This connection between the ideals of the Enlightenment and the old world of magic and superstition from which these demons sprung was, in many ways, made literal by the figure of Collin de Plancy himself.

There were several editions of the book; perhaps the most famous is the 1863 edition, which included sixty-nine illustrations by Louis Le Breton depicting the appearances of several of the demons. If anything, the strange verisimilitude of the insect-like creature makes le Breton’s image all the more terrifying. Like his uncle, Collin de Plancy was originally a partisan of liberty, equality, and fraternity, an enthused reader of Voltaire and a zealous rationalist and skeptic; also like his uncle, he would ultimately see himself reconciled to that Church he had rejected, though with a detour through the darker corners of demonology. If there is any consolation to be found, it’s that controlling our demons is possible if we’re able to name them, whether they are of the supernatural or of the rationalist variety — and in either case, a dictionary is what we shall need. De Plancy published dozens of titles in his lifetime, but he never surpassed the success (or infamy) of the Dictionnaire Infernal, which first appeared in 1818 and was followed by several updated editions.

Since 1863, the illustrations from de Plancy’s book have also been used to accompany esoteric titles such as new printings of the Lesser Key of Solomon, plus any number of books on magic and demonology (thanks, Public Domain! The Dictionnaire Infernal (English: Infernal Dictionary) is a book on demonology, describing demons organised in hierarchies.

The most interesting edition of the text is the final one of 1863, illustrated with creepy exactitude by le Breton, whose brilliant Doré-esque engravings elevate the work beyond the relative staidness of previous editions.Of course, Collin de Plancy’s concern in the Dictionnaire infernal wasn’t just the defecation of minor demons.

The Dictionnaire Infernal (English: " Infernal Dictionary") is a book on demonology, describing demons organised in hierarchies.

All together, across nearly six hundred pages, Collin de Plancy provided entries for sixty-five different demons, including favorites from the pages of Dante, Milton, and others, such as Asmodeus, Azazel, Bael, Behemoth, Belphégor, Belzebuth, Mammon, and Moloch. The Dictionnaire Infernal compiled the names, ranks, attributes, and appearances of hundreds of demons, as well as their histories, legends, and influences on human affairs. The Dictionnaire infernal, far from being an archaic remnant, reminds us that sharp distinctions between antiquity and modernity ultimately mean little.

The preface authoritatively claimed that Collin de Plancy had “reconfigured his labors, recognizing that superstitious, foolish beliefs, occult sects and practices . The Phoenician god Ba’al, from whom Collin de Plancy’s Bael derives his name, was associated with all manner of idolatries and blasphemies, and is also the inspiration for that other lieutenant of hell, Belzebuth (or Beelzebub), the trusted advisor of Lucifer whose name appears in the records of exorcists from Loudun to Salem. Not an entirely inappropriate connection, for the Dominican inquisitor Sebastian Michaelis, who classified the demons he encountered as an exorcist at the infamous monastery of Loudun in the seventeenth century, associated Astaroth with the new rationalist philosophies that were just being born in France.There, between the entry for a seventeenth-century Anglican theologian named Assheton and one for the Levantine goddess Astarte, is the demon Astaroth. Later in life, de Plancy embraced Catholicism and revised his work to conform to the Church’s views. Ignoring Astaroth’s claws and demon mount, his look of calculated intelligence could easily be that of one of the armchair intellectuals who dined with the philosophes of the Enlightenment Paris of Collin de Plancy’s youth. While it’s true that the grand experiment of the Enlightenment was supposedly to shine the light of rationality upon the shadows of superstition, the desire to assemble all possible information is one which the grimoire and the dictionary share.