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Episode Summary: How to Ward Against Annoying Spirit Energy

You can work hard to ward your home from evil entities. But sometimes, something can still slip past. Perhaps you didn’t consider warding your driveway, or your roommates’ friends. Or perhaps, something just keeps coming back when you’re all alone in the house.

Today we speak with returning guest Laura Tempest Zakroff. Last time she spoke with us, she taught us all about the use of sigils in witchcraft. Now, she tells us stories about the chilling paranormal experiences she has had that have made her particularly attentive to warding her home against evil spirits.

About the Guest, Laura Tempest Zakroff

Tempest of Rhode Island is an award-winning author, an artist, a performer, and a witch, among other things. She teaches workshops and classes on the art of sigil craft and more. She’s published 11 books and oracle decks for your various modern witchcraft needs.

You can access her live workshops, social media, and store through her website. Keep up with her books and workshops on her social: IG: @owlkeyme.arts, Twitter: @LTempestZ, FB: facebook.com/lauratempestzakroff or YouTube. Becky avidly devours the exclusive content Tempest posts on Patreon, and can’t wait for her new Sigil Witchery Oracle Deck to go on sale.

How do Wards work to protect your house from evil spirits and energy?

Lurking basement creep energy. Trash panda gremlin energy. Thank goodness Tempest is so good at crafting wards! Because that’s just what happens when you get that many witches in one spot.

Can you accidentally trap an entity inside with wards?

As Tempest says in this episode, we rarely think to ward or cleanse liminal spaces, like driveways. Also, we tend to think of the “entrances” of our home as the places where an adult human would be likely to enter the house. Few of us would think to ward our chimney, dog door, or the hole in the side of the house where the dryer vents through, even though technically these are all entrances (or at least exits) to our homes.

But as we know, ghosts don’t follow silly corporeal rules. According to many belief systems, spirits can walk right through walls, meaning anywhere could be an entrance. Perhaps that’s why practices like Feng Shui ward every inch of the home (in a sense), including solid walls. (Although if they pass through walls freely, how do ghosts get stuck in corners?)

How else can a ghost get into your house?

Instead of doors and windows, ghosts might enter our home through flowing water in a bathroom, electrical current to an appliance, a cursed object, or attached to a person. These alternative conduits could be particularly useful for spirits if our attics sport protective witch windows, and our porch ceilings are painted haint blue, a ward in itself.

We’re also constantly being told that spirits expect a certain amount of being treated like living humans. In some cultures, they get a seat at the table long after death. Perhaps some spirits hold themselves to that standard, and only enter homes through doorways like proper living folks. Even still, if a spirit felt trapped inside my home by the wards on my front and back doors, I’d like to believe they could choose to quietly slip out the vents in my soffits.

Wards, like much magick, are all about intention.

If spirits do follow human rules as some sort of psychological habit, however, it’s possible that wards work simply because someone with enough inherent magic has set the intention that they will. In that case, it doesn’t really matter where you put your wards. At least, not to the spirits. Placing your ward somewhere visibly prominent might remind you that you have it, and placing it near a doorway reminds you what it’s there for. If magick=intention, then the reminder to the caster might be all the spirit needs to respect the ward. In that case, setting wards with the intention that they should keep evil spirits out of your home, not in your home, should be all that you require for a successful protection spell.

Does sage evict good house spirits, too?

Tempest’s Italian Sicilian mom taught her to keep a clean house that’s full of meaningful, yet tidy belongings. The importance of the care and feeding of beneficial house spirits is kind of a thing in that culture, as you’ll recall from last year’s stories about La Bella Umbriana. Tempest prefers wards to sage because she worries that the beneficial spirits in her home might be evicted with the evil ones. After all, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of sage.

Read Tempest’s book Weave the Liminal for more tips on creating helpful wards in your home without ousting beneficial spirits or trapping ghosts inside.

Witches Night Out Market

Are you local to Rhode Island? Check out the Witches Night Out Market Tempest brought to New England when she moved from Seattle. They’re a group of local witches and magical practitioners based in the New England area. The goal is to build and strengthen the local community through networking, education, and creative events.

How do you ward your home against evil spirits?

Do you display a hamsa or a nazar in your house? We’ve released some content on Patreon about our various ward experiences, but I think it’s time we delve deeper. Stay tuned for more traditions, folklore, and superstitions about warding a home from evil spirits soon. Check out Skepticism with a side of Jewish Mysticism for a spooky day in the meantime!

The post When Your Roommate’s Friend Brings a Gremlin appeared first on Homespun Haints.

Listen here:

Then, listen to the bonus episode, Italian House Spirits Can Make or Break your Home Renovation:

Episode Summary: Familiar Italian Ghosts

Every family has its own unique traditions. Our ancestors’ culture, our current location, and our religion all shape the rituals we do without even thinking, even if these rituals seem foreign, or even occultish, to those outside of our family unit.

Today we explore Italian folk magic from the perspective of Lisa, an author who shares the unique traditions her grandmother brought into her family. And, of course, there’s ghosts involved. Listen above for the full interview.

About the Guest: Lisa Marie Basile

Today’s guest grew up in an area of New Jersey steeped in Italian-American culture. Her view of the supernatural was shaped by her Italian dad, her Sicilian mom, and her magical-realist grandmother. Lisa founded, edits, and writes for Luna Luna Magazine (for which Alexandra Cohl interviewed Becky). She also founded ritual poetica. She authored The Magical Writing Grimoire, Light Magic for Dark Times, and City Witchery.

Connect with Lisa on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to read more of her writing and keep up with her publications at her website, lisamariebasile.com.

Italian Ghost Folklore and Folk Magic

“Italian folk magic” is an outsider term. Most of the actual people who originally developed and still engage in this practice would never call it magic. Lisa explains that, from the inside, it’s viewed more as a series of folk traditions. These traditions blended with the mysticism of old Catholicism to become more spiritual than magical in nature. Benedicaria is therefore probably a more authentic term.

Benedicaria and ghost folklore varies between regions of Italy and even individual families. Do you recognize any of the following?

La Bella Umbriana

One of the most popular Italian house spirits from ghost folklore, La Bella Umbriana or Bella ‘Mbriana is usually a beneficial presence. According to the folklore, she is the lovelorn ghost of an Italian princess who wanders the streets of Naples in misery and madness. The king, her father, was said to reward families who offered her shelter in their homes. Carrying on the tradition, families may leave a chair open for her at the dinner table, greet her spirit upon entering their house, or honor her by keeping the home tidy and peaceful. In return, her presence can grant beauty, youth, protection, and wealth. Gently billowing curtains dappled with early afternoon sunbeams are a good sign that Bella ‘Mbriana is content with the state of the house.

But like any gorgeous, spurned, and slightly pazza Italian woman, it’s a very bad idea to get on Bella ‘Mbriana’s shit list. There is a Neapolitan idiom: “Casa accunciata morte apparicchiata.” This phrase roughly means something like “death will follow home renovations.” See, Bella ‘Mbriana highly values a safe, quiet home kept in perfect order. And nothing causes disorder in a home like renovations, or even, heaven forbid, moving. While you might be able to see past the rubble and wreckage to the promise of a future open kitchen or garden tub, Bella ‘Mbriana can’t. She’s a spirit, after all. She hears the saws sawing and hammers hammering, sees the exposed studs in demolished walls, and says “that’s it, I’m gonna kill somebody.”

Il Munaciello

The Munaciello, or the Little Monk, is a poltergeist-style sprite with various origin stories. He sneaks into your home through the plumbing. Not a challenge for him, with his small stature. Also the fact that, in 15th century Naples, “plumbing” was basically just a well. Mischevious and vengeful, il Munaciello may hide or steal your possessions. He may also break your dishes, blow in your ears while you sleep, and even grope your butt.

But having been abused and shunned in life for his unusual appearance, his spirit can sympathize with those who act strong in the face of misfortune and adversity. When you gain his sympathy, il Munaciello may sneak in to hide coins in your house. He may even leave little riddles that may reveal lucky lotto numbers. Are you thinking “I don’t want the ghost of a spiteful deformed child monk creeping up through my drains even if he does leave me a shiny quarter, thankyouverymuch”? Maintain a healthy relationship with Bella ‘Mbriana, and she’ll help prevent il Munaciello‘s nocturnal B&E.

Witches and Witch Hunts

It took a good long while for the more remote regions of Italy to transition from paganism to Christianity. When witch hunts hit their heyday in the 15th century, many Italians were secretly still involved in pagan cults. Regional folklore began to twist the narrative to reflect the pagan cultists as evil supernatural beings. While “witches” is a reasonable translation, in the stories they remind me more of fairies. Le Janare would impersonate human women. The infamous Malleus Maleficarum was written to help identify and persecute them. But before the inquisitors officially mansplained the supposed secrets to catching a janara, folk wisdom advised to just leave a bag of salt in the doorway. Much like the strzyga, the janara would be compelled to count all the grains of salt. This task would keep her occupied until sunrise. Since witches are nocturnal, that was usually enough to avoid major problems.

Unlike the more generic Janare (likely of the cult of Diana), there were also some very specific witchy boogeywomen. La Zucculara (likely of the Cult of Hecate) liked to play ding-dong-ditch while wearing loud clogs (or maybe hooves?). La Manalonga (likely of the cult of WTF) used her loooooong arms to reach out of wells and snatch you to your watery death. Tales of these spooky ghost-like “witches” of Italian folklore served to reinforce the connotation of paganism as evil. So you can see why a good Roman Catholic who practices folk traditions would strongly prefer the term Benedicare to “folk magic.”

Don’t feed the spirits

Lisa tells us that, in her family traditions, the way to avoid a haunting was to avoid feeding the spirits. While this might sound simple (just don’t leave food out, right?) it’s actually a metaphor. Spirits are said to feed on discontent. Therefore, the best way to keep them hungry is to embrace the light, and live a complaint-free life.

We hope you enjoyed this delicious lesson in Italian ghost folklore and folk magic!

We had a blast chatting with Lisa, and can’t wait to devour all of her elegant magical written words. If you’re ready to delve deeper into the practice of writing as ritual and poetry as spellcraft, we believe Lisa can take you there.

The post Lean Into The Mystery appeared first on Homespun Haints.