 1608 or 1609) was an English mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, teacher, occultist, and alchemist. He was the court astronomer for, and advisor to, Elizabeth I, and spent much of his time on alchemy, divinatio ...

, the Elizabethan

magus Magi (; singular magus ; from Latin '' magus'', cf. fa, مغ ) were priests in Zoroastrianism and the earlier religions of the western Iranians. The earliest known use of the word ''magi'' is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius th ...

and court

astrologer Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Dif ...

Elizabeth I of England Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". Eli ...

, published in Antwerp in 1564. It is an exposition of the meaning of an

esoteric Western esotericism, also known as esotericism, esoterism, and sometimes the Western mystery tradition, is a term scholars use to categorise a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas a ...

symbol A symbol is a mark, sign, or word that indicates, signifies, or is understood as representing an idea, object, or relationship. Symbols allow people to go beyond what is known or seen by creating linkages between otherwise very different co ...

that he invented. Dee glyph (fixed width)

Reception and influence

The book received little notice in English sources, though it is praised in the 1591 edition of

George Ripley George Ripley may refer to: * George Ripley (alchemist) (died 1490), English author and alchemist *George Ripley (transcendentalist) George Ripley (October 3, 1802 – July 4, 1880) was an American social reformer, Unitarian minister, and jour ...

's ''The Compound of Alchymy'' as well as in

Elias Ashmole Elias Ashmole (; 23 May 1617 – 18 May 1692) was an English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy. Ashmole supported the royalist side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II he ...

’s ''Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum'' (1652). A number of references appear in other languages, for example, Jean-Jacques Manget’s ''Bibliotheca Chemica Curiosa'' (1702) and Lazarus Zetzner’s ''Theatrum Chemicum'' (1602; 1659–1661); the latter reproduces the ''Monas Hieroglyphica'' in its entirety. Gerard Dorn's ''Judgement of the Spagiric Art of Johann Trithemius'' contains terms and phrases based on the ''Monas'', and his commentary on the ''Tractatus Aureus'' references the words ("Vulgaris, Hic, Oculus caligabit, diffidetque plurimum") accompanying a figure in the ''Monas'', saying "with the eyes of the mind, for the vulgar eye, as John Dee of London says, will here find fault and be most distrustful." Peter Forshaw suggests that it is likely that Dorn's use of the same line and circle figure in his ''Monarchia Physica or Monarchia Triadis, in Unitate'' (1577) is a reference to the figure in Dee. It is also reproduced in the English logician, mathematician, and medic Thomas Oliver’s ''De Sophismatum praestigijs cauendis admonitio'' (1604). His further comments in the work suggest that he was also familiar with Dee’s "Mathematicall Praeface" to Billingsley’s translation of ''Euclid’s Elements of Geometrie'' (1570). Giulio Cesare Capaccio refers to the ''Monas'' in his ''Delle imprese (On devices)'' (1592), paraphrasing content from the preface and mentioning the 'recondite Kabbalistic philosophy’ of 'Giovanni Dee da Londino.' Cesare della Riviera includes Dee's glyph, without attribution, in his ''Il Mondo Magico de gli Heroi'' (1605). The glyph is also reproduced in the ''Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae'' (1595; 1609) of Heinrich Khunrath, where it is used in a more

alchemical Alchemy (from Arabic: ''al-kīmiyā''; from Ancient Greek: χυμεία, ''khumeía'') is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practiced in China, India, the Muslim worl ...

context. The glyph was adopted by the

Rosicrucians Rosicrucianism is a spiritual and cultural movement that arose in Europe in the early 17th century after the publication of several texts purported to announce the existence of a hitherto unknown esoteric order to the world and made seeking its ...

and appears on a page of the Rosicrucian Manifesto, '' The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz'' (1616), beside the text of the invitation to the Royal Wedding given to Rosenkreutz who narrates the work.

Frances Yates Dame Frances Amelia Yates (28 November 1899 – 29 September 1981) was an English historian of the Renaissance, who wrote books on esoteric history. After attaining an MA in French at University College London, she began to publish her resear ...

notes that Dee's influence later "spread to

Puritanism The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. P ...

in the New World through John Winthrop Jr., an

alchemist Alchemy (from Arabic: ''al-kīmiyā''; from Ancient Greek: χυμεία, ''khumeía'') is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practiced in China, India, the Muslim world ...

and a follower of Dee; Winthrop used the 'monas' as his personal mark."

Publications

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English translations

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Notes

References

Citations

Works cited

Primary sources

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Secondary sources

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External links

Monas Hieroglyphica
at Esotericarchives.com *
Monas Hieroglyphica
at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the '' de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...

{{Authority control 1564 books Alchemical symbols Christian Kabbalah John Dee Occult books Magic symbols Religious symbols Western esotericism