Mother Shipton

Mother Shipton

Over Christmas, i'll leave the magic to Old Mother Shipton.

The term Mother is used for the more powerful witches, 

it seems. I wonder if it doesn't go back further than

the obvious use of an elderly knowledgeable woman 

a sort of local private nurse and midwife with herbal

skills living on the edge of society, to ancient times.

My impression of the old magic is that the term Mother, often 

was a title given to a senior in the coven, when the coven was composed 

of families, mostly interconnected by marriage.

There are devil-worshipping connections.

Let's be precise about this,

I do not believe that the Devil and Satan are the same entity.

(I'll leave aside the question of in what sense either entity exists)

Satan, and the Christian Demon, are later beings historically.

The lore of the Fallen Angel, which became the Demonic entourage

Of Satan, post-date the old horned Devil

Early religions worshipped horned animals.

Pan and the Devil and centaurs are all examples of this.

The old magical ancestry goes back to the horned beast,

Mothers were remnants of that tradition, 

That's my belief.

Now, to Ma Shipton. Ursula Southill  was born in 1488, allegedly,

out of wedlock, her mother dying after she was born. 

This was supposedly at  Knaresborough in Yorkshire.

 Chapbooks about her add prophecies and tales to the popular literature,

An old cover from someone jumping on the Mother Shipton

 

 bandwagon (Baltimore Press 1890.)

which are  wholly apocryphal. She was apparently a girl of hideous ugliness

but this did not stop her being married to Toby Shipton at the age of 25.

........More to come....

(Probably will not add another blog entry until after Christmas Day.)