Madeline Montalban (8 January 1910–11 January 1982) was a fascinating character in the field of 20th century magic.
Stories swarmed around her until the real Madeline disappeared leaving only the stories.
Writing a biography about her, as Julia Philips has done is nearly
impossible, even her close friends had difficulty getting past the
stories that surrounded her.
In 1998 David
Goddard told me one such story about how he and Maxine Saunders met
Montalban to discuss her legendary Angel Magic course. He said he
had never met her before and it was a late at night meeting. He
believed that she was a woman in her late 40s. They sat up talking
until dawn and when the sun came into the room he suddenly realised
that she must have been about 80 and he believed that she must have
been casting a glamour.
Philips' book then
is a collection of stories about her told through the people that
knew her and there are a lot of them. In her life it is hard to find
a notable occultist who was not connected to Madaline at some point.
Phillips has done a good job tracking down and interviewing her
students and friends and this manages to give us a good picture about
the sort of person she was.
From my
perspective I was interested in Madeline's connection to the Order of
the Golden Dawn. Madeline formed a magic order called the Order of
the Morning Star and I had worked with some of that material. There
were elements of it which could be seen as being inspired by the
Golden Dawn. When I met him, the French occultist Nicolas Tereshenko
told me that he was a member of Madeline Montalban's Order of the
Morning Star and he said that this had links to the Golden Dawn. On
a web site connected to him it claimed that he had the grade of
Adeptus Maximus in her order.
I was also aware
that my former teacher David Goddard had been teaching material based
around the Order of the Morning Star which he described as a system
of Angel Magic which pre-dated John Dee was was more reliable because
“it did not come through a tainted scryer like Edward Kelly.” He
also claimed he was one of the few in an ancient line of Angelic
initiators who had the right to teach it.
Phillips shows
that Montalban was a different sort of magician from those who were
following the Golden Dawn line. Indeed she looked upon them with
contempt. Her magic system, which was self created and based on her
researches at the British Library, was deliberately less dramatic and
simple. It was also based on her own story of Lucifer the Light
Bringer. Instead of a dramatic ritual she would use an altar,
talismans, tarot cards and a clearly written intention translated
into a magical script. This would then be activated by working with
a planetary angel on the correct day.
All this was
placed in a series of 42 lessons which were a correspondence course.
Promising students were sometimes given extra training but the Order
of the Morning Star was the same course of Angel Magic which David
had talked about. There were no initiations, no grades, it was
exactly the magical path that Montalban wanted. It was certainly
not connected to the Golden Dawn or any method of Angelic
initiations.
To clarify this I contacted the author
who told me that there was was no link she could find between
Madeline and the GD.
“She was scathing about GD-style
lineage and initiations so I can't imagine she would ever have any
real connection to any GD group. Going along as an invited guest is
another matter - she would totally do that and then ridicule it all
later!” Phillips wrote.
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| Madeline Montalban |
All I can think of is that Nicolas
Tereshenko thought the Order of the Morning Star was an English
translation for the Stella Matutina. However it would be difficult
how he could claim a high grade in an order that despised grades and
certainly did not have an Adeptus Maximus grade.
The
book also looks at Montalban's influence on Wicca. The Angel Magic
system found its way into the teachings of Maxine Saunders where it
was treated with a reverential awe. It
is one of the few times I saw a senior Alexandrian witch throw his
toys out of the pram was when he discovered that I had some parts of
the course and I was not an initiated witch.
But
Montalban also had a close connection with Wicca's founder Gerald
Gardner and was probably his ghost writer for
High
Magic's Aid.
As
a journalist, writing regularly for Prediction Magazine on Tarot and Astrology, she was well equipped to adapt the book from his notes.
Later
in her life she did not seem to hold him in much regard.
Like
the “Old Sod” which was a biography about Bill Gray which I
reviewed earlier, this
book
has
to tackle the fact that its subject had a reputation
for being difficult. Montalban
appears to have thrown temper tantrums just because she was bored and
also tended to embellish her stories. She could also be manipulative of her students. In the case of her stories it
was because she often wanted to make a point, but sometimes it was
just for the joy of telling it. Julia Phillips deals with all this
in the polite way of someone who admires her subject -- calling her "mercurial". But this attitude appears to be backed up by Montalban's students, such as Leo Vinci,
who feel the same way.
For
the reader there is a message. Madeline's path made her the Avatar
for the self initiate. Not only did she managed to prove that such a
path was possible, she convinced a lot of people that it was a better
way. But Madeline was different from many modern occultists. Her
self initiation system was harder than many would bother with and was
built on countless hours of study and thought. However it is the way
of magic that if one person manages to do it, and built their own
system, then it should be possible for others.
The book is well worth it. My only problem with it is that it is a little short and I would have liked to have seen more stories of Madeline's magic in action.
There
are not many copies of Magus of St Giles available. The print run is
limited to 400 signed copies which are available from AtlantisBookshop in the UK. Given that the shop's
owner Geraldine
Beskin is quoted in the book, and the shop was one of Madeline's
haunts it is probably the most appropriate place to buy it. I bought
it online from them. I
am told that Weiser Antiquarian in the US has a few copies too.
