Unexplained History

A sick young man writes home from a house devoted to spiritual freedom. His wife adds a private plea on the back: they need food, a warm bed and a way to leave Sicily. Within days, Raoul Loveday will be dead. What happened inside Aleister Crowley's Abbey of Thelema?
The final chapter of our Halloween special follows Crowley's claimed revelation in Cairo, his public rites, his writings on sexual energy and will, and the community he established at Cefalu. Jane Wolfe, Leah Hirsig, Loveday and Betty May enter a story of spiritual ambition, drugs, illness and dependence. Surviving letters, Crowley's own accounts, the hostile press campaign and the later Hamnett libel proceedings reveal sharply different versions of life at the abbey.
Our final segment asks what those records can support, what remains disputed, and why the human consequences matter after the legends are examined. A brief original Hilaritas Podcast interview excerpt features biographer Richard Kaczynski discussing how writers select the pieces of Crowley's life.
Crowley's quotations are performed by a newly designed synthetic dramatic reader. These are attributed readings, not historical recordings of him. Other people's testimony has not been recreated.
Selected sources and source audio:
The Book of the Law: https://library.oto-usa.org/libri/liber0220.html
Loveday to his parents, 11 February 1923: https://aleistercrowleytimeline.com/Correspondence/1923/1923-02-11-Loveday-to-Parents.htm
Loveday to Betty May, 12 February 1923: https://aleistercrowleytimeline.com/Correspondence/1923/1923-02-12-Loveday-to-May.html
Richard Kaczynski, Hilaritas Podcast episode 24: https://www.hilaritaspress.com/podcasts/richard-kaczynski-on-aleister-crowley-episode-24/

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🎧 Unexplained History explores the myths, mysteries, and misunderstood moments that shaped our world. Hosted by Tom Mackenzie and Don Masterson. New episodes every week.
Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen — and uncover the stories history tried to forget.

More at The Unexplained Company

History, Mystery, True Crime, Conspiracy, Paranormal, CIA, Cold War, Ancient Aliens, Archaeology, Unsolved, Supernatural, Tom McKenzie, Audio Drama, Storytelling, Documentaries.

This episode includes AI-generated content.

A young man raised on the Bible buys a house beside Loch Ness, intending to meet an angel. He later claims the unfinished undertaking left something darker behind. Who was Aleister Crowley before he became infamous, and what happened at Boleskine?
Tom McKenzie and our narrator begin with Crowley's childhood, follow him through Cambridge and into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and examine the demanding operation he encountered in Mathers's translation of Abramelin. Mirrored rooms, a quarrel over occult authority and Crowley's own accounts of unexplained sounds lead into the house's enduring reputation. In the final segment, we return to the records to separate documented events from later legends.
The fifth chapter of our six-part Halloween special opens a two-episode investigation of Crowley. Part Two follows his teaching to Sicily, the Abbey of Thelema and the death of Raoul Loveday.
Crowley's quotations are performed by a newly designed synthetic dramatic reader. These are attributed readings of his writings, not historical recordings of him. The brief modern Boleskine source excerpt is from the Grimm Life Collective's 2023 site film.
Selected sources and source audio:
Crowley's 1929 autobiography: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.172571
Mathers's 1898 Abramelin edition: https://sacred-texts.com/grim/abr/index.htm
Boleskine House history: https://boleskinehouse.org/history
Grimm Life Collective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCIUHbN3KsA

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unexplained-history--6429156/support.

🎧 Unexplained History explores the myths, mysteries, and misunderstood moments that shaped our world. Hosted by Tom Mackenzie and Don Masterson. New episodes every week.
Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen — and uncover the stories history tried to forget.

More at The Unexplained Company

History, Mystery, True Crime, Conspiracy, Paranormal, CIA, Cold War, Ancient Aliens, Archaeology, Unsolved, Supernatural, Tom McKenzie, Audio Drama, Storytelling, Documentaries.

This episode includes AI-generated content.

Urbain Grandier is dead, but the possessions at Loudun continue. The Jesuit Jean-Joseph Surin takes up the work and describes a struggle that seems to cross from the woman he is treating into his own body.

The fourth chapter of our Halloween special follows Jeanne des Anges through exorcism, reported sacred marks, a miraculous garment and a journey into royal circles. The final segment weighs the testimony, its later publication and the suffering that public declarations of victory did not end.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unexplained-history--6429156/support.

🎧 Unexplained History explores the myths, mysteries, and misunderstood moments that shaped our world. Hosted by Tom Mackenzie and Don Masterson. New episodes every week.
Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen — and uncover the stories history tried to forget.

More at The Unexplained Company

History, Mystery, True Crime, Conspiracy, Paranormal, CIA, Cold War, Ancient Aliens, Archaeology, Unsolved, Supernatural, Tom McKenzie, Audio Drama, Storytelling, Documentaries.

This episode includes AI-generated content.

In seventeenth-century Loudun, reports of possession inside an Ursuline convent became a public confrontation between exorcists, magistrates and an accused priest. Urbain Grandier had survived one prosecution. The next would place alleged demonic testimony before a royal commission.

The third episode of our six-part Halloween special follows the accusations, the tests, the alleged pacts and the execution. Its final segment examines how the evidence was gathered and why the story continued after the condemned man was dead.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unexplained-history--6429156/support.

🎧 Unexplained History explores the myths, mysteries, and misunderstood moments that shaped our world. Hosted by Tom Mackenzie and Don Masterson. New episodes every week.
Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen — and uncover the stories history tried to forget.

More at The Unexplained Company

History, Mystery, True Crime, Conspiracy, Paranormal, CIA, Cold War, Ancient Aliens, Archaeology, Unsolved, Supernatural, Tom McKenzie, Audio Drama, Storytelling, Documentaries.

This episode includes AI-generated content.

John Dee leaves England seeking divine knowledge. In continental Europe, his work with Edward Kelley brings him before rulers, draws religious scrutiny, and eventually produces an instruction that threatens the boundaries of both men's marriages.

The second chapter of our six-episode Halloween special follows the surviving accounts through patronage, conflict and the demand Dee called a hard and impure doctrine. Its final segment assesses the records, the reported gold, and the limits of what we can know about the women asked to obey.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unexplained-history--6429156/support.

🎧 Unexplained History explores the myths, mysteries, and misunderstood moments that shaped our world. Hosted by Tom Mackenzie and Don Masterson. New episodes every week.
Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen — and uncover the stories history tried to forget.

More at The Unexplained Company

History, Mystery, True Crime, Conspiracy, Paranormal, CIA, Cold War, Ancient Aliens, Archaeology, Unsolved, Supernatural, Tom McKenzie, Audio Drama, Storytelling, Documentaries.

This episode includes AI-generated content.