Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition

Front cover art for Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition.
Author	Frances A. Yates
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Publisher	University of Chicago Press
Publication date	1964
Media type	Print (book)
Pages	466
ISBN	0-226-95007-7
OCLC	23685519
Followed by	The Art of Memory

Part of a series on
Hermeticism
Hermes Trismegistus
Hermetic writings Liber Hermetis (astrological) Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus Corpus Hermeticum Poimandres Asclepius Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth Prayer of Thanksgiving Korē kosmou Cyranides The Book of the Secrets of the Stars The Secret of Creation Emerald Tablet Kitāb al-Isṭamākhīs Liber Hermetis de alchemia
Historical figures Ancient and medieval Zosimos of Panopolis Jābir ibn Ḥayyān (may be legendary) Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi Ibn Umayl Maslama al-Qurṭubī Aḥmad al-Būnī Early modern Marsilio Ficino Lodovico Lazzarelli Giovanni da Correggio Pico della Mirandola Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa Paracelsus John Dee Giordano Bruno Jakob Böhme Robert Fludd Christian Rosenkreuz (legendary, see Rosicrucianism)
Modern offshoots As above, so below Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn Hermetic Qabalah Rosicrucianism The Kybalion
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Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition is a 1964 non-fiction book by British historian Frances A. Yates. The book delves into the history of Hermeticism and its influence upon Renaissance philosophy and Giordano Bruno.

With the publication of Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Yates transformed Renaissance historiography. In it, she revealed the hermeticism with which the Renaissance was imbued, and the revived interest in mysticism, magic and Gnosticism of Late Antiquity that survived the Middle Ages. In the face of longstanding conventional interpretations, Yates suggested that the itinerant Catholic priest Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in 1600 for espousing the Hermetic tradition rather than his affirmation of heliocentricity.

Reception

The book is cited by the bestselling British author Philip Pullman, as a central inspiration for his own writing.^[1]

Alan Charles Kors and Edward Peters, the editors of the book Witchcraft in Europe, 400-1700: A Documentary History stated in the 2001 second edition of their collection of historical documents on the witchcraft hysteria that "this classic work [GBHT] remains" among the best of its kind on the subject.^[2]