About Coven Oldenwilde Members

In the past, villages had few adepts and naturally had small, local circles. During the Burning Times, keeping the number of Witches clannish afforded the Olde Religion protection since the fewer who knew the secret Mysteries, the fewer might be tortured, name names, and be killed. Traditionally, Witches' covens contain no more than 13 members.

Coven work includes individual and collective spellwork, leadership training, ritual construction, and the pursuit of progressively deeper levels of magical understanding.

Each Coven member is a "Priestess (or Priest) and Witch" who has undergone Initiation into the Mysteries following at least a year and a day of studying the Craft intensively. The higher the magical degree (First, Second, or Third), the longer the person has studied, and thereby mastered deeper magical skills.

The High Priestess & High Priest teach students and Coven members written liturgy, the oral history and meaning of what the ancients recorded, magical lore, spellcraft, and much more.

In Coven Oldenwilde, we've taught hundreds of students magic for many, many years. Many study for months only to find themselves unready to become an Initiate with more responsibilities. Others become First degree Initiates, only to plateau and not become a Second degree Elevant. A select few persist, thrive, and eventually achieve the Sublime & Ultimate Third Degree, thus becoming Wiccan clergy able to "marry and bury" legally in North Carolina and most other states. They may then elect to found their own "hive-off" or daughter Coven, and thus help entire communities.

Here are pictures and statements of just a few of the many Witches we have Initiated and Elevated, who perpetuate the Gardnerian traditions we have taught them. They're ranked here in traditional order of precedence, from highest to lowest degree and earliest to most recent Initiation or Elevation.

About Craft Names

Witches have traditionally used "magical names" to make themselves known to each other. Doing so reminds us that we are innately spiritual beings — drawing a distinct boundary between our mundane and our magical personae — as well as protecting those who are not publicly known as Witches from persistent societal and institutional prejudice and persecution.

For instance, we may assume the name of a Deity, or a sacred plant, animal, object, or mythological figure. Some names may initially strike you as strange, but they have been chosen by or given to Witches for specific magical reasons.

About Lineage

Gardnerianism is a form of British Traditional Witchcraft that traces its roots or lineage — the formal transmission of its magical heritage from teacher-to-student via ritual initiations and elevations — to Gerald B. Gardner (1884-1964) and those who came before him.

Gardner was an Initiate of the New Forest Coven, whose High Priestess was "Old Dorothy" Clutterbuck. The Coven was one of several in the New Forest area (including the Horsa Coven, which initiated Sybil Leek) whose lineages may trace back to the 11th or 12th century. Gardner's Initiates Raymond and Rosemary Buckland in turn brought his lineage to New York City in the 1960s, and all American branches of what's now called Gardnerianism descend from them. (But not all American practitioners of British Traditional Witchcraft do: At least one related but separate British Witch lineage, now called Central Valley Wicca, had been brought some years earlier to the U.S. West Coast.)

Gardnerians in America keep careful written track of their lineage as a check against posers fraudulently claiming to be members of this august tradition. We have also successfully kept certain centuries-old magical teachings that have been passed to us as closely guarded secrets.

Gardnerians’ emphasis on legitimacy and secret Mysteries sometimes evokes jealousy from two types whose views abound on the 'Net: eclectic Pagans who attack older traditions to try to justify their idiosyncratic inventions, and reductionist non-practitioners who reinforce academic and religious marginalization of Witchcraft by positing dismissive or lurid interpretations of Craft history.

Both separately and in tandem, these ilk mislead many sincere Seekers into believing that British Traditional Witchcraft is a relatively new invention, rather than the demonstrably unbroken continuation of beliefs and ways from ancient, even primordial times.

A third type of misleader craves power: Lacking a goodly Witch rep of their own, they try to spread lies to ruin the reputation of someone they consider a magical rival, or seize on differences in practices to denounce entire groups of fellow Gardnerians as “illegitimate”. They are "bate-breeders" (a Witch word for folk who foment discord).

The fact is, branches of the Gardnerian family tree in America, called "Lines", differ somewhat in how their Priest/esses pass down their lineage. An important tenet that distinguishes the California Line from its mother Long Island Line is this:

"We affirm that, in principle, the genders are equal in our Gardnerian practice, e.g. males may both cast circles and initiate without a Priestess." (Article 13 of The Declaration of the California Line, San Francisco Bay Area, 1988-89.)

Coven Oldenwilde is of the California Gardnerian Line and refuses to discriminate based on a person's sexual preference. Indeed, the "CalGard Line", as some nickname it, not only recognizes same-sex covens and initiations and elevations (raisings of magical rank), but also acknowledges the legitimacy of initiations or elevations when performed and the circle cast by a High Priest alone, without a High Priestess present — which is sometimes necessary when, for example, a coven is geographically isolated.

Like so much of California Gardnerian practice, the option of males casting circles for initiation or elevation represents a return to Gardnerian tradition. Rosemary Buckland, from whom most American Gardnerians descend, was initiated in a circle cast by her male mate at the time, Raymond Buckland. And all of the following well-known Gardnerian Elders were, according to their own statements, initiated, elevated, or both in a circle cast by Gerald Gardner without a High Priestess present: Doreen Valiente, Patricia Crowther, Dayonis, Donna Gardner, and Olive Green. Rosemary Buckland HPS, from whom most American Gardnerians descend, was initiated in a circle cast by a man. All the initiation and elevation scripts that Gardner copied down from his Elders in his Ye Bok of ye Art Magical are in the form of a man casting a circle and initiating a woman by himself: No doubt he was given this version on purpose because he was a lone High Priest at the time.

In short, the peculiar notion currently held by some American Gards that a Gardnerian initiation or elevation is legitimate only if it takes place in a circle cast by a High Priestess (even when she plays no other part in the rite, and may even be a stranger to the candidate) is a misunderstanding based on faulty information or distorted teaching.