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Strange History and Homelife of Renaissance Magicians with Rachel Morris

Please note this is NOT a ZOOM Lecture but an in person lecture, tickets include a complimentary glass of Devil’s Botany Absinthe

THE STRANGE HISTORY AND HOMELIFE OF RENAISSANCE MAGICIANS WITH RACHEL MORRIS

Join author Rachel Morris for a highly atmospheric exploration of the charismatic magicians of the Tudor and Renaissance courts and the wives and families who kept the whole magical show on the road.

All things were believable back then – wizards, alchemy, fairies, angels. This is the story of those magical times.

This event will offer a luminous deep dive into the lives of men from Dee to Kepler to Bruno, who were also scientists, astrologers, mathematicians and alchemists.

The remarkable ideas of these magical men still permeate modern culture, from Philip Pullman to C S Lewis. But what do we know of the rest of their households – the lovers, wives, mothers and daughters?

In The Years of the Wizard Rachel Morris also vividly reimagines the less documented lives of the magicians’ families and lovers whose stories have too often been overshadowed by those of the powerful men in their company.

Women supported the travelling households by packing up the libraries, feeding the assistants, entertaining the patrons and educating the children as well as archiving, documenting and collaborating on magical work. Without them, this astonishing era of discovery would have ground to an emphatic halt.

AUTHOR BIO

Former director of the museum-making company Metaphor, Rachel Morris has been part of the creation, design and delivery of some of the most exciting displays, renovations and museums of the last few decades, from the new Cast Courts at the V&A and the Ashmolean, Oxford to the Terracotta Warriors at the British Museum and Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Rachel is also the author of The Museum Makers and two novels.

Devil’s Botany is the UK’s first absinthe distillery, founded by Directors of The Last Tuesday Society’s Absinthe Parlour & Cocktail Bar. Celebrating spirit’s connection to art, literature, magic & mixology, Devil’s Botany is unleashing the future of absinthe with bold expressions for the adventurous drinkers of today.

The venue opens at 18:30. Doors will close at 19:00 to avoid disrupting the speaker. We kindly ask that all guests arrive before 19:00. Refunds are not possible for in person events with less than seven days notice in any circumstances.

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo – LIVE

Menagerie in The Museum – a Petting Zoo
The Menagerie at The Museum is Back!
Come, descend the spiral staircase and enter our world – then meet, handle and even cuddle our scaly, furry and even feathered friends. We can’t promise exactly what animals are coming though we have a strong inkling there will be ducks, there will be reptiles, there will be insects and there may be something furry!

The strange history and homelife of renaissance magicians with Rachel Morris – Zoom

The strange history and homelife of renaissance magicians with Rachel Morris

Join author Rachel Morris for a highly atmospheric exploration of the charismatic magicians of the Tudor and Renaissance courts and the wives and families who kept the whole magical show on the road.

All things were believable back then – wizards, alchemy, fairies, angels. This is the story of those magical times.

This event will offer a luminous deep dive into the lives of men from Dee to Kepler to Bruno, who were also scientists, astrologers, mathematicians and alchemists.

The remarkable ideas of these magical men still permeate modern culture, from Philip Pullman to C S Lewis. But what do we know of the rest of their households – the lovers, wives, mothers and daughters?

In The Years of the Wizard Rachel Morris also vividly reimagines the less documented lives of the magicians’ families and lovers whose stories have too often been overshadowed by those of the powerful men in their company.

Women supported the travelling households by packing up the libraries, feeding the assistants, entertaining the patrons and educating the children as well as archiving, documenting and collaborating on magical work. Without them, this astonishing era of discovery would have ground to an emphatic halt.

Speaker Bio

Former director of the museum-making company Metaphor, Rachel Morris has been part of the creation, design and delivery of some of the most exciting displays, renovations and museums of the last few decades, from the new Cast Courts at the V&A and the Ashmolean, Oxford to the Terracotta Warriors at the British Museum and Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Rachel is also the author of The Museum Makers and two novels.

Rachel Morris

don’t worry if you miss it – we will send you a recording valid for two weeks the next day

The Great Mandrake Robbery – Seed Sistas – Zoom

The Great Mandrake Robbery

Step right up for a wildly entertaining herbal caper! Join the Seed Sistas, Fi and Kaz, herbalists, witches, and botanical mischief-makers, as they uncover The Great Mandrake Robbery. Once revered as a sacred, screaming root of magic and medicine, Mandrake has been snatched from the people’s hands and locked away by modern legislation.

Through theatrixs, myth-busting, and a healthy dose of sass, the Seed Sistas tell the tale of Mandragora, from ancient tombs and Shakespearean drama to JK Rowling’s unfortunate cartoon baby. Discover how this infamous root once symbolized fertility, love, death, and transformation… and how it’s been silenced by the very systems meant to “protect” us.
Expect laughter, lore, and a dash of rebellion as the Seed SistAs revive Mandrake’s story, exposing the myths, celebrating the magic, and reclaiming the power of the plants.

Medicine. Magic. Mischief.

Speaker Bio

Mandrake is ready to rise again. Are you? Fiona Heckels and Kaz Goodweather, the Seed Sistas, are clinical herbalists, authors, and co-founders of Sensory Solutions Herbal Evolution CIC. With over 20 years’ experience, they blend herbal medicine, science, and a sprinkle of magic to reconnect people with plants. Authors of The Sensory Herbal Handbook, Poison Prescriptions , and The Sensory Herbal Oracle, their work features on BBC Sounds’ Witch and Ritually podcasts. Through their social enterprise, they offer accessible herbal education, community projects, and immersive online learning.Discover more at seedsistas.co.uk

Hosted by:

Lena Schattenherz Heide-Brennand is a Norwegian lecturer with a master degree in language, culture and literature from the University of Oslo and Linnaeus University. She has been lecturing and teaching various subjects since 1998. Her field of interest and main focus has always been topics that others have considered strange, eccentric and eerie, and she has specialised in a variety of dark subjects linked to folklore, mythology and Victorian traditions and medicine. Her students often point out her thorough knowledge about the subjects she is teaching, in addition to her charismatic appearance. She refers to herself as a performance lecturer and always gives her audience an outstanding experience.

don’t worry if you miss it – we will send you a recording valid for two weeks the next day

Works from The Witchcraft Series: history, development, and thinking behind the works – Anne Jackson – Zoom

Works from The Witchcraft Series: history, development, and thinking behind the works

In 1682, three women of Bideford, Devon were hanged for witchcraft in Exeter, England. Temperance Lloyd, Susannah Edwards and Mary Trembles are the last people known to have been executed for witchcraft in England.

Textile artist Anne Jackson, inspired by a monument to the dead women, is engaged in an art project of research & commemoration, also exploring the metaphors surrounding witchcraft, in history and contemporary culture.

She researches individual witch trials, and European witch-trial history. Her method of working is a hybrid technique of Gobelins tapestry and knotting. She aims to create works which are visually rich, with undercurrents of thought-provoking darkness.

Her talk will be about “The Witchcraft Series”, its history and development, and the thinking behind the works.www.annejackson.co.uk

Image:Anne Jackson, UK: ‘Saducismus Triumphatus: Mr. Glanvil’s Cabinet of Curiosities” (Elizabeth Stykes, Bayford, 1664),’ 2021, 167 x 144 cm from the Witchcraft Series; cotton, linen, synthetic yarns, artist’s own technique, knotted tapestry.

Bio

Anne Jackson was born in New York City, and raised in the US, before moving to Scotland where she completed a degree in Mediaeval History at St. Andrews University. During her studies she discovered a passion for textiles as an art form. She attained a Postgraduate Certificate in Constructed Textiles from Middlesex Polytechnic (University), before moving to the rural West Country of England, where she established her studio and still lives & works. She has exhibited widely across Europe, as well as in the UK, USA and Australia. Her work is held in a number of public & private collections in Europe, the USA and the UK.

Curated & Hosted by

Marguerite Johnson is a cultural historian of the ancient Mediterranean, specialising in sexuality and gender, particularly in the poetry of Sappho, Catullus, and Ovid, as well as magical traditions in Greece, Rome, and the Near East. She also researches Classical Reception Studies, with a regular focus on Australia. In addition to ancient world studies, Marguerite is interested in sexual histories in modernity as well as magic in the west more broadly, especially the practices and art of Australian witch, Rosaleen Norton. She is Honorary Professor of Classics and Ancient History at The University of Queensland, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. She lives in Mytilene on the Greek island of Lesvos.

don’t worry if you miss it – we will send you a recording valid for two weeks the next day