Witch Test #4
Do you send out a ghost in SPECTRAL FORM?
If a familiar spirit –
or spectral self –
or apparition from you is seen by the villagers . . .
then you are a witch!
(Drawing: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Witch Test #3
Have you got any TOOLS OF THE CRAFT?
You may be a wizard or witch if you make ointments, poisons, and herbals – or fashion wax dolls into likenesses – or learn from spell books and magic charts.
(Drawing: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Witch Test #2
CONFESSION!
If the villagers think you are a witch –
and you make a free and voluntary confession to that effect –
then you may indeed be considered a witch.
(Picture: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Witch Test: #1
There are ten ways used to detect witches. The first is finding the CAUSE OF FITS.
If a villager behaves moonstruck and odd whenever a certain person is near, that person may be accused of causing their ailment.
(Picture: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
(Painting: John Roddam Spencer Stanhope)
In the Christian version of Genesis, Adam (meaning literally “man”) is the perfect model of strength and beauty. He donates a rib to create a submissive partner, the naïve Eve. They dwell in the Garden of Eden with two special trees – the Tree of Knowledge (which gives the wisdom to uncover good and evil) and the Tree of Life (which grants immortality). Eve is tempted by the devil (in the guise of the serpent) to eat from the forbidden Tree of Knowledge and is then expelled from paradise alongside her mate, cutting off the Tree of Life and making them both mortal.
Eve, the first woman deceived by a sweet-talking male, becomes the original mother of mankind. In the beginning she is a daughter of nature – a creature half-way between animal and man – beautiful, sensual, emotional, but also fickle, stupid, and weak. This archetypal woman soon becomes the victim, the first person seduced by Satan and therefore the first witch. Indeed, in early iconography, Eve is even physically linked with the serpent through her long twisting hair.
Eve sins in multiple ways – by disobeying God and rejecting divine authority, going her own way, and in seeking the wisdom of the male Gods – implying that all the evil, death, and suffering in the world comes from disobeying your master. Naïve woman is blamed for the Fall, a typical psychological projection onto a convenient scapegoat.
At some point Lilith became entwined with Eve in the minds of the early Christian commentators. Instead of a masculine Satan being culpable for Eve’s ruin, Lilith is associated with the snake in Genesis 3 – a female demon who tempts Eve into rebellion. Even John Milton alludes to the “snake witch” in Paradise Lost. Thereafter, the gullible Eve is portrayed as a calculating, evil, seductress, and the source of man’s carnal desire.
And because the first woman committed the primal sin, all females were forever to be held accountable. For centuries they were considered subservient, lustful, untrustworthy, base, unintelligent, and sly. Small wonder that so many of the witches executed in the Burning Times were female!
Sources:
Brunel, Pierre. Companion to Literary Myths, Heroes, and Archetypes. London and New York: Routledge, 1996.
Merriam-Webster’s Encyclopedia of World Religions. Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 1999.
Witcombe, Christopher: “Eve and the Identity of Women” (7) http://witcombe.sbc.edu/eve-women/7evelilith.html
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
(Painting: Dante Gabriel Rossetti)
According to the Jewish Midrash’s explanation for the two separate accounts of the Creation Story, Adam’s first wife was a woman called Lilith. She was made of the same soil as man and therefore was his equal. But when Adam tried to dominate Lilith she rebelled, fled the Garden of Eden, and abandoned her mate to consort with more submissive demons instead. So God created another mate for Adam and called her Eve.
From the Sixth Century BC, Lilith was portrayed as a female demon who killed infants and threatened women in childbirth, and perhaps because of this association the scriptures began partnering Lilith with Samael (Satan), making her the Queen of Evil. Her Hebrew name translates into “night creature,” “night monster,” “night hag,” and “screech owl” – and only the three angels Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof can protect against her wicked powers.
In the Middle Ages the Catholic Church identified Lilith (and her daughters, the Lilim) with female succubae – demons who copulate with sleeping men, causing their erotic dreams. Contrasting with the pure, submissive, Holy Mother, Lilith was a disobedient, lustful sinner who used her sexuality to seduce and ruin men. Her evil stems from being willful – a dangerous threat to patriarchal order and stability.
Mirrors were the direct entrance into Lilith’s realm. Vanity allowed Lilith and her daughters to enter an unsuspecting maiden through her eyes, then lure her into all manner of wild, promiscuous behavior.
In some cultures Lilith is the wind-witch. She brings storms, sickness, and nighttime predators. She is bird-like – often depicted with talons and wings – and the name Lil is also associated with the Sumerian word for “wind”‘ “air,” or “storm.”
Today, however, some wiccans and occultists worship Lilith as the “first mother.”
Sources:
Brunel, Pierre. Companion to Literary Myths, Heroes, and Archetypes. London and New York: Routledge, 1996.
Merriam-Webster’s Encyclopedia of World Religions. Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 1999.
Witcombe, Christopher: “Eve and the Identity of Women” (7) http://witcombe.sbc.edu/eve-women/7evelilith.html
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
I read recently that leeches are still being used in plastic and micro surgery. Their first reported use appears in Sanskrit writings that date back 2,500 years. Here are 25 facts that you probably didn’t (ever want to) know:
1. The Ancient Greeks adopted the practice of leeching to balance the four humors in Galen’s theory of the human body.
2. The majority of leeches live in fresh water, although there are a few marine varieties too.
3. They have suckers on each end of their bodies.
4. Leeches are hermaphrodites.
5. Most species have a 3-bladed jaw that slices through the skin of the host.
6. Hirudo Medicinalis – medical leeches – have three jaws with approximately 100 sharp teeth at the rim.
7. They store blood up to 5 times their body mass.
8. Medical leeches only need to feed twice a year because they have a super-slow digestive system.
9. The European variety were so popular in the 19th Century that they actually became endangered.
10. Leeches attach themselves to feed, but fall off naturally to digest the host’s blood once they are bloated.
11.They feed between 20 minutes – 2 hours.
12. The safest way to remove these parasites is by using a blunt object to break the seal of their suckers.
13. If they are shocked from the host they regurgitate their stomach contents, which often causes infection in the bite.
14. Leech saliva makes wounds bleed more readily.
15. The anticoagulant in their spit is called hirudin.
16. Leech bites generally don’t hurt because they also release an anesthetic when they penetrate the skin.
17. Wounds itch as they heal.
18. Leeches come in brown, black, and dark green colors.
19. They vary from 1″ (2.5 cm) – 12″ (30cm) in length.
20. Leeches lay eggs in cocoons.
21. In cold or dry spells they hibernate by burying themselves in the mud until conditions improve.
22. They have poor vision, but a highly-developed response to touch and vibration.
23 Many species are nocturnal.
24. Rainforest leeches are not aquatic. They thrive in vegetation and feed of warm-bodied hosts.
25. The use of leeches in US medical procedures was FDA approved in 2004.
In leech-rich areas these tiny vampires will drop from their hiding places and inch towards you like something from a horror movie . . .
and the thought of plastic surgery drops even further down my to-do list!
(Photo: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Rushbearing.
Rushbearing is an old Lancashire custom from the early Middle Ages that still survives in a few rural areas today. It began as an annual Catholic festival to rededicate the local parish church, and soon developed into a day-long village celebration. In olden times, the floors of churches were made of packed earth. These were covered with rushes, herbs, and grasses to provide a sweet-smelling insulation against the cold and damp – a practice that continued until flagstones were finally installed. One day a year, at the end of summer, or on the Saint’s Day associated with a particular church, the old rushes got swept away and new ones were put in their place.
Over time, this religious ceremony developed into a community festival that contained many carnival elements. The rushes were harvested and dried out several weeks in advance, and then fashioned into a bee-hive decoration on the official rushbearing cart – a float also adorned with garlands and flowers. The cart was traditionally pulled by all the young bachelors of the parish, and a village maiden chosen as the Rushbearing Queen rode on top. The procession was often accompanied by banners, Morris Men, street performers, dancers, bands, and minstrels.
The day began with a slow progress through the crowded streets. Those towns that did not use an official cart appointed several Rush Maidens instead, who carried a white sheet containing the new rushes. Once they arrived at the church everyone ceremoniously helped to spread out the fresh flooring. It was originally customary to ring the church bells, and to provide wine, ale and cake for the rushbearers – but the ceremony later developed into a day-long drunken revel, which unfortunately encouraged a lot of criminal activity.
By 1579, this festival had become so bawdy that Queen Elizabeth 1st outlawed the custom, disapproving of the drinking and frolicking taking place in local churchyards. It was reestablished by King James 1st as part of the “diverting exercises” endorsed in his Book of Sports.
Rushbearing can be seen each August at Newchurch-in-Pendle. Other Lancashire towns have replaced the ceremony with similar village processions such as Club Day or Carnival Day.
Sources:
Ashworth, Elizabeth. Tales of Old Lancashire (Berkshire: Countryside Books, 2007)
Wiki: “Rushbearing” Accessed on 4/6/2015
(Painting: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Go Love-Nuts On Valentine’s Day!
If you can’t choose between two lovers then here’s a trick to try – but it must be done either on Saint Valentine’s Eve or at All Hallows:
“Light a fire and take three walnuts. Name one for yourself and one for each suitor.
Place the three nuts on the fire with yours in the middle of the other two.
If either nut cracks – or jumps away – that union is not meant to be.
The two nuts that blaze closest together will make the best marriage!”
(Traditional Spell)
(Photo: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
Magic Or Medicine?
Doctors / Physicians
Hans Brock der Altere (c. 1584)
Throughout history, people have consulted doctors to diagnose and treat their ailments, but educated physicians were rare, expensive, and often dangerous. There was no understanding of how germs spread disease. Indeed, well into the seventeenth century practitioners still followed Galen’s Greek notion that the body was made up of four humors – blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile – and when one of these fluids got out of balance the body fell sick. Leeches and blood-letting were common practices because fevers were thought to originate from having too much blood in the body.
Barber-surgeons
Franz Anton Maulbertsch (c. 1785)
The first barber-surgeons were monks who aided parishioners in their monasteries. They often advocated a heavy dose of fasting and prayer to accompany their herbal remedies.
Later on, barber-surgeons were found on battlefields tending the wounded. In the age before anesthetics, surgery was considered a lowly occupation and these quacks performed many of the procedures that physicians refused to do, including barbaric amputations, teeth-pulling, enemas, and blood-letting for those who could not afford a physician.
Apothecaries
If a person knew what was wrong and merely required a cure, they could visit the apothecary. These were early pharmacists who made medicines, salves, and potions, and also gave out advice on surgery and midwifery. Their tonics consisted of herbs, minerals, animal parts, urine, honey, and a variety of fats.
Cunning Men and Wise Women
If you could not afford any of the above, a cure might be found with a folk-healer. Cunning men and wise women used magic, prayer, herbal lore, and family experience to tackle the everyday ailments of the townsfolk, villagers, farmers, and their livestock. They were cheaper than apothecaries and could be paid by trading goods instead of money. The cunning folk also provided an array of services for specific problems that could be dealt with very discretely – contraceptive powders, abortion, love potions, impotence cures, and poisons.
Some of the more unfortunate – or unpopular – cunning folk got caught up in the witch hunts that swept across Europe throughout that period. But when people began realizing these healers were not only useful, but necessary, new regulations appeared that differentiated between good magic and bad. Lighter sentences were handed out – time spent in the pillory or jail – and capital punishment was only awarded to witches – those in league with demons, who conjured up devils or committed murder.
By the end of the Seventeenth Century extensive advancements had been made. William Harvey discovered how the heart controls blood circulation in the body; Ambroise Pare made important breakthroughs for treating war wounds; Marcello Malpighi invented the microscope; and the first blood transfusions were carried out at the Royal Society in London. But it took a great many years for these advancements to permeate throughout England. In the meantime, the common people continued to pray and turn to the wise women for help!
(Pictures: Public Domain)
Copyright © 2021 | KitPerriman.com | All Rights Reserved
