The Seventy-Two Demons of the Ars Goetia

The seventy-two demons of the Ars Goetia are the catalogued spirits of the first and most famous book of the “Lemegeton” (Lesser Key of Solomon), a seventeenth-century grimoire compendium. Each of the seventy-two is given a name, a seal, a description of its visible appearance, a military rank, the number of legions it commands, and a specific set of powers or abilities. Together they constitute the most extensively documented spirit catalogue in the Western ceremonial tradition, and they have attracted scholarly, literary, and practical attention continuously since the text’s compilation.

The tradition presents these spirits as having once served King Solomon by virtue of his divine ring and authority, and as being accessible to subsequent operators who invoke that same authority through the prescribed ritual framework. Whether a practitioner understands the seventy-two as literal fallen angels, as structural aspects of the deep psyche, as egregores built up through centuries of magical work, or as some combination of these, the catalogue provides a detailed and workable map of a specific region of spiritual intelligence.

History and origins

The list of seventy-two spirits in the Ars Goetia is not a purely original creation. It draws heavily on Johann Weyer’s “Pseudomonarchia Daemonum” (1577), which itself drew on earlier sources. Weyer, a physician, included the spirit catalogue as an appendix to his “De Praestigiis Daemonum,” a skeptical work arguing against witchcraft persecution, and presented it with sardonic intent. The Lemegeton compiler reversed this intent, presenting the same list as a practical working manual.

Earlier Jewish sources including the “Testament of Solomon,” a Greek text from late antiquity, contain demonological lists that prefigure the Goetia’s structure, including spirits with specific abilities bound to the service of Solomon. The number seventy-two has additional significance within Jewish esoteric tradition: the “Shemhamphorasch,” or the seventy-two-lettered name of God derived from Exodus, corresponds to seventy-two divine angels. The Goetia’s seventy-two spirits may be understood as the shadow or inverse of this angelic catalogue.

The text reached wider public awareness through Aleister Crowley’s 1904 edition, “The Goetia: The Lesser Key of Solomon the King,” which included a philosophical introduction and remains the most widely read modern version.

The ranks and their significance

The Ars Goetia organizes the seventy-two spirits into a hierarchy of ranks borrowed from military and aristocratic structures. The rankings are:

Kings are the most powerful class and are typically addressed first when working within their element’s quarter. The Goetia lists four kings corresponding to the four cardinal directions. Princes and Dukes hold high authority and command large numbers of legions. Marquises are described as appearing in noble or aristocratic forms and hold significant powers. Presidents govern specific domains of knowledge, particularly science and the arts. Counts or Earls are numerous and versatile. Knights and Governors round out the hierarchy at the lower end.

The number of legions commanded by each spirit is given precisely, ranging from a few to many thousands. These figures reflect the spirit’s power and the scope of its influence rather than literal military units, though the military metaphor runs consistently through the text’s self-presentation.

Selected spirits and their abilities

The range of abilities across the seventy-two is broad. Bael, the first spirit listed and a King ruling sixty-six legions, teaches invisibility and wisdom. Agares, a Duke, returns runaways, causes earthquakes, and teaches languages. Paimon, a King, teaches arts and sciences and can bind other spirits. Marbas, a President, reveals hidden things, causes and heals diseases, and teaches mechanical arts. Buer, a President, teaches natural philosophy, logic, and the virtues of herbs, and heals all infirmities in man.

The catalogue reflects the concerns of its historical context: intelligence gathering, influence over enemies, acquisition of hidden knowledge, healing, and command over natural forces. A practitioner approaching the Goetia today should read each spirit’s entry carefully and consider whether the specific abilities described match the working’s actual purpose.

Theological and psychological frameworks

The long history of Goetic practice has generated several frameworks for understanding who or what the seventy-two spirits are. The Christian theological framework, which informs the grimoire’s original presentation, treats them as fallen angels who retain real power but are subordinate to divine authority. Within this framework, working with them is legitimate only under divine authorization and with strict protective structure.

The psychological framework, developed most explicitly in the twentieth century, treats the spirits as aspects of the deep psyche, personified complexes or archetypes accessible through ritual technology. This reading does not make the working merely symbolic; the practitioner still encounters something real, but its nature is interior rather than exterior.

A third framework holds that the spirits are genuine non-human intelligences whose nature and origin remain genuinely uncertain, and that the question of ontological category is less important than the quality of the working relationship established with them. Many serious contemporary practitioners favor this agnostic but respectful position.

The importance of the seals

Each of the seventy-two spirits is accompanied by a unique geometric seal, a sigil that functions as the spirit’s signature and a primary vehicle for its presence. The seal is engraved or drawn on the lamen worn by the operator, inscribed in the Triangle of Art, and used as a point of focus in the conjurations. Working carefully with the seal, studying its form, and learning to visualize it clearly are foundational practices for any serious Goetic work.

The seals bear the marks of their medieval and Renaissance origins: geometric forms that combine circular and linear elements in patterns that often feel both arbitrary and deeply coherent once the practitioner has worked with them long enough to develop a felt relationship with the specific spirit.

In myth and popular culture

The figure of the wise king who commands demons through divine authority is very old. King Solomon’s supposed mastery over spirits appears not only in the grimoire tradition but across Jewish, Islamic, and Christian folklore. In Islamic tradition, the Quran describes Solomon commanding both jinn and humans, and numerous stories in the “One Thousand and One Nights” develop this theme in elaborate narrative form. The Testament of Solomon, a Greek text from late antiquity, contains lengthy dialogues between the king and demons he has bound, each describing its powers and its heavenly adversary, and this text forms a direct ancestor of the Goetia’s catalogue.

In literature, the idea of compelled demonic service appears in Christopher Marlowe’s “Doctor Faustus” (1592) and later in Goethe’s “Faust” (1808), both of which explore the moral cost and ultimate failure of attempting to bind spirit powers through pact or contract. Neither work is a Goetic text, but both dramatize related cultural anxieties about the relationship between human ambition and demonic power.

Popular culture has encountered the Ars Goetia most directly through its inclusion in video games. The “Shin Megami Tensei” franchise and its derivative “Persona” series incorporate Goetic spirits, including Paimon, Buer, Marbas, and dozens of others, as summoned allies and opponents with abilities drawn from the grimoire descriptions, introducing the catalogue to audiences who had never encountered the original text. The horror film “Hereditary” (2018) centers on King Paimon, borrowing the spirit’s name and some of its traditional associations, though the film’s scenario departs substantially from the grimoire’s presentation.

Aleister Crowley’s 1904 edition of the Goetia, which includes his introduction “The Initiated Interpretation of Ceremonial Magic,” has remained continuously in print and introduced the text to generations of modern practitioners. His framing of the demons as aspects of the deep psyche has been as influential in popular occultism as the traditional theological framework.

Myths and facts

Common misunderstandings about the Ars Goetia and its seventy-two spirits are widespread and deserve direct address.

• A common belief holds that working with Goetic spirits is inherently Satanic or constitutes devil worship. The historical grimoire tradition presents these workings as performed under divine authority; the practitioner invokes God’s names to compel the spirits. Modern practitioners of many orientations, including those with no Satanic affiliation whatsoever, work with the Goetia.
• Many people assume that all seventy-two spirits are malevolent. The catalogue’s spirits range across a wide spectrum: many are described as ready to teach arts and sciences, heal illness, reveal lost knowledge, or reconcile enemies. Their moral valence in the text is complex and rarely simply malevolent.
• It is sometimes claimed that the seals in the Goetia were designed by the demons themselves and communicate directly with them in some inherent way. The origins of the seals are not fully established by scholarship, and they function as conventional identifiers within the tradition rather than as inherently self-evident demonic signatures.
• Popular media often portrays Goetic evocation as inherently catastrophic. The traditional ritual framework was designed specifically to provide the practitioner with protection and control; the grimoire’s intended use was for commanded service, not for catastrophe or uncontrolled possession.
• The number seventy-two is often treated as arbitrary, but it corresponds to the seventy-two names of God derived from Exodus and to the seventy-two nations or languages in Jewish cosmological tradition. The Goetia’s seventy-two spirits can be understood as structurally mirroring the divine catalogue.