L’ars memoriae, mnémotechnie secrète. Auto-promotion et pratiques commerciales controversées

Abstract

The art of memory is often associated with secret knowledge by both Renaissance scholars
and 21st-century researchers. This article aims to demonstrate that this association was not
solely due to the use of mnemonics in magical and esoteric practices but also because memory
instructors employed a rhetoric of secrecy to control the dissemination of their expertise
and attract students. The first part of the article will describe the marginal place of the art of
memory in the books of secrets, the second will provide an overview of literary and mnemonic
sources to illustrate how and why mnemonics were considered a secret practice, while
the third will focus on Henry Herdson (b. c. 1611 - ?), an author of a memory manual and a
mnemonic instructor, to better understand the commercial utility of the rhetoric of secrecy.