A Handbook of Saxon Sorcery & Magic: Wyrdworking, Rune Craft, Divination & Wortcunning - Alaric Albertsson 2017

Galdor: The Power of Speech
More Magic Techniques

The early English druids and witches understood the power inherent in sound. They called this power galdor, and the person who specialized in incantations and magic songs was known as a galdre. Much of what we know about early Anglo-Saxon magic has been preserved in verbal charms recorded by English scribes between the ninth and eleventh centuries. There were incantations for healing and animal husbandry, for childbirth and for safe travel. The numerous verbal charms that have survived reveal techniques used by the Saxon sorcerers to produce effective and resonant galdor in their magic.

Tolkien recognized the power of galdor, although I think this is more obvious in his books than in the movies they inspired at the beginning of this millennium. The first of these movies, The Fellowship of the Ring, dramatically showed the effect of galdor when Gandolf uttered the Black Speech of Mordor in the halls of Rivendell. Overall, however, the books themselves were more descriptive of the power of song and language. In the books, the healing and creative power of elf-song is expressed more overtly. In Tolkien’s fictional Middle Earth, words have both the power to create and to destroy.

But what about the real Middle Earth, the physical plane we live in? Here, too, words have the power to create or destroy. This is the principle behind positive affirmations. When people chant, “Every day, in every way, I’m becoming better and better,” they are casting a spell. As mentioned earlier, the Old English verb spellian means to speak or proclaim, so when we cast a spell we are casting or throwing down a proclamation.

We humans are verbal creatures. This is one of the most significant factors distinguishing us from other mammals. Much of what we call intelligence is directly related to our ability to verbalize. Language—verbalization—gives form to our thoughts. It is an act of creation. Galdor takes this act of creation to the next level. The idea or goal is to give voice to a proclamation—to cast a spell—with enough force to create ripples in the web of wyrd that connects us all.

Tina-Lisa Agresta was troubled by waking up at night with a deep sense of anxiety. After attending a galdor workshop that I presented in Pittsburgh, she designed a verbal spell of her own to help with this problem. Her spell makes use of rhyme to express her words more deeply:

Gentle slumber … sweet repose

Night grows still as moonlight glows …

Soft embrace of feathered bed

Warmly welcomes weary head …

Dreams delightful come to pass

So spins the star-filled hourglass …

A wisp of wind whispers “Awake!

Anon a new dawn awaits!”

Rhyme is perhaps the most common technique used today for creating effective galdor. Rhyme implants messages and expressions into our minds. This is why rhyme is so often used in advertising slogans. For years a successful shaving cream company lined American highways with series of signs extolling the virtues of their product, Burma-Shave. By the 1930s, these signs were using rhymed verse to attract attention and deliver their message to motorists. The Burma-Shave signs and their rhymes were an American institution until the early 1960s, when they disappeared due to the company changing hands and to the expanding use of the interstate system.

The power of rhyme can be astonishing. I can remember advertising messages that I haven’t heard in forty years or more. I know how I can tell it’s Mattel (“it’s swell!”), and that Winston tastes good (“like a cigarette should”). You may be too young to remember these rhymes, but you can probably recall similar commercial slogans from your own childhood, or perhaps you know that Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492. A rhyme delivers a statement or message with such force that we remember it long after we have forgotten countless other unrhymed facts and ideas.

It should be obvious to the reader how this applies to galdor. Expressing the proclamation, or spell, in rhymed verse will give your words more force.

Rhyming your galdor requires a little advance preparation, but it is not difficult. The first thing to do is make a list of some key words suitable to your purpose. You can see that Tina-Lisa chose words relating to restful sleep: repose, bed, awake. After you have your list, select one of your words and go through the alphabet to find other words that rhyme with it. For repose Tina-Lisa may have come up with chose, close, doze, froze, glows, goes, grows, hose, knows, mows, nose, pose, prose, rose, rows, sews, shows, sows, stows, those, throws, toes, and tows. Ultimately she selected glows. Having a list of possible rhyming words provides a variety of material to work with.

Remember multisyllabic words too! The best way I have found to do this is to throw an extra syllable in while looking for a rhyme. The syllable does not need to make sense. I could use “ah,” for example. Going through the alphabet for repose rhymes, I would start with nonsense words like “ahboze,” discovering words such as oppose, arose, and bestows.

Tina-Lisa could have said, “Gentle slumber, sweet repose, night grows still as I lay down.” That states her purpose or intention of lying down calmly. But the words fall flat. They have little power. When she rhymes, saying “Gentle slumber, sweet repose, night grows still as moonlight glows,” the words take on a life of their own. It is a more powerful galdor than the first statement.

For most Saxon sorcerers, rhymed verse is an effective galdor technique. But perhaps you are one of the few who are not comfortable with rhyme. Perhaps it feels silly to you. Give it a fair try, but do not hesitate to eschew this technique if you find it counterproductive. What we are discussing are methods for creating more efficacious galdor, and you can use any of the techniques I give here alone or in combination. An experienced galdre knows the only thing that matters is whether or not the spell works!

A technique more common to the Saxons of elder days was alliteration: a sentence or verse in which many or most of the words begin with the same sound, as in “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.” Alliteration was a defining feature of Old English poetry and is often found in Old English incantations. As with rhyme, alliteration builds power through repetition. The difference is that rhyming repetition occurs at the end of a line, whereas alliteration repeats the first sound in each word. Alliteration and rhyming can be used either separately or in conjunction with one another.

Alliteration also requires some advance preparation. Again, the first thing to do is make a list of key words suitable to your purpose. Then select a key word, but instead of finding words that rhyme with it, try to find words that begin with the same sound. Go through the possible vowels (a, e, i, o, and u), using both the long and short sounds for each.

Let’s take the word repose again and see what we can find in the way of suitable alliteration. We want words that begin with an r sound, but not just any word will do. The words we’re looking for should have some possible meaning within an incantation.

Ray, rest, restful, real, relax, renew, review, rich, written, right, roam, rolling, rote, wrote, wrought. These are just a few possibilities. A dictionary will be extremely helpful for this, but keep in mind that some sounds can be written in more than one way. So look up words beginning with ph when searching for something to go with fair, and words beginning with wr when looking for something to go with repose.

From the list of words above, we could begin a galdor for peaceful, undisturbed sleep with something like, “Relax and rest with renewed repose.” Say this aloud and notice how this alliteration, the repeated r, gives the words more emphasis and power.

Alliteration and rhyme can be used in combination with each other. It is not necessary to weave alliteration through the entire incantation. Alliteration may be limited to only one or two lines, whereas rhyme typically appears as a pattern throughout the verbal proclamation. We could say, “Relax and rest with renewed repose, while night grows still and moonlight glows.” You can see here that both lines rhyme, but only the first line alliterates.

Although this is a good example of alliteration, it is not one I would choose for a galdor intended to induce calm, restful sleep. If you have been studying the runes, you may have already guessed why. The r sound is the phonetic value of the rád rune. Rád, meaning ride or road, is a rune of journeying, and that is not our intention here. We do not want either physical or mental activity. Sleep can be perceived as a sort of journey, but rád indicates action rather than relaxation. Our intention is to promote or induce rest. The galdor for this, as we have modified it with alliteration, may still be effective, but it would be even more effective if we evoke a more suitable runic power by alliterating with a d (dæg), k (cen), s (sigil), t (tir), or w (wynn) sound. This weaves the power of rúncræft into your galdor to build a more powerful incantation. It is not necessary to do this, and I do not know of anyone who combines these techniques consistently, but it is something to keep in mind when you include alliteration in your incantations.

In the chapter on The Alchemy of Magic, I gave an example of a short galdor to inscribe on a sheet of lead to banish or curse the negativity felt after breaking off a relationship with somebody. The words were:

Hate and hurt held in my heart

I banish now! Be gone! Depart!

Notice the alliteration here using the h sound in the first line. This is the phonetic value of the hagol rune. The mystery of hagol (hail) is that of transformation. Hailstones are painful and damaging, but after falling, they transform into life-giving water. By alliterating the h sound we invoke the mystery of hagol to help create a transformation from heartache to a strong, positive state of being.

The early English also used galdor in a narrative style. By this I mean that the incantation told a story describing the desired effect. The narrative often had no more than a coincidental connection with the immediate problem. The tenth-century Nine Herbs Charm, for example, includes a brief narrative of the god Woden taking up nine “glory twigs,” possibly strips of wood with runes carved into them, and throwing them at a poisonous serpent. The serpent, representing poison or disease, then shatters into nine pieces. Although this galdor did not directly address the afflicted person, its intention was to break his or her disease. The story describes the effect that the sorcerer hopes to achieve.

An effect is often more readily achieved when we direct attention away from ourselves in this way. This technique was not unique to the early English. Young lovers use the same technique today when they watch a romantic movie at the cinema or on television. Their own passions are inflamed as they observe a romantic narrative involving other, fictional people. The narrative itself may seem counterproductive, but a good romance works because it is a sort of galdor. In the movie Love Story, the heroine dies of cancer, nevertheless it was a good romance. The tragic death in the narrative served as a reminder to cherish our loved ones while we can.

In the same way, the details in a narrative-style galdor take second place to the overall message. Traditionally, Old English charms were designed for general situations rather than specific incidents. You may, of course, design a narrative for one finite purpose, but a skilled galdre will have an array of incantations at his or her disposal. These should reflect the needs and challenges that the galdre expects to address. Just as the Anglo-Saxons had charms for the water-elf disease, today’s practitioner may have charms for influenza or asthma. Few of us now need charms to protect our cattle, but galdor to protect our cars or even bicycles can prove useful.

Traditional narrative galdor is usually written in the past or present tense, rather than the future tense. To speak of something that “will” happen (future tense) is to speculate. It has not yet happened, so you might be disappointed. A statement of something that has happened or is currently happening is more solid, as there is no speculation involved. Thus, the Nine Herbs Charm does not say that the god Woden will take up nine glory twigs and smite the serpent, it says that he has already done so. The serpent—the disease—has been shattered. It is done. There is no debate or speculation about it. Stating narrative incantations in this way commits the galdre to the work at hand. The galdre has effectively given his or her word. If the incantation fails, that word has been broken. For this reason the adept galdre will not use the narrative style for every little thing. It will be reserved for more important work. And for this reason, too, a galdre of any worth will be careful to speak truthfully as much as possible. Speaking truthfully builds the strength behind your words. Speaking truthfully strengthens your mægen, that spiritual fortitude we discussed in the first chapter of this book.

Just as you can combine alliteration and rhyme, you can also combine the narrative style with either of these techniques. One tenth-century charm against acute pain includes a narrative telling us that “the smith sat and crafted a little knife.” This is a Modern English translation. In Old English the same narrative is expressed as “sæt smith sloh seax lytel.” The words repeat a hissing s sound, giving us a combination of alliteration and narrative verse.

Galdor, as a magical technique, can be used all alone, and this is done so often as to be almost a cliché of witchcraft. Practitioners who specialize in galdor often utilize the Laws of Sympathy and Contagion, using colors and images to focus their spells, empowering their symbols with rhyming or alliterative incantations. But galdor is also used in conjunction with other cræftes. Look at the Old English example given here: Sæt smith sloh seax lytel. This is not just alliteration, the line alliterates the phonetic value of sigil, a rune of guidance and safety. This is an example of two skills—rúncræft and galdor—woven together to create a more powerful effect.

Galdor can be used in conjunction with rúncræft in various ways. In the example given here, the sigil rune is hidden in the alliterative verse. It is almost incidental, but the rune will nevertheless exert some influence. The experienced galdre will use runic sounds to his or her advantage, but it is the verbal component that is emphasized.

Your telga can be used to give more emphasis to the runic significance of your alliteration if you have included this technique as part of the galdor. Use the wand to mark the shape of the rune in the air as you recite the respective alliterated line or lines. In the previous example of Old English galdor against acute pain, the shape of the rune sigil could be made with three sharp gestures. As you delineate the shape of the rune, see in your mind’s eye a crackling energy remaining in the wake of the tip of your wand. See the entire, complete shape of the rune hovering in the air before you. You can make the gesture with just your fingertips, if necessary, but the wand will help direct your own wód beyond your hama, or astral shield.

Conversely, just as an understanding of the runes can enhance your galdor, careful verbalization can enhance your rúncræft. We have already seen examples of this in the previous chapter, but additional and more complex galdor can be used to empower runic charms. Design a rhyming or alliterative galdor and recite this while coloring the runes. If this is distracting for you, recite your galdor after coloring the runes, using your telga to infuse each symbol with your personal power.

The Old English charms reveal that the Saxons also used galdor in conjunction with wortcunning, the use of herbs. The Nine Herbs Charm is perhaps the most notable example of this. Another Old English galdor, contemporary with the Nine Herbs Charm, is essentially a listing of nearly sixty herbs to use in formulating a “holy salve,” followed by instructions for making the salve. We will explore wortcunning in the following chapter, but keep in mind that galdor can be used in almost every stage of your work with herbs. You can recite an incantation while cutting an herb, if you grow your own plants, or when preparing the herb as a potion or ointment. Still another incantation may be used when consuming the potion or applying the ointment.

I should add that you will probably use at least some galdor in your work. You may eschew runes entirely, or have no interest in wiglung, or not wish to bother with herbs, but almost all sorcerers will make use of galdor to some extent in their work. Some introspection is in order here, as you will want to use galdor that you are comfortable with. If rhyming keeps you focused and helps you remember the galdor, then use a lot of rhymes. If rhyming sounds silly to you, use alliteration and narration instead. You may revel in lengthy incantations, or you may prefer short, two-line statements. Get a feel for the galdor techniques that most empower you.

Depending on your own talents, you may find your own galdor to be more effective when expressed through song rather than the spoken word. This is a traditional technique, and one not often utilized today.

If you have been keeping a personal journal, this is a good place to record any galdor that you design. If you come up with something you really like, write it down. Do not assume that you will remember the words later. For now your personal journal is fine for recording your galdor. If you find this to be a technique you really enjoy or if you discover that you have a talent for rhyming and alliteration, you can purchase a blank book just for your incantations, a galdorbóc.

If my use of the words if, can, and may seem ambiguous, it is because I cannot tell you how to develop your personal wiccecræft. Nothing is more intimate than your own magic. What resonates for you, as a sorcerer? You may be fascinated by the runes and the mysteries of the Rune Poem, or you may find them confusing or even boring. You may love working with herbs, or you may not. Galdor may be deeply empowering for you, but if you are uncomfortable with public speaking, then it may be more discomforting than empowering. In the final chapter of this book, we will explore how to develop a personal style of magic. The next chapters, everything leading up to the final chapter, present possibilities that you may or may not choose to adopt into that style.

Review

1. Why is rhymed verse so often a component of incantations?

2. What is alliteration, and how does it enhance galdor?

3. Why is narrative galdor expressed in the future tense less effective than galdor expressed in the past or present tense?

4. Select a general need that you or people you know are frequently challenged by. This could be health related, or connected to prosperity or community, or to any other facet of the human experience. Design a galdor of at least four lines using rhyming or alliteration, or a combination of both.

5. Select another need and design a galdor of at least eight lines expressed in a narrative style. It need not rhyme or alliterate, although you may certainly make use of either of these.