The Master of Demons in Topkapi Palace: Forgotten Manuscript of King Solomon’s Zauberbuch from the Last Phase of Byzantium

The incipit Ἐκ τῶν τοῦ Σολομῶντος περὶ τῆς δυνάμεως ἣν ἔλαβε παρὰ θεοῦ εἰς τὸ ἄρχειν τῶν δαιμόνων was recorded by A. Deissmann in a manuscript of the Topkapi Library (Istanbul Topkapi Serai-Bibliothek MS G.İ.17). Based upon the Greek title, he named the manuscript “König Salomos Dämonenzwang” and believed the text to derive from the Testamentum Salomonis, which had been published by Ch. McCown in 1922. In fact, considering Deissmann’s identification of the Topkapi manuscript as a “Zauberbuch”, the text might rather belong to the group of magical treatises attributed to Solomon, a fact endorsed by the category “l’astrologie judiciaire” found on an ex libris inscription. According to Ioannis Marathakis, a series of Greek grimoires contain astrological materials and date back to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. In this context, it was necessary to examine the Topkapı manuscript again in detail and compare it with other Greek copies of the Solomonic corpus. Before passing from Greek into the Latin-speaking world, this corpus—though commonly regarded as belonging to Orthodox Christianity—first took shape at a multicultural and multireligious crossroads. It incorporates elements of Jewish magical traditions and went on to influence later Arabic literature as well as Seljuk art. Since May 2024, this unpublished Topkapi manuscript is being studied as part of doctoral dissertation with the official permission of the General Directorate of National Palaces-Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye, and all the findings obtained will be presented in this paper.