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Craft Name
A craft name, also referred to as a magical name, is a secondary religious name often adopted by practitioners of Wicca and other forms of Neopagan witchcraft or magic. Craft names may be adopted as a means of protecting one's privacy (especially for those who are "in the broom closet"), as an expression of religious devotion, or as a part of an initiation ritual. It may also be used as a protective method, as it is believed by some that one's "true name" can be used to identify that person for the purpose of magical activities (predominantly curses). Pseudonym The idea of using an alternate name as an attempt to develop a different persona is not restricted to Neopagans: Samuel Clemens' adoption of the name Mark Twain has been described as the adoption of a magical name. Before the emergence of Neopaganism similar pseudonyms appear to have been used by writers of grimoires such as ''The Book of Abramelin'', attributed to the Rabbi Yaakov Moelin. Uses In traditional forms of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cerridwen Fallingstar Photo By Susanna Frohman
Ceridwen or Cerridwen ( ''Ke-RID-wen'') was an enchantress in Welsh mythology, Welsh medieval legend. She was the mother of a hideous son, Afagddu, and a beautiful daughter, Creirwy. Her husband was Tegid Foel and they lived near Bala Lake () in north Wales. Medieval Welsh poetry refers to her as possessing the cauldron of poetic inspiration (Awen) and the Tale of Taliesin recounts her swallowing her servant Gwion Bach who is then reborn through her as the poet Taliesin. Ceridwen is regarded by many Modern paganism, modern pagans as the Celtic goddess of rebirth, transformation, and inspiration. Etymology Marged Haycock catalogues various forms of the name in the early texts and in less detail in her edition of the Taliesin poems These mainly occur in manuscripts which have been dated to the 13th century, though they may, of course, be using earlier forms or 13th century adaptations of earlier forms. ''The Black Book of Carmarthen'' gives ‘Kyrridven’. ''Peniarth 3'' gives â ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton (born 1946) is a retired British conservation officer, a Wiccan initiate, and a writer on the subjects of Wicca, Paganism, and Earth mysteries. He is best known for two books, ''Wiccan Roots: Gerald Gardner and the Modern Witchcraft Revival'' and ''Gerald Gardner and the Cauldron of Inspiration'', which gather historical evidence surrounding the New Forest coven and the origins of Gardnerian Wicca. In his non-literary life his interest in landscape led to a degree in Geography and a career in Town and Country Planning; eventually he became a Conservation Officer for Hull City Council before his retirement in 1997. 1960s–1970s: Ley hunting Heselton has been described by Allen Watkins, son of Alfred Watkins, as the person who "...led the post-war revival of academic and practical interest in Leys". In 1962, Heselton and others collaborated to form the Ley Hunters' Club, a revival of Alfred Watkins' Straight Track Club. The Ley Hunters worked on a hypothesis tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Starhawk
Starhawk (born Miriam Simos on June 17, 1951) is an American feminist and author. She is known as a theorist of feminist Neopaganism and ecofeminism. In 2013, she was listed in Watkins' ''Mind Body Spirit'' magazine as one of the 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People. Early life Starhawk was born in 1951 in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Her father Jack Simos, died when she was five. Her mother, Bertha Claire Goldfarb Simos, was a professor of social work at UCLA. Both her parents were the children of Jewish immigrants from Russia. In high school she and feminist Christina Hoff Sommers were best friends. Starhawk received a BA in Fine Arts from UCLA. In 1973, while she was a graduate student in film there, she won the Samuel Goldwyn Writing Award for her novel, ''A Weight of Gold'', a story about Venice, California, where she then lived. She received an MA in Psychology, with a concentration in feminist therapy, from Antioch University West in 1982. ''The Spiral Dance'' Fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zsuzsanna Budapest
Zsuzsanna Emese Mokcsay (born 30 January 1940 in Budapest, Hungary) is a Hungarian author, activist, journalist, playwright and songwriter living in America who writes about feminist spirituality and Dianic Wicca under the pen name Zsuzsanna Budapest or Z. Budapest. She is the founder of the Susan B. Anthony Coven #1, which was founded in 1971 as the first women-only witches' coven.Lesbian Pride Website . Lesbian-pride.com (1940-01-30). Retrieved on 2011-06-23.''Witchcraft Today: An Encyclopedia of Wiccan and Neopagan Traditions'' by James R. Lewis ABC-CLIO (1999)''Voices from the Pagan Census: A National Survey of Witches and Neo-Pagans in the United States'' by Helen A. Berger, Evan A. Leach and Leigh S. Shaffer. University of South Carolina Press (2003) [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Silver RavenWolf
Silver RavenWolf (born September 11, 1956), born Jenine E. Trayer, is a best-selling American New Age, Magick and Witchcraft author and lecturer who focuses on Wicca. Career RavenWolf received her Third Degree Initiation from a member of the Serpent Stone family, a pagan congregation. While studying under a British Traditional Witch who claimed to have ties to the International Red Garters in Britain, Silver also became connected with a family lineaged witch who was the last in his line of the tradition. It was this mentorship that prompted the beginning of the Black Forest Circle and Seminary in the 1990s. , The Black Forest Circle and Seminary is an organization that contains hundreds of covens spanning the United States and Canada. Until the 2010s, she appeared as a lecturer and workshop facilitator at events in the Neo-Pagan community. She was active in Wiccan anti-discrimination issues. She was also a Powwower, having adopted the Pennsylvania Dutch practice in a neo-Paga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Book Of Shadows (biography)
''Book of Shadows'' is a 1998 memoir written by author Phyllis Curott. Promotional summary When high-powered Manhattan lawyer Phyllis Curott began exploring witchcraft in a women's group in the 1970s, she discovered a spiritual movement that defied all stereotypes. Encountering neither Satanic rites nor eccentric spinsters, she came to know a clandestine religion of the Goddess that had been forced into hiding over the course of history. The ''Book of Shadows'' chronicles Curott's remarkable initiation into Wicca, her ascent to the position of Wiccan high priestess, and her efforts to reconcile her newfound spirituality with her struggles as a woman rising through the ranks of the corporate world. Along the way, she relates the history of witchcraft. She also shares many traditional Wiccan practices – such as casting a circle, drawing down the Goddess, and casting spells for health, prosperity, and love. She explains all this from a feminist point of view. The title ''Boo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phyllis Curott
Phyllis Curott (born February 8, 1954) who goes under the craft name Aradia, is a Wiccan priestess, attorney, and author. Early life and education Curott grew up in Lynbrook, Long Island. Her parents were agnostic- atheist, socially liberal intellectuals who encouraged her to make her own decisions regarding theology but taught her to adhere to the Golden Rule. Her father worked as a maritime trade union organizer, whilst her mother, who had come from a wealthy and well-educated background, was a diplomat involved in the civil rights movement for racial equality in the United States. Curott went on to gain a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Brown University before going on to study for a Juris Doctor from New York University School of Law. Legal and film careers After graduating from law school, Curott worked in Washington, D.C. as a lobbyist for Ralph Nader. Upon returning to New York City, Curott has practiced labor law, entertainment law and real estate law. Addition ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alex Sanders (Wiccan)
Alex Sanders (6 June 1926 – 30 April 1988), born Orrell Alexander Carter, who went under the craft name Verbius, was an English occultist and High Priest in the modern Pagan religion of Wicca, responsible for founding, and later developing with Maxine Sanders, the tradition of Alexandrian Wicca, also called Alexandrian Witchcraft, during the 1960s. Raised in a working-class family, Alex, as a young man, began working as a medium in the local Spiritualist Churches before going on to study and practise ceremonial magic. In 1963, he was initiated into Gardnerian Wicca before founding his own coven, through which he merged many aspects of ceremonial magic into Wicca. He claimed to have been initiated by his Welsh-speaking grandmother, Mary Bibby (née Roberts), as a child, though recent research has disproven this, with Bibby dying in 1907, some 19 years before Sanders' birth. Throughout the 1960s, he would court publicity in the press, appearing in a number of documentaries, m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Raymond Buckland
Raymond Buckland (31 August 1934 – 27 September 2017), whose craft name was Robat, was an English writer on the subject of Wicca and the occult, and a significant figure in the history of Wicca, of which he was a high priest in both the Gardnerian and Seax-Wica traditions. According to his written works, primarily ''Witchcraft from the Inside'', published in 1971, he was the first person in the United States to openly admit to being a practitioner of Wicca, and he introduced the lineage of Gardnerian Wicca to the United States in 1964, after having been initiated by Gerald Gardner's then-high priestess Monique Wilson in Britain the previous year. He later formed his own tradition dubbed Seax-Wica which focuses on the symbolism of Anglo-Saxon paganism. Biography Britain: 1934–1962 Buckland was born in London on 31 August 1934, to Eileen and Stanley Buckland. Buckland was of mixed ethnicity; his mother was English, and his father was Romanichal ( "English Gypsy"). He was rais ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fred Lamond
Frederic Lamond (5 July 1931 – 24 May 2020) (also known by the craft name Robert) was a prominent English Wiccan. He was an early member of the Gardnerian tradition having been initiated into the Bricket Wood coven in 1957. He became involved in a number of Pagan organisations, including the Fellowship of Isis, and participated in the interfaith movement. He wrote a number of books on the subject of Wiccan theology and history. Biography Early life: 1931–1956 Lamond was born an only child and when he was only two years old his parents divorced, leaving him to live with his maternal grandparents. After the start of World War II, his grandmother, who was of Jewish ethnicity, took him to live in Switzerland, which was then one of the only neutral countries in Europe. Lamond was raised in a relatively free religious environment and was not forced to follow any religion. His grandmother had repeated on numerous occasions that "all religious dogmas are lies!". However, she ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lois Bourne
Lois is a common English name from the New Testament. Paul the Apostle mentions Lois, the pious grandmother of Saint Timothy in the Second Epistle to Timothy (commending her for her faith in 2 Timothy 1:5). The name was first used by English Christians after the Protestant Reformation, and it was popular, particularly in North America, during the first half of the 20th century. Notable women * Lois Bryan Adams (1817-1870), American writer, journalist, newspaper editor * Lois McMaster Bujold, author * Lois Capps, congresswoman * Lois Chiles, actress * Lois Collier, actress * Lois Ehlert, writer * Lois Hole, lieutenant governor of Alberta (2000–2005) * Lois Johnson (1942–2014), American country music singer * Lois Kolkhorst, American politician * Lois M. Leveen, author * Lois Lilienstein, singer * Lois Long, writer for The New Yorker * Lois Lowry, author * Lois Maffeo (''Lois''), musician * Lois Maxwell, actress * Lois McCallin, athlete * Lois McConnell, lead singer of European ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eleanor Bone
Eleanor "Ray" Bone (15 December 1911 – 21 September 2001) who also went under the craft name Artemis, was an influential figure in the neopagan religion of Wicca. She claimed to have been initiated in 1941 by a couple of hereditary witches in Cumbria. She later met and became friends with Gerald Gardner, and was initiated into Wicca, becoming the High Priestess in one of his covens. She was a friend of several important figures in Wicca during the modern Witchcraft revival, including " Dafo", Jack Bracelin, Patricia Crowther, Doreen Valiente and Idries Shah. Bone was a close confidant of Gardner's initiator Dafo, and she reported that the New Forest coven was a hereditary coven that followed the old ways of the Hampshire region, and that they traced their origins to the time of the death of King William Rufus in the Norman era.Eleanor B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
