White sows have particularly powerful lunar associations. The porcine profile can change dramatically—expanding and slimming down—in response to diet, pregnancy, and birth. This rhythmic shape-shifting was perceived as similar to that of the moon. Black sows are particularly identified with witchcraft. Black pigs, particularly small, fast ones, were often understood to be transformed witches engaged in spell-casting missions. Witch-hunters accused witches of offering black pigs to Satan.
See also Bears, Snakes, Transformation; BOTANICALS: Amanita Muscaria or Fly Agaric; CALENDAR: Yule; ERGOT; DIVINE WITCH: Artemis; Baba Yaga; Cerridwen; Circe; Freya; Hecate; Isis; Set; HAG; HORNED ONE: Chimneysweep.
Rabbits
The animal once most associated with European witchcraft wasn’t the cat, which for a long time was rare, but rabbits. Rabbits serve as witches’ familiars and messengers and are the form into which European witches once most frequently transformed.
Most rabbit and hare species graze at twilight. Little brown rabbits camouflage well; they suddenly appear and disappear, as if by magic. Rabbits’ defenses are limited to speed, brains, and fecundity. Rabbits survive and thrive because they can reproduce faster than they can be killed. No surprise, then, that the rabbit is the fertility animal extraordinaire. They are associated with sex, reproduction, and the moon. Classic tricksters, they represent success, survival and joy despite all odds, which, after all, is the primal stimulus for magic and witchcraft.
The gestation period of a rabbit is 28 days, one lunar month, akin to a woman’s menstrual cycle. The Egyptian word for “rabbit” translates as “the opener” and also indicated “period” in both the calendar and menstrual sense. Sacred rabbits, female and male, had dominion over women’s reproductive abilities. Vestiges of that pagan belief survive in the bunny that delivers eggs, emblematic of birth, at Easter, the Christian holiday that closely corresponds to the Vernal Equinox, the time of Earth’s rebirth. Easter bunnies are most frequently depicted as sweet, juvenile purveyors of candy eggs; the hares they’re based upon were understood as wild, raucous, very phallically empowered magical creatures. The consort of the pagan goddess Ostara, whose name is recalled in “Easter,” was a man-sized rabbit. (See CALENDAR: Easter; Ostara.)
Around the world, rabbits are associated with the moon, the celestial body ruling magic, romance, and reproduction. In many areas there’s a rabbit in the moon, not a man.
Throughout Central America, the moon was uniformly associated with rabbits. Classical Mayan imagery depicts a beautiful, youthful woman sitting on a crescent moon, cuddling a rabbit in her arms. The Yucatan goddess Ix Chel, lunar deity of women, magic, storms, and spinning has a consort who manifests in the form of a man-sized rabbit.
In China, rabbits are associated with witchcraft, sorcery, and alchemy. According to Chinese myth, a rabbit keeps the Moon Lady company in her lonely palace—not just any old rabbit though: the rabbit on the moon is an alchemist rabbit, seen pounding out the secret elixir of immortality with his mortar and pestle.
Rabbits are trickster spirits in Africa and now, via transplantation, in the United States as well, the classic examples being Brer Rabbit and Bugs Bunny. They represent rabbits’ powers of rebirth and regeneration: no matter how much trouble Brer and Bugs get into, even when doom seems certain, they always miraculously slip out of trouble (or resurrect) to survive and thrive. They are magical creatures, too smart for their own good; their curiosity, quest for knowledge, and inability to mind their own business inevitably leads them into trouble, which they always then manage to remedy and survive. They are somewhat dangerous creatures, too, reminding us that tricksters aren’t just cuddly bunnies but typically also possess a sharper edge that can lead others into trouble, as well as extricating them again.
Historically, when English witches transformed into animals, it was most frequently a rabbit. Unlike on the European mainland where wolves were the most common form, there’s little British tradition of werewolves. Christina Hole, author of Witchcraft in England, suggests that this powerful identification with rabbits occurred when wolves were eradicated in the British Isles.
The British Isles are filled with tales of rabbits serving as witches’ alter egos:
According to legend, Anne Boleyn haunts her parish church in the form of a hare.
Isobel Gowdie, perhaps Scotland’s most famous witch (for reasons unknown, she volunteered her witchcraft confession), claimed that she traveled in the form of a hare.
On the Isle of Man, gorse was set on fire on May Day to flush out the witches, believed to take the form of hares on that day.
In Ireland, rabbits found amid cows on May Day were once summarily killed because they were believed to be shape-shifting witches with wicked designs on cattle, milk, and butter.
Even people with little knowledge or interest in magic spells are familiar with the concept of the lucky rabbit’s foot, typically carried as a gambling charm. “Lucky for whom?” asks the old joke. “It wasn’t lucky for the rabbit!” Indeed. This “charm’s” origins derive from magical witchhunting techniques similar to those advocating slaughtering rabbits on May Day.
The custom of carrying a rabbit’s foot charm is now associated with gambling luck but that wasn’t the original intent. The magical rabbit’s foot isn’t some ancient spell but is of relatively recent origin. Although popularly associated with African-American conjure traditions, the charm has British roots. Similar charms were used in nineteenth-century England to protect against witchcraft.
Not just any old rabbit’s foot would do. Slightly different versions of this spell exist, some more difficult than others, but to turn the trick, it originally had to be the left foot of a rabbit killed in a cemetery at midnight, sometimes on a Friday or a Friday the 13th; on a dark moon Friday or any dark moon. Some American versions specify that it must be an African-American cemetery, which may indicate something about the spell-casters beliefs about witchcraft. Other versions stipulate that the rabbit must be killed with a silver bullet. (Silver is the moon’s metal.)
There are various ways of understanding this spell:
The rabbit may be understood as a transformed witch, who is now destroyed and her power stolen for the killer’s personal use.
It may be understood as similar to traditions like nailing bats or owls to barn doors to scare away witches; an announcement that what can be done to the crucified witch can be done to others.
It’s possible that the spell-caster’s goal was to obtain a rabbit familiar or even spiritual possession of the witch in rabbit form.
The rabbit may also be understood as a revenant or powerful ghost; caught outside its grave, it’s now finally really dead and unable to rise and walk again.
Scorpions
Scorpions’ profound association with witchcraft and magic is reflected in the astrological sign of Scorpio, the sign with dominion over magic, death, and sex. Scorpio rules the reproductive organs.
Astrological associations of scorpions with sex, death, birth, and rebirth derive from ancient Egyptian mythology. The Egyptians both feared and venerated scorpions. The power to harm is the power to heal and vice versa. Scorpions were potentially deadly, as were scorpion deities, who were worthy of fear and respect but also invoked for protection against scorpions and other deadly dangers. Scorpion-power may be understood as witchcraft; the ability to channel potentially dangerous energy positively or negatively as desired, and especially the ability to heal and over-ride damage caused by others—spiritual and magical poisons as well as physical ones.
Scorpion goddess Serket (also spelled Selket or Serqet) is among the Egyptian deities most associated with magic and witchcraft. Serket is usually depicted as a beautiful woman wearing a scorpion on her head (she also manifests in crocodile, cobra, and lion form). Serket travels in Isis’ entourage. She is a protective spirit who is among the four primary deities (alongside Neith, Isis and her sister Nephthys) guarding entombed coffins. Serket’s title “Mistress of the Beautiful House” is a euphemistic expression for that ancient funeral parlor, the embalming pavilion. Serket is invoked in many spells to protect and heal poisonous bites. She served as matron of those practitioners of magical medicine who specialized in such cases.
The scorpion-girls who serve as Isis’ escorts when she is in hiding with baby Horus may be understood as witches. When the Egyptian culture-hero Horus grows up, he married one of them.
Scorpions in Chinese magic are symbolic of great harm and danger, as well as of the power and ability to counteract them.
The mating habits of scorpions are similar to those of spiders, their relatives. The male scorpion is smaller than the female. Sex begins with a copulation dance, tails entwined. At the conclusion of the act, the male, who apparently knows what’s coming, usually tries to escape; the female, for her part, tries to devour him as her post-coital snack. (She’s allegedly successful only 10 percent of the time.)
Scorpions have a long pregnancy even by human standards: a year and a half before delivery. A long-lived species (15–25 years) scorpions don’t reach sexual maturity until they hit the magic number seven. Scorpions are fierce, devoted mothers; after the birth, baby scorpions stay safe by riding on their mother’s back for two to six weeks.
Skin-walkers
The term “skin-walker” refers to the same concept as those nahuals (sorcerers) who are able to change forms. It is the English translation of a Navajo term. Although traditional Navajo culture is shamanic, with a long tradition of magical healing and positive magical practices, the word “witchcraft” in Navajo is virtually always understood as malevolent. Use of the word “witch” almost always refers to a shaman gone bad or to a corrupt sorcerer or some sort of malevolent practitioner of magic. Traditional Navajo philosophy prizes harmony and places emphasis on the welfare of the community. Witches are understood to place individual desires above those of the group.
Navajo witches most frequently transform into wolves or coyotes. They may be distinguished from a regular wolf or coyote, at least by someone who is familiar with the genuine article:
Transformed wolves and coyotes may be unusually large.
They carry their tails in a different manner than real animals do.
They may betray themselves by wearing or carrying something associated with humans, like jewelry.
Snakes
Snakes are so central to witchcraft, spirituality and magic that a thousand-page book could be devoted to that topic alone. Of necessity, this has been compressed. What follows is only a brief synopsis, the proverbial tip of the iceberg.
Snakes play a profound role in witchcraft as familiars, companions, teachers and transmitters of magic, guardians of knowledge, and as witches themselves, transformed or otherwise. A Ukrainian word for “witch” is synonymous with “snake.” This may be understood as the stealthy dangerous snake in the grass or as a mysterious, powerful, holy being, however you choose.
Snakes are symbolic of birth, life, immortality, rebirth, fertility, sexuality, health, and wisdom—especially women’s wisdom. Snake venom potentially kills or cures, as do shamans, healers, and witches.
Hibernating snakes burrow within Earth; emerging in the spring, they’re believed to carry Earth’s secrets as well as her sacred generative powers with them. No animal is as identified with the powers of Earth or Great Mother Goddesses as the snake.
Snakes are emblematic of sex, generative power, and childbirth. Snakes unite the male and female generative principles as surely as does the pestle in the mortar. Snakes are understood as animals that resemble both female and male genitalia. Male resemblance is obvious—how many blues singers boast of being “crawling king snakes” or similar serpentine forces? No need to make the comparison any clearer; that’s a metaphor anyone can figure out. The resemblance to female genitalia is more subtle. The snake possesses an unhinged jaw that enables it to open up so wide that it can swallow prey bigger than its head. This was understood to symbolize the vagina, which magically opens to disgorge a baby.
Although snakes are associated with healing in general, they are particularly associated with women’s reproductive health. In Rome, it was believed that contact with snakes improved a woman’s health. It’s believed in many places that snakes actually taught women the techniques of childbirth, undulating their bodies in demonstration. Snakes are literally brought into the birthing chamber in areas as far apart as China and Arabia, sometimes for the express purpose of entrancing the laboring woman for an easier, speedier, safer birth. If snakes aren’t available or convenient, belly dancers substitute, especially snake or sword dancers, shimmying with sinuous movements to help lead the birthing mother in the childbirth dance.
Neolithic pottery from near Kiev shows snakes surrounding a pregnant womb, protecting the treasure within. Horned snakes were emblems of fertility, regeneration, and healing in Celtic Europe.
It has been suggested that the identification of women with snakes reveals women’s attachment to Earth, to Earthly (material) things and powers—an attachment that prevents them from attaining salvation and spiritual freedom. And of course, the snake most people are familiar with is the one that tempted Eve. Based on this story, snakes eventually became identified with Satan, known as that old serpent. (Other versions prefer a female snake; identifying it with a diabolized Lilith, the former childbirth spirit who shed her skin to become the Queen of Demons.)
Because the Bible is often used to rationalize violence toward witches and witchcraft as well as hostility toward snakes, it’s worth taking a brief second look. The Bible has famously been interpreted and reinterpreted to suit many purposes. The word that characterizes attitudes towards snakes in the Old Testament isn’t horror or disgust but ambivalence. The snake’s appearance in the Garden of Eden isn’t its only appearance: snakes are a common motif in the Jewish Bible.
Various versions of the Adam and Eve tale posit a different understanding. Ancient Gnostics, who understood material Earth to be created by a deceptive usurping demi-god, not the true Creator, perceived that the snake was trying to warn and save Eve. In some versions, the snake may even be the Creator deity. A modern Hasidic take on the story suggests the snake ultimately did us a favor; no potential for human growth exists in Paradise. It’s like the womb; no matter how comfortable you are, ultimately you have to get out and start living if you want to survive.
The most famous serpentine appearances include the following:
