Mythology

This is the old Scottish name given to anything a witch used to fly on.

Contrary to popular belief, the instrument of the witches’ legendary flights through the air was by no means always a broomstick.

The earliest accounts often refer to a forked wand, or simply a staff, which is given to the witch when she is initiated, together with a vessel of ointment, the witches’ unguent; and it is the latter which enables the witch to fly.

One of the earliest writers on witchcraft whose book was printed, was Ulrich Molitor, a Professor of the University of Constance.

His book, De Lamiis (Of Witches), was published in 1489 and contains six very quaint and rather attractive woodcuts.

One of them is the earliest known picture from a printed book of witches in flight.

It depicts three witches, wearing fantastic animal masks, and sharing the same forked staff, on which they are soaring over the countryside.

The incidence of this forked staff as a bune wand is interesting when we remember that Diana and Hecate, the classical moon goddesses of
witchcraft were both given the title Trivia, ‘of the three ways’, and their statues stood at places where three roads met.

The forked staff could well symbolize this and hence be used in witches’ rituals.

It also resembled the horns of the Horned God.

Long-stalked plants were often believed to be bune wands for witches, especially such plants as grew in wild and desolate places.

The yellow ragwort is one such; and there is a saying in the Isle of Man, “As arrant a witch as ever rode a ragwort.”

The Ooser was written about in Doreen Valiente’s ABC’s of Witchcraft and in Margaret Murray’s The God of the Witches.

It was a hollow mask made of painted wood, trimmed with fur, and crowned with bull’s horns.

The lower jaw of the Ooser was movable, and it possessed a strange convex boss on its forehead.

Valiente claims that this boss was representative of the third eye, a seat of psychic power.

The original Ooser mask disappeared in 1897, though a modern replica, made in 1975 by John Byfleet, is held in the Dorset County Museum, where it is taken out as a part of a procession of Morris dancers atop the Cerne Abbas giant on May Day and St George’s Day, though some records indicate that in the 19th century it was paraded at Christmas instead.

It is unknown when the original mask was made, but appeared to be in a tradition of making animal and grotesque masks to be worn in procession; in the 7th century book Liber Poenitentialis by the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Theodore, he stated:

“whoever at the kalends of January goes about as a stag or bull; that is, making himself into a wild animal and dressing in the skin of a herd animal, and putting on the heads of beast, those who in such wise transform themselves into the appearance of a wild animal, penance for three years because this is devilish”.

The etymology of the word “ooser” is of special interest to we Indiana witches, as we Indiana natives are labeled by the strange moniker “hoosier”, which is a variation of ooser.

The Indiana Historian Jacob Piatt Dunn, Jr. found that the word, “hoosier” was used, in the south, to refer to woodsmen and rough hill people.

Mr Piatt traced this word back to England and the word “hoozer,” meaning anything large in the Cumberland dialect.

This was derived from the Anglo-Saxon “hoo” meaning high or hill.

Mr Pratt suggests that this word was brought from England and applied to people who lived in the southern mountains.

This word then migrated north to the southern hills of Indiana.

“Hoosier” is still sometimes used in the southern United States to characterize someone who is less then sophisticated, or more bluntly, an “ignorant rustic.”

Thus, a hoosier is a Pagan!

The Fetch-Beast, also known as the Fetch-Wife, has been dealt with elsewhere in this book, and is the Underworld Self of the Crafter, known in Briar Rose as the Dragon.

The third kind of Fetch, the one used in shape-shifting, is traditionally a piece of skin or fur belonging to the animal into which the Shape-shifter transforms.

In some cases, such as the selkies in Ireland, it is the actual whole skin that the shape-shifter puts on to become the animal.

But when Witches refer to a Fetch, they usually mean the “thought-form” created for a specific purpose, to find something or someone, to bring people together, or carry out some other task.

Ceremonial Magick has a similar technique, the main difference being the status of the Fetch… in the Craft, it is a living entity, whereas CMs tend to see them as servitors, something akin to astral droids.

To create a fetch, you need to start by pulling energy together in a concentrated form.

There are many ways of doing this, but for a solo practitioner the most effective way is to visualize a ball of light between your hands, and pump energy into it from your core, through your hands.

Keep pumping energy into it until it is really full, and you can feel the energy really strongly.

Then you begin to shape it.

You should have chosen an appropriate form before-hand — most Witches work with animal forms, and it is recommended to avoid using human forms unless you know what you are doing.

Once the fetch has its form, you should name it, bind it to its task, and then set its destruction fate.

It is considered bad form to let a fetch exist longer than a year, so traditionally a cut off date is built in, so the fetch ceases to be on a certain date, or when the task is complete, whichever comes first.

A fetch that is allowed to exist for too long, especially after their task is complete, can develop independence and start drawing off the life-force of its creator.

State firmly the fetch’s purpose, its cut off date, and name it, binding all these things together.

Then release it to complete its task.

The castles of our system are based on Grail Lore, but they also have representations in the none world.

These castles are symbolic of the energies inherent in their names and attributed to them by myth and legend.

In the Arthurian cycle, the knights journey to seven castles, but most mythographers interpret this imram as an Otherworldly voyage, akin to the shaman’s journey into the soul, using the World Tree as a ladder.

Robert Graves, in The White Goddess, indicates that each of the seven castles is synonymous with the Spiral Castle, Caer Sidhe (or Caer Arianrhod).

Graves’ interpretation makes good sense to us. Each of the castles is so intimately connected in symbolism and meaning, and it is impossible to separate any one of them from gestalt of Caer Sidhe.

It is based on this concept that, while we talk about the castles as separate places, we ultimately view them each as a tower or turret on the great Spiral Castle.

The Castle of Stone is the home of Cernunnos, in our system.

He is the keeper of the castle and the guardian of its treasure, the Stone Bowl.

Cernunnos is honored at Summer Solstice as the Oak King, and the totems present in his time of honor are the Oak, Stag, and Robin.

One of the names of the Castle of Stone is the “4-cornered castle,” in Welsh Caer Bannawg. This name became Carbonic or Carbonak later.

Graves suggests that this castle is in fact a burial place like a kristvaen (which is formed from four stone slabs that make a stone box). It has also been suggested that “4-cornered” refers to the castle rotating four times, which certainly ties it symbolically to the Spiral Castle.

Carbonak is an important locale in Grail myth, as it is the home of Elaine (the Grail Maiden, wife of Lancelot, and mother of Galahad). It is here that the Grail is revealed in the saga, when Elaine shows it to Lancelot.

The Old French version of this name is cor beneoit, meaning both ‘blessed horn’ (alluding to the Grail as a horn of plenty) and ‘blessed body’ (referring to the Grail as a Eucharistic vessel).

The reference to horn also works nicely as an allusion to the Horned God of this keep.

Carbonak is also heavily associated with ravens and with Bran the Blessed. Corbin, which the castle is called in certain parts of the myth, is the Old French word for “raven.”

Bran means raven in Welsh and Cornish. An extent hill-fort in Penwith, Cornwall is associated with Carbonak, and it is called Caer Bran.

The Brythonic possessive version of this name is Kernowek. Castell Dinas Bran (“Castle of the City of Crows”) in Wales is assumed by scholars to be the most likely site of Carbonak, however.

Bran is inescapably tied to the Grail mythologies in the sense that he, too, went on a voyage in search of a sacred vessel, The Cauldron of Rebirth.

Like the Grail-King, he was pierced by a spear and the land suffered until he was healed. Bran is honored and remembered in the Arthurian cycle as Brons, one of Arthur’s knights, the son-in-law of Joseph of Arimehtea (who, of course, is said to have brought the grail — as cup of Christ — into Celtic lands).

The Stone Castle is no palace, no place of luxury or entertainment. It is a fortress, a place of training and of siege.

It is the Vault of the Mysteries. It is a place of safety, and it is a storehouse.

It is a seat of power and is built at a site of strength (or one with protective needs).

Several castles and forts spring to mind when envisioning Caer Bannawg for oneself.

The Krak de Chevaliers, for instance, is a wonderful example of a medieval fortress. It is a “Mont & Bailey” castle, and it is practically impenetrable.

It is functional and foreboding, and it takes very little manpower to defend it.