History

Main article: History of Wicca

[edit]Origins and early development, 1921–1959

In the 1920s and 30s, the Egyptologist Dr Margaret Murray published several books detailing her theories that those persecuted as witches during the Early Modern period in Europe were not, as the persecutors had claimed, followers of Satanism, but adherents of a surviving pre-Christian pagan religion - the Witch-Cult. Despite now being discredited by further historical research, her theories were widely accepted and supported at the time.

It was during the 1930s that the first evidence appears for the practise of a pagan Witchcraft religion^[88] (what would be recognisable now as Wicca) in England. It seems that several groups around the country, in such places as Norfolk,^[89] Cheshire^[90] and the New Forest had set themselves up as continuing in the tradition of Murray's Witch-Cult, albeit with influences coming from disparate sources such as ceremonial magic, folk magic, Freemasonry, Theosophy, Romanticism, Druidry, classical mythology and Asian religions.

The Witchcraft religion became more prominent beginning in 1951, with the repeal of the Witchcraft Act of 1735, after which several figures, such as Charles Cardell, Cecil Williamson and most notably Gerald Gardner, began propagating their own versions of the Craft. Gardner had been initiated into the New Forest coven in 1939, before forming his own tradition, later termed Gardnerianism, which he spread through the formation of groups like the Bricket Wood coven. His tradition, aided by the help of his High Priestess Doreen Valiente and the publication of his books Witchcraft Today (1954) and The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959), soon became the dominant form in the country, and spread to other parts of the British Isles.

[edit]Adaptation and spread, 1960–present

Following Gardner's death in 1964, the Craft continued to grow unabated despite sensationalism and negative portrayals in British tabloids, with new traditions being propagated by figures like Robert Cochrane, Sybil Leek and most importantly Alex Sanders, whose Alexandrian Wicca, which was predominantly based upon Gardnerian Wicca, albeit with an emphasis placed on ceremonial magic, spread quickly and gained much media attention. Around this time, the term "Wicca" began to be commonly adopted over "Witchcraft" and the faith was exported to countries like Australia and the United States.

It was in the United States and in Australia that new, home-grown traditions, sometimes based upon earlier, regional folk-magical traditions and often mixed with the basic structure of Gardnerian Wicca, began to develop, including Victor Anderson's Feri, Joseph Wilson's 1734 tradition, Aidan Kelly's New Reformed Orthodox Order of the Golden Dawn and eventually Zsuzsanna Budapest's Dianic Wicca, each of which emphasised different aspects of the faith.^[91] It was also around this time that books teaching people how to become Witches themselves without formal initiation or training began to emerge, among them Paul Huson's Mastering Witchcraft (1970) and Lady Sheba's Book of Shadows (1971). Similar books continued to be published throughout the 1980s and 1990s, fuelled by the writing of such authors asDoreen Valiente, Janet Farrar, Stewart Farrar and Scott Cunningham, who popularised the idea of self-initiation into the Craft.

In the 1990s, amid ever-rising numbers of self-initiates, the popular media began to explore "witchcraft" in fictional films like The Craft and television series like Charmed, introducing numbers of young people to the idea of religious witchcraft. This growing demographic was soon catered to through the Internet and by authors like Silver Ravenwolf, much to the criticism of traditional Wiccan groups and individuals. In response to the way that Wicca was increasingly portrayed as trendy, eclectic, and influenced by the New Age movement, many Witches turned to the pre-Gardnerian origins of the Craft, and to the traditions of his rivals like Cardell and Cochrane, describing themselves as following "Traditional Witchcraft". Prominent groups within this Traditional Witchcraft revival included Andrew Chumbley's Cultus Sabbati and the Cornish Ros an Bucca coven.

[edit]Etymology

Main article: Wicca (etymology)

The term "Wicca" first achieved widespread acceptance when referring to the religion in the 1960s and 70s. Prior to that, the term "Witchcraft" had been more widely used. Whilst being based upon the Old English word wicca, which referred solely to male sorcerers, the actual individual who coined the capitalised term "Wicca" is unknown, though it has been speculated that it was Charles Cardell, who certainly used the term "Wiccen" during the 1950s.

[edit]Demographics

Number of Wiccans by country according to recent estimates

The actual number of Wiccans worldwide is unknown, and it has been noted that it is more difficult to establish the numbers of members of Neopagan faiths than many other religions due to their disorganised structure.^[92] However, Adherents.com, an independent website which specialises in collecting estimates of world religions, cites over thirty sources with estimates of numbers of Wiccans (principally from the USA and UK). From this, they developed a median estimate of 800,000 members.^[93] In the United States population alone, there have been many attempts at finding a figure, with the 2001 American Religious Identification Survey estimating that at least 134,000 adults identified themselves as Wiccans, compared to 8,000 in 1990.^[94] Wiccans have also made up significant proportions of various groups within that country; for instance, Wicca is the largest non-Christian faith practised in the United States Air Force, with 1,434 airmen identifying themselves as such.^[95]

"[The average Wiccan is] a man in his forties, or a woman in her thirties, Caucasian, reasonably well educated, not earning much but probably not too concerned about material things, someone that demographers would call lower middle class."

Leo Ruickbie (2004)^[96]

In the United Kingdom, census figures do not allow an accurate breakdown of traditions within the Pagan heading, as a campaign by the Pagan Federation before the 2001 Census encouraged Wiccans, Heathens, Druids and others all to use the same write-in term 'Pagan' in order to maximise the numbers reported. For the first time, respondents were able to write in an affiliation not covered by the checklist of common religions, and a total of 42,262 people from England, Scotland and Wales declared themselves to be Pagans by this method. These figures were not immediately analysed by the Office of National Statistics, but were released after an application by the Pagan Federation of Scotland.^[97]