The Mag: Issue 255

On sale from 15 October

City of Symbols -
Tracing the capital's occult roots

This month, while Dan Brown looks for Masonic symbolism in Washington DC, FT journeys through Masonic London, a trail that takes in Isaac Newton and Jack the Ripper, St Paul's Cathedral and the pyramid on Canary Wharf, conspiracy theories and occult forces... We also muse over the argument that Freemasonry not only pre-dates the earliest written evidence of its activities, but has also influenced the whole development of Western culture from the shadows, through the embedding of hermetic symbolism in great literature.

Also in this issue we puzzle over a broom that stands unaided, consider the strange case of a teenager who cries blood, investigate reports of people physically attacked by ghosts, and report on strange cases of sexual fetishes, from the Japanese man in love with a pillow to a knicker-nicking Lancashire mayor.