Friday, April 29

4:30 pm - 5:00 pm: Registration

5:00 pm - 6:00 pm: Keynote Address, 101 McCormick Hall

Professor Bruce T. Moran
Department of History, University of Nevada, Reno
Dibner Distinguished Fellow in the History of Science and Technology
"Digging up Signs": Artisans, Alchemy, and Natural Magic in the Early Modern Era

6:00 pm - 7:00 pm: Opening Reception

Saturday, April 30

All sessions will take place in 106 McCormick Hall.

8:00 - 8:45 am: Registration and Continental Breakfast

8:45 am: Opening Remarks

Professor Marina Brownlee
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
Chair, Program in Renaissance Studies

9:00 am - 10:15 am: Practical Magic: Amulets, Prophecy, and the Interpretation of Dreams

Moderator: Russ Leo, Society of Fellows, Department of English

Alexander Cummins
Department of History, University of Bristol
Amulets in 17th-Century England

Lindsay Starkey
Department of History, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Astrology and the Knowledge of God's Providence: Licit and Illicit Astrology According to John Calvin's Advertissement contre l'astrologie judiciaire (1549)

Nir Shafir
Department of History, UCLA
The Science of Dreams in 15th- and 16th-Century Ottoman Encyclopedias

10:15 am - 10:30 am: Break

10:30 am - 11:45 am: John Dee, Magus and Renaissance Man

Moderator: Professor Nigel Smith, Department of English

Anannya Dasgupta
Department of English, Rutgers University
Quaint Devices: The Magic and Mechanics of John Dee and Francis Bacon

Joe Fletcher
Department of English and Comparative Literature, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Know Thyselves: The Scrying of John Dee and Edward Kelly, and the Diaries

Rachel Gostenhofer
Department of History, Brown University
Astrological Engineering and the Problems of Situating John Dee in the Elizabethan World

11:45 am - 1:00 pm: Lunch Break, 209 Scheide Caldwell

1:00 pm - 2:15 pm: Black Magic: Necromancy and Witchcraft

Moderator: William Evans, Department of English

Harman Bhogal
Department of History, Classics and Archaeology, Birkbeck College, University of London
Knowing Demons: John Deacon, John Walker and the Re-thinking of Demonic Possession in Early Modern England

Jasmine Lellock
Department of English, University of Maryland, College Park
"And necromantic books are heavenly": Magic and Performance in Marlowe's Doctor Faustus

Jorge Abril Sánchez
Department of Romance Languages, University of Chicago
A Spanish Hammer of Witches: The Treatise of Superstitions and Sorceries (Logroño, 1529) by Fray Martín de Castañega

2:15 pm - 2:30 pm: Break

2:30 pm - 3:45 pm: Alchemy beyond the Laboratory 

Moderator: Carla Caponegro, Department of French and Italian

Angela Catalina Ghionea
Department of History, Purdue University
Alchemical Patterns and Symbols in European Thought (16th - 18th Centuries)

Nicholas Johnson
Musicology, The Ohio State University
Music and Alchemy at the Court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II

Erin O'Hare
Department of English, University of Virginia
"But how out of purpose and place do I name art": Ben Jonson, The Alchemist, and the Dramatist's Philosopher's Stone

3:45 pm - 4:00 pm: Break

4:00 pm - 5:15 pm: Magic, Natural Philosophy, and the Order of the Universe

Moderator: Elizabeth Petcu, Department of Art and Archaeology

Noam Andrews
Department of the History of Science, Harvard University
Experiencing Knowledge: The Artisanal Utopia of Bernard Palissy

Noel Putnik
Medieval Studies Department, Central European University
Discerning Spirits by Theologizing Magic: Agrippa's Homo Christianus as a Perfect Magus

Kanishk Tharoor
Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies, Columbia University
The Borders of Robert Kirk's "Secret Commonwealth"

5:15 pm: Closing Remarks

5:30 pm - 7:00 pm: Closing Reception

Please contact Scott Francis (smfranci@princeton.edu) or Jebro Lit (jlit@princeton.edu) with any questions.

This conference was made possible in part by grants from our co-sponsors: The Deparments of English, French and Italian, and History, The Program in History of Science, The Council of the Humanities, The David A. Gardner '69 Magic Project, and The Davis Center for Historical Studies.