into the woods

Ania | They/Them, She/Her Queer. Married. ⚢. White-Appearing Biracial. Autistic. Traditional Folk Magician. Black Book Traditional Witch. Kyrkogardsgangare. Smdltgumma. Trollpacka. Hearthkeeper. Retired Teacher (Diverse Needs, Early Education, Elementary, History, and College Writing) + DEI Program & Resource Coordinator. Caretaker/Homemaker. Practicing diasporic familial folk magic since the late 1990’s. I speak Swedish & English. I have no Devil, no Witchfather; only Hagstone and Toad’s Bone.

𝔄𝔟𝔬𝔲𝔱 𝔪𝔶 𝔓𝔯𝔞𝔠𝔱𝔦𝔠𝔢

Please note that all of the labels I include here are used describe form, method and function, not aesthetics. My practice does not have any core or defining aesthetic value apart from my own personal preference for how the tools/curios that I make and procure look. All elements of my witchcraft are utilitarian in nature.

My Witchcraft: Founded on Familial Cunning Practice. Non-Lineaged, Non-Cochranian Traditional Magic. Practical/Non-Ceremonial Traditional Witchcraft. Black Book Traditional Magic. European Traditional Folk Magic. Commonplace Magic. Sustainable Magic. Handmade Magic. Service Magic. Animistic. Spirit Work. Spirit Flight. (In addition to my core practice, I also practice hearthcraft and various domestic magics.)

My Faith Practice: Independent Paganism. Unnamed Gods. Influenced by Dagger Period, Bronze Age, and Vendel Period Germanic and Nordic Faith & Practice. Mythic/Named Pantheon Venerated as Spiritual Ancestors and Mediators. Earlier Animistic and Cosmological Understandings Central to Worship. Secular Jewish Observation as Familial Identity, Ancestor Veneration and Traditionkeeping. Land Stewardship.

Many of the posts here will be meant only for my records and may therefore lack context or other details.

𝔄𝔟𝔬𝔲𝔱 𝔱𝔥𝔦𝔰 𝔅𝔩𝔬𝔤

This blog is where I keep academic projects, reflections, and quotations. It functions as a witchcraft and folklore bookblr/studyblr, as well as a space to document certain notes and projects that I take on. My catch-all, public consumption witchcraft blog (and where I like and follow from) is @slewfootwitch.

This is a historical charm from Manuscript KU3335 from Lakbäck, Hälsingland (in central Sweden). It is included in Dr. Thomas K. Johnson's Svartkonstböcker as MS 5 in its English translation. It is also included in the earlier version of this dissertation (Tidebast och Vändelrot) in its original Swedish, which is where I initially found its attestation. KU3335 was cataloged by the Royal Library. It belonged to the father of the man who lent it to the library (J. Arboren). According to the owner of the book, his father was a fisherman, farmer, and cunningman who copied the book from a cunningman's manuscript (which he had borrowed from the man's wife). Because the original book had been taken without the owner's permission, Aboren's father had only one day to copy all from the Black Book that he could manage, and must return the book before its owner came home the next day.

Swedish Charm: Blod mot blod. Hud mot hud, kött mot kott [.] Sen mot sen, Ben mot ben och Blod mot blod. Satt du onda blod, satt du goda blod. [Här] skall du stå och intet rinna du skall wara så sen till att rinna, lika så som Jesum Christum när han bar sitt kors i Örtagården till att springa. Statt du blod här skall du stå och der skall du Stanna så säkert som den själ som e Helwettt står och Stannar.

Translation: The faith and spirit that the stories create are always broken off from ancient rock, but the guise in which they are clothed comes from various ages, and the stories stretch over many centuries. Each tale in this book bears the mark of these transformations of the narratives, and how they reappear, renewed, from century to century.

Translation: "[...] and this is because folk tales are not antiquarian knowledge in the usual sense of the word, which is preserved unchanged from age to age; instead, they are ancient in spirit but new in composition; the old stories wither and perish over time, but in their place new minds arise, and new stories, which the imaginative spirit of the folk continually shapes anew."

Blåkulla Bokstäver: Post One (Tag)

Now that I have 10 handwritten pages so far of work on this rune-glyph system (and many more to go), I will only be privately recording them in batches of 4 (which means I will also only be writing them up here in batches of 4) because each write up takes about a page and, frankly, my wrist hurts at the end of it all.

Fä - "Beast/Livestock": Lineaged from Fehu. Represents the f-sound in spoken language. The shape is directly lineaged from Fehu's, symbolic of a horned animal. In divination, Fä represents wealth that sustains life, whether it is moveable money or a stocked refrigerator. It represents prosperity in the sense of having everything you need to be fed and comfortable. In mundanity, this glyph represents resources at our disposal; in spirit work, it can sometimes represent offerings.

Ur - "Out From/Origins": Lineaged from Uruz. Represents the u-sound in spoken language. The shape is inspired by both Uruz and the jordfäst (earth-stuck) stones and boulders than are used as places of magic in my practice, intended to represent someone or something standing on a strong foundation. Ur represents primal force and primordial roots. It is a symbol of strength and power that is beyond ourselves, that is wild and ancestral. It reminds us that, underneath it all, we are made of all the same things our ancestors were, and that we have the same reserves of strength, sovereignty and power. In mundanity, this symbol represents inner power and wild strength; in spirit-work, it can also represent unnamed, and primordial forces.

Törne - "Thorn": Lineaged from Thurisaz. Represents the th-sound, kept for English-language use and loanwords. The shape is a simplified version of barbed wire or blackthorn thorns. This glyph has a similar energy to the Tower in Tarot. It is a sign of unavoidable but necessary change. It is also a harbinger of chaos and strife. It represents a significant challenge or struggle that one must make their way through. This has the same overall meaning in mundane divination as in spirit and deity work; but, because of its Thurisaz lineage, it can likely also be a sign associated with gods and spirits associated with chaos and trickery.

Blåkulla Bokstäver - Intro Post (Tag)

This is what I have so far. I will write up they're names and such soon.

I have had several dreams about finding the runes in my own fumbling way, in my own little death journeys. In the dreams, the runes I pulled from the water were never the runes I knew and worked with. They were different, strange symbols I'd never seen before, but reading them was the same. The meanings were the same. The sounds were the same.

I initially had chalked this up to being just because it was in a dream. Sometimes, in my dreams, words and letters and numbers won't appear the way they do in waking. But I'll understand them. So, it made sense to me that that was what was happening in my dreams about the runes. But, as time as gone on and I've communed with the gods and my ancestors, I've started to wonder if maybe that's not what's happening in the dreams at all. Maybe they're not about finding the runes; maybe they are, indeed, about finding my "runes".

I have been reflecting on this in making offerings about it. The only thing I haven't done is take divination about it (though that seems unnecessary in light of the crow family that took up residence outside my window after my initial offerings on the matter). And I do think it's time for me to make my own alphabetical glyphs. Not just for divination but also for use with modern Swedish, with letters that support the sounds of modern Swedish and divinatory meanings that correspond to the meanings of the runes.