A Witch's World of Magick

Photo by Andrew Harris

About the Author Melanie Marquis is a lifelong practitioner of magick, founder of the United Witches global coven, and organizer of Denver Pagans. She’s the author of The Witch’s Bag of Tricks and has written for national and international Pagan publications, including
Circle and Pentacle Magazine
. She also writes for several of Llewellyn’s almanacs and datebooks.She resides in Colorado. Visit her at http://www.melaniemarquis.com.

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

A Witch’s World of Magick: Expanding Your Practice with Techniques & Traditions From Diverse Cultures
© 2014 by Melanie Marquis.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Llewellyn Publications, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author’s copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

First e-book edition © 2013

E-book ISBN: 9780738739854

Book design by Bob Gaul
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Llewellyn Publications does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

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Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

This book is lovingly dedicated to my magickal
mama Eva Janice Marquis, and to Franchesica Middleton
and all the other wonderful witches who choose
to make their own way in the world.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to my family and friends for the love and laughter that makes my world a magickal place. Mia, Aidan, Andrew Harris, Jon Marquis, Melissa Chapman, Elizabeth Bridges, Jenny Edwards, Eugene, Tavarius, Calvin Carter, Ahoono, and Sally, you all are the best and I thank you!

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

One
: No-Tools Body Magick

Two
: Potion Making and Mixing Magick

Three
: The Art of Containing Energies: Magick to Have and to Hold

Four
: Ties that Bind

Five
: Nail It Down: Insert Magick Here

Six
: Naming Names: Identification in the Magickal Arts

Seven
: Decoy Magick

Eight
: Cursebreaking and Countercharms: Magick to Undo

Nine
: Masks, Mimicry, and Magick

Ten
: Group Magick

Bibliography

Introduction

With all the stigma and misconceptions still associated with modern witchcraft practice, it’s easy to forget sometimes just how ancient and widespread the belief in magick truly is. Magick is arguably both older and more broadly practiced than many of the earth’s most prominent organized religions. While Christianity dates from around 30 CE and boasts 2 billion followers—an impressive tally, to be sure—magickal belief has its origins tens of thousands of years earlier and its traces can be found in nearly every culture on earth.
¹
Anthropologists have yet to discover a primitive society completely devoid of beliefs that could be categorized as “supernatural”; among modern peoples, “superstitious” (aka magickal) practices such as knocking on wood to divert bad luck or carrying a lucky charm are surprisingly common. A recent poll indicated that 51 percent of Americans consider themselves at least somewhat superstitious, while a similar survey in England revealed even higher numbers.
²

We can add to this the abundance of people around the planet who engage in magickal practices categorized and legitimized as “folk religion.” Practitioners of indigenous Chinese religion, for instance, who number an approximate 394 million, frequently practice divination, astrology, and longevity alchemy. While these activities are practiced in a primarily religious context, they nonetheless have a quality that is easy to recognize as distinctly magickal. Consider also the 5 million followers of New Age philosophy, the 1 to 3 million Wiccans, and the masses of hard-to-count Neo—Pagans, chaos magicians, ceremonial magicians, hedge witches, kitchen witches, and undefinable others whose practices involve at least some form of magickal ritual, and you’ve got a good case for the worldwide prominence and popularity of magick.
³

It’s no wonder magickal practice is so widespread. It has a long history, and besides, magick
does
often work, after all. Archeologists have uncovered ample evidence of ritualistic burial practices, “venus” fetishes, and other relics that support a very early belief in magick and mysticim. The most conservative estimates date the time of humanity’s first foray into ritual to at least 35,000–40,000 years ago, but more recent research points to an even earlier birth of magick.

In 2006, University of Oslo archeologists Sheila Coulson and Neil Walker released their findings about a ritual site located in an area of the Tsodilo Hills in Botswana that’s estimated to be around 70,000 years old. Known as Rhino Cave, the cavern contains a large (20' by 6.5'), very snakelike rock, “Python Rock,” which bears hundreds of human-made scorelines, grooves that resemble a pattern of scales. Beneath the snake, the archeologists unearthed hundreds of spearheads that seemed to have had a special, likely magickal, purpose. They’re made from finer stones than the everyday spearheads of the time, more brightly colored and crafted from stones brought from up to 100 kilometers away. The cave shows evidence that the spearheads were crafted on site, perhaps begun in another location, but finished right there at the side of the great snake.

Another interesting point about the spearheads reveals the subtlety and variance of magickal methods far into the distant past. Of the hundreds of spearheads that have been found at Python Rock in all their array of colors, only spearheads of a certain type show signs of having been placed in contact with fire. These spearheads have taken on a red color from the heating process, which was apparently a quick trip through a very hot flame. This heating action was different than the process typically used for tempering spearheads, indicating that these particular spearheads may have been burnt for a ritualistic, rather than practical, purpose. Other spearheads discovered at the site do not show any signs of burning. Fragments of quartz crystal were also found at the cave site, stuffed into cracks and crevices in the cavern walls and floor, and even stowed right beneath the giant stone snake.
⁴
If the dating on the Rhino Cave site is correct, this evidence taken together makes it appear likely that humans were exhibiting an understanding of magickal principles as far back as 70,000 years ago!

Although we’ll probably never know the exact date of the origin of magickal ritual, one thing is clear: humans have been practicing magick for tens of thousands of years, and it seems that our magickal understanding has been fairly sophisticated from the get-go.

Like the recognized religions of the world, magick reflects an established (yet ever-evolving) belief system. There may not be a centralized dogma or a single, sanctioned set of explanations of phenomenon, but all the same, the arts of magick have indeed preserved and conveyed for ages an implied understanding and acceptance of certain universal principles on which nature and the rest of the world operate. We see in all magickal acts, for instance, the belief that our conscious intentions and symbolic actions can sway the inner workings of the world around us. We see the belief in the power of nature, human, and deity to influence reality, and we can identify also the assumption that the elements of this reality are interrelated, connected by an invisible web of energy that can be accessed and manipulated through thoughts, emotion, symbol, or correspondence. Whatever the outward appearance of our magick might be, the inner workings of the act are similar throughout the world.

By looking for these similarities and locating the common core of the tried-and-true, we discover new ways to view our own practices and gain fresh insights into the many ways an effective act of magick can be achieved. Our magick need not be restricted by tradition, but rather can benefit from being inspired and informed by it. This is a book of magick from around the world, illustrating time-honored practices and finding common threads with which to weave our own modern spells.

How to Use This Book

In each chapter, you’ll find examples of tried-and-true magickal techniques from around the world. By getting more familiar with some classic “magickal moves,” you’ll have a solid starting point for designing your own mystical innovations. These examples are drawn from different cultures in different eras, highlighting the universality of various magickal principles. As you examine these methods, think about the underlying theories and beliefs exhibited in each unique act of magick. Repeating patterns and commonalities soon become apparent, and the eclectic witch can therein find a strong foundation on which to craft his or her own effective brand of magick.