Occult Profiles: Baron Julius Cesare Andrea Evola

Baron Julius Cesare Andrea Evola is one of history's most enigmatic occult and parapolitical figures. Little-known outside Europe, Evola is often cited as the Godfather of contemporary Italian fascism and radical politics. A close examination of the historical record reveals a more complex figure. Evola wore many masks: a parapolitical philosopher who ranked with Oswald Spengler and Arnold Toynbee, a religious historian who coresponded with Mircea Eliade, and a provocateur who dabbled in Dada.

Born to a Catholic aristocratic family on May 19, 1898, Evola led an extraordinary life as a mountaineer, philosopher, solider, religious historian, artist, magician and political theorist.

Fluent in French and German, the young Evola was significantly influenced by the virtue theory of German philosopher Friedrich Neitzsche. As an ardent Mountain climber, the young Italian found spiritual invigoration upon the peaks of the Alps. Coming to age on the dawn of the First World War, Evola joined the Italian Army serving in the Mountain Artillery. (...)

Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga, a Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites, spiritual oblivion and organised deviancy. To counter this and call in a primordial rebirth, Evola presented his world of Tradition. The core trilogy of Evola's works are generally regarded as Revolt Against the Modern World, Men Among the Ruins and Ride the Tiger. According to one scholar, "Evola’s thought can be considered one of the most radically and consistently antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular systems in the twentieth century."^[1] Much of Evola's theories and writings are centred on spiritualism and mysticism; the inner life. He authored books covering themes such as Hermeticism, the metaphysics of sex, Tantra, Buddhism, Taoism, mountaineering, the Holy Grail, the essence and history of civilisations, decadence and various philosophic and religious Traditions dealing with both the Classics and the Orient.

Evola relocated to Vienna, where he found himself translating Masonic documents for Heinrich Himmler's SS, a political and military organization that he had long admired. During an Allied-bombing sweep in 1945, Evola was injured, leaving him in a wheelchair for his remaining life. The Mountaineer was never to climb a peak again, however his ashes were deposited atop Mt. Rosa, upon his death in 1974. (...)

Today, Evola still has a significant influence on Continental magic (especially Italian), and has remained an icon for right wing political groups, such as Italy's "revolutionary cells" and France's National Front Party.