Glastonbury Occult Conference is next week!

Greetings all and a happy new year!  May 2020 be a blessed one for all of us!

Things have been a tad busy over here at AO central the past few months, what with Christmas and New Year and all.  Rest assured that I have plenty of exciting and informative new posts to come over 2020.  For now, I wanted to give a heads up that Glastonbury Occult Conference 2020 will be taking place next weekend, 22nd - 23rd February.  If you are in my neck of the woods, grab yourself a ticket and come along!  I will be attending on the Sunday (albeit briefly as I have a lot on that day) and there are a ton of workshops, talks by well known authorities on the occult, and trade stalls.  Probably the main interest to readers of this blog is the 1.45pm talk on Sunday by David Rankine entitled "Magic for money - the practices of British Cunning Folk".  In case you don't know, Rankine is considered one of the world's leading occult authors and scholars on Ceremonial magic, Kabbalah and Cunning Craft and I have many of his books, all of which are excellent, so I am very much looking forward to what should be a fascinating talk.  For those of you unable to make the conference I will report back on it in the next post, so stay tuned!

You can get tickets for the conference here.

See you there!

Q et I

Dusty old tomes - essential reference works

So now you know who Cunning Folk are, you may be asking, how do I get started practising the trade?  Well as I mentioned in the last post it was often a profession learned from books.  So here are some which you will find useful in your studies and career:

• Firstly and most importantly - A BIBLE (preferably the King James Version). Often called “The most magical book in the world”. If you only have a Bible, you have all the books you ever need to make magic. At the coronation ceremony of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, a Bible was presented to Her Majesty with the words, “We present you with this book, the most valuable thing that this world affords”. To uncover the true magical value of the Bible you need to read, understand and use it. You might like to have a copy in plain English for comprehension, such as the ubiquitous New International Version. For ceremonial use however, I am of the opinion that you cannot beat good old King James, a.k.a the Authorised Version. The beauty of the language and the powerful feeling it invokes is unparalleled.

Not a fan of the Bible? Don't want to read it, much less use it? I have a post for you coming soon!

Books

• Secondly, you will need a good herbal. You can go for a classic work, such as Culpeper's "Complete Herbal", or Mrs Grieve's "A Modern Herbal". Both of these can be found online. More useful for magical work would be either Scott Cunningham's "Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs" for a mostly traditional and European perspective, or Catherine Yronwode's "Hoodoo Herb and Root Magic" for a more American perspective. Get both and compare the entries.
• Also, if you plan to collect herbs in the wild, a field guide is a must. Make sure it has clear, colour photographs and clearly marks toxic plants. The one I use is called "Herbs and Healing Plants" by Deiter Podlech which is organised by flower colour for easy identification in the field, and also gives useful medicinal remedies for each plant.

...books...

Other books, not essential, you might like to have:

• "Secrets of the Psalms" by Godfrey Selig – written in German in the 17^th Century this is a classic text giving magical uses for every psalm of the Bible and is a must if you enjoy biblical magic, and for selecting suitable psalms for various operations.
• "Pow Wows or Long Lost Friend" by George Hohman – another translated German classic, written in 1820, this had a huge influence on magic in America and is the basis for many spells we use today.
• "Natural Magic" by Doreen Valiente – Doreen was a well known witch and helped revive witchcraft in the 50s and 60s alongside Gerald Gardner. This is a book of traditional European folk magic, not so much spells but the beliefs about animals, plants, weather lore, numbers etc. Really useful for understanding the folk traditions and symbolism of our ancestors.
• For more complex workings, and to understand the basis of many charms and procedures, you would do well to get a copy of some of the classical grimoires, or textbooks of magic. Good choices would be the Key or Clavicle of Solomon, the Lemegeton or Lesser Key of Solomon, the Grimorium Verum, the Grand Grimoire etc. Most of these can be found online here, or extracts in compilation works such as AE White's "Book of Ceremonial Magic" / "Book of Black Magic and Pacts" (they are the same book - my copy for some inexplicable reason is called the "Book of Spells"!) or Idries Shah's "Secret Lore of Magic" (a really great work containing, among other things, the rare and wonderful Arabic 'Book of Aptolcater', one of my favourite grimoires.  "Secret Lore" is sadly out of print but can still be picked up – I got my copy in a secondhand shop for a pound!). I probably don't need to mention that you won't be able to jump in and use these ancient grimoires straight away!

(Grimoires)

• To better understand the history of Cunning Craft and its practitioners, a must read is Owen Davies' "Popular Magic". Full of entertaining anecdotes of real life cunning men and women from the past, it also compares the continental and American workers to English practices. It is an essential read to place the craft, and indeed this blog, in context and understand where we have come from.
• One final book I completely recommend is a relatively new one and that is Jim Baker's "Cunning Man's Handbook". In my opinion, it is one of the most important works on magic to have been released so far this century, and probably the most important on the topic of Cunning Craft. If you don't already have it you need to get a copy as soon as possible. Yes it is fairly expensive, but you get what you pay for! I have devised my instructional posts to compliment this work and I will refer to it often. If you are serious about understanding and practising Cunning Craft you need this book, so start saving your pennies if you have to.

and more books

Other books I like that are not strictly relevant to Cunning Craft, but I recommend all the same:

• "Mastering Witchcraft" by Paul Huson. For many people of a certain age this was their intro book to witchcraft and magic and you will spot its influence on many a horror film from the 1970s. Huson studied many of the classical grimoires in the British Museum and mixed them with folk magic to produce what I think is a totally unique volume which works surprisingly well. Certainly it has stood the test of time and I can personally attest to the effectiveness of its rituals. Its methods are somewhat similar to Cunning Craft, in that it uses ceremonial and folk magic all at the same time, but minus any specific religious dogma. Despite the famous 'Lord's Prayer backwards' ritual at the beginning, it is not really pagan, and definitely not Wiccan. I love it.
• "The God of the Witches" – by Margaret Murray. A more populist and easy to read version of her seminal work "The Witch Cult in Western Europe". Both books have long been debunked together with Dr Murray's theories on medieval witchcraft as an organised and ancient religion dating back to prehistoric times, driven underground by Christian persecution. However they are fascinating in their details of confessed witchcraft practices, whether or not these were real or invented under torture, and they paint a picture of the historical mindset around witch beliefs. Murray's works had a big influence on the development of modern Wicca and witchcraft as you will immediately discover upon reading them. I personally love 'God of the Witches' for the immersive and compelling world it creates, regardless of 'truth'. Also, as a Cunning Practitioner it is good to suss out what you are up against!
• "The Satanic Witch" by Anton Szandor LaVey. Do not be put off by the word 'satanic'. This volume from the founder of the Church of Satan has nothing to do with Satanism and not a lot to do with witchcraft either. Rather it is a work on manipulation, and specifically, how a woman can manipulate men to get what she wants. Some of it is dubious, like the 'LaVey personality synthesiser' but most of it is genius and I have used its methods successfully time and time again. For my female readers, you NEED this book. Reading it changed my life.
• "Charms Spells and Formulas" by Ray T. Marlbrough. Last but by no means least is this classic work on Hoodoo style magic from 1986. If you want to learn the basics of American folk magic, this is the book for you. It details mojo (charm) bags, doll spells and basic recipes for oils and incenses. This is the perfect book for beginners to practical folk magic. My own copy is nearly falling apart and covered in notes, but I still return to it even after all these years.

I hope that you will be able to get a copy of at least some of these works.  They are my personal recommendations and I am constantly lending them out!  What is your favourite book on magic?  Let me know in the comments!

I must go, I'm in the library

Q et I

Who are Cunning Folk? Part Two

In my last post I started to define what a Cunning Man/Woman actually is (or mostly, was).  Here are a few more important points that you should know...

CUNNING FOLK OR WITCHES?  WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE?

Other terms for Cunning Folk are wizards, wise men or women, folk healers, conjurers (whether or not they actually conjured spirits in the traditional ceremonial manner), pellars and charmers. We often hear the term 'white witch' to describe Cunning folk. A real cunning practitioner would never refer to themselves as a white witch. The term was historically used by detractors who sought to connect them with the devil and suggest their powers came form the same evil source as what we call 'black witches'. It was an insult. By the way, 'black witch' was not a thing either. A witch was seen as evil, pure and simple, in the way a serial killer is today. The phrase 'white witch' therefore has the same connotation as saying 'good serial killer'. You can see how ridiculous that sounds. I am always leery therefore when a practitioner willingly describes themselves as a white witch. It says to me they are either ignorant of history, or not a true, Christian Cunning Person but a neopagan/Wiccan/Trad. Witch (pick one) using elements of Cunning Craft to enhance their pagan practise.

BORN OR MADE?

Cunning Folk worked alone, unlike witches who were thought to work in covens, although there were rare exceptions when they would work in a pair usually with a spouse or family member. There was no formal training or initiation to become a Cunning person – practitioners were often self taught from books available at the time, such as the classical grimoires, cheap almanacs, and popular compilations of charms, fortune telling, and folk astrology such as those by Raphael. A few were mentored in person to be successors of their local practitioner. Occasionally the trade was passed down through families. In a time when literacy was low, the possession of books gave Cunning folk legitimacy and credence. Further magical prowess could be claimed by being the ubiquitous 'seventh son of a seventh son' or having received fairy gifts (more on this topic later).

CITY OR COUNTRY?

They were not necessarily country bumpkins either – Cunning Folk could be found wherever people were found, in villages, towns or cities. London had many well known practitioners. Owen Davies has estimated that there were several thousand working in England alone. Some popular charmers would travel long distances across the country on call-outs, such was their demand and fame. My own fair city of Bristol had its local Cunning men and women and I hope to talk more about them in future posts as I feel they are my ancestors – in a spiritual, geographical way of course!

PROSECUTION AND PERSECUTION

Cunning Folk also were not particularly persecuted as witches were, and although there were many laws against them, these were mainly ignored by the layman. This is because, unlike witches, they were seen as helpful to society by the common man in the street (a position not usually shared by the authorities). Many of the Cunning Folk put on trial were tried for things like fraud, falsely accusing others of crimes, failing to provide services promised, and so on, very rarely for charges of witchcraft or consorting with the devil. It is recorded that in Essex, of the 400 people put on trial for witchcraft, only 4 were Cunning Folk. Over time, as beliefs changed, the laws against Cunning Folk also changed, from statutes against practising magic and witchcraft in general, to the fraudulent mediums act which we still have today. As a result, most prosecutions in the 19^th Century were for 'false pretences' of having magical or psychic powers.

PRACTICES

I will go into the practices of Cunning Folk in detail in future posts, but for now suffice to say they were based on a mixture of common folk beliefs (such as hanging a horseshoe above a door for luck), Christian spoken charms and magical prayers based on liturgical forms and ideas, adaptations of ancient Hebrew and Arabic spells found in books such as the Sword of Moses, and (usually simplified) ceremonial magic operations from grimoires like the Key of Solomon. Perhaps the closest thing you can compare Cunning Craft to (and this has been done a lot in recent years) is Hoodoo, which is a Christian folk magic of the USA, itself a mixture of African, European and Native American folk magic and beliefs. Many practices are mirrored in both systems, probably because Hoodoo also historically employed some of the same source books as Cunning Craft, and immigrants to the states from Europe took their folk magics with them to mingle with the then current local systems. The rootworker of Hoodoo can be compared to the Cunning man in that they fulfil the same role in their society and offer similar services within a framework of Christian belief. In fact, a popular name for Hoodoo and its practitioners is Conjure and Conjurers! I myself practised Hoodoo for many years before discovering Cunning Craft, and as I have some American ancestry, it is part of my heritage also, being used by many of my American family members. I still use a lot of Hoodoo methods so you will find them in some of the posts, although the material will be clearly marked as such to avoid confusion. Hoodoo can sometimes help to 'fill in the blanks' where time has obscured the detail of some British Cunning methods. Likewise the current state of Hoodoo in America can paint a portrait of how modern Cunning Craft in Britain might be had it not all but died out in the twentieth century.

A BIT DODGY

An unfortunate point about historical Cunning Folk is that some of them were unscrupulous. This is why most of the persecutions were for things like fraud. Some knowingly deceived and ripped off their more gullible clients for profit. Not by 'pretending' to have magical powers you understand (viz., the fraudulent mediums act), as most practitioners and clients believed they actually had these powers (although authorities in the later centuries doubted this). Mainly it was overcharging, promising to do work that was never done, accusing people of crimes out of the blue and so on. This was partly the reason the authorities were so against their practices, they believed them to be troublemakers. Many were also flamboyant, and experts at spin and self promotion. Of course it goes without saying that a Cunning man today should never defraud or cheat their clients. However, a certain amount of spectacle and good-intentioned humbuggery (comparable to that of P T Barnum) can help to draw customers and raise your profile. I will talk more about this in future posts.

Hopefully these last two posts have given you a clearer picture and an insight into the world of the Cunning Practitioner.  I will expand upon some of these points at a later date, but for now consider your crash course concluded!

Lux ex tenebris

Q et I

Who are Cunning Folk? Part One

By this point you may be asking yourself, what on earth is a Cunning Man/Woman anyway?  These days the term is not well known outside of occult circles.  In this post and the next I will attempt to define these now-rare beasts.  This is Cunning Craft 101!

CHRISTIAN MAGICIANS

The number one most important thing you need to know about Cunning Craft is that it is a Christian system of folk magic. Its practitioners were (and are) Christians, some Catholic, mostly Protestant. They were not underground pagans, Witches, Wiccans, Druids, Heathens, or any other current magico-religious movement you care to name. Not that I have anything against any of these paths you understand (in fact, I started out my magical career as a die hard Wiccan, then Druid, then Heathen, before discovering none of them were for me), this is just not what Cunning Folk were. In fact, this modern notion of painting them as pagans who hid behind a veneer of Christianity to avoid detection and persecution, would make them turn in their graves. Of course there were varying degrees of belief, as there are now. Some were extremely devout, regular churchgoers, some were less pious but still active in the church community, and others were Christian but opposed an organised clergy and church, preferring to worship alone. Still others were Christian in name only, rarely attending church or knowing little of church doctrine. But even these last would never describe themselves as pagans or witches.

We have a fine tradition here in the UK of what I will call secular Christians – that is, people who tick Church of England on the census, but who are largely ignorant of all but the most basic Christian theology, and only ever go to church for weddings, christenings and funerals (and maybe the odd carol service). I know dozens of people like this and I expect you do too. Usually this stems from the fact that they know they believe in something, but they have never taken enough real interest in religion to look into it, and after all, Anglicanism is ingrained in British society, and is probably what their parents ticked on the census too. My mum is a perfect example of this type of person. If this is you as well, that's fine!

But, you say, I'm not even a secular Christian, I am a neopagan/Witch/Wiccan (choose one), can I still practise Cunning Craft? The answer is no. The practises are built on a Christian world view, theology and scripture. The bible, holy family, sacraments and other Catholic holdovers (often dismissed as 'popish' superstition by historical authorities) are an intrinsic part of the work. If you cannot recite psalms or call upon the power of Christ sincerely and with passion and genuine intent, this path is not for you. If your appeal to Jehovah is a token gesture, or rushed through, or mumbled half heartedly, or recited drearily in rote fashion as a child in school, your workings will fail. How can you call upon something to aid you if you don't believe it is real? Your mouth will be saying one thing but your heart and mind will be thinking 'I don't believe in what I'm saying, these prayers and scriptures are bull', and this will cancel the effect of any magic you are trying to create.

Okay, you say. Well in that case I'll just strip out all of the Judeo-Christian bits from the practise and either leave them out entirely or substitute them for calls to pagan gods and goddesses. Fine, you go ahead. Just take a quick look at a small sample of the charms, spells and ceremonies in the handbooks and grimoires. That's a lot of rewriting to do.  The power behind the charms and ceremonies of Cunning Craft comes from God, the models of much of the spells are ecclesiastical rites, and the whole framework is based on Christian symbolism. If you strip all of this away, and I mean all, because you cannot just switch the word Jesus for Cernunnos, and the sign of the cross for the sign of Osiris slain and expect everything to make sense, then you are left with practically nothing, so you might as well practise something else anyway.

The short, blunt, perhaps painful truth for some of my readers is this – if you cannot identify as a Christian, be it Catholic, Protestant, Methodist, or Quaker, devout, secular or middle of the road, you cannot practise true Cunning Craft. You don't have to go to church, abstain from sex before marriage, and fast on a Friday, but you do need to be able to call on the Holy Trinity and believe in what you are saying and who you are appealing to. If you can't do this, Cunning Craft is not for you. If you self identify as a pagan of any kind, Cunning Craft is not for you. Take up something else because you will be frustrated in this endeavour. If this offends you, you might as well stop reading now because it's not going to get any better.

Sorry to make this point so long but it has to be said. I see so many self styled 'Cunning Folk' these days who when you look into their beliefs, they spout on about the Horned God and the Goddess, summerlands, reincarnation, rule of three etc., things which have NOTHING to do with true Cunning Craft. These people are trying to claim what is essentially a Christian practise as their own and twist it to make it pagan. As a result, there are so few people performing real British Cunning Craft now that it is in danger of dying out, and people are believing nonsense such as historical practitioners were secretly pagan and were the ancestors of today's witches. Thankfully a small revival seems to be taking place with the recent publication of some excellent and well researched books. I can only hope my writings will add to this revival, keep the spirit alive, and create some more Wise Men and Women.

SERVICE PROVIDERS

The next most important thing about Cunning Craft is that it is just that – a craft. It is a trade, a profession. Cunning Folk were (and are) professional or semi professional service providers. They didn't learn all those charms and methods to just benefit themselves or their immediate family and friends. While many ordinary folk would know a few common or family charms and practices, Cunning Folk were recognised as having more expertise and experience in the field of magic than regular people, and thus were consulted by all strata of society, from the poorest farm labourer to Kings and nobles. Cunning Folk gave a service, and charged accordingly for it. You often read in modern magic books that you must not accept payment for spells, for various reasons (one popular reason is given that accepting payment for a spell will nullify the magic) however there is no historical evidence to support this modern belief. Cunning Folk expected to be remunerated (whether in currency or goods) for their expertise, just as a lawyer or barber would be. They weren't like clergy who performed rites for free as a duty to the church. Neither should you be. If you fully intend to take up this path then you will need to provide your services to others, for a fair rate. Of course I don't expect you to do this straight away, so at first you will work only on yourself, then, once you gain experience you can start to work on willing family and friends. Only after practising and perfecting your techniques on them can you begin to work with the public.

There is so much more to working with clients than just knowing the spells and techniques. You have to have empathy, authority, control, discretion, accounting, marketing and organising skills, the ability to 'read' people's body language, to ask the right questions, timekeeping... the list goes on and on. Having a customer service background is an advantage. Some students are real people persons and really click with clients and understanding their needs straight away. For most people it takes a few years of time and practise. A small few will never manage it. I am going to discuss the 'mechanics' of working with clients in this blog – as in the consultation procedure, how to structure and cost different services etc. - but I will not teach business skills or people skills. Those you will have to learn yourself. I recommend a government funded business basics course, and a customer service course such as those offered to waiters or retail staff.

SEMI PROS

This brings me to the next point. Many Cunning Folk had second jobs or were semi professional. Often these jobs were from the middle trades sector of society, jobs like tailors, farmers and carpenters. Quite a few were also pub landlords, a handy thing as it kept them in the hub of local gossip, always useful for fortune telling and thief detection! So do not fret if you are unable to perform this work full time, you are still following in the tradition of offering Cunning services 'on the side'. By the way, on the topic of Cunning men as pub landlords, the role's usefulness in their work and how to replicate those advantages today, there will be more to say in a future lesson.

I still have a few more points to make but this is getting quite long and it is past my bedtime, so I will save them for the next post.

To be continued...

Q et I

AND YOU MAY ASK YOURSELF, WELL, HOW DID I GET HERE?

(WARNING: Horrendously self indulgent autobiographical post follows - feel free to skip and just watch the video clip further on if you like!)

Don't ask me where my initial interest in monsters, witches, ghosts and general occult subjects came from as I have no idea – it was just something that was always there! As a child I dreamt of being a professional exorcist, and aged four my headteacher had to call my parents as several pupils had gone home crying due to my persuading them to call up Bloody Mary in the school toilets – my dad's reaction? He just laughed! This was pretty normal behaviour for me and although my parents tutted and rolled their eyes, that didn't stop them from agreeing to buy me the Fortean Times and letting me watch black and white horror films on late night TV.

The very first book on magic I purchased was Doreen Valiente's "Natural Magic" – this is a book filled with folk magic and customs of the British Isles. Of course I already knew various bits of folk magic, such as rubbing raw beef on warts to charm them, knocking on wood for luck, and candle spells to see your future husband – these and other things were just common knowledge among my friends and family growing up. But this book had so much more information such as the lore of plants, weather omens and even (titter titter!) some sex magic – which me and my pre-teen friends found hilarious of course. It is interesting that in practising the Cunning Craft of my ancestors as I do now I have pretty much come full circle back to the first book I bought! Why did I choose this as my first book of magic though? Simply – I liked the cover!

My next purchase was also a big influence – again, I liked the cover, but also the lengthy and detailed rituals it contained – "Green Witchcraft" by Ann Moura (Aoumiel). This had a big influence on my path as it instilled my love of working with herbs which is central to my practise today.

Turns out I was a sucker for a picture of a forest!

From there I moved onto 'fluffy' Wicca books such as those by Kate West, Silver RavenWolf and their ilk for a while, but felt them somewhat lacking. I felt the spells were too stripped down to work, the rituals were too casual for my High Anglican mind, and the constant moralising irritated me. A magazine article led me to discover American Hoodoo and, being that my family is partly American, I lapped up all the (barely any) books out there on the subject at the time. I contacted some of the authors of those books as well as family members and gained more information that way too. I moved from working as a Wiccan to working as a Christian Hoodoo and felt much more at home, but still something was lacking – why was there not a British equivalent of modern American Hoodoo? What happened to make all our folk magicians disappear? Were they really stamped out for being 'pagan'?

At this time I was also immersing myself in the classical grimoires. Being a lifelong fan of Dennis Wheatley and Hammer Horror films naturally led me to seek out these forbidden tomes and I pored over texts such as the Greater Key of Solomon, the Black Pullet, and the Grimorium Verum, dreaming of performing their rites in some lavish wizard's chamber, but fully lacking the funds and opportunity to make any of it a reality. If only there was a way to use these texts without having to locate lion skin belts and ambergris – sigh. I gave up and the grimoires were gradually left to gather dust on the bookshelf.

ONLY THE END OF THE BEGINNING

So how did I eventually discover British Cunning Craft – well oddly, it was through a scene in the classic Danish silent film "Haxan" (aka "Witchcraft Through the Ages") from 1922. I urge you to watch the full movie if you haven't already as you are in for a treat. It is a masterpiece detailing popular beliefs on Witchcraft in the Middle Ages and contains some eye popping and disturbing scenes which were pretty controversial back in the day. This, however, was the scene which captivated me and left me scratching my head for days:

I just couldn't understand it – the distraught women are clearly Christians and yet they are employing someone who is calling upon Saturn – a pagan god – and using a magical ritual in order to seek out the witch who has hexed their relative. Why would Christians employ someone who was using what, in my eyes at that time, was a witchcraft rite, to seek out a witch? Why was one witch good and the other witch evil? Why would a witch be seeking out another witch in the first place? Wouldn't he be accused of witchcraft himself for performing such a rite? So many questions. I had to find out. I researched the background of the movie and the topics it focused on. Finally I found the answer – the man who I had assumed was a pagan witch was a Christian Cunning Man! I had never even heard of this before and read everything I could find on the topic, and pretty quickly I stumbled on British Cunning Craft. The more I read the more I realised this was what I had been looking for all these years. A system equivalent to American Hoodoo with a Christian, not pagan, focus. One that dealt with the folk magic and herbal practices I had started out with and loved. And – the icing on the cake – one that incorporated elements of the classical grimoires in an easy to use, effective way!

There are several differences however between American Hoodoo and British Cunning Craft. And perhaps the biggest one is the saddest: British Cunning Craft has all but disappeared as a living tradition. Far from being stamped out for being pagan, it has been swept under the carpet by 'progress' and corrupted by New Age Wiccans who have taken the bits they wanted to suit them and discarded the rest. But true British Cunning Craft is not quite dead – I have been practising it now, on my own, for twenty years and recently there has been a renewed interest in the subject with the publication of some well researched and scholarly books. This is the system of my ancestors and if you are of British descent, it is the system of your ancestors too. It is our heritage. It is my passion and it is in my heart and my soul. I am not sure how many others out there are practising real, authentic Cunning Craft but I do know this – as long as I live the tradition will never die.

Normal service will resume in the next post

Q et I

Greetings, friends!

Hello and welcome to the Armchair Occultist, a brand new blog about the traditional and historical magics of the British Isles, Western Europe and the New World.  I am a UK based 'Cunning Woman', and as this year marks a quarter of a century of my practise of magic, I figured it was about time I started sharing my experiences, techniques and insights with others!

I only wear this hat on Sundays

As a general guide, the kind of topics you can look forward to reading about on this blog include:

• spells and techniques of Cunning Craft and related folk practises
• records and analysis of mine and others' ceremonial magic experiments
• recipes and information for the magical uses of herbs and plants
• musings on historical and mythical witchcraft - Cunning Craft's traditional nemesis
• anecdotes of my experiences in the occult and paranormal fields
• theory and history of Cunning Craft, its practitioners (known as Cunning Folk) and opponents
• modern Wicca, Druidry, Satanism etc. only as they relate to historical practises
• thoughts and debate on related topics and magic theory in general

What this blog WILL NOT cover:

• meditation, yoga, reincarnation or other Eastern thought
• Golden Dawn, Thelema, Chaos magic, or Aleister Crowley
• Greek/Roman/Egyptian etc. gods and systems of paganism, historical or modern
• Santeria, Vodoun, or ATRs (African Traditional Religions)
• New Age stuff such as chakras, reiki, auras etc.
• Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings or other fantasy magic (including the Cthulhu Mythos)
• any fluffy bunny crap

I want to point out that I don't have an issue with any of the topics above (except the fluffy bunny crap), in fact I am very interested in several of them, however they fall outside the remit of this blog so I will not be discussing them here.

I also want to point out that as you can probably already tell, I do not mince my words.  The topic of Cunning Craft (and, by extension, magic in general) is something I am passionate about and I will not hesitate to express my views here.  If you disagree with my opinion on something then that is your right, you can take it or leave it, or better still, write a comment on it and start up some healthy debate!

SETTLE INTO YOUR ARMCHAIR WITH THE OCCULTIST

You may ask, why the name of this blog?  Does it intimate that I just sit around all day reading about magic, as opposed to actually practising it?  Well no, in all honesty I heard the expression and thought it was just a catchy and fun name!  Although I do enjoy books about the occult (and you can expect to see lots of reviews in future too) I am a great believer that magic is a tool you should use to better your everyday life and the lives of those around you (and very occasionally to make them a bit worse when situations demand it!).  This means constantly practising and refining your magical techniques.  Seriously, there is not one situation in your life that could not be enhanced by magic in some way, right now.  Even if you think your life is perfect, trust me, things can always be even better!  I believe that you should constantly strive to advance yourself and your loved ones and I hope to motivate and give you plenty of tools to do so in this blog.

Anyway, onwards and upwards!  I hope you will join me for my next post.

Carpe diem!

Q et I