The Key of Hell: An Enlightenment Sorcery Manual (2014) | Hacker News Reader

The Key of Hell: An Enlightenment Sorcery Manual (2014)

theappendix.net

25 pointsbenbreen5 comments

What strikes me is ... The drawings aren't very good. They are at my sort of level (OK a bit better). But in terms of modern professional illustrators ... They are childish.

It's amazing just how far we have come.

And worth noting anyone educated enough to read and write, obsessed enough to create a whole book (even today that's an acheievement) is not going to be a well balanced thoughtful kind. Hence, manuals of black magic with badly drawn picture...

I'm out of my depth in discussions about art history, but comparing the 18th century illustrations to the 15th century painting in the same article, I find it hard to infer a notion of progress as you do. Having said that, one could well imagine that the 18th century illustrator was deliberately attempting to evoke a medieval style.

Here are some links picked up from quick Google searches that might provide stylistic comparisons:

18th century - http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/06/09/charlie-charli... 14th century - http://io9.com/bizarre-and-vulgar-illustrations-from-illumin...

It's also a manuscript[1], presumably written by the author, who doesn't have particularly good handwriting. I'm guessing the illustrations were drawn by the author as he was writing.

There is no real comparison with professional illustration; a professional illustration would likely have been an engraving, and would certainly have been much better. Forex: [2], from 1707.

[1] http://wellcomeimages.org/indexplus/image/L0040806.html

[2] http://www.mtsu.edu/english/minorsandprograms/history_of_reb...

And, for those of you who are conspiracy theorists, the link to the Wellcome Images site, item F0002901[1], is to:

"Sanskrit Beta 1469: this image is from a Sanskrit manuscript thought to be dated 1469. This manuscript is from the genre of karmavipaka, meaning “the ripening of karma”. It begins with a salutation to the sage Dhanvantari, the traditional author of the original works on Ayurveda, one of the world’s oldest medical systems. It explains the karmic relationship with a given disaster or disease; listing various sinful acts together with a brief statement of the alleged consequences that follow. For example; killing a cow will cause the killer to go to hell and having sex with a priest’s wife, the wife of another, a widow, or a prostitute, may lead to diseases such as ring-leprosy, bloody bile, or excessive urination. (?)"

which has nothing to do with Pseudo-Cyprianus.

(Just kidding. If you search for "Cyprianus", you'll find the illustrations from the article such as L0036628[2] as well as some text pages. Apparently the author just cut-n-pasted the link from the address bar after initially going to F0002901 and searching---the site doesn't update the address.)

[1] http://wellcomeimages.org/indexplus/image/F0002901.html

[2] http://wellcomeimages.org/indexplus/image/L0036628.html

Darn. I was hoping to learn more about e17.

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