The Academy developed from the journal Temenos, edited by the late Professor Keith Critchlow (architect and geometer; d. 2020), Brian Keeble (publisher and writer), Kathleen Raine (poet and literary scholar; d. 2003) and Philip Sherrard (theologian and Hellenist; d. 1995). The journal had a run of 13 issues, from 1981 to 1992. During this period two Temenos conferences were held at Dartington Hall in Devonshire: ‘Art and the Renewal of the Sacred’ (1986), and ‘Art in the Service of the Sacred’ (1988).

The Temenos Academy itself was founded in 1991, under the patronage of HRH The Prince of Wales. Besides the editors of the earlier journal, other individuals instrumental in its creation were John Stewart Allitt (teacher of Dante and musicologist; d. 2007), David Cadman (trustee), Dr Hans-Wolfgang Frick (trustee; d. 2011), Esme F. Howard (trustee) and Sir Peter Parker (trustee; d. 2002). 

The Academy’s programme of lectures, seminars and study days was supplemented in 1998 by the establishment of a second journal, the Temenos Academy Review, which has appeared annually ever since. In addition, the Academy has maintained a series of occasional Publications, beginning with the collection Temenos Academy: Inaugural Addresses (1992).

In 2013 the Academy established a Foundation Course in the Perennial Philosophy: originally running for one year, this has subsequently been extended into a two-year programme. In the same year, the Academy held a conference ‘Ancient Springs: The Arts, the Imagination and Our World’, at St Hilda’s College, Oxford.

Since then, the Academy has continued to organize a range of events in London, its annual study day in Lampeter, Wales as well as short online courses. We are also pleased to announce that in 2024, HM King Charles III renewed his patronage of the Temenos Academy.