What is a Witch? This may sound like a silly question, since the reason you are here is to become a witch, so surely you know what a witch is...right?
When picturing a witch in your head a million images can come to mind. Everything from the Wicked Witch of the West to Hermione from the Harry Potter series can personify iconic witches for us.
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| Wizard of Oz gives us 2 of the most iconic witches in media |
The word witch comes from the Anglo-Saxon word wicce - meaning 'wise'. In the Old English, wicca was the word for a male witch, wicce for female. Today, we use the word witch for both genders.
Wise women, medicine men, High Priestesses, conjerors; all these and more were the names of the first witches and wizards of their communities. They are skilled in many attributes of magic including divination, healing, shapeshifting, protection, hexes and more.
Throughout history, witches have been the doctors and midwives, the match-makers and the war strategists. They read the auguries for hunting, presided over weddings and gave last rites at the time of death.
Today, witches carry out these same practices and principles with a modern twist. Witches take on multiple roles from life coach and nutritionist to librarian or CEO. We provide a magical link to human's primal past even as we are enmeshed in this modern, technological world.
Famous Witches in History
The following is a brief listing of famous witches in history and today. We will expound on this list as we go on with our lessons. This list is simply to get you started on your own studies of magical people and what they can teach you.
Hypatia of Alexandria (370- 415 CE)
Hypatia was the daughter of Theon, the last head of the Museum at Alexandria. She was librarian at the great library and renowned for her wisdom, especially regarding astronomy. She wrote The Astronomical Canon and a commentary on The Conics of Apollonius. Hypatia was as articulate and eloquent in speaking as she was prudent and civil in her deeds. Wearing her philosopher’s cloak, she walked through the middle of town, where she would publicly interpret Plato, Aristotle, or the works of any other philosopher to those who wished to listen. Hypatia was beautiful and shapely but also chaste, and remained always a virgin. The whole city adored her, but Hypatia was both female and Pagan in an increasingly misogynist (“anti-women”) Christian world.
Cyril, the new Bishop, was so envious of her beauty, intellect, wisdom, and fame that he plotted her heinous murder. In the spring of 415, a mob of Christian monks seized Hypatia on the street, beat her to death, and dragged her body to a church where they flayed her flesh from bones with sharp oyster shells and scattered her remains throughout the city. They then burned down the great library—a tragic loss for civilization.
Merlin (Emrys Myrddhin Ambrosias) (c.440-520?)
Perhaps the most famous Wizard of Western legend, Merlin is known primarily as the childhood tutor and later advisor of King Arthur (465–537). A fatherless boy said to have been sired by a demon, young Merlin was brought before King Vortigern upon the advice of his court magicians. Vortigern had brought Saxon mercenaries into England to defend against the Picts and the Scots-Irish. The Saxons had taken control of the land, and Vortigern was attempting to build a tower to strengthen his holdings. But the construction kept collapsing, and Vortigern’s advisors told him that only the blood of a fatherless boy would remedy this. But Merlin divined that the tower’s instability was due to an underground pool of water, which was discovered upon excavation. This event secured his fame as a prophet.
About ten years later, with Vortigern dead and Uther Pendragon on the throne, Merlin arranged for the birth of Arthur by disguising Uther as the husband of Ygraine, Queen of Cornwall, whom Uther then seduced and impregnated. When Arthur was born, Merlin took him away for fosterage and tutoring. Upon Uther’s death, Merlin arranged the contest of the sword in the stone; upon drawing it forth, Arthur became King of England. Merlin, then in his 40s, became Court Wizard. He is said to have established the Order of Chivalry with the Knights of the Round Table. In his old age, Merlin was seduced by the enchantress Nimué, who learned his magick and turned it against him, trapping him, it is said, in a crystal cave, thorn forest, or oak tree. There it is believed he lives on still, resting until he is needed again.
Leonardo da Vinci
(1452–1519)
Leonardo was the greatest Wizard of the Italian Renaissance. His contributions to humanity were extraordinary—as an artist, inventor, writer, and thinker. His notebooks reveal explorations and examinations of everything in the known Universe, and some of his paintings (particularly the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper) are among the best known artworks in the world. Each subject that Leonardo studied, he made a field of scientific research. He studied human anatomy to better draw the human body; he studied botany and geology in order to accurately portray plants and landscapes. He became a geologist, physiologist, astronomer, and mechanical engineer. The many machines and inventions that he conceived are marvels of engineering— including his famous designs for a flapping-wing flying machine, or ornithopter. The thousands of pages of drawings and writings he has left us convey a new vision of unity that Leonardo sought to give the world.
He spoke of science as the “knowledge of things possible in the future, of the present, and of the past.” He
wrote many of his texts in mirror image and is known for secreting coded symbols in his paintings.
History’s greatest prophet, Michel de Nostredame was best known by the Latin version of his last name, Nostradamus (“Our Lady”). His Jewish family claimed descent from the Issachar tribe, noted for prophecy. His grandfather taught him Greek, Latin, Hebrew, math, and astrology. Nostradamus studied philosophy in Avignon and received his medical license from the University of Montpelier.
Possessing a seemingly miraculous ability to heal the incurable, Nostradamus treated sufferers of the Black Plague. In a tragic irony, his first wife and two children died of the plague, and the Inquisition then accused him of heresy. For the next six years he wandered around France, caring for plague victims and studying the occult. In 1546, he married again and had six children. Using water scrying, Nostradamus was able to receive visions of the future. Starting in 1550, he issued an annual Almanac of predictions, and in 1556, he published Centuries, his famous book of prophecies from his time to the end of the world in 3799. He became famous throughout Europe for his predictions, and the French Royal Family asked him to come to Paris to prepare their astrological charts. He saw that all seven sons would gain the crown, and all would die.
Near the end of his life, Nostradamus was welcomed at the court of Catherine de Médici, where he continued making predictions, including that of his own death, which occurred exactly as he described it. His enigmatic quatrains have been reinterpreted by each generation since, and more than 40 are believed to have already come true.
Born the day Eliphas Levi died, Aleister Crowley believed himself to be the reincarnation of Levi, Cagliostro, Edward Kelly, and Pope Alexander VI. The most controversial figure in magickal history, he has been both idolized as a saint and vilified as a sorcerer. He had an enormous thirst for knowledge and power, coupled with an insatiable appetite for sex, drugs, and sensual pleasures. He joined the Golden Dawn in 1898 but was soon locked in a bitter power struggle with its founder, S.L. MacGregor Mathers, resulting in his expulsion and the breakup of the Order.
Crowley traveled widely, climbing mountains in India and studying Buddhism, Tantric Yoga, Egyptian magick, Qabalah, and Dee’s Enochian magick. In 1904, his wife Rose channeled a spirit called “Aiwass,” which Crowley identified as the Egyptian god Set. Through Rose, Aiwass dictated The Book of the Law. Its core is the Law of Thelema (“will”): “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.” From 1909 to 1913, Crowley published the secret rituals of the Golden Dawn in his magazine The Equinox, infuriating Mathers and other Golden Dawn members. He lived in the U.S. from 1915 to 1919, then moved to Sicily, where he founded the notorious Abbey of Thelema. For a time he headed the Ordo Templi Orientis, before being deported in 1923 due to scandal as “The Wickedest Man in the World”— a title he relished, calling himself “The Great Beast 666.”
In his final year, Crowley met Gerald Gardner and contributed some material to Gardner’s Book of Shadows. A brilliant writer and poet, his several books include Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), considered by many to be the best book ever on ceremonial magick. In it, Crowley introduced the now common spelling of “magick” to “distinguish the science of the Magi from all its counterfeits.”
Gerald Brousseau Gardner (1884–1964)
Born into a prosperous family in England, Gerald Gardner claimed several Witches in his family tree. In 1906, Gerald went to Ceylon as a cadet in a tea planting business. There, in 1909, he was initiated into Freemasonry. In 1912, he moved to Malaya to become a rubber planter. When the price of rubber fell in
1923, he joined the Malayan Customs & Excise Service. There he befriended the Sea Dayaks, a Malayan tribe from whom he learned their folk magic. Returning to England in 1936, after retiring from the Service, Gerald and his wife Donna eventually settled in the New Forest region in 1939. There he joined an occult group called the Fellowship of Crotona, a Co-Mason lodge (both men and women) with three associated magickal groups: Rosicrucian (who also put on esoteric plays for the public), Theosophical, and Witchcraft reconstruction according to the ideas of Margaret Murray. Some claimed to be hereditary Witches, and “Dafo” (Elsie Woodford- Grimes), their high priestess, initiated him in 1939. She became his magickal partner for the next 15 years.
In 1946, he met Cecil Williamson, founder of the Witchcraft Research Center and Museum of Witchcraft.
A year later, Arnold Crowther introduced him to Aleister Crowley. From materials obtained from Crowley, fragmentary elements from the New Forest Coven, Leland’s Aradia, and his own collections and researches, Gardner compiled his Book of Shadows.
Much of it he published as fiction in a novel, High Magic’s Aide (1949). After Britain’s anti-Witchcraft law was repealed in 1951, Gardner purchased Williamson’s Museum. In 1953 he initiated Doreen Valiente, who substantially reworked the Book of Shadows, giving more emphasis to the Goddess. Out of this collaboration grew the Gardnerian Tradition. In 1954 Gardner published Witchcraft Today, supporting Murray’s disputable theory of Witchcraft as the surviving remnant of old European Paganism. The book made Gardner famous and launched new covens all over England.
Gardner’s last book was The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959). He met and initiated Raymond Buckland in 1963, just before sailing to Lebanon for the Winter. He died aboard ship on the return voyage the following Spring. Buckland brought Gardnerian Witchcraft to the United States, where it has blossomed into the Wiccan religion.
Raymond Buckland (1934–),
known as “The Father of American Wicca,” was the first to introduce Gardnerian Wicca to the U.S. in the early 1960s. He was born in London of Romany (Gypsy) descent. His spiritual quest led him to the works of Gerald Gardner. Buckland began serving as Gardner’s spokesman in the U.S. and was initiated into the Craft shortly before Gardner’s death in 1964. In the mid-1970s he founded the Saxon tradition, Seax-Wica, now practiced in countries around the world. He was also instrumental in helping spread the solitary practice of PectWita, a form of Scottish Witchcraft. He has had more than 30 titles published, including The Witch Book and Buckland’s Complete Book of Witchcraft. Raymond is the Fæder of Seax- Wica and a member of the International Guild of Sorcerers and the International Society of Independent Spiritualists. www.raybuckland.com.
is a Wiccan Priestess of the Ladywoods Tradition, from the Pagan Way Tradition, out of the Gardnerian Tradition. She has served the Goddess and the Horned God for more than 24 years, in various roles: as priestess, as National First Officer of Covenant of the Goddess, as editor of Circle Network News, as a faculty member of RCG’s Cella program, and currently as Executive Director of Ardantane Witch College and Pagan Learning Center in New Mexico. She is the author of True Magick, Covencraft, Moonrise, The Pagan Kids’ Activity Book, Candlemas, and The Heart of Tarot. She lives and works with her partner Azrael Arynn K in among the red mesas and high desert of the Jemez Mountains, the home of Ardantane. www.ardantane.org.
(1952–) is a Pagan author, a master herbalist, and a Druid Priestess. She is the author of several books and videos on herb craft and Druid wisdom including Tree Medicine— Tree Magic (on the herbal and magickal properties of trees), A Druid’s Herbal (Druid medicine and lore of herbs), Being A Pagan (with Lawrence Bond, a book about what it means to be a Wiccan, a Witch, or a Druid in the world today), and Walking The World In Wonder—A Children’s Herbal (a book of herbal formulas and recipes suitable for children of ALL ages). Her videos Gifts From the Healing Earth, Vol. I and II will teach you the basics of herbal healing and her video “Pagans” covers the eight festivals of the Pagan Wheel of the Year. http://saille333.home.mindspring.com/willow.html.
Raven Grimassi (1951–)
is the author of nine books on Witchcraft and Wicca, including the award-winning titles The Wiccan Mysteries and The Encyclopedia of Wicca & Witchcraft. Raven has been a practitioner and teacher of Witchcraft for more than 30 years. He is a popular lecturer and speaker at Pagan conventions and festivals throughout the U.S. Raven is currently the director of the Arician Tradition of Witchcraft and co-director of a Mystery school known as The College of the Crossroads. It is Raven’s life work to preserve and teach the pre-Christian European oots of Pagan religion. He lives in southern California on a ranch in the countryside where he maintains a sacred grove to the Goddess and God of the Old Religion and a shrine to Ceres, the Goddess of the Mysteries, on whose festival day he was born.
www.stregheria.com.
is the author of Grimoire for the Apprentice Wizard, Companion for the Apprentice Wizard, and A Wizard's Bestiary. A respected leader and Elder in the worldwide magickal community and an initiate in several different Traditions, he has created and participated in many Pagan and interfaith groups and projects, playing a major role in reclaiming the spiritual heritage of pre-Christian Europe. As publisher of the award-winning magazine Green Egg, Oberon was the first to adopt the words "Pagan" and "Neo-Pagan" to describe the newly emerging Nature religions of the 1960s. Since 1968, Green Egg has served as a primary catalyst and journal for the entire Pagan community. Oberon resides in Sonoma County, California, with Morning Glory, his beloved wife of 35 years.
www.oberonzell.com/
is First Priest and Paramount High Priest of the Correllian Tradition, and at Mabon of Year 0 Aquarius was acclaimed Chancellor of the Tradition as well.
Don is the son of the blv. Lady LaVeda, former Regent of the Correllian Tradition. Don is the head of the Mabelline branch of the High-Correll family. He has been an initiated Priest of the Correllian Tradition since 1576 Pisces (1976 AD), and a Third Degree High Priest since 1579 Pisces (1979 AD).
Don is well known both as an artist and as an author. Don’s writing or artwork has appeared in numerous Pagan ‘zines, including Circle Network News, Green Egg, Panegyria, Harvest, Covenant of the Goddess Newsletter, Gerina Dunwich's Golden Isis Magazine, and Silver RavenWolf's PWPA Newsletter.
Don is well known as a professional psychic. He has been a professional clairvoyant since 1584 Pisces (1984 AD), and is a well-known astrologer. But Don is best known as a Tarologist, and the designer of the Tarot of Hekate ('82).
