Neolithic Shamanism: Spirit Work in the Norse Tradition - Raven Kaldera 2012
Birch (Betula spp.)
The Green World: Plants
Raven: There is something ethereally beautiful about a birch tree, one of the most revered and honored trees in the northern hemisphere. The Saami people say that they are the best trees to stand under during a thunderstorm because they are never struck by lightning. The inner bark of birch contains salicylates, painkillers drunk in birch tea. Birch Lady, as I have often called her, is a powerfully nurturing guardian. I once had to go broker a deal with the spirit of a local mountain, and it was the Birch Lady who stepped forward as a go-between. When I speak to her, she is a tall, ivory white woman who always reaches out and strokes my hair. She, like Dame Ellhorn, will chide me for not getting enough sleep, for not taking enough care of myself. Grandmother Birch is wise and windblown, standing tall and proud in the coldest weather. I carry bits of birchbark and rub them when I need her aid.
Galina: Birch was one of the first trees who reached out for me. She was my entryway into journey work, and her touch helped me very early on in balancing and integrating the immense emotional and energetic changes resulting from esoteric work, priestcraft, and particularly shamanic practice. Birch’s power is that of cleansing. She opens and cleanses, balances and integrates. There is a sense of the holy about her, and I have often called her the high priestess of trees. She is a teacher of magic, skilled at seeing that which is unseen and teaching those she allies with to do the same. In her oldest aspect, she is connected to ecstatic madness, the trance that breaks the heart and mind open to the Otherworlds and allows that inspired fire to pour fourth into Midgard. She is the tree of the priest, the mystic, the shaman. For all that, I’ve always found her very practical. There is a side to this tree that is about careful planning, careful crafting, and common sense. She is one of the first plant spirits who I personally would suggest seeking out because so much of what she has to teach involves spiritual cleanliness; purity (if it be not too old-fashioned a term); and an understanding of taint, taboo, and debt.
Birch trees have been used for their paper bark in northern and central Europe since Mesolithic times; we know because we’ve found it in archaeological sites. In every culture that reveres Birch, she is associated with mother goddesses of some sort. To the Germanic folk, she was the tree of Frigga, the rune Berkana/Beorc, which symbolizes growth and is a pictograph of woman’s breasts. Birch was also associated with purity, due to its light color, and beginnings, as it is the first tree to “step out” into a burned area and start the reforestation process. Birch is the first of the Celtic tree months, Beth.
A cradle of birchwood protects babies. The traditional witch’s broom was often made of birch twigs. As birch is a strong but gentle purifying tree, birch limbs have been used to strike possessed people or animals as a way to exorcise them. A birch tree hung with red and white ribbons outside a stable was believed to protect the animals inside from being hag-ridden, or bothered by faeries. Sprigs of birch twigs hung around the house prevented burned food or kitchen accidents. The Saami people would lay a person with chronic pain on a bed of fresh birch leaves (or would use dried leaves soaked in warm water), and cover that individual with the leaves as well. Birchbark can be made into dyes, medicines, baskets, shoes, waterproof boats, and sleds. It is also the source of the earliest paper, and it can be ground into nutritious flour in times of famine. Birchwood made skis, furniture, and many other things. In the frozen North, birch was definitely the “mother tree,” giving of herself entirely, adding to comfort and survival.
Grandmother Birch is a tall, white woman—skin like old ivory, flowing hair the color of rich cream, breasts that overflow with milk. Usually, she is an extremely motherly plant, treating those who come to her like children who need to be coddled. While she is usually a fountain of overflowing nurturing, once in a while she may turn fey and appear as aged and gaunt, with wild, tangled silver hair and gray white skin like that of a corpse. This is her oldest aspect, and perhaps her most dangerous; this is Birch as the Lady with the White Hand, whose touch upon the brow leaves a white scar that causes madness. It is unclear what causes such a change in her; perhaps it is the attitude of those who approach. Some say that it is because the individual is in such a bad way that all she can think of to do is to reduce them to a babe’s wits, a state in which they are more likely to be taken care of, at least as she sees things. Or it may be that this is the gift of ecstasy and poetic lunacy, and that it is the best blessing she may bestow in light of the person’s calling and wyrd. Usually she is loving and willing to help as she can.
Exercise: Birch Mothering
When you are feeling down and no humans can comfort you, go sit under a birch tree. Bring some milk with you, and pour it out as an offering. Ground, center, and breathe deeply. Put yourself into a meditative trance, and if possible, a deeper trance. We like to hum (tunefully or tunelessly) when reaching out to Grandmother Birch. Often the first sign of her presence is the faint touch of a cool, delicate hand brushing against your head. Ask her to give you some comfort, and then close your eyes and let her do her work. Your thoughts may wander, but that’s all right—she will do her work while you are distracted.