Mythos and Lore
A caveat or reminder is needed here to contextualise what is offered. As the Wildwood Tradition holds many of the details of our mythos and lore as inner court only, here we speak in broad terms about unique and distinctive features of our Craft. Like other contemporary Craft traditions in the so-called west we work certain initiatory and ever-deepening rites of passage that invite more and more intimacy with the Tradition. Part of this intimacy is the revelation of certain names, signs, stories, cosmologies, rituals, and workings that are contextualised by participating in the magic of the Wildwood and Our Tradition.
This is offered in the spirit of sharing meaningful and sacred truths in ways that honour the Family of Wildwood and respect curiosity, a desire to learn, and an inclination to wonder.
The Wildwood
Our Tradition of Witchcraft is named for this mystery, this magic, this place, this story. Our Tradition of Witchcraft is married with, anchored in, and grows from the Wildwood.
There are multiple truths about the Wildwood:
The Wildwood is an otherworldly realm that we travel to, that seeps through our dreams, that calls to us...
The Wildwood is ever-present, in the mycelial web, in the invisible bacterial sabbats of wonder all around and within us, in and as the oceans, in and as the roaring darkness, in the hearts of stars and swirling galaxies, the rivers, the mountains, the jungle, the bush, the forest, the tundra, the desert, the valley, the village, the town, the city, the heart…
The Wildwood is where the wild things go when they are torn from this world...
The Wildwood is the Witch’s Heartland.
Witches of the Wildwood might say - the Wildwood belongs to all Witches, and some Witches belong to the Wildwood - to attempt to express a central mystery of Our Covenant.
The Wildwood may be accessed in trance and spirit-flight, in imagination, in day-dreams, through reading, writing, film, dance, art, singing, sex, yearning, getting lost, getting found, in visions, in any way that brings us closer to Mystery.
The First Witch
In the Wildwood we honour Ara, the First Witch. She is many things to each of us, and often all at the same time. She is a paradoxical being, story-spirit, idea, intelligence, happening. When we say First Witch, we might mean the Spirit of Witchcraft Hirself! Sometimes Wildwood witches will say, Where the First Witch is All Witches are…
The word ara in Latin means altar. In the Catalan language it means now. Both are relevant, for the altar of our living art and craft is always Now. In working with the First Witch we invoke the mysterious origins of who we are and who we might become.
First Witch Ara - Holy Queen
Keeper of the Wildwood Green
Holder of the Midnight Dream
We call you in.
- chant to the First Witch created by witches of OakSun Grove,
a Wildwood coven that was based in Kombumerri, Yugambeh, and Bundjalung Country.
The Guardians - First Coven and Company
Often when a newly-blessed aspirant has begun their journey into the Wildwood Tradition they are introduced to/reminded of the beings we call the Guardians. Many Witchcraft traditions are covenanted with spirits called Guardians or beings who might have a guardian function. In most branches of Anderson Feri there are the six or seven Guardians of the Directions, often coloured by Elemental connections. In some Wiccan and Ceremonial Magic groups there are the Guardians of the Watchtowers or the Mighty Ones who guard the circle and witness the rites.
In early Wildwood lore these beings were called those who pass judgement and sometimes the Judges. We largely refer to them as the Guardians or the Guardian Beasts in the Tradition, and sometimes as the First Coven and Company of Ara, the First Witch.
The Guardians are the Horned Owl, the Cunning Fox, the King Stag, the Mother Bear, and the Cub. They are often conceived of as being emissaries of the Elemental Powers and also being connected to certain realms of magic and particular gender mysteries. The general map is as follows,
Horned Owl, Air, the Genderless: Silent, Seeing, Wise, Discerning One.
Cunning Fox, Fire, the Genderful: Shapeshifting, Invisible, Transforming One.
King Stag, Water, Male-of-Centre: Linking, Attending, Listening One.
Mother Bear, Earth, Female-of-Centre: Mighty, Protective, Nurturing, Robust One.
Cub, Earth/Spirit, Mystery: Dreaming, Dancing, Spiralling One.
We often call these Guardians to our rites and workings to guard, bless, inspire, direct, and deepen our magic. We may occasionally link them to directions but this isn’t set in stone or even necessary. Witches of the Wildwood may also become acquainted or intimate with native guardian beings of the bioregions they are working within and ask for the presence or blessing of these Guardians as well.
An example of this on the East Coast of Australia might be,
Horned Owl and Magpie or Kookaburra.
Cunning Fox and Tiger Quoll or Dingo.
King Stag and Green Sea Turtle or Saltwater Crocodile.
Mother Bear and Grey-Nosed Wombat or Koala.
Cub and Platypus.
The Sacred Four - the Wildwood Gods
At the heart of Wildwood Tradition is a mystery cultus, a deep wedding to four great witching spirits. These beings could also be called Gods. They are who we are, we are initiated into and by their mysteries and each of us has distinct and personal relationships with the beings we often call the Sacred Four.
Grandmother Weaver
She is all, the void, the nothing/everything/infinite. We are formed of Her, woven in the warp and weft of the threads of Her never-beginning, unfolding tapestry… we are the Web that She is. She weaves us, She picks us apart, swallows us up, reforms us -
We may call this Primordial Mystery the Weaver, Grandmother, the Hag-who-is-the-Maid, the Ancient One, Grandmother Goose, Bone Mother… She knits us with Her knuckles and laughs our hearts awake in the Night. She is the very principle of Fate, of Wyrd, of the unfinishedness of things. That which has become, that which is becoming, that which may become.
To say that the Grandmother is a Goddess might be missing the point entirely… She haunts and harrows and bends and twists and laughs and desires us all - in the end/beginning - we are Her secret wish.
Grandfather Green
The Old One, we often say, is the face and form of the Grandmother Weaver’s Mystery. This Mystery is the bones of the Earth, the wind shaking the trees (and those very trees and the earth they grow within, and the mycelial web, the bacteria, the stones, the grasses, the -), the thunder in the land, the lightning, the waves, the voice, the breath, the gate of birth, the gate of death…
We may call Him Green Man, Grandfather, Old One. We may call Them Dark One, Wind-Wizard, Hiding-in-the-Grass, Old God of Nature who swears to ever uphold and defend the Lady’s children.
The Green One is all that can be touched, all that can touch us. All the senses and their sensations (all that senses us), all gates of perception, all doors to knowing - these are the Presence of Grandfather. The Grandfather is Time because They are the Gate of Birth and Death, and the giver of that first breath which stays with us until we give it back. The breathing in, the breathing out - these are the Old One. To invoke Him is simply to turn our awareness to That Which Is.
Our beloved Old Ones, these Ancient Forces, Primordial Mysteries are the very expansion and contraction of the Cosmos and all the hidden secrets of Nature, Time, Space, Existence… The Younger Gods, the Lady and the Prince, awake within Them and move through Them, bringing to us the mysteries of Witchery in that most animal and human sense.
The Lady - the Crescent-Crowned Goddess
Queen of Witches, Goddess of Our People,
Our Lady, Rose Queen, Wolf Mother, Raven Queen, Queen of Elphame,
Veiled and Unveiled, who has been called Many Names.
Some say out of the primal darkness who is the Weaver, Our Lady rose - naked and adorned in Herself - spread out like a five-pointed star singing wordless names and nameless words. Around Her ravens who sound like bees, bees who sound like ravens, serpents, hares, horses, marvels, rainbow, song, roses, blossoms. Her Secret Name written on our hearts. From Her comes the Prince outside of the Wheel of the Stars, and She is present at all Their rites of passage in one way or another.
She is loved and loves fiercely the blessed St Brigid who is the midwife and foster-mother of the Horned-Cloaked God and who will take Him from the Queen of Witches after the Yuletide and bring Them back to the Oak, the Well, and the Forge and Flame to prepare Him for the world to come.
The Crescent-Crowned Goddess reveals Love, Truth, and Wisdom and holds the dare to behold Beauty in and as All Things - Beware, Beyond is Beauty - and Gods gather here. She appears to us also through the Mysteries of the Black and White Veils connected to the Mythos of the Great Feasts of the Year.
We might feel Her in our heartbreak, hear Her in a song, see Her in the swelling of the sea or the phases of the moon, notice Her when we hold hands with our friends and lovers, or invoke Her when we must take a holy risk. She holds us to Our Own Holy Selves.
The Prince - the Horned-Cloaked God
Fallen Angel, First Dead, Faerie Lover, Reddest Red…
Devil, Master of the Art, Son of the Art, Prince of Paradise, Stag-Antlered One, Stag-Bull-Goat,
God of the Witches who has been called Many Names.
He is born of Her, Our Lady, and He will be killed by Her. She, as the Raven Queen, the Grieving, Raging One within the Black Veil, will deal the final death blow at the Lammastide. The Prince is born as the Great Spirit of Mastery, Wonder, and Holy Dread at Yuletide. They will seek Her always and in doing so, seek Themself.
As Wildwood witches, in common with some other Witchcraft traditions, we may journey through a deep and profound Mythos we hinge to the Feasts of the Year. These are sacred and poignant thresholds of consciousness and gates of power to pause within. Here we may take deep time to honour the rhythms and spirits of the Lands we are in, and to experience the mysteries of the Prince, the Lady, the Grandmother and Grandfather. The Prince may be the Fool-Leaper-Lover-King-for-a-Day being we follow through the cycles.
The Prince of Paradise is our Witch-God par excellence. As with the chant at the beginning, many Wildwood witches understand the Horned-Cloaked God through the mysteries of the White (Fallen Angel), Black (First Dead), Green (Faerie Lover), Red (Reddest Red) Kin. These Kin (Black, White, Red, and Green) may aid the witch to explore the Worlds within and without, and their secret kissing places, and more intimately come to relate to these Great Spirit Families. Again, the Horned One is our teacher, our provocateur, our lover, our guide.
The Sacred Four are deep wells, mighty pillars, ancient titanic gods who are especially significant to Wildwood Witchcraft and to the ways we might speak of magic, initiation, life, pain, transformation, and belonging.
The Others
Alongside and growing up from within the web of the Wildwood, the First Witch, the Guardians and Gods, are various covenants and regions of relationship that we bring our sacred awareness to in different ways.
St Brigid forms a strong and necessary braid of Wildwood witchcraft. She is not only the lover and beloved of Our Lady, but the midwife and foster-mother of the Prince! She also stands in witness to the happenings in the Worlds, harmonises lawfully between the Compass Kin (Black, White, Red, and Green), and Beholds all who are born and all who die. She is, as She always has been, the Healer, the Poet, the Smith. Goddess and Saint, we honour Her.
The Serpents… Black with the White Eyes, White with the Black Eyes, Red with the Gold Eyes… Necessity, Time, Desire… play an integral part in Creation neverending.
Particular Seraphic Spirits we call the Watchers and Nine of the Good Folk are deep in the hearts of some Wildwood Witches.
We honour many Gods, Ancestors, Familiars, and Spirits - the Wildwood is vast, leviathan, legion, and mighty.
