ETRUSCAN GODS LIVE ON - ARADIA

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                                                                   L A V E R N A



The following very curious tale, with the incantation, was not in the text of the Vangelo, but it very evidently belongs to the cycle or series of legends connected with it. Diana is declared to be the protectress of all outcasts, those to whom the night is their day, consequently of thieves; and Laverna, as we may learn from Horace and Plautus, was pre-eminently the patroness of pilfering and all rascality. In this story she also appears as a witch and humorist.

It was given to me as a tradition of Virgil, who often appears as one familiar with the marvelous and hidden lore of the olden time.

It happened on a time that Virgil, who knew all things hidden or magical, he who was a magician and poet, having heard a speech (or oration) by a famous talker who had not much in him, was asked what he thought of it. And he replied, "It seems to me to be impossible to tell whether it was all introduction or all conclusion; certainly there was no body in it. It was like certain fish of whom one is in doubt whether they are all head or all tail, or only head and tail; or the goddess Laverna, of whom no one ever know whether she was all head or all body, or neither or both."

Then the emperor inquired who this deity might be, for he had never heard of her.

And Virgil replied, "Among the gods or spirits who were of ancient times - may they be ever favorable to us! Among them (was) one female who was the craftiest and most knavish of them all. She was called Laverna. She was a thief, and very little known to the other deities, who were honest and dignified, for she was rarely in heaven or in the country of the fairies.


                                               

"She was almost always on earth, among thieves, pickpockets, and panders - she lived in darkness.

"Once it happened that she went (to a mortal), a great priest in the form and guise of a very beautiful stately priestess (of some goddess), and said to him:

" 'You have an estate which I wish to buy. I intend to build on it a temple to (our) God. I swear to you on my body that I will pay thee within a year'

"Therefore the priest transferred to her the estate.

"And very soon Laverna had sold off all the crops, grain, cattle, wood, and poultry. There was not left the value of four farthings.

"But on the day fixed for payment there was no Laverna to be seen. The fair goddess was far away, and had left her creditor in the lurch!

"At the same time Laverna went to a great lord and bought of him a castle, well furnished within and broad rich lands without.

"But this time she swore on he head to pay in full in six months.

"And as she had done by the priest so she acted to the lord of the castle, and stole and sold every stick, furniture, cattle, men, and mice - there was not left wherewith to feed a fly.

"Then the priest and the lord, finding out who this was, appealed to the gods, complaining that they had been robbed by a goddess.

"And it was soon made known to them all that this was Laverna.

"Therefore she was called to judgment before all the gods.

"And when she was asked what she had done with the property of the priest, unto whom she had sworn by her body to make payment at the time appointed (and why she had broken her oath)?

"She replied by a strange deed which amazed them all, for she made her body disappear, so that only her head remained visible, and it cried: -

" 'Behold me! I swore by my body, but body have I none!'

"Then all the gods laughed.

"After the priest came the lord who had also been tricked, and to whom she had sworn by her head. And in reply to him Laverna showed all present her whole body without mincing matters, and it was one of extreme beauty, but without a head; and from the neck thereof came a voice which said: -

'Behold me, for I am Laverna, who Have come to answer to that lord's complaint, Who swears that I contracted debt to him, And have not paid although the time is o'er And that I am a thief because I swore Upon my head - but, as you all can see, I have no head at all, and therefore I Assuredly ne'er swore by such an oath.'

"Then there was indeed a storm of laughter among the gods, who made the matter right by ordering the head to join the body, and bidding Laverna pay up her debts, which she did.

"Then Jove spoke and said: -

" 'Here is a roguish goddess withoout a duty (or a worshipper), while there are in Rome innumerable thieves, sharpers, cheats, and rascals who live by deceit.

" 'These good folk have neither a church nor a god, and it is a great pity, for even the very devils have their master, Satan, as the head of the family. Therefore, I command that in future Laverna shall be the goddess of all the knaves or dishonest tradesman, with the whole rubbish and refuse of the human race, who have been hitherto without a god or a devil, inasmuch as they have been too despicable for the one or the other.'

"And so Laverna became the goddess of all dishonest and shabby people.

"Whenever any one planned or intended any knavery or aught wicked, he entered her temple, and invoked Laverna, who appeared to him as a woman's head. But if he did his work of knavery badly or maladroitly, when he again invoked her he saw only the body; but if he was clever, then he beheld the whole goddess, head and body.

"Laverna was no more chaste than she was honest, and had many lovers and many children. It was said that not being bad at heart or cruel, she often repented her life and sins; but do what she might, she could not reform, because her passions were so inveterate.

"And if a man had got any woman with child or any maid found herself enceinte, and would hide it from the world and escape scandal, they would go every day to invoke Laverna.

"Then when the time came for the suppliant to be delivered, Laverna would bear her in sleep during the night to her temple, and after the birth cast her into slumber again, and bear her back to her bed at home. And when she woke in the morning, she was ever in vigorous health and felt no weariness, and all seemed to her as a dream.

"But to those who desired in time to reclaim their children, Laverna was indulgent if they led such lives as pleased her and faithfully worshipped her.

"And this is the ceremony to be performed and the incantation to be offered every night to Laverna.

"There must be a set place devoted to the goddess, be it a room, a cellar, or a grove, but ever a solitary place.

"Then take a small table of the size of forty playing cards set close together, and this must be hid in the same place, and going there at night...

"Take forty cards and spread them on the table, making of them a close carpet or cover on it.

"Take of the herbs paura and concordia, and boil the two together, repeating meanwhile the following:

I boil the cluster of concordia To keep in concord and at peace with me Laverna, that she may restore to me My child, and that she by her favoring care May guard me well from danger all my life! I boil this herb, yet 'tis not it which boils, I boil the fear, that it may keep afar Any intruder, and if such should come (to spy upon my rite), may he be struck With fear and in his terror haste away!

Having said thus, put the boiled herbs in a bottle and spread the cards on the table one by one, saying: -

I spread before me now the forty cards Yet 'tis not forty cards which here I spread, But forty of the gods superior To the deity Laverna, that their forms May each and all become volcanoes hot, Until Laverna comes and brings my child; And 'till 'tis done may they all cast at her Hot flames of fire, and with them glowing coals From noses, mouths, and ears (until she yields); Then may they leave Laverna at her peace, Free to embrace her children at her will!

"Laverna was the Roman goddess of thieves, pickpockets, shopkeepers or dealers, plagiarists, rascals, and hypocrites. There was near Rome a temple in a grove where robbers went to divide their plunder. There was a statue of the goddess. Her image, according to some, was a head without a body; according to others, a body without a head; but the epithet of 'beautiful' applied to her by Horace indicates that she who gave disguises to her worshippers had kept one to herself." She was worshipped in perfect silence. This is confirmed by a passage to Horace, where an impostor, hardly daring to move his lips, repeats the following prayer or incantation: -

"O goddess Laverna! Give me the art of cheating and deceiving, Of making men believe that I am just, Holy, and innocent! extend all darkness And deep obscurity o'er my misdeeds!"

It is interesting to compare this unquestionably ancient classic invocation to Laverna with the one which is before given. The goddess was extensively known to the lower orders, and in Plautus a cook who has been robbed of his implements calls on her to revenge him.

I call special attention to the fact that in this, as in a great number of Italian witch incantations, the deity or spirit who is worshipped, be it Diana herself or Laverna, is threatened with torment by a higher power until he or she grants the favour demanded. This is quite classic (Grecco-Roman or Oriental) in all of which sources the magician relies not on favour, aid, or power granted by either God or Satan, but simply on what he has been able to wrench and wring, as it were, out of infinite nature or the primal source by penance and study. I mention this because a reviewer has reproached me with exaggerating the degree to which diabolism - introduced by the Church since 1500 - is deficient in Italy. But in fact, among the higher classes of witches, or in their traditions, it is hardly to be found at all. In Christian diabolism the witch never dares to threaten Satan or God, or any of the Trinity or angels, for the whole system is based on the conception of a Church and of obedience.

The herb concordia probably takes its name from that of the goddess Concordia, who was represented as holding a branch. It plays a great part in witchcraft, after verbena and rue.

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             T H E   C H I L D R E N   O F   D I A N A   O R   H O W   T H E   F A I R I E S   W E R E   B O R N




All things were made by Diana, the great spirits of the stars, men in their time and place, the giants which were of old, and the dwarfs who dwell in the rocks, and once a month worship her with cakes.

There was once a young man who was poor, without parents, yet he was good.

One night he sat in a lonely place, yet it was very beautiful, and there he saw a thousand little fairies, shining white, dancing in the light of the full moon.

"Gladly would I be like you, O fairies!" said the youth, "free from care, needing no food.But what are yee?

                                                 


"We are moon rays, the children of Diana," replied one - We are children of the Moon. We are born of shining light; When the Moon shoots forth a ray, Then it takes a fairy's form.

"And thou art one of us because thou wert born when the Moon, our mother Diana, was full; yes, our brother, kin to us, belonging to our band.

"And if thou art hungry and poor...and wilt have money in thy pocket, then think upon the Moon, on Diana, unto whom thou wert born; then repeat these words -

"'Moon, Moon, beautiful Moon! Fairer far than any star; Moon, O Moon, if it may be, Bring good fortune unto me!'

"And then, if thou has money in thy pocket, thou wilt have it doubled.

"For the children who are born in a full moon are sons or daughters of the Moon,

'Good evening, fair goat! And he will reply, 'Good evening, fair sir! I am so weary That I can go no farther And thou shalt reply as usual, 'Fairy Diana, I conjure thee To give to this goat relief and peace!'

"Then will we enter in a great hall where thou wilt see many beautiful ladies who will try to fascinate thee; but let thy answer ever be, 'She whom I love is her of Monteroni.'

"And now Gianni, to horse; mount and away!" So he mounted the cat, which flew as quick as thought, and found the mare, and having pronounced over it the incantation, it became a woman and said -

In the name of the Fairy Diana! Mayest thou hereby become A beautiful young man, Red and white in hue, Like to milk and blood!

After this he found the goat and conjured it in like manner, and it replied -

In the name of the Fairy Diana! Be thou attired more richly than a prince!

So he passed to the hall, where he was wooed by beautiful ladies, but his answer to them all was that his love was at Monterone.

Then he saw or knew no more, but on awakening found himself in Monterone, and so changed to a handsome youth that no one knew him. So he married his beautiful lady, and all lived the hidden life of witches and wizards from that day, and are now in fairy land.

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APPENDIX



So long ago as the year 1886 I learned that there was in existence a manuscript setting forth the doctrines of Italian witchcraft, and I was promised that, if possible, it should be obtained for me. In this I was for a time disappointed. But having urged it on Maddalena, my collector of folk lore, while she was leading a wandering life in Tuscany, to make an effort to obtain or recover something of the kind, I at last received from her, on January 1, 1897, from Colle, Val d'Elsa, near Siena, the MS entitled Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches.

Now be it observed, that every leading point which forms the plot or center of this Vangel, such as that Diana is Queen of the Witches; an associate of Herodius (Aradia) in her relations to sorcery; that she bore a child to her brother the Sun (here Lucifer); that as a moon-goddess she is in some relation to Cain, who dwells as prisoner in the moon, and that the witches of old were people oppressed by feudal lands, the former revenging themselves in every way, and holding orgies to Diana which the Church represented as being the worship of Satan - all of this, I repeat, had been told or written out for me in fragments by Maddalena (not to speak of other authorities), even as it had been chronicled by Horst or Michelet; therefore all this is in the present document of minor importance. All of this I expected, but what I did not expect, and what was new to me, was that portion which is given as prose-poetry and which I have rendered in meter or verse. This being traditional, and taken down from wizards, is extremely curious and interesting, since in it are preserved many relics of lore which, as may be verified from records, have come down from days of yore.
                                            

Aradia is evidently enough Herodius, who was regarded in the beginning as associated with Diana as chief of the witches. This was not, as I opined, derived from the Herodias of the New Testament, but from an earlier replica of Lilith, bearing the same name. It is, in fact an identification or twin-ing of the Aryan and Shemitic Queens of Heaven, or of Night and of Sorcery, and it may be that this was known to the earliest myth makers. So far back as the sixth century the worship of Herodias and Diana by witches was condemned by a Church Council at Ancyra. Pipernus and other writers have noted the evident identity of Herodias with Lilith. Isis preceded both.
               
Diana is very vigorously, even dramatically, set forth in this poem as the goddess of the god forsaken and ungodly, of thieves, harlots, and, truthfully enough, of the 'minions of the moon,' as Falstaff would have fain had them called. It was recognized in ancient Rome, as it is in modern India, that no human being can be so bad or vile as to have forfeited all right to divine protection of some kind or other, and Diana was this protectress. It my be as well to observe here, that among all free thinking philosophers, educated parias, and literary or book bohemians, there has ever been a most unorthodox tendency to believe that the faults and errors of humanity are more due (if not altogether due) to unavoidable causes which we cannot help, as, for instance, heredity, the being born savages, or poor, or in vice, or unto 'bigotry and virtue' in excess, or unto inquisitioning - that is to say, when we are so over burdened with innately born sin that all our free will cannot set us free from it.

It was during the so called Dark Ages, or from the downfall of the Roman Empire until the thirteenth century, that the belief that all which was worst in man owed its origin solely to the monstrous abuses and tyranny of Church and State. For then, at every turn in life, the vast majority encountered downright shameless, palpable iniquity and injustice, with no law for the weak who were without patrons.
               The perception of this drove vast numbers of the discontented into rebellion, and as they could not prevail by open warfare, they took their hatred out in a form of secret anarchy, which was, however, intimately blended with superstition and fragments of old tradition. Prominent in this, and naturally enough, was the worship of Diana the protectress, for the alleged adoration of Satan was a far later invention of the Church, and it has never really found a leading place in Italian witchcraft to this day. That is to say, purely diabolical witchcraft did not find general acceptance till the end of the fifteenth century, when it was, one may almost say, invented in Rome to supply means wherewith to destroy the threatening heresy of Germany.

The growth of Sentiment is the increase of suffering; man is never entirely miserable until he finds out how wronged he is and fancies that he sees far ahead a possible freedom. In ancient times men as slaves suffered less under even more abuse, because they believed they were born to low conditions of life. Even the best reform brings pain with it, and the great awakening of man was accompanied with griefs, many of which even yet endure. Pessimism is the result of too much culture and introversion.

It appears to be strangely out of sight and out of mind with all historians, that the sufferings of the vast majority of mankind, or the enslaved and poor, were far greater under early Christianity, or till the end of the Middle Ages and the Emancipation of Serfs, than they were before. The reason for this was that in the old 'heathen' time the humble did not know, or even dream, that all are equal before God, or that they had many rights, even here on earth, as slaves; for, in fact, the whole moral tendency of the New Testament is utterly opposed to slavery, or even sever servitude. Every word uttered teaching Christ's mercy and love, humility and charity, was, in fact, a bitter reproof, not only to every lord in the land, but to the Church itself, and its arrogant prelates. The fact that many abuses had been mitigated and that there were benevolent saints, does not affect the fact that, on the whole, mankind was for a long time worse off than before, and the greatest cause of this suffering was what may be called a sentimental one, or a newly born consciousness of rights withheld, which is always of itself a torture. And this was greatly aggravated by the endless preaching to the people that it was a duty to suffer and endure oppression and tyranny, and that the rights of Authority of all kinds were so great that they on the whole even excused their worst abuses. For by upholding Authority in the nobility the Church maintained its own.
                                      The result of it all was a vast development of rebels, outcasts, and all the discontented, who adopted witchcraft or sorcery for a religion, and wizards as their priests. They had secret meetings in desert places, among old ruins accursed by priests as the haunt of evil spirits or ancient heathen gods, or in the mountains. To this day the dweller in Italy may often find secluded spots environed by ancient chestnut forests, rocks, and walls, which suggest fit places for the Sabbat, and are sometimes still believed by tradition to be such. And I also believe that in this Gospel of the Witches we have a trustworthy outline at least of the doctrine and rites observed at these meetings. They adored forbidden deities and practiced forbidden deeds, inspired as much by rebellion against Society as their own passions.

There is, however, in the Evangel of the Witches an effort made to distinguish between the naturally wicked or corrupt and those who are outcasts or oppressed, as appears from the passage:

"Yet like Cain's daughter (offspring) thou shalt never be, Nor like the race who have become at last Wicked and infamous from suffering, As are the Jews and wandering Zingari, Who are all thieves: like then ye shall not be."

The supper of the Witches, the cakes of meal, salt, and honey, in the form of crescent moons, are known to every classical scholar. The moon or horn shaped cakes are still common. I have eaten of them this very day, and though they are known all over the world, I believe they owe their fashion to tradition.

In the conjuration of the meal there is a very curious tradition introduced to the effect that the glittering grains of wheat from which spikes shoot like sun rays, owe their brilliant likeness to a resemblance to the firefly, 'who comes to give the light.' We have, I doubt not, in this a classic tradition, but I cannot verify it. Hereupon the Vangelo cites a common nursery rhyme, which may also be found a nursery tale, yet which, like others, is derived from witch lore, by which the lucciola is put under a glass and conjured to give by its light certain answers.

The conjuration of the meal or bread, as being literally our body as contributing to form it, and deeply sacred because it had lain in the earth, where dark and wondrous secrets bide, seems to cast a new light on the Christian sacrament. It is a type of resurrection from earth, and was therefore used at the Mysteries and Holy Supper, and the grain had pertained to chthonic secrets, or to what had been under the earth in darkness. Thus even earthworms are invoked in modern witchcraft as familiar with dark mysteries, and the shepherd's pipe to win the Orphic power must be buried three days in the earth. And so all was, and is, in sorcery a kind of wild poetry based on symbols, all blending into one another, light and darkness, fireflies and grain, life and death.
                                 
Very strange indeed, but very strictly according to ancient magic as described by classic authorities, is the threatening Diana, in case she will not grant a prayer. This recurs continually in the witch exorcisms or spells. The magus, or witch, worships the spirit, but claims to have the right, drawn from a higher power, to compel even the Queen of Earth, Heaven and Hell to grant the request. "Give what I ask, and thou shalt have honor and offerings; refuse, and I will vex thee by insult." So Canidia and her kind boasted that they could compel the gods to appear. This is all classic. No one ever heard of a Satanic witch invoking or threatening the Trinity, or Christ or even the angels or saints. In fact, they cannot even compel the devil or his imps to obey - they work entirely by his good will as slaves. But in the old Italian lore the sorcerer or witch is all or nothing, and aims at limitless will or power.

Of the ancient belief in the virtues of a perforated stone I need not speak. But it is to be remarked that in the invocation the witch goes forth in the earliest morning to seek for verbena or verbain. The ancient Persian magi, or rather their daughters, worshipped the sun as it rose by waving freshly plucked verbena, which was one of the seven most powerful plants in magic. These Persian priestesses were naked while they thus worshipped, nudity being a symbol of truth and sincerity.

The extinguishing the lights, nakedness, and the ****, were regarded as symbolical of the body being laid in the ground, the grain being planted, or of entering into darkness and death, to be revived in new forms, or regeneration and light. It was the laying aside of daily life.

The Gospel of the Witches, as I have given it, is in reality only the initial chapter of the collection of ceremonies, incantations, and traditions current in the fraternity or sisterhood, the whole of which are in the main to be found in my Etruscan Roman Remains and Florentine Legends. I have, it is true, a great number as yet unpublished, and there are more ungathered, but the whole scripture of this sorcery, all its principal tenets, formulas, medicaments, and mysteries may be found in what I have collected and printed. Yet I would urge that it would be worth while to arrange and edit it all into one work, because it would be to every student of archeology, folk lore, or history of great value. It has been the faith of millions in the past it has made itself felt in innumerable traditions, which deserve to be better understood than they are, and I would gladly undertake the work if I believed that the public would make it worth the publisher's outlay and pains.
 
                                           
                                            STREGONERIA by DOSSO DOSSI

It may be observed with truth that I have not treated this Gospel, nor even the subject of witchcraft, entirely as folk lore, as the word is strictly defined and carried out; that is, as a mere traditional fact or thing to be chiefly regarded as a variant like or unlike sundry other traditions, or to be tabulated and put away in pigeon holes for reference. That it is useful and sensible to do all this is perfectly true, and it has led to an immense amount of valuable search, collection, and preservation. But there is this to be said, and I have observed that here and there a few genial minds are beginning to awake to it, that the mere study of the letter in this way has developed a great indifference to the spirit, going in may cases so far as to produce, like Realism in Art (to which it is allied), even a contempt for the matter or meaning of it, as originally believed in.

I was lately much struck by the fact that in a very learned work on Music, the author, in discussing that of ancient times and of the East, while extremely accurate and minute in determining pentatonic and all other scales, and what may be called the mere machinery and history of composition, showed that he was utterly ignorant of the fundamental fact that notes and chords, bars and melodies, were in themselves ideas or thoughts. Thus Confucius is said to have composed a melody which was a personal description of himself. Now if this be not understood, we cannot understand the soul of early music, and the folk lorist who cannot get beyond the letter and fancies himself 'scientific' is exactly like the musician who has no idea of how or why melodies were anciently composed.

The strange and mystical chapter 'How Diana made the Stars and the Rain' is the same given in my Legends of Florence, but much enlarged, or developed to a cosmogonic-mythologic sketch. And here a reflection occurs which is perhaps the most remarkable which all this Witch Evangel suggests. In all other Scriptures of all races, it is the male, Jehovah, Buddha [he's totally wrong here on Buddha] or Brahma, who creates the universe; in Witch Sorcery it is the female who is the primitive principle. Whenever in history there is a period of radical intellectual rebellion against long established conservatism, hierarchy, and the like, there is always an effort to regard Woman as the fully equal, which means the superior sex. Thus in the extraordinary war of conflicting elements, strange schools of sorcery, Neo-Platonism, Cabala, Hermetic Christianity, Gnosticism, Persian Magism and Dualism, with the remains of old Greek and Egyptian theologies in the third and fourth centuries at Alexandria, and in the House of Light of Cairo in the ninth, the equality of Woman was a prominent doctrine. It was Sophia or Helena, the enfranchised, who was then the true Christ who was to save mankind.

[Note: ONLY by allowing in the Darkness, does the Logos rise up. By Christ, he must mean Christos - another name for Logos.]

When Illumination, in company with magic and mysticism, and a resolve to regenerate society according to extreme free thought, inspired the Templars to the hope that they would master the Church and the world, the equality of Woman derived from the Cairene traditions, again received attention. And it may be observed that during the Middle Ages, and even so late as the intense excitements which inspired the French Huguenots, the Jansenists and the Anabaptists, Woman always came forth more prominently or played a far greater part than she had done in social or political life. This was also the case in the Spiritualism founded by the Fox sisters of Rochester, New York, and it is manifesting itself in many ways in the Fin de Siecle, which is also a nervous chaos according to Nordau - Woman being evidently a fish who shows herself most when the waters are troubled.

But we should also remember that in the earlier ages the vast majority of mankind itself, suppressed by the too great or greatly abused power of Church and State, only manifested itself at such periods of rebellion against forms or ideas grown old. And with every new rebellion, every fresh outburst or wild inundation and bursting over the barriers, humanity and woman gain something, that is to say, their just dues or rights. For as every freshet spreads more widely its waters over the fields, which are in due time the more fertilized thereby, so the world at large gains by every revolution, however terrible or repugnant it may be for a time.

                             
  
The Emancipated or Woman's Rights woman, when too enthusiastic, generally considers man as limited, while Woman is destined to gain on him. In earlier ages a contrary opinion prevailed, and both are, or were, apparently in the wrong, so far as the future is concerned. For in truth both sexes are progressive, and progress in this respect means not a conflict of the male and female principle, such as formed the basis of the Mahabarata, but a gradual ascertaining of true ability and adjustment of relations or coordination of powers.

These remarks are appropriate to my text and subject, because it is in studying the epochs when woman has made herself prominent and influential that we learn what the capacities of the female sex truly are. Among these, that of witchcraft as it truly was - not as it is generally quite misunderstood - is a deeply interesting as any other. For the witch, laying aside all question as to magic or its non-existence - was once a real factor or great power in rebellious social life, and to this very day it is recognized that there is something uncanny, mysterious, and incomprehensible in woman, which neither she herself nor man can explain.

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In Tuscan folklore, Aradia (Herodias) was the daughter of the Roman Goddess Diana and Lucifer. Aradia is venerated by followers of Stregheria, and the central character in Leland's Gospel of the Witches. The biblical character Herodias was the evil mother of the dancer Salome, who arranged for the death of John the Baptist.


                                                    


Pronunciation: Ah-rah-dee-ah • (noun)

Alternate Spellings: Heria, Herodias

Related resources:                                 
Religio Romana
Religio Romana is the main name under which various Neopagan groups attempt to accurately reconstruct ancient Roman Pagan worship.

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Cimaruta, in Italian, means "Sprig of Rue," and the rue amulet is one of Italy's oldest cultural objects. The amulets, which are made of silver, depict a rue sprig with various small symbols in its branches, most commonly keys, crescent moons, daggers, stars, and flowers. The cimaruta of today is evolved from ancient Etruscan amulets; historical uses are as protective charms agains malevolent magic, witchcraft, and the evil eye, especially for infants.

Ironically (perhaps intentionally so), the cimaruta has become associated with Strega (an Italian/Roman flavored form of Wicca), and so-called Italian Traditional Witchcraft, which appears to be largely based on the works of Charles Goeffry Leland, a nineteenth century author who penned several volumes on Italian witchcraft and folklore, including Aradia (The "Gospel of the Witches"), purporting to be the gospel of a secret Dianic Roman witchcraft tradition.

RELATED SYMBOLS



RELIGIO ROMANA
 
Religio Romana is the main name under which various Neopagan groups attempt to accurately reconstruct ancient Roman Pagan worship.

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THE AUTHOR OF 'ARADIA'







                                        C H A R L E S   G O D F R E Y   L E L A N D
 
 
Born 1824

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

 
Died 1903


Charles Godfrey Leland (August 15, 1824 – March 20, 1903) was an American humorist and folklorist, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and educated at Princeton University, and in Europe. Leland worked in journalism, travelled extensively, and became interested in folklore and folk linguistics, publishing books and articles on American and European languages and folk traditions. By the end of his life shortly after the turn of the century, Leland had worked in a wide variety of trades, achieved recognition as an author of the comedic Hans Breitmann Ballads, fought in two conflicts, and had written what was to become a primary source text for Neopaganism half a century later, Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches.
 


Life

Leland was born to Charles Leland, a commission merchant, and Charlotte Godfrey August 15, 1824 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Shortly after his birth, Leland's nurse took the child to the family attic and performed a ritual on him involving a Bible, a key, a knife, lighted candles, money and salt to ensure a long life as a "scholar and a wizard", a fact which Leland's biographers have commented upon as foreshadowing his interest in folk traditions and magic.

Charles Godfrey Leland's early education was in the United States, and he attended college at Princeton University. During his schooling, Leland studied languages, wrote poetry, and pursued a variety of other interests, including hermeticism, Neo-Platonism, and the writings of Rabelais and Villon. After college, Leland continued his studies in Heidelberg and Munich. In 1848 Leland attended the Sorbonne, and was involved in the Revolutions of 1848 in France, fighting at consructed barricades against the King's soldiers as a captain in the revolution.

Leland returned to America after the money given to him by his father for travel had run out, and passed the bar in Pennsylvania. Instead of practicing law, he instead began a career in journalism. As a journalist, Leland wrote for The Illustrated News in New York, the Evening Bulletin in Philadelphia and eventually took on editorial duties for Graham's Magazine, and the Philadelphia Press. In 1856 Leland married Eliza Bella "Isabel" Fisher.

Leland was also an editor for the Continental Monthly, a pro-Union Army publication. He enlisted in the Union Army in 1863, and fought at the Battle of Gettysburg. Leland coined the term "emancipation" as an alternative to "abolition" to refer to the anti-slavery position.

Leland returned to Europe in 1869, and travelled widely, eventually settling in London. In his travels, he made a study of the Gypsies, on whom he wrote more than one book. Leland began to publish a number of books on ethnography, folklore and language. His fame during his lifetime rested chiefly on his comic Hans Breitmann Ballads (1871), written in a combination of broken English and German (not to be confused, as it often has been, with Pennsylvania German).  His writings on Algonquian and gypsy culture were part of the contemporary interest in pagan and Aryan traditions. He erroneously claimed to have discovered 'the fifth Celtic tongue': the form of Cant, spoken among Irish Travellers. He named it Shelta. Leland became president of the English Gypsy-Lore Society in 1888. Eleven years later Godfrey produced Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, reportedly containing the traditional beliefs of Italian witchcraft as conveyed to Leland in a manuscript provided by a woman named Maddalena, who Leland refers to as his "witch informant."

 Influence

In more recent times his writings on pagan and Aryan traditions have eclipsed the now largely forgotten Breitmann ballads, influencing the development of Wicca and modern Neo-paganism. The most influential of these books is Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches. Aradia's accuracy has been disputed, and used by others as a study of witch lore in 19th century Italy.

                                     

                      Leland was also an important influence on the Arts and Crafts movement. He had established a school to teach crafts to disadvantaged children in Philadelphia, which became widely known when it was praised by Oscar Wilde. Wilde later wrote to Leland he would be "recognised and honoured as one of the great pioneers and leaders of the art of the future."  The Home Arts and Industries Association was founded in imitation of this initiative.
 
Title page of the original edition of Aradia.Leland's comical Hans Breitmann Ballads were his biggest success as an author during his life, but most of his books dealt with the traditions and languages of the peoples that he studied. He is best known today for Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, one of his three books on Italian folk traditions.

1855: Meister Karl's Sketch-book
1864: Legends of Birds
1871: Hans Breitmann Ballads
1872: Pidgin-English Sing-Song
1873: The English Gipsies
1879: Johnnykin and the Goblins
1882: The Gypsies
1884: Algonquin Legends
1891: Gyspsy Sorcery and Fortune Telling
1892: The Hundred Riddles of the Fairy Bellaria
1892: Etruscan Roman Remains in Popular Tradition
1896: Legends of Florence Collected from the People (2 vols.)
1899: Unpublished Legends of Virgil
1899: Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches
                                                              
1899: Have You a Strong Will?
1901: Legends of Virgil
1902: Flaxius, or Leaves from the Life of an Immortal

Further reading

Varesano, A.M.J. (1979). Charles Godfrey Leland: The Eclectic Folklorist, Ph.D Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania. 
Parkhill, Thomas (1997). Weaving Ourselves into the Land: Charles Godfrey Leland, "Indians" and the Study of Native American Religions. State University of New York Press. 
Di Fazio, Massimiliano (2003). "Un esploratore di subculture: Charles Godfrey Leland", in "Archaeologiae" 2,1. 


 Notes and references


Wikisource has original works written by or about:

Charles Godfrey Leland^ Pennell, Elizabeth Robbins (1906). Charles Godfrey Leland: a Biography. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Co..  cited in Mathiesen, Robert (1998). "Charles G. Leland and the Witches of Italy: The Origin of Aradia", in Mario Pazzaglini: Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, A New Translation. Blaine, Washington: Phoenix Publishing, Inc., 25. ISBN 0-919345-34-4. 

^ Mathiesen, Robert (1998). "Charles G. Leland and the Witches of Italy: The Origin of Aradia", in Mario Pazzaglini: Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, A New Translation. Blaine, Washington: Phoenix Publishing, Inc., 25-57. ISBN 0-919345-34-4. 

^ a b c Farrar, Stewart (1998). "Foreword", in Mario Pazzaglini: Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, A New Translation. Blaine, Washington: Phoenix Publishing, Inc., 13-21. ISBN 0-919345-34-4. 
 
^ W. P. Trent, J. Erskine, S. P. Sherman & C. Van Doren (Eds.) (1907). Cambridge History of English and American Literature, Vol. XVIII Part III. Cambridge University. 1-58734-073-9. 

^ Leland, Charles Godfrey (1899). Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches. David Nutt.  See Leland's description in the appendix.

^ See Russell, Jeffrey (1982). A History of Witchcraft: Sorcerers, Heretics and Pagans. Thames and Hudson, pp. 148-53. ISBN 0-19-820744-1.  and especially Hutton, Ronald (2000). Triumph of the Moon. Oxford University Press, p. 148. ISBN 0-500-27242-5.  for a discussion of the dispute

^ Magliocco, Sabina (2002). "Who Was Aradia? The History and Development of a Legend". Pomegranate: The Journal of Pagan Studies, 18. 

^ "I would have a workshop attached to every school...I have seen only one such school in the United States, and the was in Philadelphia, and was founded by my friend Leland. I stopped there yesterday, and have brought some of their work here to show you." Report of Wilde's New York lecture, Montreal Daily Witness, May 15, 1882. See also, Wilde, O, letter to Leland, May 1882, MS, Yale University, "When I showed them the brass work and the pretty bowl of wood with the bright arabesques at New York they applauded to the echo, and I have received so many letters about it and congratulations that your school will be known and honoured everywhere, and you yourself recognised and honoured as one of the great pioneers and leaders of the art of the future."

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                                                          A R A D I A




                                                                                           


Many Italian witches believe in the historical existence of a woman named Aradia, who brought about a revival of Italian Witchcraft. She is often called the Holy Strega or The Beautiful Pilgrim. In the oral traditions surrounding Aradia, residing in the Old Religion of Italy, it is said that she lived and taught during the later half of the 14th century. The Italian Inquisitor Bernardo Rategno documented in his Tractatus de Strigibus (written in 1508 AD.) that a "rapid expansion" of the "witches sect" had begun 150 years prior to his Time. Rategno studied many transcripts from the trials of the Inquisition concerning Witchcraft.

Tracing back over the years, he pin- pointed the beginnings of the witch trials, and noted their sharp increase over a period of years. Following a thorough study of these records (kept in the Archives of the Inquisition at Como, Italy) Rategno fixed the time somewhere in the mid to late 14th century. If Aradia had been born in 1313, as the legends claim, this would certainly have made her old enough to have taught and influenced others, and for groups to have formed that carried on her teachings. In 1890, author and folklorist Charles Leland published a book on Italian Witchcraft titled Aradia; Gospel of the Witches.

Leland's account of Aradia includes a legend about the "beautiful Pilgrim" preserved among Tuscan peasants for generations. In part this legend says: "Then having obtained a pilgrim's dress, she traveled far and wide, teaching and preaching the religion of old times, the religion of Diana, the Queen of the Fairies and of the Moon, the goddess of the poor and the oppressed. And the fame of her wisdom and beauty went forth over all the land, and people worshipped her, calling her La Bella Pellegrina (the beautiful pilgrim)." In 1962, T.C. Lethbridge (former Director for Cambridge University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology) published a book called Witches, which does refer to Aradia in several chapters

In Chapter 2, Lethbridge writes: "We can then, I think, assume that Leland's Vangelo and Dr. Murray's trial evidence are more or less contemporary and that it is reasonable to use the two together to form a picture of the witch cult at about A.D.1400... Aradia was sent to earth to teach this art to Mankind. That is, she was, in the opinion of her devotees, a personage, known in Hindu Religion as an Avatar, who taught them how to harness magic power. Aradia, at some far-off time, may have been as much an historical person as Christ, Krishna or Buddha..." It is also interesting to note that Ecstascies - Deciphering the Witches' Sabbath, by Carlo Ginzburg, contains a passage that may be a historical reference to Aradia. On page 189 he speaks of a Pagan Sect known as the "Calusari" who, during the Middle Ages (as late as the 16th and 17th Centuries), worshipped a Mythical Empress who they sometimes called "Arada" or "Irodeasa."

The Calusari also used the term "mistress of the fairies" for her, just as the followers of Aradia called Diana the Queen of the Fairies. Could this sect have still been practicing a form of worship initiated by Aradia over 100 years prior? According to the original legend of Aradia, she left Italy at some point in her Quest and traveled out of the country. Serbia, the home of the Calusari, lies a short distance across the Adriatic from Central Italy, and travel by ship was not uncommon in that Era. When Aradia left Italy she would not have traveled west to France because the Papacy was still established in France at the time, and Aradia was still being hunted by the Church. It would have been too dangerous to have gone to northern Europe because witches were being burned or hanged in that Region (Italy did not begin the burning of witches until after the time of Aradia). So in fact an eastern exodus would have been the only logical action which Aradia could have taken. At the very least, there is a striking coincidence between Aradia's witches and the Calusari of Arada.

In the late 12th century, Joachim de Flora (also called Joachim de Fiore) the Abbot of Corazzo wrote a prophetic text on the Age of Reason. His writings had a major influence on religious thought throughout the remainder of the Middle Ages. He passed his writings on to the Holy See in 1200 for approval. Concerning the Age of Reason to come, Joachim wrote:

"The Old testament period was under the direct influence of God the Father. With the advent of Christ came the age of God the Son. The time was now ripe for the reign of God the Holy Ghost. A new era was being introduced, a culmination; in the new day man would not have to rely on faith for everything would be founded on knowledge and reason."

The year 1300 was declared a Jubilee Year by Boniface VIII. It was also the year that Dante had his "vision: of Inferno Panderers." A sect known as the Guglielmites believed that a certain woman named Guglielma of Milan was the incarnation of the Holy Spirit and wished to establish a church with a female pope and female cardinals. Millennialism has frequently provided a basis for social progress regarding women. Women have historically taken very active and creative roles in millennial groups, even in societies where their voices would normally have been repressed such as that of Guglielma of Milan.

                                                                                                   LA PAPESSA MANFREDA VISCONTI


Manfreda Visconti was elected by the Guglielmites to be their papess. She was burnt at the stake in 1300. The year 1300 was to usher in a new era of female popes with Manfreda officiating a mass at Ste. Maria Maggiore. Guglielma was in reality, Princess Blazena Vilemina, daughter of the King of Bohemia. She was born in 1210 and appeared in Milan around 1260 and reportedly died on August 24, 1281. She appeared in Milan dressed as a "common-woman." Because of her noble background, she attracted followers from both the Visconti family as well as the Torriani family, noble rivals of the time, and was seen as a "peacemaker" between the families. There is some conjecture that she might have been influenced by the sisters of the "Free Spirit", a very prominent heretical group of the time, that preached the teachings of Joachim.

Guglielma's chief disciple, a man by the name of Andrea Saramita, said that he heard her make claims to "divinity." He was a rather well-off-layman, well versed in the teachings of Joachim about the Age of the Spirit. He wrote most of the documents and was the chief theologist of the sect.

Maifreda da Pirovano, cousin of Matteo Visconti, was the chief of the Guglielmite sect. Maifreda was actually granted the title of pope, vicar of the Holy Spirit upon earth, by the sect, and supposedly, it is her portrait that is the Papessa of the Visconti Tarot deck. Of the approximately 30 members of the sect from about 7 Milanese families, women outnumbered men, but 10 of the most fervent members were male. The sect had an interesting social life in which there was equality of the genders. There was no emphasis on virginity in the sect, though a good number of the female members were widowed or unmarried. What is interesting, is that the members of the sect crossed social boundaries. There were very wealthy people involved, as well as poor servants. Membership ranged from the ruler's son, Galeazzo Visconti to the poor seamstress Taria and the serving maid Bianca. On the ground that Guglielma had wanted her devotees to remain together as a family, they held frequent commemorative meals in her honor. Reportedly there were attempts throughout the 1300's to continue the remembrance of Guglielma, by hiding her in paintings and calling her by another name.

This theme, of a female messiah, a commemorative meal, and a coming Age of Reason may well have laid the foundation for the legends surrounding Aradia. At the very least it demonstrates that such a theme was known in Italy during the early 14th century. The pre-existence of such a theme later appearing in the Aradia material, lends credence to the Streghe legends, thus providing some historical foundation for its logical appearance in Old Italy.

According to legend, Aradia was born in 1313 in northern Italy, in the town of Volterra. She gathered a small band of followers and went about the countryside teaching and preaching the Old Religion of Italy. Aradia spoke of an Age of Reason that would come, and which would replace the Age of the Son. When she departed, Aradia requested that a meal be held in her honor, and that she be remembered by future generations.


                             

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LEGENDS OF FLORENCE at Online Books

http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupid?key=olbp21991

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                                      CATHOLICISM AND ITALIAN WITCHCRAFT





"It is the most natural thing in the world that there should be certain blendings, compromises, and points of affinity between the Stregoneria - witchcraft, or "old religion", founded on the Etruscan or Roman mythology and rites - and the Roman Catholic: both were based on magic, both used fetishes, amulets, incantations, and had recourse to spirits. In some cases these Christian spirits or saints corresponded with, and were actually derived from, the same source as the heathen. The sorcerers among the Tuscan peasantry were not slow to perceive this." - Leland, Etruscan Roman Remains 1892 
In Italy it has long been the custom, since even the Middle Ages, for Italian witches to cover their identity with a veneer of Catholicism so as not to draw suspicion. This includes attending Mass and participating in the Rites of Passage expected of one in the Catholic community.   

Charles Leland, in his book Etruscan Magic & Occult Remedies, records the old connection between Witches and Catholicism, of which he writes: 
                                     

"As for families in which stregoneria, or a knowledge of charms, old traditions and songs is preserved, they do not among themselves pretend to be even Christian. That is to say, they maintain outward observances, and bring the children up as Catholics, and "keep in" with the priest, but as the children grow older, if any aptitude is observed in them for sorcery, some old grandmother or aunt takes them in hand, and initiates them into the ancient faith." 


Much of their magic is mixed with Catholic rites and saints, the origins of which date back to ancient times. Certain saints such as Anthony, Simon, and Elisha are viewed as demi-gods and their magical rites of evocation are performed in cellars. Leland mentions in the introduction to Etruscan Roman Remains, a conversation he had with a Strega woman, she says: 

"I call myself Catholic - oh yes - and I wear a medal to prove it" - here she, in excitement, pulled from her bosom a saint's medal - "but I believe in none of it all. You know what I believe." (Leland responds) "Si, la vecchia religione (the old faith), I answered, by which faith I meant that strange, diluted old Etrusco-Roman sorcery which is set forth in this book. Magic was her real religion." 

                         

Many modern Strega simply consider Catholics to be Pagans who have accepted the divinity of Jesus. There are some interesting concepts in both the Old and New Testaments which resemble Strega beliefs and may well be the foundation of such a concept. According to the New Testament the Magi were the first to seek out Jesus after "seeing" his star. Legend claims that they were astrologers and associates them with the lands of Chaldea, Egypt and Persia. These are all places that have an occult history dating far back into antiquity. The tale of the Magi recorded in the book of Matthew seems to indicate that these Mystic Pagans were among the first to go and pay homage to Jesus. In the book of proverbs (chapter 8, verse 2) we find a personage called "wisdom" conceived of in the form of a female divinity who "stands at the crossroads" (a phrase used in ancient times concerning the witches' goddess.) Wisdom speaks of being present both prior to and during the process of Creation. In verse 30 (The Jerusalem Bible) she claims to have been God's assistant during the process of Creation: 

"I was by his side, a master Craftsman, delighting him day after day, ever at play in his presence, at play everywhere in his world, delighting to be with the sons of men."

In the book of Wisdom (found only in the Catholic version), "wisdom" is praised with these words (chapter 7: 22-27):

"For within her is a spirit intelligent, holy...penetrating all intelligent, pure and most subtle spirits; for Wisdom is quicker to move than any motion; she is so pure, she pervades and permeates all things...She is a reflection of the eternal light, untarnished mirror of God's active power...although alone, she can do all; herself unchanging, she makes all things new..." 

Connected to this concept of the feminine aspect of Divinity is the word Ruach. In Hebrew this word is of feminine gender and would properly be defined in the sense of feminine divinity. When we read in the account of Creation (Book of Genesis) that the "spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters" the Hebrew word used here for spirit was ruach. In the New Testament this has been translated into "Holy Spirit" as in the Trinity concept of "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." Hebrew mystics of the Kabbalah considered ruach to be associated with the element of air and thus with spirit as well. Among early Kabbalists the sound of a word denoted its elemental association; soft sounds were associated with air, hard sounds with earth, hissing sounds with fire and muted sounds with water. 

It is not necessary, however, to look to Catholicism in order to find remnants of earlier pagan worship. Aspects of Stregoneria still survive today in both Italy and America, even among those who would not readily identify themselves as being members of La Vecchia Religione. They employ various prayers to a host of saints, lighting candles and placing assorted objects as required by tradition. Saints such as St. Anthony, St. Jude, St. Anna, and St. Simon have replaced the old pagan gods to whom similar prayers and offerings were once made.      

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              E T R U S C A N   -   R O M A N   R E M A I N S   I N   P O P U L A R   T R A D I T I O N



by Charles Godfrey Leland
[1892]


Charles Godfrey Leland, who also wrote Aradia, Gospel of the Witches, was a 19th century journalist, author and folklorist, specializing in Native American, Gypsy and Italian traditions. This book is a classic study of the folklore of the Tuscan region of Italy (to the northwest of Rome, around Florence). It ties these traditions to ancient Etruscan and Roman pagan practices. The central focus is the ideology and practice of Stregoneria, Italian traditional witchcraft.

This is essentially an ethnography of what neopagans term a 'family tradition': that is, practical magic--but with an Italian flavor. We meet the Goddess of Truffles, learn the details of divining by oil, fire and molten lead; how to bring back the dead, and coerce nature spirits into performing favors. Leland carefully documents his field notes, and includes the full text of numerous spells and songs in Italian, particularly the Tuscan dialect. The text includes many fairy-tales of the sort that are not suitable for children. Leland draws on often obscure sources which tie his data into classical and pre-classical pagan traditions, particularly the little-known Etruscan religion.

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But--as the saying goes--wait, there's more. Leland takes numerous witty, but somewhat bipolar, tangents. He is both a rationalist and a romantic; one moment he is off on an anti-clerical rant, the next he is revealing that he was initiated into witchcraft at an early age by a Pennsylvania Dutch nanny. He patronizes his informants with a wink and a nudge to the reader; then rhapsodizes over the innate spiritual qualities of the natural world in language that would make a neo-druid blush.

In short, Leland was obviously not the detached observer which modern social science demands. This has not helped acceptance of his books by academics, and even some neopagans are deeply suspicious of his work. However, he makes it clear that he isn't writing for a rigorous academic audience, but for posterity. As a progressive Victorian, Leland believed that modernism would soon overwhelm and extinguish these traditions. The antiquarian in him worked to bring them to light.

Although difficult reading at points, this book will reward anyone seeking details about the actual practice of a folk magic, which despite Lelands' prediction of its impending demise, persists to this day.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/pag/err/index.htm                           

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                              M O R E   A B O U T   C H A R L E S   L E I L A N D






It was in 1888 when Leland discovered himself in Florence, Italy, where he spent the remainder of his life. There he met a woman of whom he would only refer to as "Maddelena." Though some people believed her real name was Margherita Talanti. She worked the Florentine back streets as a "card reader" telling fortunes. Leland discovered that Maddelena was a Witch and quickly employed her to assist him in gathering material for his research of Italian Witchcraft. Pennell, in Leland's biography, mentions coming across a description of Maddelena in his manuscript notes:

…a young woman would have been taken for a Gypsy in England, but in whose face, in Italy, I soon learned to know the antique Etruscan, with its strange mysteries, to which was added the indefinable glance of the Witch. She was from the Romagna Toscana, born in the heart of its unsurpassingly wild and romantic scenery, amid cliffs, headlong torrents, forests, and old legendary castles. I did not gather all the facts for a long time, but gradually found that she was of a Witch family, or one whose members had, from time to immemorial, told fortunes, repeated ancient legends, gathered incantations, and learned how to intone them, prepared enchanted medicines, philters, or spells. As a girl, her Witch grandmother, aunt, and especially her stepmother brought her up to believe in her destiny as a sorceress, and taught her in the forests, afar from human ear, to chant in strange prescribed tones, incantations or evocations to the ancient gods of Italy, under names but little change, who are now known as folletti, spiriti, fate, or lari-the Lares or household goblins of the ancient Etruscans.
                             
Through his company with Maddelena she introduced him to another woman who also helped to provide material for his research. Her name was Marietta, whom from Leland's notes Pennell thought was a sorceress, but in his books Leland's description of Marietta is less clear. At one time Leland seemed to have suspected that the two women might have been fabricating the material, mostly verses, which they were giving him, but later he seems to change his mind. In later letter to his niece Leland describes the vast amount of training that Maddelena has undergone as a Witch. He wrote that her memory seemed inexhaustible, the incantations that she had learned seemed endless, and when her memory failed her she consulted another witch. She told him that you never finished learning Stregheria-witchcraft. Leland wrote that he was sure that the incantations were originally Etruscan; and Maddelena had written over 200 pages of folklore, incantations, and stories.

In letters addressed to others Leland tells of other Witches also helping him gather material. From them he obtained certifications that their testimonies about the Etruscan Jupiter, Bacchus, and so on were real. In this material was included some minor Roman rural deities. Leland wrote that he found himself in an atmosphere of witchcraft and sorcery as he went about collecting songs, spells, and stories of sorcery. An eminent scholar told him that he could do well at folklore except he had too many irons in the fire.

Leland described the Italian Witches that he met as "living in a bygone age." Apparently it was an age that he longed for himself. There is indication in his work Etruscan Roman Remains that Leland not only kept company with the Witches he met but was initiated into the Stregheria.

True, there are witches good and bad, but all whom I ever met belonged entirely to the buone. It was their rivals and enemies who were maladette et cetera, but the latter I never met. We were all good.

In the chapter entitled "Witches and Witchcraft" in the same book Leland indicates a priest joined the Craft. He asked a strega how a certain priest became a stregone. The female Witch answered the he (the priest) "came to practice our noble profession." It is assumed that the stega, Leland and the priest all belonged to the same organization, or fraternity.

Some people are puzzled by Leland's descriptions of Italian Witchcraft when reading his works. He describes the Witchcraft in common negative Christian stereotypes of the period while depicting the Witches as "good" and "noble" followers of the goddess Diana instead of the devil.

His book Aradia: Gospel of the Witches is an example of this as it was a shocking turn from his general theme of the good witches of Benevento. Perhaps Leland was attempting to describe both attitudes toward Witchcraft at that time: the attitude of the Italian people, and the one of the Witches themselves. The author T. C. Lethbridge speculated that the Aradia: Gospel of the Witches might be a collection of beliefs and practices dating back just to the Middle Ages but drawing on beliefs perhaps much older.                         


http://www.themystica.com/mystica/articles/l/Leland_charles_godfrey.html