THE TRADITIONAL WITCH’S CALENDAR: 15-21 JANUARY

A warm January tends to be much wetter but the Old Craft witch takes advantage of those rare, frosty days to wander the fields and lanes in the early mornings before the winter sun melts the frost ... to experience those first magical moments when the winter sun breaks over the skyline to spread its scarlet fingers across the white, frozen landscape … or to watch the sun go down in a blaze of fire over the tree tops. A traditional witch will be out and about at dawn and dusk to utilise the magical energies of this ‘time between times’, especially at the boundaries and borders of the field margin.

17th New Moon, also Old Twelfth Night, continuing the custom of the date determined by the old Julian calendar. Also the Feast of St Anthony, the patron saint of domestic animals, whose emblem is the pig and a bell; even non-Christians offer up a quick prayer to St Anthony to help them find missing possessions. Remember that the old grimoires used the saints in their spells. For example:

“Saint Anthony, who received from God
the special power of restoring lost things,
grant that I may find (mention your petition)
which has been lost. As least restore to me
peace and tranquillity of mind, the loss of
which has afflicted me even more than my
material loss.”

20th St Agnes’s Eve when unmarried girls wishing for a husband would perform certain rituals before going to bed. Her emblem is a lamb.

FOLKLORE:
Finding and picking up a piece of metal in the road was regarded as lucky, especially if it was a horseshoes and horseshoe nails – the latter an important element of spell-casting. Unlike a lot of cultures, iron has a very positive reputation in British folklore and was often placed under the doormat to keep negative influences at bay. The earliest reference to finding iron is the Harleian manuscript of the late 14th century, which says ‘iron nails are among the lucky finds …’ The antipathy to iron supposedly felt by witches and fairies is another example of old superstition being turned on its head.

THE TRADITIONAL WITCH’S CALENDAR:  22-31 JANUARY

The hearth fire is the symbolic and magical centre of any witch’s home, and it is to the hearth we bring the richness of Nature’s bounty to help celebrate the old festivals and feast days. It is at the hearth fire we regularly use the four sacramental foods that have been part of spiritual observance since ancient times, oil (Elemental Fire), bread (Elemental Air), salt (Elemental Earth) and wine (Elemental Water).

22^nd Feast of St Vincent.  The weather on St Vincent’s Day is used to forecast the weather: wind an sun are favourable omens for the coming year’s crops and grain.

24^th Full Moon – a good time to bathe in the light of the full moon and replenish those tired energies that are always at a low ebb at the beginning of the year.

MAGICAL LORE:

Salt is the symbol for Elemental North/Earth and most make do with the common table variety.  There is, however, an alternative that is much purer and native to these shores – Maldon Salt.  This unmistakeable brand of flaky sea salt has been produced on the banks of the Blackwater Estuary for the past 130 years and has been gathered there since Roman times.

The salt is ‘harvested’ according to the elements and the best time for drawing off the salted water from the Estuary is during the high spring tides that occur twice a month – one just before the full moon and one just before the new moon.  This is when the saline content of the water is at its highest since it has absorbed all the salt drying on the marsh grass.  A heavy rainfall during the preceding week means that the freshwater content will be too high to produce good quality salt and so production is halted until the weather improves and the tide is right.

 Consecrated salt

Use Maldon salt magically to represent the Element of Earth.  Hold both hands cupped together, palms facing downwards over the small bowl containing the salt and visualise energy flowing from the palms into the salt.  Pause for a moment and feel the power making the salt glow and becoming ‘magically alive’.  From now on this salt is a highly charged magical substance and should be kept solely for magical use.  To make consecrated water use one teaspoon of Maldon salt to a small bowl of water and repeat the above rite; use for blessing, cleansing and protective charms.

Maldon salt is available in the US from good delis.