Read it and weep
CURSED BOOKS THAT DABBLE IN THE OCCULT & SATANISM LEAD TO DEATH AND DESTRUCTION
★ READ all about it… or rather don’t!
New movie Evil Dead Rise is out this week and sees sisters taking on demons that escape from an old book.
★ Don’t flick over yet as KIM CARR takes a look at some supposedly cursed, demonic or magical tomes through the ages…
Grand Grimoire
Written in 1521, this dark work contains black magic spells and instructions on how to summon Lucifer and make a deal with the Devil.
Divided into two books, the first contains the instructions to call a demon and make tools to force it to do your bidding. The second reveals how to make a diabolical pact, along with offering spells on subjects such as becoming invisible and getting someone to love you.
It is said to be kept in the secret archives of the
Vatican.
Great Omar
Dubbed the “most cursed book of all time” the poetry collection was on board the Titanic and sank with the ship. A copy was made but it was destroyed by bombings during World War II in London. Francis Sangorski, who spent twoand-a-half years creating its ornate jewelled binding, drowned on holiday while trying to rescue a woman a few weeks after the “unsinkable” ship went down.
Codex Gigas
A 13th Century tome known as The Devil’s Bible due to its unusual full-page portrait of Satan.
Legend has it a monk called Herman the Recluse in Bohemia – the modern day Czech Republic – sold his soul to the Devil after breaking his vows and being sentenced to be walled up alive.
To escape his fate he promised to pen a book on the universe in one night but, unable to do so fast enough, begged the Devil to finish it. The book is written entirely in Latin.
Voynich manuscript
This work is written in an unknown script which has been dated to the 15th Century by scholars and studied unsuccessfully by codebreakers during both World Wars. With its strange drawings of animals and plants – and lack of clues to its meaning and origins – it has been linked to being the work of aliens. Legend has it anyone who can figure it out will unleash a deadly curse.
Book of Soyga
This 16th Century book on magic, demonology and astrology includes parts written in an unknown language. One copy was owned by the Elizabethan scholar John Dee who claimed he called an angel to help him decode it but was told “only the worthy one of this book” could do so.
It vanished in 1608 when John died. Then in the 19th Century two copies were mysteriously discovitish ered at the British Library and the Bodleian Library in Oxford.
The Book of Abramelin
Penned in the 15th Century, this tells the story of a magic practitiones er who teaches his secrets to a German man called Abraham of Worms, who then passes them on
to his son. The pages are said to reveal how to contact the Devil, how to become invisible and fly, and where to find treasure under the Earth through the use of magic word squares.
The Orphan’s Story
The manuscript to this novel about a Spanish orphan seeking his fortune was supposedly “lost” for more than 400 years after being written by priest Martín de León Cárdenas in the early 1600s.
He went on to become Archbishop of Palermo but is said to have broken his vow to God. After the book was found in 1965, those who tried to translate or publish it died under mysterious circumstances, including a car accident and rare disease. It finally came out in 2018.
Written In Blood
As if the title wasn’t off-putting enough, this history book about the Caribbean island of Haiti is said to have been cursed by the widow of the country’s leader after the American authors Robert and Nancy Heinl were banished in 1963 following a political fallout between the two countries.
The manuscript was lost, stolen, then when it was finally sent to print the machine broke and the authors’ clocks all stopped. Robert had a stage collapse on him, was attacked by a dog and then died on holiday with Nancy.