Talk:Stregheria/Archive 01


I cut the following here for repair:


The history of Stregheria, in this sense referring to Italian witchcraft, began with the arrival of the Etruscans in Italy circa 1,900 BCE (roughly 4,000 years ago). The Etruscans refined the religious practices of the native Italians, which before were almost undoubtedly similar to the practices of central Europe's germanic fertility cults from which Druidry and Wicchecraeft both derived. This is when Italian witchcraft first became differentiated from other regional forms of witchcraft, about 400 years prior to Druidry becoming a distinct religion.
At this point, Italian witchcraft was simply the folk magick being practiced in the shadow of the more ceremonial rituals of the Etruscan priesthood.

It makes several confident assertions of dubious validity:

  • Whence this date for the arrival of the Etruscans? Whence the assertion that they were outside arrivals, not autochthonous? (Both hypotheses have support; neither is certain.)
  • Whence this information on Etruscan refinements of native Italian religious practice?
  • Whence this assertion that native Italian religious practices were "undoubtedly" similar to central European religions? (Since the Germanic and Celtic languages and—to some extent—mythologies were both Indo-European, this would place Indo-Europeans in Italy before the arrival of the Etruscans, who were not Indo-European. I shouldn't need to explain why this is mistaken.)
  • For that matter: what little we know of Etruscan religion is largely filtered through Roman minds; is anything known of pre-Etruscan belief and practice, the "Italian witchcraft" and "folk magick" spoken of here? Mythologies borrow from other mythologies, true, and it's sometimes possible to tease out the different strands that form the whole (see for example Greek mythology#Origins of Greek Mythology). This takes extensive knowledge; what are the sources of this knowledge on Etruscan religion? Or is the whole thing pure fancy and speculation?

(A final note: Mythologies of an ancient origin are very common: everyone from ancient Romans to modern-day nationalists makes them. So do neo-pagans. No such claims should be taken at face value.) —E. Underwood 06:54, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Very good points, though I'd say more sensational than dubious on most accounts. Likely a lot of these assertions have grains of truth in them, but as with any religion Stregheria seems to have taken some liberties in describing its own history. I'll tweak with it in the next couple of days and try to assemble something more mainstream (with references) and try to separate out the legendary "history" from what's actually known. (I think the legendary history should remain, as it is important to understanding of the religion, but should not be so completely infused into the "actual" history as to appear presented as known fact.) --Corvun 13:44, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Good, I'm glad we're on the same page here. For what it's worth, this old version of the paragraph (11:41, 17 Nov 2004) is probably a better starting point. (I love the term "religious retconning"; too bad there's no article for it. :-)

As an example of religious retconning, Stregheria attempts to connect itself with the religion of the original Etruscans, and claims that its origins lie with the appearance of the Etruscans in Italy circa 1,900 BCE (roughly 4,000 years ago). Evidence of pre-Christian grimoires and books of charms and incantations are said by followers to date back as far as the year 30 BC. However, even most adherents admit that Stregheria could not have existed in anything even remotely resembling its modern form until around 1350 CE.

Older Italian belief in witches could probably go under Strega, the Roman origins thereof under strix (mythology) (actually closer to a vampire than a witch), and the neo-pagan self-claims under this heading. —E. Underwood 17:19, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree it's a shame there's no article for "religious retconning", especially since it's such a widespread practice. Vodun's claim to be the "Old Religion" of Africa, Wicca's claim to be the "Old Religion" of Europe, or Christianity's claim that Adam & Eve were the first Christians (I've heard Pentacostals preach entire sermons about how Adam was given special knowledge of things to come, and that he knew of the coming of Jesus -- in this scheme, Judaism is seen as a corruption of Christianity, rather than its parent religion). Sometimes it's as simple as claiming that religion Y is a direct descendant from ancient sources X and Z, X and Z are thousands of years old, therefore religion Y is thousands of years old. Sometimes it involves a mythological history (like the Pagan Roman religion). And sometimes it fuses both. Strangely, though, Wicca seems to be the only religion to have (mostly) halted this practice, possibly because it has undergone the most attack for it. Not that all of this is directly related to Stregheria, but it would make interesting fodder for an article. --Corvun 21:04, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

yes, Eusebius rewrote the history of Judaism to give Christianity a respectable antiquity, and before him the JEDP authors remade the history of Israelite religion according to their own views. Wiccan and other neo-pagan claims that, for example, every horned mythological figure in ancient religions represented a single Horned God, are just a more recent appearance of this phenomenon. A title like religious retcon would bring the Originality Police down like a pack of harpies, but some of this might go in an article on origin myths or mythic history or something similar. —E. Underwood 16:10, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I too agree for the most part and hope I'm on the same page - that Margaret Murray, for an example, was going way overboard and that what Wiccans claimed to be the "old religion" was a romanticized version of a set of various indiginous belief systems which once existed, and some of which existed in the "heath" fairly late (16-17th CE?). I don't think you have to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but as mentioned earlier I do believe there are half-truths going on. While I feel that co-opting say the Shiva from Mohenjo-Daro and claiming it to be Pan or Cernunnos can seem deceptive, they are all quite similar. Personally I attribute this more to a humanistic level, but I don't have the problem with the theory that they all represent one archetypal deity, even though I don't personally ascribe to that belief. My problem, if I understand you guys, is when a group claims this is because of some ancient "Atlantean society" or something and not, say, the PIEs, or plain human nature to notice and develop the same ideas of worship. Or just plain make up stuff - Like Buckland, PectiWicca and the elusive Aidan Breac. If anyone could prove that that existed I would love to know. Sorry for jumping in, and the summations of well known theories are just for my edification. What I would really like to know, is if it would be a fallacious to hypothesize that the practice of burying an upside down statue of Saint Joseph in your yard to help sell your house, might be a pre-Christian tradition transposed onto Roman Catholicism? To me it seemed straight out of the Golden Bough or even Wicca. Anyway, that's what originally brought me here, since the custom started in Italy, I wanted to know if anybody knew of a possible folk origin. ;-) Khirad 11:11, 15 September 2005 (UTC)