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Witchcraft Lore

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Select a Month May 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 July 2024 June 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 December 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 December 2021 July 2021 May 2021 April 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 December 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 June 2017 October 2016 September 2016 July 2016 June 2016 April 2016

March 2025

March 27, 2025

Maundy Thursday: Night of the Witches

The preeminent day connected with Judas... is Maundy Thursday... To the medieval mind, Maundy Thursday...

February 2025

February 17, 2025

Witchcraft in Reality: A Rebuttal

A little over a year ago, medieval historian and podcaster, Eleanor Janega wrote a blog...

January 2025

January 22, 2025

The Devil and the Sun King: The Affair of the Poisons

Whenever we think of historic accounts of witchcraft, there are a number of cases that...

August 2023

August 30, 2023

Book Review: By Moonlight and Spirit Flight, by Michael Howard

First published in 2013, By Moonlight and Spirit Flight: The Praxis of the Otherworldly Journey to the Witches'...

July 2023

July 07, 2023

Innocent Pope Drinks Children’s Blood?

Pope Innocent VIII issued a papal bull in 1484, entitled ‘Summis desiderantes affectibus’ (desiring with...

September 2022

September 10, 2022

Mortem Obire – Facing Death in the Wake of the Queen’s Passing

The death of the Queen of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth realms on Thursday...

August 2022

August 14, 2022

The Witch Compass – Working with the Winds in Traditional Witchcraft

"The language of symbolism and allegory is important to almost all understandings of magic, accessing a...

April 2022

April 21, 2022

Cosmogony of the Compass – Yetzirah Mysticism

The universe that is created by means of the sefirot and letters is constituted according to...

July 2021

July 05, 2021

Antisemitism and Witchcraft in the Middle Ages

Many of the oldest, most iconic depictions of the witch feature the pronounced characteristics that...

April 2021

April 19, 2021

Whistling the Winds of Beltane

“South wind —heat and produce, North wind—cold and tempest, West wind—fish and milk, East wind—fruit...

January 2021

January 30, 2021

Discussing the Late Witch Ralph Harvey with Richard Gordon

"...there was a whole lot of secrecy involved due to the fact that, at the...

December 2020

December 05, 2020

The Black Fast – The Witch Trial of Mabel Brigge and Fasting as Magic

The Black Fast In the Year of Our Lord, 1537, the potato arrived in Europe,...

November 2020

November 27, 2020

Pax Deorum – The Formula of Do ut Des & Making of Offerings

Pax Deorum Being the First Book of the Wanderer (previously unpublished © Ian Chambers 2018)...

November 25, 2020

Cain – The Witchfather in Traditional Witchcraft (Part 1)

Traditional Witchcraft has become rather popular among the neopagan and occult milieu today, allowing freedom...

September 2020

September 05, 2020

Castles in Traditional British Witchcraft Lore

…the distribution of the castes in the city exactly follows the march of the annual...

July 2020

July 19, 2020

Sympathy for the Devil

The role of the Devil in the early Medieval period incorporated mostly a capacity similar...

June 2020

June 14, 2020

Apocalypse Then: Reflections upon Gnostic Expressions of Revelation

Myths of the flood represent the crisis of the soul when the psyche plumbs the...

May 2020

May 22, 2020

Losing Your Head At Midsummer – An Ancient Rite Revisited

The following is an extract from Pax Deorum - A Modern Witchcraft Primer, 2018, by...

April 2020

April 14, 2020

St George – A Cainite Myth?

The legend of St George may be an initiatory myth in which a ritual enactment...

March 2020

March 25, 2020

A Journey To Spiral Castle in Traditional Witchcraft

In Britain the tradition of Spiral Castle survives in the Easter Maze dance of country villages,...

March 23, 2020

Guy of Warwick & St George – An Exposition of a Localised Green Man

Guy of Warwick features in medieval romance and legend as a questing knight fighting dragons...

March 15, 2020

Pilgrim’s Progress: A Journey We All Make Through the Year

The purpose of the pilgrimage is relevant to cultures across the world and spanning time....

February 2020

February 20, 2020

Breaking With Tradition: The Future of Witchcraft

First published in The Cauldron No. 150, November 2013 Since the last century, and accelerated by...

January 2020

January 30, 2020

The Witch’s Stang: The Hope of Man from Every Angle

The Witch's Stang is often thought to have been introduced into modern practice by the...

January 15, 2020

The Witch’s Compass: Finding Direction With The Seven Winds

Within Traditional Witchcraft, the concept of the Compass sometimes erroneously replaces that of the Circle....

December 2019

December 01, 2019

The Old Devil Saint Nick

The Santa Claus we now know, incorporating the older British Father Christmas and Lord of...

November 2019

November 05, 2019

Keep a Crooked Sixpence

Like many cultures and countries, Britain and America share a rich history of fairy and...

September 2019

September 15, 2019

Wyrd Goes Ever As She Shall

At any given moment in our lives, we might give pause to contemplate the course...

September 08, 2019

Castles in the Sky

1. Within Caer Sidhi doth our tale commence, That spectral Castle, spiralling abode Where Pale-Faced,...

July 2019

July 26, 2019

Witchcraft Is Political And It’s Time To Use It!

Following a previous blog entry, among the comments I received was one accusing me of...

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