Des Vermis Mysteriis -

: Prinn allegedly wrote the manuscript while imprisoned for witchcraft in Brussels; it was published in Cologne in 1542, shortly after he was burned at the stake. Thematic Content

The text is pseudepigraphically attributed to , a 16th-century Belgian sorcerer, alchemist, and alleged diabolist. According to tradition, Prinn traveled extensively in the Middle East, Egypt, and the ruins of Babylon, where he claimed to have decoded pre-diluvian tablets written in a cuneiform-like script. des vermis mysteriis

This belief was fueled by the fact that Robert Bloch had grounded Prinn in real historical settings (the Crusades, Prague, the Inquisition). For a time, the fictional alchemist achieved a status similar to the Comte de St. Germain—a figure whom history cannot definitively prove existed, yet whom legend refuses to let die. : Prinn allegedly wrote the manuscript while imprisoned