The Devil and the Sun King: The Affair of the Poisons

January 22, 2025 By Ian Chambers

Whenever we think of historic accounts of witchcraft, there are a number of cases that are frequently mentioned. In particular, these are the ones that popular authors have included in their studies, from Margaret Murray to Emma Wilby. But there is one incident in history that incorporates all of the tropes and stereotypes of witchcraft and magic in the early modern period, including the black mass, black magic, clergy, love spells, witchcraft, devilish pacts, poisoning, abortions, and child sacrifice. What’s... Read more

To Always Hele, Ever Conceal, and Never Reveal…

December 9, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

I swear that I will always conceal and never reveal these secrets… (Society of Esoteric Endeavour 2009, 89) [1] This solemn oath is delivered by the initiate into the secretive Society of the Horseman’s Word, taken from The Ancient Ritual of the Buchan Ploughmen, Incorporated with the Ancient Horsemen. A parallel society to the Freemasons, such initiatory oaths contain similar phraseology, and these binding words have, therefore, a magical context. Indeed, throughout the magical milieu, such oaths of secrecy serve... Read more

Feast of the Gods: Outrage and Parody…

July 28, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

“Our idea was inclusion… Naturally when we want to include everyone and not exclude anyone questions are raised… We wanted to talk about diversity. Diversity means being together. We wanted to include everybody… In France, we have artistic freedom. We are lucky in France to live in a free country.” – Paris 2024 artistic director Thomas Jolly (extract from The Independent). The Paris Olympic Games 2024 opened this week, with a ceremony at times equally bizarre and uniquely French. Full... Read more

Running Witch…

June 20, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

Things I’ve been contemplating lately synchronised for me today when my Facebook feed presented a post from someone whom I respect greatly in our community, BJ Swain. This moral story is both true and representative of something I’ve found great solace in over the last year that I have become a runner in earnest. The running community generally has an encouraging and nourishing ethos as I’ve found it to date, frequently reminding me that the only person I am racing... Read more

Sorcerous Boundaries with the Witch Compass

April 24, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

“…And after the said Jane allighted and pulld the bridle of her head, and she and the rest had drawne their compasse nigh to a bridg end, and the devil placed a stone in the middle of the compasse; they sett themselves downe, and bending towards the stone, repeated the Lord’s prayer backwards.” Testimony of Anne Armstrong, 1673 [1] Anne Armstrong was likely just a teenager when she became swept up in a dark cloud following the Newcastle witch trials... Read more

Privilege and Witchcraft

March 23, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

Within modern witchcraft, two positions have made themselves apparent in recent years that is somewhat of a surprise — and is perhaps informed in some small way by the increased popularity of witchcraft and its emergence as a mainstream, and commercialised, endeavour. On the one hand are those who recognise, in historic notions of witchcraft and its power, that this practice and archetype has most often been the recourse of the disadvantaged against the abuses of those in some position... Read more

The Devil in Witchcraft – The Witch Compass Extract

February 4, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

The figure of the devil, the Black Man of the Sabbat, the adversarial force that presides over all witchery, has become a popular topic for discussion of late. The following is an extract from my book, The Witch Compass: Working with the Winds in Traditional Witchcraft, published by Llewellyn. Signed copies are also available from the Surrey Cunning website. Within the folklore and custom of the common man, we must remember that the Devil manifests a force that challenges... Read more

A Defence of Witchcraft Belief – Book Review

January 25, 2024 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

A Defence of Witchcraft Belief: A Sixteenth-century Response to Reginald Scot’s Discoverie of Witchcraft, Edited by Eric Pudney, Manchester University Press 2023 In 1584, the would-be know-all, university dropout and so-called authority on the subject of early modern witchcraft, Reginald Scot published his now famous book The Discoverie of Witchcraft. This tome was dedicated to the intellectual, reasoned pursuit of the Protestant view of early modern witchcraft as naught but a relic of superstition and was contemporaneous with other less... Read more

Father Time: Ring out, wild bells…

December 20, 2023 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

veritas filia temporis The Midwinter, especially around the solstitial event of the sun’s apparent stasis (around the 21st/22nd December), has long held significance for mankind. As humanity developed narrative to bring order and meaning to life’s ever turning wheel, so myth developed around this dark time of the year — winter in the northern hemisphere. It is, therefore, little coincidence that codified within our current apprehension of custom and tradition at this time is a dark robed figure, with sickle... Read more

Midwinter Traditions – From Wild Hunt to Festive Spirit

December 8, 2023 By Ian Chambers

0 Comments

There has been much made in recent decades about the pagan origins of Christmas customs. It is important to note that this idea is not, strictly speaking, an accurate portrayal and is symptomatic of unhelpful reductionism. It does form, however, a broader sentiment in modern Neopaganism to reject anything that smacks of Christianity, and this often throws the baby out with the bathwater. Life, belief, perspective, traditions, customs and accompanying lore form a part of an unfolding spectrum and history... Read more