John Dee(1527-1608).

[791]John Dee:—Mr. Ashmole hath his nativitie. Resp.—'tis in hisTheatrum Chemicum. Hee had a veryfaire cleare rosie complexion: so had the earl of Rochester, exceeding.

[792]'Johannes Dee, natus Londini, 1527, Julii 13, 4h2´P.M.'—this nativity[DO]I copied out of the learned John Dee's papers in the hands of Elias Ashmole, esq.

[793]From Elias Ashmole—the father of this John Dee was a vintner in ... London.

[794]John Dee—from Meredith Lloyd:—Talbot, marying an inheritresse of the prince of South Wales (who was descended from Howel Da, i.e. Howelus bonus: the same family from whom John Dee was descended).—Dr. Troutbec hath Raymund Lully's ... (a chymical tract) with John Dee's marginall notes.

[795]I left about 1674, with Mr. Elias Ashmole, 3 pages in folio concerning him[DP].

Memorandum:—Mr. Meredith Lloyd tells me that his father was Roland Dee[DQ], a Radnorshire gentleman[LVII.], and that he hath his pedegree, which he hath promised to lend to me. He was descended from Rees, prince of South Wales.

[LVII.]J. Dee's father was a vintner in London at the signe of ... in ...: from Elias Ashmole, esqre, who had it from his grandsonne (sonne of Arthur).

My great-grandfather, William Aubrey (LL.Dr.), and he were cosins, and intimate acquaintance. Mr. Ashmole hath letters between them, under their owne hands, viz. one of Dr. W. A. to him[796](ingeniosely and learnedly written) touching theSovraignty of the Sea, of which J. D. writt a booke which he dedicated to queen Elizabeth and desired my great grandfather's advice upon it. Dr. A.'s countrey-house was at Kew, and J. Dee lived at Mortlack, not a mile distant. I have heard my grandmother say they were often together.

Arthur Dee, M.D., his son, lived and practised at Norwich, an intimate friend of Sir Thomas Browne, M.D., who told me that Sir William Boswell, the Dutch ambassador, had all John Dee's MSS.: quaere his executors for his papers. He[797]lived then somewhere in Kent.

Memorandum:—Sir William Boswell's widowe lives at Bradburne, neer Swynoke, in Kent. Memorandum:—Mr. Hake, of the Physitians' Colledge, hath a MS. of Mr. John Dee's, which see or gett.

Quaere A. Wood for the MSS. in the Bodlean library of Doctor Gwyn, wherein[798]are severall letters between him and John Dee, and Doctor Davies, of chymistrey and of magicall secrets, which my worthy friend Mr. Meredith Lloyd hath seen and read: and he tells me that he haz been told that Dr. Barlowe gave it to the Prince of Tuscany[799].

Meredith Lloyd sayes that John Dee's printed booke of Spirits, is not above the third part of what was writt, which were in Sir Robert Cotton's library; many whereof were much perished by being buryed, and Sir Robert Cotton bought the field to digge after it.

Memorandum:—he told me of John Dee, etc., conjuring at a poole[LVIII.]in Brecknockshire, and that they found a wedge of gold; and that they were troubled and indicted as conjurers at the assizes; that a mighty storme and tempest was raysed in harvest time, the countrey people had not knowen the like.

[LVIII.]Vide Almanac, about the poole in Brecon.

His picture in a wooden cutt is at the end of Billingsley's Euclid, but Mr. Elias Ashmole hath a very good painted copie of him from his sonne Arthur. He had a very fair, clear[800]complexione (as Sir Henry Savile); a long beard as white as milke. A very handsome man.

Investigatio cinerum △

Old goodwife Faldo[DR](a natif of Mortlak in Surrey), 80+ aetatis (1672[801]), did know Dr. Dee, and told me he dyed at his howse in Mortlack, next to the howse where the tapistry hangings are made, viz. west of that howse; and that he dyed about 60+, 8 or 9 yeares since (January, 1672), and lies buried in the chancell, and had a stone(marble) upon him. Her mother tended him in his sicknesse. She told me that he did entertain the Polonian ambassador at his howse in Mortlak, and dyed not long after; and that he shewed the eclipse with a darke roome to the said ambassador[LIX.]. She beleeves that he was eightie years old when he dyed. She sayd, he kept a great many stilles goeing. That he layd the storme Sir Everard Digby. That the children dreaded him because he was accounted a conjurer. He recovered the basket of cloathes stollen, when she and his daughter (both girles) were negligent: she knew this.

[LIX.]A Brief History of Muscovia, by Mr. John Milton, Lond. 1682, pag. 100, scil. 1588. 'Dr. Giles Fletcher went ambassador from the Queen to Pheodor then emperour; whose relations, being judicious and exact, are best read entirely by themselves. This emperour, upon report of the great learning the mathematician, invited him to Mosco, with offer of two thousand pound a-yeare, and from Prince Boris one thousand markes; to have his provision from the emperor's table, to be honourably recieved, and accounted as one of the chief men in the land. All which Dee accepted not.'

He is buried (upon the matter) in the middest of the chancell, a little towards the south side. She sayd, he lies buried in the chancell between Mr. Holt and Mr. Miles, both servants to queen Elizabeth, and both have brasse inscriptions on their marble, and that there was on him a marble, but without any inscription, which marble is removed; on which old marble is signe of two or three brasse pinnes. A daughter of his (I thinke, Sarah) maried to a flax-dresser, in Southwarke: quaere nomen.

He dyed within a yeare, if not shortly, after the king of Denmark was here: vide Sir Richard Baker'sChronicleand Capt. Wharton'sAlmanac.

[802]He built the gallery in the church at Mortlak. Goody Faldo's father was the carpenter that work't it.

A stone was on his grave, which is since removed. At the upper end of the chancell then were steppes, which in Oliver's dayes were layd plaine by the minister, and then 'twas removed. The children when they played in the church would runne to Dr. Dee's grave-stone. She told me that he forewarned Q. Elizabeth of Dr. Lopez attempt against her (the Dr. bewrayed, —— himselfe).

He used to distill egge-shells, and 'twas from hencethat Ben Johnson had his hint of the alkimist, whom he meant.

He was a great peace-maker; if any of the neighbours fell out, he would never lett them alone till he had made them friends.

He was tall and slender. He wore a gowne like an artist's gowne, with hanging sleeves, and a slitt.

A mighty good man he was.

He was sent ambassador for Queen Elizabeth (shee thinkes) into Poland.

Memorandum:—his regayning of the plate for ...'s butler, who comeing from London by water with a basket of plate, mistooke another basket that was like his. Mr. J. Dee bid them goe by water such a day, and looke about, and he should see the man that had his basket, and he did so; but he would not gett the lost horses, though he was offered severall angells. He told a woman (his neighbour) that she laboured under the evill tongue of an ill neighbour (another woman), which came to her howse, who he sayd was a witch.

In J. David Rhesus'British Grammar, p. 60:—'Juxta Crucis amnem (Nant y groes), in agroMaessyuetiano, apud Cambro-brytannos, erat olim illustris quaedamNigrorumfamilia, undeJoan Du, id est,Johannesille cognomentoNiger, Londinensis, sui generis ortum traxit: vir certe ornatissimus et doctissimus, et omnium hac nostra aetate tum Philosophorum tum Mathematicorum facile princeps: monadis illius Hieroglyphicae et Propaedeumatum aphoristicorum de praestantioribus quibusdam Naturae virtutibus, aliorumque non paucorum operum insignium autor eximius. Vir praeterea ob tam multam experientiam frequenti sua in tot transmarinas regiones peregrinatione comparatam, rerum quamplurimarum et abditarum peritissimus.'

Notes.[DO]In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 36, Aubrey gives the horoscope, with astrological notes, e.g. that there is 'a reception between Saturn and Luna,' that 'Jupiter is in his exaltation and lord of the ascendant,' etc.[DP]In MS. Aubr. 7, fol. 6, Aubrey notes:—'vide the new additions in John Dee's life.' This perhaps refers to MS. Aubr. 6, foll. 36-38, as being additional to the paper which he here says he left with Ashmole.[DQ]In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 37, Aubrey gives in colours the coat, 'gules, a lion rampant within a bordure indented or,' adding the note:—'Memorandum in the scutcheon at the beginning of his preface the bordure is engrailed: I believe that is the truest, for 'twas donne with care—sed quaere.'In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 36v, he gives in trick the coat for Dee's match '1578, Febr. 5,' with Jane Fromundz, viz.:—'in the 1 and 6, gules, a lion rampant within a bordure engrailed or [Dee]; in the 2, or, a lion rampant gules [...]; in the 3, ..., a lion rampant crowned sable [ ...]; in the 4, azure, a lion rampant ... [Dun]; in the 5, argent, on 2 bends gules 6 cross crosslets or [ ...],' as the coat of John Dee; impaling 'per chevron ermines and gules, a chevron between 3 fleur de lys or' [Fromundz], for Jane Fromundz. The motto is 'A Domino factum est istud.'[DR]Aubrey's conversation with 'goodwife Faldo,' written down at the time (Oct. 22, 1672), is found in a letter to Anthony Wood, in MS. Wood F. 39, fol. 192.

[DO]In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 36, Aubrey gives the horoscope, with astrological notes, e.g. that there is 'a reception between Saturn and Luna,' that 'Jupiter is in his exaltation and lord of the ascendant,' etc.

[DP]In MS. Aubr. 7, fol. 6, Aubrey notes:—'vide the new additions in John Dee's life.' This perhaps refers to MS. Aubr. 6, foll. 36-38, as being additional to the paper which he here says he left with Ashmole.

[DQ]In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 37, Aubrey gives in colours the coat, 'gules, a lion rampant within a bordure indented or,' adding the note:—'Memorandum in the scutcheon at the beginning of his preface the bordure is engrailed: I believe that is the truest, for 'twas donne with care—sed quaere.'In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 36v, he gives in trick the coat for Dee's match '1578, Febr. 5,' with Jane Fromundz, viz.:—'in the 1 and 6, gules, a lion rampant within a bordure engrailed or [Dee]; in the 2, or, a lion rampant gules [...]; in the 3, ..., a lion rampant crowned sable [ ...]; in the 4, azure, a lion rampant ... [Dun]; in the 5, argent, on 2 bends gules 6 cross crosslets or [ ...],' as the coat of John Dee; impaling 'per chevron ermines and gules, a chevron between 3 fleur de lys or' [Fromundz], for Jane Fromundz. The motto is 'A Domino factum est istud.'

In MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 36v, he gives in trick the coat for Dee's match '1578, Febr. 5,' with Jane Fromundz, viz.:—'in the 1 and 6, gules, a lion rampant within a bordure engrailed or [Dee]; in the 2, or, a lion rampant gules [...]; in the 3, ..., a lion rampant crowned sable [ ...]; in the 4, azure, a lion rampant ... [Dun]; in the 5, argent, on 2 bends gules 6 cross crosslets or [ ...],' as the coat of John Dee; impaling 'per chevron ermines and gules, a chevron between 3 fleur de lys or' [Fromundz], for Jane Fromundz. The motto is 'A Domino factum est istud.'

[DR]Aubrey's conversation with 'goodwife Faldo,' written down at the time (Oct. 22, 1672), is found in a letter to Anthony Wood, in MS. Wood F. 39, fol. 192.

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