The Solomonic Grimoire Family
From the Testament of Solomon to the Lemegeton and its descendants.
Legends of Solomon commanding demons are ancient, but the grimoires that bear his name are not one book copied down the centuries. The Testament of Solomon is a late-antique Greek narrative; the Clavicula (Key) appears in Latin and Italian manuscripts from the fifteenth century; the Lemegeton (Lesser Key) is a seventeenth-century compilation.
Later French chapbook grimoires borrowed Solomonic names and procedures freely. The labels below separate proven textual borrowing from shared legend.
The Lineage
Listed in approximate chronological order. The label above each title states how it relates to the rest of the family.
The Testament of Solomon
Greek narrative of Solomon binding demons with a ring. Shares the legend with later grimoires but is not their textual source.
Clavicula Salomonis de Secretis
A Latin witness to the Key of Solomon manuscript family.
The Key of Solomon the King (Clavicula Salomonis)
Mathers’ English edition assembled from British Museum manuscripts of the Clavicula.
The Key of Solomon the King (Clavicula Salomonis)
S.L. MacGregor Mathers (trans.)
Heptameron
Planetary angel magic whose conjurations were reused in later Solomonic compilations.
The Lesser Key of Solomon (Lemegeton)
Five-part compilation; its Goetia catalogue overlaps with Johann Weyer’s 1577 Pseudomonarchia daemonum.
The Lesser Key of Solomon (Lemegeton)
S.L. MacGregor Mathers & Aleister Crowley
Goetia
Edition of the first book of the Lemegeton.
Grimorium Verum (True Grimoire)
Claims Solomonic authority and borrows material from the Key, but is a separate French compilation.
The Grand Grimoire
French popular grimoire in the same genre; Solomonic in name only.
The Grimoire of Honorius
Distinct from the medieval Sworn Book despite the shared name.
Relationship Labels
Root text: The earliest surviving text the family is organised around.
Direct textual relationship: Shares or reworks text, or is a translation or edition, of an earlier member (supported by manuscript or textual scholarship).
Influence: Draws on ideas, names or structures from earlier members without reproducing their text.
Similar tradition: Belongs to the same current or genre; no textual dependence is claimed.