PaganSquare.com - WitchesAndPagans.com

If you want to make a pendant shaped like the crescent Moon, you've basically got three options: two horns up, one horn up, or two horns down. If you wanted to over-interpret, you could read these as Moon rising, zenith Moon, and Moon setting, respectively.

In that case, this one is Moon Come Down for sure.

The silversmith who, during the Baltic Bronze Age, made the original on which this little silver amulet is based chose the third option. What makes this lunula (“little Moon”) unique is its Double Moon shape. From one crescent grows another. One Moon holds another in its arms.

If you want, paradoxically, a static symbol of change, you'd go far to find one better than the Moon. This double Crescent redoubles that symbolism. It's a pregnant Moon, one Moon giving birth to another, to itself: Moon within Moon, as seed within seed, forever.

The dotted circles that cover its surface intrigue me: their irregular distribution lends a certain visual dynamism, even a kinetic quality, to the piece. Do we see here merely the proverbial horror vacui of the Bronze Age craftsman? Or is there meaning to be derived?

Are they, perhaps, Suns? Shining with mirrored light, the Moon contains the Sun.

(Circles within circles, crescents within crescents.)

Or are they Full Moons, which every Crescent contains within herself?

I count twenty. If they're intended as Full Moons, along with the two Crescents, that makes twenty-two: a number of no obvious lunar (or, for that matter, solar) association. Either there's some symbolism here too recondite for my learning, or—this would be my guess—they're simply the number required to fill the space.

As I said, over-interpretation.

Witches, of course, have always been a people of the Moon. I kiss the little silver pendant and hang it around my neck.

Dreaming about being headless is often a sign that there is a disconnect between your head and your heart (what you’re thinking and what you’re feeling). For example, you might be thinking so much about an upcoming match of vocabulary test coming up and doing so much memorization and study that you are living temporarily mostly in your head and thinking, thinking, thinking. When I am consumed with a project and forget to eat, that is when I know I am too much in my mind and head. You may be lacking a sense of balance in your life. Try to identify the role that your heart and mind play in your life. Is one taking more control than the other? You may be so focused on common sense and logic that you have started to neglect or suppress your emotions. On the other hand, it’s possible that you are letting your feelings dictate your actions without thinking things through.

Cast yourself down
at the feet of mystery.
Fling your heart wide
and let all your dreams
cascade out onto the
welcoming earth.
Match your breath
with the heartbeat
beneath you.
Let everything you
no longer need,
seep away.
Discover life is simpler
than you thought.
Let go of worry,
release your fear.
Feel tension roll away
like an slow ebbing tide.
Rise,
scoured,
and stripped bare,
soft and renewed.
Gather up those
dream fragments
that sparkle around you,
but only those that
still beat to your rhythm
and that sing your song.
Nestle them back beneath
your breastbone,
keep them safe and warm
and breathing
as they prepare to fly.

Every step you take will be supernatural when you wear your Twinkle-Star Toe Ring! To make this ring, you’ll need forty-four tiny amethyst beads, 18 inches of elastic thread, two sewing needles or two wire thread needles, and glue. Once you get the knack of the projects, you can try it again and vary the number and type of crystal beads.

Begin by blessing the beads on your altar. Next, thread the needles onto each end of the elastic thread and then string four beads to the center of the elastic. Thread the left needle through the last bead on the right-hand side. Pull it tight, forming a diamond shape. Next, string one bead on the left thread end and two beads on the right. Thread the left needle through the last bead on the right. Pull it tight. Repeat until all the beads are used. In order to close the ring, thread the left needle through the end bead of the first diamond, instead of the last bead on the right. Pull tight, tie the ring off with a double knot, and place a drop of glue on the knot.

An Open Letter

Dear Andras Corban-Arthen,

I'm looking forward to hearing your presentations at Paganicon 2023 this year; I've long been an admirer of your work.

Really, though? “Indians”?

Indians of Old Europe

European paganism never died out completely – to this day, ethnic survivals of traditional pagan practices can still be found in remote areas of Eastern and Western Europe. Andras has spent over 40 years seeking out such surviving traditions, and in this workshop he will discuss the nature and scope of some of those practices, how they managed to survive, and the striking similarities they share with indigenous spiritualities from other parts of the world. The presentation will also include slides of people and places, as well as a short video.

I get it, I get it. As “Indians” are to the Americas, so “pagans” are to Europe. Indigenous Americans, Indigenous Europeans. For all its inherent limitations, it's a useful analogy.

Still, “Indians”?

Well, I don't know about the Berkshire highlands of western Massachusetts, but around here in the Paleozoic Plateau's upper Mississippi Valley—historic Dakota country—there are still lots of Indigenous/First Nations people, our elders in the Land. These folks are our friends, our neighbors, and our kin, and I think you should know that at least some of them—for reasons that should be pretty obvious—find the term “Indian” more than a little objectionable.

You can cleanse all of your jewelry by placing it into a bowl of sea salt for seven days to make sure nobody else’s energy is permeating the pieces. This is especially helpful if you own antique or estate jewelry.

Tritons are a type of mollusk, a large (10-40 cm long) sea snail in the genus Charonia. That's a photo of one of their shells above. They live in tropical and temperate waters around the world, including in the Mediterranean. As you might guess, the Minoans knew about them.

In fact, the Minoans were kind of obsessed with them. I have some thoughts about that obsession.