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WORD LIST HOME - DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
THE MYSTICAL AND MAGICAL
DIRECTORY OF MYSTIC WORD LISTS
Mystical and Magical - Home
SEE ALSO
Feature: Fate and Destiny in an Eternal World
Feature: A History of Time
Syzygy - The Alignment of the Universe
Cosmic Order of the Universe
The Sun, the Moon and the Star
Mystical and Magical - Home
- Mysterious Magic of the Mystical
- Supernatural Spirituality of the Occult
- Practicing the Art of Divination
SEE ALSO
Feature: Fate and Destiny in an Eternal World
Feature: A History of Time
Syzygy - The Alignment of the Universe
Cosmic Order of the Universe
The Sun, the Moon and the Star
Sorcery & Witchcraft PRACTITIONERS
OF MAGIC
PRACTICING MAGIC
Witchcraft is the practice of what the practitioner ("witch") believes to be magical skills and abilities such as using spells, incantations, and magical rituals. Witchcraft is a broad term that varies culturally and societally, and l can be difficult to define with precision. Historically, the most common meaning is the use of supernatural means to cause harm to the innocent; this remains the meaning in most traditional cultures worldwide.
The word is over a thousand years old: Old English formed the compound wiccecræft from "wicce" ("witch") and "cræft" ("craft"). The word witch was also spelled "wicca" or "wycca" in Old English, and was originally masculine. Folk etymologies link witchcraft "to the English words wit, wise, wisdom [Germanic root *weit-, *wait-, *wit-; Indo-European root *weid-, *woid-, *wid-]", so "craft of the wise."
In terminology, witches differ from sorcerers in that they don't use physical tools or actions to curse; their maleficium is perceived as extending from some intangible inner quality, and one may be unaware of being a witch, or may have been convinced of their nature by the suggestion of others.
Spell casting
Probably the most widely known characteristic of a witch was the ability to cast a spell, "spell" being the word used to signify the means employed to carry out a magical action. A spell could consist of a set of words, a formula or verse, or a ritual action, or any combination of these. Spells were cast by many methods, such as by the inscription of runes or sigils on an object to give that object magical powers; the immolation or binding of a wax or clay image (poppet) of a person to affect them magically; the recitation of incantations; by the performance of physical rituals; by the employment of magical herbs as amulets or potions; and by gazing at mirrors, swords or other specula (scrying) for purposes of divination;
Necromancy (conjuring the dead)
Necromancy is the practice of conjuring the spirits of the dead for divination or prophecy, although the term has also been applied to raising the dead for other purposes.
Demonology
In Christianity sorcery came to be associated with heresy and apostasy and to be viewed as evil. Fears about witchcraft sometimes led to witch-hunts. The fifteenth century saw a dramatic rise in awareness and terror of witchcraft. In total, thousands of people were executed, and others were imprisoned, tortured, banished, and had lands and possessions confiscated. The majority of the accused were women, though in some regions the majority were men. In early modern Scots, the word warlock came to be used as the male equivalent of witch.
The Malleus Maleficarum, (Latin for "Hammer of The Witches") was a witch-hunting manual written in 1486 by two German monks, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger. It was used by both for several hundred years, outlining how to identify a witch, what makes a woman more likely than a man to be a witch, how to put a witch on trial, and how to punish a witch. The book defines a witch as evil and typically female. The book was a handbook for secular courts throughout Renaissance Europe, but was not used by the Inquisition.
Modern witchcraft considers Satanism to be the "dark side of Christianity" rather than a branch of Wicca
The New Testament condemns the practice as an abomination, just as the Old Testament had (Galatians 5:20, compared with Revelation 21:8; 22:15; and Acts 8:9; 13:6). The word in most New Testament translations is "sorcerer" / sorcery" rather than "witch"/"witchcraft".
Jewish law views the practice of witchcraft as being laden with idolatry and/or necromancy; both being serious theological and practical offenses in Judaism. Judaism does make it clear that Jews shall not try to learn about the ways of witches and that witches are to be put to death (Exodus 22:17).
Divination and magic in Islam encompass a wide range of practices, including black magic, warding off the evil eye, the production of amulets and other magical equipment, evocation, casting lots, and astrology. Muslims commonly believe in magic (sihr - meaning black magic) and explicitly forbid its practice.
From 1645 to 1663, about eighty people throughout England's Massachusetts Bay Colony were accused of practicing witchcraft. 13 women and 2 men were executed in a witch-hunt that lasted in New England from 1645 to 1663. The Salem witch trials followed in 1692–93. These witch trials were the most famous and took place near Salem, Massachusetts. Prior to the witch trials, nearly 300 men and women had been suspected of partaking in witchcraft, and 19 of these people were hanged, and one was "pressed to death".
GLOSSARY OF TERMS
A Year And A Day - a unit of time used frequently in witchcraft. e.g. “I dedicate myself to studying with this coven for a year and a day”.
Degrees of Witchcraft - There are four levels of witchcraft, first, second, another second and third — neophyte, middle stage, second middle stage and fully fledged. Each degree has its own symbol. Sometimes witches write the symbol after their name: an inverted triangle, a triangle, a pentagram (star), and finally a triangle on top of a pentagram. The triangle is also known as the ‘three-fold salute’ and during initiation the shape of this inverted triangle is also drawn in the air, and in sequence on the breast, breast, genitals and breast.
Eostara - is one of the Lesser Wiccan Sabbats, usually celebrated on the Vernal or Spring Equinox (March 21). Also known as Eostre’s Day, Rite of Eostre, Festival of the Trees and Lady Day.
Fascinous - caused or acting by witchcraft (obsolete). From Latin fascinum (“witchcraft”).
Goety - an archaic word for the black magic or witchcraft in which the assistance of evil spirits is invoked. Necromancy.
WITCH-HUNTING
Black virgin - a german witch hunting invention. An iron case the size of a human body covered in spikes. It was closed around the victim and designed to torture but not kill when it closed around her.
PUNISHMENT AND TORTURE
Devil’s Marks - areas on a witch’s body seen to be insensitive to pain. Spelled witch ‘markes’ or witch ‘signalls’ in documents.
Dunking - form of water torture also known as ducking or ‘swimming’. It was thought that one way to identify a witch was to bind her hands and feet and throw her into a body of water. A real witch would float. And if she wasn’t a witch, she would have sunk and drowned unless hastily rescued.
Flogging - flogging is a punishment or deterrent today, but in antiquity, flogging was for purification. Someone would get flogged to bewitch them, or more generally, to deal with any situation implying spiritual impotence.
Gibbet - any instrument of public execution including guillotine, executioner’s block, impalement stake, hanging gallows, or related scaffold
COVENS
Cone of power - a metaphor for the will of the group. They ask for things as a group and consider that they can hold sway over distant things.
Daughter coven - a breakaway coven, still under the guidance of the mother coven
Dedicant - someone who dedicates themselves to a period of study/practice with a coven
Elder - in some covens you count as an elder if you’ve been the leader of a coven for nine years.
Esbat - a small gathering of local witches. A ‘small Sabbat’.
TYPES OF WITCHES
Anjana - type of witch from the Hispanic tradition. This type of witch is a beautiful young woman in her true form, but takes the form of an old woman to test people’s charity. She spends her days watching over animals, and hanging out in her underground palace which is full of treasure and jewels. She has a lot of treasure because everything she touches with her staff can turn into treasure.
Baba Yaga - a legendary Slavic witch, or a hag, who lives in a hut that stands on chicken legs and who flies through the air in a mortar, using the pestle as a rudder. The predatory Baba Yaga, who has a special liking for children, is a subcategory of crone. She’s also known as Old Hag Yaga. Her name is synonymous with ved’ma, which means witch in Russian.
Befana - the ‘good witch’ from Italy who brings presents to children on Epiphany. (Many other countries get a male Santa Clause instead.) In Italy, la Befana is the “Epiphany Witch,” and is celebrated on January 6th (The Feast of the Epiphany).
Benandanti - Italy has a number of ‘good witches’. These ones fought ritual battles against the Malandanti (bad ones) over the fate of the harvest.
Black witch- black witches are usually shown with evil tendencies and rarely get happy endings.” Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau is known as an evil witch. Black witches have a tendency to fall into two categories — supportive friends to the more powerful and popular protagonist or a witch with some malevolent quality.
Boschetto - Italian word for a coven of witches, literally a ‘grove’. (Related to the beautiful English word ‘bosky’, meaning wooded. In Middle English, ‘bosk’ was a variant of ‘bush’.)
Bruja - Spanish word for ‘witch’. (Male witch is ‘brujo’.) The word used to be used in Mexico to refer to a woman knowledgeable about folk magic.
Burlesque witch - this character archetype is very old, starting out as Baba Yaga types, evolving into Mother Goose types, and the Internet burlesque witch can be seen in characters such as (fictional) Betty White.
Circe - the first great witch in literature, described by Homer as “goddess or girl, we couldn’t tell” and when she’s first seen by Odysseus’ men she seems a sweet young weaver and before her loom she sings ‘a chill, sweet song’. She is enthralling to men, turning them into swine, the power to make men impotent, both sexually and otherwise.
Cookbook Witch - witch who has tried to teach themselves witchcraft and spells out of a book.
Cosmic Mother Of All - Starhawk, a modern feminist witch, uses this phrase to describe the Mother Earth-type character and who stands in contrast to the Judeo-Christian/Islamic notion of a masculine God. This prescribes that positive images of women are lactating, motherly, strong, authoritative. This idealized imagery supports the patriarchal notion of the woman as nurturer of others. Women are subordinated today because The Great Mother (standing in for women in general) originally controlled everyone, and men had to take back some control of their own because women were oppressive and also incompetent as leaders. Patriarchy is women’s punishment, and the natural order of things. Unfortunately, modern witchcraft doesn’t always do a great job of dismantling this narrative.
Coven - traditionally 13 in number but anywhere between 3 and 20. They begin by ‘casting the circle’, which isolates and purifies the holy place where magic will occur, where gods and goddesses will manifest, where time will disappear, where faith will become incarnate.
Covenstead - the location of the coven
Covendom - the area around the covenstead. Traditionally one league in size. (About three miles in all directions.)
Cowan - Anyone who is not a witch.
Craft - A shortening of ‘witchcraft’. (It is also used by Freemasons to describe their fraternity without publicly naming it.) Sometimes people say ‘Art and Craft’, meaning witchcraft.
Craft-names — the name a witch receives after an initiation ritual. Craft names tend to allude to favorite deities. (Covens are also named.)
Crone - midwife/sister/woman in touch with the earth and all things natural. We see this archetype in fairytales, and in contemporary folktales written for children. These women might be quite stupid.. They are often surrounded by a menagerie of pets and farm animals (who she considers pets).
Cunning Folk - The cunning folk in Britain were professional or semi-professional practitioners of magic in Britain, active from the Medieval period through the early 20th century.
Diana - sometimes considered the Goddess of all Witches
Famtrad - short for “Family Tradition.” This refers to a Wiccan or Witchcraft tradition that is centered around the beliefs and practices of a single family as opposed to a tradition centered around individual personalities or a coven.
Graeae — “old women”, “grey ones”, or “grey witches” from Greek mythology. These sisters shared one eye and one tooth between them, suggesting they are each a different facet of the same individual. These witch sisters are called Deino (or Dino), Enyo, and Pemphredo (or Pephredo). Their weakness is that they had to take their eye out and share it between them. Their other sisters are the Gorgons. While the Gorgons lost their beauty but retained their immortality, the Graiae lost their youth and became old hags dependant on one tooth and one eye to see.
Grandmaster - witch cults were organized. There were twelve to a coven led by a grandmaster. The grandmaster’s assistant was Maiden of the coven, sometimes called Maid Marian where the legend of Robin Hood was strong.
Hag - In its 14th century sense, hag meant a repulsive, vicious or malicious old woman. By the mid 1500s it had come to mean an evil spirit, demon or infernal being in female form. By the 1580s it meant a woman who had dealings with Satan (ie. a witch). The word hag is probably a shortening of Old English hægtesse, “witch fury”.
Hagborn - person born of a witch or a woman considered wicked
Hag-ridden - something ridden by hags (like a horse) and therefore afflicted with nightmare. Other examples are ‘haunted’ (by a memory or dream), ‘diabolical’ (difficulties), ‘possessed’ (by an idea), and I’ve lately noticed a resurgence of ‘cursed’, especially among kids, to describe something unpleasant or weird in general.
CREATURES AND FAMILIARS
Cats - ancient Egyptians associated the cat with the moon. To them the cat was sacred to the goddesses Isis and Bast (the guardian of marriage). Black cats are associated with darkness and death. In witch folklore, cats often make use of black cats as familiars.
Familiar - short for familiar spirit — a common domestic animal given to the witch by the Devil — according to Inquisitors — to do her malicious bidding. The notion of the witch’s familiar comes out of the folklore of household fairies — brownies, elves and hobs, but not all familiars are fairies. Familiars can also be the ghosts of dead children, demons and ghosts. The concept of the familiar came from Scotland and England. Like fairies, familiars originally exhibited all forms of morality (they could range between the extremes of good and bad), but after the Reformation, belief in the supernatural was black and white and from that point on, all supernatural creatures were either good or bad.
Foxes - In the Edo period of Japan (1603–1867), beliefs around kitsune (foxes) share commonalities with witch legend from all over the world. Kitsune can shapeshift. When a kitsune changes shape, its hoshi no tama holds a portion of its magical power. The pearl represents the kitsune’s soul; the kitsune will die if separated from it for long. Those who obtain the ball may be able to extract a promise from the kitsune to help them in exchange for its return.
BELIEFS
Chimney Demon - Chimneys, windows and doors are considered liminal spaces where bad spirits can enter the home. Among the creatures that may fly down your chimney: witches, of course.
Contagion of the Deity - the idea that holy objects should not be used in other than holy places. (This is not just witchcraft but common to all religions.) It’s therefore unlucky to steal something from a place of worship.
Fairy cross - a rock in the shape of a stone, thought to function apotropaically (warding off bad luck). The points represent earth, air, fire and water, and influenced the thinking behind crosses as good luck charms. Also called: andalusite, chiastolite, staurolite.
Evil Eye - a threatening gaze or stare was once thought to be so powerful it caused actual harm. As a result, numerous amulets and charms have been invented, thought The commonly recognized symbol of the evil eye is the Arabic hamsa. This symbol in turn comes from Tanit, the principal goddess of ancient Phoenicia.
RITUALS, CURSES AND SPELLS
Badmouth - the origin of the word originally meant hexing and cursing someone.
Bell, Book and Candle - the phrase comes from Catholicism. It refers to the ritual of excommunication: the ringing of a bell, the closing of the Bible, and the snuffing of a candle.
Bewitching - to bewitch is to cast a spell on someone with witchcraft or to capture their attention in another way. Witches can bewitch people, animals and objects.
Cakes and Wine - the end to any ritual. A small ‘feast’. Might actually be bread and ale.
Cantrip - this Scottish term means a magic spell. It tends to be the minor, mischievous kind. It has been used in novels and role-playing games and means whatever the creator wants it to mean. It sometimes refers to a spell that reads the same forwards and backwards.
Charge of the Goddess - a gospel used by many modern witches in a variety of adapted forms.
Cloves - worn around the neck in a conjure bag promote friendship (voodoo/hoodoo)
Curse - a solemn utterance intended to invoke a supernatural power to inflict harm or punishment on someone or something. There are people who believe curses work and they are sometimes taken seriously at government level.
Deosil - Clockwise. In Scottish folklore, deosil/sunwise/sunward (clockwise) was considered the “prosperous course”, turning from east to west in the direction of the sun. The opposite course, counterclockwise, was known as widdershins (Lowland Scots), or tuathal (Scottish Gaelic). In witchcraft, “deosil” usually refers to the direction of a witch’s dance or circle-casting.
Drawing down the moon - ritual by which the High Priestess becomes in effect a goddess for the duration of the ritual. The rite is performed on the first night of the full moon, at midnight, the “witching hour.” The witch evokes the goddess within herself—that is, becomes the goddess incarnate. The goddess is she whom we call the triple goddess, the moon goddess, with her three phases—waxing, full, waning. She is Diana/Artemis, Astarte, Aphrodite, the Mother Goddess, and thus associated with birth, death, rebirth, and the lunar cycles. Meditation, chanting, dancing, and singing may all be used to evoke the goddess.
Drawing down the sun - newer expression based on ‘drawing down the moon’. This sometimes describes the ritual in which the High Priest becomes a god for the duration of a ritual. (The male equivalent of drawing down the moon.)
Drinking horn or chalice — filled with wine
The word is over a thousand years old: Old English formed the compound wiccecræft from "wicce" ("witch") and "cræft" ("craft"). The word witch was also spelled "wicca" or "wycca" in Old English, and was originally masculine. Folk etymologies link witchcraft "to the English words wit, wise, wisdom [Germanic root *weit-, *wait-, *wit-; Indo-European root *weid-, *woid-, *wid-]", so "craft of the wise."
In terminology, witches differ from sorcerers in that they don't use physical tools or actions to curse; their maleficium is perceived as extending from some intangible inner quality, and one may be unaware of being a witch, or may have been convinced of their nature by the suggestion of others.
Spell casting
Probably the most widely known characteristic of a witch was the ability to cast a spell, "spell" being the word used to signify the means employed to carry out a magical action. A spell could consist of a set of words, a formula or verse, or a ritual action, or any combination of these. Spells were cast by many methods, such as by the inscription of runes or sigils on an object to give that object magical powers; the immolation or binding of a wax or clay image (poppet) of a person to affect them magically; the recitation of incantations; by the performance of physical rituals; by the employment of magical herbs as amulets or potions; and by gazing at mirrors, swords or other specula (scrying) for purposes of divination;
Necromancy (conjuring the dead)
Necromancy is the practice of conjuring the spirits of the dead for divination or prophecy, although the term has also been applied to raising the dead for other purposes.
Demonology
In Christianity sorcery came to be associated with heresy and apostasy and to be viewed as evil. Fears about witchcraft sometimes led to witch-hunts. The fifteenth century saw a dramatic rise in awareness and terror of witchcraft. In total, thousands of people were executed, and others were imprisoned, tortured, banished, and had lands and possessions confiscated. The majority of the accused were women, though in some regions the majority were men. In early modern Scots, the word warlock came to be used as the male equivalent of witch.
The Malleus Maleficarum, (Latin for "Hammer of The Witches") was a witch-hunting manual written in 1486 by two German monks, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger. It was used by both for several hundred years, outlining how to identify a witch, what makes a woman more likely than a man to be a witch, how to put a witch on trial, and how to punish a witch. The book defines a witch as evil and typically female. The book was a handbook for secular courts throughout Renaissance Europe, but was not used by the Inquisition.
Modern witchcraft considers Satanism to be the "dark side of Christianity" rather than a branch of Wicca
The New Testament condemns the practice as an abomination, just as the Old Testament had (Galatians 5:20, compared with Revelation 21:8; 22:15; and Acts 8:9; 13:6). The word in most New Testament translations is "sorcerer" / sorcery" rather than "witch"/"witchcraft".
Jewish law views the practice of witchcraft as being laden with idolatry and/or necromancy; both being serious theological and practical offenses in Judaism. Judaism does make it clear that Jews shall not try to learn about the ways of witches and that witches are to be put to death (Exodus 22:17).
Divination and magic in Islam encompass a wide range of practices, including black magic, warding off the evil eye, the production of amulets and other magical equipment, evocation, casting lots, and astrology. Muslims commonly believe in magic (sihr - meaning black magic) and explicitly forbid its practice.
From 1645 to 1663, about eighty people throughout England's Massachusetts Bay Colony were accused of practicing witchcraft. 13 women and 2 men were executed in a witch-hunt that lasted in New England from 1645 to 1663. The Salem witch trials followed in 1692–93. These witch trials were the most famous and took place near Salem, Massachusetts. Prior to the witch trials, nearly 300 men and women had been suspected of partaking in witchcraft, and 19 of these people were hanged, and one was "pressed to death".
GLOSSARY OF TERMS
A Year And A Day - a unit of time used frequently in witchcraft. e.g. “I dedicate myself to studying with this coven for a year and a day”.
Degrees of Witchcraft - There are four levels of witchcraft, first, second, another second and third — neophyte, middle stage, second middle stage and fully fledged. Each degree has its own symbol. Sometimes witches write the symbol after their name: an inverted triangle, a triangle, a pentagram (star), and finally a triangle on top of a pentagram. The triangle is also known as the ‘three-fold salute’ and during initiation the shape of this inverted triangle is also drawn in the air, and in sequence on the breast, breast, genitals and breast.
Eostara - is one of the Lesser Wiccan Sabbats, usually celebrated on the Vernal or Spring Equinox (March 21). Also known as Eostre’s Day, Rite of Eostre, Festival of the Trees and Lady Day.
Fascinous - caused or acting by witchcraft (obsolete). From Latin fascinum (“witchcraft”).
Goety - an archaic word for the black magic or witchcraft in which the assistance of evil spirits is invoked. Necromancy.
WITCH-HUNTING
Black virgin - a german witch hunting invention. An iron case the size of a human body covered in spikes. It was closed around the victim and designed to torture but not kill when it closed around her.
PUNISHMENT AND TORTURE
Devil’s Marks - areas on a witch’s body seen to be insensitive to pain. Spelled witch ‘markes’ or witch ‘signalls’ in documents.
Dunking - form of water torture also known as ducking or ‘swimming’. It was thought that one way to identify a witch was to bind her hands and feet and throw her into a body of water. A real witch would float. And if she wasn’t a witch, she would have sunk and drowned unless hastily rescued.
Flogging - flogging is a punishment or deterrent today, but in antiquity, flogging was for purification. Someone would get flogged to bewitch them, or more generally, to deal with any situation implying spiritual impotence.
Gibbet - any instrument of public execution including guillotine, executioner’s block, impalement stake, hanging gallows, or related scaffold
COVENS
Cone of power - a metaphor for the will of the group. They ask for things as a group and consider that they can hold sway over distant things.
Daughter coven - a breakaway coven, still under the guidance of the mother coven
Dedicant - someone who dedicates themselves to a period of study/practice with a coven
Elder - in some covens you count as an elder if you’ve been the leader of a coven for nine years.
Esbat - a small gathering of local witches. A ‘small Sabbat’.
TYPES OF WITCHES
Anjana - type of witch from the Hispanic tradition. This type of witch is a beautiful young woman in her true form, but takes the form of an old woman to test people’s charity. She spends her days watching over animals, and hanging out in her underground palace which is full of treasure and jewels. She has a lot of treasure because everything she touches with her staff can turn into treasure.
Baba Yaga - a legendary Slavic witch, or a hag, who lives in a hut that stands on chicken legs and who flies through the air in a mortar, using the pestle as a rudder. The predatory Baba Yaga, who has a special liking for children, is a subcategory of crone. She’s also known as Old Hag Yaga. Her name is synonymous with ved’ma, which means witch in Russian.
Befana - the ‘good witch’ from Italy who brings presents to children on Epiphany. (Many other countries get a male Santa Clause instead.) In Italy, la Befana is the “Epiphany Witch,” and is celebrated on January 6th (The Feast of the Epiphany).
Benandanti - Italy has a number of ‘good witches’. These ones fought ritual battles against the Malandanti (bad ones) over the fate of the harvest.
Black witch- black witches are usually shown with evil tendencies and rarely get happy endings.” Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau is known as an evil witch. Black witches have a tendency to fall into two categories — supportive friends to the more powerful and popular protagonist or a witch with some malevolent quality.
Boschetto - Italian word for a coven of witches, literally a ‘grove’. (Related to the beautiful English word ‘bosky’, meaning wooded. In Middle English, ‘bosk’ was a variant of ‘bush’.)
Bruja - Spanish word for ‘witch’. (Male witch is ‘brujo’.) The word used to be used in Mexico to refer to a woman knowledgeable about folk magic.
Burlesque witch - this character archetype is very old, starting out as Baba Yaga types, evolving into Mother Goose types, and the Internet burlesque witch can be seen in characters such as (fictional) Betty White.
Circe - the first great witch in literature, described by Homer as “goddess or girl, we couldn’t tell” and when she’s first seen by Odysseus’ men she seems a sweet young weaver and before her loom she sings ‘a chill, sweet song’. She is enthralling to men, turning them into swine, the power to make men impotent, both sexually and otherwise.
Cookbook Witch - witch who has tried to teach themselves witchcraft and spells out of a book.
Cosmic Mother Of All - Starhawk, a modern feminist witch, uses this phrase to describe the Mother Earth-type character and who stands in contrast to the Judeo-Christian/Islamic notion of a masculine God. This prescribes that positive images of women are lactating, motherly, strong, authoritative. This idealized imagery supports the patriarchal notion of the woman as nurturer of others. Women are subordinated today because The Great Mother (standing in for women in general) originally controlled everyone, and men had to take back some control of their own because women were oppressive and also incompetent as leaders. Patriarchy is women’s punishment, and the natural order of things. Unfortunately, modern witchcraft doesn’t always do a great job of dismantling this narrative.
Coven - traditionally 13 in number but anywhere between 3 and 20. They begin by ‘casting the circle’, which isolates and purifies the holy place where magic will occur, where gods and goddesses will manifest, where time will disappear, where faith will become incarnate.
Covenstead - the location of the coven
Covendom - the area around the covenstead. Traditionally one league in size. (About three miles in all directions.)
Cowan - Anyone who is not a witch.
Craft - A shortening of ‘witchcraft’. (It is also used by Freemasons to describe their fraternity without publicly naming it.) Sometimes people say ‘Art and Craft’, meaning witchcraft.
Craft-names — the name a witch receives after an initiation ritual. Craft names tend to allude to favorite deities. (Covens are also named.)
Crone - midwife/sister/woman in touch with the earth and all things natural. We see this archetype in fairytales, and in contemporary folktales written for children. These women might be quite stupid.. They are often surrounded by a menagerie of pets and farm animals (who she considers pets).
Cunning Folk - The cunning folk in Britain were professional or semi-professional practitioners of magic in Britain, active from the Medieval period through the early 20th century.
Diana - sometimes considered the Goddess of all Witches
Famtrad - short for “Family Tradition.” This refers to a Wiccan or Witchcraft tradition that is centered around the beliefs and practices of a single family as opposed to a tradition centered around individual personalities or a coven.
Graeae — “old women”, “grey ones”, or “grey witches” from Greek mythology. These sisters shared one eye and one tooth between them, suggesting they are each a different facet of the same individual. These witch sisters are called Deino (or Dino), Enyo, and Pemphredo (or Pephredo). Their weakness is that they had to take their eye out and share it between them. Their other sisters are the Gorgons. While the Gorgons lost their beauty but retained their immortality, the Graiae lost their youth and became old hags dependant on one tooth and one eye to see.
Grandmaster - witch cults were organized. There were twelve to a coven led by a grandmaster. The grandmaster’s assistant was Maiden of the coven, sometimes called Maid Marian where the legend of Robin Hood was strong.
Hag - In its 14th century sense, hag meant a repulsive, vicious or malicious old woman. By the mid 1500s it had come to mean an evil spirit, demon or infernal being in female form. By the 1580s it meant a woman who had dealings with Satan (ie. a witch). The word hag is probably a shortening of Old English hægtesse, “witch fury”.
Hagborn - person born of a witch or a woman considered wicked
Hag-ridden - something ridden by hags (like a horse) and therefore afflicted with nightmare. Other examples are ‘haunted’ (by a memory or dream), ‘diabolical’ (difficulties), ‘possessed’ (by an idea), and I’ve lately noticed a resurgence of ‘cursed’, especially among kids, to describe something unpleasant or weird in general.
CREATURES AND FAMILIARS
Cats - ancient Egyptians associated the cat with the moon. To them the cat was sacred to the goddesses Isis and Bast (the guardian of marriage). Black cats are associated with darkness and death. In witch folklore, cats often make use of black cats as familiars.
Familiar - short for familiar spirit — a common domestic animal given to the witch by the Devil — according to Inquisitors — to do her malicious bidding. The notion of the witch’s familiar comes out of the folklore of household fairies — brownies, elves and hobs, but not all familiars are fairies. Familiars can also be the ghosts of dead children, demons and ghosts. The concept of the familiar came from Scotland and England. Like fairies, familiars originally exhibited all forms of morality (they could range between the extremes of good and bad), but after the Reformation, belief in the supernatural was black and white and from that point on, all supernatural creatures were either good or bad.
Foxes - In the Edo period of Japan (1603–1867), beliefs around kitsune (foxes) share commonalities with witch legend from all over the world. Kitsune can shapeshift. When a kitsune changes shape, its hoshi no tama holds a portion of its magical power. The pearl represents the kitsune’s soul; the kitsune will die if separated from it for long. Those who obtain the ball may be able to extract a promise from the kitsune to help them in exchange for its return.
BELIEFS
Chimney Demon - Chimneys, windows and doors are considered liminal spaces where bad spirits can enter the home. Among the creatures that may fly down your chimney: witches, of course.
Contagion of the Deity - the idea that holy objects should not be used in other than holy places. (This is not just witchcraft but common to all religions.) It’s therefore unlucky to steal something from a place of worship.
Fairy cross - a rock in the shape of a stone, thought to function apotropaically (warding off bad luck). The points represent earth, air, fire and water, and influenced the thinking behind crosses as good luck charms. Also called: andalusite, chiastolite, staurolite.
Evil Eye - a threatening gaze or stare was once thought to be so powerful it caused actual harm. As a result, numerous amulets and charms have been invented, thought The commonly recognized symbol of the evil eye is the Arabic hamsa. This symbol in turn comes from Tanit, the principal goddess of ancient Phoenicia.
RITUALS, CURSES AND SPELLS
Badmouth - the origin of the word originally meant hexing and cursing someone.
Bell, Book and Candle - the phrase comes from Catholicism. It refers to the ritual of excommunication: the ringing of a bell, the closing of the Bible, and the snuffing of a candle.
Bewitching - to bewitch is to cast a spell on someone with witchcraft or to capture their attention in another way. Witches can bewitch people, animals and objects.
Cakes and Wine - the end to any ritual. A small ‘feast’. Might actually be bread and ale.
Cantrip - this Scottish term means a magic spell. It tends to be the minor, mischievous kind. It has been used in novels and role-playing games and means whatever the creator wants it to mean. It sometimes refers to a spell that reads the same forwards and backwards.
Charge of the Goddess - a gospel used by many modern witches in a variety of adapted forms.
Cloves - worn around the neck in a conjure bag promote friendship (voodoo/hoodoo)
Curse - a solemn utterance intended to invoke a supernatural power to inflict harm or punishment on someone or something. There are people who believe curses work and they are sometimes taken seriously at government level.
Deosil - Clockwise. In Scottish folklore, deosil/sunwise/sunward (clockwise) was considered the “prosperous course”, turning from east to west in the direction of the sun. The opposite course, counterclockwise, was known as widdershins (Lowland Scots), or tuathal (Scottish Gaelic). In witchcraft, “deosil” usually refers to the direction of a witch’s dance or circle-casting.
Drawing down the moon - ritual by which the High Priestess becomes in effect a goddess for the duration of the ritual. The rite is performed on the first night of the full moon, at midnight, the “witching hour.” The witch evokes the goddess within herself—that is, becomes the goddess incarnate. The goddess is she whom we call the triple goddess, the moon goddess, with her three phases—waxing, full, waning. She is Diana/Artemis, Astarte, Aphrodite, the Mother Goddess, and thus associated with birth, death, rebirth, and the lunar cycles. Meditation, chanting, dancing, and singing may all be used to evoke the goddess.
Drawing down the sun - newer expression based on ‘drawing down the moon’. This sometimes describes the ritual in which the High Priest becomes a god for the duration of a ritual. (The male equivalent of drawing down the moon.)
Drinking horn or chalice — filled with wine
DIRECTORY OF MYSTIC WORD LISTS
Mystical and Magical - Home
Feature: Fate and Destiny in an Eternal World
Feature: A History of Time
Syzygy - The Alignment of the Universe
Cosmic Order of the Universe
The Sun, the Moon and the Star
Mystical and Magical - Home
- Mysterious Magic of the Mystical
- Wonders of Wicca
- Practitioners of Sorcery & Magic
- Spellbound by the Witch’s Gaze
- Paranormal Playground of the Psyche
- Spectacular Show of Superpowers
- Mythology and a Duality of Darkness
- Beware the Mythical Beasts
- Navigating the Underworld
- Supernatural Spirituality of the Occult
Feature: Fate and Destiny in an Eternal World
Feature: A History of Time
Syzygy - The Alignment of the Universe
Cosmic Order of the Universe
The Sun, the Moon and the Star
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A SERIES OF BEAUTIFUL WORDS
Collection of Vocabulary Books, Sites and Resources
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Words are also posted on twitter under the hashtags #beautifulwords and #wordoftheday and shared visually on pinterest bulletin boards
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Original content © 2021 Copyright, Kairos
