The Sorcerer’s Sorry Apprentice

Of all the stories concerning medieval magician Henry Cornelius AGRIPPA von Nettesheim (1486-1535), the most famous reads something like The Sorcerer’s Apprentice scene from Walt Disney’s acclaimed cartoon, Fantasia (minus Mickey Mouse and the happy ending). The incident supposedly happened when Agrippa was living in Louvain, Belgium and renting out a room of his house to an overly inquisitive young scholar; and it goes like this...

Act I: While the enigmatic Agrippa is out of town, his curious boarder cannot resist the opportunity to snoop into the man’s study. Once there, he notices a book of magic spells lying on a table and begins to read aloud one of the spells. Lo and behold, it works! A demon appears and demands to know why it has been summoned. And the terrified youth, who probably hadn’t realized that he had been summoning a demon, can give no answer. So the demon grabs him by the throat and strangles him.

Act II: Agrippa arrives home to the frightful sight of his border’s corpse and realizes that it is very likely he will be accused of his murder. What a pickle! However, he’s not a man to panic. Re-summoning the demon, Agrippa orders it to restore the corpse to life (or, at least, animation), and then sends the magically mobilized body down to the marketplace to wander around a bit before collapsing in a seemingly natural death.

Conclusion: It was a slick try, but the strangulation marks on the young man’s throat spoiled it. Agrippa was accused of murder anyway, and had to flee town. Fortunately, hasty departures were nothing new to him, so he made it safely away.

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