Birth and early career Much of Kelley's early life is obscure. He said he was descended from the family of
Ui Maine in
Ireland. He was born at Worcester on 1 August 1555, at 4 P.M. according to a horoscope that John Dee drew up (based on notes Dee kept in his almanac/diary). His sister Elizabeth was born in 1558, and he had a brother Thomas who later joined him in Dee's household. However, much of Kelley's life before meeting John Dee is not known. He may have studied at Oxford under the name of Talbot; whether or not he attended university, Kelly was educated and knew Latin and possibly some Greek by the time he met Dee.
Anthony à Wood records in
Athenae Oxoniensis that Kelley, "being about 17 years of age, at which time he attained to a competency of Grammar learning at Worcester and elsewhere, was sent to Oxford, but to what house I cannot tell. However, I have been informed by an ancient Bachelor of Divinity who in his younger years had been an Amanuensis to
Mr Thomas Allen of
Gloucester-hall, that he (Kelly) had spent some time in that House; whereupon I, recurring to the matriculation, could not find the name Kelly, only Talbot of Ireland, three of which name were students there in 1573, 74, &c... This relation being somewhat dubiously delivered to me, I must tell you that Kelly having an unsettled mind, left Oxford abruptly, without being entitled into the matricula." According to some accounts, Kelley was
pilloried in Lancaster for forgery or counterfeiting. Both his ears were supposedly
cropped, a common punishment during the Tudor Dynasty. He usually wore a cap on his head, and it was thought this was to hide his lack of ears. John Weever says, "Kelly (otherwise called Talbot) that famous English alchemist of our times, who flying out of his own country (after he had lost both his ears at Lancaster) was entertained with
Rudolf the second, and last of that Christian name, Emperor of Germany." In 1595, Kelly agreed to co-operate and return to his alchemical work; he was released and restored to his former status. When he failed to produce any gold, he was again imprisoned, this time in
Hněvín Castle in
Most. His wife and stepdaughter attempted to hire an imperial counselor who might free Kelley from imprisonment, but he died a prisoner in late 1597/early 1598 of injuries received while attempting to escape. However, according to the account of Simon Tadeáš, Rudolf II's geologist, he poisoned himself in front of his wife and children. In 1674, Sir
Thomas Browne, an acquaintance of John Dee's son
Arthur Dee, in correspondence to
Elias Ashmole, stated that "
Arthur Dee said also that Kelley dealt not justly by his father, and that afterwards imprisoned by the Emperor in a castle, from whence attempting an escape down the wall, he fell and broke his leg and was imprisoned again." A few of Kelley's writings are extant today, including two alchemical verse treatises in English, and three other treatises, which he dedicated to Rudolf II from prison. They were entitled
Tractatus duo egregii de lapide philosophorum una cum theatro astronomiae (1676). The treatises have been translated as
The Alchemical Writings of Edward Kelley (1893). ==Angelical, the "Enochian" language==