I was fortunate enough to be given a heads up on a seriously interesting event towards the close of 2016. It transpired that two well respected and established senior figures of traditional witchcraft held a talk together on the 30th September 2016 in London, followed by a tarot workshop on the 2nd October.
Stuart Inman is the Magister of the Clan of the Entangled Thicket, a 1734 strand in the lineage of Joseph Wilson and is well known for talks in London, most recently at Treadwells. Griffin Ced is the Magister of the Ced tradition of witchcraft into which he received initiation in Britain over 4 decades ago before moving to the US. In the words of God, aka Alanis Morissette, ‘isn’t it ironic’? Both distinctly British chaps represent each a tradition which has passed from the US to the UK in the former and the UK to the US in the latter.
I’m certainly proud to have had a friend in Stuart for many years and have great amounts of respect for his knowledge, experience and humour (but don’t tell him that to his face). Stuart was initiated into Alexandrian Wicca by Alex Sanders before turning to Buddhism and, finally, traditional witchcraft. He began a dialogue with Joe Wilson in the US, a now well known correspondent of Robert Cochrane (aka Roy Bowers of Clan of Tubal Cain). Before Joe’s passing, Stuart received the Virtue of the 1734 tradition of witchcraft and has been working this through his Clan of the Entangled Thicket.
Griffin Ced (also an extremely good friend with bags of knowledge and experience and a wicked sense of humour) is the Virtue holder and Witch Father of the House of the Ced Tradition & family line. Together with Rita Morgan, the Dame and Mother of the House of Ced, they have lead the Line and Tradition in the USA for the past 20+ years. Hailing from Britain, Griffin comes from a mix of Hertfordshire Village folk, Essex and London breeding. The Witchblood mixture of Saltmarsh Romany was passed onto him across the veil from his Great-Grandmother, who having decided it was time to move on, drowned herself in a bucket a year before his birth. Born beyond the Hedge, he was raised with Spiritualism and good old-fashioned British Craft, into which he was initiated in Essex back in 1975. Escaping the soggy isles for the snowy climbs of Norway, a quick tour of Africa and many other strange lands, he finally fell in love with California, making LA his home for the past 27 years! Griffin has been teaching and leading public rituals for the past two decades and is committed to Community-building today at The Green Man store in North Hollywood.
Griffin has developed a tarot deck that utilises traditional tarot, but perceived through the lens of the Ced tradition and received through gnosis. In my experience, this deck is truly an expression of a witchcraft tradition, encompassing the mythos and geography of the mythic landscape, enfleshed through the cards and spanning the three worlds. As a learning device, I have personally found it an invaluable tool, applicable to much more than simple divination in my witchcraft. Speaking from personal and individual experience, the Ced tarot deck is a living expression of traditional witchcraft, in particular the Ced stream, reflecting those key elements which are inherent in the old craft.
Griffin took the opportunity to launch the Ced tarot in the UK and carried out a workshop on the Sunday (2nd October). With experience as Manager of the Green Man Store in LA, and as a teacher and leader in the community, Griffin is extremely experienced in workshops, and I can’t wait to see him present this subject so personal to him and marking an exciting return of Ced to Britain.
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