Witchcraft

Hedge Witchcraft

The meaning of the word hedge witch as I use it is more related to the older praxis of hedge-riders, myrk-riders, or even wyrd-riders, and is not used as a simple descriptive term that encompasses the somewhat misguided and romantic notions of solitary witches, tooling about in their gardens by the light of the moon (an idea that is often erroneously coupled with Kitchen Witchery).

I have intentionally replaced the i in the second half of the word with a y in the word hedgewytch as to differentiate it from the meaning that has been somewhat corrupted by Rae Beth and her followers, who practice what I believe she terms Wildwood Crafting.

My use of the label hedge witch is a specific term that draws on the vast knowledge of wortcunning in order to create salves and balms and use of Trance States used for lifting the spirit out of the body — to travel oot and aboot as it were. This is hardly the sort of work one would want to be solitary while doing. To even consider it would be foolhardy and potentially dangerous.

The Hedge itself is representative of the boundary, not only of the village or community where the hedge witch resides, but the boundaries between this world and the other world, between the mundane and the spirit world.