Moon Magick: Myth & Magic, Crafts & Recipes, Rituals & Spells

About the Author

I was born on a Beltane Full Moon with a total lunar eclipse, one of the hottest days of that year. Although I came into an Irish-North Germanic-Native American family with natural psychics on both sides, such abilities were not talked about. So I learned discrimination in a family of closet psychics.

I have always been close to Nature. As a child, I spent a great amount of time outdoors by myself. Trees, herbs, and flowers become part of my indoor and outdoor landscapes wherever I live. I love cats, music, mountains, singing, streams, stones, ritual, and nights when the Moon is full. My reading covers vast areas of history, the magickal arts, philosophy, customs, mythology, and fantasy. I have studied every part of the New Age religions from Eastern philosophy to Wicca. I hope I never stop learning and expanding.

Although I have lived in areas of this country from one coast to the other, I now reside on the West Coast. I am not fond of large crowds or speaking in public.

I live a rather quiet life in the company of my husband and my two cats, Callisto and Finnigan, with occasional visits with my children and grandchildren. I collect statues of dragons and wizards, crystals and other stones, and of course, books. Most of my time is spent researching and writing. I have published eight books. Before I am finished with one book, I am working on another in my head. All in all, I am just an ordinary Pagan person.

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Moon Magick: Myth & Magic, Crafts & Recipes, Rituals & Spells © 1995 by D.J. Conway

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First Edition

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To Esther, my sister-priestess from Greece,

and especially to all the Pagan children

who will one day change the world.

Table of Contents

Part One: The Moon’s Influence on Our Lives

Chapter 1. Moon Touched

Chapter 2. History of Lunar Calendars

Part Two: The Lunar Year

Chapter 3. Introduction to the Lunar Year

Chapter 4. Wolf Moon—January

Chapter 5. Ice Moon—February

Chapter 6. Storm Moon—March

Chapter 7. Growing Moon—April

Chapter 8. Hare Moon—May

Chapter 9. Mead Moon—June

Chapter 10. Hay Moon—July

Chapter 11. Corn Moon—August

Chapter 12. Harvest Moon—September

Chapter 13. Blood Moon—October

Chapter 14. Blue Moon—October 27-November 1

Chapter 15. Snow Moon—November

Chapter 16. Cold Moon—December

APPENDICES: Moon Dieties and Symbols

Appendix 1: Moon Deities

Appendix 2: Moon Symbols

Appendix 3: The Charge of the Goddess

Bibliography

Moon Song

I raise my arms in greeting

As She slips up through the night,

The rounded Moon of Mystery,

A glowing silver disk of light.

My spirit answers to Her call

And longs for wings to fly,

That I might seek Her secret place

Whose symbol is the sky.

A place of hidden secrets,

Of sacred Mysteries old,

A place I knew in other times,

In temple wisdom no more told.

I struggle to remember

All the things I learned before,

The forgotten Mysteries of the Moon,

The Goddess and Her lore.

Although my arms reach skyward,

I turn inward toward Her voice.

I tread the inner labyrinth,

Trusting in my choice.

Seek not without, but deep within.

The words are soft and clear.

"Keep faith with Me for thirteen months,

The Mother’s Sacred Year."

I watch Her through Her cycles,

As I did in lives before,

And follow down Her moonbeam path

To the secret, inner door.

Part One

The Moon’s

Influence on

Our Lives

Chapter 1

Moon Touched

Moon struck or Moon touched: affected by the Moon;

distracted; bemused; given to unnatural fantasies (as when one is psychic and those about the person are not).

N o one knows exactly when humans began to observe the Moon but it must have been very early in our development. The carving of the Great Goddess of Laussel, dating back to about 20,000 BCE , shows the Goddess holding a bison horn with thirteen marks for months on it. In a cave at the Abri du Roc aux Sorciers at Angles-sur-l’Anglin is a massive carving of three women, very likely goddesses. This carving dates from between 13,000 and 11,000 BCE . These three figures, standing on a bison, may well represent the three phases of the Moon.

The Sun was a constant factor to early humans, except for its seasonal rise and fall on the horizon, but the Moon was mysterious, changing Her faces and shapes, withholding and giving light during the dark hours of the night. It wasn’t long before menstruating women learned to count Moon cycles, thus creating the first calendar. However, the Sun was no help in dividing time into smaller portions than seasons. Counting from one Moon phase through the cycle and back to the same phase enabled clans to plan gatherings and religious ceremonies.

For centuries, women were the calendar-keepers, priestesses, healers, and advisors of the clans because of their ability to communicate with the powers of the Moon Goddess. Men learned to read the Moon’s seasonal passages for use in hunting and farming. All early people knew that no human was unaffected by the Moon and Her mystical powers.

I was born on a Beltane Full Moon, with a total lunar eclipse. The Moon has always been important to me, long before I knew what She symbolized. As a small child, I would stand under the light of a Full Moon, reaching toward Her and yearning for something I couldn’t put into words. Some in my family called me Moon touched, to them a derogatory term, but little realizing how right they were under another definition.

Everyone is Moon touched, or influenced, some just more than others. About one-third of all people have a Full Moon in their natal astrological chart. These people are highly sensitive and emotional, with intense reactions each time the Moon re-enters its natal sign. For those whose religious views do not permit emotional and psychic sensitivity, these Moon phases can be miserable, upsetting experiences, particularly if a person’s sensitivity takes the form of seeing non-physical beings, having precognitive dreams and visions, or recalling past lives.

Humans cannot escape the influence of the Moon, whether they believe in it or not. The Moon touches the lives of all people in one way or another. Some individuals, who make little effort to obey the social laws or take responsibility for their lives anyway, who are either unstable or on the edges of being so, allow Her influence to lead them into violence, robberies, overindulgence in alcohol or drugs, or antisocial, harmful behavior. Even the best of us may snap and snarl when the Full Moon is in certain astrological signs. The more unaware we are of Her influences, the more we tend to react.

The police, firemen, paramedics, bartenders, and hospitals know that Full Moons bring more dramatic, dangerous problems. A team of psychiatrists in Florida compiled a report on murders in Dade County and Greater Cleveland, Ohio, over a fifteen-year period; they found there was a sharp increase in deadly violence at the Full Moon. A similar study done in New York charted peaks in robbery, assault, and car theft when the Moon was full. Research in Buffalo, New York, discovered an increase in suicides during a Full Moon. Another study done by the Department of Psychology at Edgecliff College in Ohio found that ten categories of crime are affected by the Full Moon: rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny, theft, auto theft, drunkenness, disorderly conduct, and offenses against children or family members.

It isn’t only the Full Moon that seems to stir up human emotions and irrational behavior, although the Full Moon appears to have the most influence. The New Moon also affects humans, especially those with mental instability. As far back as the sixteenth century, Paracelsus wrote that the New Moon made mentally unstable people worse. The New Moon is the second, albeit lesser, time in a lunar cycle when authorities see an increase in strange and dangerous behavior.

The influences and power of the New and Full Moons need not be all negative. Fishermen in Nova Scotia have passed down the information for many years that the largest catches of herring can be taken at the Full Moon. The grunion (smelts) of California spawn according to the Full Moon and high tides. Those in magick have long used various lunar cycles to increase their powers for manifestations.

Aristotle and Pliny both insisted that earthquakes usually occurred on the New Moon. An M.I.T. geophysicist was curious about the effects of the Moon on earthquakes and did a study on over 2,000 of them in Turkey. Dr. Toksoz discovered that twice as many earthquakes happened at the New and Full Moons, during the two highest daily tides. Perhaps if this information were taken more seriously, we would not be caught un-aware by earthquakes.

Everyone complains about the weather and the inaccuracy of weather reporting. A Leningrad geophysicist, Sergei Timofeyev, decided to investigate old folk sayings that the Moon affected the weather; scientists now believe that only the sunspot cycle does this. However, Timofeyev found some very interesting facts by monitoring the air temperatures, in comparison with Moon phases, for a number of years over various places in Russia. Sunspot activity runs on an eleven year cycle; Timofeyev discovered that changes in air masses and temperature had a nine and nineteen¹ year cycle, that of the Moon. By checking Moon phases, he discovered a parallel with historical catastrophic weather phenomena around the world.

The greatest proportion of the human body is made up of water. If the Moon affects the oceanic tides, the lowly grunion and herring, and possibly the weather through the moisture in the atmosphere, it is logical to concede that humans are directly affected also. Some scientists and medical experts will grudgingly agree because of the accumulating data on violent crime and mental upheavals during certain Moon phases.

But what has all this to do with the average law-abiding person, stable in mind and emotions? History tells us that there were other influences of the Moon, mystical influences that most people once knew and used to better their lives. This knowledge was forgotten when the modern religions gained control and either forbade their practices or ridiculed them into near-extinction along with the ancient deities that represented and symbolized the Moon.

These powers of the Moon phases were ancient knowledge in a great many cultures around the world and that same Moon knowledge is being used today by Pagans, Ceremonial Magicians, and the Wiccan groups. Certain phases of the Moon produce unique energies which can be tapped by humans through rituals large and small. In simple terms, spellworking for banishing, decreasing, or removing problems takes place from after the Full Moon until the New Moon, with the day or night of the New Moon being strongest. Spellworking for increase, growth, and gain takes place from after the New Moon until the Full Moon, with the day or night of the Full Moon being the most powerful. This use of Moon magick is ancient, and it still works.

But actual Moon magick is a little more involved than this simple explanation. The Moon month has traditionally been connected with three aspects of the Triple Goddess: Maiden (Crescent Moon), Mother (Full Moon), Crone (Dark Moon). These three aspects are further joined by specific energy paths: waning (decreasing) and waxing (growing). There are thirteen Moon months in a calendar year. Each Moon month is directly connected with a different type of seasonal energy flow.

With the Goddess coming into Her own once again, the Moon is being more openly recognized for Her influence and importance in the lives of humans. Anne Kent Rush, in Moon, Moon, wrote that the importance and position of women in a society can be judged by the importance that society gives to the Moon. Hidden in that statement is the religious fact that where the Moon is ignored or denigrated to the role of fantasy and fairytale, so the Goddess is ignored, forbidden, or cast in the role of the wife/mother of a deity. Women, the Moon, and the Goddess are inextricably bound together. What is doubly sad is that the patriarchal societies have concealed the fact that men also are caught up in the weaving of the Goddess and the Moon.

Women subconsciously know their connection with the Moon through their bodies and menstruation. Men do not have such obvious physical connections. However, a Japanese taxi company would tell you that men are not immune. They began a study to understand the unusual monthly cycles of accidents by their all-male drivers. They found that each male seemed to have periods that affected his reactions, and these periods corresponded to certain lunar positions. When schedules were changed to fit around these lunar cycles, the rash of accidents ceased.

The entire Chinese philosophy of Yin and Yang is linked to the waxing and waning of the Moon and the rise and fall of life-energy in humans. This would place the New and Full Moons as times of extremes in energy. Hindu astrology places great importance on the Moon phases as well, saying that people born during a waxing Moon live longer.

So, of what use is watching the Moon and Her phases? Being aware of the Moon and Her influences upon your life can save you a lot of frustration, time, and wasted energy. The Crescent, sometimes called the New, Moon is a time for introversion, of starting new projects and plans, and making personal changes in general. It is an excellent time for self-examination in everything from your love life, career, moving into a new house, and breaking habits, to spiritual intentions. The Full Moon, the most powerful phase, is a time of extroversion, high-energy tasks, and work with other people.

Are you letting the intense Moon energy lead you by the hormones, and are you really seeing your lover as she/he is, not a fantasy-person? Are you suddenly restless in your career? Watch out for those Moon phases! Are you making quick decisions to move or join a religious group? Back off, and let the Moon slide into another phase before you make a commitment. Check the Moon cycle before you shop for any item that requires you to sign a contract. You can be more easily swayed emotionally during a Full Moon. If you must deal with someone you really don’t get along with, stay away from Full or New Moon meetings. Chances are you both will be edgy and the communication will be off. If you must undergo surgery of any kind, check the Moon before setting the date. Simply, don’t set a surgery during a Full Moon or for four days before or after it. Bleeding will be more profuse at this time.

There are benefits to being in tune with the Moon as well. By cutting your hair and nails during a waxing Moon, they will grow back stronger and faster. Planting by the Moon has been known for centuries; certain plants grow better when planted during certain phases. There are Moon sign almanacs, such as the excellent one by Llewellyn Publications, that give you all the information on this you need.

This is all interesting information on the Moon but hardly of much practical use unless you combine it with magickal techniques. And magickal techniques are of little use unless you apply them in practical ways to your personal life. After all, magick is for improving your life physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

To do this throughout a lunar year can be a challenge. The lunar year consists of thirteen months, the old calendar reckoning. I have divided Part Two of this book into these months, filling each lunar division with old sayings about the Moon, ancient religious information, recipes, practical rituals and spellworkings, and a great many other things to make your lunar year one of interest and enthusiasm. By working with the Moon’s energies, instead of against them, you should find yourself in greater harmony with yourself, others, and the universal spiritual rhythm.

Part Three includes a list of Moon goddesses and gods from around the world. This can be used to find an appropriate deity if you wish to add a name to your rituals. Or it can be an interesting overview of world Moon deities and how long the Moon has been important to humans.

We can’t escape the influence of the Moon and Her powers, even if we don’t consciously believe in them. The collective unconscious, or universal mind, still holds all the old information from our own past lives and those of our ancestors. The Moon knowledge of all those ancient civilizations still can affect our subconscious thinking, and our lives, in subtle ways. Each human, however, can learn to deliberately access this portion of the mind through deep meditation and, therefore, be more aware of how it is influencing life. Add this to the fact that the physical Moon affects our bodies and emotions, and it seems rather absurd not to work with the flow of power instead of against it. Life is difficult enough. Why not use Moon magick to smooth the path a bit?

[contents]

1. This is called the Meton cycle after its discoverer, Meton of Athens, who lived in the fifth century BCE. It takes the Moon nineteen years for Her phases to repeat themselves on the same days.

Chapter 2

History of Lunar Calendars

T he word calendar comes from the Latin calendae or kalendae, which was the title of the first day of each Roman month. The Indo-European root words for moon, mind, and month are mati-h, manas, mana, or men; all are connected in meaning to the menstrual blood of women and the Goddess. In Greek, mene means Moon, while in Latin the word for Moon was mensis and mensura. These same root words are found in measurement. Even today there is a remnant of the Moon in our present calendar under the name Monday, or Moon Day. The word create comes from the word crescent, or New Moon. In modern French this survives openly in the word croissant, or crescent cake.

There are three types of calendars: solar, lunar, and luni-solar. Calendars are used to establish dates, both secular and religious. They help to mark the times of the Solstices, Equinoxes, eclipses of Sun and Moon, etc. They are a way of dividing the seasonal year. The most ancient calendars were lunar, those based on the Moon.

The solar calendar which most of the world now uses is a rather modern innovation, when compared to the length of time humans have inhabited this planet. There are a great many archaeological finds and historical documents which reveal that the first cultures lived their lives around the Moon and its phases. Certain holidays are still figured according to the Moon phases. A few cultures even retain the use of the lunar calendar.

The earliest Chinese calendar was based on lunar cycles, with observations of both the Sun and the Moon. The twenty-eight divisions of the Chinese lunar year were called Hsiu, Houses; each House was inhabited by a warrior-consort of the Moon goddess. Such a calendar was also used in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. The calendar of the early Hindus was lunar; still today they speak of the 28 mansions of the Moon.

The very early Egyptians had a lunar calendar; in fact, the hieroglyph for month was a crescent Moon. In about 4236 BCE, they set up their solar calendar consisting of twelve months of thirty days each. Their weeks were ten days long. At the end of the last month, they added five additional days, which were known as the birthdays of special deities. This calendar was based on observations of the rising of Sirius (or Sothis, the Dog Star).

The early calendars of Chaldea, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome, and the Celtic clans were also lunar. Babylonian priests taught that the god Marduk counted holy days and the seasons by the movements of the Moon. The Chaldean Moon-worshippers believed that movement of the Moon through the zodiacal signs determined a person’s fate. The Gaelic words for menstruation and calendar are almost identical: miosach and miosachan.

Even today the Moslems use lunar months and years. Because the Islamic year is only 354 or 355 days long, their religious feasts, such as Ramadan, proceed through the seasons.

The Jewish culture uses a combination lunar-solar calendar, with the years as solar and the months as lunar. Each month begins when the first sign of the crescent Moon is seen.

The Moon never has just one form or size to present to the Earth and its inhabitants. She changes her form as She makes a complete cycle from crescent, through Her phases, back to crescent, in approximately 291⁄2 days.

Sometimes the Moon appears to be larger than at other times. This is caused by the elliptical orbit of the Moon around the Earth. When She is closest to the Earth (at perigee), She appears about 15 percent larger than She does when She is farthest away (at apogee). When a planetary body like the Moon is even a little closer to us than usual, its visual size increases dramatically. Magickally, the Moon would be 25 percent stronger at perigee than at apogee. This is a time when we have much higher tides than normal because of the in-creased influence of the Moon upon the Earth. Theoretically, the available power for magick would increase also.

Also, because of the variation in the Moon’s angle at its zenith, She rises higher at some times than at others. This happens because the Moon’s orbit is not exactly at the Earth’s equator. Magickal common sense tells you that the higher the Moon rises, the more directly Her rays or powers fall upon the Earth, and the more energy is available for ritual and spellworking. Most of this energy is wasted, as the vast majority of people struggle against the psychic flow instead of putting it to beneficial use.

As the Moon moves through the seasonal year, Her energies also change subtly, for She is influenced by the Sun and the angles She makes between the Sun and the Earth. To use the Moon’s energies to the fullest throughout the year, one must not only be aware of Her phases, but of the seasons themselves.

I have divided the lunar months in the following calendar according to the solar months with which most of us are familiar and live our lives. However, the thirteenth month, which I have chosen to list only as the end of October and the beginning of November, is not a full twenty-nine days here. It is very confusing to try to divide the solar months equally into thirteen Moon months, which may begin and end in the midst of a solar month. People have spent centuries living to the rhythms of the solar division of time. For convenience of use, I have chosen to use this unorthodox division system.

A Blue Moon, or the second Full Moon contained in a month, can come at any time of the year. I have chosen to insert it in October-November, a time of year in Northern European tradition that brought remembrances of the ancestors and the Thin Veil between the worlds (a celebration now known as Halloween).

All of the ancient dates of celebration are not listed in this lunar calendar for two reasons: one, other sources already provide this information²; two, the exact dates of many celebrations cannot be agreed upon. When in doubt, I used what seemed reasonable to me. I also listed only a sampling of ancient rituals, ones which are practical and have modern meaning for today’s practitioners.

[contents]

2. Pennick, Nigel, The Pagan Book of Days; Budapest, Z., Grandmother of Time and Grandmother Moon; Stein, Diane, The Goddess Book of Days.

Part Two

The Lunar

Year

Chapter 3

Introduction to the Lunar Year

T he following list of Moon months contains information that I feel will help the reader understand many of the ancient mystical mysteries, ideas, festivals, and lore about the Moon. The list of correspondences may differ from those of other writers; most lists do. They are not engraved in stone and can be changed to suit individual needs.

The Recipes and Crafts sections of each lunar month was produced out of my personal files and recipe box. Although I like to collect authentic recipes, I invariably change them, whenever possible, into easier methods. Few people have the luxury or time to fuss with hours of cooking. The foods and beverages can be used during ritual or when entertaining friends in mundane situations. Some of the recipes can be made and given as gifts, as can the crafts. I included them as fun projects.

In making the colognes, use unscented rubbing alcohol; this releases the scent as it evaporates. Distilled water is important since the impurities have been removed. The glycerin is a fixative which holds the scent. If the recipe calls for solid ingredients, let the cologne set for several days, then strain out the solid particles.

Many practitioners of magick prepare for their rituals by taking a bath first, using special salts. Some magicians use only sea salt, but I see no reason that regular salt could not be used. All salt comes from the Earth. Add about a tablespoon of the blended salt, herbs, and/or essential oils to the bath before slipping in for a pleasant soak. Any solid particles should be of a fine grind that will wash down the drain. If you have allergies, test a little of the essential oil (which is an ingredient in the bath salts) on the inside of your elbow before using it for bath salts. Store the bath salts in a container with a tight fitting lid.

All the potpourris and sachets use dried ingredients unless it says otherwise. If the recipe says Hot Pot, the mixture is to be used in the small pots which gently heat this type of potpourri. Potpourris can be stored in fancy boxes or jars; the lids are removed for short periods of time to perfume the room.

The myths related here are only a sampling of what exists. If you are really interested in a particular cultural pantheon, you should visit your local library. They have or can get for you books on any particular pantheon.

Although I have tied in various rituals with the ideas behind ancient festivals and celebrations, I have made no attempt to reproduce the old rituals. Instead I have written modern ones. First, reproduction of ancient rites would be impossible since we have few, if any, records telling us exactly what went on. Second, we live in a totally different era. It would not be logical to perform ancient rituals (including use of the language) as they were once performed. Many of the dates are debatable since there have been several drastic calendar changes. The ancient festivals and rituals listed are the ones I felt would be of most interest today.

Rituals should be fun as well as serious. I’m sure the deities and other supernatural beings have a sense of humor; they must since they work with us mortals. Therefore, not every ritual in this book is somber and serious. We should be celebrating the joy of life besides taking care of what we need and desire.

Each lunar month has rituals for the Crescent, Full, and Dark Moons. Most Pagans are quite familiar with the Crescent and Full Moons and use rituals for at least the Full Moon. However, a great many people are either outright frightened or at least wary of the Dark