Demon of the Day

Demon of the Day is a 40-card oracle by Travis McHenry, published by Rockpool in 2024. Its cards draw on Goetic demons, figures named in the Ars Goetia, a book of ritual magic traditionally associated with King Solomon, the biblical king of ancient Israel.

Above: Furcas, a white-bearded knight on horseback, appears among the alphabetical entries. The facing page combines other demonological notes with a hybrid creature.

This double-page spread comes from the 1863 French edition of Jacques Collin de Plancy’s Dictionnaire infernal. Furcas appears within an alphabetical reference work that ranges across demonology, magic, divination, Kabbalah, witchcraft and superstition. The book gathers named figures, stories and engravings rather than presenting a single continuous account, which helps explain why its imagery could be selected for a pack such as Demon of the Day.

Rockpool presents these demons as infernal spirits that helped Solomon build his temple. Each card gives one of them a daily message. The box invites the reader to shuffle while thinking of a question or problem, then draw a card, or to draw one each morning. It credits McHenry for the text and images, and Sara Lindberg at Rockpool Publishing for the design.

Each reverse carries a seal or sigil for its named demon. The box says these sigils use Kabbalistic magic to connect with a Goetic demon. Kabbalah is a Jewish mystical tradition. The pack brings that sigil practice together with figures and seals from the Ars Goetia.

Many of the illustrations draw on Jacques Collin de Plancy’s Dictionnaire infernal, a French reference work published in 1863. It is an alphabetical catalogue of the nineteenth century’s occult world: demonology sits beside magic, divination, palmistry, spirits, witchcraft, superstition and prodigies.

Its entries give named demons a short account and a grotesque form. McHenry draws from that material for many of the card images, then repurposes it as a daily oracle with the name on the face and the seal on the reverse.