Once upon a time there was a magazine called “Primordial Traditions”. The best articles were bundled in a book with the same title and then Primordial Traditions became a publisher starting a series with titles such as “Northern Traditions” and “Radical Traditions”. Whereas the initiative started with a (somewhat) Traditionalistic approach, this is less so nowadays and maybe this is one of the reasons that the publisher is now called Numen Books. (Another reason could of course be that Numen Books publishes more than just the “traditions” series.) The latest publication available is “Occult Traditions”. The book has the size and the look of previous book in the series, which is nice. The cover is strangely ‘rubbery’ and the number of pages (over 300 pages) makes a nice addition to the series. With this title you might not be surprised that there is not much Traditionalism to be found here, just a reference to Evola. What is presented is more an interesting collection of scholarly writings about occultism and magic, old and new and writings of or about contemporary occultists, both investigations of rituals and rituals themselves. I do not have a large interest in contemporary occultism, but a publication like this does show the state of magic of our day. The editor has a liking for the very interesting Papyri Graecae Magicae and we go from ancient rituals from that sort of texts to a day in the lives of contemporary Wiccas. Indeed, the variety is large. A prejudice against contemporary heathens is confirmed too by the way, since the pagan scholar Christopher -Heathen Journal- Plaisance contributed two essays. Pagans do practice occultism and not just an old religion. Now Plaisance’ texts are of course scholarly and philosophical and there is nothing to suggest that he practices the ritual magic that he describes, but the link between even the serious heathens of our time and the occultists is proven once more (and me reviewing this book of course doubles that). The large number of texts in “Occult Traditions” include Icelandic magic, much medieval magic, one author claiming that medieval and Renaissance magic are linked, inspite of what the Renaissance man wanted us to believe, Wicca, sex magic, the dark side of Buddhism (main woman Gwendolyn Toynton’s article is certainly the most interesting in this volume), necromancy and much more. Not my favourite literature, but a nice alternation between my usual books. Next up is Northern Traditions II, that will be more in my line.
2012 Numen Books, isbn 0987158139