John Dee (13 July 1527 – December 1608 or March 1609) was an English mathematician, astronomer, teacher, astrologer, occultist, and alchemist. He was the court astronomer for, and advisor to, Elizabeth I, and spent much of his time on alchemy, divination, and Hermetic philosophy. As an antiquarian, he had one of the largest libraries in England at the time. As a political advisor, he advocated the foundation of English colonies in the New World to form a "British Empire", a term he is credited with coining. Dee eventually left Elizabeth's service and went on a quest for knowledge of the occult and supernatural. He aligned himself with several individuals who may have been charlatans, travelled through Europe, and was accused of spying for the English Crown. Upon his return to England, he found his home and library vandalised. He eventually returned to the Queen's service, but was turned away when she was succeeded by James I. He died in poverty in London, and his gravesite is unknown.
Biography
Early life Dee was born in Tower Ward, London, to Rowland Dee, of Welsh descent, and Johanna, daughter of William Wild. His surname "Dee" is an anglicisation of Welsh du (black). His grandfather was Bedo Ddu of Nant-y-groes, Pilleth, Radnorshire; John retained his connection with the locality. His father, Roland, was a mercer (cloth merchant) and gentleman courtier to Henry VIII. Dee traced descent from Rhodri the Great, 9th-century ruler of the Kingdom of Gwynedd, and constructed a pedigree accordingly. His family had arrived in London around the time of Henry Tudor's coronation as Henry VII. Dee attended Chelmsford Chantry School (now King Edward VI Grammar School, Chelmsford) from 1535 to 1542. He entered St John's College, Cambridge, in November 1542, aged 15, graduating with a BA in 1545 or early 1546. His abilities recognised, he became an original fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, upon its foundation by Henry VIII in 1546. At Trinity, he designed stage effects for a production of Aristophanes's Peace. Using pulleys and mirrors, Dee created the illusion of "the Scarabeus flying up to Jupiter's palace" in a mechanical contrivance, possibly based on rediscovered classical techniques. Dee would later claim this to be the source of his reputation as a magician. In the late 1540s and early 1550s, he travelled around Europe, studying at the Old University of Leuven (1548). He studied under Gemma Frisius and became friends with the cartographers Gerardus Mercator and Abraham Ortelius. Dee also met, worked with and learnt from other continental mathematicians, such as Federico Commandino in Italy. He returned to England with a major collection of mathematical and astronomical instruments. In 1552, he met Gerolamo Cardano in London, with whom he investigated a purported perpetual motion machine and a gem supposed to have magical properties.
Working life Rector at Upton-upon-Severn from 1553, Dee was offered a readership in mathematics at Oxford University in 1554 but declined it, citing as offensive English universities' emphasis on rhetoric and grammar (which, together with logic, formed the academic trivium) over philosophy and science (the more advanced quadrivium, composed of arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy). He was busy with writing and perhaps hoped for a better position at court. On 17 February 1554, Dee took Catholic orders in the midst of the Marian reaction. The Catholic bishop Edmund Bonner, likely already a close friend of Dee's at this point, gave him special permission to receive all of the holy orders from first tonsure to priesthood in only a single day. In 1555, Dee joined the Worshipful Company of Mercers, as his father had, through its system of patrimony. In that same year, Dee was arrested and charged with "lewd and vain practices of calculating and conjuring" because he had cast horoscopes of Mary I of England and Princess Elizabeth. The charges were raised to treason against Mary. Dee appeared in the Star Chamber and exonerated himself, but he was turned over to Bonner for religious examination. His strong, lifelong penchant for secrecy may have worsened matters. The episode was the most dramatic in a series of attacks and slanders that dogged Dee throughout his life. At some point, possibly before his charges were officially dismissed, Dee became Bonner's chaplain. In some early editions of John Foxe's Acts and Monuments, Dee, as Bonner's chaplain, is recorded debating the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist with Protestant prisoner Robert Smith (who accused Dee of Marcionism because his argument in favor of transubstantiation rested on the idea that Jesus possessed only a spiritual body) and participating in the seventh examination of John Philpot. Dee presented Queen Mary in 1556 with a visionary plan to preserve old books, manuscripts, and records and to found a national library, but it was not taken up. Instead, he expanded his personal library in Mortlake, acquiring books and manuscripts in England and on the Continent. Dee's library, a centre of learning outside the universities, became the greatest in England and attracted many scholars.
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