Tag Archives: Leipzig

Part of the Abramelin process is preparing the word squares – all two hundred and fifty five of them – for use in the final ritual. Which leads me to wonder: how do I know that any of the word squares are in fact correct?

This thought arose when I was going through each of them in the Book of Abramelin – when I noticed that one of the squares – the 12th square of chapter 5 in book four – to obtain servant spirits in the form of an ape – contained a mixture of six and five letter words – there was not indication how words of differing lengths were expected to fit into a square.

Enquiring on a Facebook group alerted me to the fact that one Abramelin manuscript is located in the University of Leipzig’s library, where it is called Cabala mystica Aegyptionorum et Patriarchum, das ist das Buch der wahren alten und gottlichen Magia geschrieben von Abraham den Sohn Simonis an seinen jungern Sohn Lamech – Cod. Mag. 15., i.e. “Mystical Cabala of the Egyptians and Patriarchs, which is the book of the true, ancient and Sacred Magic, written by Abraham the son of Simon, to his younger son Lamech.”

If you are able to read German, you can download the actual book here – but it is only available fifty pages at a time (there are four hundred and seventy pages in total).

Searching through the manuscript, I came to a word square which at first glance looked like the one I was after – although there were several differences in spelling, e.g. “CEHHER” instead of “Cephir” in both Dehn’ and Mathers’ version.