The Wicca and Witchcraft Glossary includes uses for Herbs, magical meaning of colour for using Candles and Altar Cloths, Wiccan tools, and Wicca dictionary. Also included are The Wiccan Festivals for the Southern Hemisphere.

Akasha : the fifth element, the omnipresent spiritual power that permeates the Universe. It is the energy out of which the elements formed.

Altar Cloth : Altar Cloths play a very important part when setting up your altar. Depending on what ritual you will be performing at your altar will usually determine the colour or type of Altar Cloth used. We offer a selection of sizes, colours and patterns from triple moon, triquetra and pentagram to plain solid colours.

Amulet : An object worn or carried to bring luck or to attract certain vibration or people.

Angelica : Protection, exorcism, healing, visions.

Basil : Love, exorcism, wealth, flying, protection, purification.

Bay Leaves : Protection, psychic powers, healing, purification, strength.

Beltane : (October 31st ) Celebrated with famous fires, it’s perhaps the most well known Sabbath after Samhain. It’s the fertility festival, where we celebrate the union of the Goddess and the God. It still survives in the May Poles in some places of the Northern Hemisphere. This celebration was condemned by the Church, saying it promoted indecent sexual behaviour.

Blue (colour) : Healing, sleep, peace.

Blue Mallow : Love, protection, exorcism.

Candles Ritual : Traditionally candles have always played a significant part in magic and sacred ceremony and no Altar is complete without them. They embody the positive symbolism of light. Lit candles represent the fire element.

Chalice : The Chalice represents the Goddess, fertility and the element of water. Its primary purpose is to hold a libation that will be offered during a magic ritual. A Chalice should be watertight, and difficult to break (in case it tumbles over during a spell). When choosing a Chalice, it should be made from either clay, stone, wood or metal (silver, gold or bronze).

Book of Shadows (BOS) : Also known as a Grimoire, A Book of Shadows is a Wiccan Workbook containing invocations, ritual patterns, spells, runes, rules governing magic, and for recording your wiccan journey. A Book of Shadows is hand written and individual. There is no wrong way to compile/compose a Book of Shadows. To make your own Book of Shadows – Start with a book with blank pages. Simply write in the book any rituals, spells, invocations, magical information about your wiccan journey, observations, feelings and anything to do with your wiccan development.

Borage : Courage, psychic powers.

Brown (colour) : Healing animals, the home.

Chamomile Herb : Money, sleep, love, purification, meditation.

Charge : To infuse with magical power or a specific magic purpose.

Charm : A spell or incantation.

Charm Bag : A magical sachet.

Cinnamon Herb: Spirituality, success, healing, power, psychic powers, lust, protection, love.

Clove Herb: Protection, exorcism, love, money.

Comfrey Herb: Safety during travel, money.

Consecrate : To make pure, holy or sacred.

Copal Resin: Love, purification.

Dandelion Herb: Divination, calling spirits, wishes.

Dragon’s Blood: Love, protection, exorcism, potency.

Frankincense Resin: Protection, exorcism, spirituality, purification, consecration.

Ginger Root Herb: Love, money, success, power.

Goats Rue Herb: Healing, health.

Green (colour) : Healing, money, prosperity, luck, fertility, beauty, employment, youth.

Hand Fasting : A Wiccan, Pagan or Gypsy Wedding.

High John the Conquerer: Money, love, success, happiness.

Hyssop Herb: Purification, protection.

Imbolc : (August 1st or 2nd ) Fire festival, taken by the christians later to their Candlemass celebration. At this time we celebrate the first hints of spring after the long winter. It’s the childhood of the God, and a celtic traditions honours on this day the Goddess, calling that feast Brigantia.

Jasmine Herb: Love, money, prophet dreams.

Lavender Herb: Love, protection, sleep, chastity, longevity, purification, happiness, peace.

Lemongrass Herb: lust, psychic powers.

Lilac : Exorcism, protection.

Lovage Root Herb: Love, purification.

Lughnassadh: ( February 2nd ) The feast of the celtic god Lugh, identified with the Sun, and one of the names the God can take upon Himself. The power of the God is lesser, but even then he blesses the cattle in a traditional ceremony where they’re driven over the ashes of the fires lit during the festival.

Mabon: ( March 21st ) The Autumn Equinox, when the Earth gets ready for the absence of the God and the days start to get sensibly shorter. It’s a good time for meditation and introspection.

Midsummer: ( December 21st ) Summer’s Solstice, where the God reaches the peak of it’s power before starting it’s withdrawal again. The shortest night of the year, and traditionally good for magick and love rites.

Mistletoe Herb: Protection, love, hunting, fertility, health, exorcism.

Mugwort Herb: Strength, psychic powers, protection, prophetic dreams, healing, astral projection.

Myrrh Resin: Protection, exorcism, healing, spirituality.

Nettle Leaf Herb: Exorcism, healing, protection, lust.

Orange (colour) : legal matters, success.

Ostara: ( September 21 st ) Spring Equinox. The God is young, and him and the Goddess fall in love, their love renowing Nature like the sun that gently caress the earth, also inspiring the animals to multiply. It’s a feast of love and growth.

Parsley : Lust, protection, purification.

Patchouli : Money, fertility, lust, passion.

Pentacle : A ritual object (usually a circular piece of wood, stone, metal, clay etc) upon which a five pointed star (pentagram) is painted, engraved or inscribed. It represents the element of earth.

Peppermint : Purification, sleep, love, healing, psychic powers.

Pink (colour) : Emotional love, fidelity, friendships.

Purple (colour) : Power, exorcism, healing.

Red (colour) : Lust, strength, courage, power, sexual potency.

Rose/Rose Buds : Love, psychic powers, healing, love divination, luck, protection.

Sage: Immortality, longevity, wisdom, protection, wishes.

Samhain: ( April 30th ) It’s the Wiccan New Year. A time for meditation and remembering of those who have passed away, coinciding with the end of the harvest, and when they say the veil between this world and the other thins to it’s most. In the anglosaxon countries it’s celebration lived on with the Halloween feasting, taking some of it’s symbols like Jack o’Lanterns. A sabbath traditionally considered as excellent for divination, and on which offerings are left at the doorsteps for the souls of the Dead which come to visit. At this Sabbath we celebrate the death of the God and the promise of his rebirth in Yule.

Sandalwood : Love, clear negative energy.

Spell : A magical ritual performed to cause change;

Summer Solstice : Summer Solstice is also known as Midsummer or Litha. It arrives when the powers of nature reach their highest point. The earth is awash in the fertility of the Goddess and God. Midsummer/Summer Solstice is a classic time for magic of all kinds.

Sweet Orange Peel : Love, divination, luck, money.

Thyme : Health, healing, sleep, psychic powers, love, purification, courage.

White (colour) : Protection, peace, purification, chastity, happiness, halting gossip, spirituality.

White Oak Herb: Protection, health, money, healing, potency, fertility, luck.

White Willow Herb: Love, divination, protection, healing.

Witch Hazel Herb: Protection, chastity.

Wormwood Herb: Psychic powers, protection, love, calling spirits.

Yellow (colour) : Divination, psychic powers, mental powers, wisdom, visions.

Yerba Mate Herb: Fidelity, love, lust.

Yule : ( June 21st ) The Winter Solstice Festival, when the sun, after it’s withdrawal and the longest night of the Year, starts  to come back closer to the Earth. This new closeness marks the rebirth of the God from his own seed planted on the Goddess, and was later taken by christianity as Christ’s birth day (keep in mind Yule falls near christmas in the northern hemisphere). It’s a solar festival, in which traditionally all lights and fires were put down, lighting a new one by midnight using rubbing methods. Then, from that first fire all the rest were lit. We find something similar in the England of the victorian period with the Yule Log, which was burnt slowly all along the year and was said to prevent the house from being struck by lighting.