Gerald Gardner
Encyclopedia
Gerald Brousseau Gardner (13 June 1884 – 12 February 1964), who sometimes used the craft name Scire, was an influential English
Wicca
n, as well as an amateur anthropologist
and archaeologist
, writer
, weaponry expert
and occultist. He was instrumental in bringing the Neopagan
religion of Wicca to public attention in Britain and wrote some of its definitive religious texts. He himself typically referred to the faith as "witchcraft" or "the witch-cult", its adherents "the Wica", and he claimed that it was the survival of a pre-Christian pagan
Witch cult
that he had been initiated into by a New Forest coven
in 1939.
Gardner spent much of his life abroad in southern
and south-eastern Asia, where he developed an interest in many of the native peoples, and wrote about some of their magical practices. It was after his retirement and return to England that he was initiated into Wicca by the New Forest coven. Subsequently fearing that this religion, which he apparently believed to be a genuine continuance of ancient beliefs, would die out, he set about propagating it through initiating others, mainly through the Bricket Wood coven
, and introduced a string of notable High Priestesses into Wicca, including Doreen Valiente
, Lois Bourne
, Patricia Crowther
and Eleanor Bone
. He would go on to develop his own variant of the Craft that has come to be named after him, Gardnerian Wicca
, which combined the teachings that he had received from the New Forest coven with additional ideas taken from a number of disparate sources, including Freemasonry
, ceremonial magic
, mediaeval grimoire
s and the writings of the occultist Aleister Crowley
, a man whom Gardner knew personally.
He also published two books on the subject of Wicca, Witchcraft Today
(1954) and The Meaning of Witchcraft
(1959), along with a couple of novels, and ran the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft
on the Isle of Man, which was devoted to the subject. For this, he has left an enduring legacy on the modern Wiccan and Neopagan movement, and is frequently referred to as "the Father of Wicca".
(but attributed to Jack L. Bracelin
) as one of the first titles of Shah's Octagon Press
publishing house. Writers such as Ronald Hutton
, Leo Ruickbie
, Doreen Valiente
, Lois Bourne
and Philip Heselton
have also discussed Gardner's involvement with Wicca in their books.
, near Liverpool
in England
to a well-off middle class
family as one of four brothers, only two of which, Bob and Douglas, lived with Gerald at home. The family business was Joseph Gardner & Sons, the British Empire
's oldest and largest importer of hardwood
, and they were of Scottish
ancestry.
The Gardners' had in their service an Irish
nursemaid named Josephine "Com" McCombie, who was employed to take care of the young Gerald. Gardner had been suffering from asthma
at the time, bearing the illness from a young age, and his nursemaid had offered to take him to warmer climates at his father's expense. This began in 1891, when the pair travelled to the Canary Islands
, and they then went on to Accra
, followed by Madeira
. According to Gardner's official biographer, J.C. Bracelin, Com was very flirtatious and "clearly looked on these trips as mainly manhunts".
), and it was agreed with the Gardners that Gerald would live with her on a tea plantation named Ladbroke Estate. In 1905, Gardner came back to Britain for a visit, during which he spent a lot of time with family relations known as the Surgensons. Gerald became very friendly with this side of his family, whom his mother and father avoided because they were Methodists.
According to Gerald the Surgensons readily talked about the paranormal
with Gardner. The patriarch of the family, Ted Surgenson, Gerald claimed believed that fairies were living in his garden, would say "I can often feel they're there, and sometimes I've seen them", though he readily admitted the possibility that it was all in his imagination. It was from the Surgensons that Gardner claimed to have discovered a family rumour that his grandfather, Joseph, had been a practising witch, after being converted to the practice by his mistress. Another family belief according to Gerald was that a Scottish ancestor, Grissell Gairdner, had been burned as a witch
in Newburgh
in 1610.
In 1908, after a brief stint in Singapore
, Gardner moved to Borneo
where he became a rubber
planter on the Mawo Estate at Membuket, where he did not get on well with the manager, Graham, who had wanted to cut down all the local forest to grow rubber. Instead Gardner became friendly with many of the locals, including the Dyaks
, a tribe of local headhunters. Gardner, as an amateur anthropologist, was fascinated by their way of life, particularly their weaponry, but also their beliefs in polytheism
and spiritualism
.
for a holiday, on his planned way back to Ceylon, however he was soon offered a job working on a rubber plantation and decided to stay. It was here that Gardner made friends with an American man known as Cornwall, who had converted to Islam
, and married a local Malay woman. Through Cornwall, Gardner was introduced to many locals, whom he soon befriended. He went on to also befriend members of the Saki, a secretive jungle tribe of pygmies.
In 1916 Gardner once again returned to Britain. At the time, the country was fighting in the First World War
, and so he attempted to join the British Navy, but was turned down due to ill health. Unable to fight on the front lines, he began working in a hospital treating injured soldiers from the Western Front
. He soon had to give this up when he caught malaria
, and so decided to return to Malaya. His mother died in 1920, though Gardner did not return home on this occasion. In 1923, he gave up his job as a rubber planter, and became a civil servant inspecting the various rubber plantations around the country. In this role he had to deal with a great deal of criminality, and was shot at on a number of occasions.
In 1927 his father became very ill and he returned to Britain. On this visit, he began to investigate spiritualism
and mediumship
. He soon had several encounters which he attributed to spirits of deceased family members. Continuing to visit Spiritualist churches and seances, he was highly critical of much of what he saw, but he encountered several mediums he considered genuine, some of which concerned obscure prophecies that later came true. That same year, Gardner married Dorothea Rosedale, who went by the name of Donna, and they honeymoon
ed in Ryde
, before both headed, via France
, to Malaya. Gardner witnessed the magical practises performed by the Malay locals, and both he and Cornwall readily accepted a belief in magic
. During his time in the country, Gardner became very interested in local customs, namely those involved in folk magic and weapons. In 1936, he published an authoritative text on the subject of the keris, a Malayan knife used for magical purposes: Keris and other Malay Weapons. Gardner was not only interested in the anthropology of Malaya, but also in its archaeology. He began excavations at the city of Johore Lama, alone and in secret, as the local Sultan considered archaeologists little better than grave-robbers. Prior to Gardner's investigations, no serious archaeological excavation had occurred at the city, though he himself soon unearthed four miles of earthworks, and uncovered finds that included tombs, pottery, and porcelain dating from Ming China. He went on to begin further excavations at the royal cemetery of Kota Tinggi
, and the jungle-city of Syong Penang. His finds were displayed as an exhibit on the "Early History of Johore", at the Museum of Singapore, and several beads that he had discovered helped to prove that trade went on between the Roman Empire
and the Malays, presumably, Gardner thought, via India
.
, where he became involved in the archaeological excavations at Lachish
. Here he grew particularly interested in a temple containing statues to both the male deity of Judeo-Christian theology and the pagan goddess Astaroth
. From there he went on to Turkey
, visiting several local museums, and to Greece
, followed by Hungary
and Germany
(which at the time was under the Nazi regime). He eventually reached England, but soon went on a visit to Denmark
to attend a conference on weaponry.
In 1938 he sailed to Cyprus
. Gardner was a believer in reincarnation
, and felt that he had lived on the island once before; he wrote his first novel, A Goddess Arrives, partially based upon his supposed recollections of a past life on the island. A Goddess Arrives was set in ancient Cyprus and featured a queen, Dayonis, who practiced sorcery in an attempt to help her people defend themselves from invading Egyptians. In 1938, Gardner returned from Cyprus to Britain, where he and Donna settled down and remained for much of the rest of his life. Despite initially living in London
, the pair soon moved to Highcliffe
, just south of the New Forest
, Hampshire
. With the threat of war with Nazi Germany
looming, Gardner joined the Air Raid Precautions
as a warden, and he went on to arm, from his own personal collection of weapons, many of the members of his local A.R.P.
held by a local dramatic society known as the Rosicrucian
Theatre. Donna, herself an amateur thespian, hated it, thinking the quality of both actors and script terrible, and she refused to go again. Gardner was intrigued, however, and joined the group running the theatre - the Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship
, an occult
society based upon Rosicrucianism. However, Gardner was quite critical of many of the group's practices; their leader, who went by the name of Aurelius, claimed to be the reincarnation of Pythagoras
, Cornelius Agrippa and Francis Bacon
. Gardner facetiously asked if he was also the Wandering Jew
, much to the annoyance of Aurelius himself. Another belief held by the group that Gardner found amusing was that a lamp hanging from one of the ceilings was the disguised holy grail
of Arthurian legend. Gardner's dissatisfaction with the group grew, particularly when in 1939, one of the group's leaders sent a letter out to all members in which she stated that war would not come. The very next day, Britain declared war on Germany
, greatly unimpressing the increasingly cynical Gardner.
Prior to his encounter with Wicca, Gardner was already an accomplished writer on the topic of magic and witchcraft. For instance, he had become a member of the Folklore Society
in 1939. His first contribution to its journal Folklore, appeared in the June 1939 issue and described a box of witchcraft relics that he believed had belonged to the 17th century 'Witch-Finder General', Matthew Hopkins
. In 1946 he became a member of the society's council, and anxious to achieve academic acceptance, claimed to have doctoral degrees from the Universities of Singapore and Toulouse. Doreen Valiente
has shown these claims were untrue.
Meanwhile, Gardner became good friends with a group of people within the Rosicrucian Crotona Fellowship who the later researcher Philip Heselton
speculated to be the siblings Ernest and Susie Mason. According to Gardner, "unlike many of the others, had to earn their livings, were cheerful and optimistic and had a real interest in the occult". Gardner later said of them:
One night in September 1939 they took him to a large house owned by "Old Dorothy" Clutterbuck
, a wealthy local woman, where he was made to strip naked and taken through an initiation ceremony. Halfway through the ceremony, he heard the word "Wica", and he recognised it as an Old English word for witchcraft. He was already acquainted with Margaret Murray
's theory of the Witch-cult
, and "I then knew that that which I had thought burnt out hundreds of years ago still survived. How wonderful; to think that these things still survive." This group, he claimed, were the New Forest coven
, and he believed them to be one of the few surviving coven
s of the ancient, pre-Christian Witch-Cult religion. Subsequent research by the likes of Hutton and Heselton has shown that in fact the New Forest coven was probably only formed in the early 20th century, based upon such sources as folk magic and the theories of Margaret Murray. It has also been speculated that the woman who initiated Gardner was an elocution teacher named Edith Woodford-Grimes, who went under the pseudonym of "Dafo" and the two would certainly remain friends for the rest of their lives.
Gardner only ever described one of their rituals in depth, and this was an event that he termed "Operation Cone of Power". According to his own account, it took place in 1940 in a part of the New Forest and was designed to ward off the Nazis from invading Britain by magical means. Gardner said of this:
, with himself as High Priest and Edith Woodford-Grimes as High Priestess. The new group met on the grounds of the Fiveacres Nudist Club, Bricket Wood
, outside St Albans
, which Gardner, being a keen nudist, had purchased the previous year. They celebrated their rites and rituals for the esbat
s and sabbats in a building known as the Witches' Cottage, which Gardner had assembled in the centre of the Club's woodland
; the cottage itself had been purchased off of his friend, J.S.M Ward
, who was a pioneer of the restoration of historical buildings.
Alongside his work with the Craft in his coven, Gardner became interested in many other forms of esotericism
and the occult
around this time. He joined the Ancient Druid Order, an organisation that promoted the Neopagan
religion of Druidry
, as well as a mystical Christian
group, the Ancient British Church, who ordained him as a priest. The researcher Philip Heselton also speculated that Gardner may well have met Dion Byngham, the leader of the pagan wing of the Order of Woodcraft Chivalry
, whose beliefs and practices, termed Dionisianism after the Greco-Roman god Dionysus
, bore many similarities with Gardnerian Wicca.
On May Day
1947, his friend, the stage magician Arnold Crowther
, introduced Gardner to his friend, the Magus Aleister Crowley
. Shortly before his death, Crowley elevated Gardner to the VII° of Ordo Templi Orientis
(O.T.O.) and issued a charter decreeing that Gardner could perform its preliminary initiation rituals. The charter itself was written in Gardner's handwriting and only signed by Crowley. Crowley's friend and student, Gerald Yorke, was reported to have stated that Gardner had paid £300 for Crowley to sign the charter, though this story seems highly apocryphal. Despite owning it, and later displaying it in his Museum of Magic and Witchcraft, Gardner never made use of his O.T.O. charter or performed any of the rituals it allowed him to, claiming that he "had neither the money, energy or time". Crowley also sold Gardner some of his books, including The Book of the Law
and The Blue Equinox
which may have been the source of Crowley material later used within Gardner's witchcraft rites. This is consistent with Gardner's claims that the rituals he had received were fragmentary, and that he had incorporated other material to make a coherent system.
After Crowley's death on 1 December 1947, Gardner was considered the highest ranking O.T.O. member in Europe, and contacted another English member Lady Frieda Harris (painter of the Thoth tarot deck
) about continuing the work of the Order in the U.K. Lady Harris wrote to Karl Germer
, Crowley's successor as head of O.T.O., on 2 January 1948 that Gardner was now the "Head of the O.T.O. in Europe". Gardner later met with Germer in New York to formulate further plans for the O.T.O. However Gardner's continuing ill health during this period led to the abandonment of the plans, and in 1951 he was replaced by Frederic Mellinger as the O.T.O's European representative.
Dr Leo Ruickbie
concluded that Aleister Crowley played a crucial role in inspiring Gardner to establish a new pagan religion. Ruickbie, Hutton, Rankine & d'Este, and Orpheus all argue that much of what has been published of Gardnerian Wicca
, as Gardner's practice came to be known by, was derived from works by Aleister Crowley and also contains borrowings from other identifiable sources.
in London's Atlantis Bookshop during a talk which Gardner was giving. Williamson later revealed that he was planning to open a museum devoted to witchcraft and magic, the Folklore Centre of Superstition and Witchcraft, in Castletown on the Isle of Man
. The following year Gardner and his wife moved to the island, where Gardner became employed as the museum's "resident witch". On 29 July, The Sunday Pictorial published an article about the museum in which Gardner declared "Of course I'm a witch. And I get great fun out of it." The museum was not a financial success, and the relationship between Gardner and Williamson deteriorated. In 1954, Gardner bought the museum off of Williamson, who returned to England to found the rival Museum of Witchcraft
, eventually settling it in Boscastle
, Cornwall
. Gardner renamed his exhibition the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft and continued running it up until his death.
In 1952, Gardner had begun to correspond with a young woman named Doreen Valiente
. She eventually requested initiation into the Craft, and though Gardner was hesitant at first, he agreed that they could meet during the winter at the home of Edith Woodford-Grimes. Valiente got on well with both Gardner and Woodford-Grimes, and having no objections to either ritual nudity or scourging (which she had read about in a copy of Gardner's novel High Magic's Aid that he had given to her), she was initiated by Gardner into Wicca on Midsummer 1953. Valiente went on to join the Bricket Wood Coven. She soon rose to become the High Priestess of the coven, and helped Gardner to rewrite his Book of Shadows
, cutting out Crowley's influence, which she feared was too shrouded in bad publicity.
In 1954, Gardner published a non-fiction book, Witchcraft Today
, containing a preface by Margaret Murray
, who had published her theory of a surviving Witch-Cult in her 1921 book, The Witch-Cult in Western Europe. In his book, Gardner not only espoused the survival of the Witch-Cult, but also his theory that a belief in faeries
in Europe was due to a secretive pygmy race that lived alongside other communities, and that the Knights Templar
had been initiates of the Craft. Alongside this book, Gardner began to increasingly court publicity, going so far as to invite the press to write articles about the religion. Many of these turned out very negatively for the cult; one declared "Witches Devil-Worship in London!", and another accused him of whitewashing witchcraft in his luring of people into covens. Gardner continued courting publicity, despite the negative articles that many tabloids were producing, and believed that only through publicity could more people become interested in witchcraft, so preventing the "Old Religion", as he called it, from dying out.
Gardner's increasingly overt attempts at garnering media attention was one of the major reasons for rifts in his coven (and others). Many Witches felt he was threatening their traditional vows of secrecy and bringing about too much bad publicity, which in turn led to ostracism and job losses. Gardner introduced the Wiccan Laws
to his coven, which drastically limited the powers of the High Priestess and even allowed the High Priest to call for the retirement of the High Priestess when he considered her too old. Valiente and other members of the coven were furious and left in disgust. Valiente herself said "we had had enough of the gospel according to Gerald, but we still believed that the ancient religion of Witchcraft had existed".
In 1959 Gardner published his final book, The Meaning of Witchcraft
. It was a sequel to Witchcraft Today, and included his early witchcraft experiences with the New Forest Coven.
, but used the name of one of Gardner's High Priests, Jack L. Bracelin
, because Shah was wary about being associated with Witchcraft. In May of that year, Gardner travelled to Buckingham Palace
, where he enjoyed a garden party in recognition of his years of service to the Empire in the Far East. Soon after his trip, Gardner's wife Donna died, and Gardner himself once again began to suffer badly from asthma
. The following year he, along with Shah and Lois Bourne, travelled to the island of Majorca to holiday with the poet Robert Graves
, whose The White Goddess
would play a significant part in the burgeoning Wiccan religion. In 1963, Gardner decided to go to Lebanon
over the winter. Whilst returning home on the ship, The Scottish Prince on 12 February 1964, he suffered a fatal heart attack at the breakfast table. He was buried in Tunisia
, the ship's next port of call, and his funeral was attended only by the ship's captain. He was 79 years old.
Though having bequeathed the museum, all his artifacts, and the copyright to his books in his will to one of his High Priestess', Monique Wilson, she and her husband sold off the artefact collection to the American Ripley’s, Believe It Or Not organisation several years later. Ripley's took the collection to America, where it was displayed in two museums before being sold off during the 1980s. Gardner had also left parts of his inheritance to Patricia Crowther
, Doreen Valiente
, Lois Bourne
and Jack Bracelin, the latter inheriting the Fiveacres Nudist Club and taking over as full-time High Priest of the Bricket Wood coven.
Several years after Gardner's death, the Wiccan High Priestess Eleanor Bone
visited North Africa and went looking for Gardner's grave. She discovered that the cemetery he was interned in was to be redeveloped, and so she raised enough money for his body to be moved to another cemetery in Tunis
, where it currently remains. In 2007, a new plaque was attached to his grave, describing him as being "Father of Modern Wicca. Beloved of the Great Goddess".
attacks. Despite this, as many coven members slept over at his cottage due to living too far away to travel home safely, he was known to cuddle up to his young High Priestess, Dayonis, after rituals. The author Philip Heselton
, who largely researched Wicca's origins, came to the conclusion that Gardner had held a long-term affair with Dafo
, a theory expanded upon by Adrian Bott. Gardner was a nudist, taking up the hobby on doctor's instructions after getting a bad cold
. Those who knew him within the modern witchcraft movement recalled how he was a firm believer in the therapeutic benefits of sunbathing. He also had several tattoo
s on his body, depicting magical symbols such as a snake, dragon, anchor and dagger. In his later life he wore a "heavy bronze bracelet... denoting the three degrees... of witchcraft" as well as a "large silver ring with... signs on it, which... represented his witch-name 'Scire', in the letters of the magical Theban alphabet
."
According to Bricket Wood coven member Fred Lamond
, Gardner also used to comb his beard into a narrow barbiche
and his hair into two horn like peaks, giving him "a somewhat demonic appearance". Doreen Valiente
, who had split from Gardner's Bricket Wood coven over disagreements regarding his handling of publicity and his control over the group, recounted many years after his death:
----
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
Wicca
Wicca
Wicca , is a modern Pagan religious movement. Developing in England in the first half of the 20th century, Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by a Wiccan High Priest named Gerald Gardner, who at the time called it the "witch cult" and "witchcraft," and its adherents "the Wica."...
n, as well as an amateur anthropologist
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
and archaeologist
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
, writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
, weaponry expert
Weapon
A weapon, arm, or armament is a tool or instrument used with the aim of causing damage or harm to living beings or artificial structures or systems...
and occultist. He was instrumental in bringing the Neopagan
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...
religion of Wicca to public attention in Britain and wrote some of its definitive religious texts. He himself typically referred to the faith as "witchcraft" or "the witch-cult", its adherents "the Wica", and he claimed that it was the survival of a pre-Christian pagan
Paganism
Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....
Witch cult
Witch-cult hypothesis
The Witch-cult is the term for a hypothetical pre-Christian, pagan religion of Europe that survived into at least the early modern period. As late as the 19th and early 20th centuries, some scholars had postulated that European witchcraft was part of a Satanic plot to overthrow Christianity; most...
that he had been initiated into by a New Forest coven
New Forest coven
The New Forest coven were a group of Neopagan witches or Wiccans who allegedly met around the area of the New Forest in southern England during the 1930s and 1940s...
in 1939.
Gardner spent much of his life abroad in southern
South Asia
South Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan countries and, for some authorities , also includes the adjoining countries to the west and the east...
and south-eastern Asia, where he developed an interest in many of the native peoples, and wrote about some of their magical practices. It was after his retirement and return to England that he was initiated into Wicca by the New Forest coven. Subsequently fearing that this religion, which he apparently believed to be a genuine continuance of ancient beliefs, would die out, he set about propagating it through initiating others, mainly through the Bricket Wood coven
Bricket Wood coven
The Bricket Wood coven, or Hertfordshire coven was a coven of Gardnerian Witches founded in the 1940s by Gerald Gardner. It was notable for being the first coven in the Gardnerian line, though having its supposed origins in the pre-Gardnerian New Forest coven...
, and introduced a string of notable High Priestesses into Wicca, including Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
, Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne is an influential figure in the Neopagan religion of Wicca, having been involved in it from the early 1960s, and has written a number of books on the subject...
, Patricia Crowther
Patricia Crowther (Wiccan)
Patricia Crowther is considered influential in the early promotion of the Wicca religion. She was born in Sheffield as Patricia Dawson....
and Eleanor Bone
Eleanor Bone
Eleanor "Ray" Bone was an influential figure in the neopagan religion of Wicca. She claimed to have been initiated in 1941 by a couple of hereditary witches in Cumbria. She later met and became friends with Gerald Gardner, and was initiated into Wicca, becoming the High Priestess in one of his...
. He would go on to develop his own variant of the Craft that has come to be named after him, Gardnerian Wicca
Gardnerian Wicca
Gardnerian Wicca, or Gardnerian Witchcraft, is a mystery cult tradition or denomination in the neopagan religion of Wicca, whose members can trace initiatory descent from Gerald Gardner. The tradition is itself named after Gardner , a British civil servant and scholar of magic...
, which combined the teachings that he had received from the New Forest coven with additional ideas taken from a number of disparate sources, including Freemasonry
Freemasonry
Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation that arose from obscure origins in the late 16th to early 17th century. Freemasonry now exists in various forms all over the world, with a membership estimated at around six million, including approximately 150,000 under the jurisdictions of the Grand Lodge...
, ceremonial magic
Ceremonial magic
Ceremonial magic, also referred to as high magic and as learned magic, is a broad term used in the context of Hermeticism or Western esotericism to encompass a wide variety of long, elaborate, and complex rituals of magic. It is named as such because the works included are characterized by...
, mediaeval grimoire
Grimoire
A grimoire is a textbook of magic. Such books typically include instructions on how to create magical objects like talismans and amulets, how to perform magical spells, charms and divination and also how to summon or invoke supernatural entities such as angels, spirits, and demons...
s and the writings of the occultist Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley , born Edward Alexander Crowley, and also known as both Frater Perdurabo and The Great Beast, was an influential English occultist, astrologer, mystic and ceremonial magician, responsible for founding the religious philosophy of Thelema. He was also successful in various other...
, a man whom Gardner knew personally.
He also published two books on the subject of Wicca, Witchcraft Today
Witchcraft Today
In the book Gardner also repeats the claim, which had originated with Matilda Joslyn Gage, that 9 million victims were killed in the European witch-hunts." Current scholarly estimates of the number of people executed for witchcraft during this time period vary between about 40,000 and 100,000.The...
(1954) and The Meaning of Witchcraft
The Meaning of Witchcraft
The Meaning of Witchcraft is a non-fiction book written by Gerald Gardner, the, known to many in the modern sense as the "Father of Wicca", based around his experiences with the religion of Wicca and the New Forest Coven...
(1959), along with a couple of novels, and ran the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft
Museum of Witchcraft
Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall, England is a museum dedicated to witchcraft and has the largest collection of witchcraft and Wiccan related artifacts in the world...
on the Isle of Man, which was devoted to the subject. For this, he has left an enduring legacy on the modern Wiccan and Neopagan movement, and is frequently referred to as "the Father of Wicca".
Biography
To date, there is only one dedicated biography about Gardner, which was Gerald Gardner: Witch, published in 1960, and written by his friend, Idries ShahIdries Shah
Idries Shah , also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi , was an author and teacher in the Sufi tradition who wrote over three dozen critically acclaimed books on topics ranging from psychology and spirituality to travelogues and culture studies.Born in India, the descendant of a...
(but attributed to Jack L. Bracelin
Jack L. Bracelin
Jack L. Bracelin was an influential figure in the early history of the neopagan religion of Wicca, being a High Priest of Gardnerian Wicca who had been inititated into the craft by Doreen Valiente in 1956 and had been a member of the Bricket Wood coven....
) as one of the first titles of Shah's Octagon Press
Octagon Press
Octagon Press is a cross-cultural publishing house based in London, UK. It was founded in 1960 by Sufi teacher, Idries Shah to establish the historical and cultural context for his ideas.-Description:Octagon Press published many of Shah's later works...
publishing house. Writers such as Ronald Hutton
Ronald Hutton
Ronald Hutton is an English historian who specializes in the study of Early Modern Britain, British folklore, pre-Christian religion and contemporary Paganism. A reader in the subject at the University of Bristol, Hutton has published fourteen books and has appeared on British television and radio...
, Leo Ruickbie
Leo Ruickbie
Leo Ruickbie is an historian and sociologist of magic, witchcraft and Wicca. He is the author of several books, beginning with Witchcraft Out of the Shadows, a 2004 publication outlining the history of witchcraft from ancient Greece until the modern day. Ruickbie was born in Scotland and took a...
, Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
, Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne is an influential figure in the Neopagan religion of Wicca, having been involved in it from the early 1960s, and has written a number of books on the subject...
and Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton is a retired British Conservation Officer, a Wiccan initiate, and a writer on the subjects of Wicca, Paganism and Earth mysteries...
have also discussed Gardner's involvement with Wicca in their books.
Early life
Gardner was born at The Glen, Crosby, BlundellsandsBlundellsands
Blundellsands or Blundell Sands is an area of Merseyside, England in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton, and a Sefton council electoral ward...
, near Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
to a well-off middle class
Middle class
The middle class is any class of people in the middle of a societal hierarchy. In Weberian socio-economic terms, the middle class is the broad group of people in contemporary society who fall socio-economically between the working class and upper class....
family as one of four brothers, only two of which, Bob and Douglas, lived with Gerald at home. The family business was Joseph Gardner & Sons, the British Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
's oldest and largest importer of hardwood
Hardwood
Hardwood is wood from angiosperm trees . It may also be used for those trees themselves: these are usually broad-leaved; in temperate and boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostly evergreen.Hardwood contrasts with softwood...
, and they were of Scottish
Scottish people
The Scottish people , or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse.In modern use,...
ancestry.
The Gardners' had in their service an Irish
Irish people
The Irish people are an ethnic group who originate in Ireland, an island in northwestern Europe. Ireland has been populated for around 9,000 years , with the Irish people's earliest ancestors recorded having legends of being descended from groups such as the Nemedians, Fomorians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha...
nursemaid named Josephine "Com" McCombie, who was employed to take care of the young Gerald. Gardner had been suffering from asthma
Asthma
Asthma is the common chronic inflammatory disease of the airways characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and bronchospasm. Symptoms include wheezing, coughing, chest tightness, and shortness of breath...
at the time, bearing the illness from a young age, and his nursemaid had offered to take him to warmer climates at his father's expense. This began in 1891, when the pair travelled to the Canary Islands
Canary Islands
The Canary Islands , also known as the Canaries , is a Spanish archipelago located just off the northwest coast of mainland Africa, 100 km west of the border between Morocco and the Western Sahara. The Canaries are a Spanish autonomous community and an outermost region of the European Union...
, and they then went on to Accra
Accra
Accra is the capital and largest city of Ghana, with an urban population of 1,658,937 according to the 2000 census. Accra is also the capital of the Greater Accra Region and of the Accra Metropolitan District, with which it is coterminous...
, followed by Madeira
Madeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
. According to Gardner's official biographer, J.C. Bracelin, Com was very flirtatious and "clearly looked on these trips as mainly manhunts".
Ceylon and Borneo, 1900-1911
In 1900, Com married David Elkington, a wealthy man in Ceylon (modern Sri LankaSri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
), and it was agreed with the Gardners that Gerald would live with her on a tea plantation named Ladbroke Estate. In 1905, Gardner came back to Britain for a visit, during which he spent a lot of time with family relations known as the Surgensons. Gerald became very friendly with this side of his family, whom his mother and father avoided because they were Methodists.
According to Gerald the Surgensons readily talked about the paranormal
Paranormal
Paranormal is a general term that designates experiences that lie outside "the range of normal experience or scientific explanation" or that indicates phenomena understood to be outside of science's current ability to explain or measure...
with Gardner. The patriarch of the family, Ted Surgenson, Gerald claimed believed that fairies were living in his garden, would say "I can often feel they're there, and sometimes I've seen them", though he readily admitted the possibility that it was all in his imagination. It was from the Surgensons that Gardner claimed to have discovered a family rumour that his grandfather, Joseph, had been a practising witch, after being converted to the practice by his mistress. Another family belief according to Gerald was that a Scottish ancestor, Grissell Gairdner, had been burned as a witch
Witch-hunt
A witch-hunt is a search for witches or evidence of witchcraft, often involving moral panic, mass hysteria and lynching, but in historical instances also legally sanctioned and involving official witchcraft trials...
in Newburgh
Newburgh
-Places:Scotland*Newburgh, Fife, a former royal burgh*Newburgh, Aberdeenshire, a village*Newburgh, Borders, a village*Newburgh, Moray, a village*Newburgh, Orkney, a villageEngland*Newburgh, Lancashire, a village*Newburgh, North Yorkshire, a village...
in 1610.
In 1908, after a brief stint in Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
, Gardner moved to Borneo
Borneo
Borneo is the third largest island in the world and is located north of Java Island, Indonesia, at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia....
where he became a rubber
Rubber
Natural rubber, also called India rubber or caoutchouc, is an elastomer that was originally derived from latex, a milky colloid produced by some plants. The plants would be ‘tapped’, that is, an incision made into the bark of the tree and the sticky, milk colored latex sap collected and refined...
planter on the Mawo Estate at Membuket, where he did not get on well with the manager, Graham, who had wanted to cut down all the local forest to grow rubber. Instead Gardner became friendly with many of the locals, including the Dyaks
Dayak people
The Dayak or Dyak are the native people of Borneo. It is a loose term for over 200 riverine and hill-dwelling ethnic subgroups, located principally in the interior of Borneo, each with its own dialect, customs, laws, territory and culture, although common distinguishing traits are readily...
, a tribe of local headhunters. Gardner, as an amateur anthropologist, was fascinated by their way of life, particularly their weaponry, but also their beliefs in polytheism
Polytheism
Polytheism is the belief of multiple deities also usually assembled into a pantheon of gods and goddesses, along with their own mythologies and rituals....
and spiritualism
Spiritualism
Spiritualism is a belief system or religion, postulating the belief that spirits of the dead residing in the spirit world have both the ability and the inclination to communicate with the living...
.
Malaya, 1911-1936
In 1911, Gardner travelled to MalayaBritish Malaya
British Malaya loosely described a set of states on the Malay Peninsula and the Island of Singapore that were brought under British control between the 18th and the 20th centuries...
for a holiday, on his planned way back to Ceylon, however he was soon offered a job working on a rubber plantation and decided to stay. It was here that Gardner made friends with an American man known as Cornwall, who had converted to Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, and married a local Malay woman. Through Cornwall, Gardner was introduced to many locals, whom he soon befriended. He went on to also befriend members of the Saki, a secretive jungle tribe of pygmies.
In 1916 Gardner once again returned to Britain. At the time, the country was fighting in the First World War
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, and so he attempted to join the British Navy, but was turned down due to ill health. Unable to fight on the front lines, he began working in a hospital treating injured soldiers from the Western Front
Western Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
. He soon had to give this up when he caught malaria
Malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...
, and so decided to return to Malaya. His mother died in 1920, though Gardner did not return home on this occasion. In 1923, he gave up his job as a rubber planter, and became a civil servant inspecting the various rubber plantations around the country. In this role he had to deal with a great deal of criminality, and was shot at on a number of occasions.
In 1927 his father became very ill and he returned to Britain. On this visit, he began to investigate spiritualism
Spiritualism
Spiritualism is a belief system or religion, postulating the belief that spirits of the dead residing in the spirit world have both the ability and the inclination to communicate with the living...
and mediumship
Mediumship
Mediumship is described as a form of communication with spirits. It is a practice in religious beliefs such as Spiritualism, Spiritism, Espiritismo, Candomblé, Voodoo and Umbanda.- Concept :...
. He soon had several encounters which he attributed to spirits of deceased family members. Continuing to visit Spiritualist churches and seances, he was highly critical of much of what he saw, but he encountered several mediums he considered genuine, some of which concerned obscure prophecies that later came true. That same year, Gardner married Dorothea Rosedale, who went by the name of Donna, and they honeymoon
Honeymoon
-History:One early reference to a honeymoon is in Deuteronomy 24:5 “When a man is newly wed, he need not go out on a military expedition, nor shall any public duty be imposed on him...
ed in Ryde
Ryde
Ryde is a British seaside town, civil parish and the most populous town and urban area on the Isle of Wight, with a population of approximately 30,000. It is situated on the north-east coast. The town grew in size as a seaside resort following the joining of the villages of Upper Ryde and Lower...
, before both headed, via France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, to Malaya. Gardner witnessed the magical practises performed by the Malay locals, and both he and Cornwall readily accepted a belief in magic
Magic (paranormal)
Magic is the claimed art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science. It is in contrast to science, in that science does not accept anything not subject to either direct or indirect observation, and subject to logical...
. During his time in the country, Gardner became very interested in local customs, namely those involved in folk magic and weapons. In 1936, he published an authoritative text on the subject of the keris, a Malayan knife used for magical purposes: Keris and other Malay Weapons. Gardner was not only interested in the anthropology of Malaya, but also in its archaeology. He began excavations at the city of Johore Lama, alone and in secret, as the local Sultan considered archaeologists little better than grave-robbers. Prior to Gardner's investigations, no serious archaeological excavation had occurred at the city, though he himself soon unearthed four miles of earthworks, and uncovered finds that included tombs, pottery, and porcelain dating from Ming China. He went on to begin further excavations at the royal cemetery of Kota Tinggi
Kota Tinggi
Kota Tinggi is a town in the state of Johor of Malaysia, located around 42 kilometers north-east of Johor Bahru, on the road to Mersing. Hometown of Azizul Hanipah. Kota Tinggi can also be reached by ferry from Changi terminal in Singapore where tourists need to pass through the immigration check...
, and the jungle-city of Syong Penang. His finds were displayed as an exhibit on the "Early History of Johore", at the Museum of Singapore, and several beads that he had discovered helped to prove that trade went on between the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
and the Malays, presumably, Gardner thought, via India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
.
Return to Europe
In 1936, Gardner left Malaya, and on his way back to Britain, visited PalestinePalestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
, where he became involved in the archaeological excavations at Lachish
Lachish
Lachish was an ancient Near East town located at the site of modern Tell ed-Duweir in the Shephelah, a region between Mount Hebron and the maritime plain of Philistia . The town was first mentioned in the Amarna letters as Lakisha-Lakiša...
. Here he grew particularly interested in a temple containing statues to both the male deity of Judeo-Christian theology and the pagan goddess Astaroth
Astaroth
Astaroth , in demonology, is a Crowned Prince of Hell. He is a male figure named after the Canaanite goddess Ashtoreth.-Background:...
. From there he went on to Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
, visiting several local museums, and to Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, followed by Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
and Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
(which at the time was under the Nazi regime). He eventually reached England, but soon went on a visit to Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
to attend a conference on weaponry.
In 1938 he sailed to Cyprus
Cyprus
Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...
. Gardner was a believer in reincarnation
Reincarnation
Reincarnation best describes the concept where the soul or spirit, after the death of the body, is believed to return to live in a new human body, or, in some traditions, either as a human being, animal or plant...
, and felt that he had lived on the island once before; he wrote his first novel, A Goddess Arrives, partially based upon his supposed recollections of a past life on the island. A Goddess Arrives was set in ancient Cyprus and featured a queen, Dayonis, who practiced sorcery in an attempt to help her people defend themselves from invading Egyptians. In 1938, Gardner returned from Cyprus to Britain, where he and Donna settled down and remained for much of the rest of his life. Despite initially living in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, the pair soon moved to Highcliffe
Highcliffe
Highcliffe-on-Sea is a small town in the borough of Christchurch, Dorset in southern England. It forms part of the South East Dorset conurbation along the English Channel coast...
, just south of the New Forest
New Forest
The New Forest is an area of southern England which includes the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pasture land, heathland and forest in the heavily-populated south east of England. It covers south-west Hampshire and extends into south-east Wiltshire....
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
. With the threat of war with Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
looming, Gardner joined the Air Raid Precautions
Air Raid Precautions
Air Raid Precautions was an organisation in the United Kingdom set up as an aid in the prelude to the Second World War dedicated to the protection of civilians from the danger of air-raids. It was created in 1924 as a response to the fears about the growing threat from the development of bomber...
as a warden, and he went on to arm, from his own personal collection of weapons, many of the members of his local A.R.P.
The Rosicrucian Order and the New Forest Coven
In 1939, Gardner took his wife to a theatrical performance on the life of PythagorasPythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos was an Ionian Greek philosopher, mathematician, and founder of the religious movement called Pythagoreanism. Most of the information about Pythagoras was written down centuries after he lived, so very little reliable information is known about him...
held by a local dramatic society known as the Rosicrucian
Rosicrucian
Rosicrucianism is a philosophical secret society, said to have been founded in late medieval Germany by Christian Rosenkreuz. It holds a doctrine or theology "built on esoteric truths of the ancient past", which, "concealed from the average man, provide insight into nature, the physical universe...
Theatre. Donna, herself an amateur thespian, hated it, thinking the quality of both actors and script terrible, and she refused to go again. Gardner was intrigued, however, and joined the group running the theatre - the Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship
Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship
The Rosicrucian Order Crotona Fellowship was a Rosicrucian group founded by George Alexander Sullivan in about 1924. It may have existed under the name Order of Twelve from 1911–1914 and again from 1920. The ROCF operated first from the Liverpool area of England and then after the mid-1930s from...
, an occult
Occult
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...
society based upon Rosicrucianism. However, Gardner was quite critical of many of the group's practices; their leader, who went by the name of Aurelius, claimed to be the reincarnation of Pythagoras
Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos was an Ionian Greek philosopher, mathematician, and founder of the religious movement called Pythagoreanism. Most of the information about Pythagoras was written down centuries after he lived, so very little reliable information is known about him...
, Cornelius Agrippa and Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Albans, KC was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, author and pioneer of the scientific method. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England...
. Gardner facetiously asked if he was also the Wandering Jew
Wandering Jew
The Wandering Jew is a figure from medieval Christian folklore whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. The original legend concerns a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming...
, much to the annoyance of Aurelius himself. Another belief held by the group that Gardner found amusing was that a lamp hanging from one of the ceilings was the disguised holy grail
Holy Grail
The Holy Grail is a sacred object figuring in literature and certain Christian traditions, most often identified with the dish, plate, or cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper and said to possess miraculous powers...
of Arthurian legend. Gardner's dissatisfaction with the group grew, particularly when in 1939, one of the group's leaders sent a letter out to all members in which she stated that war would not come. The very next day, Britain declared war on Germany
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, greatly unimpressing the increasingly cynical Gardner.
Prior to his encounter with Wicca, Gardner was already an accomplished writer on the topic of magic and witchcraft. For instance, he had become a member of the Folklore Society
Folklore Society
The Folklore Society was founded in England in 1878 to study traditional vernacular culture, including traditional music, song, dance and drama, narrative, arts and crafts, customs and belief...
in 1939. His first contribution to its journal Folklore, appeared in the June 1939 issue and described a box of witchcraft relics that he believed had belonged to the 17th century 'Witch-Finder General', Matthew Hopkins
Matthew Hopkins
Matthew Hopkins was an English witchhunter whose career flourished during the time of the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament...
. In 1946 he became a member of the society's council, and anxious to achieve academic acceptance, claimed to have doctoral degrees from the Universities of Singapore and Toulouse. Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
has shown these claims were untrue.
Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton is a retired British Conservation Officer, a Wiccan initiate, and a writer on the subjects of Wicca, Paganism and Earth mysteries...
speculated to be the siblings Ernest and Susie Mason. According to Gardner, "unlike many of the others, had to earn their livings, were cheerful and optimistic and had a real interest in the occult". Gardner later said of them:
- I was really very fond of them, and I knew that they had all sorts of magical beliefs. They had been very interested when I told them that an ancestress of mine had been burned alive as a witch at Newborough in Scotland about 1640; although I did not mention Grandfather. And I would have gone through hell and high water even then for any of them.
One night in September 1939 they took him to a large house owned by "Old Dorothy" Clutterbuck
Dorothy Clutterbuck
Dorothy Clutterbuck , was a wealthy Englishwoman who was named by Gerald Gardner as a leading member of the New Forest coven, a group of pagan Witches into which Gardner claimed to have been initiated in 1939...
, a wealthy local woman, where he was made to strip naked and taken through an initiation ceremony. Halfway through the ceremony, he heard the word "Wica", and he recognised it as an Old English word for witchcraft. He was already acquainted with Margaret Murray
Margaret Murray
Margaret Alice Murray was a prominent British Egyptologist and anthropologist. Primarily known for her work in Egyptology, which was "the core of her academic career," she is also known for her propagation of the Witch-cult hypothesis, the theory that the witch trials in the Early Modern period of...
's theory of the Witch-cult
Witch-cult hypothesis
The Witch-cult is the term for a hypothetical pre-Christian, pagan religion of Europe that survived into at least the early modern period. As late as the 19th and early 20th centuries, some scholars had postulated that European witchcraft was part of a Satanic plot to overthrow Christianity; most...
, and "I then knew that that which I had thought burnt out hundreds of years ago still survived. How wonderful; to think that these things still survive." This group, he claimed, were the New Forest coven
New Forest coven
The New Forest coven were a group of Neopagan witches or Wiccans who allegedly met around the area of the New Forest in southern England during the 1930s and 1940s...
, and he believed them to be one of the few surviving coven
Coven
A coven or covan is a name used to describe a gathering of witches or in some cases vampires. Due to the word's association with witches, a gathering of Wiccans, followers of the witchcraft-based neopagan religion of Wicca, is also described as a coven....
s of the ancient, pre-Christian Witch-Cult religion. Subsequent research by the likes of Hutton and Heselton has shown that in fact the New Forest coven was probably only formed in the early 20th century, based upon such sources as folk magic and the theories of Margaret Murray. It has also been speculated that the woman who initiated Gardner was an elocution teacher named Edith Woodford-Grimes, who went under the pseudonym of "Dafo" and the two would certainly remain friends for the rest of their lives.
Gardner only ever described one of their rituals in depth, and this was an event that he termed "Operation Cone of Power". According to his own account, it took place in 1940 in a part of the New Forest and was designed to ward off the Nazis from invading Britain by magical means. Gardner said of this:
- We were taken at night to a place in the Forest, where the Great Circle was erected; and that was done which may not be done except in great emergency. And the great cone of power was raised and slowly directed in the general direction of Hitler. The command was given: "you cannot cross the sea, you cannot cross the sea, you cannot come, you cannot come". Just as, we were told, was done to Napoleon, when he had his army ready to invade England and never came. And, as was done to the Spanish Armada
Spanish ArmadaThis article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...
, mighty forces were used, of which I may not speak.
Aleister Crowley and the Early Gardnerian Tradition, 1946-1950
In 1946, with the end of the Second World War, Gardner and his wife Donna left the New Forest and returned to London. However, Gardner did not want to abandon his new faith, and fearing that it would die out, founded his own coven, the Bricket Wood CovenBricket Wood coven
The Bricket Wood coven, or Hertfordshire coven was a coven of Gardnerian Witches founded in the 1940s by Gerald Gardner. It was notable for being the first coven in the Gardnerian line, though having its supposed origins in the pre-Gardnerian New Forest coven...
, with himself as High Priest and Edith Woodford-Grimes as High Priestess. The new group met on the grounds of the Fiveacres Nudist Club, Bricket Wood
Bricket Wood
Bricket Wood is a village in the county of Hertfordshire, England, approximately 4½ miles from St Albans. It is part of the parish of St Stephen. Its railway station is served by a London Midland service that runs between St Albans Abbey and Watford Junction stations.Close to the village stands...
, outside St Albans
St Albans
St Albans is a city in southern Hertfordshire, England, around north of central London, which forms the main urban area of the City and District of St Albans. It is a historic market town, and is now a sought-after dormitory town within the London commuter belt...
, which Gardner, being a keen nudist, had purchased the previous year. They celebrated their rites and rituals for the esbat
Esbat
An esbat is a coven meeting other than one of the Sabbats within Wicca and other Wiccan-influenced forms of Neopaganism. Janet and Stewart Farrar describe esbats as an opportunity for a "love feast, healing work, psychic training and all."...
s and sabbats in a building known as the Witches' Cottage, which Gardner had assembled in the centre of the Club's woodland
Woodland
Ecologically, a woodland is a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade. Woodlands may support an understory of shrubs and herbaceous plants including grasses. Woodland may form a transition to shrubland under drier conditions or during early stages of...
; the cottage itself had been purchased off of his friend, J.S.M Ward
John Sebastian Marlowe Ward
John Sebastian Marlow Ward was an English writer on Freemasonry and spiritual matters....
, who was a pioneer of the restoration of historical buildings.
Esotericism
Esotericism or Esoterism signifies the holding of esoteric opinions or beliefs, that is, ideas preserved or understood by a small group or those specially initiated, or of rare or unusual interest. The term derives from the Greek , a compound of : "within", thus "pertaining to the more inward",...
and the occult
Occult
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...
around this time. He joined the Ancient Druid Order, an organisation that promoted the Neopagan
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...
religion of Druidry
Neo-Druidism
Neo-Druidism or Neo-Druidry, commonly referred to as Druidism or Druidry by its adherents, is a form of modern spirituality or religion that generally promotes harmony and worship of nature, and respect for all beings, including the environment...
, as well as a mystical Christian
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
group, the Ancient British Church, who ordained him as a priest. The researcher Philip Heselton also speculated that Gardner may well have met Dion Byngham, the leader of the pagan wing of the Order of Woodcraft Chivalry
Order of Woodcraft Chivalry
The Order of Woodcraft Chivalry is a Scouting-like movement operating in the United Kingdom, which was founded in 1916 by Ernest Westlake. Like Scouting, it was inspired by Ernest Seton's Seton Indians, and Seton was its honourary Grand Chieftain...
, whose beliefs and practices, termed Dionisianism after the Greco-Roman god Dionysus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...
, bore many similarities with Gardnerian Wicca.
On May Day
May Day
May Day on May 1 is an ancient northern hemisphere spring festival and usually a public holiday; it is also a traditional spring holiday in many cultures....
1947, his friend, the stage magician Arnold Crowther
Arnold Crowther
Arnold Crowther was a skilled stage magician, ventriloquist, and puppeteer, and was married to Patricia Crowther. He was born as one of a pair of fraternal twins...
, introduced Gardner to his friend, the Magus Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley , born Edward Alexander Crowley, and also known as both Frater Perdurabo and The Great Beast, was an influential English occultist, astrologer, mystic and ceremonial magician, responsible for founding the religious philosophy of Thelema. He was also successful in various other...
. Shortly before his death, Crowley elevated Gardner to the VII° of Ordo Templi Orientis
Ordo Templi Orientis
Ordo Templi Orientis is an international fraternal and religious organization founded at the beginning of the 20th century...
(O.T.O.) and issued a charter decreeing that Gardner could perform its preliminary initiation rituals. The charter itself was written in Gardner's handwriting and only signed by Crowley. Crowley's friend and student, Gerald Yorke, was reported to have stated that Gardner had paid £300 for Crowley to sign the charter, though this story seems highly apocryphal. Despite owning it, and later displaying it in his Museum of Magic and Witchcraft, Gardner never made use of his O.T.O. charter or performed any of the rituals it allowed him to, claiming that he "had neither the money, energy or time". Crowley also sold Gardner some of his books, including The Book of the Law
The Book of the Law
Liber AL vel Legis is the central sacred text of Thelema, written by Aleister Crowley in Cairo, Egypt in the year 1904. Its full title is Liber AL vel Legis, sub figura CCXX, as delivered by XCIII=418 to DCLXVI, and it is commonly referred to as The Book of the Law.Liber AL vel Legis contains three...
and The Blue Equinox
The Blue Equinox
The Blue Equinox first published in 1919, is a book by English mystic and occultist Aleister Crowley, the founder of Thelema, detailing the principles and aims of the secret society O.T.O. and its ally the A∴A∴...
which may have been the source of Crowley material later used within Gardner's witchcraft rites. This is consistent with Gardner's claims that the rituals he had received were fragmentary, and that he had incorporated other material to make a coherent system.
After Crowley's death on 1 December 1947, Gardner was considered the highest ranking O.T.O. member in Europe, and contacted another English member Lady Frieda Harris (painter of the Thoth tarot deck
Thoth tarot deck
The Thoth Tarot is a divinatory tarot deck painted by Lady Frieda Harris according to instructions from Aleister Crowley. Crowley referred to this deck as The Book of Thoth, and also wrote a book of that title intended for use with the deck....
) about continuing the work of the Order in the U.K. Lady Harris wrote to Karl Germer
Karl Germer
Karl Germer was the Outer Head of the Order of Ordo Templi Orientis from 1947 until his death in 1962...
, Crowley's successor as head of O.T.O., on 2 January 1948 that Gardner was now the "Head of the O.T.O. in Europe". Gardner later met with Germer in New York to formulate further plans for the O.T.O. However Gardner's continuing ill health during this period led to the abandonment of the plans, and in 1951 he was replaced by Frederic Mellinger as the O.T.O's European representative.
Dr Leo Ruickbie
Leo Ruickbie
Leo Ruickbie is an historian and sociologist of magic, witchcraft and Wicca. He is the author of several books, beginning with Witchcraft Out of the Shadows, a 2004 publication outlining the history of witchcraft from ancient Greece until the modern day. Ruickbie was born in Scotland and took a...
concluded that Aleister Crowley played a crucial role in inspiring Gardner to establish a new pagan religion. Ruickbie, Hutton, Rankine & d'Este, and Orpheus all argue that much of what has been published of Gardnerian Wicca
Gardnerian Wicca
Gardnerian Wicca, or Gardnerian Witchcraft, is a mystery cult tradition or denomination in the neopagan religion of Wicca, whose members can trace initiatory descent from Gerald Gardner. The tradition is itself named after Gardner , a British civil servant and scholar of magic...
, as Gardner's practice came to be known by, was derived from works by Aleister Crowley and also contains borrowings from other identifiable sources.
Doreen Valiente and the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft, 1950-1957
In 1950, Gardner met the Witch Cecil WilliamsonCecil Williamson
Cecil Williamson was an influential English Neopagan Witch. He was the founder of both the Witchcraft Research Center which was a part of MI6's war against Nazi Germany, and the Museum of Witchcraft...
in London's Atlantis Bookshop during a talk which Gardner was giving. Williamson later revealed that he was planning to open a museum devoted to witchcraft and magic, the Folklore Centre of Superstition and Witchcraft, in Castletown on the Isle of Man
Isle of Man
The Isle of Man , otherwise known simply as Mann , is a self-governing British Crown Dependency, located in the Irish Sea between the islands of Great Britain and Ireland, within the British Isles. The head of state is Queen Elizabeth II, who holds the title of Lord of Mann. The Lord of Mann is...
. The following year Gardner and his wife moved to the island, where Gardner became employed as the museum's "resident witch". On 29 July, The Sunday Pictorial published an article about the museum in which Gardner declared "Of course I'm a witch. And I get great fun out of it." The museum was not a financial success, and the relationship between Gardner and Williamson deteriorated. In 1954, Gardner bought the museum off of Williamson, who returned to England to found the rival Museum of Witchcraft
Museum of Witchcraft
Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall, England is a museum dedicated to witchcraft and has the largest collection of witchcraft and Wiccan related artifacts in the world...
, eventually settling it in Boscastle
Boscastle
Boscastle is a village and fishing port on the north coast of Cornwall, England, in the civil parish of Forrabury and Minster. It is situated 14 miles south of Bude and 5 miles north-east of Tintagel....
, Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
. Gardner renamed his exhibition the Museum of Magic and Witchcraft and continued running it up until his death.
In 1952, Gardner had begun to correspond with a young woman named Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
. She eventually requested initiation into the Craft, and though Gardner was hesitant at first, he agreed that they could meet during the winter at the home of Edith Woodford-Grimes. Valiente got on well with both Gardner and Woodford-Grimes, and having no objections to either ritual nudity or scourging (which she had read about in a copy of Gardner's novel High Magic's Aid that he had given to her), she was initiated by Gardner into Wicca on Midsummer 1953. Valiente went on to join the Bricket Wood Coven. She soon rose to become the High Priestess of the coven, and helped Gardner to rewrite his Book of Shadows
Book of Shadows
A Book of Shadows is a book containing religious texts and instructions for magical rituals found within the Neopagan religion of Wicca. Originating within the Gardnerian tradition of the Craft, the first Book of Shadows was created by the pioneering Wiccan Gerald Gardner sometime in the late 1940s...
, cutting out Crowley's influence, which she feared was too shrouded in bad publicity.
In 1954, Gardner published a non-fiction book, Witchcraft Today
Witchcraft Today
In the book Gardner also repeats the claim, which had originated with Matilda Joslyn Gage, that 9 million victims were killed in the European witch-hunts." Current scholarly estimates of the number of people executed for witchcraft during this time period vary between about 40,000 and 100,000.The...
, containing a preface by Margaret Murray
Margaret Murray
Margaret Alice Murray was a prominent British Egyptologist and anthropologist. Primarily known for her work in Egyptology, which was "the core of her academic career," she is also known for her propagation of the Witch-cult hypothesis, the theory that the witch trials in the Early Modern period of...
, who had published her theory of a surviving Witch-Cult in her 1921 book, The Witch-Cult in Western Europe. In his book, Gardner not only espoused the survival of the Witch-Cult, but also his theory that a belief in faeries
Fairy
A fairy is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term...
in Europe was due to a secretive pygmy race that lived alongside other communities, and that the Knights Templar
Knights Templar
The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon , commonly known as the Knights Templar, the Order of the Temple or simply as Templars, were among the most famous of the Western Christian military orders...
had been initiates of the Craft. Alongside this book, Gardner began to increasingly court publicity, going so far as to invite the press to write articles about the religion. Many of these turned out very negatively for the cult; one declared "Witches Devil-Worship in London!", and another accused him of whitewashing witchcraft in his luring of people into covens. Gardner continued courting publicity, despite the negative articles that many tabloids were producing, and believed that only through publicity could more people become interested in witchcraft, so preventing the "Old Religion", as he called it, from dying out.
Gardner's increasingly overt attempts at garnering media attention was one of the major reasons for rifts in his coven (and others). Many Witches felt he was threatening their traditional vows of secrecy and bringing about too much bad publicity, which in turn led to ostracism and job losses. Gardner introduced the Wiccan Laws
Wiccan Laws
The Wiccan Laws, also called the Craft Laws, the Old Laws, the Ardanes or simply The Laws are the traditional laws of Wicca from the Book of Shadows...
to his coven, which drastically limited the powers of the High Priestess and even allowed the High Priest to call for the retirement of the High Priestess when he considered her too old. Valiente and other members of the coven were furious and left in disgust. Valiente herself said "we had had enough of the gospel according to Gerald, but we still believed that the ancient religion of Witchcraft had existed".
In 1959 Gardner published his final book, The Meaning of Witchcraft
The Meaning of Witchcraft
The Meaning of Witchcraft is a non-fiction book written by Gerald Gardner, the, known to many in the modern sense as the "Father of Wicca", based around his experiences with the religion of Wicca and the New Forest Coven...
. It was a sequel to Witchcraft Today, and included his early witchcraft experiences with the New Forest Coven.
Later life and death
In 1960, Gardner's official biography, entitled Gerald Gardner: Witch, was published. It was written by a friend of his, the Sufi mystic Idries ShahIdries Shah
Idries Shah , also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi , was an author and teacher in the Sufi tradition who wrote over three dozen critically acclaimed books on topics ranging from psychology and spirituality to travelogues and culture studies.Born in India, the descendant of a...
, but used the name of one of Gardner's High Priests, Jack L. Bracelin
Jack L. Bracelin
Jack L. Bracelin was an influential figure in the early history of the neopagan religion of Wicca, being a High Priest of Gardnerian Wicca who had been inititated into the craft by Doreen Valiente in 1956 and had been a member of the Bricket Wood coven....
, because Shah was wary about being associated with Witchcraft. In May of that year, Gardner travelled to Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace, in London, is the principal residence and office of the British monarch. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is a setting for state occasions and royal hospitality...
, where he enjoyed a garden party in recognition of his years of service to the Empire in the Far East. Soon after his trip, Gardner's wife Donna died, and Gardner himself once again began to suffer badly from asthma
Asthma
Asthma is the common chronic inflammatory disease of the airways characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and bronchospasm. Symptoms include wheezing, coughing, chest tightness, and shortness of breath...
. The following year he, along with Shah and Lois Bourne, travelled to the island of Majorca to holiday with the poet Robert Graves
Robert Graves
Robert von Ranke Graves 24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985 was an English poet, translator and novelist. During his long life he produced more than 140 works...
, whose The White Goddess
The White Goddess
The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
would play a significant part in the burgeoning Wiccan religion. In 1963, Gardner decided to go to Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
over the winter. Whilst returning home on the ship, The Scottish Prince on 12 February 1964, he suffered a fatal heart attack at the breakfast table. He was buried in Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
, the ship's next port of call, and his funeral was attended only by the ship's captain. He was 79 years old.
Though having bequeathed the museum, all his artifacts, and the copyright to his books in his will to one of his High Priestess', Monique Wilson, she and her husband sold off the artefact collection to the American Ripley’s, Believe It Or Not organisation several years later. Ripley's took the collection to America, where it was displayed in two museums before being sold off during the 1980s. Gardner had also left parts of his inheritance to Patricia Crowther
Patricia Crowther (Wiccan)
Patricia Crowther is considered influential in the early promotion of the Wicca religion. She was born in Sheffield as Patricia Dawson....
, Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
, Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne
Lois Bourne is an influential figure in the Neopagan religion of Wicca, having been involved in it from the early 1960s, and has written a number of books on the subject...
and Jack Bracelin, the latter inheriting the Fiveacres Nudist Club and taking over as full-time High Priest of the Bricket Wood coven.
Several years after Gardner's death, the Wiccan High Priestess Eleanor Bone
Eleanor Bone
Eleanor "Ray" Bone was an influential figure in the neopagan religion of Wicca. She claimed to have been initiated in 1941 by a couple of hereditary witches in Cumbria. She later met and became friends with Gerald Gardner, and was initiated into Wicca, becoming the High Priestess in one of his...
visited North Africa and went looking for Gardner's grave. She discovered that the cemetery he was interned in was to be redeveloped, and so she raised enough money for his body to be moved to another cemetery in Tunis
Tunis
Tunis is the capital of both the Tunisian Republic and the Tunis Governorate. It is Tunisia's largest city, with a population of 728,453 as of 2004; the greater metropolitan area holds some 2,412,500 inhabitants....
, where it currently remains. In 2007, a new plaque was attached to his grave, describing him as being "Father of Modern Wicca. Beloved of the Great Goddess".
Personal life
Gardner only married once in his life, to Donna, and several who knew him made the claim that he was devoted to her. Indeed, after her death in 1960, he began to again suffer serious asthmaAsthma
Asthma is the common chronic inflammatory disease of the airways characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and bronchospasm. Symptoms include wheezing, coughing, chest tightness, and shortness of breath...
attacks. Despite this, as many coven members slept over at his cottage due to living too far away to travel home safely, he was known to cuddle up to his young High Priestess, Dayonis, after rituals. The author Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton
Philip Heselton is a retired British Conservation Officer, a Wiccan initiate, and a writer on the subjects of Wicca, Paganism and Earth mysteries...
, who largely researched Wicca's origins, came to the conclusion that Gardner had held a long-term affair with Dafo
Dafo
Edith Rose Woodford-Grimes was an English Wiccan who achieved notoriety as one of the faith's earliest known adherents. She had been a member of the New Forest coven which met during the late 1930s and early 1940s, and through this became a friend and working partner of Gerald Gardner, who would...
, a theory expanded upon by Adrian Bott. Gardner was a nudist, taking up the hobby on doctor's instructions after getting a bad cold
Cold
Cold describes the condition of low temperature.Cold may also refer to:*Common cold, a contagious viral infectious disease of the upper respiratory system*Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease...
. Those who knew him within the modern witchcraft movement recalled how he was a firm believer in the therapeutic benefits of sunbathing. He also had several tattoo
Tattoo
A tattoo is made by inserting indelible ink into the dermis layer of the skin to change the pigment. Tattoos on humans are a type of body modification, and tattoos on other animals are most commonly used for identification purposes...
s on his body, depicting magical symbols such as a snake, dragon, anchor and dagger. In his later life he wore a "heavy bronze bracelet... denoting the three degrees... of witchcraft" as well as a "large silver ring with... signs on it, which... represented his witch-name 'Scire', in the letters of the magical Theban alphabet
Theban alphabet
The Theban alphabet is a writing system with unknown origins. It was first published in Johannes Trithemius' Polygraphia , in which it was attributed to Honorius of Thebes. Trithemius' student Agrippa attributed it to Pietro d'Abano...
."
According to Bricket Wood coven member Fred Lamond
Fred Lamond
Frederic Lamond is a prominent English Wiccan who was an early member of the Gardnerian tradition, having been initiated into it in 1957, when he joined the Bricket Wood coven...
, Gardner also used to comb his beard into a narrow barbiche
Goatee
Goatee refers to a style of facial hair incorporating hair on a man’s chin. The exact nature of the style has varied according to time and culture.Traditionally, goatee refers solely to a beard formed by a tuft of hair on the chin...
and his hair into two horn like peaks, giving him "a somewhat demonic appearance". Doreen Valiente
Doreen Valiente
Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente , who also went under the craft name Ameth, was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho...
, who had split from Gardner's Bricket Wood coven over disagreements regarding his handling of publicity and his control over the group, recounted many years after his death:
- With all his faults (and who among us is faultless?), Gerald was a great person, and he did great work in bringing back the Old Religion to many people. I am glad to have known him.
External links
- GeraldGardner.com an online reference resource
- Historical documents and media reports about Gardner
- Biography at Controverscial.com
- Biography at About.com
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