The Magical Circle School Newsletter Litha 2014

The Hedge Druid's Craft blends the traditions of Wicca, Witchcraft and Druidry into a spiritual path that uses the techniques of "hedge riding" to travel between the worlds, bringing back wisdom and enchantment into our everyday lives. It is about working with boundaries, with a foot in either world, living around the edges and working with liminal times and places. For those whose paths meander and often overlap, and those who would not be constrained nor confined by labels, yet who seek some definition, this book is for you. If you are interested in Witchcraft, Wicca or Druidry, this book will sing to your soul.

Festive Sabbats for You and Yours Pagan Folklore • Rituals • Crafts • Recipes • Planetary Guidance Now in its sixth year, the Sabbats Almanac features a wealth of recipes, rituals, craft projects, and lore. Filled with over fifty articles by your favorite Wiccan and Pagan writers, Llewellyn's 2015 Sabbats Almanac provides welcome ideas and insights into each holiday on the Wheel of the Year. Plan spiritually uplifting celebrations and family activities. Perform sabbat-specific rituals and world folk rites. Whip up tasty treats and crafts as reminders of the season's gifts and lessons. Also featured are astrological influences to help you plan rituals according to cosmic energies. Creative, low-cost arts and crafts projects Ideas for celebrating the Sabbats Simple recipes for delicious appetizers, entrees, beverages, and desserts Astrological influences with Full and New Moon rituals Extended rituals for groups and individuals Journal pages for keeping track of your festival plans and memories Fascinating Pagan folklore and customs

Midsummer—also known as the Summer Solstice or Litha—is a time to rejoice in abundance and light. This guide to the history and modern celebration of Midsummer shows you how to celebrate and work with the energy of the longest day of the year. Rituals Recipes Lore Spells Divination Crafts Correspondences Invocations Prayers Meditations Llewellyn's Sabbat Essentials explore the old and new ways of celebrating the seasonal rites that are the cornerstones of the witch's year.

Harness the natural, spiritual, and positive power of the Wiccan tradition to heal an illness, attract love, and make wishes come true. Modern Wiccan expert Gerina Dunwich guides today’s witches into developing and utilizing your own powers of will and visualization to achieve positive results. Dunwich also reveals the secrets of spellcraft through easy-to-follow, yet highly powerful magickal formulas. Discover the proper craft and use of amulets, potions, mojo bags, poppets, and much more. In addition to the magickal arts, there are sections on the various methods of divination used by witches, the magickal association of herbs, the eight Sabbats of the Wiccan tradition, and an up-to-date directory of occult shops, publications, and services of interest to the Wiccan community. The Wicca Spellbook is a grimoire of modern Wiccan magick for both novice and seasoned Witches and coveners. “I recommend this book for eclectic Wiccans who want to draw insight and spells from other places and cultures. I have read many Wiccan spellbooks, and I find the spells in this one to be unique.”—The Witches’ Circle, Amino

Swa wiccan taeca?: ?as the witches teach.' So, explained the Old English translator, it was witches who counseled people to ?bring their offerings to earth-fast stone and also to trees and to wellsprings.' His contextualizing commentary on a Frankish penitential reveals the witches? intimate association with animist, earth-based ceremonies, contradicting the now-engrained idea that they were ?wicked.' In a compelling exploration of language, archaeology, early medieval literature and art, Max Dashu pulls the covers off ethnic lore known to few except scholarly specialists. She shows that the old ethnic names for ?witch? signify wisewoman, prophetess, diviner, healer, shapeshifter, and dreamer. She fleshes out the spiritual culture of the Norse völur (?staff-women?), with their oracular ceremonies, incantations, and ?sitting-out? on the land for wisdom. She examines archaeological finds of women's ritual staffs, many of which symbolize the distaff, a spinning tool that connects with broader European themes of goddesses, fates, witches, and female power. Ecclesiastical records show that these aspects of European women's spiritual culture survived state conversions to Christianity. Witches and Pagans plunges into the megalithic taproot of the elder kindreds, and the ancestral Old Woman known as the Cailleach. It draws on priestly Frankish and German sources to trace the foundational witch-legend of the Women Who Go by Night with the Goddess'and her links to women's spinning sacraments in the orature of Holle, Fraw Percht, and Swanfooted Berthe. The book also looks at the sexual politics of early witch burnings and the female ordeal of treading red-hot iron. Anglo-Saxon ?mystery-singers? shed light on ancestor veneration in early medieval Europe.The webs of Wyrd, weavers? ceremonies, herb-chanters, crystal balls and the Völuspá: this book uncovers the authentic ethnic roots of witchcraft. Putting the common woman at the center results in a very different view of European history than the one we have been taught. Sagas, ecclesiastical canons, laws, chronicles, charms, manuscripts and sculpture show the spiritual leadership of women and the goddesses, fates, and ancestors they revered. These strands can help to reweave the ripped webs of women's culture.