Tag: astronomy

Entry 242 – Planets

We look at the magical lore of the planets in our night sky

Artists image of planets in night sky
All images (c) Cory Thomas Hutcheson 2025

If you’re reading this in early 2025, lucky you! Because in January and February, there’s a beautiful procession of planets across our night sky. We mentioned this in one of our recent Folk Magician’s Notebook episodes, saying:

“Venus will shine brightly near the southern horizon for the whole month and should be fairly easy to spot. If you look just a bit south of Venus, you’ll also be able to see a visible (if fainter) Saturn below it which will remain there for the first half of the month (it will technically still be there even in the last half of February but will get harder to see). Looking up, you can find Jupiter glowing very brightly near the Pleiades, and if you have binoculars or a telescope you can even see some of Jupiter’s moons like Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa! Finally, look a bit to the east and find the glowing reddish dot–that’s Mars! If you still have that telescope out you can even see Phobos and Deimos, the Martian moons!. Late in the month, you can also find Mercury rising over the horizon where Saturn was (and technically you could see them both at the same time if you get the timing right–around Feb. 24th–and have a telescope). Uranus and Neptune are also in the sky, although seeing them without a telescope is very difficult, but it’s still good to know they’re there! The beginning of the month will have the least lunar light so you’ll see the most planets and moons, but most of February will be a beautiful time to watch the planetary parade in the hour or so after sunset!”

A few nights ago, I went out when the sky was clear and the moon no more than a sliver and was so awed by the experience of seeing Saturn, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars that I immediately summoned my eldest teenager away from her computer to come see. If you know much about teens, you will be duly impressed by the fact that my enthusiasm over the event was contagious and we both stood and marveled for a few moments at that astounding arc of planets overhead.

While bewitching the younger generation is a magical power unto itself, the planets have also held a special place in magical thought and practice for millennia. Astronomical and astrological observation of these movements shows up in some of our most ancient cultures, including Ancient Grecian, Mayan, Babylonian, and Chinese civilizations. Some schools of thought place charting the motions and influences of the planets firmly in the hands of an educated elite class of nobles, kings, and/or priests, but one of the joys of astronomy is that when it comes to several of these planets anyone can observe them and share in their wonder. The planets have been thought to influence people and been associated with powerful deities in popular astrological thought (just ask anyone somewhat knowledgeable about their “Saturn return” and they’ll tell you how tumultuous their mid-twenties were). They have also been a part of folk magical thought in North American as well. So I thought it might be good to take a little solar system tour and see what sorts of enchantment gets attributed to our celestial neighbors.

A quick note: in the interest of keeping things brief and brisk, I’m only going to talk about the planets commonly named in folkloric texts. That means poor, lonely Pluto gets only a brief mention and bodies like the dwarf planet Ceres are not going to get any attention. Similarly, the outer planets are going to have significantly less magical lore than the inner ones because they just aren’t easily visible. Additionally, I’m not going to talk about the Sun, Earth, Moon, comets/asteroids, or other heavenly bodies since 1) we’ve done some articles on things like comets and eclipses already and 2) I would like to sleep again someday and if I try to cover everything I will probably be writing for a very long time to come. Healthy boundaries make for good New World Witchery articles.

On to the celestial dance!

GENERAL LORE

Broadly speaking, much of the lore regarding planets comes from the more “learnéd astronomer” types and depends on written manuals of magic. We find grimoires laced with planetary lore that assigns different planets particular spirits and intelligences. However, a few standard manuals that found their way into folk magic included texts like Nicholas Culpepper’s Complete Herbal, which took the more formal astrological associations and assigned planetary correspondences to plants. Culpepper even introduces his text with the following note about why planets and plants are so intimately linked:

“And herein let me premise a word or two. The Herbs, Plants, &c. are now in the book appropriated to their proper planets. Therefore, first, consider what planet causeth the disease; that thou mayest find it in my aforesaid Judgment of Diseases.

Secondly, Consider what part of the body is afflicted by the disease, and whether it lies in the flesh, or blood, or bones, or ventricles.

Thirdly, Consider by what planet the afflicted part of the body is governed: that my Judgment of Diseases will inform you also.

Fourthly, You may oppose diseases by Herbs of the planet, opposite to the planet that causes them: as diseases of Jupiter by herbs of Mercury, and the contrary; diseases of the Luminaries by the herbs of Saturn, and the contrary; diseases of Mars by herbs of Venus, and the contrary.

Fifthly, There is a way to cure diseases sometimes by Sympathy, and so every planet cures his own disease; as the Sun and Moon by their Herbs cure the Eyes, Saturn the Spleen, Jupiter the liver, Mars the Gall and diseases of choler, and Venus diseases in the instruments of Generation.”

In the same way that Culpepper’s Herbal held a great deal of sway over folk magical thought on herbs and folk medicine, so too did many of the almanacs produced over the years influence folk magicians in their practice. So many almanacs were produced it would be daunting to list them all here, but many were valuable because they provided astrological guidance for agriculture, weather, and much more. Some of that material also derived from older grimoires and texts on “natural philosophy” that linked planets to colors, days of the week, and other correspondences that then became accepted as fact within folk magic. For example, one encyclopedia of folklore notes that:

“The Babylonians believed that

the five planets, Mercury, Venus,

Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, were

“interpreters of human fate,” and

foretold events by the rising and

setting and by their colors.”

That same source also makes the point that Uranus and Neptune weren’t known during earlier times (and even goes on to mock natural philosophers like Emanuel Swedenborg who claimed to have visits from planetary spirits, but only ones from known planets and strangely not from Uranus and Neptune). 

Still, the common beliefs about planetary influence were widespread enough that many beliefs about the roles particular planets played in our lives stuck around.

MERCURY

The first planet from the Sun is Mercury, taking its name from the Roman god for messengers, thieves, commerce, and travel (and by extension through his earlier Greek counterpart Hermes, a psychopomp who guided the souls of the dead on their final journey into the Underworld). Mercury has a rapid orbit, something early astronomers likely noticed, and engages in solar transits on a fairly predictable schedule. In magical thought, planetary Mercury also oversees many of the spheres that fell into the Roman god’s purview. Jewish astrologers, for example, used Ptolemaic astrological guidance to create tables assigning the planets particular traits, and Mercury held sway over “wisdom, intelligence, learning, trades, and occupations” (Trachtenberg 252). The planet is also associated with the archangel Raphael in some Jewish and Christian traditions, known as Israfil in Islam. Raphael is often depicted as a messenger angel and is one of only a few angels given a name in biblical and talmudic texts.

Mercury was associated with the color blue in astrological texts, and sometimes thought to have dominion over water or ice (at least before the discovery of Neptune, that is). It rules both Gemini and Virgo, making those two signs ones marked by intellectualism, study, wanderlust, and communication (full disclosure, the author is a Gemini with a PhD who has lived on more than one continent and who, obviously, writes). A thirteenth-century astrological manual called the Early South-English Legendary says of those ruled by Mercury that:

In books he shall be studious

And in writing curious…

He loveth ease, he loveth rest,

So is he not the worthiest ;

But yet with a little business

His heart is set upon riches [author’s transliteration]

So those ruled by Mercury may not be the most industrious, but manage to be clever enough to get more done with less–doing with one hand what others might do with two, one could say.

In folk belief, Mercury is thought to rule over aspects of the body that might be linked to the mind and movement: the brain and nervous system of course, but also the respiratory system as well as hands and arms, throat, mouth, and ears. Culpepper lists several herbs that are linked to treatments of the nerves and respiratory system as Mercurial. For example, mountain mint is ruled by Mercury and Culpepper notes it is “excellent good in all afflictions of the brain.” He says the same of herbs like dill and germander, also ruled by Mercury. Curiously, he makes a note that Mercury-ruled hazelnuts are thought to be good for the lungs by their association, but then digresses to say “if this be true, as it is, then why should the vulgar so familiarly affirm, that eating nuts causes shortness of breath, than which nothing is falser? For, how can that which strengthens the lungs, cause shortness of breath?” As someone who is the parent of a child with tree nut allergies, I can very easily see why using hazelnuts to strengthen the lungs would be a bad idea in many cases (and I note that such tree nut allergies are not a new phenomenon as they are being described in quite an old book).

Perhaps no other aspect of Mercury is so widely known in folk magical thought as its tendency to wreak havoc when it is in retrograde. Because Mercury rules areas of communication–and by proxy much of the technology we use regularly–its retrograde periods are times when many will attribute any failure in their smartphone, laptop, or relationship to that wily planet. In truth, a retrograde is simply a period of time when a planet appears to move backward because of our own perspective. Thus it might actually be better for folk magicians to think of Mercury’s retrograde as a time for reflection and contemplation (although it might also be an effective time to curse someone’s Tesla should the impulse strike you).

VENUS

Venus is probably the planet with the most lore in our night sky, not least because it holds the honor of being both the Morning Star and the Evening Star. It is, of course, a planet and not a star but it shines very brightly and consistently appears near the horizon at both morning and evening. Folk astrologers list its color as white likely because it shines so clearly and brightly in the night sky. Interestingly, the orbital path of Venus means that it does an eight-year dance that–when mapped out–creates a pretty profound shape: a five-pointed star or five-petaled flower. These “petals of Venus” make the planet–named after the Goddess of love and beauty–a powerful influence over our emotional lives. English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson described Venus as “the planet of Love” in his sensual poem “Maud,” describing her morning arrival as “In a bed of daffodil sky, To faint in the light of the sun she loves, To faint in his light, and to die.”

Tennyson’s association of Venus with dying also appears in his long lament, “In Memoriam: A.H.H.,” written after the death of his close friend (and possibly livelong love) Arthur Hallam. There Tennyson calls Venus “Hesper-Phosphor,” names for the morning and evening stars, and says ““Sweet Hesper-Phosphor, double name/ For what is one, the first, the last,/ Thou, like my present and my past,/ Thy place is changed; thou art the same,” meaning that death leaves his love for his friend untouched, although it may look different through grief. That mournful aspect of Venus is echoed in some Australian lore as well:

If a person thinks he sees the

planet Venus set twice in one night,

he will soon be struck with death.

(Daniels 999)

That same source also notes that the Burmese people call Venus the “stars of death” who are thought to be lights that guide the way into the underworld. 

Christian symbolism adopted Venus as well, with Jesus taking on the title of “Morning Star” (and eventually passing that ascription on to Satan/Lucifer, since the Luciferian name of “Light Bringer” was already connected to Venus in Ancient Roman thought). A bit of lore from New England notes that “Pagans considered Friday a lucky day, for the ‘fortunate planet,’” because “Venus influences the world on that day.” Of course, that source also notes that Christianity turned the joy of Friday on its head because Christ died on a Friday (Cahill 38).

Folk medical astrology associates Venus with the “Instruments of Generation” as noted above, meaning pretty much anything you do with your no-no square is covered by Venutian power: sex, urination, kidneys, reproductive health more generally, etc. Culpepper notes that some of the plants ruled by Venus include alder, beans, lady’s bedstraw, birch, burdock, cherries, daisies, foxgloves, goldenrod, artichokes, lady’s mantle, mint, mugwort, peaches, pears, pennyroyal, plums, meadowsweet, some roses (although interestingly red roses fall to Jupiter), strawberries, thyme, and vervain. The last of these is also known as the “witch’s herb,” and it may be worth noting that many of the Venutian plants have witchy associations. Birch, for example, is connected to witch-goddesses like Perchta/Berchta, mugwort is good for psychic dreaming, and foxglove can cause sensations of flying due to its effects on the heart (it is lethal depending on the dosage, though, and not one to play around with, unless you’re trying to find out about those connections between Venus and death).

MARS

Our bright red neighbor is named after the god of war, and is seen by many as a planet of assertiveness. Astrologer (and early Harvard graduate) John Forster claimed in his 1680 almanac that Mars was “hot and dry in excess, causing [extreme] heat in Summer, and warm air in Winter, likewise Storms of Rain, Hail, Thunder, Lightning.” This hot, turbulent effect extended beyond atmospheric conditions, though. Almanacs of the period also saw a link between Martian influence and illness. An outbreak of “sweating sickness” (likely a novel viral outbreak of some kind) in 15th century England was linked to “a notable Conjunction of Saturn and Mars” (Hall 60). This association with poor health seems quite old, as a fourth century C.E. text by theologian Firmicus Maternus noted that a person born when “Mars receives rays from a waxing moon” could expect to “die violently” (Copenhaver 187). Such a link seems to have lingered on for nearly two millennia, as an informant in West Virginia was recorded in the twentieth century as noting “if the moon is afflicted by Mars…at the time fo the child’s birth, he will go blind” (Brown 126). Jewish lore associated Mars with the angel Samael, and with attributes of “blood, the sword, evil, war, enmity, envy and destruction” (Trachtenberg 251-2). That’s a lot to pile on a planet that just sits there in our night sky giving of a lovely orangey-pink glow!

Not everything was bad about Mars, though. In the Latin Picatrix–a thirteenth century magic manual translated from a likely eleventh-century predecessor–Mars is personified through the first “decan” or degree progression of Aries as “a restless black man with a large body and red eyes, holding a cutting axe in his hand and belted with a white garment, and this is of great excellence in itself. It is a face of courage, serenity, and unashamed excellence” (Copenhaver 288). 

William Lilly, a well-known 17th-century occultist and astrologer, provided a series of correspondences that linked Martian influence with warm, windy weather (including thunder and lightning) as well as connecting all herbs that “ come near to [redness], whose leaves are pointed and sharp” and “whose taste is [caustic] and burning.” Among the many he highlights are most forms of thorn and chestnut, as well as nettles, spurge, onion, ginger, leeks, and pepper (Baker 346). A trip for some Thai food would be very Martial in nature, then, it seems!

JUPITER

Jupiter is of course named for the King of the Gods, the latinized name of Zeus (derived from “Ieus” or “Deus” which referred to Zeus’ status as a sky god and “pater” meaning “father”). Jupiter’s presence as a planet was seen as very fortuitous, especially when he shone brightly as he’s doing this month. 

Our biggest planet is also one that has provided magicians with all the good stuff. According to the Key of Solomon Jupiter could “reveal hidden treasures,” and through the use of Jupiterian symbols one could gain “glory, honours, dignities, riches, and all kinds of good, together with great tranquility of mind” (Dillinger 90). Lilly notes that Jupiter is connected to “the Sweet or well scented Odours,” as well (Baker 347), while Culpepper’s Herbal connects Jupiter to the sense of taste. Culpepper also links Jupiter to agrimony, betony, borage, cinquefoil, and dandelion, which Culpepper notes to be “of an opening and cleansing quality, and therefore very effectual for the obstructions of the liver, gall and spleen” (which feels kind of shady given that Jupiter’s Greek counterpart, Zeus, had an eagle tearing out poor Prometheus’ liver every day).

Jewish lore connects Jupiter to to “life, peace, joy, wealth, honor,” and “sovereignty.” One source links Jupiter’s influence to weddings in Jewish culture, and comments that wedding rings were often procured and inscribed with a blessing under Jupiter’s influence (Trachtenberg 252; Daniels 1002). 
Also, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that in rewatching Twin Peaks the celestial clock that counts down to the opening of the spooky and sorcerous Black Lodge comes when Jupiter comes into conjunction with Saturn. So there’s that.

Which, I think, means it’s time to head to our next planet!

SATURN

Listen, the Saturn return is no joke. The upheaval that comes in one’s late 20s can be chaotic, and there’s a reason we associate the 50s with “midlife crisis.” Saturn’s influence is often thought to be a bit dark, with one source even noting that “Saturn is a very evil planet to be born under” and stating that those who are so fated will be “wranglers, chiders, and they will never forgive until they are avenged of their wrongs” (Daniels 1001). Which actually sounds like they’d make some pretty terrific anti-heros, right?

In Trachtenberg’s Jewish Magic and Superstition, Saturn is associated with “poverty, wounds, illness, and death,” so nobody’s having a good time with this planet. This is also found in other lore, as one source records a Hindu belief that when Saturn aligns with Mars it will “produce putrid diseases” and that while it rules by itself it prompts “much theft and little charity” (Daniels 1001. The power of conjunction is a major part of Saturn’s magical lore. One astrologer from the Royal Society of England, John Flamsteed, noted that in 1682-83 that when Saturn and Jupiter formed several conjunctions, “the Common People have admired to see the two Superior Planets Saturn and Jupiter continue so near” but that “our Astrologers have affrighted them with fearful Predictions of direful events” (Stahlman 556-7). 

Culpepper notes that herbs ruled by Saturn include the elm tree, the poplar tree, holly, ivy, and hemp, as well as a number of poisonous plants like hellebore, henbane, and nightshade, further linking it to death (or giving those anti-heroes some useful tools, maybe).

THE LONELY PLANETS (URANUS, NEPTUNE, & PLUTO)

The lore of the outer planets is scarce, mostly due to their discovery so late as compared to the more “visible” planets already listed. However there is a bit of lore that these planets might influence people to become “very learned, cautious and require a reason for everything. They are fond of history, and liable to have headache and stomach Troubles” (Daniels 1001). 

And then there’s poor Pluto, no longer a planet officially. But somehow it’s hard not to identify a little bit with this lonely little planetoid. It always makes me think of the famous “pale blue dot” photo taken by the Voyager I spacecraft as it passed Pluto and exited our solar system (sort of, since the photo was taken in 1990 and Voyager 1 finally left the actual range of our sun’s heliosphere in 2012, which should give you an idea just how big space is). Carl Sagan suggested that the craft take that last photo, turning back to face us before its exit, and in 1994 he shared his thoughts on what those farthest reaches of space say about us:

“From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Consider again that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar”, every “supreme leader”, every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”

Maybe that’s not folk magic, but there’s something enchanting about that all the same.

And so we end our tour of the planets. I know this hardly scratches the surface of the many ways these planets have been incorporated into magical thought and lore, but even this quick look shows you how much there is. Knowing everything about these planets is wonderful, perhaps, but if you can try to get outside and look up while they are all dancing in our sky. That’s really the most magical thing. To me, anyway. 

Happy star-gazing everyone. Thanks for reading. And be well.

-Cory

REFERENCES

  1. Encyclopedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, by Cora Daniels (vol.2)
  2. Magical Treasure Hunting in Europe and North America: A History, by Johannes Dillinger
  3. “Astrology in Colonial America: An Extended Query,” by William D. Stahlman in The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, Vol. 13, No. 4 (Oct., 1956), pp. 551-563.
  4. The Complete Herbal, by Nicholas Culpepper. London, 1850.
  5. Olde New England’s Strange Superstitions, by Robert Ellis Cahill. Massachusetts, 1990.
  6. Jewish Magic and Superstition: A Study in Folk Religion, by Joshua Trachtenberg. New York, 1961.
  7. “The Seven Planets,” by P.J. Heather. Folklore, Vol. 54, No. 3 (Sep., 1943), pp. 338-361 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/1257293) 
  8. The Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, By Frank C. Brown. Vol. 6. Wayland Hand, ed. Duke Univ. Press, 1961.
  9. “Almanacs and the Disenchantment of Early America,” by Peter Eisenstadt. Pennsylvania History, Vol. 65, No. 2 (Spring 1998), pp. 143-169.
  10. Worlds of Wonder, Days of Judgment, by David D. Hall,1989.
  11. The Book of Magic: From Antiquity to the Enlightenment (Penguin Classics), ed. Brian Copenhaver, 2015. 
  12. The Cunning Man’s Handbook, by Jim Baker, 2014.

Special Episode – Folk Magician’s Notebook – February 2025

Planets on Parade

Planets on Parade

Summary:
Our latest notebook episode shares the parade of planets, our lunar forecast, a tale of a talking skull, a little on Jack ball divination, and some teacup candle magic!
 
Please check out our Patreon page! You can help support the show for as little as a dollar a month, and get some awesome rewards at the same time. Even if you can’t give, spread the word and let others know, and maybe we can make New World Witchery even better than it is now.
 
Producers for this show:
Elle, Bree, Victoria & Keifel of 1000 Volt Press, Lauren, Cate, Sierra, Lisa, Donna, Liz, Meg, Vee, Mark, Kels, Benjamin, AromaG’s Botanica, DanielKnits, Abbi of Morningstar Coven, Stephanie, Jenna, Donna, Jennifer, Fergus, Heather, Christopher, Ralph of the Holle’s Haven Podcast, Jamie, Catherine, Achija Branvin Sionach, Jen Rue of Rue & Hyssop, AthenaBeth, and Conjured Cardea! 
Our sincere thanks to everyone supporting us!
 
Play:
 
 
 
-Sources-

We highly recommend that you find an almanac or lunar-oriented datebook to help you with planning out your own magical year. Some we can recommend: 

You can find a transcript of this episode at our Transcripts page.

Our folktale this month is “The Talking Skull,” a tale from Cameroon

Additional Sources this month include:

365 Days of Hoodoo by Stephanie Rose Bird

In our cartomancy section, Laine will read for Cory, and Cory for Laine, but we’ll also share general information on the cards we pull, too. If you are interested in playing card divination, you can check out our Cartomancy post or pick up Cory’s book, 54 Devils.

You can now buy Cory’s book, New World Witchery: A Trove of North American Folk Magic! (also available from Amazon). We also have a new book, Conjuring the Commonplace: A Guide to Everyday Enchantment and Junk Drawer Magic (1000Volt Press) (also available from Amazon).

Image via Pixabay (CC 2.0)

If you have feedback you’d like to share, email us at compassandkey@gmail.com or newworldwitcherypodcast@gmail.com or leave a comment at the website: www.newworldwitchery.com . We’d love to hear from you!

Don’t forget to follow us at Twitter! And check out our Facebook page! For those who are interested, we are also on TikTok now. You can follow us on Instagram (main account, or you can follow Laine as well) or check out our new YouTube channel with back episodes of the podcast and new “Everyday Magic” videos, too (as well as most of our contest announcements)! 

Promos and Music:

Title and closing music are “Runaround (AM Radio),” by Aaron Solomon, and is licensed from Audio Socket. (License #1273). Additional incidental music Kevin Macleod, from Free Music Archive and used under a CC 2.0 license.

Sound effects from Freesound.org and in the Public Domain. Additional “rooster” sound effect from Darina Evstafeva from Pixabay.

Please consider supporting us by purchasing our promotional items in the New World Witchery Threadless shop or by joining our Patreon supporters.

If you like us AND you like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you will love our new show: Myth Taken: A Buffy the Vampire Slayer Podcast, now available through all the podcatchers! You can also check out Cory’s folklore show, Chasing Foxfire, where he explores the intersection of folklore and topics like history, medicine, science, nature, literature, pop culture, and more!

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Video – Eclipse Lore

Disaster! Wolves! Pots and pans? Cory reads his recent article on Eclipse Lore.

Cory reads his recent article on Eclipse Lore while drawing a little illustration inspired by some of the lore and images.

Speed drawing illustration (c) Cory Thomas Hutcheson

All other images are designed by Canva. Music in this video is licensed through Canva Pro.

(Note: Clicking on links may result in financial or other compensation to the video’s creators)

Entry 239 – Eclipse Lore

Doomsdays, weather forecasts, making noise, and hidden treasures

(Image source: Conrad Heingartner (Main), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

On April 8, 2024, contiguous North America will get its last glimpse of a full solar eclipse for twenty years (the next one is due 2044). When we last had the opportunity to glimpse this astronomical wonder in 2017, Laine and I put out an episode focusing on some of the lore and significance of eclipses, and we just released an episode of our Folk Magician’s Notebook that features a lot of eclipse lore as well. We thought it might also be a good idea to compile some of that lore for readers, too, who would be interested in having it to hand as the big day approaches (or just in general out of folkloric curiosity, which is often the best reason to do anything!). So today we’re sharing a few of our favorite tidbits of eclipse-based lore. We should note that much of this material will reference eclipses broadly, so they could be solar or lunar, although we’ll try to be as specific as we can when sources allow. Let’s do some shadow-dancing, then!

Probably the single most pervasive belief about eclipses is that they are portents of some kind. In most cases, they seem to be viewed as fearsome ones, forewarning of doom or calamity of some kind to follow. Biblical prophecies regarding eclipses lean into this, as any Ghostbusters fan knows:

And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood (Revelation 6:12, KJV)

And when I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light. (Ezekiel 32:7, KJV)

In these contexts eclipses are associated with wrath and judgment and destruction and just generally a bad time had by all. It’s important to note, though, that Christianity hardly has a monopoly on eclipses and doomsaying. According to Joshua Trachtenberg’s book, Jewish Magic and Superstition, the Jewish people also get quite anxious about eclipses: “Eclipses of the moon were taken to be especially ominous for the Jewish people. Eclipses of the sun which occurred on October 26, 1147 and September 4, 1187 threw German Jewry into consternation; later it was learned that on these days German crusaders had suffered serious reverses in Palestine” (pp. 251-52). 

One particularly colorful Christian belief about eclipses has to do with a secret planet full of saints:

“There is a planet called Adamida, on which reside the unborn spirits of saints, martyrs and believers. There they remain, awaiting their time to be born into this world. When a martyr is recognized by us, we know that he came from Adamida, the planet of unborn souls. At the crucifixion, Uriel, the angel of the sun, was ordered to interpose this planet between the earth and the sun, thus producing a total eclipse. This is mentioned in the description by the apostles. They say ‘the sun was darkened’”

(Daniels 942).

That may seem like a LOT to derive from a four word biblical passage, but then there has been plenty of ink (and blood) spilled over any number of scriptural excerpts, so a magical planet full of holy people that occasionally blocks out the sun seems somehow almost charming.

Less charming, of course, is the end of the world. Norse mythology features an eclipse event associated with Ragna Rok, or the Doom of the Gods, in the Prose Edda. A volva (seeress) prophecies that as the gods begin to clash with one another, “Then happens what will seem a great miracle, that the wolf devours the sun, and this will seem a great loss. The other wolf will devour the moon, and this too will cause great mischief. The stars shall be hurled from heaven. Then it shall come to pass that the earth and the mountains will shake so violently that trees will be torn up by the roots, the mountains will topple down, and all bonds and fetters will be broken and snapped” (Abridged from the Prose Edda, Penguin Edition, Trans. by Rasmus B. Andersen). As we pointed out during the reading of this passage in our podcast episode, though, the Ragnarok section is immediately followed by a Regeneration section that foresees a renewed earth emerging “green and fair.” 

(Image source: Friedrich Wilhelm Heine (1845-1921)., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

Other religions shared this approach, connecting eclipses with mighty powers but not dwelling on them as fearsome. In Islam, a sunnah (saying of the Prophet Muhammad) collected in the third century by an historian named Bukhari noted that the Prophet once said that “The sun and the moon do not eclipse because of the death of someone from the people but they are two signs amongst the signs of Allah. When you see them stand up and pray” (Volume 2, Book 18, Number 151). 

Still, in the minds of the folk, eclipses frequently meant one thing: trouble. In the Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, one entry puts it quite succinctly, saying “When the sun goes into eclipse, it is a sign of some great disaster.” This sentiment gets echoed in folklore collections from Canada to Mexico and back again, although the nature of the disaster is often not specified. In at least one case, an eclipse on 13 April 1140 was taken as a portent that the current king, King Stephen, would soon be removed from rule. An eclipse followed by a “halo” around the sun or moon in the following days was also thought at one time to portend diseases soon to follow (Daniels 941-43). 

(Image source: By Ji-Elle – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)

Some of the lore, however, does tie eclipses to specific events, namely weather-related ones:

In addition to an association with storms, there’s a rather “stormy” character associated with eclipses in North American nautical lore (do eclipses also improve segues? So it seems!). In tales of Alfred Bulltop Stormalong, also known asOld Stormy, a character who was the sailing equivalent to John Henry, the legendary mariner is said to continue working the docks and seas well into the afterlife. According to the Encyclopedia of American Folklore: 

Even in the afterlife, Old Stormalong is said to be building ships in the sky, where he carries on his maritime career navigating the heavens rather than the oceans. For this reason, some tales explain that an eclipse is caused by the shadow cast by Old Stormalong’s great ship, and shooting stars occur when they are struck by the movement of Stormalong’s harpoon (Watts)

Leaving aside Old Stormy, what could a person do if an eclipse did seem like a portent of doom to them? Fortunately, numerous cultures came to the same conclusion about what to do: get loud. To forestall any negative eclipse effects, you can beat your pots and pans loudly and shout to scare away anything that might be trying to unleash some wickedness in your home–this is a method used in Ancient Rome, Ancient China, France, Ireland, and Wales. In at least one account of Hindu eclipse beliefs, the text notes that eclipses were a time to give alms to the poor, which would help “relieve the pain which the sun and moon [endure] while being swallowed” (Daniels 943). 

(Image source: Joseph Norman Lockyer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

There are also a few activities that benefit from eclipses. The same source that describes Hindu almsgiving and the pot-and-pan noisemaker methods also says that while starting a lawful enterprise during an eclipse would doom it to failure, starting something illicit would ensure its success. Additionally, beginning a journey during an eclipse (lunar or solar) ensured its success. And finally, you might just get rich if you had the right bouquet on you:

“During an eclipse, all hidden treasures are open, and if you are wise enough to carry a primrose with you, you will be able to help yourself to any of them”

(Daniels 941)

So that’s a brief look at some of the widespread folklore around eclipses. We hope that you’ll go enjoy this year’s celestial obscuring with care and caution, but also a bit of wonder as you think about what they might mean to you as well. And maybe keep a primrose or two handy, just in case there’s some buried treasure nearby.

Thanks for reading!

-Cory

References

  1. Anderson, Rasmus B. The Prose Edda. Penguin Books/Sacred-Texts, 1936. 
  2. Brown, Frank C. Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, v. 6, Wayland Hand, ed. Duke Univ. Press, 1964.
  3. Brown, Frank C. Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, v. 7, Wayland Hand, ed. Duke Univ. Press, 1964.
  4. Daniels, Cora Linn. Encyclopedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World. Univ. of Michigan Libary, 1903.
  5. Green, Archie. The Archie Green Collection, 1944-2009. University of North Carolina Archives. 
  6. Hyatt, Henry M. Folklore from Adams County, Illinois. Alma Egan Hyatt Foundation, 1935. 
  7. Trachtenberg, Joshua. Jewish Magic and Superstition. World Publishing Co./Jewish Publication Society of America, 1939.
  8. Watts, Linda. The Encyclopedia of American Folklore. Facts on File, 2020.

Episode 114 – Of Suns, Stars, and Magic

Summary:

With the solar eclipse coming up, we look at eclipse folklore and magic, then expand into the heavens to discuss other solar and stellar lore and enchantments.

 

Please check out our Patreon page! You can help support the show for as little as a dollar a month, and get some awesome rewards at the same time.  Even if you can’t give, spread the word and let others know, and maybe we can make New World Witchery even better than it is now.

 

Producers for this show: Corvus, Khristopher, J.C., Josette, Renee Odders, Ye Olde Magic Shoppe, Raven Dark Moon, Sarah, Catherine, AthenaBeth, Jen Rue of Rue & Hyssop, Little Wren, Jessica, Victoria, Johnathan at the ModernSouthernPolytheist, Montine, Achija of Spellbound Bookbinding, Mandy, Regina, and Hazel (if we missed you this episode, we’ll make sure you’re in the next one!). Big thanks to everyone supporting us!

 

Play:

Download: Episode 114 – Of Suns, Stars, and Magic

Play:

 

 -Sources-

We mention that we’re not talking much about lunar magic, since we’ve covered that in both Episode 75 – Moon Magic and Episode 97 – A Lunar Wheel of the Year. You may also hear some of the lore associated with the sun and stars in Episode 5 – Signs and Omens and Episode 7 – Weather Magic and Lore. You might also be interested in our article on Comets as well.

We mention several books that might be of interest to our listeners who like to look up into the sky, whether day or night:

And Cory highly recommends Bri Saussy’s Star Magic course, which he’s taken before and loved!

We’ve got a contest going on, but only for another few weeks! Check out the rules and get your entries to us by September 1st! You can win one of two prize packs.

If you have feedback you’d like to share, email us or leave a comment. We’d love to hear from you!

Don’t forget to follow us at Twitter! And check out our Facebook page! For those who are interested, we also now have a page on Pinterest you might like, called “The Olde Broom.” Have something you want to say? Leave us a voice mail on our official NWW hotline: (442) 999-4824 (that’s 442-99-WITCH, if it helps).

 

 Promos & Music

Title and closing music is “Homebound,” by Bluesboy Jag, and is used under license from Magnatune.

Blog Post 184 – Comets

The Comet of 1680, by Lieve Verschuier (via Wikimedia Commons)

“Like a comet burn’d
That fires the length Ophiuchus huge
In the Arctic sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes pestilence and war” (Milton, Paradise Lost)

With the ISON comet drawing eyes to the night sky, I started thinking a lot about the superstitions and magical beliefs surrounding the appearance of comets in the sky. Comets have long inspired people in strange, occasionally beautiful, and sometimes disturbing ways. Mark Twain’s life was framed by the appearance of Haley’s Comet, a point the author himself noted. The Heaven’s Gate cult engaged in a group suicide surrounding the arrival of the Hale-Bopp comet.

Increase Mather, famed early American religious writer, dedicated an entire work to explaining the spiritual importance of comets in his Kometographia of 1683. He was responding to the presence of the Great Comet of 1680, which had captured the attention of most of the Western world, and felt that many people would be afraid at this sign and misunderstand it as a phenomenon which directly influenced the course of events on earth, rather than a sign from God of some important event to come (see more here). Generally speaking, comets have historically been associated with strife and woe to come. My Opie/Tatem Dictionary of Superstitions gives a laundry list of examples of ill-omen presaged by what the Venerable Bede called “long-haired stars”:

  • A comet as portending a change in governance (Tacitus, Annals)
  • Famine or pestilence or war or “fearful storms” (Byrhtferth, Manual)
  • A comet [the Great Comet of 1680] appeared two days before the Duke of Monmouth died, and all over Europe before the death of Charles II (J. Case, Angelical Guide)
  • An appearance before the plague struck London (Defoe, Journal of a Plague Year)
  • A wry observation that those who laugh at comets as tokens of disaster will studiously insist on “times and situations proper for intellectual performances” (Johnson, The Idler)

In the New World, comets seem to have retained much of their wicked reputation. In some cases the danger foretold by the comet is vague and ill-defined: “When a comet appears there will be trouble” (Roberts, “Louisiana Superstitions”). In other places, the significance of the hairy star was more direct and its consequences very  clearly understood: “A comet is a sign of war” (Thomas, Kentucky Superstitions).  Why should these astronomical phenomena, which had been showing up in night skies for ages, have such a bad rap? Considering even Classical authors like Tacitus cite the comet as woeful, the impulse must run deep. The unique cosmological view of Calvinism, though, which influenced much of Atlantic American colonization, both denigrated occult practices like witchcraft and supported an enchanted view of a univers under Divine direction:

“The Calvinism of the colonial awakenings also paralleled important occult ideas. The fatalism inherent in Calvinism’s concept of predestination found an occult equivalent in the idea fundamental to astrology that motions of star and planets revealed a future that individuals could not control. Calvinist evangelists and occult practitioners also explained catastrophes in similar ways. Believers in occult ideas thought the coming of comets and eclipses had inescapable and usually disastrous consequences; not even kings and queens escaped their verdicts. No one escaped judgment by the Calvinist God either. Sometimes He damned seemingly model Christians simply to demonstrate His sovereign” (Butler, “Magic, Astrology, & the Early American Religious Heritage”).

The shared cosmology of the colonists saw the universe as inhabited by spiritual consciousness, and an intelligence that wished to convey its meaning to human beings for one reason or another. Signs, omens, and portents were one such method. Comets, with their placement among the stars, their strange and ill-understood movement, and temporary nature made perfect fodder for prognosticators of all stripes—religious, occult, and both (they did exist, even during the Colonial period).

Lest we make the mistake of thinking that the observation of comets was the purview of only a few dusty old white occultists or a lot of fiery former Englishmen with strong religious convictions, I’d also like to point out that the cosmology which imbued comets with significance stretched across a broad swath of New World denizens, including Native Americans, Spanish and French colonists, and of course, the imported Black slaves.

“English Protestants often read unusual events as evidence of the divine presence in everyday life, acknowledging the activity of a creator deity who operated through omens and portents within the natural order, or signs and wonders in the heavens, philosophy known as Providentialism. “Comets, hailstorms, monster births and apparitions” and other disruptions of the ordinary were demonstrations that foretold God’s will or signaled His displeasure withhumankind. Africans’ understandings of the universe were also inspired by visible manifestations of spiritual forces within nature. They too viewed thunder, lightning, and other elements as heralds of sacred hierophanies,the awesome presence of numerous divine beings.” (Chireau, Black Magic).

The Providentialism Chireau notes fits the cosmology of the English and other European settlers, but it is clearly not unique to them. A world with Divine presence not only innate to its component parts, but in which those component parts act as mediums for communicating with humans, is also very much an African perspective. And while it is tempting to think that such beliefs can be relegated to history’s dustbin, we should also remember that in our time comets stir up a lot of strange excitement. Religious scholar Camile Paglia notes, for example:

“The Children of God, founded in 1968 as Teens for Christ by “Moses” David Berg in Huntington Beach, California, were negligible in number but came to public attention when they loudly prophesied that the us would be destroyed by Comet Kohoutek in January 1974. The group continues under the name “The Family” and is regularly excoriated by conserva tive Christian watchdog groups for its practice of free love (called “Flirty Fishing”) as well as its heretical beliefs that Jesus was sexually active and that God is a woman. (Paglia, “Cults and Cosmic Consciousness”)

Paglia also references the Hale-Bopp comet mentioned earlier, and Marshall Applewhite’s Heaven’s Gate cult. I have, so far, not heard of any particularly distressing phenomena surrounding ISON’s appearance, but if nuclear war breaks out, I may have to blame that particular “long-haired star.”

If you have comet lore you’d like to share, please do so in the comments!

As always, thanks for reading!

-Cory