In the historical records of European Witchcraft, one of the most notorious allegations against the accused was the use of a magical salve to gain the power of nocturnal flight. Rubbed on the body, it was said to be compounded of toxic herbs, animals, and noxious constituents such as human fat, and could effect 'travel' by the witch over great distances. According to legend, the ointment, or the instructions for its manufacture were given to the witch directly by the Devil himself in the midst of their frenzied Sabbats. Despite the persistence of these features of the witches' ointment in lore, actual recipes for it were rare and often speculative.

Initially the obsession of clerical and legal authorities, then of writers on Natural Magic, the ointment continued to perplex researchers well into the Age of Enlightenment. In more recent times, it has become the fascination of pharmacological speculation, psychology, entheogenic theory, and occult experiment. Despite the curiosity it has generated over the centuries, the mystery of the witches' ointment abides.

Bringing a much-needed approach of plant lore and folk magic to the subject, The Devil's Ointment examines the witches' salve against the broader historical use of magical unguents and greases, considering supernatural contexts in addition to witchcraft. This is complimented by the additional investigational viewpoint of folk medicine, which made therapeutic use of many of the toxic plants ascribed to the ointment. Rationales for use, source materials, and symbolical ingredients of the european pharmacopoeia are also examined, revealing the witches' ointments as but one small part of the essential and timeless accoutrements of European occult practices.

Plants of the Devil examines the history and magic of herbs associated with Satan and his minions, delving into the folklore of ancient Europe and the British Isles.

Examined in the book are the diabolical concept of the Wild Adversary and the Devil's Garden, Temptation, plants that harm and curse such as Blackberry, Stinging Nettle, Briar Rose, and Thistle, Poisonous Plants, herbs of evil omen, and herbs for protection, or 'Plants to keep the Dark Prince at bay.' The book will be of great interest to students of the occult, witchcraft, and plant folklore.

In many esoteric traditions, there exists an iconic or linguistic corollary between the concepts of 'poisoner' and 'sorcerer', suggesting a sinistral magical kinship. Indeed, the use of plant, animal and mineral toxins is a strand of magic originating in remotest antiquity and reaching the present day. Beyond its mundane function as an agent of corporeal harm, poisons have also served as gateways of religious ecstasy, occult knowledge, and sensorial aberration, as well as the basis of cures. Allied with Samael, the fallen serpent-angel of first transgression whose Hebrew name in some translations is 'Venom of God', this facet of magic wends through the rites of ancient Sumer and Egypt, penetrating European Necromancy, Alchemy, the arcane the rites of the Witches' Sabbath, and modern-day folk magic. VENEFICIUM concerns the intersection of magic and poison. Of particular note to this study are the herbs of the so-called 'Devil's Garden', which bear relation to the allied witchcraft concepts of the Graal of Midnight, the Witches' Supper, and the flying ointment of the witches which has exerted fascination over scholars, historians, and practitioners alike. Beyond consideration of the toxicological dimensions of magical power, the related threads of astral and philosophical poisons are also examined, and their resonance and dissonance with magical practice explored. VENEFICIUM will be of interest to students of magic, witchcraft, alchemy, botanical folklore, medicine, and occult pharmacology.

Shamanism, religion and magic have long acknowledged the significance of dreams as a bridge to the spirit world, and over time developed practices for dream incubation.

Many such practices involved plants, and were operant at the folk level, seeking to incept dreams of a prophetic nature, to obtain knowledge of future loves, fortunes, births and deaths. In Dream Divination Plants in Northwestern European Traditions, Corinne Boyer draws together many strands of plant dream-lore, focusing on dream-divination. Bringing old lore to life with modern insight and a practical approach, she examines the many ways of using flowers, fruits, branches and leaves to make contact with the oneiric realm. With original illustrations by Peter Köhler.

--Publisher Publisher Website

Plant folklore contains a persistent group of plants associated with witches, and baneful magic. These spells, rituals, and taboos reflect a hidden dimension of the vegetal world, mantled with ominous attributes. The Witch's Cabinet contains thirteen essays on these dark plant aspects, revealing their powers, fearsome qualities, and occult uses. Certain trees were considered cursed and thought to carry afflicted power, to be exploited by witches. Particular roots and flowers were used for causing disease, conjuring demons, or bringing nightmares; other plants fell under the governance of Satan, or were used to gain the powers of witchcraft itself. A particularly pernicious reservoir of corrupt power was the graveyard, with a unique retinue of plants all its own. Not all such herbal lore is malevolent; countless teachings reveal how certain plants --sometimes the same ones which are considered cursed-- can protect a person from witches, evil spirits or other users of malefic magic. Other plants of dark character, like the Hawthorn, were in perpetual communion with the souls of the dead, and possessed the power to reveal hidden treasure. As a meditation of the shrouded dimensions of plant folklore, The Witch's Cabinet approaches this often-disquieting garden holistically, a gathering of allied power-plants, many of which contain keys of spiritual transformation, healing, and occult mysteries of the plant world. In addition to the enigmatic original drawings of artist Peter Köhler, the book also contains an introduction by Daniel A. Schulke, author of Thirteen Pathways of Occult Herbalism.

The discipline of Occult Herbalism encompasses the knowledge and use of the magical, spiritual, and folkloric dimensions of plants.

This perennial wisdom animates many global spiritual traditions, especially those which have maintained their integrity of transmission even in the face of industrial development and cultural destruction. Often concealed within the deepest strata of the Western Esoteric Traditions, this green strand of wisdom, though obscured, is a potent legacy of all magic, sorcery, and occult science.

In addition to the hard sciences of botany, ethnology, agriculture and ethnopharmacology, a number of pathways can assist the magical herbalist in furthering the depth of understanding and integrity of personal approach. Thirteen Pathways of Occult Herbalism circumscribes the metaparadigm of herbal magical practice, providing useful examples of its manifestation, as well as demonstrating its time-honored routes of inquiry.

THE GREEN MYSTERIES is a complete lexicon of the spiritual, magical and occult properties of plants. Containing more than 400 individual entries, this occult herbal focuses especially upon plant power as an emanation of spirit, and how herbs are utilized in the active practices of magic and ritual. It includes trees and herbs from the Americas, as well as native European plants familiar to students of the Western Esoteric Tradition. Prepared with the modern occult practitioner and researcher in mind, it draws from diverse sources of herb lore, folk magic practice and myth, as well as religious and occult traditions. Interspersing the encyclopedic plant entries are short narratives addressing the spiritual dimensions of the vegetal world, the concept of wildness, and the practice of occult herbalism. Much of the material is also drawn directly from the author's experience working with the plants themselves. Many of the featured herbs also feature tables of correspondence, linking the plants to gods, spirits, planetary attributions, and psychological states. As a further arena of investigation, some also feature a Spirit-Retinue, a grouping of thirteen personified attributes, virtues and powers demonstrating the plant's dominion of power within the human sphere. The text is also augmented with recipes and 'The Dream-Book of Sylvanus', a short dream interpretation manual examining the significance of specific plants in dreams. The Green Mysteries is accompanied by over 300 original illustrations by artist Benjamin A. Vierling, prepared in collaboration with author especially for this volume. Paying homage to the traditions of the European herbal, these faithful botanical renderings uniquely embody the viriditas of each herb --its 'sacred green power'-- as well as its magical character and arcana.

The Pyrenees Mountains of Spain are a locus unique, characterized by a rugged landscape, extremes in climate, and isolated villages. A stronghold of independence, the area has long sheltered a rich tapestry of folk customs and magical belief, and served as a refuge for heretical sects of the Middle Ages. It was here, in 1424, that the first secular laws against witchcraft were passed. It was also the birthplace of the unique figure of the bruxa or Primordial Witch, a supernatural figure which could communicate with spirits, cast spells, control weather, and serve as the Devil's consort.

Drawing upon Inquisition records, as well as local history, folklore, and magical practices, the Land of the Goat explores the nature of the Pyrenean witch and the evolution of its character and craft over time. Its subjects include the Spirit-Double, veneficium (the use of poisons), and the witches' nocturnal flight to the phantasmagoric Lande de Boc or 'Land of the Goat'. Also examined is the animistic substrate of ancient goddesses and spirits of the nocturnal realm, such as the Basque Mari who, like Diana, was associated with the sky-roving Night Host. The unique forms of the Pyrenean Devil, pre-dating the Christian Satan, are also investigated; chief among these was Akerbeltz, the Black He-Goat, closely associated with Pyrenean shepherds and bearing the powers of death and fertility.

The Land of the Goat documents not only the history of the Pyrenean witch, but also its status as liminal to humanity, and as a perennial emanation of the land itself. Held in balance to folk custom, popular magic, and the twin adversaries of Christianity and Rationalism, the legacy of the bruxa has endured in many aspects of local folklore.

--Three Hands Press Publisher

Onomasticon of Occult Herbs is a cross-cultural lexicon of sacred plant names, as they emerged from the religions and magical traditions of the world.

The great procession of common plant names, given to them by humans, forms a unique passed down through time. In religion, magic and myth, these names serve a greater function than mere verbal signifiers; they operate at transcendent levels of spirit. In traditions of magic, religion and mysticism, a plant name may speak of its healing power, its legends, or its associations with gods or spirits. In anthropological contexts, these names also speak to the plant's steward culture, in which traditional interaction with the plant is embedded. Onomasticon of Occult Herbs is a cross-cultural lexicon of 3,000 plant names, with special focus on those herbs used in ceremonial and spiritual practice. In addition to selected annotations on the names and information on linguistic sources, the book also contains the introductory essay The Litany of Green Saints, which examines the powers behind the names.

Far from being a religion defined by rituals of peace, and love and salvation, Christianity has a dark side which historically embraced the imprecatory arts --rituals of cursing and malediction. Beginning with God's curse upon Adam, Eve, the Serpent, and their descendants, the religion of Jesus Christ embraces a rich tradition of cursing and bringing evil upon others, even if unacknowledged. The magic of hate and harm also had a special place amongst the learned clergy, whose traffic with angels and demons is also known through the historical genre of grimoires, the so-called 'Black Books' of European necromancy. Drawing upon the Bible, as well as non-canonical scriptures and folk traditions, Anathema Maranatha examines the rich history of Christian malediction, from curses to blight farmland to magical operations meant to cause a building to collapse, to invoking the Saints against one's enemies.--Publisher Publisher

The flight of the medieval witches was a rapturous transportation to the distant, ecstatic rite of the Sabbat.

As has been established by modern historians, the elements of the Witches' Sabbat to are now known to contain far more than religious heresy and the deranged projections of churchly inquisitors, and also included localized folk-beliefs and remnants of pre-Christian religion, such as the cult of the moon-goddess Diana. The witches' flight itself also contained such historical rudiments, notably the night-roving armies of the Wild Hunt, and the exteriorized or shape-shifted 'spirit-double'.

Howard's text examines such elements as the ancestral horde, the flight of the Furious Host, and the entheogenic Witches' 'Flying Ointment', each of which played a unique role in the 'flight' of the medieval witches. The mythos of the Sabbatic conclave, containing infernal and diabolical elements, is taken beyond its Christian pathology to connect it with actual practices in folk-magic. Originally released in 2013 as part of the limited Three Hands Press Occult Monographs series, it has long been out of print and is not available in a redesigned stand-alone edition.

The mid-twentieth century saw a resurgence of popular occultism in Europe and North America, including an interest in witchcraft. Chief among these was Wicca, a recension of ceremonial magic and nature worship advanced by Gerald Gardner and Alex Sanders, now widely regarded as a religion. However, lesser-known traditions of the witch-current thrived the shadows, having older historical roots, and linked to a body of practices - witch-bottles, knotted cord spells, curses, exorcisms, sexual magic, and charms ranging from the conjuration of angels to protection for livestock and hearth. These formed a body of practices loosely called Traditional Witchcraft, whose origin in part lies with the sorcery of the cunning-folk of Britain, Europe and Colonial America. Eschewing the popular occult limelight, its perpetuation as a mystery-cult continues as a largely closed group of initiates. Now revised and expanded, the second edition of CHILDREN OF CAIN is the definitive history of Traditional Witchcraft and its key operatives in Britain and the United States, and is based on over forty years of research and private collaboration with practitioners of this mysterious form of folk magic.

The translation of magical power to a created image is a matter well understood in so-called 'archaic' sorcery, in which a mutual embodiment of re-presentation and represented occurs. The carved fetish, for example, participates in a reciprocal process between object and creator that often begins long before chisels and adzes are set to wood, drawn from the atavistic spirit-reservoir of the carver. From the view of magic, the spirit that the idol represents thus participates in its own reification. Many of these forms of image-making were concerned with accessing power, and it was only later, in the context of religious devotion, that their forms densified into 'mere' idols. Witchcraft and the Occult, because of their syncretic nature, partake in multiple infusions of traditional image-making lore, including not only sorcery and religious iconography, but also science, craftsmanship, and the fine arts. However, because much of its images are used privately, and indeed created for consumption by a limited set of observers, they participate in a concentrated alembic of exposure wherein all who experience them do so in the context of magical practice and devotion. This intensity of private magical interaction provides a locus which enables the image to transcend its medium --and indeed that fetish known as 'icon'. First published in book form in 2013 and long out of print, this second edition of Idolatry Restor'd contains additional textual expansion and is newly typeset.

The figure of the witch in medieval Europe was strongly defined by her relation to the Sabbat: the phantasmagoric nocturnal rite where the living trafficked with the dead. Sometimes conflated with the Christian heresy of the Black Mass (or derided by occult writers as a degenerate form of ancient high magic), the Sabbat is in fact a fully-realized wellspring of ecstasy and ritual power wit its roots in prehistory. This sequel to Schulke's Veneficium examines the elements of the Sabbat, from the nocturnal flight of the witches, to the frenzied Round Dance, to its more notorious features such as The Witches' Supper and Intercourse wit the Devil. The essential syncretic nature of Sabbatic ritual and magic is examined, as well as its relation to Judaism, Christianity and Islam, as well as the polytheistic and animist religions which preceded them. As well as as its capacity as a vehicle for individual power and ecstatic experience, the book examines the persistent embodiments of the Sabbat through time, up to an including modern occult practices.--Publisher

With its geographic diversity of rocky edifices, deep river valleys and dense forests, Europe's Balkan mountain region has been characterized as a natural fortress. This natural multiformity is mirrored by an ancient admixture of magical beliefs and practices present in the region for thousands of years. Among the many specialist types of Balkan magic is 'Vesticarstvo', a sorcery drawing its power from Balkan folk belief, relict shamanism, and medieval heresy. This traditional magic, which has also been referred to as The Balkan Craft, is present today in many forms, and uses of thousands of charms, rites, and spells in the rural communities where it survives. A quintessential embodiment of this power is the zmajevit covek or 'dragon-man'. Part human, part serpent, he possessed supernatural heredity and the power to curse, cure, and traffic with supernatural beings. Often incorporating the ancient powers of the pre-Roman Gods, the Queen of the Fairies, elemental spirits, and the ancestral retinue, the vital corpus of Vesticarstvo lore is a little-explored area of occult study. Drawing from both historical sources and present survivals, the present volume examines its history, beliefs, and rituals, including a complete English translation of DE INTORKATURA, an age-old rite of magical combat, as well as several other Balkan witchcraft rituals never before translated into English.--Publisher

From the preeminent author of At Fear's Altar and the occult manifesto The Benighted Pathcomes Sylvan Dread, Richard Gavin's fifth collection of preternatural tales. Bound within are thirteen nightmares exploring the Sinister Pastoral, the dominion which prevails at the intersection of mortal reckoning and the primoridum of malevolent Nature. As a meditation on the forces of predation and parasitism, monstrous fecundity and decay, and those hidden folk who occupy the spaces between the branches, Sylvan Dread evokes the primeval wood -- the place where all dreams and nightmares begin. In this isolate copse we witness the excavation of abominations long earthbound, the twilight of the rational, and the forgotten violence of the Dionysian Rite.

Irish Witches, Magicians and Fairies is the fifth and final book in Micael Howard's 'Witchcraft in the British Isles' series.

It examines the history of Irish magic and sorcery, and their convergence with the era of witchcraft persecutions. Including historical personages and actual occult witchcraft practices over the centuries, the book also examines the relationship of faery lore to folk magical practice.

The Lexicon of Witchcraft is an illustrated compendium of witchcraft terminology, encompassing rituals, symbols, spirits, objects, and other specialized concepts of witchcraft. Focusing on the European medieval witch and her modern occult legacy, the work contains over 600 terms, many rare or obscure, and also includes the phenomena of contemporary witchcraft practices. Supplemented by the arresting imagery of witchcraft artist Adrienne Rozzi, the book contains over 55 of her original images, specially commissioned for the work. Contributing authors to the Lexicon include Michael Howard, A.D. Mercer, Júlia Carreras-Tort, Andrew D. Chumbley, Daniel A. Schulke, Corinne Boyer, and Robert Fitzgerald.

The Olympic Spirits examines the ritual magic and spiritual frameworks of the renowned Swiss alchemist Paracelsus (1493-1541). Its approach to the subject is divided into three categories: biographical, historical and practical.

The biographical approach examines the often larger than life personality of Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim (Paracelsus), as the creator of the term 'Olympic Spirits', and the radical new magical concept behind it.

Historically, the book details the transformation that the Olympic Spirits have undergone as they have migrated into different books and manuscripts over the past five centuries, constantly transformed and evolving with each recension into new forms and magical operations.

The practical dimension examines the lived experience of the Olympic Spirits within the magical practitioner, and offers guidance for the student's own magical work with the Paracelsian retinue.

In the approachable voice he is known for with other works such as Ingenium and Trutmezzer, Frater Acher brings the complex and original Renaissance magic of Paracelsus into the twentieth century, making it accessible for the modern practitioner. Acher provides ample access to the writings of Paracelsus by translating original sources into English for the first time. The book also includes four appendices with first-time English translations of important works by Robert Fludd and Adam Haslmayr.

The book contains original illustrations by the occult artist Joseph Uccello, known for his work in Occlith and Ingenium.

There is a world that mirrors our own. Everything in this world is made of substance finer than air, finer than light, finer than thought itself--the aether. In the aether, inner sensations are as tangible as anything in the material world. In The Mentalist's Handbook, Clint Marsh gives us a glimpse of this world through step-by-step exercises, detailed and beautifully written explanations and definitions, and gorgeous black and white illustrations by award-winning artist Jeff Hoke. Newly designed and typeset for its tenth anniversary, this commemorative edition features expanded text, new chapters, and many illustrations which appear here for the first time. Inspired by esoteric, occult, and magic books published over the last 150 years, Marsh has aspired to create something of singular importance in the tradition of classic occult manuals. Both practical and whimsical, and complete with visual aids, this field guide to the paranormal will appeal to students of the New Age, esoteric scholars, readers of post-modern and magical-realism literature, angel, ghost, and fairy enthusiasts, comics and graphica fans, and artists.