#black pullet

[pretentious-art-love]

Book Reviews #16 - The Black Pullet

The Black Pullet is a kinda charming little book. Wikipedia describes it like this:

The Black Pullet (original French: La poule noire) also known in French as “la poule aux œufs d’or” (the hen that lays golden eggs) is a grimoire that proposes to teach the "science of magical talismans and rings", including the art of necromancy and Kabbalah. It is believed to have been written in the 18th century[1] by an anonymous French officer who served in Napoleon's army. The text takes the form of a narrative centering on the French officer during the Egyptian expedition led by Napoleon (referred to here as the "genius") when his unit is suddenly attacked by Arab soldiers (Bedouins). The French officer manages to escape the attack, but is the only survivor. An old Turkish man appears suddenly from the pyramids and takes the French officer into a secret apartment within one of the pyramids. He nurses him back to health whilst sharing with him the magical teachings from ancient manuscripts that escaped the "burning of Ptolemy's library".

I do like the atmosphere wrapped in history the book has. You know, a guy living in the pyramids who knows about magic talismans, that cranks up the esoteric factor to the max. The book mentions that with the power of each talisman you can do freaky magic stuff. Request spirits to serve you, make yourself loved, find treasure, find secrets, heart others thoughts, destroy things, etc. There isn't that much to the book aside that and the instructions are composed of just "recreate the talisman and have a pure heart, if you don't have a pure enough heart, it won't work!" which isn't the most immersive read ever, even more now with the slavery the narrator is part of in the book, heh.

But... I don't think that matters for this grimoire, I don't feel the writer takes the immersion factor that seriously, for them the book is just a way to show their talisman designs, which are undeniably very pretty and ornate. If you are a fan of The Mars Volta, you could probably check the book, some of their merchandise uses these talismans for their designs.

Here are some of them:

4/10

[ducissatenebrarum]

This talisman and ring will serve to transport you into whatever part of the world you judge appropriate without running any danger. Say merely these words: Raditus ☩ Polastrien ☩ Terpandu ☩ Ostrata, Pericatur ☩ Ermas. Know that the rings are of bronzed steel with the characters engraved thereon. The talismans should be made of silk cloth in the dimensions of the figures in puce satin embroidered in gold.

The talisman is from The Black Pullet (original French: La poule noire) also known in French as “la poule aux œufs d’or” (the hen that lays golden eggs) is a grimoire that proposes to teach the "science of magical talismans and rings", including the art of necromancy and Kabbalah. It is believed to have been written in the 18th century by an anonymous French officer who served in Napoleon's army. 

The text takes the form of a narrative centering on the French officer during the Egyptian expedition led by Napoleon (referred to here as the "genius") when his unit is suddenly attacked by Arab soldiers (Bedouins). The French officer manages to escape the attack, but is the only survivor. An old Turkish man appears suddenly from the pyramids and takes the French officer into a secret apartment within one of the pyramids. He nurses him back to health whilst sharing with him the magical teachings from ancient manuscripts that escaped the "burning of Ptolemy's library".

Above:  The talisman and the ring will make you invisible to all eyes, even those of the spirits. Only the Great Being could be witness to your steps and your actions. You will penetrate everywhere into the bosom of the seas, into the bowels of the earth, you can likewise survey the airs, and no action of men can be hidden from you. Say only: Benatir ☩ Cararkau ☩ Dedos ☩ Etinarmi. Know that the rings are of bronzed steel with the characters engraved thereon. The talismans should be made of silk cloth in the dimensions of the figures in yellow satin embroidered in black silk.

[skepticaloccultist]

Maggi’s Sufurino

"The Book of St Cyprian" "Jonas Sufurino", attribution.

 The history of fictional magicians is long and tawdry, often evolving out of folktales related to actual historic figures there are those who were created whole cloth for the purpose of selling books.

While we may have record of those occultists like Michael Scot, Johann Faust, and others who were in fact real people, there are some figures who defy historic documentation. St Cyprian himself is supposed to have existed in the 3rd century of the common era, but even the Catholic Church has been hard pressed to provide any hard evidence for a Cyprian of Antioch.

Jonas Sufurino seems to be a character who was created as part of the evolving Cyprian mythologies, possibly by a Spanish publisher, to give a more modern context to a supposedly ancient text.

As the story goes, Sufurino was a German monk at the Abbey of Walkenried near Mount Brocken, a location famous for its legends of witches and devils meeting there each year on Walpurgisnacht. He claims to have gotten Cyprian's book from the Devil himself after conjuring him forth.

The book we have at hand goes even deeper into the abyss of speculative authorship as we are presented with a version of the book that is said to be translated from the German of Sufurino's hand, apparently a copy/translation Sufurino made of the Hebrew original written by St Cyprian, to the Spanish that has been translated by Humberto Maggi.

That no German version of the work ever existed is more than likely, but the path of authorship is convoluted to say the least, although no credit is given for the translator who was supposed to have brought the work from German to Spanish.

Maggi's earlier translation of the "Book of St Cyprian" was drawn from a Mexican edition published in 1920. That earlier volume is a tome of a work that covers the ground of hodgepodge occult sources. Each Cyprianos seems to be tailored to the local reader's interests, culled from a list of sources nearest to hand to each publisher in question.

While Maggi's earlier Cyprian takes most of its content from the "Le Véritable Magie Noire" the Sufurino, an edition published in Spanish in Barcelona, casts an even wider net, taking from the "Grand Grimoire" and the "Black Pullet" as well. Maggi speculates, based on scholarship by Félix Castro Vincente, that the Sufurino was copied in part from earlier Portuguese editions. It does contain a series of charms that involve the torture of animals that is found in the Portuguese Cyprians, but lacks the treasure hunting aspects.

The work is a mixed bag of ceremonial magic whose roots ultimately come to us, via the hand of many editors over many years, from the Greek Magical Papyri. It contains versions of the "Key of Solomon", "The Red Dragon", "The Grand Grimoire", as well as sections on magic candles, "Chaldean and Egyptian" philters, enchantments and sorceries.

Maggi has done a splendid job bringing this work into an English translation. It is a handsome volume, beautifully bound in black (faux?) leather with metallic red stamping to the spine and a metallic red devil in the corner of the cover. The paper is a nice thicker quality of cream with a rougher tooth, giving it an old book feel. The endpapers are printed with a splendid artwork by Daniele Valeriani.

For any scholar of Cyprian literature this is a must have edition in one's collection. Nephilim Press have provided an important part of the puzzle of St Cyprian the Magician as an Iberian folk character and focal point of an evolving magical tradition that has spanned centuries.

Get yourself a copy from Nephilim Press here:

Sufurino Humberto Maggi

[jakattax]

The Black Pullet or Le Poule noire is an interesting and somewhat contradictory read to the modern magician and Grimoire collector. Interesting in that regard that the text details 20 separate magical rings and silken talismans which bestow the magician a variety of powers from “knowledge of all plants and minerals” to “works destruction, commanding the elements and Calling down storms (...)” and of course, magic to conjure (unnamed) spirits. A Grimoire no different from the Solomonic or Verum family of texts, or indeed the vast majority of the canon of classical texts, with each text offering their own metallic talismans, and rings which grant great knowledge and wisdom concerning the Occult sciences. The Black Pullet also includes a magic circle for protection, a wand (perhaps the most unique and zaniest of all Grimoire wands) and the prayers which the magician must employ before and after their work. Again these are all hallmarks of a traditional Grimoire set-up.

However the text is contradictory and perhaps controversial in the regard that while presenting itself as a magical text, complete with plates and the ‘language of the magi’ (an obscure tongue in which certain words activate the rings) it is read and formatted more akin to a short story, or a pulp fiction. The story concerns a wounded French soldier in the Napoleonic conquest for Egypt who is saved by the Old Man of the Pyranid, a Turkish mage who teaches the soldier magic and shows him the twenty rings and the wonders they perform. Now a Grimoire with a narrative is not unheard of, the Cyprian grimoires usually include biblical tales of Saint Cyprian before delivering on the magical goods, yet the rampant Egyptomania of the period cannot be separated from considering the text an ‘authentic’ Grimoire.

The discoveries being made at the time regarding Egypt utterly enchanted the European imagination, and The Black Pullet with its tales of secret vaults containing gold beneath the pyramids, a wise turbaned mage sharing arcane wisdom and spirits of the Egyptian deserts themselves would have only fuelled this exotic and mysterious notion of Egypt and its history. Indeed the Grimoire mentions that the Old Man is the last man alive who can read and understand the hieroglyphs of the pyramid, a language of magicians, a romantic ideal of a true and divine language with coincided with the discovery of the Rosetta Stone being rediscovered by French army men.

It’s a mixed book of fact and fiction, the magical and the mundane. If the text was intended to capture the imagination of the reader to dream of secret talismans and magic then it has definitely succeeded. Whether The Black Pullet is pure fantasy or workable Grimoire is unclear, in my personal view while alnowledging it as a curious text, it is without a doubt in my mind a workable text of magic, well-worth the read and study.

I myself shall be conducting experiments from it, so I’ll keep you duly informed.

[vethox]

Black Pullet: Talismans of the Sage of the Pyramids

[skepticaloccultist]

The Black Pullet

"The Black Pullet" Paul Summers Young, translator

The border between occult fiction and occult scholarship has always been a bit blurry. No less centuries ago than now. Over the history of occult publishing the need for fictional frameworks to deliver "occult truths" has been a consistent theme, a veritable genre of occult literature.

A narrative fable gives the reader context, outlines where the secrets being imparted have come from, and gives the more casual reader something sensational to follow along with besides practical lists of spirit hierarchies and complex sigils.

In the early 17th century France became a hotbed of publishing activity, giving birth to the so called "Bibliothèque bleue" publishing series. Cheaply made and printed volumes in a softbound "chapbook" style with blue coloured covers, these volumes were intended as fantastical fanfare devoured by a bourgeois readership looking for a thrill.

It is from this period of occult fiction that we find a number of mass produced "grimoires", and the beginning of the cut and paste editing of older source material that would lead to a wide selection of works that would come haphazardly to influence occult thinking through the late modern period.

Thus was born in 1700 a volume commonly known as "La poule Noire" or the Black Pullet. A narrative of occult secrets revealed, told first person by the supposed receiver of this ancient wisdom.

The Black Pullet presents itself as the first person narrative of a French soldier in Egypt as part of Napoleon's ill fated invasion. Ambushed while on a scouting mission mapping pyramids, he is the sole survivor of the attack. Left for dead and discovered by an old man with a white beard, later revealed to be Turkish.

The soldier is convalesced by the Turk within a hidden apartment inside a pyramid over some period of time, and discovers he has been abandoned with the departure of Napoleon's forces from Egypt. The Turk then reveals he is the last person who can read the hieroglyphs and is in possession of ancient occult sciences and offers to teach the soldier these mysteries.

The central theme is the making of a series of talismans that control an array of spirits and the making of a hen that procures gold for the magician. It is given a rather Paracelsian framework of gnomes/slyphs/undines/salamanders but relies heavily on concepts from the "Arbatel of Magic", published a century or so before the Black Pullet.

Black Letter Press have produced this hardbound edition of "The Black Pullet" in a beautiful deep purple cloth binding, a rather gothic black and purple design with a gold ouroboros stamp to the face. Nicely typeset and with quality paper, it makes a handsome edition.

The translation by Young is, according to his introduction, taken from three sources. Although he never cites those sources he gives us an outline of his editorial style in translating but unfortunately does not provide any substantial historic context for the work itself in the introduction.

He does offer some interesting speculation on the influence of the 17th century novel "Comte de Gabalis" (The Count of Cabala, Or Dialogs on the Secret Sciences, first published in 1670) and provides a translated snippet of the Comte at the end of the volume as proof of its influence. While true that the "Comte de Gabalis" was a widely influential occult novel at the time that the Black Pullet was originally published, beyond the common framework of "teacher reveals ancient secrets" both the "Comte de Gabalis" and the Black Pullet are widely accepted to be derivative of the Arbatel of Magic, a Paracelsian grimoire published in Switzerland in 1575, a century before the "Comte de Gabalis."

Black Letter Press continue to produce exceptionally bound and designed volumes of historic works, handsome editions for the library of any occultist. It is my hope that the scholarship surrounding these translations will continue to improve with their future editions. The Black Pullet is a wonderful volume to add to one's collection, occult enthusiast or bibliophile alike.

Get yourself a copy here:

"The Black Pullet"

[jakattax]

After a very long and delayed delivery, I’ve finally got my hands on the ring and talisman from the Black Pullet.

This particular ring “…will serve to activate as many spirits as you wish to undertake or to stop operations which would be contrary to you.”

[jakattax]

Just ordered this beauty from Treadwells of London.

If a Grimoire is a limited edition you bet I’m going to buy it.