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Witchcraft

This category contains everything on Witchcraft & Folklore related to the Maier files series. Many aspects of witches and witchcraft are explored.

A Turning Point in the Witch Hunts

In The Maier Files series, the character Albruna Gudrun leads the “Hexenkommando,” an elite force of “witch” girls. These characters significantly influence the plot, reflecting the historical and esoteric undertones prevalent in the series. Drawing on this theme, we delve into Cautio Criminalis, a key work that addressed the real historical witch trials that devastated Germany in the early modern period. Historical Context In the 16th...
Albruna Gudrun

Albruna

In ancient times the Maidenschaft (Society of maidens) was organized in 4 groups, which are the Hexas (the lowest group), the Drudas, the Walas and finally the Albrunas. The Hexas group had as their duty the care and preservation of the eternal flame. These Hexas were also initiated into herbology and arts of animal-healing. DRUDAS The DRUDAS, however, provided service as “Wise Women.” They were counselors...
Ishtar

Crescent Moon and Star

It was Rodin who stated that “Man never invented anything new, only discovered things.” Although it’s correct to say that certain symbols have been man-made for a particular purpose, it’s just as correct to argue that everything is somehow inspired by the natural world around us, by the forms of nature, plants, animals, the elements. Even a reaction against the fluid forms of nature is usually...
Witch

European Witch-Craze

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. —EXODUS 22:18 The European witch-craze. Evil thrives on lies, the most malignant of which have drained all through populations and nations—even the world—with devastating consequences. Nothing is more dangerous on this planet than a mob of idiots and ignorant human beings using their childish, literalist mind-set! What follows is a mere glimpse of the misery wrought by the...
Hexen kommando

German Witches

It’s almost Walpurgisnacht, no better moment to have a closer look at our witches or Hexen. Where did this cruel hatred against women and the ancient pre-christian sanctuaries start? When Pope Innocent VIII (1484–92) professed his belief in witchcraft, he condemned it, and dispatched inquisitors to Germany to try its supposed practitioners and punish them unimpeded. Singling out Mainz, Cologne, Trier, Salzburg, and Bremen, the papal...
Himmler's book stash Czech Library

Heinrich Himmler’s hidden book collection

The Daily Mail published an article related to one of the Maier files backstories. An unusual collection of books on witches as well as the occult that was collected by SS chief Heinrich Himmler in the war has actually been found in the Czech Republic. The books – part of a 13,000-strong collection – were discovered in a depot of the National Library of Czech Republic...
twelve night of Yule with Holle

Holle and the twelve days of Yule

Holle the goddesses and Yule. Frau Holle is connected to springs, wells and lakes, where she lives in a land on the bottom of the water. She is also connected with the fog. Holle can be seen as a bright shape drifting in the fog, and her fog maidens are “die Hollen”, who move over the land to come to the aid of women and children....
Holle Teich

Holle: a nearly absolute power?

Hella, Hel, known to all Germanic peoples, including the Goths as Hellarunester. A Gothic word for “witch” was Haljoruna. The name itself stems from a root meaning “to hide”. The word Hellirunar describes people who ‘rune’ (Speak, sing, whisper) with Hel/Helja, the goddess and realm of the underworld. “Hell”, in its original meaning is the hidden realm, the dark and foggy place where the dead and...
Man Rune

Mysteries of the Man Rune and the Graal

Man rune or Algiz  and its traditional link with the Grail mysteries. In its origine a rune is a puzzle and a mystery above all else. Only in a later epoch Runes became also letters or writing symbols. In antiquated times only a certain codified group rune staves became writing signs or an alphabet. In the later obscure German custom of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, supernatural hypotheses...

Satanist conspiracy of witchcraft and maleficium

The tendency to deprecate the religious other through systematic attribution of Satanism survived the fragmentation of Western christianity during the Reformation schisms in the early modern period. Catholic polemicists deployed old stereotypes about Satanist heretics against Protestant Christians, while Protestants accused the Roman Catholic Church of demonic idolatry and proclaimed the Roman pope to be a servant of Satan. A new sect Indeed, it was to...
ilmarinen finnish folklore

Secrets hidden in Finnish Folklore

An enigmatic depiction of the golden fleece quest: an Athenian Red-figure cup discovered in 1834 and attributed to the Athenian painter Douris (c. 480 BC) shows in its interior the goddess Athena who watches as a huge serpent disgorges a man, alive. Behind them is a tree with a ram’s skin in its branches. These clues assure us that the hero is Jason. The artist has...

The case of the benandanti, good walkers

Benandanti. Carlo Ginzburg,  is a noted Italian historian and proponent of the field of microhistory and medieval culture. In 1966, he published The Night Battles, an examination of the benandanti visionary folk tradition found in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Friuli in northeastern Italy. He returned to looking at the visionary traditions of early modern Europe for his 1989 book Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches’ Sabbath. Italian Inquisition One of...
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