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Elias Ashmole

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   Elias Ashmole by an unknown hand (detail), c. 1688, after the portrait
   by John Riley, c. 1681, below.
   Enlarge
   Elias Ashmole by an unknown hand (detail), c. 1688, after the portrait
   by John Riley, c. 1681, below.

   Elias Ashmole ( 23 May 1617– 18 May 1692), the celebrated English
   antiquary, was a politician, officer of arms, student of astrology and
   alchemy, and an early speculative Freemason. He supported the royalist
   side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II
   he was rewarded with several lucrative offices. Throughout his life he
   was an avid collector of curiosities and other artifacts. Many of these
   he acquired from the traveller, botanist, and collector John Tradescant
   the younger, and most he donated to Oxford University to create the
   Ashmolean Museum. He also donated his library and priceless manuscript
   collection to Oxford.

   Apart from his collecting hobbies, Ashmole illustrates the passing of
   the occult philosophy in the 17th century: while he immersed himself in
   alchemical, magical and astrological studies and was consulted on
   astrological questions by Charles II and his court, these studies were
   essentially backward-looking. Although he was one of the founding
   members of the Royal Society, a key institution in the development of
   experimental science, he never participated actively.

Solicitor and royalist

   Ashmole was born in Lichfield, Staffordshire. His family had been
   famous, but its wealth had declined somewhat by the time of Ashmole's
   birth. The family name is likely a variation in spelling of Ashmore
   (from "ash moor," also a place name), as the two spellings were used
   interchangeably in the Midlands. His father, Simon Ashmole, was a
   soldier and a saddler; his mother Anne was a cousin of James Pagit, a
   Baron of the Exchequer. Ashmole attended Lichfield Grammar School and
   became a chorister at Lichfield Cathedral. In 1638, with the help of
   Pagit, he became a solicitor. He enjoyed a successful practice in
   London, and married Eleanor Mainwaring, a member of a poor but
   aristocratic family, who died only three years later. Still in his
   early twenties, Ashmole had taken the first steps towards status and
   wealth. Ashmole supported the side of Charles I in the Civil War. At
   the outbreak of fighting in 1642, he left London for the house of his
   father-in-law, Peter Mainwaring, at Smallwood in Cheshire. There he
   lived a retired life until 1644, when he was appointed King's
   Commissioner of Excise at Lichfield. Soon afterwards, he was given a
   military post at Oxford, where he devoted most of his time to study and
   acquired a deep interest in alchemy, astrology and magic. He studied
   physics and mathematics at Brasenose College, Oxford, though he did not
   formally enroll as a student. In late 1645, he left Oxford to accept
   the position of Commissioner of Excise at Worcester. (Excise
   Commissioners set taxes on specific locally-produced commodities; at
   that time, the division between official and personal property was not
   as rigorously observed as it is today, so such offices could be very
   lucrative to their holders.) Ashmole was given the additional military
   posts of Captain of the Horse and Comptroller of Ordnance, though he
   seems never to have participated in any fighting.

Freemason

   After the Royalist defeat of 1646, he retired again to Cheshire. During
   this period, he was admitted as a Freemason (the earliest documented
   admission of a Freemason in an English lodge). His diary entry for 16
   October 1646 reads in part: "I was made a Free Mason at Warrington, in
   Lancashire, with Coll: Henry Mainwaring, of Karincham, in Cheshire."
   Although there is only one other mention of Masonic activity in his
   diary he seems to have remained in good standing and well-connected
   with the fraternity as he was still attending meetings in 1682. On 10
   March that year he wrote: "About 5 H P.M., I received a summons to
   appear at a Lodge to held the next day, at Mason's Hall, London." The
   following day, 11 March 1682, he wrote: "Accordingly, I went & about
   Noone were admitted into the Fellowship of free Masons." And, "I was
   the Senior Fellow among them (it being 35 years since I was admitted)."
   And "We all dyned at the halfe Moone Taverne in Cheapside, at a noble
   dinner prepaired at the charge of the new-accepted Masons."

Marriage

   In 1649, he married Mary, Lady Mainwaring (daughter of Sir William
   Forster of Aldermaston), a wealthy thrice-widowed woman twenty years
   his senior. She was a relative by marriage of his first wife's family
   and the mother of grown children. The marriage took place over the
   opposition of the bride's family, and it did not prove to be
   harmonious: Lady Mainwaring filed an unsuccessful suit for separation
   and alimony in 1657. The match, did, however, provide Ashmole with her
   first husband's estates centred on Bradfield in Berkshire which left
   him wealthy enough to pursue his interests without concern for his
   livelihood.

Alchemy and the Tradescant Collection

   Frontispiece to Ashmole's translation of Fasciculus Chemicus.
   Enlarge
   Frontispiece to Ashmole's translation of Fasciculus Chemicus.

   During the 1650s, Ashmole devoted a great deal of energy to the study
   of alchemy. In 1650 he published Fasciculus Chemicus under the
   anagrammatic pseudonym James Hasholle. This work was an English
   translation of two Latin alchemical works, one by Arthur Dee. In 1652,
   he published his most important alchemical work, Theatrum Chemicum
   Britannicum, an extensively annotated compilation of alchemical poems
   in English. The book preserved and made available many works that had
   previously existed only in privately held manuscripts. It was avidly
   studied by other alchemists.
   Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum (1652), Ashmole's annotated compilation
   of alchemical poems in English.
   Enlarge
   Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum (1652), Ashmole's annotated compilation
   of alchemical poems in English.

   In 1653, the alchemist and near-neighbour, William Backhouse of
   Swallowfield, who had made Ashmole his alchemical "son", is said to
   have confided the secret of the Philosopher's Stone to Ashmole when the
   former believed himself to be close to death. (The Philosopher's Stone
   was a substance or object that had the power to convert base metals to
   gold, among other mystical virtues: its discovery was one of the key
   goals of European alchemists.) Ashmole is said to have passed the
   secret on to Robert Plot, the first keeper of the Ashmolean Museum.
   Ashmole published his final alchemical work, The Way to Bliss, in 1658.
   There is no evidence of him personally carrying out any actual
   experiments (or "operations", in the alchemical jargon of the time).

   Ashmole met the botanist and collector John Tradescant the younger
   around 1650. Tradescant had, with his father, built up a vast and
   renowned collection of exotic plants, mineral specimens and other
   curiosities from around the world. Ashmole helped Tradescant catalogue
   his collection in 1652, and, in 1656, he financed the publication of
   the catalogue, the Musaeum Tradescantianum. In 1659, Tradescant, who
   had lost his only son and heir ten years earlier, legally deeded his
   collection to Ashmole. Under the agreement, Ashmole would take
   possession at Tradescant's death. When Tradescant died in 1662, his
   widow Hester contested the deed, but the matter was settled in Chancery
   in Ashmole's favour two years later. Some scholars consider that
   Ashmole was an “ambitious, ingratiating” social climber who stole a
   hero's legacy.

Restoration

   At the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, Ashmole's loyalty was richly
   rewarded. He was given the office of Comptroller for the Excise in
   London, and later was made a Commissioner of Surinam and the Accountant
   General of the Excise, a position that made him responsible for a large
   portion of the king's revenue. These posts yielded him considerable
   income as well as considerable patronage power.
   A painting of Elias Ashmole wearing a tabard as Windsor Herald, painted
   by Cornelius Neve in 1664.
   Enlarge
   A painting of Elias Ashmole wearing a tabard as Windsor Herald, painted
   by Cornelius Neve in 1664.

   Ashmole became one of the founding members of the Royal Society in
   1661, but he was never an active member. His most significant
   appointment, though, was to the College of Arms as Windsor Herald of
   Arms in Ordinary in 1660. In this position he devoted himself to the
   study of the history of the Order of the Garter, which had been a
   special interest of his since the 1650s. In 1667, he began collecting
   information for his Antiquities of Berkshire and, five years later,
   published the fruits of years of research concerning The Institution,
   Laws and Ceremonies of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, a lavish
   folio with illustrations by Wenceslaus Hollar. Ashmole performed the
   heraldic and genealogical work of his office scrupulously, and he was
   considered the leading authority on court protocol and ceremony.

   In 1668, Lady Mainwaring died, and Ashmole married the much younger
   daughter of his friend and fellow herald, the antiquarian Sir William
   Dugdale. In 1675, he resigned as Windsor Herald, perhaps because of
   factional strife within the College of Arms. He was offered the post of
   Garter Principal King of Arms, but he turned it down in favour of
   Dugdale.

   As might be expected of a herald, Ashmole possessed a coat of arms. In
   his case, he was entitled to one by descent from armigerous ancestors.
   This coat of arms is expressed in heraldic terminology ( blazoned) as
   Quarterly sable and or with a fleur de lis or in the first quarter with
   a greyhound courant for the crest. In 1661, Ashmole was granted a new
   crest in place of the greyhound, one which reflected his interest in
   astrology: On a wreath sable and or the planet Mercury collocated in
   the middle of the caelestiall Signe Gemini proper his right hand
   extended toward heaven and left holding a Caducan rod or.

   Though his interest in alchemy cooled somewhat after the 1650s, he
   never lost interest in magic and astrology. He was often consulted on
   astrological matters by Charles II and members of his court. In 1672,
   he acquired some of John Dee's previously unknown spiritual diaries
   describing his conferences with angels. He devoted much time and energy
   to the intensive study of these manuscripts, and contemplated writing a
   biography of Dee.

Ashmolean Museum

   Portrait of Elias Ashmole c. 1681 by John Riley. Now in the Ashmolean
   Museum, Oxford.
   Portrait of Elias Ashmole c. 1681 by John Riley. Now in the Ashmolean
   Museum, Oxford.

   In 1677, Ashmole made a gift of the Tradescant Collection, together
   with material he had collected independently, to Oxford University on
   the condition that a suitable home be built to house the materials and
   make them available to the public. The Ashmolean Museum, designed by
   Christopher Wren, was completed in 1682. According to Anthony Wood, the
   collection filled twelve wagons when it was transferred to Oxford. It
   would have been more, but a large part of Ashmole's own collection,
   destined for the museum, including coins, medals, antiquities, books,
   manuscripts and prints, was destroyed in a disastrous fire in the
   Middle Temple on January 26, 1679.

   Ashmole's health began to deteriorate in the 1680s, and though he would
   hold his excise office until he died, he became much less active in
   affairs. He began to collect notes on his life in diary form to serve
   as source material for a biography; although the biography was never
   written, these notes are a rich source of information on Ashmole and
   his times. He died in Lambeth on May 18, 1692. He was buried at South
   Lambeth Church. Ashmole bequeathed his library and his priceless
   manuscript collection to Oxford.

   Michael Hunter, in his entry on Ashmole for the Oxford Dictionary of
   National Biography, concluded that the most salient points of Ashmole's
   character were his ambition and his hierarchical vision of the world—a
   vision that unified his royalism and his interests in heraldry,
   genealogy, ceremony, and even astrology and magic. He was as successful
   in his legal, business and political affairs as he was in his
   collecting and scholarly pursuits. His antiquarian work is still
   considered valuable, and his alchemical publications, especially the
   Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum, preserved many works that might
   otherwise have been lost. He formed several close and long-lasting
   friendships, with John Aubrey for example, but, as Richard Garnett has
   observed, "acquisitiveness was his master passion".
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