The History of Magic

A Catalogue of Sorcery, Wichcraft, and the Occult. This is a reprint of the Pantheon Books 1948 original. This reprint (1997) is by the Book-of-the-Month Club. ISBN: 0-965-084631 (Amazon's system will not accept this number but it's correct, from the book cover. Shading green dust jacket cover, blue and gray boards, 504 pp, 255 illustrations. Book is magnificently illustrated by renowned surrealist painter Kurt Seligmann, recounting the whole fascinating story of magical ideas and manifestations in the Western world and reveals the aesthetic value and influence of magic on man's creative imagination. This book crystallizes the most significant and interesting aspects of the subject since antiquity. Delving into the works of hundreds of scholars and specialists who have written on the inexhaustible subject, seligmann presents a vivid picture of the most typical religio-magical beliefs of ancient, medieval, and modern times. The 255 illustrations, selected by Seligmann with a true artist's eye, came from his own library of old books on magic and witchcraft, and from the archives of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Yale University Art Gallery, and other authoritative sources. Embodied int he text as an integral part of the narrative, they mirror the magical world view throughout the ages as no other presentation has ever done before.