The Other Picatrix Translation

[ecosophia]

I had the chance a few days back to take a look at Dan Attrell and David Porreca's new translation of the Latin Picatrix, and was pleasantly surprised. Not, mind you, by the fact that it's a capable translation, well introduced and footnoted -- academic standards for such things are pleasantly high these days, and some of the absurd habits that used to pass unchallenged in the history of magic in previous decades have thankfully been put to rest for the time being. 

No, the surprise was that the translators were gracious enough to include the translation of the Picatrix Chris Warnock and I did in their acknowledgments, and also in a footnote, which I can't forbear quoting in full: 

"6. Though there already exists a good translation of Pingree's Latin Picatrix, translated and edited by the respectable duo John Michael Greer and Christopher Warnock, their edition appears to be directed toward practicing 'students of medieval and Renaissance magic' or 'students of the occult' rather than toward an audience of historians. See Greer and Warnock, Picatrix, 19." (Attrell and Porreca, Picatrix, 281)

Of course Attrell and Porreca are quite correct. The translation Chris and I did was specifically intended for people who want to practice the magic of the Picatrix; the introduction, notes, and even in some cases the choice of words in our translation were guided by that intention; and it's quite reasonable that historians, whose concerns are very different from those of magical practitioners, would want a translation of their own. 

For quite a long time, though, it was de rigueur in the end of the academic community that studies magic to pretend that the modern occult scene doesn't exist, or -- when that scene forced its attention on the academy in some way or another -- to look down their noses at those of us who have kept up the habit of practicing these things. I've sometimes thought of this as being akin to the legendary disdain of the physicist for the engineer, or more generally of those who study theory for those who roll their sleeves up and get into the messy realm of practice. That disdain wasn't helpful for either side, and it's good to see it giving way to something a little closer to mutual respect. 

I haven't had the chance to go through Attrell and Porreca's translation in detail yet, but it looks very capable, and I'd encourage anyone whose interest in the Picatrix focuses on history (rather than practice) to pick up a copy. Of course those who are more interested in practice already know where to find a good translation... ;-)

Comments

Books written from a skeptical viewpoint

[packshaud]

Well written books are very useful even if they are made with a skeptical viewpoint. Two great resources that come to my mind are A Lycanthropy Reader edited by Charlotte F. Otten and Religion and the Decline of Magic by Keith Thomas.

Even when they get exceedingly annoying (Missing Pieces by Joe Nickell) they can still be useful.

Sympathetic books are, of course, better. For example, Paranormal Experience and Survival of Death by Carl B. Becker.

Re: Books written from a skeptical viewpoint

[ecosophia]

I couldn't care less what a translator's viewpoint is, provided that he or she does a competent job!

Re: Books written from a skeptical viewpoint

[(Anonymous)]

I actually kind of doubt that Dan Attrell is a skeptic of the occult on a personal level, because his interviews on occult podcasts seem rather sympathetic. But this is not relevant to the work he does. Since the occult became less taboo as a subject of historical study after the 1990s, a project like a close and accurate translation of the Picatrix can now be justified and commissioned based purely on historical interest, without any pretext to having to debunk the material. So the personal views of the translator can be omitted, or deferred, as Derrida likes to say.

Of course, I agree with you that sometimes skeptics can provide useful information in the midst of a debunking.

Renaissance Astrology's Picatrix recommended edition

[packshaud]

And specifically regarding the book--I'm not interested in renaissance magic, but still--I guess you would recommend the Liber Viridis edition, because of the green magic index, right?

Re: Renaissance Astrology's Picatrix recommended edition

[ecosophia]

Depends entirely on what interests you. The green magic index is useful if you want to see what the Picatrix has to say about agriculture.

Which one for CGD?

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG

I'm glad they did have the courtesy of putting your translation in the references!

I was looking at CW's website the other day and wondered about which one of all of them would be compatible for CGD? I'm going to start with your book soon, but I'm really drawn to it because of the divination system and such.

Many Thanks!

Re: Which one for CGD?

[ecosophia]

There's basically no overlap at all between the kind of magic taught in the Picatrix and the kind of magic taught in The Celtic Golden Dawn. Both of them work, and work well, but the skills you develop for one will not help you with the other, and the knowledge you need for one will not be found in the other. It's as though one is astronomy and the other is biochemistry -- except even there, there's probably more common ground.

So if the Picatrix interests you, choose whichever one you like, have fun, and take the various warnings in the introduction and text very, very seriously.

Re: Which one for CGD?

[(Anonymous)]

"...take the various warnings in the introduction and text very, very seriously."

Seems like that should be common sense to me....

Re: Which one for CGD?

[ecosophia]

You'd think so, wouldn't you? And yet I constantly run into people who think that magic is whatever they want it to be, and they don't have to pay attention to all those stuffy rules...

There are things in the Picatrix that can kill you stone cold dead. There are other things that can mess you over in slightly more subtle but even more unpleasant ways. This is serious magic, and it should be handled with the sort of care you use with high-voltage electricity.

Re: Which one for CGD?

[(Anonymous)]

I keep running into such people, so I know it's not. It's still breathtakingly strange to me that they'd be willing to work with something but not follow the safety rules.

Picatrix

[(Anonymous)]

I noticed the new translation for sale at the Fields Book Store booth at Pantheacon. Decided I didn't need two translation of the same book when I haven't read the first. I fully expect my ultimate cause of death will be "crushed under pile of 'books to read soon'."

[robertmathiesen]

It's probably worth noting here that both of these translations of the Picatrix have been made from the Medieval Latin text, which is a translation of the Arabic original by way of a (now lost) Castillian Spanish translation that had been commissioned by King Alfonso the Wise in the middle of the 13th century. The Latin translation was first edited by my late friend and colleague, David Pingree, and was published by the Warburg Institute in London in 1986.

The original Picatrix was written in Arabic perhaps as much as 200 years earlier. Its usual title is Ghãyat al-Ḥakīm in Arabic. It is somewhat longer than the Latin translation, which was slightly reworked (censored?) by its Spanish translators.

The Arabic text, too, was edited and published by the Warburg Institute in 1933, the work of Hellmut Ritter and Martin Plessner. The same two scholars also translated this Arabic text into German, which, too, was published by the Warburg Institute in 1962.

All three of these Warburg Institute publications can be downloaded for free from the Institute's website as PDFs. (The copyrights are held by the Institute, so these are legitimate downloads.) The links to these downloads can be most conveniently found at the end of the Wikipedia article "Picatrix," but also on the website of the Institute itself.

A new English translation of the Arabic original text is being prepared by Liana Saif. It should appear fairly soon (as academics measure these things).

[ecosophia]

I'll look forward to a useful translation of the Arabic version! Chris and I translated the Latin version, partly because we know Latin and not Arabic, and partly because the Latin version's the one that Marsilio Ficino, Cornelius Agrippa, Giordano Bruno, et al. used as the basis of their own magical practice, and those figures are ancestral to the magic that Chris and I practice.

[robertmathiesen]

Indeed! For Western magic, the original Ghāyat al-Ḥakīm in Arabic is nothing more than a historical by-path.

Pingree understood that, and that was one of the reasons why he edited the Latin text from all known manuscripts, though he could also read Arabic.

Pingree was not just a world-class scholar, but an amazing polyglot. His colleagues joked among themselves that he had already learned and forgotten more dead languages than most of us could ever manage to learn. But he hadn't actually forgotten any of them, truth to tell: Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, Pali, Arabic, Syriac, Avestan, Pahlavi, and so forth ... His working academic library filled three very large rooms in his office building, with shelves up to the ceilings, and he had read almost everything on those shelves. Not bad for a man who had been blind since childhood in one eye, and who could only read with the other eye at a distance of about 6" from his face. He never would say just how seriously he took the practices of actual magicians, but always very gently deflected any conversation that came at all close to that question. He had a wonderful sense of humor, too.

And among his ancestors were about half of the people accused of witchcraft at Salem in 1692, as he happily told me once.

[ecosophia]

His work made it possible for Chris and I to get the Picatrix into the hands of today's mages; I've worked with unedited Latin originals (bleah) and having his first-rate critical edition to work from was really a pleasure.

Re: Ummm...

[ecosophia]

Nope. The internet really is a nest of thieves.

Re: Ummm...

[(Anonymous)]

Ugh. This sort of thing must seriously cut into your income. Frankly, it's a miracle there are still professional writers out there given this sort of thing.

BTW, this has convinced me not to use archive.org. I refuse to use a site that engages in this sort of behavior.

[wire_mother]

I think that Ioan Culianu was a major part of the reason that academia is no longer quite so dismissive of practicing magicians in the present day. Not only did he practice it, but also taught it to his students under the idea that the subject can't really be understood as well without knowing how it works in a practical sense.

[ecosophia]

By all accounts he was a first-rate geomancer, which raises him quite a bit in my estimation!

Warning

[(Anonymous)]

Be warned that a competent translator does not necessarily a good practitioner make. Dan got blasted pretty hard by some forces that were hard to explain during the process of this work. I might have caught some of that collateral damage is well in the process of being burned my own workings in the neighborhood. Do be aware that families and friends find out about these things and the consequences can continue to haunt the aspiring mage for years. Have some care for those in your orbit when you play with the planets!

Re: Warning

[ecosophia]

That's why I don't recommend dabbling in the Picatrix unless you've got a good solid background in at least one tradition of ceremonial magic. Chris and I got through the translation process in fine shape, but he's been doing classic astrological magic for years and I've completed the courses of study in several major magical orders, including the Golden Dawn. Of course our families and friends are well aware that we're occultists, too...