Dee, John

English mathematician and astrologer, Dee studied at Cambridge and taught Frobisher and Raleigh. He cast the horoscope to determine the best day for Elizabeth I’s coronation. He sought ‘Perfect Navigation’ and had frequent conversations with angels, especially Uriel.

Dee used the metaphor of the egg: Earth is the shell, the Moon and planets the white, and the Sun and inner planets the yolk. [Cf Stoics.]

Dee had the largest private collection of books (so the Jeremy Beadle of his day).

Notes from a presentation by Peter Forshaw of Birkbeck, University of London.