ABSTRACT
The ‘observations (very many to the houre and minute) of the heavenly influences and operations actuall in this elementall portion of the world’, which Dee began to make while at Louvain in 1547, undoubtedly refer in part to some brief manuscript notes found in one of the first astrological works he acquired. 1 These notes include a chart of planetary positions that, when corrected for time and place, would give the positions of the planets at Louvain at noon on the first of November 1548, from which the horoscope for that month could be cast. The horoscope for the first day of a year, a quarter, or a month was also the horoscope for the entire period beginning with that day and provided a basis from which weather predictions for those periods could be derived. Further, these notes include a list of weather observations that note the temperature, the direction and force of the wind, and various atmospheric conditions, such as the type and extent of cloud cover and precipitation, along with the time when changes in these conditions occurred at Louvain for each day of August 1548. Although the weather observations and the table for planetary positions do not coincide chronologically, they serve as examples of Dee’s programme to observe the influences and operations of the heavens in the elemental sphere by relating concrete meteorological events to the changing dispositions of the heavens. Dee continued to make similar observations throughout the rest of his life, recording the place, time, and characteristics of meteorological phenomena alongside the planetary configurations given in the ephemerides that he used as a diary. 2
