Winchester 1

Witch Hunter or Witch?

The Life and Influence of “Reverend” Montague Summers

Jake B. Winchester
Dr Marco Pasi
Occult Trajectories I
29 May 2015
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In July of 1929 infamous occultist and magician Aleister Crowley dined with eccentric
man-of-letters Montague Summers. Although Summers was at the time best-known as a scholar
of Restoration theater, over the previous three years he had published a series of studies on the
history of witchcraft, demonology, and vampires. These were popular topics among occultists,
but Summers differed from other commentators in one profoundly important respect: he
repeatedly stresses his belief in their literal reality. In the introduction to his 1926 study The
History of Witchcraft and Demonology, Summers explains:
In the following pages I have endeavoured to show the witch as she really was – an evil liver;
a social pest and parasite; the devotee of a loathly and obscene creed; an adept at poisoning,
blackmail, and other creeping crimes; a member of a powerful secret organisation inimical to
Church and State; a blasphemer in word and deed, swaying the villagers by terror and
superstition; a charlatan and a quack sometimes; a bawd; an abortionist; the dark counsellor
of lewd court ladies and adulterous gallants; a minister to vice and inconceivable corruption,
battening upon the filth and foulest passions of the age.1
This evocative passage demonstrates two important facts about Summers. Firstly, he was a
master of purple prose. His complex and intentionally antiquated style is often frustrating—but
always fascinating. Secondly, he considered witchcraft and its practitioners a real and credible
threat to society. In this respect Summers is more in line with the medieval witch-hunters he
quotes than the contemporary historians he criticizes. This adds an intriguing element of
mystery to Summers' meeting with Crowley: what business did the witch-hunter have with the
witch? It must have been quite the conversation; Crowley later recorded in his diary: “Dinner
with Montague Summers – the most amusing evening I have spent in decades.”2
Although seemingly polar opposites, Crowley and Summers actually shared a great deal
in common. They were born and died within five years of each other. They moved in
overlapping social circles. Both were extremely interested in magic, sexuality, and the occult,
although they approached the topics from decidedly different directions. Both wrote prolifically,
authoring an endless stream of poetry, essays, articles, and scholarly studies—much of which
remain in print. Moreover, both men attained a certain degree of fame during their lifetimes.3
However, Summers and Crowley are by no means equally remembered today. Crowley is the
1 Montague Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co.,
1926), xiv.
2 Lawrence Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt: The Life of Aleister Crowley (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2002), 338.
3 Crowley's biographer Lawrence Sutin considered them consummate figures, as discussed below. See also:
Appendix I & II
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subject of a number of biographies—both scholarly and amateur—and countless academic

articles. Summers, on the other hand, has been almost entirely ignored by scholars. He is the
subject of a short biography by the Carmelite friar and literary figure Brocard Sewell, and an
exhaustive bibliography by antiquarian book-seller Timothy d'Arch Smith; however, both books
are out-of-print and extremely scarce. Apart from a smattering of references in modern works on
witchcraft and 20th-century occulture, Summers is now a footnote in history. But why?
A partial explanation can be found in difference of intent: Crowley developed an entirely
new esoteric system—Thelema—which is still practiced by the occult organization O.T.O., or
Ordo Templi Orientis. The O.T.O. continues to publish and promote Crowley's works, which
assures him a certain degree of contemporary relevance. Summers, paradoxically, never openly
advocated the practice of occultism or magic. While his works are filled with theatrical accounts
of the devilish magic of witches, overall they contain no coherent or workable system of magic.
Summers instead professed an extremely literal and conservative form of Catholicism.
Although he is no longer remembered as a historical figure, Summers' continuing
relevance is undeniable. All of his major works on occultism are still in print and available in
book stores around the world. Indeed, most readers interested in the occult—especially topics
such as witchcraft, Satanism, and black magic—have likely read Summer's name, if not his
works themselves. In light of the enduring popularity of his books, this paper is first and
foremost an effort to save the historical figure of Summers from the dust-bin of history.
Accordingly, I begin with a biographical account of his early life and literary career.
Subsequently, I provide a conspectus of his works and an analysis of his influence.
Summers' biography by Fr Brocard Sewell—who writes under the pseudonym “Joseph
Jerome”—was published in 1965 in a limited run of 750 numbered copies.4 It has never been
reissued and is currently unavailable online. The text itself is unfortunately brief, running just
over 100 pages. Sewell considered the work a memoir rather than a biography. He argues that
“It seems unlikely that it will ever be possible for anyone to write a biography of Montague
Summers.”5 Sewell attributes this to two factors: Summers' self-conscious secrecy and myth-
making regarding his own life, and the disappearance of his private papers and correspondences

4 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers: a Biographical Memoir (London: Cecil & Amelia Woolf, 1965), iii.
5 Ibid., xiii.
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under “mysterious circumstances.”6 The papers have recently come back to light;7 however, they
have not yet been systematically studied and much of Summers' life remains shrouded in
mystery.
Sewell himself worked from a number of sources to compile his “memoirs” of Summers.
His first and most important source was an “elaborate dossier” he had assembled from
“testimony both oral and written of many who knew Summers personally.”8 Especially
important among these papers were the unpublished Recollections of Montague Summers
originally compiled by J. Redwood-Anderson, a minor poet and college friend of Summers.9
Sewell also made use of an incomplete autobiographical manuscript discovered among Summers'
possessions.10 The manuscript covers his early life and career as a scholar of Restoration drama.
Summers apparently intended to write a second volume to cover his “ecclesiastical and occult
interests”—unfortunately, it was never written.11 Sewell occasionally contributed introductions
and forewords to new editions of Summers' works; however, these essays contain no
biographical material not found in the 1965 “memoirs.”12
Alphonsus Joseph-Mary Augustus Montague Summers was born on 10 April 1880 in the
quiet Bristol suburb of Clifton.13 His father, Augustus William Summers, was an “influential and
wealthy” banker and community figure.14 His mother, Ellen (née Bush), was the daughter of a
bank manager. Montague was the youngest of their seven children.15 The Summers were a
wealthy family, and the extensive private library of their manor—Tellisford House—contributed
greatly towards the development of their youngest son's eclectic interests. Wealth allowed the
family to travel extensively, and the young Montague saw much of continental Europe as a child.
Private tutors conducted Montague's earliest formal education, but his parents eventually packed
6 Ibid.
7 The bulk of Summers' private papers were rediscovered in the late 2000s. They are now in private hands in
Portland, Maine. See: <http://www.asideofbooks.com/?p=981>, accessed 7 May 2015.
8 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, xvi.
9 Ibid., 88.
10 The MSS was subsequently edited by Sewell and published in 1980 by “Cecil & Ameilia Woolf,” a small-run
private press. I was unable to determine the size of the initial (and only) print run; however, the book is held in
even fewer libraries world-wide than Sewell's Montague Summers, suggesting that it is rare in the extreme.
11 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, xii.
12 For example see the “Foreword” by Fr Brocard Sewell that appears the 1961 re-issue of The Vampire in Europe.
Montague Summers, The Vampire in Europe (New Hyde Park: University Books, Inc., 1961), vii-xvi.
13 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 1.
14 Ibid.
15 Ibid.
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him off to the reputable school of one “Misses Lucas.”16 Although only in his early teens,
Summers impressed his teachers with his wit and knowledge of Renaissance literature.17 At
Misses Lucas' school he studied Classics and English under W.W. Asquith, the older brother of
future prime-minister H.H. Asquith—himself a Classicist of some renown.18 Summers made
friends with many of his teachers, including Asquith, but peers apparently found him
unsociable.19 Although he was obviously intelligent, Summers was not a particularly good
student.20 He presumably received much of his early education through extra-curricular reading.
Those who knew Summers in his early years would later remember him as unremarkable
except for cleverness.21 When he left home to attain his undergraduate degree at Oxford,
however, his more eccentric side began to emerge. Montague Summers officially enrolled in
Trinity College on 13 October 1899.22 He quickly earned a reputation for erudition, impressing
peers with his literary knowledge and command of ancient and modern languages.23 He also
started to dress flamboyantly, burn incense in his room, and engage in other “unusual behavior,”
with the result that rumors began to circulate regarding his sexuality.24 Summers was indeed
homosexual—or “sexually inverted” as Sewell prefers to say. This has important ramifications
for his writings and will be explored in greater depth below.
While at Oxford, Summers made numerous “friends of distinction,” including ex-Papal
Chamberlain Hartwell de la Garde Grissell, who founded the Newman Society for Oxford
Catholics; poet and critic Arthur Symons; and poet and novelist Baron Jacques d'Adelswärd
Fersen.25 During this period Summers developed a deep appreciation for the poetry of Oscar
Wilde and Algernon Charles Swinburne,26 and he began to compose his own poems in imitation.
Many of these were later incorporated into Summers' first publication: the 1907 Antinous and
Other Poems, a “distinctly decadent […] mélange of 'sacred' and 'satanic' which would well

16 Ibid., 2.
17 Ibid., 2-3.
18 H.H. Asquith attended Balliol College, Oxford on a Classical scholarship. See: “Mr. Asquith's Brother
Cremated,” The Advertiser, Adelaide, SA: 4 February 1919, p. 9.
19 Ibid., 3.
20 Ibid., 3-4.
21 Ibid., 4
22 Ibid., 5.
23 Ibid.
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid., 6.
26 Swinburne was also a favorite of Aleister Crowley.
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qualify for the baudelarian title of Fleurs de Mal.”27

Summers graduated from Trinity with a fourth in theology in 1903.28 Subsequently, he
enrolled in Lichfield Theological College as a candidate for ordination in the Anglican church.
All those who knew Summers during this period claim that—in spite of his eccentricities and
occasional joking blasphemies—he was a deeply religious man. A peer at Lichfield remembered
him 51 years later as a walking enigma: he burned jos-sticks in his room and wore purple silk
socks during lent, but was nonetheless pious in the extreme. Moreover, he always left “an
unfading impression of extraordinary cleverness and fine scholarship.”29
Summers completed his seminary studies in 1908. He was promptly ordained by the
bishop of Bristol and appointed to the vicarship of Bitton, a rural parish near Clifton.30 The
appointment ended disastrously. Bitton was the worst possible place for a pastor fresh from
seminary—especially one like Montague. The senior vicar, Canon Ellacombe, was old, neurotic,
and inconsistent in his duties. As a result, Summers was chronically unsupervised and left to his
own devices. A visiting pastor was appalled to find Summers in a “thoroughly neurotic state and
exhibiting a morbid fascination with evil […] shocking in a clergyman.”31 Even worse, before
the year was out Summers was accused of pederasty. Although acquitted, he immediately fled
his post.32 Thus ended Montague Summers' brief career as an Anglican clergyman.
Not one to give up easily, Summers quickly converted to Catholicism and commenced
study for the Roman Catholic priesthood at St. John's Seminary in Wornesh.33 Summers
received his clerical tonsure in the college chapel at Wornesh on 28 December 1910; however,
he would never receive his orders. The circumstances surrounding his failure to achieve
ordination are uncertain; Sewell remarks that “From one source you heard that he was an
unfrocked parson; from another that he had never had any right to style himself 'Reverend'; while
others said that he was not, and never had been, a Catholic.”34 In an attempt to shed light on the
matter, Sewell interviewed surviving clergymen who had known Montague Summers at

27 Ibid.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid., 9.
30 Ibid., 10.
31 Ibid.
32 Ibid.
33 Ibid., 12.
34 Ibid., 15.
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Wornesh. They related to Sewell an “authoritative tradition” that Summers' ordination to the
priesthood was cancelled only days before the official ceremony. Apparently, a reverend of the
diocese related some unknown information regarding Summers to the Bishop of Clifton, who in
turn told the Bishop of Nottingham, who promptly cancelled Summers' ordination.35 Whether it
was rumors of Summers' homosexuality or the scandal at Bitton that cost him his second chance
at the priesthood makes little difference—either one alone would disqualify an aspirant from
Holy Orders. Whatever the case, Summers' 1910 tonsuring is the last identifiable record of his
involvement in the Catholic Church. Although he represented himself as a Catholic priest for the
rest of his life—continuing to style himself “Reverend” and even celebrating the Mass in public
—his name does not appear in any official clerical registries.36
Forced to abandon his chosen career, Summers earned his living as a school master for
the next 15 years. His first appointment was at Hertford Grammar School, where he began
teaching in 1911.37 In 1912 he moved to London to teach at the Central School of Arts and
Crafts in Holborn, where he remained until 1921. From 1922 to 1926 Summers occupied the
post of “Senior English and Classics Master” at Brockley County School.38 Subsequently, he
retired from teaching and devoted himself entirely to writing. Brocard Sewell interviewed a
number of Summers' ex-pupils in the course of his researches. He found the teacher both well-
liked and vividly remembered by his students. Summers particularly impressed pupils with his
perfect knowledge of Latin; he apparently boasted that he could translate anything into the
language.39 It was also during these years that Summers perfected the bizarre and antiquated
style of dress which would later make him an easily recognizable figure in the occult world. An
ex-pupil remarked that “His dress was as near as it could be to his beloved Restoration and
Queen Anne period, with a long frock coat, purple stockings, buckled shoes, tall mounted cane,
and hair shaved at the sides and long at the back, until it appeared to be almost a short wig.”40
This led students to refer to Summers as “Wiggy”41 and later remember him as “one of the

35 Ibid., 14.
36 Ibid., 13.
37 Ibid., 24. During this period Summers began a long-lasting correspondence with the famous scholar of
mysticism Evelyn Underhill, to whom he had apparently given a relic of St Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi.
38 Ibid., 25.
39 Ibid., 24.
40 Ibid., 26.
41 Ibid., 28.
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strangest personalities ever to be pitchforked onto the staff of a Boys' School.”42

Shortly after he began teaching in London, Summers embarked upon a remarkable
second career as an author. He wrote on a variety of topics, but his three principle areas of
interest were Restoration theater, the Gothic novel, and the occult. Beginning in 1914 Summers
released an endless stream of essays, books, and collections which only dried up following his
death in 1948. According to Sewell, his career as a man of letters had actually begun in 1910
when he first met the “distinguished Elizabethan scholar” Arthur Henry Bullen.43 Bullen was a
publisher, an editor, a founding partner of the Shakespeare Head Press, and a well-known
authority on Elizabethan theater.44 Bullen was evidently impressed by the young school-master;
in 1914 Shakespeare Head released a handsome new edition of George Villiers' The Rehearsal
edited and introduced by Montague Summers.
Actually, Bullen did much more for the young Summers than put his name in print: he
opened doors to the elite intellectual and literary circles of London. The Rehearsal was followed
in 1915 by The Complete Work of Aphra Behn, published by William Henry Heinemann.
Following the success of these two volumes, Summers began contributing to periodicals at an
astonishing rate. 1916 alone saw the release of over twenty articles.45 Summers contributed
most frequently to the ongoing literary journal Notes & Queries, but he wrote for a range of other
periodicals, including The Occult Review, The Times Literary Supplement, and The Modern
Language Review.
Summers' works on restoration drama—especially his new editions of neglected authors
—were warmly received by his contemporaries. Reviewers especially praised his erudition and
attention to detail. The public intellectual Edward Gosse, for instance, writing in the 13 March
1927 edition of The Sunday Times, praised Summers' “energy and erudition. His notes are
astonishingly full of marrowy information, and, I should say, if I were not afraid again to incur
his displeasure, are often more entertaining than the particular text they illustrate.”46 Arthur

42 Ibid., 26. It is worth noting that there are no instances, accusations, or even rumors of sexual misconduct on the
part of Summers during his teaching years. On the contrary, all of hist students all spoke of him extremely
fondly—or at least so says Sewell.
43 Ibid., 30.
44 Richard Storer, “Bullen, Arthur Henry,” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford
University Press, 2004): <http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/32163>
45 Timothy D'Arch Smith, Montague Summers, a Bibliography (Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1983) 137-8.
46 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 35.
 Winchester 9

Symons, writing for The Daily Telegraph, complimented Summers' “profound, subtle,
controversial Introduction”47 to the 1923 Complete Works of William Congreve. Lytton Stachey
also admired the work. He wrote in The Nation and Athenaeum: “The get-up of these four
quarto volumes is admirable; and the critical prefaces, notes, and commentaries are a monument
of erudition and exactitude. Montague Summers's interesting introduction is full of learning,
argument, and feeling.”48 Brocard Sewell contends that “Summers's Introductions to the old
dramatists [...] are perhaps the best thing he ever wrote.”49 The Canadian novelist and professor
Robertson Davies seconds this opinion in his entry on Montague Summers in the Oxford
Dictionary of National Biography. Davies writes: “although the wrongs suffered by his church
obtrude needlessly here and there, the scope and depth of [Summers'] knowledge is awesome.”50
In 1919 Summers founded The Phoenix, a society devoted to staging the works of
Restoration dramatists. His work with the group helped expand his influence, and Sewell writes
that by this date Summers was well “on the way to becoming a social figure in London.”51 He
was a regular feature in the salon of society-hostess Lady Cunard, where he met many influential
literary figures. The performances Summers organized for the Phoenix drew large crowds and
he was greatly admired by the actors and actresses who worked with him. An ex-pupil who
studied under Summers during this period later recalled:
[He was] always a mysterious figure, with his large moon-like face, wearing a black shovel
hat and flowing cape, flitting bat-like across the literary scene of the twenties and early
thirties of the present century, hitting out around him right and left at any who dared hazard a
literary opinion contrary to his own—such as blaming Wycherley or praising Jeremy Collier.
In consequence, there came pouring after him in full pursuit a posse of outraged professors, a
hue and cry of book-sellers with bills in their hands, and an admiring following of young
actors and authors enchanted by his prolific knowledge of Restoration stage.52
In 1924, Summers expanded his reach beyond drama and started publishing new editions
of gothic novels. He began, appropriately, with a combined edition of the first gothic novel and
the first gothic play: The Castle of Otranto and The Mysterious Mother by Horace Walpole.53

47 Ibid., 33.
48 Ibid.
49 Ibid., 34.
50 Robertson Davies, “Summers, (Augustus) Montague,” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford
University Press, 2004): <http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/39387>
51 Ibid., 37.
52 Ibid., xi.
53 Timothy d'Arch Smith, Bibliography, 59-60.
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Summers had originally intended to publish new editions of all seven of the “Northanger Horrid
Novels” described by Jane Austen in Northanger Abbey. However, he ultimately only released
two: the Marquis de Grosse's Horrid Mysteries (pub. 1927)54 and Carl Friedrich Kahlert's The
Necromancer (pub. 1927).55 Summers' followed up with a new edition of Charlotte Dacre's
Zofloya (pub. 1928).56 Over the next decade Summers published two collections of gothic ghost
stories before concluding his writings on the genre with two important monographs: The Gothic
Quest (pub. 1938)57 and A Gothic Bibliography (pub. 1940).58 As with his work on Restoration
drama, Summers scholarly contributions to the study of the gothic genre were praised by
contemporaries. The historian Dr André Parreaux, for instance, wrote of The Gothic Quest: “the
amount of information offered, its general reliability, the perfect good faith of the author, and his
clear sense of values […] make The Gothic Quest a unique and valuable book, indispensable to
the student of the period, and not likely to be replaced soon.”59 Although The Gothic Quest has
lately been superseded by the work of other scholars, this “critical” study is still discussed in any
comprehensive academic overview of the gothic literature.60 Summers' Gothic Bibliography, on
the other hand, is as useful today as the day it was published.61
In his extensive introduction to The Castle of Otranto and The Mysterious Mother,
Summers writes:
The Romantic writer fell in love with the Middle Ages, the vague years of long ago, the days
of chivalry and strange adventure. He imagined and elaborated a medievalism for himself, he
created a fresh world, a world which never was and never could have been, a domain which
fancy built and fancy ruled. And in this land there will be mystery, because where there is
mystery beauty may always lie hid.62
Whether or not all this applies to the gothic authors he is describing, it certainly applies to
Summers himself. His works on witchcraft and Satanism are excellent examples of “a domain

54 Ibid., 65-6.
55 Ibid., 66.
56 Ibid., 73-4.
57 Ibid., 39-40.
58 Ibid., 40-41.
59 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 63.
60 Vijay Mishra, The Gothic Sublime (New York: SUNY Press, 1994) 1.
61 For a contemporary academic appraisal of The Gothic Quest and A Gothic Bibliography, see the annotated
bibliography to Carol Davison's Gothic Literature 1764-1824. Carol Margaret Davison, Gothic Literature 1764-
1824 (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2009) 343-5.
62 Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto and The Mysterious Mother, ed. Montague Summers (London: Chiswick
Press, 1924), ii.
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[...] fancy built and fancy ruled.”63 Summers' description of the Mass of Saint-Sécaire in A
Popular History of Witchcraft provides a perfect example. He writes:
Few priests know the awful ritual, and of those who are learned in such dark lore fewer yet
would dare to perform the monstrous ceremonies and utter the prayer of blasphemy. No
confessor, no bishop, not even the Archbishop of Auch, may shrive the celebrant; he can only
be absolved at Rome by the Holy Father himself. The mass is said upon a broken and
desecrated altar in some ruined or deserted church where owls hoot and mope and bats flit
through the crumbling widows, where toads spit their venom upon the sacred stone. The
priest must make his way thither late attended only by an acolyte of impure and evil life. At
the first stroke of eleven he begins; the liturgy of hell is mumbled backward, the canon said
with a mow and a sneer; he ends just as midnight tolls [… and] the man for whom that mass
is said will slowly pine away, nor doctor's skill nor physic will avail him aught, but he will
suffer, and dwindle, and surely drop into the grave.64
There is, of course, no evidence that the Mass of Saint-Sécaire was ever actually performed. The
best-known account occurs in Frazer's The Golden Bough, from which Summers copied his
description of the rite almost verbatim. Frazer relates the mass as an example of the superstitions
of the “ignorant classes” and rejects its literal reality.65 The fact that Summers presents it instead
as a bonafide medieval Satanic rite suggests that he is more concerned with effect and
atmosphere than factual reality.
Nevertheless, Summers presents his works on witchcraft as serious scholarship. Perhaps
aware that his interpretation of the phenomenon would be met with derision, he spends
considerable time outlining his methodology and establishing his academic credibility. In the
introduction to his first volume on the subject—1926's The History of Witchcraft and
Demonology—Summers states: “My present work is the result of more than thirty years close
attention to the subject of Witchcraft, and during this period I have made a systematic and
intensive study of [it].”66 As with his scholarship on Restoration drama and the gothic novel,
Summers worked almost exclusively from original sources. He writes that “The only sound
sources of information are the contemporary records ; the meticulously detailed legal reports of
the actual trials ; the vast mass of pamphlets which give eye-witnessed accounts of individual
witches and reproduce evidence verbatim as told in court ; and above all, the voluminous and

63 Ibid.
64 Montague Summers, A Popular History of Witchcraft (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1937) 188.
65 James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: a Study in Magic and Religion (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995),
62.
66 Montague Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology, xv.
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highly technical works of the Inquisitors and demonologists.”67 Summers held the final category
in particularly high regard. Whereas most contemporaries viewed the medieval witch hunters as
superstitious sociopaths responsible for countless innocent deaths, Summers considered them
“holy and reverend divines, doctors utriusque iuris, hard-headed, slow, and sober lawyers—
learned scholars of philosophic mind, the most honourable names in the universities of Europe,
in the forefront of literature, science, politics and culture.”68
Ever the diligent scholar, Summers read not only primary sources, but all the relevant
academic studies treating witchcraft as well. He frequently provides critical evaluations of these
works, such as when he writes: “Thomas Wright's Narratives of Sorcery and Magie, 2 vols.,
1851, is to be commended as the work of a learned antiquarian who often referred to original
sources, but it is withal sketchy and can hardly satisfy the careful scholar.”69 Summers
vehemently denies that the medieval witch scare can be explained away as “Freudian, hysterical,
or political,” or as the outcome of “the merry frolics of peasants or the suspicions of superstitious
clergy.”70 On the contrary, he argues that “far […] from the confessions of the witches being
mere hysteria and hallucination they are proved, even upon the most material interpretation to be
in the main hideous and horrible fact.”71 Summers especially criticizes Margaret Murray's
famous The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, which he argues, “although worked out with nice
ingenuity and no little documentation, is radically and wholly erroneous.”72 He writes of
Murray's thesis:
That here and there lingered various old harmless customs and festivities which had come
down from pre-Christian times and which the Church had allowed, nay, had even sanctified
by directing them to their right source, the Maypole dances, for example, and the Midsummer
fires which now honour S. John Baptist, is a matter of common knowledge. But this is no
continuance of a pagan cult.73
Summers rightly accuses Murray of selectively picking facts and distorting evidence to support
her theory of a Pan-European pagan cult, but the alternative analysis he provides is even more
preposterous. Indeed, there is a curious discrepancy between Summers' bull-headed insistence

67 Ibid., 1.
68 Ibid., 15. Summers translated and published a number of medieval works by the inquisitors he admired.
69 Ibid., x.
70 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 49.
71 Montague Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology, 10.
72 Ibid., 32.
73 Ibid., 43.
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on the reality of witchcraft and the careful and cogent argumentation he employs throughout his
books. It is precisely this discrepancy which caused one contemporary reviewer to remark on
Summers' “odd mixture of learning and almost childish credulity.”74
After all of his careful debunking of Murray's work, Summers ultimately concludes that
“Anthropology alone offers no explanation of Witchcraft. Only the trained theologian can
adequately treat the subject.”75 In keeping with this position, Summers occasionally abandons
scholarship entirely and adopts the tone and methodology of a medieval inquisitor. In true
heresiological style, he traces witchcraft—and, indeed, all heresy—back to Simon Magus and
Zoroaster, the originators of “Manichaeism.”76 Summers also engages in spirited polemic
against mediumship and séances, or “modern Witchcraft, for frankly such is Spiritism in
effect.”77 He devotes an entire chapter in The History of Witchcraft in Demonology to “Diabolic
Possession and Modern Spiritism,” in which he explores the devilish dangers of the movement.
He ultimately concludes that “this 'New Religion' is but the Old Witchcraft.”78 Summers,
moreover, considers witches the source of all political agitation. He writes:
It must be clearly borne in mind that these heretical bodies with their endless ramifications
were not merely exponents of erroneous religious and intellectual beliefs by which they
morally corrupted all who came under their influence, but they were the avowed enemies of
law and order, red-hot anarchists who would stop at nothing to gain their ends. Terrorism and
secret murder were their most frequent weapons.79
In The History of Witchcraft and Demonology Summers equates witches with anarchism. By the
1937 release of A Popular History of Witchcraft he considers them the architects of communism

74 E.J. Dingwall, “Review: The Vampire: His Kith and Kin by Montague Summers.” Man vol 29 (1929): 92. Given
the quality of Summers' scholarship in other areas, it is tempting to think that—if one could correct for Summers'
single clearly stated bias—his witchcraft studies might be academically rehabilitated. Whatever the case, his
works remain invaluable as collections of quotes—most of which Summers adapted from rare, original
manuscripts.
75 Montague Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology, 45.
76 Ibid., 17. This is a perfect example of what Wouter Hanegraaff calls “genealogies of darkness.” Hanegraaff
writes in his Guide for the Perplexed, “A particularly effective strategy of polemical discourse is the creation of
historical genealogies according to which all forms of heresy can be imagined as having sprung from a single
origin. Irenaeus described Simon Magus (Acts 8:9- 24) as the original arch- heretic and instrument of the devil,
and this narrative was adopted during the sixteenth century by many anti- witchcraft authors and critics of
heresy.” Wouter Hanegraaff, Western Esotericism: a Guide for the Perplexed (London: Bloomsbury Academic,
2013), 57.
77 Ibid., xii. It is curious that although Spiritualism was very much in decline by the 1920s, Summers treats it as a
Satanic plague poised to sweep the earth.
78 Ibid., 256.
79 Ibid., 17.
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as well. “The Communist […] is superficially atheist, but he certainly has a god, for he has set
up Satan as his god, who is worshiped not with prayer [… but] by anarchy and blood.”80
Ultimately, Summers' polemics are a perfect imitation of the vague and paranoid fears of
the original inquisitors. In fact, Summers' learned inquisitor act was so convincing that people
began to refer to him as “the witchfinder”—a title which gave him considerable delight.81 Not
everyone, however, took Summers' writings at face value. Throughout his life he was dogged by
rumors of Satanism, occultism, and magical practice. A Dominican Friar who knew Summers
remarked that he was “a good man whose romantic fascination with evil had in earlier days
involved him in certain dark activities.”82 Compensation for youthful transgressions would
certainly explain Summers' zealous attacks on witchcraft; however, many rumors accused him of
diabolism even as an adult. A particularly common story contented that “at some time in the
nineteen-thirties Summers was inhibited from receiving holy communion in Blackfriars Priory
Church at Oxford because he was suspected of receiving holy communion with sacrilegious
intent.”83 Sewell rejects the rumor and denies that Summers was at any point a practicing
occultist, but Timothy d'Arch Smith is convinced that he officiated at a Black Mass in 1913.84
Whether or not Summers actually engaged in such sacrilegious practices, his friendship with
Aleister Crowley was certainly long-standing. In the late twenties Summers advised Crowley on
the prospects of his experimental sexual perfume, “It.”85 In the summer of 1940, he was a
frequent guest at Crowley's Richmond home, where the two would talk late into the night.86
According to biographer Lawrence Sutin, Crowley's friend Lance Sieveking once asked him if
he had ever met Summers—“The question was natural enough, as Crowley and Summers were

80 Montague Summers, A Popular History of Witchcraft, 16-17

81 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 81.
82 Ibid., 79.
83 Ibid., 79-80.
84 “On Boxing Day of [1918], to Eton Road, Hampstead, Summers invited [Anatole] James to participate in the
Black Mass. There can be no question of the truth of that. James, although an old man when I knew him, had an
exceptional memory; and he was no liar […] His agnosticism, rather his utter disbelief in things religious, had
rendered the ceremony acutely tedious. He knew enough of such matters to understand he was witnessing a
debased form of the Roman Mass […] There were only three people present: Summers, Anatole, and a youth
named Sullivan. Anatole was not asked again.” Timothy d'Arch Smith, The Books of the Beast (Oxford:
Mandrake, 1991): 44.
85 Lawrence Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000): 343.
86 Ibid., 389. This is originally reported by Donald Cammell, Crowley's friend and biographer, who often attended
the meetings as well.
 Winchester 15

the two greatest figures in the British occult world at that time.”87 Crowley surprised Sieveking
by speaking fondly of Summers. He had naturally “[assumed] the two men to be mortal
enemies.”88
Clearly, there was a significant gap between Summers' public image and his private life.
This naturally raises the question: which of the rumors circulating about Summers were true? He
certainly made no attempt to dispel them himself; interviewers would occasional ask him about
the rumors of his diabolical practices, and he always replied in “a humorous non-committal way”
that left his air of mystique intact.89 Sewell remarks that much of the mystery surrounding
Summers' life is a byproduct of his naturally theatrical personality. “Summers was a born actor,
and he could assume a deliberately sinister role when he pleased.”90 Many others who knew
Summers remarked that he always seemed to be wearing a mask, which makes perfect sense in
light of his love of outlandish dress and Restoration theater. Sewell also speculates that
Summers' double life was a defense mechanism to help disguise his “sexual inversion.” Indeed,
the pederasty charges leveled against Summers, his obvious relish when recounting the “foul
orgies”91 of witches, his “distinctly decadent” poetry, and his extensive writings on the Marquis
de Sade, all point to a darker sexual side. Ultimately, however, there is no concrete evidence of
sexual impropriety on Summers' part. Like so much of his life, his romantic and sexual interests
remain shrouded in mystery.
Given Summers' extremely rich and varied literary output—not to mention his colorful
and influential life—it is curious that he has so largely eluded scholarly comment. Summers'
books have lately enjoyed an extraordinary resurgence in popularity. The History of Witchcraft
and Demonology alone has gone through over 60 editions since it was first reissued in 1956.92
Summers' works on vampirism are particularly popular, thanks no doubt to the Twilight series of
novels by Stephanie Miller, which contain a number of references to the learned Reverend.93
Evidently Summers is on the rise in the occult imagination—all the more reason he should be

87 Ibid, 338.
88 Ibid.
89 Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, 81.
90 Ibid.
91 Montague Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology, 44.
92 Data obtained via WorldCat, 10 May 2015. <www.worldcat.org>
93 Lois H. Gresh, The Twilight Companion: the Unofficial Guide to the Bestselling Twilight Series (New York: Pan
Macmillan, 2009): 75.
 Winchester 16

seriously studied.
It seems fitting to give the final word on Summers to his friend John Redwood-Anderson.
Anderson knew Summers well during the latter's conversion to Catholicism, and his impressions
of the period are suggestive.
Certainly [the] conversion appeared to have no deeper spiritual significance […] It was, once
again, a matter of ritual; Rome had the correct and effective ritual; the Church of England had
not. I should have been really glad to know what really lay under his change of religious
outlook, yet the only clear impression that I received […] was of the actor who had found a
new role more suited to his talents; or worse, of the magician who had a found a more
authentic and powerful magic.94

94 Ibid., 18.
 Winchester 17

Bibliography

d'Arch Smith, Timothy. Montague Summers, a Bibliography. Wellingborough: Aquarian Press,

1983.
d'Arch Smith, Timothy. The Books of the Beast. Oxford: Mandrake, 1991. Print.
Davies, Robertson. “Summers, (Augustus) Montague.” Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004. <http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/39387>
Davison, Carol Margaret. Gothic Literature 1764-1824. Cardiff: University of Wales Press,
2009. Print.
Dingwall, E.J. “The Vampire: His Kith and Kin by Montague Summers.” Man vol 29 (1929): 92-
93. Print.
Frazer, James George. The Golden Bough: a Study in Magic and Religion. New York: Simon &
Schuster, 1995. Print.
Gresh, Lois H. The Twilight Companion: the Unofficial Guide to the Bestselling Twilight Series.
New York: Pan Macmillan, 2009. Print.
Hanegraaff, Wouter. Western Esotericism: a Guide for the Perplexed. London: Bloomsbury
Academic, 2013. Print.
Jerome, Joseph. Montague Summers: a Biographical Memoir. London: Cecil & Amelia Woolf,
1965.
Mishra, Vijay. The Gothic Sublime. Albany: SUNY Press, 1994. Print.
“Mr. Asquith's Brother Cremated.” The Advertiser. Adelaide, SA: 4 February 1919. P. 9. Print.
Summers, Montague. A Popular History of Witchcraft. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner &
Co., 1937. Print.
Summers, Montague. The History of Witchcraft and Demonology. London: Kegan Paul, Trench,
Trubner & Co., 1926. Print.
Summers, Montague. The Galanty Show: an Autobiography. London: Cecil & Amelia Woolf,
1980. Print.
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Storer, Richard. “Bullen, Arthur Henry.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford
University Press, 2004. <http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/32163>
Sutin, Lawrence. Do What Thou Wilt: The Life of Aleister Crowley. New York: St. Martin's
Griffin, 2002. Print.
Villiers, George. The Rehearsal. Ed. Montague Summers. London: The Shakespeare Head Press,
1914. Print.
Walpole, Horace. The Castle of Otranto and The Mysterious Mother. Ed. Montague Summers.
London: Chiswick Press, 1924. Print.
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Appendix I

Google's “Ngram Viewer” searches over 30 million scanned books for words or phrases and
plots their frequency across time on a graph. Limitations include the large body of as-yet
unscanned material and textual corruption caused by the scanning process. The results are
nonetheless indicative of the frequency with which a phrase—such as a name—occurs within
published books during a given period of time. The results of this particular search display an
inversion: the once well-known Montague Summers has lately been eclipsed by both Aleister
Crowley and Margaret Murray.
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Appendix II

Summers was widely enough known in his lifetime for a caricature of him to appear in the
Evening Standard. Joseph Jerome, Montague Summers, xviii.