Dictionnaire infernal, tome 1

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And then there is my favorite, Belphégor, who is associated with the deadly sin of sloth and is shown sat hunched with pinched brow, straining atop a toilet, holding his tail from harm’s way, trying to take a shit. Ignoring Astaroth’s claws and demon mount, his look of calculated intelligence could easily be that of one of the armchair intellectuals who dined with the philosophes of the Enlightenment Paris of Collin de Plancy’s youth. He became an ardent defender of the faith and denounced his previous writings as erroneous and dangerous. Their odd depictions of stilt-legged owl men, insect-legged frog-cat kings, and spiral-horned jesters transformed the Dictionnaire Infernal from an occult oddity that could easily have been forgotten to a frightening bestiary that is still referenced and shared today.

There is Eurynome, who has “long teeth, a frightful body full of wounds, and a fox skin for clothing. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others.While it’s true that the grand experiment of the Enlightenment was supposedly to shine the light of rationality upon the shadows of superstition, the desire to assemble all possible information is one which the grimoire and the dictionary share. Anecdotes of the nineteenth century or stories, recent anecdotes, features and little known words, singular adventures, various quotations, compilations and curious pieces, to be used for the history of the customs and the mind of the century in which we live, compared with centuries past. There is ambiguity in the book’s project itself, for what could be more modern than the dictionary, and yet what could be more antique than the knowledge collected in this particular dictionary? And then there is Ephialtes — a pug-faced, bird-winged, wild-eyed little gremlin perched atop the chest of a man, like Fuseli’s Nightmare — who Collin de Plancy describes in just a single sentence, explaining that he derives from the “Greek name for the nightmare . As depicted by the French artist Louis le Breton for his fellow countryman Jacques-Albin-Simon Collin de Plancy’s Dictionnaire infernal, Astaroth is a skinny man with reptilian claws punctuating long hands and feet, hobbled over on the back of a lupine demon sporting a massive pair of bat wings and a serpentine tail.

Although Jacques Collin de Plancy’s Dictionnaire infernal, a monumental compendium of all things diabolical, was first published in 1818 to much success, it is the fabulously illustrated final edition of 1863 which secured the book as a landmark in the study and representation of demons. By the end of 1830 he was an enthusiastic Roman Catholic, to the consternation of his former admirers. Altogether, Louis Breton executed 550 illustrations including a set of 72 depictions of demons, which were published by J. Perhaps in reaction to that affair, he added the aristocratic “de Plancy” to his otherwise plebeian name.The Dictionnaire Infernal compiled the names, ranks, attributes, and appearances of hundreds of demons, as well as their histories, legends, and influences on human affairs. The Phoenician god Ba’al, from whom Collin de Plancy’s Bael derives his name, was associated with all manner of idolatries and blasphemies, and is also the inspiration for that other lieutenant of hell, Belzebuth (or Beelzebub), the trusted advisor of Lucifer whose name appears in the records of exorcists from Loudun to Salem. Perks include receiving twice-a-year our very special themed postcard packs and getting 10% off our prints. Our small-group adventures are inspired by our Atlas of the world's most fascinating places, the stories behind them, and the people who bring them to life.