Aradia

Gospel Of The Witches

and pepper and salt, and then sang a song. These are the words, a song of witchcraft of the very old time.

This bag for Endamon I wove,

It is my vengeance for the love,

For the deep love I had for thee,

Which thou wouldst not return to me,

But bore it all to Tanas shrine,

And Tana never shall be thine!

Now every night in agony

By me thou shalt oppressed be!

From day to day, from hour to hour,

Ill make thee feel the witchs power;

With passion thou shalt be tormented,

And yet with pleasure neer be contented;

Enwrapped in slumber thou shalt lie,

To know that thy beloved is by,

And, ever dying, never die,

Without the power to speak a word,

Nor shall her voice by thee be heard;

Tormented by Loves agony,

There shall be no relief for thee!

For my strong spell thou canst not break,

And from that sleep thou neer shalt wake;

Little by little thou shalt waste,

Like taper by the embers placed.

Little by little thou shalt die,

Yet, ever living, tortured lie,

Strong in desire, yet ever weak,

Without the power to move or speak,

With all the love I had for thee,

Shalt thou thyself tormented be,

Since all the love I felt of late

Ill make thee feel in burning hate,

For ever on thy torture bent,

I am revenged, and now content.

But Tana, who was far more powerful than the witch, though not able to break the spell by

which he was compelled to sleep, took from him all pain (he knew her in dreams), and embracing him, she sang this counter charm.

Endamone, Endamone, Endamone!

By the love I feel, which I

Shall ever feel until I die,

Three crosses on thy bed I make,

And then three wild horse chestnuts take,

In that bed the nuts I hide,

And then the window open wide,

That the full moon may cast her light

Upon the love as fair and bright,

And so I pray to her above

To give wild rapture to our love,

And cast her fire in either heart,

Which wildly loves to never part;

And one thing more I beg of thee!

If any one enamoured be,

And in my aid his love hath placed,

Unto his call Ill come in haste.

So it came to pass that the fair goddess made love with Endamone as if they had been

awake (yet communing in dreams). And so it is to this day, that whoever would make love with him or her who sleeps, should have recourse to the beautiful Tana, and so doing there will be success.

This legend, while agreeing in many details with the classical myth, is strangely

intermingled with practices of witchcraft, but even these, if investigated, would all prove to be as ancient as the rest of the text. Thus the sheeps intestine - used instead of the red woolen bag which is employed in beneficent magic - the red and black ribbon, which mingles threads of joy and woe, the (peacock) feather, pepper and salt, occur in many other incantations, but always to bring evil and cause suffering.

I have never seen it observed, but it is true, that Keats in his exquisite poem of Endymion

completely departs from or ignores the whole spirit and meaning of the ancient myth, while in this rude witch-song it is minutely developed. The conception is that of a beautiful youth furtively kissed in his slumber by Diana of reputed chastity. The ancient myth is, to begin with, one of darkness and light, or day and night, from which are born the fifty-one (now fifty-two) weeks of the year. This is Diana, the night, and Apollo, the sun, or light in another form. It is expressed as love-making during sleep, which, when it occurs in real life, generally has for active agent some one who, without being absolutely modest, wishes to preserve appearances. The established character of Diana among the Initiated (for which she was bitterly reviled by the Fathers of the Church) was that of a beautiful hypocrite who pursued amours in silent secrecy.

Thus as the moon Endymion lay with her,

So did Hippolytus and Verbio.

But there is an exquisitely subtle, delicately strange idea or ideal in the conception of the