Tag Archives: Daniel A Schulke

Hands of Apostasy

Hands of Apostasy: Essays on Traditional Witchcraft, edited by Michael Howard and Daniel A. Schulke, in special and standard hardcover editions from Three Hands Press, and available for pre-order now, may be of interest.

Michael Howard Daniel A Schulke Hands of Apostasy from Three Hands Press

“Old-style Craft, also known as traditional witchcraft, endures as a distinct body of archaic magical practices in present-day Britain, North America and Australia. Originally nameless, such bodies are related to a variety of historical magical streams, most notably the practices of the Grimoires or ‘black books’, folk-healing, and popular magic of the early modern era. Typically, such groups operate in secret, with strict means of initiatic succession, and practice sorcery characterized by a dual ethos of healing and harming. Though an internally contentious issue, the word witch is accepted as a descriptor for practitioners of this art, as is anti-witching for practices of removing curses and binding magical malefactors.

Though still obscure, even in occult circles, the variety and idiosyncrasy of Old Craft traditions is remarkable. The witches of Cornwall, with their corpora of folk charms and blessings, are one such phenotype. The Pickingill Craft as described by E.W. Liddell, remains despite its controversy one of the most unique and potent Craft persuasions, as do the teachings and practices of Robert Cochrane, founder of Clan of Tubal Cain. The Manx Old Order, the Skull and Bones tradition of Pennsylvania, and the Cultus Sabbati, with the medieval Witches’ Sabbath as an important organizing principle, are yet other distinctive traditions.

Hands of Apostasy is a groundbreaking witchcraft anthology presenting nineteen articles written by both scholars and practitioners, addressing such crucial Old Craft topics the Devil, Initiation, the relation of witchcraft to the grimoire corpus, the mysticism and magic of herbs, folk-charming, the nocturnal flight, the Romantic movement, the witches’ cauldron, and the powers of moon and tide. Representing widely-varying witchcraft traditions and perspectives, the book is a sound testament to the Craft’s history, diversity and strength, as well as the characteristic marks of an evolving and contemplative tradition. A complete list of essays and authors is found at right.

The work is profusely illustrated with a specially-commissioned set of illustrations by renowned Finnish engraver Timo Ketola, pleasing both sensus and spiritus. In his darkly opulent style evocative of nocturnal tableaux and forlorn landscapes, Mar. Ketola’s work for Hands of Apostasy is a stunningly original addition to the iconography of the witch. In conjunction with the book release we are also offering a limited edition print of Timo Ketola’s LUCIFER.”

“Authors and Essays
The Magic of History: Some Considerations
Andrew Chumbley

A Family Craft Tradition
Douglas McIlwain

Killing the Moon:
Witchcraft Initiations in the Mountains of the Southern United States
Corey Hutcheson

Pentacles of Wood
David Rankine

Moon-Raking in the Old Craft
Cecil Williamson

The Cauldron of Pure Descent
Martin Duffy

Spirits and Deific Forms: Faith and Belief in British Old Craft
Melusine Draco

Waking the Dead: The Ancient Magical Art of Necromancy
Michael Howard

The Witching Hour
Peter Hamilton Giles

The Man in Black
Gemma Gary

Origins and Rationales of Modern Witch Cults
Andrew Chumbley

Mirror, Moon and Tides
Levannah Morgan

The Traditional Witchcraft of Ellan Vannin
Manxwitch

Unchain the Devil!
Radomir Ristic

Where the Three Roads Meet:
Oneiric Praxis in the Sabbatic Craft
Jimmy Elwing

Pharmakeute:
Witches as the Plant People of Old Europe
Raven Grimassi

Conjure-Charms of the Welsh Marches
Gary St. Michael Nottingham

The Blasphemy of Things Unseen
Daniel A. Schulke

Romantic Age Roots of Traditional Witchcraft
Lee Morgan”

The Occult Reliquary

The Occult Reliquary: Images and Artifacts of the Richel-Eldermans Collection, foreword by Daniel A Schulke, introduction by Graham King, from the Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall and Three Hands Press, is part of the collection at the Reading Room.

Daniel A Schulke Graham King The Occult Reliquary from Three Hands Press

When I got this volume and actually looked through it in person, I thought I was being punked by a fantasist artist’s recent portfolio of whimsy (I guessed the bulk or total of these works were possibly by Daniel A Schulke himself due to striking similarity in style to his own work, or maybe by J H W Eldermans’ own hand instead of collected by him), similar perhaps the Codex Seraphinianus or something in the tradition of Froud or Simon, rather than a collection of the work by actual non-recent and historical practitioners I’d understood this book to be when I ordered it. Frankly, I ended up shelving it as fiction and regretted my purchase. Subsequently however, Daniel A Schulke’s presentation “The Richel-Eldermans Collection: A Hidden Lexicon of European Witchcraft” at 2010 Esoteric Book Conference convinced me that I should make another appraisal of these pieces and take this book more seriously. So, while the images seem clearly still more modern in provenance than I had presumed from the information provided, and I’m personally still not comfortable with the claim these predate the development of Gardnerian Wicca, on the weight of Schulke’s presentation, this does appear to me now as a collection from actual practitioners worth consideration and study as non-fiction. It is also worth noting that Schulke’s presentation revealed there are some even more challenging images in the collection, and presented at least one such then, that were intentionally left out of this publication due to possibly shocking content they did not want to offer in print.

“Housed in the Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall is a cache of over 2,000 occult images accumulated for a century in the secret archives of obscure European magical orders. Compiled by J. H. W. Eldermans, a likely member of the Dutch Secret service, the enigmatic collection appears on its surface to be a private encyclopedia of magical charms, rituals and mystery-teachings. The Richel-Eldermans Collection is iconographically situated at the crossroads of erotic magic, ceremonial angelic conjuration, rural witchcraft, and Freemasonry. Its images comprise, in part, a veiled pictorial cipher of the rituals of Ars Amatoria, and occult fraternity using sex magic, and the lesser known M∴M∴. The procession of images, charms, magical seals, and ritual objects in the Collection is the work of multiple artists, and displays a high degree of creativity and technical skill. Of particular interest to the scholar of magical history is the rich array of sexual magic formulae and folk-magical charms. Additionally, the collection boasts perhaps the most original series of occult illustrations and formulae utilising the root of the Mandrake (Mandragora spp.). The Occult Reliquary presents for the first time selections of the collection, with 275 illustrations, 130 of which are in full colour.” — flap copy

“The Occult Reliquary concerns the Richel-Eldermans Collection, an archive of some 2,000 magical images and artifacts housed in the Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall.

Situated at the crossroads of erotic magic, ceremonial angelic conjuration, and witchcraft, the images comprise, in part, a pictorial cipher of the rituals of Ars Amatoria, a European magical order using sex magic, and the lesser-known M∴M∴, based in the Hague and Leiden. Also referenced among the collection are materials relating to A∴A∴ of Aliester [sic] Crowley.

The transfixing procession of images, charms, magical seals, and ritual objects in the Collection is the work of multiple artists, and displays a high degree of magical insight and creativity. It will be of interest to students of witchcraft, Freemasonry, the Goetia, sex magic, and early twentieth century occultism.” [via]

Idolatry Restor’d

Idolotry Restor’d: Witchcraft and the Imaging of Power by Daniel A Schulke, from Three Hands Press, was scheduled for release in November 2013, but appears to still be in pre-order. The special leather-bound edition is sold out, but deluxe and standard hardcover editions are still available.

Daniel A Schulke Idolatry Restor'd from Three Hands Press

“The translation of magical power to image is a matter well understood in so-called ‘primitive’ sorcery, in which occurs a mutual embodiment of re-presentation and the Represented. The Fetish, for example, apprehends a reciprocal process between Object and Creator that often begins long before chisels and adzes are set to wood, participating in its own reification. Many of these eldritch forms of image-making were concerned with accessing power, and it was only later, in the context of religious devotion, that their forms densified into ‘mere’ idols. With increasing levels of religious control over art, a Moiré pattern arises between the Artist and the forces of the Divine, which may either suppress individual visionary power in favor of canonized icons, or, when correctly accessed, give rise to an ‘heretical creativity’.

Witchcraft, because of its syncretic nature, partakes in multiple infusions of traditional image-making lore, including not only sorcery and religious iconography, but also science, craftsmanship, and the fine arts. However, because much of its images are used privately, and indeed created for a limited set of observers, they participate in a concentrated alembic of exposure wherein all who experience them do so in the context of magical practice and devotion. This intensity of private magical interaction provides a locus which enables the image to transcend its medium—and indeed that fetish known as ‘icon’—and generates living numen.

First published as an essay in the British folklore quarterly The Cauldron in 2009, Idolatry Restor’d drew upon the experiential arenas of magical practice and Image-Artistry which came to inform Schulke’s book Lux Haeresis (Xoanon, 2011). Here substantially expanded with illustrations prepared especially for the work, Idolatry Restor’d is a book of engaging fascinum for both Artists and Beholders alike, and strikes at the heart of magical image-aesthesis.” [via]

Veneficium: Magic, Witchcraft and the Poison Path

You may be interested in Daniel A Schulke’s Veneficium: Magic, Witchcraft and the Poison Path available through Three Hands Press.

 

“Veneficium concerns the intersection of magic and poison, originating in remotest antiquity and reaching into the present day. Beyond their functions as agents of bodily harm, poisons have also served as gateways of religious ecstasy, occult knowledge, and sensorial aberration, as well as the basis of cures.

Allied with Samael, the Edenic serpent of first transgression whose name in some interpretations is ‘Venom of God’, this facet of magic wends through the rites of ancient Sumer and Egypt, through European Necromancy, Alchemy, the arcane the rites of the Witches’ Sabbath, and modern-day folk magic.

Of particular note to this study are the herbs of the so-called ‘Devil’s Garden’, bearing relation to the witchcraft concepts of the Graal of Midnight, the Witches’ Supper, and the Unguentum Sabbati, the flying ointment of the witches which has exerted fascination over scholar, historians, and practitioners alike.

Beyond consideration of the toxicological dimensions of magical power, the concurrent thread of astral and philosophical poisons are also examined, and their resonance and dissonance with magical practice explored. Veneficium will be of interest to students of magic, witchcraft, alchemy, botanical folklore, medicine, and occult pharmacology.” [via]