A 16th-century grimoire claims Alloces teaches astronomy and holds a grimoire in his hand. But unlike most Goetic spirits who command legions as their primary function, this Great Duke bridges two worlds: he answers questions about hidden things while also revealing the mechanical laws of the heavens. Alloces is a Goetic demon (the 52nd spirit in the Ars Goetia) who appears as a soldier riding a crocodile, carrying a book he will open for the summoner, and commanding 36 legions of spirits.
Le Grand Grimoire’s library catalogs the 72 spirits of the Lemegeton, and Alloces occupies a curious middle ground. He is neither a king nor a president, but a duke who teaches rather than commands. Understanding where he fits relative to the other 71 spirits requires looking at his position in the hierarchy, the nature of his gifts, and how practitioners have interpreted him across four centuries of ceremonial magic.
The Hierarchy Explains Why Alloces Matters
The Ars Goetia arranges its 72 spirits into a strict feudal structure. Kings outrank dukes. Dukes outrank marquises. Presidents and earls sit below. Alloces, as the 52nd spirit, falls squarely among the dukes alongside Bune, Gusion, and Sallos. But the numbering does not directly map to power. It maps to sequence in the conjuration list.
What matters more is Alloces’ unique combination of attributes. Most dukes in the Goetia command between 20 and 40 legions. Alloces commands 36, placing him near the top of the dukes by military force, though far below the 66 legions of the Great Duke Bael (who is actually a king despite the title). The crocodile he rides signals something else entirely.
A crocodile in Renaissance demonology meant duality. It lives in water and on land, a creature of two worlds, neither fully at home in either. The image fits Alloces precisely. He teaches astronomy, which is a science of celestial law, but he also reveals secrets, which is an art of hidden knowledge. He operates in the observable and the occult simultaneously, a hybrid role that few other Goetic spirits share.
What Alloces Offers That Other Spirits Do Not
The Ars Goetia describes Alloces as one who “teaches astronomy and all the liberal sciences.” That phrasing matters. “Liberal sciences” meant the quadrivium: arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. These were the foundations of medieval education, the subjects that prepared a student for philosophy and theology. Alloces, by this description, is a tutor, not a warlord.
Compare him to Agares, who makes people dance and teaches languages. Compare him to Vassago, who declares past, present, and future. Compare him to Marbas, who reveals mechanical arts and can change shape. Each spirit specializes, but Alloces’ specialty is systematic knowledge of the cosmos. He does not merely predict. He explains how the machine works.
This distinction matters for practitioners. A summoner who wants to know a future event calls Vassago or Raum. A summoner who wants to understand the principles that govern that event calls Alloces. He does not show the clock’s face. He shows the gears.
Historical grimoires reflect this difference. The 1904 edition of the Lemegeton by S.L. MacGregor Mathers lists Alloces as appearing “in the form of a soldier riding a great horse.” Later editions corrected this to the crocodile. The confusion itself reveals something. A soldier suggests martial force. Alloces is not a fighter. He is a scholar in armor.
The Crocodile Changes Everything
No other Goetic demon rides a crocodile. Buer appears as a star with five legs. Valefor takes a lion’s body with a man’s head. But only Alloces mounts an animal associated with the Nile, with Set, with the primordial chaos that preceded creation.
The crocodile in Egyptian mythology was both feared and sacred. Sobek, the crocodile god, represented pharaonic power, military might, and the fertile flood of the Nile. Renaissance demonologists, drawing on classical sources, would have known this. They would also have known Pliny the Elder’s description of the crocodile as a creature that moves its upper jaw, an anatomical oddity that made it seem unnatural.
Alloces, then, appears on a symbol of hybrid nature. The demon himself is a hybrid. He teaches mathematics and astronomy, which are rational, while also revealing mysteries, which are occult. The crocodile carries him across the boundary between known and unknown, the visible sky and the hidden forces behind it.
No other Goetic spirit rides an animal associated with a specific regional mythology in this way. Bune appears as a three-headed dragon. Sitri appears as a leopard with wings. These are generic monstrous forms. Alloces’ crocodile is specific. It points to Egypt, to Gnostic cosmology, to the idea that the demon himself is a keeper of ancient knowledge that predates Christianity.
How Alloces Compares to Other Teaching Spirits
The Goetia contains several spirits whose primary function is instruction. Comparing them reveals Alloces’ place:
- Marbas teaches mechanical arts and can cure diseases. His knowledge is applied, practical.
- Buer teaches herbal medicine and moral philosophy. His domain is the body and ethics.
- Vepar teaches navigation and knowledge of the sea. Her domain is maritime.
- Amdusias teaches music. His domain is sound.
- Alloces teaches astronomy and liberal sciences. His domain is the cosmos itself, the structure of reality.
Notice that none of these overlap exactly. Alloces is the only Goetic spirit whose teaching focuses on the laws of heaven. The stars were considered divine in medieval and Renaissance cosmology. They were signs of God’s order. By teaching astronomy, Alloces essentially teaches the language in which creation was written.
This made him dangerous to the Church. Understanding the cosmos too well risked heresy. A summoner who learned from Alloces might begin to ask why the spheres moved, who set them in motion, and whether the angelic intelligences were truly separate from the demons. The line between astronomy and astrology, between science and divination, had not yet been drawn.
The 36 Legions Problem
Alloces commands 36 legions of spirits. The number appears in virtually every edition of the Ars Goetia. But what does 36 mean?
In Jewish mystical tradition, the number 36 is significant. The Lamed Vav Tzadikim are 36 righteous people who sustain the world. The number appears in the Sefer Yetzirah as the 36 letters of creation. In astrology, the decans divide the zodiac into 36 sections of ten degrees each.
Goetic legions are not literal military units any more than a spirit’s “appearance” is literal. The number of legions a spirit commands correlates with its sphere of influence. Alloces’ 36 legions align with the decans, the faces of the stars. A spirit who teaches astronomy commands forces that correspond to the heavens themselves.
Compare this to Paimon, who commands 200 legions and serves as a king. Paimon’s vast forces reflect his status as a ruler over broad domains. Alloces’ smaller but precise number reflects his specialized function. He does not rule. He instructs. His legions are not soldiers but students, or perhaps the stars themselves.
Alloces in the Grimoire Tradition
The earliest known version of the Ars Goetia appears in a 17th-century manuscript, Harley 6483, held at the British Library. Alloces appears there as “Alloges” or “Alloces” depending on the scribe’s hand. The spelling inconsistencies across manuscripts suggest a word that scribes found unfamiliar.
Some scholars have proposed that the name derives from the Greek “allos,” meaning other, combined with “koitos,” meaning bed or resting place. The etymology remains speculative. What is certain is that Alloces does not appear in earlier Solomonic texts like the Testament of Solomon, which predates the Lemegeton by at least a millennium.
This late emergence matters. Alloces is not an ancient demon in the sense that Lucifer or Beelzebub are ancient. He is a Renaissance creation, assembled from classical and medieval elements to fill a specific role in the Goetic system. He represents the Renaissance fascination with mathematics, astronomy, and the rediscovery of ancient knowledge.
Common Misconceptions About Alloces
The most persistent error about Alloces concerns his appearance. Modern sources often describe him as riding a “great horse” based on the Mathers translation. The earlier manuscript evidence supports the crocodile. The distinction is not pedantic. The animal changes the demon’s symbolic meaning.
Another misconception treats Alloces as a mere “revealer of secrets” in the same category as Vassago or Seere. This flattens his role. Alloces reveals systematic knowledge, not random facts. He teaches astronomy as a discipline. A summoner who asks Alloces for a simple prediction misses the point.
A third error assumes Alloces is hostile or dangerous. Like all Goetic spirits in the Solomonic tradition, he is constrained by the circle and the triangle. His nature is neither good nor evil in the Christian sense. He is a teacher whose subject happens to be forbidden.
Finally, some modern practitioners conflate Alloces with Alocer, a duchess in certain later grimoires. The names are similar, and some traditions have merged them. The Ars Goetia treats them as distinct. Alocer appears as the 52nd spirit of the Lemegeton? No. Alocer is a different spirit from some later traditions. The confusion persists.
FAQ
Is Alloces dangerous to summon? No more than any other Goetic spirit when proper Solomonic procedures are followed. The circle and triangle constrain his action.
Can Alloces predict the future? He reveals hidden knowledge, but his primary domain is astronomy and the liberal sciences, not fortune-telling. He explains how the cosmos works.
What does Alloces look like? He appears as a soldier riding a crocodile, holding a grimoire in his hand. Some older sources say a horse, but the crocodile is original.
How many legions does Alloces command? Thirty-six legions of spirits, a number that may correspond to the 36 decans of the zodiac.
The Practical Distinction
For the practitioner, the difference between Alloces and other Goetic spirits comes down to intent. A ritual for Bune seeks financial gain. A ritual for Marchosias seeks martial protection. A ritual for Alloces seeks understanding.
The summoner who calls Alloces does not ask for wealth or love. They ask for the map of heaven. They ask how the spheres turn, what the stars say, and why the cosmos follows the laws it does. Alloces answers with mathematics, with geometry, with the patient explanation of a tutor who has been teaching for centuries and expects his students to study.
That is what separates him from the rest. The other spirits grant favors. Alloces grants knowledge. And knowledge, in the grimoire tradition, is the most dangerous gift of all.
The demonology and Goetia hub catalogs all 72 spirits with their seals, attributes, and historical transmission. For a deeper look at how Goetic spirits are organized, read the hierarchy of the Ars Goetia explained. The Seal of Alloces page offers the binding diagram used in Solomonic conjuration.