Progressive Witchcraft

It is in the early 1950s that we see the rise of modern witchcraft, or Wicca as it is called today. In most people’s minds this came about mainly because of one man, but this is not the only history that exists. It is from this point that we first see the first named traditions within witchcraft occur. This not only a modern idea, but also came out of acrimony between a self professed hereditary and the followers of Gerald Gardner, the man often referred to as the father of modern witchcraft. Of course, there are those who avoided such labels, and in recent years this has included us. To understand the argument you have to understand some of the history of modern witchcraft related to Gerald Gardner and the New Forest coven.

In 1936, Gerald Gardner retired from his duties as a tea and rubber planter and Customs official and moved back to England to be with his wife, Donna. His interest in folklore and the occult had been sparked while living in Malaya. This area of the world has always been a melting pot of cultures, and prior to his retirement Gardner had already started to work on his book The Keris and other Malay Weapons, which was published in 1936. It is not surprising that he choose this time to move back to England. The Japanese had already invaded China and everyone was expecting a war in the Far East between the armies of the Rising Sun and the Colonial nations. Of course, by the time Gerald and his wife settled in the New Forest, war with Germany was imminent.

He was a well-read man on the subject of magic. His interest in Malaysian folk magic made him look carefully into its European equivalent, witchcraft. After reading Margaret Murray’s The Witch Cult in Western Europe, he became convinced that her central hypothesis that witchcraft had survived the Middle Ages was correct. It spurred him on to read more on the subject, including Charles Godfrey Leland’s Aradia; the Gospel of the Witches, which claimed in its introduction that its contents originated from a hereditary Italian witch, or strega, named Maddelena.

It was during this period that Gardner supposedly first made contact with what he claimed was surviving witchcraft traditions. He first met several people who were Rosicrucian through the Rosicrucian Theatre in Christchurch. It soon became obvious to him that there was more here than met the eye. He was introduced to the members of the Fellowship of Crotona, formed under the guidance of one Brother Aurelius and Mrs. Besant-Scott, the daughter of Annie Besant, who had been an active figure in the Theosophy movement. According to his story, it was through them that he met several other people, including one Dorothy Clutterbuck, and it was she initiated him into the surviving witch coven in England. Of course, there is much more to the story, which has been told, retold, and re-interpreted several times. It is, in fact, the most analyzed story of modern witchcraft, but bear in mind that, as we said earlier, it is not the only history. More information of the history of modern witchcraft and Gerald Gardner can be found in Doreen Valiente’s Witchcraft for Tomorrow and Rebirth of Witchcraft, as well as in our own books, The Witches Bible and What Witches Do. The most complete work we have come across is Wiccan Roots⁶ by Philip Heselton. This is a subject that has been written about to point of exhaustion and remains the central myth of the modern witchcraft movement.

Right from the beginning Gardner claimed that the origins of what he practiced were hereditary, although the material he produced in his Book of the Art Magical and then Book of Shadows (the main liturgy of Wicca) was anything but! His story is that he was initiated into a coven that originated with an East Anglican gentleman known as George Pickingill. There are several problems with this story, the main one being that Pickingill never claimed to be a witch. He was often referred to as "the Cunning Man", but in his own words was a self-confessed Satanist. It is fascinating that East Anglia comes into the picture again, as it is an area renowned for its survivals of witchcraft.

We will probably never know whether Gardner really found a genuine coven or not. We believe that those he referred to as witches probably never referred to themselves as such or considered their working group to be called "a coven". There is plenty of evidence to suppose that the group he is talking about is in fact the Fellowship of Crotona, a Rosicrucian group whose ritual practices included those originating from the French Lodge of Masonry (Grande Loge Symbolique Ecossaise Mixte de France)⁷. This was very different from English Freemasonry; it was Co-Masonic, allowing women members, and was more Gnostic in its approach, incorporating elements of Cabalistic ritual magic in its practices. We base this belief on two claims, the first of these being that the degree system used by Gardner is patently Masonic, even down to some of the ritual practice. The second is that the word witchcraft had a broader meaning at the time of Gardner than the way it is used today within the Neo-Pagan movement. During this period, any form of magic was referred to as witchcraft, as was Spiritualism and even Theosophy. From this perspective one could even argue that Co-Masonry is really a survival of witchcraft. But note that many hereditary practitioners stated that they never originally described themselves as witches, as we mentioned earlier regarding Pickingill. What we have here is a problem with the definition of the word witch.

Gerald Gardner wrote several books including High Magic’s Aid and Witchcraft Today, some of the first books on the subject of Wicca. He claims he was thrown out of the original coven for betraying the secrets in his books. He therefore became the first known banished witch in the history of modern Wicca. It is more than likely the real reason was that the group got fed up with being referred to in a term they very likely found insulting. Gardner went on to form a coven in the early 1950s and over the years initiated several High Priestesses, including Doreen Valiente, Eleanor (Rae) Bone, Madge Worthington, Patricia Crowther, and Monique Wilson. All went on to initiate more modern witches and create more covens.

This resulted in Wicca spreading not only through Britain, but also into America. It was Doreen Valiente who first pointed out some of the inconsistencies in Gardner’s claims regarding the origins of the witchcraft he practiced or wrote about. The young Doreen was a well-read person when it came to the occult, and she quickly picked up on the fact that much of the material scribbled into Gardner’s Book of Shadows was from published sources. When she challenged him about this, his reply was that this was necessary, as much of the material had been lost. Gardner had introduced large amounts of Western magical tradition into Ye Bok of the Art Magical⁸ and his later Book of Shadows. Most obvious is the use of passages from Leland’s Aradia⁹, but there are also passages from the Carmina Cadelica¹⁰. There are even claims that elements of the teachings of the infamous Aleister Crowley¹¹ are present (see pages 46–47). Regardless, it was a viable magical system for its time; it fulfilled the needs of those practicing it, and more importantly, it worked.

Gerald Gardner’s absorption of material from several sources, mainly published works, has been cited as proof for his creation of modern witchcraft. Although this can be seen as an argument as to why Wicca is not an ancient tradition, there is one factor ignored in it; witchcraft has always used magical techniques "to get the job done". It saw magical practice in its past as a tool for survival, in the forms of tribal healing and sympathetic hunting magic, rather than for the creation of a religious doctrine. Like all crafts, it has always updated its methods and used what was around at the time. Exchanges of ideas between craftsmen to update their skills are a common practice, for after all the aim at the end of the day is produce quality work. This is no different for the witch. The method of magical practice is only important in that it produces a quality outcome for the person for whom it is done. The aim and intent has always been more important that the form that it takes. Gardner and his followers integrated the magical technique of their time, Ceremonial magic, rather than necessarily trying to historically recreate those of the past. By doing this they unwittingly continued the real tradition of witchcraft—"if it works, use it!"

Initially, Gardnerians did not describe themselves or their practice as "Gardnerian". There is actually no noted use of the term Gardnerian in any of Gardner’s works or in the literature on witchcraft of the time; the term simply wasn’t in use. In a 1965 copy of The Pentagram magazine, we find the term first used in a rather condescending article called "‘Ancients’ and ‘Moderns’" by an anonymous figure calling himself Taliesin. It reads as follows:

"The report of Mrs. Valiente’s talk at the Pentagram dinner, together with Mr. Cochrane’s article in the same issue, make fascinating reading, and could be said to represent the two extremes of the Craft—Witchcraft Ancient and Modern, so to speak. From the former one gets the Gardnerian atmosphere of sweetness and light coupled with good clean fun, all under the auspices of a universal auntie!"

—Taliesin, The Pentagram,
March 1965

Not surprisingly, a rebuff followed from Arnold Crowther, husband of High Priestess Patricia Crowther, particularly as a following article by Taliesin attacked Gardnerians for cloak and dagger initiations. In Arnold Crowther’s rather curt reply, he uses the term "Gardnerites", not Gardnerian. It is likely that those who were initiated by Gardner originally thought they possessed the only survivals of witchcraft in England. To be rebuffed by those who also claimed hereditary origins would have been a shock.

In the final interview prior to her death in September of 1999, Doreen pointed to Robert Cochrane as the originator of the label Gardnerian, and probably the real identity of the anonymous figure, Taliesin¹²:

"He (Cochrane) claimed to be a hereditary witch and detested those whom he called ‘the Gardnerians’. In fact, I believe he invented this word ‘Gardnerian’—originally as a term of abuse."

—Doreen Valiente’s interview with Sally Griffyn in Wiccan Wisdomkeepers

Prior to 1965, Gardnerians were referred to as "followers of Gardner". This division by Taliesin was meant to outline the difference between self professed hereditaries (if their claims were even really true) and those following the modern tradition of witchcraft embodied by Gardner’s teachings. Inadvertently he sowed the seeds of the idea of "tradition" in the witchcraft movement by his attack on the new wave of Paganism that was occurring. Even Robert Cochrane, "the Magister" as he is often referred to, found it necessary to label his practices "1734 tradition" to separate them from Gardner’s. He also didn’t use the term witch until the public use of it by Gardnerians, and he stated that none of his family used it either. Prior to this, there is no evidence from the past that witches separated themselves into specific traditions. What does appear are natural traditions dictated by culture and language. The ancestral tribal magic worker may not have used the term witch to describe him or herself; it may have been a label used by the Christian culture around them. Its use today is most definitely a modern reclaiming of the word. More on this is covered by Margot Adler in Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers and other Pagans in America Today¹³. She dedicates a whole section of one chapter to "that vexing ‘w’ word", discussing whether it should be used by modern witches at all. We feel that whether we like it or not we are stuck with the word and should therefore make the best of it. For many, the use of the term Wiccan was one of convenience, a way of avoiding witch, which had too many overtones for people who were influenced by the Christian concept of the word. The use of the word Wiccan allowed people to reply with "what’s a Wiccan", thereby creating dialogue.