The Western Gate

The Devil’s Ointment
Corinne Boyer
Three Hands Press

AT the outset the key to what lay within this book is in the sub-heading, A history of unguents in European magic and witchcraft. This is what is explored in Corinne Boyer’s book. So my discourse and innate rambling that may follow is not really explored in the book, and if you want to know of ‘ungents’ history then it would be better to learn it from this book.
There are many things therefore that are not included, because how deep would you go, the toxicological effects of ingestion or smearing the body with various substances would need to be concise and what not.
Most ingredients in the nefarious witches ‘flying ointment’, particularly the Atropines will cause heart problems, fevers, delirium and death. Each ingredient is not fully explained as to its known effects on the body. We’re not stupid, this book is a history after all, not a prompt to be curious and have our knowledge fulfilled entirely.
Monkshood, or Aconite and also known as wolfsbane will cause burning/tingling of mouth and extremities, Severe cardiotoxicity: life-threatening heart rhythm disturbances, Nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, general Weakness, paralysis and then sudden cardiac collapse may occur without warning blah blah.
A beautiful plant that even if handled can cause catastrophic consequence, i.e. remember that prickly rose that spiked you earlier in the garden, well that skin break has now ingested some of our Monkshood properties after you’ve been stroking its beautiful petals and sliding your fingers along its stalk , and suddenly your mouth starts to dry. &c. Aristotle likened this urge in the desirous man regardless, to be ‘Akrotic’. Indulging in something knowing the dangers yet compelled to do so. The man sleeps with a particular woman of renown because she is beautiful, alluring, her perfumes rich and enticing and very passionate, knowing full well he may end up with a nasty ‘itch’, or the man who climbs a mountain ignoring the fact that he has to return the trek, but it’s too late, in his eagerness and wanton passion, he is now exhausted, and stuck.
But to continue, Henbane though not as severe, it is unstable, heart racing similar to the old Foxglove, and some may feel like they’ve had a particular brand of Volcanic coffee, whilst others with a history of heart problems, even hereditary, may well collapse with seizures to follow and respiratory depression. Its a roulette wheel of risk.
Deadly Nightshade likewise is disorienting and can lead to convulsions and severe vomiting. But aren’t those shiny black berries gorgeous. Beautiful little apple Snow White.
All these “cans” and “possibles” don’t deter us, we’ve smoked Cannabis after being told it will lead to your downfall, and, (super-skunk- psychosis aside) deemed all those tales and warnings were in fact lies to prevent us from having fun. Likewise, moving onto the class A’s and “what’s all the fuss about?” Well that’s how it is in the early days of space cadetism.

But! We are talking about ointments, to be applied over the body, hopefully no broken skin. The actual specific amounts, complete conjecture and guesswork. The ratios between the active ingredients and the balm~ non specific.
Many ointments listed in Corinnes book use the fat of babies for their compound, see the wonderful film The VVitch (2015). Remembering this book is a historical account of what grimoires and witchfinders were telling.
Are these pseudonyms, are the Fat of babies really ejaculate, and the dead babies, the menses. In the modern age we could converse on the matter, but Corinne as she must is discussing the historical context. That’s what was said, whether we can accuse them of being products of belief or scaremongering. It is also noted that the reference to riding the hedges off to debauchery with Ol’ Scratch is not implied as a dream, an hallucination, but an actual flight in the physical, according to the histories. In our modern way we can put this down to delusion because we’ve taken acid and know the clouds didn’t really turn into a dragon.

Corinne of course does not then discuss modern dream unction’s/, creams and ‘teas’. Why should she.

Dreaming and Lucid dreaming is easy for me, I very rarely need to delve into methods of promoting such visions. Valerian, Blue Lotus, Mugwort have the subtle notes to create trance inducement (and let subtle be the byword), sleep enhancement and dream incubation. Taken in a tea some 1 to two hours before bed.
Would be advisable not to prolong the experiment due to the bodies growing tolerance for more than a fortnight at a time, and let that fortnight be on the waxing period of the moon.
There are of course other, some-say, effective methods of dream and astral ignition, Melatonin will shift the circadian timing at sleep, then there’s that serotonin dabbler 5HTP which will create and promote, in some, more vivid dream. 5HTP does have contra-indications with any other dugs/medication and should be researched, it shifts gears in the mind, doesn’t everything.
I would add that a pouch of lavender and rosemary under the pillow, or better in the sock sole, will help clarity and the mind to remember.

But now I’ve digressed completely off the paths set by this book, and this book isn’t about dreamers, as lucid as they can be, it’s about nefarious ‘hag’s smearing their carcass with bloods of animals, and babies, and every Saturnian herb and plant that grows in their locale. Let that be another prompt.
We, us wanderers on this broken path, should only really absorb that which is local to us, our natural environment. If Peyote doesn’t grow in your local woods, then its not in your psyche to ingest, let the local mushrooms be the replacement when of course they are ready, and always microdosing at first just as we would patch test an essential oil.

In as much as can be summarised Corine’s book deals mainly with poisons, rather than psychedelics and shamanistic (is that a word) experiments. Let it be rememebered that מְכַשֵּׁפָה refers to poisoners and those that create malefic substances as oppossd to the “witch” that shall not be suffered to live.Good ol’ King James (wanker).
And also, shock. Hanged Mans hands and cloth from the undergarments of the busiest whore in Bethnal Green (I made that up).
Every ‘witch’ is green, because we are inherent in nature, and Corinne’s books are prominent in my bulging shelves of Herbalism and propagation (Corine doesn’t tell us how to grow these dastardly plants- because, for the last time… it isn’t mentioned in the histories).
From personal experience…I once lived in Thundersley and had a very large garden with a side plot where I grew quite a few ‘exotic’ plants. One late summer/ harvest and I was cutting them back, they were now sundried and ‘depleted’ I assumed, when a gust of wind reared its troublesome sweep and the pile of debris I had collected likewise blew up, and some I inhaled. A few hours later I began to feel itchy, my temperature rose and I spent the next three days in bed with dilated pupils, feeling like I was growing fur and having the strangest dreams/daydreams and thoughts and of course the dizziness and delirium, I was certainly not grounded… though perhaps not flying. Thankfully I had not grown Monkshood and certainly not Hemlock.
It would be good if there was a follow up to this, with modern approaches, The Contemporary Praxis of Ungents in European Magic and Witchcraft. All the Cabinet of influence could be ascertained from your little nipple headed mushrooms to Calea Zacatechichi ( think this is banned in the UK now) to Tulsi and Basil brew, Galantamine and those I’ve noted above, Mugwort, Valerian, Blue Lotus et al
In today’s modern era we have watches and rings that specify when we sleep, when we deep sleep and more importantly REM, dreamtime. These are usually quite regular. A timer could be set to bring on an infuser to start dissipating scents that ignite the mind on cue with expected REM time. I favour Starchild’s (Glastonbury) Flight oil, and perhaps before bedtime a bath with a liberal dash of Starchild’s Astral oil wash.
Of course there are the options to time signature home made candles where certain oils are sealed, to be exposed to the flame at certain periods But again, I’m veering off the beaten track, speculating and wayfaring.

As I’ve said before in previous reviews of her work, with Corinne Boyer, you know what you’re getting, if she says its a book about The history of Ungents in European witchcraft, then that’s what you’re going to get.
And if that’s what you want. Go get it.
I’ve only omitted half a star, because it’s Three Hands Press and because like Oliver and Claudia from Interview with a Vampire, I want more.

Hecate’s Bouquet ~ Wenborn

Addendum.
Only a couple of times did Corinne note that she would omit or not include details of something, this particular case from Russia in 1888 as an example which i’ve added, not in dispute with her reasons, it is quite triggering.

(From Mummies, Cannibals and Vampires ~ Richard Sugg )

…..In 1888, a similar crime occurred in the Kursk district of Russia.
Sentenced to between eight and twenty years’ penal servitude for the
October murder of a young girl, Lukeria Cherkuahina, four peasants
confessed that they had wished to ‘procure some “magic candles”
before entering on a series of predatory expeditions’. A local man had
narrowly escaped being their victim (as he was armed with a woodaxe), as had an ‘abnormally stout’ priest who fortunately chanced to
be out administering sacraments when they called upon him. Finally,
the thieves followed Lukeria into some woods, and after murdering her, ‘removed certain parts of the body, which they afterwards
boiled’. They escaped detection for some time, until a handkerchief
containing human fat was found in their rooms, and identified as
being that of the murdered girl.….

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Header Image:Lightning Struck a Flock of Witches ~William Holbrook Beard – Late 19th Century