Posted: May 22nd, 2023

The study and significance of the Western Esoteric Traditions

The study and significance of the Western esoteric traditions have recently been taken
increasingly seriously among the historians of ideas and science, and we have argued
in this paper that historical archaeology could also benefit from the study of
esotericism. While esoteric traditions and the associated material culture are certainly
interesting and worth attention in their own right, the case has been made above that
the relevance of esotericism for post-medieval archaeology is not limited to the study
of specialized cases, such as alchemical laboratories.