Spring Equinox Sabbat

The next Sabbat at Carlford Coven with be the Spring Equinox on Wednesday 21st March 2007.

We will be gathering for this Lesser Sabbat at the Covenstead with a ritual celebrating the return of Spring when we will be calling upon Andred, a Romano-Celtic / British warrior Goddess. She was venerated in Southern Britain, by the Iceni tribe (Suffolk/Norfolk) and particularly in Sussex where many placenames preserve her memory. One of her sacred groves was thought to be in Epping Forest. As a lunar Mother Goddess she was associated with fertility, the Hare is her animal, used for divination and reportedly released as an act of propitiation by Queen Boudicca before her battle with the Roman army.

All over the world the Hare is linked with the Moon in mythology. It is associated with Spring because this is when it becomes very active; it is a symbol of growth, reproduction, fertility, lust, abandonment, madness, shapeshifting...sounds like our Coven...

The Hare was once thought to lay eggs: because it does not burrow but squats low on the earth, it's form was hard to find and plovers eggs were mistakenly identified as belonging to the Hare. We will be releasing our Hare who will distribute its Eggs to all

A local artist who creates wonderful sculptures, especially of hares is Carl Newman

Joyce Dore has written an intriguing (fictional) account of the life of Boudica, see http://www.joycedore.co.uk/. Common myth suggests that the Romans handed her over to the Druids, who forced her to drink hemlock - that's very unlikely as the Druids believed that blood should flow back to mother earth, and had little use for drugs, such as hemlock, during sacrifice.