Ideas like these developed over time. So around AD Gervase of Tilbury could write: They have partly the nature of human beings and partly that of angels, and when they wish they assume human form and sleep with women. Merlin is said to have been fathered by one of these, for he was born, according to the History of the Britons, of a woman but had no human father. And they say that the Antichrist will be begotten in this way, and will claim on this account to be the son of a virgin. We know that many things are seen every day relating to these phenomena.

We have actually observed that some demons 18 Among the many books on Greek mythology I chose Willis See also Brach Its female equivalent was the succubus, seeking out male victims. There were diverse theories as to whether or not the devil could impregnate women. If so, the most voiced theory was that the devil-as-a-succubus could collect semen from a man, and, changing into an incubus, could discharge it in a woman. One of the theoretical problems theologians had to deal with was the status of such offspring: Towards the end of the fifteenth century, linked to the appearance of the Malleus Maleficarum c.

People became convinced of the existence of sorcerers who had signed a pact with the devil, authors of witch studies inform. Sorcerers, it was believed, gathered in nocturnal sabbaths during which they worshipped the devil. The language of mystics like Origen, Hadewych, and Bernard of Clairvaux is clearly erotic. Jesus as bridegroom, Jerusalem as bride, embraces and kisses between bride and groom have led to a stream within mysticism 20 Gervase of Tilbury cited in Meyrone Frequently erotic in nature is also the complex relationship between the Unicorn and the Virgin Mary or a young, beautiful woman, a theme carrying a long tradition in Christian symbolism.

Albertus Magnus for instance acknowledged the creature with overwhelming horn-power as Christ, and vividly stated: There are many stories in which fairies steal human babies and swap them with their ugly own, the so called changelings;25 mutual off-spring can be illustrated by the tale of Tom Thumb;26 the importance of intimate affection by the story of the princess who had to kiss a frog. The play was performed over most of the time during a century and a half after its creation around , and again in the second half of the nineteenth century up to the 24 Albertus Magnus cited in Gotfredsen From what I had access to — some promising works remained out of reach31 — my conclusion is that most authors repeat a few facts written down first in the late seventeenth, and early eighteenth century;32 only centuries later a handful of scholars unearthed new bits and pieces.

The play inspired others to more or less similar stage performances where fairies, dryads, sylphs, half human and half nonhuman beings play a role Lambourne Doyon perhaps not so promising since Laufer in Villars Mot ; and the introductions by c. Horacio Vazquez Rial, and e.

XIX, and McKenna Mot is consulted by Nelli It brought some family details to the fore not mentioned by any one else. He was named after the bishop and count of Alet, Nicolas Pavillon. The years most often mentioned for his birth are , , and See notes 36 and See also Omont Pierre de Villars, as he is recorded in files, was arrested in early He must have continued his participation in the literary circles which Vieul-Marville characterises as 40 Doyon in Villars Complex because it is difficult to sort out the differences between the Jansenists, Pascalisants, friends of Port-Royal, and others.

To fully assess this style, and its novelty, a further study is needed: Anyway, the writing brought Villars once more in trouble, and, although not fairly acknowledged, it also brought him lasting fame. Laufer in Villars Nonetheless, within a year a reprint of Le Comte de Gabalis was issued in Amsterdam,54 and Nicolas-Pierre-Henri wrote three, probably four, more works. Actually, the latter contains two novels. See also Treske Shortly thereafter rumours have it that he was killed by gnomes 56 Laufer in Villars Reading into this subject, i.

Treske knows two other works ascribed to Villars: See also Bremond Prior to the five encounters, the reader is informed, he had corresponded with the illustrious German. But the Jewish wisdom is passed on by sheer name dropping: Due to its wittiness, almost all authors writing about Villars — I am no exception!

See among others Doyon in Villars They are long-lived but mortal creatures without a soul. Appendix 4, Frame 1. From hereon Villars builds his own story. Whereas Paracelsus emphasises the water elementals undines , and wood creatures, Villars focuses on the sylphs. The alteration makes sense when one considers that the element air had become a topic of scientific research for Blaise Pascal.


  1. .
  2. The Caravan Road (The Ingenairii Series Book 9);
  3. Canadian Policing in the 21st Century: A Frontline Officer on Challenges and Changes.
  4. .
  5. Therapeutic Problems in Pregnancy!
  6. The Beginners Bible Noah and the Ark (I Can Read! / The Beginners Bible).

Presumably Borri copied from Le Comte de Gabalis in made up letters, antedated these to , and then included the letters in La Chiave del Gabinetto which was published first in For the linkages between Villars and Paracelsians, see Laufer in Villars An exception to view Paracelsus as source of inspiration for Villars is Wagner Sylphs suit the public discourse much better than nymphs, or, for that matter, salamanders or gnomes. Then, the Count teaches, ever since Adam sinned with Eve, the elementals, in particular the sylphs and salamanders, had developed love relationships with humans.

The couples even brought forth great children. During the discussions the Count de Gabalis mentions several.

Solomos, Makis

Then separate the Elements scientifically, which is particularly easy to do with Water and Earth. It is marvellous what a magnet for attracting Nymphs, Sylphs, and Gnomes, each one of these purified Elements is. After taking the smallest possible quantity every day for some months, one sees in the air the flying Commonwealth of the Sylphs, the Nymphs come in crowds to the shores, the Guardians of the Treasures parade their riches.

Thus, without symbols, without ceremonies, without barbaric words, one becomes ruler over these Peoples. They exact no worship whatever from the Sage, whose superiority to themselves they fully recognise. Thus venerable Nature teaches her children to repair the elements by 68 Rupp Thus man recovers his natural empire, and can do all things in the Elements without the Devil, and without Black Art.

Still, Gabalis continues stoically, occasionally showing emotion through a smile or a shrug with the shoulders. But if exasperated women have been known to murder their perjured lovers, we must not wonder that these beautiful and faithful mistresses fly into a passion when they are betrayed, and all the more so since they only require men to abstain from women whose imperfections they cannot tolerate, and give us leave to love as many of their number as we please.

They prefer the interest and immortality of their companions to their personal satisfaction, and they are very glad to have the Sages give to their Republic as many immortal children as possible. It does not happen, at least not in the story, but again, it is a humorous element tying in with public knowledge of the occult. Note the word republic: The commentaries in Villars Mostly the content of the legends is not explained; the figures are used in arguments and the reader is supposed to immediately know the basic details attached to these devout men and women.

As is the case with Cardan, de Gabalis explains each and every peculiar case as if it involves elementals, not demons, not witches. Towards the end of the book Villars seems willing to go along with the uncommon teachings of the Count. But this is in words uttered to the Count; to the reader Villars talks otherwise.

The warning has been to no avail.

Over the centuries several people did come to believe the Count of Gabalis to have been a real sage. See also Laufer in Villars In their turn, those new works were read and used by others after them, and it is through this chain of reading, getting inspired, creatively making use of particular ideas and constructing innovatively fresh yet related works that Le Comte de Gabalis has evolved out of its original setting into something with an existence of its own.

The novel then was spiced up with sentences filled with astrological terminology, conjuring practices, and references to legendary and folkloristic figures involving incubi and succubi. Note also Waite Particular themes directly or indirectly hinted at by Villars, and names dropped by him, light up quite differently in works of others. Villars did the very same. Still, even though subjects in both novels are similar, the major subjects themselves are treated rather differently.

La 81 La Fontaine Not being well informed see on the gardens at Rueil Woodbridge , Scarboro The whereabouts of a god and human ultimately remain in the realm of myth; no secrets about the supernatural are revealed. Some incubi, Gervase of Tilbury believed, could love women with such passion the women experienced something then identified as a nightmare. Completely different in focus compared to the two novels of Villars and La Fontaine, is The Secret Commonwealth, a manuscript about abnormal phenomena, often dealing with super- and subterranean inhabitants witnessed in the Scottish Highlands, written by Minister Robert Kirk See also Powell For in our High-Lands, as there be many fair Ladies of this aereal order which doe often tryst with lascivious young men in the qualitie of succubi or lightsom paramours and strumpets […] so doe manie of our Highlanders as if a-strangling by the night Mare, pressed with a fearful dream, or rather possessed by one of our aerel Neighbours [ ].

They prove the intensity of diverse ideas about the reality of elementals and aereal, mythic or devilish creatures at the end of the seventeenth century, the era in which Montfaucon de Villars composed Le Comte de Gabalis. Hunter notes to this passage: The Italian natural philosopher Girolamo Cardan does indeed record the preternatural abilities of his father, Fazio , see Cardan Currently sylphs are recognized as a topos in French literature, poetry, and comedies;88 closely related are the water fairies, or undines, in German romantic literature and music;89 English literature and visual arts reveal intertwined connections between fairies, sylphs and undines.

In hindsight it even seems that over the years a reasonable amount of academics have paid attention to Villars: I could compile a much longer list than I had originally anticipated. Still, what is missing is an updated, scholarly study, one that integrates the various studies, bits and pieces loosely or strongly related to the impact of Le Comte de Gabalis in esoteric discourse. What follows is a first attempt to bring order to the relatively wide range of material, the elements discovered to answer my research question.

The main focus of the second half of the section is the way in which Le Comte de Gabalis has appeared in literature earmarked as esoteric. Through both lines works surface which must have had the interest of members of the Golden Dawn. His mock-epic The Rape of the Lock, a satirical poem of five cantos, was written in several phases. After the initial version in , the first two cantos were published in The final version appeared in , and the third, already extended to five parts, in These Machines I determined to raise on a very new and odd foundation, the Rosicrucian doctrine of Spirits.

The best account I know of them is in a French book called Le Comte de Gabalis, which both in its title and size is so like a novel, that many of the fair sex have read it for one by mistake. According to these gentlemen [the Rosicrusians], the four elements are inhabited by spirits, which they call Sylphs, Gnomes, Nymphs, and Salamanders. The Gnomes or Daemons of Earth delight in mischief; but the Sylphs, whose habitation is in the air, are the best- conditioned creatures imaginable. For they say, any mortals may enjoy the most intimate familiarities with these gentle spirits The better known one by Philip Ayres was published by B.

Whereas the novel was not written as a Rosicrucian novel — Villars did not hint at secret brotherhoods, nor did he drop the name Christian Rosenkreuz93 —, and it 91 The amount of versions of The Rape of the Lock differs. Cummings counts three; Schuchard A question lingers nonetheless: According to Edighoffer See for example Mackay Those involved or interested in Rosicrucianism would want to know what the Count of Gabalis had taught. To make sure he wins, the Baron previously had lighted an altar fire, and prayed to the gods.

The terrible crime committed on her, the rape, happens when the Baron succeeds in snipping off a lock Appendix 4, Frame 6. Much can be said and has been said about the poem. At some point Shock is equated with a husband. Villars did not say sylphs transformed in dogs or 98 See Rogers When in a new edition was planned by Francis Isaac Du Roveray , Du Roveray wrote to Henry Fuseli requesting the favour of a painting to be reproduced and incorporated in the new edition.

Her source is the English translation by A. This surprises me since the two English translations are said to be made independent from one another. The Dream of Belinda was probably painted between See also Frayling His portrayal of romantic yet sinister scenes filled with nonhuman creatures took off the visual art of fairies; due to Fuseli the nymphs and airy creatures gained a strong impetus to enter our three dimensional world. Goethe, interested in Rosicrucianism and influenced by the alchemist Georg von Welling Appendix 4, Frame 12 , is neglected for I did not see him mentioned in combination with Villars in the literature studied, nor did I locate obvious traces of Le Comte de Gabalis in his Faust.

Littérature

Except for Goethe, of whom I am not completely certain, all of these men created novels, poems or paintings that substantiate love relationships between humans and elementals. He complied too, and by intentionally envisioning sylphs in the possession of butterfly wings, he became the first to portray sylphs like fairies.

Towards the end of his life, around , Fuseli created a series of works based on Undine, a story about a love relationship between a water nymph and a knight Halsband See also Phillpotts Several engravings made by others before Stothard to illustrate The Rape of the Lock show similar puttis see figures 9, 16, in Halsband , yet, as Halsband points out, Stothard purposely went out into the field to study insect wings to equip his puttis.

He may also have read stories about sylphs from eighteenth century France that had entered the literary scene after the Count had revealed some secrets to Villars. The boy was barely ten! Through his poem Oberon , Wieland also conglomerates to Fuseli Silver And sixty-four thousand Genii, guard the Eastern Gate: And sixty-four thousand Gnomes, guard the Northern Gate: And sixty-four thousand Nymphs, guard the Western Gate: And sixty-four thousand Fairies, guard the Southern Gate.

It is Blake In an earlier passage in the same work, Blake See also Blake Serpentina is a bright green snake. By sheer coincidence Anselmus sees her on Ascension Day when she is playing with her two sisters in a tree. He immediately falls for her deep sparkling, gorgeous eyes, and crystal clear voice. About two thirds of the way into the tale, Serpentina informs Anselmus that her father belongs to the lineage of Salamanders; her mother was a green Snake. She elaborates on things happened in the past, and, as things ought to unfold in fairytales, a clue follows. If Serpentina marries a man, she and her love can return to Atlantis.

The same is possible for her sisters. After eleven chapters, Hoffmann, the narrator, is at a standstill, or so he lets the reader know. Undine, Zauberoper in drei Akten, composed by Hoffmann, had its premiere in Berlin on August 3, Probably as a result of the popularity of Undine as tale and opera, in the nineteenth century Melusine becomes an opera by Karl Freiherr von Perfall, a fairy play by Ferdinand Langer, and the overture of an unfinished opera from Mendelssohn and Bartholdi.

Besides, Wilde must have had a leaning to esoteric thought through connections with the Theosophical Society and the Golden Dawn. Wilde, his brother Willie and their mother attended meetings at the Theosophical Society, and his wife Constance briefly was a member of the Society. Haweis, whose book on dress reform Wilde admired, and, again, his wife, who was initiated in November , and left the Order a year later. If Wilde, as a writer, had an interest in such thought, and was surrounded by people who did too, he will have been familiar with either Undine or Le Comte de Gabalis or both , probably enjoyed it as a good read, and took a story line from it.

There is another line from the cluster around Fuseli leading to Theosophy and the Golden Dawn. It runs via the fifth person tied in with him — his pupil and admirer, Theodor Matthias von Holst Hoffmann, painted twice Bertalda frightened by apparitions and , scenes he took from Undine Appendix 4, Frame 8. The first Bertalda painting was purchased in by Bulwer Lytton, patron of von Holst.

These resemble the arms Fuseli invented for the elemental presenting Flora with gifts from the earth, see Appendix 4, Frame 7. A Rosicrucian novel, it is a story about an initiate named Zanoni who falls in love with Viola. A love story between a man and an elemental published in the same year as Zanoni was written by the journalist, poet, songwriter and linguist Charles Mackay , quite well read in esoteric lore as his Madness of Crowds testifies.

It is a development Silver relates to the rights and roles of women in their time.


  • .
  • The Briefing: Whats wrong with rights?.
  • .
  • Tantos tontos tópicos (Spanish Edition).
  • Hints for Apple Tree Selection and After Care (Article).
  • .

    • Bulwer Lytton was not the only one interested in art depicting elementals. Maclise, another admirer of Fuseli Wood For a summary of The Salamandrine, see Appendix 4, Frame Performed first in Paris, then London, La Sylphide initiated the romantic ballet. It brought Marie Taglioni , the dancer for whom La Sylphide was written, fame like a modern day movie- or pop star. When Taglioni retired, a series of water colours were made in her honour, works nowadays included in studies of fairy art Appendix 4, Frame 9. Naturally, due to the popularity of dramatic stories of humans in love with elementals, the theme was embroidered on in a variety of ways.

    Sylphs portrayed as guardian angels for instance, or elementals conservatively interpreted as evil creatures. Among the many novels, plays, ballets, paintings featuring elementals it is sometimes easy to trace Le Comte de Gabalis as source of deluded inspiration. When The Rape of the Lock enhanced interest in Seeber Montolieu, translated it into French.

    The slim booklet is illustrated with two engravings, and a piece of music staves entitled Romance. See also Maurevert The conviction that Le Comte de Gabalis is a Rosicrucian novel has survived until the twentieth century. Both Erika Treske, and Marsha Keith Schuchard, respectively in their and dissertations, mark and treat it as such, as do Christopher McIntosh and Pat Rogers in more recent academic works.

    The formulation suggests Le Comte de Gabalis to contain Kabbalistic secrets but the French priest only hinted upon the subject. The former considered Villars a lousy philosopher; the latter thought him to exhibit the secret language of the Rosicrucian Society Appendix 4, Frames 12 and On Borri as source for Villars, see note Waite in his younger years, refer to Villars as someone who Knows. The following elaborates on what has been derived theoretically, and what has developed practically by means of rituals.

    The latter makes sense since people had experiences with beings they believed to be elementals.


    • .
    • .
    • ?
    • !
    • Oeuvres complètes de lord Byron. Volume 6 comprenant ses mémoires publiés par Thomas Moore (French Edition)?
    • Returning Your Trust - A Brief Introduction to Islam?
    • !

      • See also note According to Paracelsus, the blood lost at certain regular periods by the female sex and the nocturnal emissions to which male celibates are subject in dream people the air with phantoms. They are those monstrous offspring of nightmare which used to be called incubi and succubi.

      When sufficiently condensed to be visible, they are as a vapour tinged by the reflection of an image; they have no personal life, but they mimic that of the magus who evokes them, as the shadow images the body. They collect above all about idiots and those immoral creatures whose isolation abandons them to irregular habits. They forgot their life in Eden, or viewed it only as a dream seen through the glass of memory.

      Over the years Waite must have adjusted his opinion since in he had written: Several pages thereafter he continues: Imaginations were fired by these astonishing fictions when the visions in the air began to be seen in the full light of day. They signified unquestionably the descent of sylphs and salamanders in search of their former masters. Voyages to the land of sylphs were talked of on all sides, as we talk at the present day of animated tables and fluidic manifestations.

      The folly took possession even of strong minds, and it was time for an intervention on part of the Church, which does not relish the supernatural being hawked in the public streets, seeing that such disclosures, by imperilling the respect due to authority and to the hierarchic chain of instruction, cannot be attributed to the spirit of order and light. The Brothers in Villars The article must have been written around Having had a very satisfying sexual relationship with a lover between and but being unmarried caused Craddock to write Heavenly Bridegrooms.

      Her experiences were presented as stemming from love making with her angelic husband named Soph: In her perspective a hierarchy of beings exists. The mere difference between the Theosophical view and that of the Roman Catholic Church, or Spiritualists, or others, she explains, is in the naming of these groups of beings. A fan of Bulwer Lytton, H. They are the creatures evolved in the four kingdoms of earth, air, fire, and water, and called by the kabalists gnomes, sylphs, salamanders, and undines. They may be termed the forces of nature, and will either operate effects as the servile agents of general law, or may be employed by the disembodied spirits — whether pure or impure — and by living adepts of magic and sorcery, to produce desired phenomenal results.

      Bjerregaard , Nizida , Olcott , Leadbeater , and D. Leadbeater discusses various classes of nature spirits, and consciously and unconsciously formed elementals. Kingsford, cited by Silver Ayton warns Frederick L. It must have stirred the interest in nature spirits. Supernatural experiences with elementals To prove the reality of elemental spirits, i. We opened the folding doors which separated the sitting [room] from the small bedroom, sat on chairs facing the wide doorway, and by a wonderful process of Maya I now suppose I saw the bedroom converted, as it were, into a cube of empty space.

      The furniture had disappeared from my view, and there appeared alternately vivid scenes of water, cloudy atmosphere, subterranean caves, and an active vulcano; each of the elements teeming with beings, and shapes, and faces, of which I caught more or less transient glimpses.

      Some of the forms were lovely, some malignant and fierce, some terrible. They would float into view as gently as bubbles on a smooth stream, or dart across the scene and disappear, or play and gambol together in flame or flood. Olcott discusses a story of an Indian family harassed by fire elementals, and how to attract them, and how to drive them away by means of ceremonial magic. Indeed, most of them punctuate the history of electroacoustic music as masterpieces full of originality and innovation.

      As they are composed at important moments of Xenakis' evolution, these works can also be analyzed to understand the various aspects of his musical, theoretical, aesthetic and interdisciplinary thought: This book stems from an international symposium organized in May by Musidanse University Paris 8 , which hosted forty researchers musicologists, composers It contains seventeen papers from the symposium and two other papers.

      It testifes to the extraordinary richness and vitality of Xenakis' studies. Quel devenir pour ces musiques dans le cadre de la globalisation? The limits of composition? La Casa Encendida, from 10th to 16th of March Recording 3 editions published in in English and held by 45 WorldCat member libraries worldwide. Tales of artists born and bred in this remote and at the time little known corner of France are intertwined with the stories of the visiting artists from Paris who were challenging and changing the face of modern art.

      Savoir(s) et connaissance - Editions Les Presses Littéraires

      Nombreux furent les jeunes gens qui ont connu son sort. Des psys en parlent. Un nouveau livre sur la chasse direz-vous! Savoir s et connaissance. TTC, frais de port non compris Frais de port offerts dans les pays suivants: The first guide for collectors - Nathalie Cortinovis. TVA incluse Frais de port offerts dans les pays suivants: Les fontaines poissonneuses de Salses - Jean-Paul Martin. TTC, frais de port offerts dans certains pays Frais de port offerts dans les pays suivants: Paroles de maquisard ou Cyprien - Jean-Paul Martin.

      Les fontaines de Perpignan - Jean-Louis Roure.