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The earliest known appearance of the Magdalene Grimoire dates back to the early 1900's when it was under the care of curator Doctor John Hathaway of the Royal Museum. In 1916, occultist Roderick Burgess learned of the grimoire and bartered with Hathaway

The Magdalene Grimoire is a text of occult ceremonies, incantations, mystic rites and summoning spells.

History

The earliest known appearance of the Magdalene Grimoire dates back to the early 1900's when it was under the care of curator Doctor John Hathaway of the Royal Museum. In 1916, occultist Roderick Burgess learned of the grimoire and bartered with Hathaway for possession of it. In exchange for stealing the grimoire from the museum, Burgess promised Hathaway that he would use the book in conjunction with his own abilities to resurrect the doctor's late son Edmund. That evening, Burgess and his Order of Ancient Mysteries used the grimoire in an effort to summon the very essence of death itself. They failed to invoke the entity of Death, but instead brought forth Death's younger sibling Dream. Burgess used the book to bind Dream inside of a mystic circle in his cellar at Fawny Rig where he remained a prisoner for more than seventy years.[1]

In 1947, Roderick Burgess passed away and the Magdalene Grimoire was passed down to his son Alex. As a youth, Alex was present during the ceremony that brought Dream into the physical world and was now the caretaker of his father's legacy. But Alex was not the magus that his father was and he had little true understanding of how the grimoire worked. By the 1960's, Alex had turned the Order of Ancient Mysteries into a New Age refuge for hippies to practice yoga, tantric sex and Kundalini. The Magdalene Grimoire was largely ignored. During one of these parties, one of Alex's guests Stanley Dover took possession of the grimoire and brought it home to the United States. Over the course of many years he studied it and tried to conduct a ritual that would draw a powerful demon up from Hell and place it under his control. Dover practices these rites while taking care of his infant grandson (also named Stanley). What Dover never realized was that the incantation had actually worked, and he brought a demon into the Earth realm. Instead of bonding with the spell caster however, the "Monster" bonded with young Stanley and became something of a pet to him. The two shared in many misadventures together, though Stanley the elder never realized what had taken place.[2]

Years passed until one day Dover attempted to use the book once again. This time his target was the formerly deceased super-hero Green Arrow. Green Arrow had returned to the land of the living due to the efforts of his friend Hal Jordan. However, when he returned to life, he was bereft of a soul. Stanley Dover, now an old man, befriended Queen and invited him into his home. He intended on using the grimoire to displace his own soul into Queen's soulless body and thereby gain renewed health and vitality. Thanks to the efforts of Queen's son Connor Hawke and Stanley's Monster, Dover's plan failed. The Monster ate Dover and took possession of the grimoire, promising that it would not fall into the wrong hands again.[3]

The Magdalene Grimoire's present status and location are unknown.


See Also

Links and References

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