All about Candles

This set of pages is all about candles so to start off I am going to talk about Bees, as all our bespoke candles are made from the by-product of this wonderful insect. Then to the right you will find more pages on a variety of candle related subjects. I have also included amongts these pages some images of our newly created bespoke range of candles with links to the page where you can find out they have been made, by who and how you can purchase them if you wish.

Bees in mythology

From early times the bee was used as an image to represent the Mother Goddess and the hive was likened to the womb of the Great Mother. The most famous icon, depicting the goddess with the head of a bee and the feet of a bird, was found in a cave painting in Southern Spain and dates from Neolithic times. It is known that bees existed in their present form long before humankind. In many cultures they were a symbol of immortality and in an ancient Hindu custom that has survived today, a father will feed a child honey while asking Parvati, the gentle Mother Goddess, that the child might live to see a hundred autumns.

Bees like butterflies, another early Mother Goddess representation, are often etched or painted on protective amulets especially for children, babies, pregnant women, mothers, very old or sick people and to guard against loss, rejection, loneliness and grief.

But the power and ferocity of the bee should not be underestimated. The potency resides in the Queen Bee and the female virgin worker bees who gather the pollen. The Queen Bee in myth symbolised the Goddess or her High Priestess and the worker bees her priestesses. Priests would become eunuchs to serve the Bee Goddesses, for example at the temple of Artemis, the Greek Huntress and Moon Goddess at Ephesus where her statues were adorned with bees. These priests were called essenes, which means drones, the name given to the male bee. It is said that a virgin can walk through a swarm of bees and not be stung (I would not recommend trying this).

Over the millennia, bees have been adopted as the icon of Rhea, the Greek Earth Mother, Demeter the Grain Mother, Cybele, originally an Anatolian Earth and Mountain Goddess whose worship spread throughout the Ancient Greek world and Roman Empire, Artemis and her Roman counterpart Diana.

In Celtic myth, bees were regarded as sources of great wisdom and messengers between the dimensions and in Christianity as emissaries of the Virgin Mary. For this reason they were kept informed of any major changes in their owners’ lives as it was thought they would otherwise leave the hive. It is still considered unlucky to kill a bee that goes into a house as she is bringing blessings to the home.

The Goddess was also depicted as a Queen Bee in Minoan culture and this image was closely tied to the early bull worship that originally was dedicated to the Mother Goddess. The bee represented the soul and rebirth in Minoan civilization, partly because it was believed bees were created from dead bulls, especially if the carcass was buried up to the horns in Mother Earth. This idea pervaded other European cultures and still was recorded in mediaeval times in England.

In Ancient Greece the dead were embalmed in honey in the foetal position in huge urns, waiting for their restoration to a future life.

The Melissae

Aphrodite, Greek Goddess of love, was worshipped at a honeycomb-shaped shrine at Mount Eryx. Her High Priestess was called Melissa (meaning bee) and the other virgin priestesses melissae. By virgin this meant that they belonged to no man, but practiced a form of sacred prostitution that celebrated the fertility aspect of Aphrodite, the Queen Bee and the sacred marriage between Earth and Sky. The hexagonal shape of the honeycomb (six was believed to be the number of Aphrodite and later Venus) was the sacred geometric shape of harmony. Bees, who were considered in Greece to be the souls of dead priestesses, were creators of this perfect form and thus greatly revered. Indeed the mathematician Pythagoras believed that the honeycomb form suggested a symmetry that was reflected in the cosmos itself.

The Magic of Honey

Because honey was, apart from salt, the main preservative, for thousands of years it was treated as a magical substance and used in folk rituals. Honey is placed in the South of a circle in magick (see the ritual at the end of this section).

Honey in the form of ambrosia was the food of the Olympian deities and Hera, Greek Mother Goddess and wife of Zeus, gave honey to the other gods and goddesses to keep them young. Honey was placed also on the straw Bride bed of the Celtic maiden Goddess Brighid on her festival Imbolc at the beginning of February.

This bed was created near the hearth in farmsteads and workers would come from the fields to ask the Goddess in the form of the virgin representing her to bless their craft. This custom persisted at least until the Industrial Revolution. The honey represented fertility and abundance and in Celtic times the chief of the tribe would mate with a maiden representative of Brighid on the Bride bed to renew the sacred marriage with the land (see the chapter on the Sacred Marriage). Fertility is still one of the magical meanings of honey

Both the Egyptian Papyrus Ebers that was written about 1500BC and the Jewish Talmud, cite honey as a healer for many external and internal illnesses. In the African tradition, the Yorubi Mother Goddess Oshun heals humankind with her sacred honey through her medicine men and women.

Bees and Prophecy

Because bees were divine messengers, honey made into sacred mead, wine created from fermented honey, has traditionally endowed prophetic powers on the favoured. The original Thriae, three maiden seers at Delphi, were the daughters of Zeus and demanded payment in honey. They drank mead brewed to a secret formula from the nectar of sacred bees who lived in the grove. This recipe was handed down to their successors who continued to prophecy at Delphi. The High Priestess, the Oracle of Delphi herself, assumed the name of Queen Bee and the bee symbol was engraved on coins at Delphi. When the Oracle was taken over by Apollo, the priestesses retained the title melissae. But the most famous mead was that brewed by the Viking giantess Gonlod who is called the mother of poetry. She owned the cauldron of inspiration that the Father god Odin stole from her so that he might possess the gift of inspired utterance (see also Cauldron goddesses). Interestingly, the name of one of the few Old Testament prophetesses, Deborah meant bee and she has been linked with the Mycean Bee Goddess.

The Virgin Mary

Bees are symbols of the Virgin Mary throughout the western world and especially in Eastern Europe. In the Slavonic folk tradition the bee is linked with the Immaculate Conception. July 26, the feast of St Anna mother of Mary whose birth also resulted from an immaculate conception, is the time when beekeepers pray for the conception of new healthy bees. In the Ukraine bees are the tears of our Lady and the Queen Bee of any hive is called Queen Tsarina, a name associated with Mary, Queen of Heaven. Throughout Eastern Europe, Mary is protectress of bees and beekeepers and consecrated honey is offered on altars on the Feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary on August 15, the date linked with her ascension into heaven.

The following ritual is adapted from folk magick, using the fruits and grains of the Earth mother to represent her abundance.

A Honey ritual to bring abundance and fertility of all kinds into your life

• Create a circle of yellow, brown or gold flowers or leaves beginning in the North (you can use a compass or an approximation), as you do so visualising the circle radiant with light.

• Make the circle large enough to walk round. You can work alone or with friends, family or a partner if you have a joint project or area of your life in which you need increase or fertility.

• In the center, on a small round table, place a beeswax candle. I have seen some for sale with small wax bees adorning them.

• To the North of the candle within the flower circle set a small round loaf of bread to represent the element of Earth and the Winter.

• To the East of the candle have a dish of seeds, to represent the element of Air and the Spring.

• In the South place a dish of honey in a pottery jar with a spoon, to represent the element of Fire and the abundance of Summer.

• Finally in the West, have a small jug of milk to represent the element of Water and Autumn.

• Light the candle and say:

 Melissa, Lady, Mother bee, ever shine your light on me

• Take first the bread and hold it high above the candle, saying

 Wake from thy winter sleep. Mother of the grain, nourish in me the stirrings of new life.

• Crumble a little of the bread into a second small pottery tribute dish that you can place in front of the candle, saying;

Accept Mother Earth, Mother Bee, this my/our tribute

• Then eat a little bread yourself, saying

Life giver, bringer of healing and protection, I/we give thanks

• Take next the dish of seeds and hold it high over the candle, saying

Take seed new life that you may be fertilised by the sun and the rain and grow strong and tall

• Drop a few seeds into the tribute dish, saying

 Nurture Mother Earth, Mother Bee, this my/our tribute

• Eat some seeds, saying

 Womb of new growth, bringer of energy, vitality and hope I/we give thanks

• Hold the honey over the candle, saying

Let the warm sun bring forth flowers for the bees, grass for the cattle and sheep and fertility in this endeavour

• Spoon a little honey into the tribute dish saying

 Melissa, Mother Bee, take your own as tribute

• Eat a little honey saying

 Gift of the bees, your priestesses, for this sacred ambrosia that promises abundance, I/we give thanks

• Finally hold the jug of milk over the candle, saying

Milk of the Mother, in richness and sweetness flowing free I /we give thanks for your nourishment and nurturing.

• Pour enough milk in the tribute dish to dissolve the honey and stir it clockwise, saying

 Melissa, milk to your honey, mingled in tribute to you

• Drink a little milk, saying

 We have eaten and drunk of your bounty, why should we fear you will not grant our dearest wishes; for all your gifts I/we give thanks.

• Sit in the circle and eat and drink the bread, honey, seeds and milk. When you have finished, walk anti-clockwise round the circle, beginning just to the west of your starting point and ending where you began, saying

 May be circle of the Mother Bee, the sacred hoop of life, be un-cast, but never broken.

• Leave the dish of offerings in front of the candle still within the circle of flowers. When the candle is burned through, either cast the contents of the tribute dish into flowing water or bury them in earth. You may have seedlings by spring.

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CALLING YOUR LOVE IN THE CANDLE FLAME

CREATING CANDLE WEB

CANDLE WAX DIVINATION

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made by Miranda especially for this site

Candles made from natural and coloured beeswax

Created by the bees, constructed by Miranda, empowered by Cassandra, made magical by you!