An Attempt to Date
an Occultist
October, 2014
G.D.O'Bradovich III
The Oxford English Dictionary has been consulted and secondary sources are in red. Due to the recent open nature of the occult, citations beyond the year 1800 are included.
Forms:
15–16 occulte, 15– occult; Sc. pre-17 ocult, pre-17 17– occult.
Etymology:
< classical Latin occultus secret, hidden from the understanding, hidden, concealed, past participle of occulere to cover up, hide, conceal
< ob- ob- prefix + the stem of which a lengthened form is seen in cēlāre to hide (see cele v.), cognate with Early Irish ceilid(Irish ceil ), Welsh celu to hide, conceal (12th–13th cent.), Old High German helan to hide, conceal (see hele v.1).
Compare Anglo-Norman and Middle French, French occulte secret (first half of the 12th cent. in Anglo-Norman; also in Anglo-Norman as oculte (first half of the 12th cent.)), Italian occulto (1308), Spanish oculto (1438), Catalan ocult (1481), Portuguese oculto (16th cent.). With use as noun compare classical Latin occulta secrets, use as noun of neuter plural of occultus (see above), and French occulte secret thing (1821).
With occult philosophy (see quot. 1651 at sense A. 1b) compare post-classical Latin occulta philosophia , title of a work by H. C. Agrippa (1531), and Frenchphilosophie occulte (1603 or earlier). With occult sciences (see quots. 1711 at sense A. 1b, 1903 at sense A. 1b) compare French sciences occultes (1690).
With occult qualities (see sense A. 2c) compare French qualités occultes (1677). With occult disease (see sense A. 3b) compare classical Latin occulti morbi , plural (Pliny). With occult line (see sense A. 3c) compare French ligne occulte (1690).
A. adj.1 a. Not disclosed or divulged, secret; kept secret; communicated only to the initiated. Nowrare.
a1513 J. Irland Meroure of Wyssdome (1926) I. 128
His fyrst cummyne was occult & secret.
1533 J. Bellenden tr. Livy Hist. Rome (1822) i. 62
Began to rise ilk day occult slauchteris and cruelteis in his ciete.
1621 R. Burton Anat. Melancholy iii. ii. ii. v. 591
Such occult notes, Stenography, Polygraphy, [etc.].
1655 H. L'Estrange Reign King Charles 60
By occult interests of State.
1673 J. Ray Observ. Journey Low-countries 255
These suffrages are all occult, that is, given by putting of balls into balloting-boxes.
1741 C. Middleton Hist. Life Cicero I. vi. 457
Ancient and occult sacrifices were polluted.
1789 J. Bentham Introd. Princ. Morals & Legisl. Pref. 5
Those philosophers of antiquity, who are represented as having held two bodies of doctrine, a popular and an occult one.
1841 I. D'Israeli Amenities Lit. I. 323
Printing remained..a secret and occult art.
1885 R. Bridges Eros & Psyche v. iii. 54
Of their plots occult [they] Sat whispering on their beds.
1990 A. Tomlinson et al. Consumption, Identity & Style (1991) (BNC) 153
Although couched in the typically occult language of the time, Garland's prescient account [in his notorious homosexual novel of 1953 The Heart in Exile] catches society at a crossroads.
b. Of or relating to magic, alchemy, astrology, theosophy, or other practical arts held to involve agencies of a secret or mysterious nature; of the nature of such an art; dealing with or versed in such matters; magical.
1593 G. Harvey Pierces Supererogation 162
Occult Philosophers, wrap-vp their profoundest..mysteries in the..closest intrals of an Asse.
a1634 W. Austin Devotionis Augustinianae Flamma (1635) 249
Much vertue and power is attributed to these..by the Occult Philosophers.
1651 J. Freake (title)
Three books of occult philosophy, written by Henry Cornelius Agrippa..Translated out of the Latin into the English tongue.
1711 Ld. Shaftesbury Characteristicks III. Misc. ii. i. 53
From this Parent-Country of occult Sciences..he was presum'd..to have learnt..judicial Astrology.
1797 W. Taylor in Monthly Rev. 24 509
Agrippa and his friends had a taste for the occult sciences, for alchemy, divination, dæmonurgy, and astrology.
1832 W. Irving Alhambra I. 216
A beetle of baked clay, covered with Arabic inscriptions, which was pronounced a prodigious amulet of occult virtues.
1851 D. Wilson Archaeol. & Prehist. Ann. Scotl. (1863) II. iv. iii. 257
A charm, or occult sign.
1884 H. Jennings Phallicism xiii. 133
An assertion of the occult philosophers.
1903 F. L. Gardner (title)
A Catalogue raisonné of works on the occult sciences.
1961 A. Christie Pale Horse v. 64
She's very occult... Goes in for spiritualism and trances, and magic. Not quite black masses, but that sort of thing.
1993 Times 29 July 5/1
Sales of horror and occult books are stronger than ever.
2 a. Not apprehended, or not apprehensible, by the mind; beyond ordinary understanding or knowledge; abstruse, mysterious; inexplicable.
a1549 A. Borde Fyrst Bk. Introd. Knowl. (1870) Forewords 25
To pronostycate any mater of the occulte iugements of god.
1597 King James VI & I Daemonologie (1924) 44
He is farre cunningner then man in the knowledge of all the occult properties of nature.
1661 J. Glanvill Vanity of Dogmatizing iii. 26
Some secret Art of the Soul, which to us is utterly occult, and without the ken of our Intellects.
1751 Johnson Rambler No. 160. ⁋8 Some have..an occult power of stealing upon the affections.
1830 J. F. W. Herschel Prelim. Disc. Study Nat. Philos. i. iii. 39
If..the essential qualities..be really occult, or incapable of being expressed in any form intelligible to our understandings.
1856 D. Masson Ess. 430
The occult suasion of the rhyme.
1925 J. M. Murry Keats & Shakespeare v. 57
That is an indication of Keats' own awareness that the connection between his expressed thought and his true poetic thought is so occult that Bailey will be baffled.
1961 J. Heller Catch-22 xx. 202
For a few precarious seconds, the chaplain tingled with a weird, occult sensation of having experienced the identical situation before in some prior... existence.
1979 C. Reid Arcadia (BNC) 21
Flying to Vegas, there we struck What seemed, to foreign eyes, to be Some occult empire of ennui.
2. With the. The realm of the unknown; the supernatural world or its influences, manifestations, etc.; (collectively) magic, alchemy, astrology, and other practical arts of a secret or mysterious nature (see A. 1b).
a1888 J. B. Stephens Universally Respected in Austral. Poets 1788–1888 (1888) 499
There were forces supersensual that higher were and stronger, And with consentaneous clamour we pronounced for the occult.
1900 J. Jastrow Fact & Fable in Psychol. ii. ii. 57
The supernormal, transcendent, undiscovered world of the occult shines through..the commonplace, constrained phenomena of earth-bound reality.
1957 E. Jones Sigmund Freud III. xiv. 411
Ferenczi's belief in the occult was also certainly stronger than Freud's.
1991 Healing & Wholeness Jan. 42/2
His literature revealed that he was into every kind of religious sect and cult, including the occult, and all sorts of fringe groups.
Etymology:
< occult adj. + -ism suffix. Compare French occultisme (1842).
The doctrine, principles, or practice of occult science. See occult adj. 1b.
1876 C. Sotheran P. B. Shelley as Philosopher & Reformer 16
A great traveler, and most learned modern writer on Occultism, who claims..to have been received into the ancient branch of the Rosie Cross in the far East, Madame P. de Blavatsky.
1881 A. P. Sinnett Occult World (1883) 3
It is chiefly in the East that occultism is still kept up—in India and in adjacent countries.
1886 St. James's Gaz. 25 Sept. 6/1
Occultism was, indeed, a necessary concomitant of polytheism.
1932 Internat. Jrnl. Ethics 42 495
Modern scientific civilization opposes the ways of occultism.
1958 Spectator 1 Aug. 160/1
He [sc. Freud] was always attracted by telepathy (so much so that he alarmed his English followers, who feared that it would give their enemies an excuse to sneer at analysis as occultism).
1984 C. Wilson Lord of Underworld Introd. 9
The surge of interest in ‘occultism’—in the paranormal and Eastern religious disciplines.
Etymology:
< occult adj. + -ist suffix. Compare occultism n. Compare French occultiste (1891).
A. n.An expert in or adherent of occultism.
1876 C. Sotheran P. B. Shelley as Philosopher & Reformer 18
For the Man Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, the carpenter's carnate son, the mystical Essene and occultist, Shelley exceeded in love and reverence many of the most earnest Christians.
1881 A. P. Sinnett Occult World (1883) 12
The occultists have been a race apart from an earlier period than we can fathom.
1948 Yale French Stud. No. 2. 76
This is not only a view inherited from occultists, it translates an aspiration so profound that it is doubtless from it essentially that surrealism will be considered as having taken its substance.
1986 R. Pollack Teach Yourself Fortune Telling iv. 66
Most occultists, however, connect the Tarot primarily to Kabbala, a vast and complex system of esoteric teachings.
B. adj.
Of or relating to occultists or occultism.
1893 Mind 2 99
Even among the more rational votaries of hypnotism, who stand aloof from such superstitious errors, the insidious influence of this occultist current is apt to show itself in many ways.
1902 Encycl. Brit. XXX. 275/1
Cabalistic, occultist, Indian, and modern spiritualistic ideas and formulas.
1977 R. L. Wolff Gains & Losses iv. 316
Charles Maurice Davies['s]..book The Great Secret (1896)..was published anonymously. His occultist leanings were, however, well known.
1990 Daily Herald (Arlington Heights, Illinois) 30 Nov. 3/3 A magazine article..claimed the literature anthology contained violent and occultist materials.
15–16 occulte, 15– occult; Sc. pre-17 ocult, pre-17 17– occult.
Etymology:
< classical Latin occultus secret, hidden from the understanding, hidden, concealed, past participle of occulere to cover up, hide, conceal
< ob- ob- prefix + the stem of which a lengthened form is seen in cēlāre to hide (see cele v.), cognate with Early Irish ceilid(Irish ceil ), Welsh celu to hide, conceal (12th–13th cent.), Old High German helan to hide, conceal (see hele v.1).
Compare Anglo-Norman and Middle French, French occulte secret (first half of the 12th cent. in Anglo-Norman; also in Anglo-Norman as oculte (first half of the 12th cent.)), Italian occulto (1308), Spanish oculto (1438), Catalan ocult (1481), Portuguese oculto (16th cent.). With use as noun compare classical Latin occulta secrets, use as noun of neuter plural of occultus (see above), and French occulte secret thing (1821).
With occult philosophy (see quot. 1651 at sense A. 1b) compare post-classical Latin occulta philosophia , title of a work by H. C. Agrippa (1531), and Frenchphilosophie occulte (1603 or earlier). With occult sciences (see quots. 1711 at sense A. 1b, 1903 at sense A. 1b) compare French sciences occultes (1690).
With occult qualities (see sense A. 2c) compare French qualités occultes (1677). With occult disease (see sense A. 3b) compare classical Latin occulti morbi , plural (Pliny). With occult line (see sense A. 3c) compare French ligne occulte (1690).
A. adj.1 a. Not disclosed or divulged, secret; kept secret; communicated only to the initiated. Nowrare.
a1513 J. Irland Meroure of Wyssdome (1926) I. 128
His fyrst cummyne was occult & secret.
1533 J. Bellenden tr. Livy Hist. Rome (1822) i. 62
Began to rise ilk day occult slauchteris and cruelteis in his ciete.
1621 R. Burton Anat. Melancholy iii. ii. ii. v. 591
Such occult notes, Stenography, Polygraphy, [etc.].
1655 H. L'Estrange Reign King Charles 60
By occult interests of State.
1673 J. Ray Observ. Journey Low-countries 255
These suffrages are all occult, that is, given by putting of balls into balloting-boxes.
1741 C. Middleton Hist. Life Cicero I. vi. 457
Ancient and occult sacrifices were polluted.
1789 J. Bentham Introd. Princ. Morals & Legisl. Pref. 5
Those philosophers of antiquity, who are represented as having held two bodies of doctrine, a popular and an occult one.
1841 I. D'Israeli Amenities Lit. I. 323
Printing remained..a secret and occult art.
1885 R. Bridges Eros & Psyche v. iii. 54
Of their plots occult [they] Sat whispering on their beds.
1990 A. Tomlinson et al. Consumption, Identity & Style (1991) (BNC) 153
Although couched in the typically occult language of the time, Garland's prescient account [in his notorious homosexual novel of 1953 The Heart in Exile] catches society at a crossroads.
b. Of or relating to magic, alchemy, astrology, theosophy, or other practical arts held to involve agencies of a secret or mysterious nature; of the nature of such an art; dealing with or versed in such matters; magical.
1593 G. Harvey Pierces Supererogation 162
Occult Philosophers, wrap-vp their profoundest..mysteries in the..closest intrals of an Asse.
a1634 W. Austin Devotionis Augustinianae Flamma (1635) 249
Much vertue and power is attributed to these..by the Occult Philosophers.
1651 J. Freake (title)
Three books of occult philosophy, written by Henry Cornelius Agrippa..Translated out of the Latin into the English tongue.
1711 Ld. Shaftesbury Characteristicks III. Misc. ii. i. 53
From this Parent-Country of occult Sciences..he was presum'd..to have learnt..judicial Astrology.
1797 W. Taylor in Monthly Rev. 24 509
Agrippa and his friends had a taste for the occult sciences, for alchemy, divination, dæmonurgy, and astrology.
1832 W. Irving Alhambra I. 216
A beetle of baked clay, covered with Arabic inscriptions, which was pronounced a prodigious amulet of occult virtues.
1851 D. Wilson Archaeol. & Prehist. Ann. Scotl. (1863) II. iv. iii. 257
A charm, or occult sign.
1884 H. Jennings Phallicism xiii. 133
An assertion of the occult philosophers.
1903 F. L. Gardner (title)
A Catalogue raisonné of works on the occult sciences.
1961 A. Christie Pale Horse v. 64
She's very occult... Goes in for spiritualism and trances, and magic. Not quite black masses, but that sort of thing.
1993 Times 29 July 5/1
Sales of horror and occult books are stronger than ever.
2 a. Not apprehended, or not apprehensible, by the mind; beyond ordinary understanding or knowledge; abstruse, mysterious; inexplicable.
a1549 A. Borde Fyrst Bk. Introd. Knowl. (1870) Forewords 25
To pronostycate any mater of the occulte iugements of god.
1597 King James VI & I Daemonologie (1924) 44
He is farre cunningner then man in the knowledge of all the occult properties of nature.
1661 J. Glanvill Vanity of Dogmatizing iii. 26
Some secret Art of the Soul, which to us is utterly occult, and without the ken of our Intellects.
1751 Johnson Rambler No. 160. ⁋8 Some have..an occult power of stealing upon the affections.
1830 J. F. W. Herschel Prelim. Disc. Study Nat. Philos. i. iii. 39
If..the essential qualities..be really occult, or incapable of being expressed in any form intelligible to our understandings.
1856 D. Masson Ess. 430
The occult suasion of the rhyme.
1925 J. M. Murry Keats & Shakespeare v. 57
That is an indication of Keats' own awareness that the connection between his expressed thought and his true poetic thought is so occult that Bailey will be baffled.
1961 J. Heller Catch-22 xx. 202
For a few precarious seconds, the chaplain tingled with a weird, occult sensation of having experienced the identical situation before in some prior... existence.
1979 C. Reid Arcadia (BNC) 21
Flying to Vegas, there we struck What seemed, to foreign eyes, to be Some occult empire of ennui.
2. With the. The realm of the unknown; the supernatural world or its influences, manifestations, etc.; (collectively) magic, alchemy, astrology, and other practical arts of a secret or mysterious nature (see A. 1b).
a1888 J. B. Stephens Universally Respected in Austral. Poets 1788–1888 (1888) 499
There were forces supersensual that higher were and stronger, And with consentaneous clamour we pronounced for the occult.
1900 J. Jastrow Fact & Fable in Psychol. ii. ii. 57
The supernormal, transcendent, undiscovered world of the occult shines through..the commonplace, constrained phenomena of earth-bound reality.
1957 E. Jones Sigmund Freud III. xiv. 411
Ferenczi's belief in the occult was also certainly stronger than Freud's.
1991 Healing & Wholeness Jan. 42/2
His literature revealed that he was into every kind of religious sect and cult, including the occult, and all sorts of fringe groups.
Etymology:
< occult adj. + -ism suffix. Compare French occultisme (1842).
The doctrine, principles, or practice of occult science. See occult adj. 1b.
1876 C. Sotheran P. B. Shelley as Philosopher & Reformer 16
A great traveler, and most learned modern writer on Occultism, who claims..to have been received into the ancient branch of the Rosie Cross in the far East, Madame P. de Blavatsky.
1881 A. P. Sinnett Occult World (1883) 3
It is chiefly in the East that occultism is still kept up—in India and in adjacent countries.
1886 St. James's Gaz. 25 Sept. 6/1
Occultism was, indeed, a necessary concomitant of polytheism.
1932 Internat. Jrnl. Ethics 42 495
Modern scientific civilization opposes the ways of occultism.
1958 Spectator 1 Aug. 160/1
He [sc. Freud] was always attracted by telepathy (so much so that he alarmed his English followers, who feared that it would give their enemies an excuse to sneer at analysis as occultism).
1984 C. Wilson Lord of Underworld Introd. 9
The surge of interest in ‘occultism’—in the paranormal and Eastern religious disciplines.
Etymology:
< occult adj. + -ist suffix. Compare occultism n. Compare French occultiste (1891).
A. n.An expert in or adherent of occultism.
1876 C. Sotheran P. B. Shelley as Philosopher & Reformer 18
For the Man Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, the carpenter's carnate son, the mystical Essene and occultist, Shelley exceeded in love and reverence many of the most earnest Christians.
1881 A. P. Sinnett Occult World (1883) 12
The occultists have been a race apart from an earlier period than we can fathom.
1948 Yale French Stud. No. 2. 76
This is not only a view inherited from occultists, it translates an aspiration so profound that it is doubtless from it essentially that surrealism will be considered as having taken its substance.
1986 R. Pollack Teach Yourself Fortune Telling iv. 66
Most occultists, however, connect the Tarot primarily to Kabbala, a vast and complex system of esoteric teachings.
B. adj.
Of or relating to occultists or occultism.
1893 Mind 2 99
Even among the more rational votaries of hypnotism, who stand aloof from such superstitious errors, the insidious influence of this occultist current is apt to show itself in many ways.
1902 Encycl. Brit. XXX. 275/1
Cabalistic, occultist, Indian, and modern spiritualistic ideas and formulas.
1977 R. L. Wolff Gains & Losses iv. 316
Charles Maurice Davies['s]..book The Great Secret (1896)..was published anonymously. His occultist leanings were, however, well known.
1990 Daily Herald (Arlington Heights, Illinois) 30 Nov. 3/3 A magazine article..claimed the literature anthology contained violent and occultist materials.
The above references in chronological order.
1513a (1926) His fyrst cummyne was occult & secret.
1533 (1822) Began to rise ilk day occult slauchteris and cruelteis in his ciete.
1549a (1870) To pronostycate any mater of the occulte iugements of god.
1593 Occult Philosophers, wrap-vp their profoundest..mysteries in the..
1597 King James VI & I Daemonologie (1924) 44 .. then man in the knowledge of all the occult properties of nature.
1621 Such occult notes, Stenography, Polygraphy, [etc.].
1634a (1635) power is attributed to these... Occult Philosophers.
1651 Three books of occult philosophy, written by Henry Cornelius Agrippa...
1655 By occult interests of State.
1661 Some secret Art of the Soul, which to us is utterly occult, ...
1673 These suffrages are all occult, that is, given by putting of balls into balloting-boxes.
1711 From this Parent-Country of occult Sciences...to have learnt..judicial Astrology.
1741 Ancient and occult sacrifices were polluted.
1751 Some have..an occult power of stealing upon the affections.
1789 Those philosophers of antiquity...held two bodies of doctrine, a popular and an occult one.
1797 Agrippa and his friends had a taste for the occult sciences, ...and astrology.
1830 If..the essential qualities..be really occult, or incapable of being expressed in any form intelligible to our understandings.
1832 A beetle of baked clay,... which was pronounced a prodigious amulet of occult virtues.
1841 Printing remained..a secret and occult art.
1851 (1863) A charm, or occult sign.
1856 The occult suasion of the rhyme.
1876 ... learned modern writer on Occultism, who claims...
1876 .. . carnate son, the mystical Essene and occultist, ...
1881 (1883) The occultists have been a race apart from an earlier period than we can fathom.
1881 (1883) It is chiefly in the East that occultism is still kept up—in India and in adjacent countries.
1884 An assertion of the occult philosophers.
1885 Of their plots occult [they] Sat whispering on their beds.
1886 Occultism was, indeed, a necessary concomitant of polytheism.
1888a (1888) There were forces supersensual that higher were and stronger... we pronounced for the occult.
1893 ... from such superstitious errors, the insidious influence of this occultist current is apt to show itself in many ways.
1900 The supernormal, transcendent, undiscovered world of the occult shines through...
1902 Cabalistic, occultist, Indian, and modern spiritualistic ideas and formulas.
1903 A Catalogue raisonné of works on the occult sciences.
1925 ...true poetic thought is so occult that Bailey will be baffled.
1932 Modern scientific civilization opposes the ways of occultism.
1948 This is not only a view inherited from occultists, it translates an aspiration so profound...
1957 Ferenczi's belief in the occult was also certainly stronger than Freud's.
1958 He [sc. Freud] was always attracted by telepathy ... an excuse to sneer at analysis as occultism).
1961 She's very occult... Goes in for spiritualism and trances, and magic. ...
1961 ...a weird, occult sensation of having experienced the identical situation before in some prior..existence.
1977 ....was published anonymously. His occultist leanings were, however, well known.
1979 Flying to Vegas, there we struck What seemed, to foreign eyes, to be Some occult empire of ennui.
1984 The surge of interest in ‘occultism’—in the paranormal and Eastern religious disciplines.
1986 Most occultists, however, connect the Tarot primarily to Kabbala,...
1990 (1991) (BNC) Although couched in the typically occult language of the time...
1990 ...claimed the literature anthology contained violent and occultist materials.
1991 ...he was into every kind of religious sect and cult, including the occult, ...
1993 Sales of horror and occult books are stronger than ever.
The following are the dates of the first primary citation by year.
1513a (1926) His fyrst cummyne was occult & secret.
1533 (1822) Began to rise ilk day occult slauchteris and cruelteis in his ciete.
1549a (1870) To pronostycate any mater of the occulte iugements of god.
1593 Occult Philosophers, wrap-vp their profoundest..mysteries in the..
1597 King James VI & I Daemonologie (1924) 44 .. then man in the knowledge of all the occult properties of nature.
1621 Such occult notes, Stenography, Polygraphy, [etc.].
1634a (1635) power is attributed to these... Occult Philosophers.
1651 Three books of occult philosophy, written by Henry Cornelius Agrippa...
1655 By occult interests of State.
1661 Some secret Art of the Soul, which to us is utterly occult, ...
1673 These suffrages are all occult, that is, given by putting of balls into balloting-boxes.
1711 From this Parent-Country of occult Sciences...to have learnt..judicial Astrology.
1741 Ancient and occult sacrifices were polluted.
1751 Some have..an occult power of stealing upon the affections.
1789 Those philosophers of antiquity...held two bodies of doctrine, a popular and an occult one.
1797 Agrippa and his friends had a taste for the occult sciences, ...and astrology.
1830 If..the essential qualities..be really occult, or incapable of being expressed in any form intelligible to our understandings.
1832 A beetle of baked clay,... which was pronounced a prodigious amulet of occult virtues.
1841 Printing remained..a secret and occult art.
1851 (1863) A charm, or occult sign.
1856 The occult suasion of the rhyme.
1876 ... learned modern writer on Occultism, who claims...
1876 .. . carnate son, the mystical Essene and occultist, ...
1881 (1883) The occultists have been a race apart from an earlier period than we can fathom.
1881 (1883) It is chiefly in the East that occultism is still kept up—in India and in adjacent countries.
1884 An assertion of the occult philosophers.
1885 Of their plots occult [they] Sat whispering on their beds.
1886 Occultism was, indeed, a necessary concomitant of polytheism.
1888a (1888) There were forces supersensual that higher were and stronger... we pronounced for the occult.
1893 ... from such superstitious errors, the insidious influence of this occultist current is apt to show itself in many ways.
1900 The supernormal, transcendent, undiscovered world of the occult shines through...
1902 Cabalistic, occultist, Indian, and modern spiritualistic ideas and formulas.
1903 A Catalogue raisonné of works on the occult sciences.
1925 ...true poetic thought is so occult that Bailey will be baffled.
1932 Modern scientific civilization opposes the ways of occultism.
1948 This is not only a view inherited from occultists, it translates an aspiration so profound...
1957 Ferenczi's belief in the occult was also certainly stronger than Freud's.
1958 He [sc. Freud] was always attracted by telepathy ... an excuse to sneer at analysis as occultism).
1961 She's very occult... Goes in for spiritualism and trances, and magic. ...
1961 ...a weird, occult sensation of having experienced the identical situation before in some prior..existence.
1977 ....was published anonymously. His occultist leanings were, however, well known.
1979 Flying to Vegas, there we struck What seemed, to foreign eyes, to be Some occult empire of ennui.
1984 The surge of interest in ‘occultism’—in the paranormal and Eastern religious disciplines.
1986 Most occultists, however, connect the Tarot primarily to Kabbala,...
1990 (1991) (BNC) Although couched in the typically occult language of the time...
1990 ...claimed the literature anthology contained violent and occultist materials.
1991 ...he was into every kind of religious sect and cult, including the occult, ...
1993 Sales of horror and occult books are stronger than ever.
The following are the dates of the first primary citation by year.
A. 1b
A. 1a A. 2a A. B. 2. |
1593
1621 1661 1876 1876 1893 1900 |
occult
occult occult occultism occultist occultist occult |
We can date an occultist to the year 1876 and we note that the 18th Century Occult Revival in England and France, as well as Germany, was expanding throughout western civilization.
APPENDIX:
AN ATTEMPT TO DATE
AN APPRENTICE
Forms:
ME aprentys, apprentys, 15 apprentise, ME– apprentice.
Etymology:
< Old French aprentis, nominative of aprentif ,
< aprendre to learn (see apprehend v.), 3rd singular aprent , by form-assoc. with words in -tis , -tif
< Latin -tīvus , -tīvum : see -ive suffix. (Modern French takes apprentis as plural with singular apprenti .)
Compare appentice n. The aphetic prentice n. appears in English as early as the full word, and was for several centuries the more usual form.
A. n.1.
A learner of a craft; one who is bound by legal agreement to serve an employer in the exercise of some handicraft, art, trade, or profession, for a certain number of years, with a view to learn its details and duties, in which the employer is reciprocally bound to instruct him.
1362 Langland Piers Plowman A. ii. 190
Apparayleden him as a prentis.
1362 Langland Piers Plowman A. iii. 218
Alle kunne craftes men · craueþ Meede for heore prentys [1393 for here aprentys].
1551 T. Wilson Rule of Reason sig. Gvv,
To make seruauntes, and apprentises fre.
1660 R. Coke Elements Power & Subjection 5
in Justice Vindicated, His duller child he binds an apprentice to some trade.
1756 C. Lucas Ess. Waters iii. 299
A fact known to the apprentices of apothecaries.
1863 M. Howitt tr. F. Bremer Greece & Greeks I. i. 11
Poor boys, of good families, will often take service as apprentices.
3. By extension: One who is only learning the rudiments; an unskilled novice, a tyro.
1489 Caxton tr. C. de Pisan Bk. Fayttes of Armes i. xvi. 47
Noo prentiz..in puttyng his oost in fayre ordenance.
1639 T. Fuller Hist. Holy Warre iv. xxvii. 216
As yet they were Apprentises to piracie.
1863 C. Cowden Clarke Shakespeare-characters xv. 377
A mere apprentice in treason.
ME aprentys, apprentys, 15 apprentise, ME– apprentice.
Etymology:
< Old French aprentis, nominative of aprentif ,
< aprendre to learn (see apprehend v.), 3rd singular aprent , by form-assoc. with words in -tis , -tif
< Latin -tīvus , -tīvum : see -ive suffix. (Modern French takes apprentis as plural with singular apprenti .)
Compare appentice n. The aphetic prentice n. appears in English as early as the full word, and was for several centuries the more usual form.
A. n.1.
A learner of a craft; one who is bound by legal agreement to serve an employer in the exercise of some handicraft, art, trade, or profession, for a certain number of years, with a view to learn its details and duties, in which the employer is reciprocally bound to instruct him.
1362 Langland Piers Plowman A. ii. 190
Apparayleden him as a prentis.
1362 Langland Piers Plowman A. iii. 218
Alle kunne craftes men · craueþ Meede for heore prentys [1393 for here aprentys].
1551 T. Wilson Rule of Reason sig. Gvv,
To make seruauntes, and apprentises fre.
1660 R. Coke Elements Power & Subjection 5
in Justice Vindicated, His duller child he binds an apprentice to some trade.
1756 C. Lucas Ess. Waters iii. 299
A fact known to the apprentices of apothecaries.
1863 M. Howitt tr. F. Bremer Greece & Greeks I. i. 11
Poor boys, of good families, will often take service as apprentices.
3. By extension: One who is only learning the rudiments; an unskilled novice, a tyro.
1489 Caxton tr. C. de Pisan Bk. Fayttes of Armes i. xvi. 47
Noo prentiz..in puttyng his oost in fayre ordenance.
1639 T. Fuller Hist. Holy Warre iv. xxvii. 216
As yet they were Apprentises to piracie.
1863 C. Cowden Clarke Shakespeare-characters xv. 377
A mere apprentice in treason.
We are left with the uncomfortable position of acknowledging that "Apprentices" are documented before "Occultists". We look forward to the day when the Oxford English Dictionary rectifies this obvious oversight.