Witchcraft Medicine: Healing Arts, Shamanic Practices, and Forbidden Plants (7 page)
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Authors: Claudia Müller-Ebeling,Christian Rätsch,Ph.D. Wolf-Dieter Storl
Burdock leaf, I strangle you,
burdock leaf you shall not go
’til the cow lets the threadworm go.
Many people looked for the mysterious “midsummer coal” beneath the roots of the burdock during the noon hour of the longest day of the year. (It is also alleged to be underneath a tangle of mugwort roots.) Those who dared to pick up the red-hot coal with their bare hands would be spared bad luck and sorrows.
Folklorists have given themselves a headache trying to figure out what sort of “coal” the fools had been digging up. Recently it has been thought that it was kermes lice, which contain a red pigment. The “witches” know better: This “coal” appears at certain moments in inner visions. It has to do with beings of the etheric dimension, with “salamanders” that can be connected in service to people who have a psychic relationship with nature. These fire spirits know well how to conceal themselves from the critical gaze of curious scientists.
The August Festival
During the dog days of August the grain—the staff of life—grows ready to harvest. Again the Divine draws near. As the noble matron with the horn of plenty or as the Madonna carrying a sickle, she reveals her presence in dreams and visions. Her womb produces berries, fruits, grains, and the most potent herbs. Her companion, the sun god, no longer shows his gentle, brightly radiating figure; he is now fiery, burns hotly, and is drying. The Celts called him Lugh, the smart and skillful god, the “master of all arts” (Lugh-Samildánach), the “Lion with the Quiet Hand” (Lleu Llaw Gyffes). It is he who brings everything to fullness and ripeness with his flame
(lohe),
his wisdom
(logos).
He symbolizes the receding year, the west where the sun sets in red-hot embers. Under his reign the grain grows golden, the fruit becomes sweet and red-yellow, the herbs become spicier and stronger than at midsummer. But the sun god is also the ruthless harvester, the reaper, the Terminator who finishes off the green and budding life with his heat. The northern Germanic peoples knew him as Loki, who killed the gentle Balder (who was beloved by all), ultimately provoking the utter destruction of the apocalypse. However, Loki is not the devil the Christians made him out to be.
Lugh and the goddess of the earth celebrated a wedding during the full moon of August and invited the people to celebrate with them. The festival of Lugh (Lughnasa) was a fire festival during which huge piles of wood were ignited. This tradition endured among the insular Celts for many years. During the three-day-long festival, water was taboo; washing and bathing were prohibited and fishing was not permitted (not even with nets).
Tansy (
Tanacetum vulgare
L., syn.
Chrysanthemum vulgare
[L.] Bernh.) was hung by the Germanic peoples on the house as magical protection against monsters. The aromatic herb was also used as an incense. The herb is used in folk medicine for worms. The volatile oil contains the neurotoxin thujone. (Woodcut from Otto Brunfels,
Contrafayt Kreüterbuch,
1532.)
Another part of the festival included the grain king (grain wolf, grain bear) being brought into the village in a festive procession and sacrificed. During the late Neolithic period and the Bronze Age it was a human sacrifice, wherein the chieftain’s son, a foreigner, or a prisoner of war would take the place of the grain king. The celebrants would be blessed with the sacrificial blood. The corpse was cut into pieces and buried in the fields in order to transmit its strength to the soil. This was a kind of agricultural magic that was entirely alien to the hunter-gatherers! The Goddess, as the mother of the grain, mourned her sacrificed son, and thus turned into the mother of sorrow. She lived on into the Christian era as the Mater Dolorosa who bitterly mourns her son, the one who revealed himself by preaching, “I am the bread and I am the wine.”
This festival was called
Hlafmaesse
(bread mass) by the Anglo-Saxons; Lammas, the “witches’ festival” celebrated on or around the first of August, derives from this word.
Lughnasa was the occasion for blessing all the herbs that would be needed during the coming year for the health and well-being of the house and stable. It also made good sense to collect the plants during the dog days of summer because the aroma, taste, and medicine precipitates in the active ingredients (mainly the volatile oil) are manifestations of the powerful light and warmth the vegetation takes in during this season. At other times of the year these characteristics are not yet fully matured or the active ingredients are decomposing.
The women made these powerful herbs of August sacred to the Goddess, who was slowly retreating from the world of appearances. In the synod of Liftinea (743 C.E.) the missionary Boniface—who had felled the sacred tree of the heathens—attempted to ban this custom. But the women did not want to abandon their herbs, and so they placed them under the dominion of the Mother Goddess and consecrated them to the dying Mary on the day of her Assumption. These plants are believed to be the flowering herbs that were found in Mary’s grave instead of her corpse.
During Lughnasa nine sacred healing plants were gathered: herbs that protected against witchcraft, firestorms, and hailstorms; herbs that were good for sex; and herbs that eased births. Some of the plants were placed in graves or in coffins with the dead. Many were used as incense for sacred times (such as the “smoking nights” of the winter solstice).
Yarrow was included in the medicine bundle along with mugwort, arnica, calendula, and sage. In addition there were such well-known herbs as lovage
(Levisticum officinale),
which was valued as a culinary spice and an aphrodisiac, and dill
(Anethum graveolens),
which was trusted to ward off any ill-willed spirits. Dill’s powerful aroma is probably also the reason that the ancient peoples, such as the Scythians, used the herb with other aromatic herbs for the embalming of their dead. Dill, a garden herb brought to central Europe by monks, not only chased off the
Buhlteufel
f
but also suppressed fertility (Müller, 1982: 77). And a bride who didn’t want to be subjected to her husband’s will could secretly bring mustard and dill seeds to her wedding and murmur, “I have you, mustard and dill. Husband, when I speak, you stay still!”
Valerian
(Valeriana officinalis)
also belonged in the bundle. The old name alone, Weyland’s herb, indicates a powerful magical plant: Weyland the Smith was a great magician and a shaman with a swan’s wings. Before the Industrial Age, when this witches’ herb came to be used as a nervine, valerian was above all considered an aphrodisiac. Both husband and wife were supposed to drink wine in which the root had been soaking. An old recipe advises: “Take valerian in your mouth and kiss she who you desire, and she will be yours in love right away” (Beuchert, 1995: 31).
Tansy
(Tanacetum vulgare),
with its aromatic yellow flowers, was also included in the sacred bundle. Because of its thujone-containing volatile oils it was an important vermifuge, as well as an abortifacient.
The sacred bundle was also decorated with stems of grain and flowering weeds, such as the blue cornflower (which was reminiscent of the Goddess’s heavenly blue cloak) and the red corn cockle (which was sacred to the fiery Lugh). The artistic creation was then surrounded by low-growing herbs—flowering chamomile, thyme, bedstraw, feverfew. In the middle of the bundle reigned, like the Goddess herself in the middle of her retinue, tall mullein, also known
Himmelbrand
(heavenly fire) or
Königskerze
(king’s candle). In the Middle Ages it was said that Mary traveled through the land during this time of year, blessing it. An old saying relates, “Our beloved Lady goes through the land, she carries mullein in her hand!” Sometimes she touched the sick with the mullein and heals them.
The herbs for the August festival must be picked in the hours before the sun rises, while speaking the right charms. The woman should go to the plants silently, naked or at least barefoot, without being seen and without thinking any thoughts. Under no circumstance should the herbs be cut with an iron knife or dug up with an iron spade, for that would take away their power.
Yarrow
(Achillea millefolium)
Yarrow is one of the main herbs sacred to midsummer. It is sacred to August and is a beloved medicinal plant. Yarrow tea tastes slightly bitter and spicy, and it is a mild diaphoretic; if taken as part of a treatment, it will help rid the body of toxins. Yarrow lowers the blood pressure, disinfects the urinary tract, is anti-inflammatory, and relieves cramps. Because of its bitter properties it stimulates the entire digestive system and increases bile production. In other words, it is a true health tonic. It was also taken during the Middle Ages when the plague, the black death, was making its rounds.
“When the yarrow and dandelion flourish, it is for the good of humans.”
—COMMON FOLK SAYING
The scientific name of the genus is
Achillea
and refers to Achilles, the hero of the Trojan War. His mother made him invincible to wounds by holding him in the heavenly fire during the night and healing him again with ambrosia in the morning. Only at his heels, where she held him, did he remain vulnerable. It was in this unprotected spot that the poisonous and deadly arrow of Paris struck Achilles. Following the advice of Aphrodite, the goddess of this pleasant-smelling herb, Achilles placed yarrow on the wound and it healed immediately (Birmann-Dähne, 1996: 92).
As a young warrior Achilles, like Asclepius and other great men skilled in the arts of medicine, entered into an apprenticeship with the intelligent horse-man Chiron in order to learn about the wound herbs. Chiron revealed to Achilles the power of yarrow, which the horse-man had used to heal many wounded comrades. The saga suggests that yarrow is truly an excellent wound medicine. This is also indicated by the many common names for the herb: soldier’s woundwort, knight’s milfoil, nose bleed, carpenter’s weed, bloodwort, staunchweed,
Sichelkraut
(sicklewort). In Russia it is called ax-blow herb. In France it is known as
herbe militaris
and, in honor of the patron of the carpenters,
herbe à charpentier
or
herbe de Saint-Joseph
. According to religious legend Joseph once gravely injured himself at work. Christ picked some yarrow from the meadow and laid it on him. The wound immediately stopped bleeding and miraculously closed over.
Dioscorides, the ancient Greek “father of phytotherapy,” used the “thousand-leafed soldier’s herb” for puncture wounds and slashes. Hildegard treasured the
Garwe
—Old German for the plant, which can be interpreted as “to make healthy”—for internal and external wounds, to quell the flow of blood and tears, and as a remedy for insomnia. The plant contains tannic acids, which are contracting and astringent, helping to dry the wound and encouraging coagulation. In other words, the tannins neutralize the poisons excreted by the wound bacteria. Yarrow also contains the anti-inflammatory volatile oil azulene, which is found in chamomile as well.
Yarrow (
Achillea millefolium
L.) is one of the most valued medicinal plants throughout the world. It contains bitters, flavonoids, and a volatile oil with cineole and proazulene. The aromatic herb is used as a bitter, as a wound medicine, and primarily as a medicinal herb for women. (Woodcut from Tabernaemontanus,
Neu vollkommen Kräuter-Buch,
1731.)
Astrologers placed the wound medicines under the dominion of the warlike Mars. But where Mars is found, his beloved Venus is never far. Names such as virgin’s herb,
herbe de Notre Dame
, Margaret’s herb (Saint Margaret was called on for many female illnesses), and the eyebrow of Venus
(supercilium veneris)
are testament to the role that this medicinal herb plays in women’s health. “Yarrow inside the body is good for all women,” goes an old farmer’s saying. As a Venus plant yarrow was used for the drying and healing of venereal diseases; Venus rules problems such as these in the urogenital tract. The English herbalist Nicholas Culpeper (1616–1664) also ascribed yarrow to Venus and described its characteristics as “binding and drying, for weak kidneys in men and discharge in women.” Yarrow is used in a warm sitz bath—often in combination with other relaxing and tonifying women’s herbs such as melissa and lavender—to ease abdominal tension and cramps. When used in this way or as an enema or drunk as a tea, the herb regulates discharge or prolonged heavy menstrual bleeding.
Women also used this plant of Venus for oracles. If a girl wished to know what the young man who would marry her and free her from her parents’ care looked like, she turned to this herb. For this the yarrow was picked from an unusual place, one where ghosts were found, such as a fork in the path or, better yet, from the grave of a dead man. The girl placed the herb under her pillow and whispered:
The first yarrow I found there,
In the name of Christ I picked it right,
And as Jesus thought of Mary with love,
Let my beloved appear in my dream tonight!
In the British Isles maidens cut the yarrow at moonlight with a black-handled knife, placed it under their beds before going to sleep, and said,
Thou pretty herb of Venus’ tree,
Thy true name it is Yarrow:
Now who my bosom friend must be,
Pray tell me to-morrow.
g
Yarrow oracles such as these are found in many cultures. Rudolf Steiner spoke about the “sulfur action” of this plant, which allows it to channel supernatural and future events. (According to anthroposophists, “The spirit moistens its finger with sulfur in order to work in the physical world.”) In China yarrow stalks have been used with the I-Ching for thousands of years. The oracle sticks are thrown in a particular manner, thus creating a “natural connection” between the person seeking advice and the energy of the
feng shui,
which reveals the future events.
6
Yarrow was a sacred plant to the ancient Germanic peoples. The aromatic herb was generally dedicated to Freya as a medicine and a women’s plant. The tender leaves belonged to the nine green herbs that are eaten in springtime as folk food (the socalled green nine). With this soup or little cake consecrated to the Goddess, the humans connected to the greening and rejuvenating nature. Eggs, the symbols of life, were also colorfully decorated. In those days—as is still done today—the eggs were probably wrapped in yarrow leaves and dunked into dye to create delicate patterns.
The use of yarrow leaves in love oracles is also an ancient heathen custom. In order to be sure that a distant boyfriend would stay true, a girl could speak the necessary words, which went something like: “Yarrow, yarrow, if my beloved is good, neither water nor foam comes, otherwise red blood.” She would then turn a yarrow leaf three times around her nose. If she got a bloody nose, her lover was true. The fact that the tips of the feathery leaves had tiny prickers was certainly on the side of the questioner.
h
Before the Benedictine monks introduced hops, the northern Europeans used yarrow and other bitter and aromatic herbs (such as ground ivy, heather, and wild rosemary) for the flavor and preservation of beer. As a brewing herb yarrow was more sacred to the mighty thunder god Thor, lord of the intoxicating drinks, than to fair Freya.