الجمعة، 4 فبراير 2011

Asmodeus and other devils

This bizarre image caught my eye at A Journey Round My Skull's tumblr.  The caption there is in French, which Google translates as:
Asmodeus (Asmodai). The manuscript which these engravings are from is called "Compendium totius rarissimum Artis Artis celeberrimos Magicae sistematisatae per hujus Magistros. Anno 1057. Noli Me Tangere "
Next I checked Wikipedia, which offered this information:
Asmodeus or Asmodai... is a king of demons mostly known from the deuterocanonical Book of Tobit... He was supposed by some Renaissance Christians to be the King of the Nine Hells. Asmodeus also is referred to as one of the seven princes of hell...

The Asmodeus of the Book of Tobit is attracted to Sarah, Raguel's daughter, and is not willing to let any husband possess her (Tobit, vi.13); hence he slays seven successive husbands on their wedding nights, thus impeding the sexual consummation of the marriages. When the young Tobias is about to marry her, Asmodeus proposes the same fate for him; but Tobias is enabled, through the counsels of his attendant angel Raphael, to render him innocuous. By placing a fish's heart and liver on red-hot cinders, Tobias produces a smoky vapor that causes the demon to flee to Egypt, where Raphael binds him (viii.2, 3).  Asmodeus would thus seem to be a demon characterized by carnal desire...
I also checked my Advanced D&D Monster Manual from 1977, which lists Asmodeus as an arch-devil of Armor Class -7 and with 199 hit points (!) and 90% magic resistance.  Formidable.

The original source for the image is Elisandre - L'Oeuvre au Noir,  which also has these images:
The caption between these two reads as follows:
This is a German book on demonology written in Latin, which was published in 1775, covering all aspects and mastery of the art of magic in the years 1057.
The second demon is not identified at the link; perhaps someone can read the script above his head.  The third guy is Beelzebub - who doesn't look particularly scary.

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