Other names: Witches’ Eggs
Amanita muscaria, also commonly called fly agaric, is not a botanical. It is a fungus, a type of mushroom. However, these are modern classifications. Ancient people looked for similarities of essence as well as for differences and distinctions. Mushrooms were (and are) used similarly to botanicals and so it is classified here amongst the botanicals.
Even if you know next to nothing about mushrooms or botanicals, even if you don’t know what’s so special about Amanita muscaria, it’s pretty certain that you’re familiar with what it looks like even if you don’t recognize its name. You may never have seen a real one, but you’ve undoubtedly seen its picture. Amanita muscaria are the big red speckled mushrooms known as toadstools that are inevitable components of folkloric imagery. Look at traditional illustrations of witches, dwarfs, or fairies and you’ll likely find at least one amanita tucked into a corner.
Mushrooms were understood as very special and powerful. Mushrooms pop up overnight directly from Earth or emerge from tree trunks, fully grown as if by magic. Some have psychotropic properties; many are poisonous, some to the point of fatality.
In Germany, mushrooms in general are known as hexensessel or “witch’s chair.”
Psychotropic mushrooms, of which Amanita muscaria is the classic example, have historically been used in spiritual rituals worldwide. In fact there are scholars who believe that Amanita muscaria may have initially inspired a vast proportion of all human spiritual traditions and religions.
Among the traditions that some believe derive from mushroom cults are the Eleusinian Mystery religion, various ancient Egyptian traditions, Judaism and Christianity. Some scholars believe that Amanita muscaria was the mysterious biblical manna as well as Jesus Christ’s “bread of life.” There is even a Dead Sea Scrolls’ scholar who has suggested that New Testament references to Jesus are actually euphemisms, eventually forgotten, misunderstood, and distorted, for Amanita muscaria, hence the emphasis on the host as sacrament. Others believe that soma, the mysterious brew of the Aryan people of India mentioned in the Rig Veda, is really amanita.
Amanita’s associations with shamanism and ancient religion are so primordial and powerful that they transcend associations with witchcraft. Thus, images of Amanita muscaria show up everywhere, in Easter imagery as much as in Halloween’s. Folkloric toys are created in the form of these mushrooms—I have a Polish carved wooden toy amanita. You remove the polkadotted red roof to reveal carved wooden soldiers within. Even though amanita is poisonous, its image proliferates in children’s books, not as scary images like spiders but friendly ones. (Can you imagine artists blithely submitting similar images of datura or wolfsbane?) Those dancing mushrooms in Disney’s Fantasia? Amanita muscaria. Some even believe that the image of Santa Claus in his red and white suit may be a coded reference to amanita. Certainly his reindeerdriven sleigh can only be a reference to the cultures of the far north, where Amanita muscaria is intrinsically tied to shamanism, with reindeers integral to the ritual. (You’ll find out why below.) Santa’s habit of going up and down chimneys is also strangely reminiscent of shamans’ and witches’ flight.
Fly agaric is not uncommon throughout Eurasia and North America. It prefers poor soils, growing in marshes or along roads. It grows near birch, fir or pine trees, and is a traditional component of Siberian shamanism, where it’s sometimes called “lightning mushroom.” Based on linguistic studies, its use in that region may go back at least as far as 4000 BCE.
Amanita muscaria provokes a state of intoxication and allegedly opens portals to other realms. It has traditionally been used for divination, to contact spirits or journey to other realms and to locate lost, stolen or missing objects, especially those believed hidden in Earth.
Although Amanita muscaria is highly toxic, historically certain methods of preparation make it safer for use. Ibotenic acid, one of the psychotropic chemicals in amanita, is almost wholly retained in urine and not used by the body. (This is not true of its other chemical constituents, including the poisonous atropine and muscarine.) The traditional method of use, among the Finno-Ugric people of Finland, Lapland, and Siberia was to drink the urine of reindeer, which ate the mushrooms. (Reindeer may even have taught people about Amanita muscaria.) Reindeer meat may also be eaten in order to receive the hallucinatory experience. This is traditionally believed to be the safest method of use.
Amanita muscaria is among the ingredients cited in formulas for witches’ flying ointments. However, it is not among the magical ingredients traditionally cited in medieval grimoires. Shamans desired to meet, commune, consort, and battle with spirits; medieval sorcerers just wanted to boss them around.
Medieval sorcerers, with all their emphasis on commanding and compelling spirits, weren’t interested in using substances that couldn’t be commanded as well. Amanita is, to say the least, unpredictable. It is also potentially fatal. It is not safe for individual experimentation under any circumstances, nor has it ever been considered appropriate for solitary sorcery. Instead amanita’s use has historically been restricted to shamanism and to those folk magic practices directly descended from shamanism.
Because it is potentially fatal, Amanita muscaria has historically been a component of group ritual supervised by sober observers. Because dosage is so crucial, because the amanita cannot be standardized, and because there’s no room for mistakes, amanita lore has always been transmitted orally and within shamanic channels.
According to Russian folklore, the presiding spirits of these mushrooms manifest in the form of small red tubular beings who are able to communicate with those under amanita’s influence. (The mushroom may be understood as providing a portal for communicating with these spirits.) These spirits can be helpful and provide information, however they are also reputed to be wild tricksters with a taste for mean practical jokes, funny to them perhaps but tragic for their target. They may try to persuade the consumer of the mushroom to do potentially dangerous things—one more reason why sober supervision is so crucial.
Vivid red Amanita muscaria with its white polka dots may be understood as the mushroom equivalent of Amazonian poison arrow frogs. Its bold color announces its poisonous nature.
Decoctions of Amanita muscaria have historically been used to kill flies, hence it is also commonly called fly agaric. Amanita muscaria’s many other nicknames reflect its background in shamanism and witchcraft. Words used to name fly agaric are frequently connected to words for that shamanic tool the drum, and to toads. The common rationale for toad references has to do with childlike images of toads sheltering from the rain under large umbrella-like toadstools. However, among the chemical components isolated from Amanita muscaria is bufotenine a secretion otherwise found in toads’ skins.
Apples
(Malus pumila or Pyrus malus)
Apples are magical fruits. Slice them in half horizontally and the star or pentacle secretly hidden within is revealed. In ancient days, apples were associated with love, lust, and pleasure, but eventually love, lust, and pleasure fell out of grace and apples became identified with witches and the devil.
The most famous apple of all may be the one with which Eve tempted Adam; the story is often told as if the apple were a euphemism for sex. Apples were already long associated with love, sex, and forbidden pleasures when Christianity came to prominence, whereupon translations then identified the apple as the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. However, apples are native to temperate regions and are not indigenous to the region where Bible stories were first told. Many biblical scholars are absolutely certain that apples were not the forbidden fruit (figs, quinces, and pomegranates are the front-runners, although of course the argument has been made that all trees existed in the Garden of Eden, therefore the forbidden fruit could be anything).
Apples became synonymous with sex, sin, and feminine wiles. Fairy-tale apples, like the one the wicked witch-queen feeds Snow White, look seductively beautiful and innocently tasty but are secretly poisonous and perversely dangerous. Apples remained prized love spell ingredients—there are literally hundreds of love spells featuring little more than apples. Perhaps for this reason, apples became classified as more than just a food; they were witches’ tools, especially those bright scarlet apples.
Belladonna
(Atropa belladonna)
Atropa belladonna has many names: banewort, deadly nightshade, devil’s cherry, dwale, but most popularly belladonna which means “beautiful lady,” a surprisingly innocuous, even seductive name for such a deadly plant. The standard explanation for this folk name says that it derives from an extract made from the berry’s juice that was used in ladies’ eyes during the Renaissance to create a dilated “doe-eyed” expression, which was, at that time, considered very beautiful and seductive.
However, centuries previously, belladonna was sacred to the Roman war deity, Bellona, daughter of Mars. The plant was considered under her dominion and to share her essence. Ancient Roman priests allegedly drank some sort of elixir containing belladonna prior to ritual appeals to Bellona. The word belladonna contains the name Bellona within it, and it may have been a euphemistic pun on her name so that one could refer to her without actually calling upon this beautiful but fearsome Lady. Belladonna, like the goddess Bellona, is a beautiful but lethal killer.
Belladonna’s genus name Atropa honors Atropos, one of the three Fates, whose name means “the dreadful,” “the merciless,” or “the cutter.” Atropos is the Fate who cuts or terminates the thread of life.
All parts of the belladonna plant are poisonous including flowers, leaves, and roots. However the berries are the most virulently poisonous part of all: as few as three can kill a child. Do you remember those advisory stories reminding you not to assume that because birds can eat berries, that those same berries are safe for human consumption? Belladonna berries are the perfect example; many birds munch on the berries with impunity, something that is impossible for humans and for many mammal species.
Belladonna is a member of the nightshade family and is frequently equated with Deadly Nightshade. The names may or may not be used to indicate the same species. Various types of nightshade do exist that are also deadly, including Black Nightshade (Solanum nigrum) and Russian Nightshade (Scopolia carniolica), also known as Russian belladonna.
The primary toxin is the alkaloid atropine, which first stimulates the nervous system, then paralyzes it, causing muscular convulsions. Belladonna may also cause hallucinations, cramps, severe headache, mental stupor and, of course, death. Fly agaric (Amanita muscaria, see page 152) is the traditional antidote, however, it, too, is potentially fatally poisonous and the antidote must be administered at an incredibly fine, delicate balance and only by a skillful, professional hand.
Belladonna is a perennial that grows rampant among ruins and in wastelands. It is still found in this manner in Great Britain. It is rarely found wild in North America but is instead a cultivated plant. As its name implies, it has lovely flowers and so is often a prized component of poison gardens, where it may be appreciated visually and from a distance.
Belladonna’s alkaloids are used to make atropine, an eye medication. Until World War I belladonna was not an uncommon medicinal plant. Trained herbalists and pharmacists knew correct methods of use. The main pharmaceutical crop was derived from wild belladonna growing on stone ruins in the wilder regions of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was used to treat asthma, sciatica, and various other disorders.
As a beautiful and dangerous plant, belladonna was beloved and prized by herbalist wise-women who marked their skill by their proficiency with such plants. (There is no margin for error; no room for smoke and mirrors. It is impossible to fake your ability and knowledge with plants such as these; the truth will immediately be demonstrated.)
According to ancient witchcraft traditions, belladonna is at the peak of its power on May Eve (Walpurgis Night), so European witches only picked it on that night, when it is at its most powerful and magical.
See also CALENDAR: Walpurgis; PLACES: The Brocken.
Birch
(Betula alba)
Other names: The Lady of the Woods
Birch trees are unusual: their bark is white unlike the more usual brown. Birches are the botanical equivalent of the sacred white doe or buffalo. They are symbolic of light, purity, healing, and magic.
Birch is the tree of birth and new beginnings. This isn’t merely mystical palaver but is based on some historical truth: birch trees are believed to have been the first to cover the land emerging from the Ice Age. Its use is certainly ancient; Ötsi, the Neolithic “Ice Man” who was found frozen in an Alpine glacier was carrying a birch bark bag when he perished. Birch is believed to epitomize female qualities. If oaks are essentially male, then birches are female. They are associated with powerful goddesses like Brigid and Sarasvati. Baba Yaga lives in the heart of a birch forest.
The name allegedly derives from Sanskrit bhurga, meaning “tree whose bark is used for writing upon.” Birch bark is used in that manner among various Native cultures of North America, most notably the Ojibwa, who put birch to many uses, but also in Russia, where birch bark “paper” is incorporated into spell-casting to leave messages for nature spirits.
Amanita muscaria mushrooms grow beneath birches so birches are closely identified with these hallucinogenic mushrooms. The mushrooms may be understood as gifts of the tree. Birch wine and beer are also made.
Various traditions illustrate the identification of birch trees with new beginnings:
The birch is the first tree in the Ogham alphabet (Beth).
Cradles are traditionally carved from birch wood to provide blessings and protection and a good start for a new baby.
As the tree of new life, the birch was frequently chosen to be the maypole. Birch is among the most traditional materials for crafting a witch’s broom.
Roman officials carried bundles of birch twigs as symbols of authority. A bundle of birch twigs with an axe in the center was known as a fascis and was originally intended as a symbol of generation and fertility. (Axes were symbols of rebirth and fertility deities, both male and female.) The fascis was appropriated by Mussolini and the word has since derived new meanings.
Once upon a time, bundles of birch twigs were used to slap cattle and women (gently!) to boost fertility and offer blessings and protection. Many horned deities carried similar bunches of birch twigs. English has no specific word for this bundle of birch twigs but in Hungarian the word virgàcs (pronounced veer-goch) names this item. Krampus, Santa Claus’ Central European “helper” is never without his virgàcs. The symbol also survives among the traditional accoutrements of the chimneysweep as well as among the birch twigs used to enhance the experience of the Finnish sauna.
See also DIVINE WITCH: Baba Yaga; HORNED ONE: Krampus; PLACES: Bathhouse.
Coca
