Julius Evola (1898-1974) was an extraordinarily bizarre and colourful individual, who must be considered to be the father of European right-wing magical paganism. Born in Rome of humble Sicilian parentage (he was not a baron, for all that he is claimed to have been one), he studied engineering, became a talented artist and writer, and served in World War I as an artillery officer. Much influenced by the decadents and symbolists, he dropped Catholicism early on. (There was a certain amount of two-way traffic here, as some members of these artistic movements became converts.)