340 Grimoire for the Apprentice Wizard
as a saint and vilified as a sorcerer. He had an enormous
thirst for knowledge and power, coupled with an
insatiable appetite for sex, drugs, and sensual pleasures.
He joined the Golden Dawn in 1898 but was soon
locked in a bitter power struggle with its founder, S.L.
MacGregor Mathers, resulting in his expulsion and the
breakup of the Order.
Crowley traveled widely, climbing mountains in
India and studying Buddhism, Tantric Yoga, Egyptian
magick, Qabalah, and Dee’s Enochian magick. In 1904,
his wife Rose channeled a spirit called “Aiwass,” which
Crowley identified as the Egyptian god Set. Through
Rose, Aiwass dictated The Book of the Law. Its core is
the Law of Thelema (“will”): “Do what thou wilt shall
be the whole of the law.” From 1909 to 1913, Crowley
published the secret rituals of the Golden Dawn in his
magazine The Equinox, infuriating Mathers and other
Golden Dawn members. He lived in the U.S. from 1915
to 1919, then moved to Sicily, where he founded the
notorious Abbey of Thelema. For a time he headed the
Ordo Templi Orientis, before being deported in 1923
due to scandal as “The Wickedest Man in the World”—
a title he relished, calling himself “The Great Beast 666.”
In his final year, Crowley met Gerald Gardner and
contributed some material to Gardner’s Book of
Shadows. A brilliant writer and poet, his several books
include Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), con-
sidered by many to be the best book ever on ceremonial
magick. In it, Crowley introduced the now common
spelling of “magick” to “distinguish the science of the
Magi from all its counterfeits.”Gerald Brousseau Gardner (1884–1964)
Born into a prosperous family
in England, Gerald Gardner
claimed several Witches in his
family tree. In 1906, Gerald went
to Ceylon as a cadet in a tea plant-
ing business. There, in 1909, he
was initiated into Freemasonry. In
1912, he moved to Malaya to be-
come a rubber planter. When the price of rubber fell in
1923, he joined the Malayan Customs & Excise
Service. There he befriended the Sea Dayaks, a
Malayan tribe from whom he learned their folk magic.
Returning to England in 1936, after retiring from
the Service, Gerald and his wife Donna eventually
settled in the New Forest region in 1939. There he
joined an occult group called the Fellowship of
Crotona, a Co-Mason lodge (both men and women)
with three associated magickal groups: Rosicrucian
(who also put on esoteric plays for the public),
Theosophical, and Witchcraft reconstruction according
to the ideas of Margaret Murray. Some claimed to be
hereditary Witches, and “Dafo” (Elsie Woodford-
Grimes), their high priestess, initiated him in 1939. She
became his magickal partner for the next 15 years.In 1946, he met Cecil Williamson, founder of the
Witchcraft Research Center and Museum of Witchcraft.
A year later, Arnold Crowther introduced him to Alei-
ster Crowley. From materials obtained from Crowley,
fragmentary elements from the New Forest Coven,
Leland’s Aradia, and his own collections and re-
searches, Gardner compiled his Book of Shadows.
Much of it he published as fiction in a novel, High
Magic’s Aide (1949). After Britain’s anti-Witchcraft
law was repealed in 1951, Gardner purchased William-
son’s Museum. In 1953 he initiated Doreen Valiente,
who substantially reworked the Book of Shadows,
giving more emphasis to the Goddess. Out of this
collaboration grew the Gardnerian Tradition. In 1954
Gardner published Witchcraft Today, supporting
Murray’s disputable theory of Witchcraft as the sur-
viving remnant of old European Paganism. The book
made Gardner famous and launched new covens all
over England.
Gardner’s last book was The Meaning of Witch-
craft (1959). He met and initiated Raymond Buckland
in 1963, just before sailing to Lebanon for the Winter.
He died aboard ship on the return voyage the following
Spring. Buckland brought Gardnerian Witchcraft to
the United States, where it has blossomed into the
Wiccan religion.Victor Anderson (1917–2001)
Co-founder of the Feri (pre-
viously Faerie) Tradition, Victor
Anderson was born in New Mex-
ico and grew up in Oregon. As a
child, he contracted an ailment that
left him nearly blind for life—and
a psychic seer. He claimed a mystical initiation at the
age of nine by an old Faerie Witch woman, who intro-
duced him to her coven of mostly Southerners. They
honored “The Old Gods” and “The Old Powers,” and
emphasized harmony with Nature, magick, celebra-
tion, music, and ecstatic dancing.
Victor married Cora, an Alabama woman whose
Christian family practiced folk magick, and they moved
to the San Francisco Bay area. In 1959, they initiated
a neighbor boy who later took the name Gwydion
Pendderwen. Inspired by the rise of modern Witchcraft,
Victor and Gwydion wrote beautifully poetic rituals
for the Faerie Tradition, named for Victor’s childhood
Witches. It combined their “Faerie” Witchcraft with
Hawaiian Huna, Vodoun, and Celtic folklore. Over the
years, a number of remarkable people were trained by
Victor, including Alison Harlow, Starhawk, Francesca
De Grandis, Ian “Lurking Bear” Anderson, and my
own beloved Morning Glory. Through these illustrious
folks, the influence of the shamanic tradition now called
“Feri” has been enormous.
Victor wrote a lovely book of mystical poetry,
called Thorns of the Blood Rose.- Lore.p65 340 1/15/2004, 9:38 AM