Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim (; ; 14 September 1486 – 18 February 1535) was a German Renaissance polymath, physician, legal scholar, soldier, knight, theologian, and occult writer.

Agrippa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy published in 1533 drew heavily upon Kabbalah, Hermeticism, and Neoplatonism. His book was widely influential among esotericists of the early modern period, and was condemned as heretical by the inquisitor of Cologne.

Early life and education

Agrippa was born in Nettesheim, near Cologne, on 14 September 1486, to a family of middle nobility. In letters later in life he wrote that members of his family had been in the service of the House of Habsburg, On the record of his matriculation at the University of Cologne in 1499, he is listed simply as a citizen of Cologne, and his father's name is recorded as Henricus de Nettesheym. Agrippa studied at the university from 1499 to 1502, (age 13–16) when he received the degree of magister artium. Agrippa himself named Albert’s Speculum as one of his first occult study texts. a book pronouncing the theological and moral superiority of women. Edition with English translation, London 1652.

De occulta philosophia libri tres (Three Books Concerning Occult Philosophy, Book 1 printed Paris 1531; Books 2–3 in Cologne 1533). This summa of occult and magical thought, Agrippa's most important work in a number of respects, sought a solution to the skepticism proposed in De vanitate. In short, Agrippa argued for a synthetic vision of magic whereby the natural world combined with the celestial and the divine through Neoplatonic participation, such that ordinarily licit natural magic was in fact validated by a kind of sourced ultimately from God. By this means Agrippa proposed a magic that could resolve all epistemological problems raised by skepticism in a total validation of Christian faith.

One example of the text, not especially indicative of its broader contents, is Agrippa's analysis of herbal treatments for malaria in numeric terms:

<blockquote>Rabanus also, a famous Doctor, composed an excellent book of the vertues of numbers: But now how great vertues numbers have in nature, is manifest in the hearb which is called Cinquefoil, i.e. five leaved Grass; for this resists poysons by vertue of the number of five; also drives away divells, conduceth to expiation; and one leafe of it taken twice in a day in wine, cures the Feaver of one day: three the tertian Feaver: foure the quartane. In like manner four grains of the seed of Turnisole being drunk, cures the quartane, but three the tertian. In like manner Vervin is said to cure Feavers, being drunk in wine, if in tertians it be cut from the third joynt, in quartans from the fourth.</blockquote>

The book was a major influence on such later magical thinkers as Giordano Bruno and John Dee. The book (whose early draft, quite different from the final form, circulated in manuscript long before it was published) is often cited in discussions of Albrecht Dürer's famous engraving Melencolia I (1514).

A spurious Fourth book of occult philosophy, sometimes called Of Magical Ceremonies, has also been attributed to him; this book first appeared in Marburg in 1559 and is not believed to have been written by Agrippa.

Modern editions

De occulta philosophia libri tres

  • Book one only.
  • Book one only.
  • Purdue, Eric, ed. (2021). Three Books of Occult Philosophy. Translated by Eric Purdue. Inner Traditions. ISBN 978-1644114162.

Other works

See also

References

Notes

Citations

Works cited

Further reading

  • The only in-depth scholarly study of Agrippa's occult thought.
  • An examination of one of Agrippa's university orations, on the subject of love, from a Neoplatonic and Cabalistic perspective.
  • The first serious bio-bibliographical study.
  • Detailed examination of Agrippa's minor orations and the De vanitate by a Neo-Latin philologist.
  • Provides a scholarly summary of Agrippa's occult thoughts in the context of Hermeticism.
  • Website devoted to Agrippa's Life
  • Writings of Agrippa
  • Article in the Catholic Encyclopedia
  • Online Galleries, History of Science Collections, University of Oklahoma Libraries High resolution images of works by and/or portraits of Agrippa in .jpg and .tiff format.
  • Magische Werke – From the Harry Houdini Collection at the Library of Congress
  • De occulta philosophia – From the Collections at the Library of Congress
  • De occulta philosophia. Book 4 – From the Collections at the Library of Congress
  • Querelle | Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim Querelle.ca is a website devoted to the works of authors contributing to the pro-woman side of the querelle des femmes.
  • Objects related to Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa in the Urus : Techniques and Reception of Graphic Art in Central and Eastern Europe (15th–18th centuries) database