Join me next week at the Utica Library @uticapubliclibrary
This event is FREE, in-person and not recorded (like a sand painting once it’s over it’s gone forever :D)
I’m excited to present this class at the Utica Library next week! The Mohawk Valley is where I was born and grew up and I am full of gratitude for this land and my community here. I have spent all of my life playing, hiking , dreaming, and exploring the hills, mountains, trails and river flats from the valley up to the Adirondacks.
When I was a small girl my Nonno (grandfather) would take me hiking on the trails by his cabin near Old Forge in the mountains and I always wanted to go off the trail. I would ask if we could and he always said “yes!”. He would follow me, and guide me, through the woods and up the rock faces.
The flora and fauna here feel like family to me. When I became an herbalist I spent much of my time gathering wild plants in forests and fields until I learned the terrain near my house (outside of Newport, NY) so well that I can now tell you where every patch of Wild Sarsaparilla grows for acres and acres around me.
I am looking forward to sharing some of my favorite plants during this talk. I’ll have some live plants to show you and slides of a bunch more.
Registration is appreciated! Link in bio
#mohawkvalley #wildplants #herbalism #herbalmedicine
And “Della Medicina” is released! Today is the day that this book full of years and years of love and devotion is fully available.
With gorgeous illustrations by @ravenandmagnolia , forward by @marybethbonfiglio and contributions from @profgmm and @cimarutaremedies .
🌱🌱🌱
Also a great honor to have an endorsement from the most venerable author of many non-fiction books and journals about folklore, witchcraft, religion and professor Anthropology at the University of British Colombia, Sabina Magliocco @possumbina
Della Medicina is available at all major booksellers! Or head to my profile for more details.
🌀🕷️🌶️🤘🏼
#italianfolkmedicine #italianfolkmagic #italianamerican #italianwitchcraft #witchcraft #witchesofinstagram #strega #americanstrega #plantmagic #folkmedicine #writersofinstagram #herbalmedicine #herbalism #italiandiaspora #italianmagic #folkmagic #Stregoneria
#MedicinalPlants #sacredplants #folkmedicine #ancestralhealing #folkloric
#writersofinstagram #folkcatholic #traditionalmedicine #ancestralmagic #folkhealer #ancestralwisdom #folkcatholicism #medicinemaking #italianaf #contadina
Hail Mary, Full of Grace
(Luke 1 28: Χαῖρε, κεχαριτωμένη, ὁ Κύριος μετὰ σοῦ)
“Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee”
“Ave Maria, piena di grazia (Hail Mary, full of grace)
She is a landing place for grace and when we pray to her we ask for that.
This is part 2 of a series about the Ave Maria or Hail Mary, a Catholic prayer that has its origins in the New Testament but emerges from an ancient tradition of sacred and coded speech.
It is the same style of speech we find in the Orphic hymns that use sound, rhythm, and tonal reverberation to formulate language keys that match and invoke divine patterns and beings into communication/communion with initiates of that tradition.
This is a way of speaking that we could also equate with witchcraft and the creation of spells that are meant to align us with various forces in nature. This is partly why it is so important that we are careful with our words, especially when it is our intent to connect with non-material realms.
The Ave Maria is not a random series of phrases, but is instead can be understood as a precise devotional formula, even through translation.”
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Read the full piece at:
Image 2: The beginning of the Gospel of Luke(chapter 1:1–7a), folio 102 in Minuscule 481, made in 10th century
Join me with Cassandra Harris Lockwood Wednesday on Utica NY’s @955theheat Phoenix radio! The topic is menopausal and post-menopausal urinary system and pelvic health using herbs. We’ll also talk about physiology and how post-partum care as well as life long activities can impact how we experience our bodies during this phase of life.
This is a live radio show you can stream at 95.5theheat.com
#herbalmedicine #wisewomen #uticany
Belladonna root harvest. Roots can be harvested in the Spring or Fall. There’s opinions on what’s best. The point is to grab the roots before or after the plant starts to leaf out or flower because then it directs its stored energy out of the roots and up. The ideal for Belladonna is the Fall but I had to rearrange this garden bed so did it now!
This is a POISONOUS plant.
Notice the gloves. Chemical compound from plants can easily soak into your skin. Also use nitrile gloves because latex gloves are somewhat permeable. This is not an instructional reel on working with this or any other poisonous plant. That requires guidance from a trained herbalist/poisoner.
The fact that plant compounds can soak into your skin is why witches’ salves or unguenti work so well and not just for “flying”. Salves can be made with a lot of medicinal plants.
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I’ll be teaching specifically about “flying ointments” coming up in June in Brooklyn with @hiddenvillage.x
We will be making an unguento together but will not be using Belladonna for obvious reasons. We’ll be making with mugwort another traditional plant used in flying ointments.
The root I’m holding is from my garden and the photos after that are from the Apennine mountains near Benevento where it grows wild.
#belladonna #poisoner #witchesofinstagram #unguento #flyingointment
So much has changed in the past 30+ years. I can’t say I’m disheartened by the commercialization of our folk traditions including herbalism. Though there have certainly been positive aspects of the internet and social media, we can’t forget the importance of real life/in-person/3-D interactions.
When I started learning about herbs there were two books in my local bookstore; one was Jethro Kloss’ “Back to Eden” and the other was Euell Gibbons “Stalking the Healthful Herbs”.
Through pure synchronicity/coincidence I was fortunate enough to have a skilled herbalist move into my community, Kate Gilday @woodlandessence With whom I undertook a lifelong apprenticeship.
Apprenticeship meaning day-to-day work and practice that included things most wouldn’t think of as herbalism such as cleaning out old tincture bottles and weeding gardens. We were and continue to be in community together. We are part of a web that has many points of connection.
Read more of my musings on this at “Leaving The House of the Night” on Sbstack 🌱
The Trilliums are blooming!
These are endangered so don’t pick or trample please 🙏
Red trillium is called Birthroot with a traditional use for labor and delivery. The deer, who are giving birth now, eat the flower tops.
And in the same family, as shown in the last two slides, is a plant known as “Paris quadrifolia” which is native to the temperate and boreal forests of Eurasia. It’s also called l’uva di volpe in Italian. And I just learned about it from @etnobotanica_errante
When I first saw the first thing I thought was “Trillium!” They are both in the tribe Parideae of the Melanthiaceae family.
Trillium was on the Liliacaea family but taxonomists moved it based on molecular phylogenetic studies though who needs those to tell these two are related!
I love discovering Mediterranean plants that are family members of our native plants in North America!
#trillium #nativeplants #mediterraneanplants #herbalism #witchesofinstagram
Burdock root dig!
Those of you worried for my bare feet will be happy to see I am wearing my PPE this time but it’s not to protect my feet. It’s because the Burdock is growing in the brush and I’m afraid of ticks.
Many people aren’t aware that Spring and Fall are the most active tick seasons. Not Summer though you can still get bit then. They just don’t like the heat. Cool and damp weather brings them out the most.
#folkmedicine #herbalist #hedgewitch #burdockroot #witchesofinstagram
Found these photos in an old file. Spring circa 2003-4
Horses are natural swimmers btw.
How are they so gentle with such power, with such might?
1. Me catching a baby horse
2. Ditto
3. Baby horse standing
4. Mama horse helping
5. Mama and baby acting chill like nothing just happened
6. My baby @_amferguson_
7. Me riding a horse (barefoot and bareback) in the water which is an experience I have no words to explain but if I could compare it to something I’d say it’s like riding a whale. You’d think it would feel like riding on land but the way they swim their backs arch up like dolphin or whale. So it’s like riding a wave but with skin and muscles.
Horse photo cred Colette Louis
A Substance That Moves Between
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In the myth of Psyche and Eros, Aphrodite requires Psyche to perform a series of impossibile and deadly tasks, the most dangerous of which is to descend to the Underworld and acquire a sacred beauty ointment from Persephone. This ointment becomes Psyche’s psychopomp that transforms her beauty (not merely physical) from conscious to unconscious.
EXCERPT:
“Though, we may think of a salve (or any herbal remedy for that matter) as a simple substance, a combination of ingredients, a superficial process. Certainly we could see it that way, but if we lean into our making we can notice that it is a transformation using oil, fat, wax, or maybe resins infused with plants and sometimes blood, ash, and wine (as recorded in old recipes).
These are the bodies, the combined constituents that carry the remedy, that carry other bodies to be absorbed into ours and thereby carrying us (so we can fly or change or heal).
An unguento is a substance that receives and transmits.”
Read the full piece on my Substack
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If you are interested in making UNGUENTI together in community I will be leading a workshop with @hiddenvillage.x in BROOKLYN on June 6. This is in-person!
Register in bio!
Image: Mary Magdalen with the jar of ointment, Master of the Mansi Magdalen (c.1490 – 1530)
#unguento #witchcraft #herbalmedicine #herbalism #italianfolkmedicine
Happy Earth Day!
Hope you got your hands (and feet) in the dirt or at least on some ground.
This is the outside part of my process today harvesting Elecampane root. I do two water baths and scrub. This is to get the worst of the dirt/mud off so it doesn’t go down my drain. I have a dry well, it’s a rural thing. And you don’t want it clogged up!
After this I brought it inside to wash and scrub again, chop and make a tincture.
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Elecampane has a vast array of virtues but is probably best known for its affinity towards the lungs and as a treatment for acute infection and chronic respiratory conditions.
It is antibacterial and antiseptic relieving bronchitis, whooping cough, and any damp phlegmatic lung infection especially those that are stuck with an unproductive cough.
A good indication for Elecampane is when there is green or yellow mucus or a damp, moist cough of any sort particularly when it has been long standing past the acute phase.
I wrote a whole thing about it years ago on my blog:
/blog/2018/4/28/devotions-to-inula-all-the-reasons-i-love-elecampane
#rootcutting #folkmedicine #herbalmedicine #witchesofinstagram #elecampane
