John Dee, the original 007

Before Daniel Craig, Pierce Brosnan and Roger Moore- hell, even before Sean Connery- there was the Faustian character of Dr John Dee. The 16th century English mathematician and astronomer is far better remembered today as a magician, Hermetic philosopher and royal astrologer to Queen Elizabeth I. Adding to that already-substantial portfolio, there’s long been a theory that John Dee’s missions to the courts of continental Europe weren’t purely to ply his trade as an alchemist and conjuror, but rather as part of the extensive Elizabethan spy network. The 007 code was first used by John Dee as a cipher to mark letters that were for the Queen’s eyes only. The exact meaning has been lost to history- the number could have had an auspicious meaning for Dee, or else the zeros could represent two eyes, and the elongated seven might actually be a square-root sign.


The Earl of Leicester- who had been a student of Dr Dee- used a similar cipher for his own correspondence with the Queen, though dropping the seven and adding two dots to the zeros to complete the eye symbolism (although, Leicester being almost certainly Elizabeth’s secret lover, this could just as easily denote another part of the royal anatomy).

There’s considerable evidence of connections between Dee and Sir Francis Bacon, Sir Philip Sidney (the Earl of Leicester’s nephew), as well as other infamous members of the first English “secret service” founded by Sir Francis Walsingham. Also worth noting is the strong association cryptography had in this period with the occult- or perhaps it is better to say that cryptography was itself a kind of occult practice that, like astrology and other esoteric disciplines, necessitated a thorough grounding in complex mathematics. Consider the work of Johannes Trithemius for instance, or Robert Fludd, or that arch-heretic of the later renaissance, Giordano Bruno (incidentally a close associate of the aforementioned Philip Sidney- also, like Dee, has been tapped as a possible spy for Elizabeth and Walsingham). The foremost mathematician of the period, Pedro Nunes (a Portuguese marrano by birth) was an accomplished astrologer- he was a direct influence on John Dee, Christopher Clavius (architect of the Gregorian calendar), Gemma Frisius (taught Dee and Mercator) and many others. Indeed it might appear that the diverse fields of mathematics, navigation, cartography and astronomy very often came together as part and parcel with hermetic philosophy, astrology, cabalism and espionage.

Sure there are other explanations for Ian Fleming’s use of 007 as the codename for his James Bond character, but Fleming knew his history and his novels are peppered with similar little references. The fictional recusant Bond family were derived from the 17th century Stuart courtier and baronet, Sir James Bond, and their motto of “Orbis non sufficit” - The World is not enough - was that of King Philip II of Spain, the great nemesis of Elizabethan England.