The Rosicrucian Enlightenment

Yates, Frances A. The Rosicrucian Enlightenment.  London : Routledge & K. Paul, 1972; repr., New York: Barnes & Noble, 1996.

9780760701171; Genre--History

Frances A. Yates’s The Rosicrucian Enlightenment presents the Rosicrucian moment as a transitional phase in European thought: an intersection of magic, religion, and early science that helped pave the way for the scientific revolution and Enlightenment ideals, even as its mystical aspirations faded into the background of mainstream intellectual history.

Yates places the Rosicrucian movement in the wider intellectual and spiritual ferment of early seventeenth-century Europe.  To Yates, the Rosicrucian manifestos—the Fama Fraternitatis, Confessio Fraternitatis, and The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz—were expressions of a yearning for the reform of religion, science, and society.  Yates argues that Rosicrucianism thrived amid the political and religious upheavals of the time, particularly around the court of the Elector Palatine, where thinkers and printers engaged in a vibrant exchange of ideas.  But all that was dashed with the start of the Thirty Years War.  While the moment was over, Yates traces the movement’s longer influence through the networks of figures such as John Dee, Robert Fludd, Michael Maier, and later intellectuals including Francis Bacon and Elias Ashmole, the establishment of the Royal Society and the Freemasons.  In short, Yates's shows how esoteric thought intersected with emerging scientific inquiry.

The royal wedding of the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of James I of England, with the Elector Palatine,  The Bohemain tragedy, John Dee and the rise of 'Christian Rosencreutz', The Rosicrucian manifestos, the chemical wedding of Christian Rosencreutz, The Palatinate publisher: Johann Theodore De Bry and the publication of the works of Robert Fludd and Michael Maier, The Rosicrucian furore in Germany, The Rosicrucian scare in France, Francis Bacon 'under the shadow of Jehova's wings', Italian liberals and Rosicrucian manifestos, The R.C. Fraternity and the Christian Unions, Comenius and the Rosicrucian rumour in Bohemia, From the invisible college to the royal society, Elias Ashmole and the Dee tradition: Isaac Newton and Rosicrucian alchemy, Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry, Hermetism; hermeticism;

Frances Yates (1899–1981) was a highly influential English Renaissance historian at the Warburg Institute in London. She was known for her groundbreaking work on Renaissance esotericism, Hermeticism, magic, and their connections to philosophy, science, theatre, and how they shaped Western thought and modern science. She was a key figure at the Warburg Institute, adopting an interdisciplinary approach to history. She was awarded an DBE by Queen Elizabeth in 1977.

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