Ars Vercanus: Advanced Magickal Techniques

Ars Vercanus is an almost dauntingly comprehensive Grimoire. In this intensive textbook, Vasilios and Lynn Wennergren present first their working theory of magic, followed by a thorough presentation of core techniques to master for magical practice, and then provide material on every magical practice, psychic phenomenon, and afterlife theory a magical group might explore. The book includes a series of illustrations to guide the hand of the magician that works his or her way through this book.

While no Grimoire can truly encompass every single aspect of magical practice, this particular book comes close. It speaks to one tradition of magic – not all. In some passages, the language becomes burdensome rather than educational, especially when discussing pneuma/etheric fields. This often happens when authors attempt to pull together a magical concept that has roots in multiple cultural traditions. In this case, the Wennergrens attempt to combine the Greek concept of pneuma with the Indian chakra system with the Chinese concept of Wai Chi. The attempt to get the idea across using something more specific than the metaphysical go-to energy while admirable, does not quite work as intended here. It’s important material, but it seems unlikely that any magic worker will ever fully explain that weird stuff that makes magic work.

The strength of this book lies in its charts. While the authors spend a reasonable amount of time on the theory behind each practice, every piece leads to an emphasis on practice. At the end of each passage, detailed charts provide a would-be magician a thorough step-by-step process for mastery of a given concept. A self-motivated person can work through skills from etheric perception to operations for love magic by going through the step by step tables presented in each chapter. Working through this book may not make an adept as no single book or practice can, but it certainly gives arguably among the most through explorations of magical skills available.

Highly Recommended

~ review by Diana Rajchel

Author: Wennergren, Vasilios & Lynn
Megalithica Books, 2014
pp. 422, $22.99