The Dictionary of Demons, page 60
Toxai: A demon whose name is taken to mean “the toxic one.” In the Mathers edition of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, Toxai is listed among the demons governed by infernal ruler Astaroth. A variant of this demon’s name is Texai. See also ASTAROTH, MATHERS.
Tracatat: A minister of the demon Canibores. According to Driscoll’s translation of the Sworn Book, Tracatat holds sway over passion and voluptuousness in both men and women. He can heighten pleasure and summon luxury items like costly fabric and perfumes. When he manifests, this demon assumes a body that shines like a star. He is compared to malleable silver, and is said to have a moderate stature. He is closely related to the demon Trachathath from the Peterson translation of the Sworn Book. See also CANIBORES, SWORN BOOK, TRACHATHATH.
Trachathath: A servant of the demon Sarabocres, named as the infernal king of the planet Venus in the Peterson translation of the Sworn Book of Honorius. Trachathath has power over passion, lust, and pleasure. He is almost certainly a variation of the demon Tracatat, named in the Driscoll edition of the Sworn Book. This demon is also said to be one of four in Sarabocres’s court ruled by the east and west winds. See also SARABOCRES, SWORN BOOK, TRACATAT.
Trachi: A demon ruled by Oriens, Amaimon, Paimon, and Ariton, the four infernal princes of the cardinal directions, Trachi appears in the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. According to Mathers, his name is from a Greek word meaning “harsh” or “rude.” See also AMAIMON, ARITON, MATHERS, ORIENS, PAIMON.
Transidium: According to the Clavicula Salomonis, this demon wields power over invisibility. Transidium is one of several demons who answer to the demonic master of invisibility, Almiras, and his infernal minister, Cheros. This demon is also mentioned in connection with invisibility in the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. See also ALMIRAS, CHEROS, CLAVICULA SALOMONIS, MATHERS.
Trapisi: A demon whose name may come from a Greek root meaning “turning,” Trapisi is governed by the four demonic princes of the cardinal directions. He is named in Mathers’s translation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. See also AMAIMON, ARITON, MATHERS, ORIENS, PAIMON.
Treatise on Angel Magic: A manuscript in the collection of the British Library filed under the designation Harley MS 6482. It is one of several manuscripts in this collection produced by the same individual. Written at the end of the seventeenth century, the Treatise on Angel Magic deals mainly with methods for summoning angels, although it contains the names and descriptions of both demons and fallen angels as well. It bears some techniques in common with the Enochian magick of Dr. John Dee, and it includes a set of seven magickal squares specifically described as the Tables of Enoch. The work is attributed to a scholar by the name of Dr. Rudd, who is thought by writers like Francis Yates to be the individual known as Thomas Rudd. In 1651, this Rudd published an edition of the Euclidean Mathematical Preface, originally written by Dr. John Dee, establishing a connection between his work and the writings of Dr. Dee. The Harley manuscripts are not Rudd’s originals but are instead copies made by one Peter Smart. Occultist Adam McLean believes that the Rudd manuscripts were never meant for public consumption. Instead, he suggests that they were copies produced for private use or for the use of a small circle of practitioners working closely with Dr. Rudd. See also RUDD.
Devilish Melodies
The Devil is a fiddle player. At least, that’s what we learn in the classic song “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” where the Devil appears to challenge a young fiddle player named Johnny. Johnny, according to the song, is “the best that ever was,” and he knows it—so the Devil takes advantage of his sin of pride, betting him a golden violin if Johnny can outplay Old Scratch. The song, covered dozens of times since it was written, is a rousing mix of story and melody. It draws upon a well-established tradition in Southern folklore where the Devil shows up to wage a bet for a boastful person’s soul.
The Devil’s connection with the violin is much older than this 1979 song by the Charlie Daniels Band, however. Around 1749, the Devil reportedly appeared to a real-life fiddle player and offered a pact. The “fiddle” player was none other than renowned Baroque violinist Guiseppe Tartini. Tartini was a composer as well as a master of the violin, and he created one of his most masterful works after a very peculiar dream.
While Tartini slept, he dreamed that the Devil appeared to him and made a pact. As part of the pact, the Devil did whatever Tartini would bid him. Curious about the Devil’s skill on his favorite instrument, Tartini handed Old Scratch his violin and asked him to play. In the dream, the Devil reportedly admitted that he could manage a few tunes and then proceeded to play a sonata that left Tartini utterly dumbfounded. In Tartini’s own words recording the event, “Imagine my surprise when I heard a sonata so unusual and so beautiful, performed with such mastery and intelligence, on a level I had never before conceived was possible!” *
Tartini was so overcome by the beauty and mastery of the Devil’s violin work in his dream that he awoke gasping for breath. He immediately took up his violin in the waking world and struggled to recreate the infernal melody of his dream. Although Tartini felt that he did not even come close, the resulting sonata is considered a masterwork. Tartini called it the Devil’s Trill (sometimes also called the Devil’s Trill Sonata), and anyone who’s attempted to play it will admit that it seems almost inhuman in its complexity.
* Mario Gómez, “The Legend of Tartini’s ‘Devil’s Trill Sonata.’ ”
Triay: The Munich Handbook identifies Triay as a demon with a particularly nasty temperament. This malignant demon, carefully conjured, can be set upon an enemy. When he attacks, the victim will be struck senseless with no hope of recovering, unless the magician wills it. He attacks the mind, causing delusions and confusing the senses. See also MUNICH HANDBOOK.
Trimasel: Skilled in the alchemical arts, the demon Trimasel is reputed to be able to teach how to craft a powder that will transform any base metal into either silver or gold. This demon is further skilled in both chemistry and sleight of hand, and he will teach either of these skills upon request. Named in Peterson’s Grimorium Verum, Trimasel, whose name can also be rendered Trimasael, is one of the four main spirits serving under the demon Satanachia. See also GRIMORIUM VERUM, SATANACHIA.
Trinitas: A demon connected with Monday, Trinitas is named in the Grimoire of Pope Honorius. His name may be derived from the word trinity and is related to the Latin word for “three.” See also GRIMOIRE OF POPE HONORIUS.
Trisaga: A servitor of the demon-kings Amaimon and Ariton. In his translation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, Mathers relates the name of this demon to “three” and “triads.” In other versions of the Abramelin material, the name of this demon appears as Trisacha. See also AMAIMON, ARITON, MATHERS.
Trithemius, Johannes: A German cryptographer and occultist who lived between 1462 and 1516. Born Johann Heidenberg, he was elected abbot of the Benedictine abbey of Sponheim in 1483 at the age of twenty-one. He turned the abbey into a center of learning, significantly increasing the collection of books in its library. However, rumors of his involvement in the occult abounded, ultimately forcing him to resign in 1506. On the recommendation of the Bishop of Würzburg, he became the abbot of Saint James’s Abbey and served there until the end of his life.
His most famous work is the Steganographia, a book written around 1499 and posthumously published in 1606. On the surface, it seems to be a book on magick and occultism, and its first chapter includes a list of spirits nearly identical to that outlined in the Ars Theurgia. Steganographia, however, is a word coined by Trithemius from Greek roots meaning “concealed writing.” Later studies of this book revealed it to contain hidden material on cryptography and steganography, the art of concealing hidden messages beneath innocuous or misleading cover text. Trithemius’s choice of cover text was anything but innocuous, however. The choice of concealing his hidden messages in a work on demons was a curious one, especially in a time when interest in such subjects could earn censure and worse from the church. Despite this, there is some debate among modern scholars as to whether or not Trithemius believed in the spiritual and demonic magick put forth in the Steganographia.
Although it may be hard to posthumously prove that he was a practicing magician, it is impossible to deny his long-standing interest in occult topics. One of his other books, the Antipalus Maleficiorum, written in 1508, contains a catalogue of necromantic books that remains one of the most complete resources on Renaissance magick to this day. In addition to inventing the art and science of steganography, Trithemius numbered occultists Paracelsus and Agrippa among his students. It was at Trithemius’s suggestion that Agrippa held off on the publication of his Three Books of Occult Philosophy for nearly two decades after the work was first produced. See also AGRIPPA, STEGANOGRAPHIA.
True Keys of Solomon: A text kept in the British Museum under the designation of Lansdowne 1202, with the title Les Vrais Clavicules du Roi Salomon par Armadel. Lansdowne 1202 contains three books of Solomonic material. The first two were sourced by Mathers in his 1898 translation of the Clavicula Salomonis. The third section, referenced in this work as Les Vrais Clavicules, was rejected by Mathers on the grounds that the Key of Solomon is traditionally comprised only of two books. Additionally, he felt that this third book bore too much in common with a completely different work known as the Grimorium Verum. Joseph Peterson, a modern occult scholar, agrees that Les Vrais Clavicules shares material in common with the Grimorium Verum. He includes a translation of the Clavicules at the end of his own edition of the Grimorium Verum, published in 2007. The True Keys of Solomon contains a list of demons, their offices, and functions, as well as a few spells and instructions for crafting certain essential magickal tools, such as the wand. One of the most interesting details about this text is that it accounts for female practitioners of magick. In almost all other grimoires, practitioners are assumed to be male. Of course, this should come as no surprise because the grimoiric tradition is a tradition founded in the written word. In the twelfth through the sixteenth centuries, when many of the grimoires were written, few women were taught to read. The vast majority of practitioners tended to be clergy, in part because the clergy were the most widely literate class at the time. See also CLAVICULA SALOMONIS, GRIMORIUM VERUM, MATHERS.
Tudiras Hoho: A great marquis who appears as a pretty maid. He is one of very few demons with a first and a last name. He makes men wise in all the sciences and can transform a person into the guise of a bird. His rather unique name appears in the French Book of Spirits, where it is said that thirty-one legions follow his command. See also LIVRE DES ESPERITZ.
Pentagram surrounded by astrological figures. Detail from the Clavis Inferni. Image courtesy of the Wellcome Collection, London.
Tugaros: A demon in the service of Camuel, a king in the hierarchy of the east. According to the Ars Theurgia, Tugaros holds the rank of duke, although he has no ministering spirits beneath him. He is tied to the hours of the night, but he manifests during the hours of the day. When he manifests, he is courteous and beautiful to behold. See also ARS THEURGIA, CAMUEL.
Tulot: A demon ruled by the four infernal princes of the cardinal directions: Oriens, Paimon, Ariton, and Amaimon. Tulot’s name appears as part of the working focused on the Holy Guardian Angel, as described in the 1898 Mathers translation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. See also AMAIMON, ARITON, MATHERS, ORIENS, PAIMON.
Turael: A Watcher Angel named in the Book of Enoch. He is said to be one of the chiefs of these fallen angels. Compare to the angel Turiel, whose name means “rock of God.” Elsewhere in the same text, his name is spelled Turel. See also WATCHER ANGELS.
Turitel: According to Mathers, the root of this demon’s name comes from a Hebrew term meaning “rock” or “mountain.” Turitel is named in the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. According to this text, he is ruled by the infernal prince Oriens. See also MATHERS, ORIENS.
Tuveries: This mighty marquis in the hierarchy of Hell has a full thirty legions under his command. Described in the thirty-fourth spell of the fifteenth-century grimoire known as the Munich Handbook, Tuveries appears as a knight riding a black horse. When requested, he has the power to reveal all things hidden, including treasure. He further assists in all travel over bodies of water, causing distances by river or sea to be crossed with alacrity. He will also teach trivium to the magician. This skill may be more important than it seems at first glance. In the modern age, trivia has come to mean information of little consequence. However, in the days of the Munich Handbook, trivium might well refer to the secrets of the crossroads, otherwise known as the tri-via. This was a juncture of three roads, sacred to the goddess Hecate, thought to be a patroness of witches. By the fifteenth century, Hecate had come to be viewed as a dark goddess indeed, and so Tuveries may have it within his power to teach the magician all the secrets of the black arts. See also MUNICH HANDBOOK.
Tygra: A demon attributed with the rank of senator, he is one of seven who serve the great emperor Tantavalerion. In the Book of Oberon, Tantavalerion and his seven senators are called upon to compel other spirits to appear, as well as to keep them docile and obedient. See also ASMOO, BOELL, BOOK OF OBERON, DANALL, ORYMELL, PASCARY, SALARICA, TANTAVALERION.
Tyros: A demon named in the Munich Handbook. Tyros has power to assist with divination. He is called upon in a spell connected with the art of scrying. See also MUNICH HANDBOOK.
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Ubarin: According to the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, Ubarin is a demonic servitor of the arch-fiend Magoth. In the Mathers translation of this work, Ubarin is said to also serve the demon Kore. Occultist Mathers suggests that this demon’s name means “insult” or “outrage.” Ubarin is spelled Ubarim in other versions of the Abramelin material. See also KORE, MAGOTH, MATHERS.
Udaman: A demonic servitor of both Astaroth and Asmodeus, Udaman appears in the 1898 Mathers translation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. The name of this demon may be derived from a Greek word, eudaimon, meaning “good demon.” See also ASTAROTH, ASMODEUS, MATHERS.
Udiel: One of several demons ruled by the infernal king Malgaras, Udiel holds the rank of chief duke. He is connected with the region of the west and he only serves his demonic master during the hours of the day. The Ars Theurgia describes Udiel as having thirty lesser spirits at his command. See also ARS THEURGIA, MALGARAS.
Ugales: One of several demons who answer to Astaroth and Asmodeus, Ugales is named in the 1898 translation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage by occultist S. L. MacGregor Mathers. In the other copies of this work, the name of this demon is spelled Ugalis. See also ASTAROTH, ASMODEUS.
Ugirpen: A demon commanded by the infernal ruler Astaroth, Ugirpen appears in the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. He is invoked along with all the other demonic servitors of Astaroth as part of the Holy Guardian Angel rite. See also ASTAROTH, MATHERS.
Urbaniel: The fifteenth duke serving beneath the infernal prince Icosiel, Urbaniel is reportedly drawn to the interior of homes. According to the Ars Theurgia, he belongs to the last portion of time if the day is divided into fifteen parts. He may only make an appearance during these specific hours and minutes each day. When he appears, he is likely to be accompanied by at least a few of the two thousand two hundred lesser spirits said to minister to him. His name is likely derived from the Latin word urbanus, meaning “city.” See also ARS THEURGIA, ICOSIEL.
Uriel: In the Ars Theurgia, Uriel makes an appearance as one of the so-called “wandering princes.” In this capacity he is said to have ten chief dukes and one hundred lesser dukes who serve to carry out his wishes. Those of his hierarchy are described as being truculent and evil by nature. They are also said to be full of trickery, so they are always false in their dealings. Uriel’s manifest form is that of a serpent with the head of a beautiful maiden. All of the demons who serve in his court assume the same monstrous shape when they appear to mortals. Uriel also appears as a demon in Trithemius’s Steganographia.
Uriel, of course, is a name that is not typically associated with demonic entities. He is better known as one of the archangels. Uriel appears in the Book of Enoch alongside the archangels Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel. Later in the same text, seven archangels are named, and Uriel is again included among their number. He appears as the fourth of the archangels in Saint Gregory’s heavenly hierarchy as well as that composed by Pseudo-Dionysus. Uriel is also identified as an angel in the Testament of Solomon. Uriel’s name is sometimes rendered Oriel or Auriel. His name is taken to mean “Light of God” or “Fire of God.” See also ARS THEURGIA, BOOK OF ENOCH, SOLOMON.
Urigo: A name rendered Urgido in both the Wolfenbüttel and Dresden versions of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage. In Mathers’s widely read translation of this work, Urigo’s name is presented as meaning “spoiled” or “rotten.” Most of the Abramelin texts agree that Urigo is a servant of the demon Magoth. Mathers also lists him as a servant of Kore. See also KORE, MAGOTH, MATHERS.
Ursiel: One of twelve main dukes said to serve the demon-king Caspiel, Emperor of the South. Ursiel is a stubborn and churlish spirit who interacts with humanity only reluctantly. According to the Ars Theurgia, Ursiel sometimes appears alongside his master, Caspiel, but he can also be conjured independently. Although no explanation of the meaning of the demon’s name is given in the Ars Theurgia, there is a possible connection to Ursa, the bear. Ursiel reportedly has a total of two thousand two hundred and sixty lesser spirits at his command. See also ARS THEURGIA, CASPIEL.
Usiel: In the Ars Theurgia, Usiel is named as the third spirit under Amenadiel, Emperor of the West. Usiel rules the region of the northwest. He commands a total of eighty infernal dukes. Half of these serve him during the hours of the day. The other half serve during the hours of the night. Usiel and the infernal dukes in his hierarchy are most often invoked to protect valuables from theft or discovery and to reveal precious objects that have been obscured by others through enchantment. The name of this demon can also be found in the Steganographia of Trithemius, written around 1499. See also AMENADIEL, ARS THEURGIA, TRITHEMIUS.
