William Lilly was an English

English people

The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...

 astrologer

Astrologer

An astrologer practices one or more forms of astrology. Typically an astrologer draws a horoscope for the time of an event, such as a person's birth, and interprets celestial points and their placements at the time of the event to better understand someone, determine the auspiciousness of an...

 famed during his time. Lilly was particularly adept at interpreting the astrological charts

Natal chart

In astrology, a natal chart is a stylized map of the universe with the "native" at the center. It is calculated for the exact time and location of the native's birth for the purposes of gaining insight into the native's personality and potential...

 drawn up for horary

Horary astrology

Horary astrology is an ancient branch of horoscopic astrology by which an astrologer attempts to answer a question by constructing a horoscope for the exact time at which the question was received and understood by the astrologer...

 questions, as this was his speciality.

Lilly caused much controversy in 1652 for allegedly predicting the Great Fire of London

Great Fire of London

The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through the central parts of the English city of London, from Sunday, 2 September to Wednesday, 5 September 1666. The fire gutted the medieval City of London inside the old Roman City Wall...

 some 14 years before it happened. For this reason many people believed that he might have started the fire, but there is no evidence to support these claims. He was tried for the offence in Parliament but was found to be innocent.

Early life

William Lilly was born in 1602 in Diseworth

Diseworth

Diseworth is a village in the English county of Leicestershire. It is south of East Midlands Airport and off Junction 23A of the M1 motorway.A village of some 670 residents, it is located 14 km to the north-west of Loughborough and 2.5 km to the south-east of Castle Donington...

, Leicestershire

Leicestershire

Leicestershire is a landlocked county in the English Midlands. It takes its name from the heavily populated City of Leicester, traditionally its administrative centre, although the City of Leicester unitary authority is today administered separately from the rest of Leicestershire...

, where his family were long-established yeomen. He received a basic classical education

Classical education movement

The Classical education movement advocates a form of education based in the traditions of Western culture, with a particular focus on education as understood and taught in the Middle Ages. The curricula and pedagogy of classical education was first developed during the Middle Ages by Martianus...

 at the school of Ashby-de-la-Zouch

Ashby-de-la-Zouch

Ashby-de-la-Zouch, — Zouch being pronounced "Zoosh" — often shortened to Ashby, is a small market town and civil parish in North West Leicestershire, England, within the National Forest. It is twinned with Pithiviers in north-central France....

, but makes a point of saying that his master never taught logic

Logic

In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...

. At the age of seventeen, his father having fallen into poverty, he went to London and was employed in attendance on an elderly couple. His master, at his death in 1627, left him an annuity of £20; and, Lilly having soon afterwards married the widow, she, dying in 1633, left him property to the value of about £1000.

Career

He began to dabble in astrology

Astrology

Astrology consists of a number of belief systems which hold that there is a relationship between astronomical phenomena and events in the human world...

, reading all the books on the subject he could fall in with, and occasionally trying his hand at unravelling mysteries by means of his art. The years 1642 and 1643 were devoted to a careful revision of all his previous reading, and in particular, having lighted on Valentine Naibod

Valentin Naboth

Valentin Naboth , known by the latinized name Valentinus Naiboda, was a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer.- Life and academic career :...

's Commentary on Alcabitius, he "seriously studied him and found him to be the profoundest author he ever met with." About the same time he tells us that he “did carefully take notice of every grandaction betwixt king and parliament, and did first then incline to believe that as all sublunar

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

y affairs depend on superior causes, so there, was: a possibility of discovering them by the configurations of the superior bodies." And, having thereupon "made some essays," he "found encouragement to proceed further, and ultimately framed to himself that method which he ever afterwards followed."

Lilly's most comprehensive book was published in 1647 and was entitled Christian Astrology. It is so large that it came in three separate volumes in modern times, and it remains popular even today and has never gone totally out-of-print. It is considered one of the classic texts for the study of traditional astrology

History of astrology

Astrology, the belief in a connection between the cosmos and terrestrial matters has played an important part in human history.Regional branches of astrology include Western astrology, Indian astrology, and Chinese or East Asian astrology.-Early origins:...

 from the Middle Ages

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

, in particular horary astrology

Horary astrology

Horary astrology is an ancient branch of horoscopic astrology by which an astrologer attempts to answer a question by constructing a horoscope for the exact time at which the question was received and understood by the astrologer...

, which is mainly concerned with predicting future events or investigating unknown elements of current affairs, based on an astrological chart cast for the time a particular question is asked of the astrologer. Lilly studied thousands of horary charts, most of the time successfully giving correct answers for a wide range of questions from the location of missing fishes to the outcome of battles. Worked examples of horary charts are found in Volume 2 of Christian Astrology.

He then began to issue his prophetical almanac

Almanac

An almanac is an annual publication that includes information such as weather forecasts, farmers' planting dates, and tide tables, containing tabular information in a particular field or fields often arranged according to the calendar etc...

s and other works, which met with serious attention from some of the most prominent members of the Long Parliament

Long Parliament

The Long Parliament was made on 3 November 1640, following the Bishops' Wars. It received its name from the fact that through an Act of Parliament, it could only be dissolved with the agreement of the members, and those members did not agree to its dissolution until after the English Civil War and...

. Lilly was on intimate terms with Bulstrode Whitelocke

Bulstrode Whitelocke

Sir Bulstrode Whitelocke was an English lawyer, writer, parliamentarian and Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England.- Biography :...

, William Lenthall

William Lenthall

William Lenthall was an English politician of the Civil War period. He served as Speaker of the House of Commons.-Early life:...

 the speaker, Sir Philip Stapleton

Philip Stapleton

Sir Philip Stapleton , of Warter-on-the Wolds in Yorkshire, was an English Member of Parliament, a supporter of the Parliamentary cause during the English Civil War. His surname is also sometimes spelt Stapylton or Stapilton.-Life:...

, Elias Ashmole

Elias Ashmole

Elias Ashmole was a celebrated English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy. Ashmole supported the royalist side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II he was rewarded with several lucrative offices.Ashmole was an antiquary with a...

 and others. Even John Selden

John Selden

John Selden was an English jurist and a scholar of England's ancient laws and constitution and scholar of Jewish law...

 seems to have acknowledged him, and probably the chief difference between him and the mass of the community at the time was that, while others believed in the general truth of astrology, he ventured to specify the future events to which he referred.

In 1650, Lilly wrote a preface to Sir Christopher Heydon

Christopher Heydon

Sir Christopher Heydon was an English soldier, Member of Parliament, and writer on astrology.-Background:Born in Surrey, Heydon was the eldest son of Sir William Heydon of Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, and his wife Anne, daughter of Sir William Woodhouse of Hickling, Norfolk...

's An Astrological Discourse with Mathematical Demonstrations, a defence of astrology written about 1608 which was first published posthumously, largely at the expense of Elias Ashmole

Elias Ashmole

Elias Ashmole was a celebrated English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy. Ashmole supported the royalist side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II he was rewarded with several lucrative offices.Ashmole was an antiquary with a...

.

Retirement and death

After the Restoration

English Restoration

The Restoration of the English monarchy began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Interregnum that followed the Wars of the Three Kingdoms...

 he very quickly fell into disrepute. His sympathy with the parliament, which his predictions had generally shown, was not calculated to bring him into royal favour. He came under the lash of Butler, who, making allowance for some satiric exaggeration, has given in the character of Sidrophel

Hudibras

Hudibras is an English mock heroic narrative poem from the 17th century written by Samuel Butler.-Purpose:The work is a satirical polemic upon Roundheads, Puritans, Presbyterians and many of the other factions involved in the English Civil War...

 a probably not very incorrect picture of the man; and, having by this time amassed a tolerable fortune, he bought a small estate at Hersham

Hersham

Hersham is a village in Surrey, within the M25 boundary. It is within easy reach of Heathrow and Gatwick airports. The main A3 London to Portsmouth road runs through its boundaries...

 in Surrey

Surrey

Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...

, to which he retired, and where he diverted the exercise of his peculiar talents to the practice of medicine

Medicine

Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....

. He died in 1681. In 2003 a commemorative plaque was placed next to the disused Aldwych tube station

Aldwych tube station

Aldwych is a closed London Underground station in the City of Westminster, originally opened as Strand in 1907. It was the terminus and only station on the short Piccadilly line branch from Holborn that was a relic of the merger of two railway schemes. The disused station building is close to the...

 on the Strand. Lilly lived close to this spot.

Modern influence

The publication of a facsimile of the original 1647 edition of Lilly's Christian Astrology in 1985 by Regulus Publishing Company Ltd., in the UK, brought about a renaissance in astrological

History of astrology

Astrology, the belief in a connection between the cosmos and terrestrial matters has played an important part in human history.Regional branches of astrology include Western astrology, Indian astrology, and Chinese or East Asian astrology.-Early origins:...

 scholarship in North America and Europe, and also a transformation of the techniques of modern astrology. Olivia Barclay

Olivia Barclay

Olivia Barclay was a British astrologer who played an important role in the revival of traditional forms of astrology in the late twentieth century...

 and other British astrologers began to unearth Lilly's astrological work, and were influential in the eventual re-publication of Christian Astrology.

External links

• Lilly's account of his life and the story of Christian Astrology — PDF download of Lilly's introduction to his work, with annotations by Deborah Houlding
• The Life & Work of William Lilly
• Christian Astrology (1647) — Volumes 1 & 2 — Lilly's complete tome in PDF and Word format
• William Lilly Biography, Rules for Horary Questions & Examples
• Christian Astrology (1647)
• William Lillly (1644), SUPERNATURAL SIGHTS AND APPARITIONS
• Anima Astrologiae, GUIDO BONATUS by William Lilly, Student in Astrology