Lords of unclean spirits. Demonised dead kings. Seniors of the cardinal directions. Princes of Hell. The very thorns of the compass rose. The mighty spirits Oriens, Paymon, Amaymon, and Egyn (also known as Ariton) are known by may titles and have many glosses. Deliberately excised by Weyer from the spirit-lists which would later inform the Lemegeton or Lesser Key of Solomon, these Four Regents have been somewhat historically overlooked until relatively recently. Yet in our rediscoveries of the Book of the Offices of Spirits we find testament of their absolute authority; indeed the Four Regents form the very means of organising and working with the miscellany of spirits called 'goetic'. By most pre-modern practices of conjuration, calling these Four Regents was considered quite simply operatively essential to successful goetic conjuring.

In this course, the Doctor leads us through an exploration and analysis of various conjurations and methodologies for working with the Four Regents and their courts of "sub-kings" and messengers, drawn from a combination of historical evidence, grimoiric manuscript record, and a personal practice of spiritwork, divination, and experimentation. Intimate links to early modern English conceptions of the Sorcerer Saint Cyprian and his dread Black Book are further elucidated. We track the Four Kings through grimoiric texts such as the Excellent Book, Sloane 3850, the Book of the Dannel, and a variety of other nigromantic treatises.

This course furthermore includes an hour of one-to-one consultation and coaching with the instructor, designed for students to be able to go over the material, address queries and consider follow-up in a way that best supports their practice and extant pacts and projects.

Materia, methodologies, and manners of such a goetia are shared in the understanding that these Four Regents represent a significant - nay, central - component of pre-modern European traditions and techniques of conjuration and spiritwork that should be honoured by all enterprising karcists and nigromancers who engage with such spirits.

This three-part series breaks down into the following two-hour-long classes:

Session 1: Dramatis Personae
In which we introduce these four principle spirits, ‘the four spirits who are the rulers of the four regions and quarters of the world’; outlining primary grimoiric sources, and some important historiographic considerations and methodologies for exploring and operationalising such early modern demonologies.

Session 2: How You Gonna Call
In which we consider two approaches to calling, conjuring, cohering, charging, and working with the Four Kings in a range of spiritworkings: A Call to the Four Kings (from MS e Mus 173) and The Excellent Book of the Art of Magic (from Additional MS 36674).

Session 3: To The Crux Of it
In which we consider various extended practicable methodologies for working with the Four Kings: reflecting on a image magic operation; the Table of Practice from the Art of Drawing Spirits Into Crystals, Honorian invocations for working with the seven demons of the days of the week, demonological dreamwork, and calling messenger-kings from the cardinal directions, as well as offering some reflections on my personal practice working with fetish-mobile ‘chairs’ for these senior aerial spirits.

By purchasing this class, you agree that you understand that no part of the material dictated or provided throughout the duration of the course may be reproduced, distributed, or used in any other form (neither electronic nor mechanic, including photocopies and recordings), without the direct and written consent of the instructor, Dr Alexander Cummins.