Barn Owl Trust - How to make a Bird Cake for garden birds

BBC Secret Knowledge - The Art of Witchcraft

Shadwell Shams

My attention was drawn to today's entry on the Spitalfields Life blog. It casts light on an item in the Museum's collection and gives some interesting background information.

http://spitalfieldslife.com/2014/01/04/billy-charleys-shadwell-shams

We would very much like to wish all our readers the very best for 2014 and hope that you all had a restful and Happy Yuletide/Christmas/Holidays!

And so it begins!

We are soon to begin the process of Accreditation for the Museum. For those unfamiliar with the process, "Accreditation is the UK standard for museums and galleries. It defines good practise and identifies agreed standards, thereby encouraging development. It is a baseline quality standard that helps guide museums to be the best they can be, for current and future users."

There are many benefits to us in becoming an accredited museum, such as demonstrating that we meet a national standard, which will strengthen any applications for private or public funding in the future and generally helping our status. It also helps should we ever want to have items on loan from another museum. 

And so the form filling starts!

Woods for sale

We don't normally put 'For Sale' pieces on the blog but we are making an exception as a good friend of ours has a lovely woods for sale in the Holsworthy area of Devon. Details here . It is nicely secluded and has a small shack & pond.  If anyone is interested please contact the Estate Agency.

Horniman Museum Workshop 23rd November

Last Saturday, Simon Costin, Joyce Froome, Steve Patterson and Helen Cornish took part in an amulet workshop, ‘Cosmologies of Care’, at the Horniman Museum in London.

The workshop was an unmissable opportunity to handle some of the Horniman’s remarkable and beautiful amulets from Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and compare them with amulets in our collection.

There was then a series of presentations by our team and the other participants – Rashad Salim, Iraqi artist and expert on the geometry of magic, and Beverly Butler, Anne Lanceley and Mike Rowlands from University College London – which provided some fascinatingly varied insights into the importance of magical objects.

Many thanks to Tom Crowley, Johanna Zetterstrom-Sharp and all the rest of the Horniman team involved in organising a very enjoyable and thought-provoking event.

Room available

A room has just become available for the AGM at the Wellington due to the person now staying with friends. If you're coming to the AGM but can't find a room you may get it if you're quick 01840250202

Special Halloween Visitors

I couldn't resist putting this lovely photo of Barney & Twiglet on the blog. Their owners, who had made the special Halloween coats themselves, were visiting the Museum on Thursday and were happy to give their permission for their doggles to be on the website. They really put a smile on my face. Am hoping to urge Graham to get a small dog now that he has more time. The photo was taken by filmmaker Tom Chick who was visiting at the time. 

Nothing is changing - just a new manager!

The Museum of Witchcraft has a new manager – nothing else changes – it is the same company.  It is not moving for at least 5 years and all of the procedures and protections remain the same.  It will still be called The Museum of Witchcraft.

I hope this reassures you

Graham

Other reports?

A comment was made about 'other reports' saying the museum is moving to Sussex or Dorset . Let us be clear that the museum is staying in Boscastle for at least 5 years. That is official!

Announcement!

Graham would like to announce that as of the 31st Oct 2013, he will retire as Director of the Museum of Witchcraft and Simon Costin has been appointed as the new Director.

The management of the museum will now come under the umbrella of the Museum of British Folklore. The entire contents of the museum and library has been donated to the MoBF to ensure its survival as a single collection and it will remain in its current location and will continue to run as an autonomous

entity. Simon has obtained charitable status for his museum and so this will be extended to encompass the Museum of Witchcraft. There are many benefits to be gained from this, from Gift Aid to tax relief.

Graham will be fully involved with the transition period and the appointment of the new manager. Simon very much looks forward to the continued support of the Friends of the Museum of Witchcraft and a special newsletter will be issued shortly with more details.

We hope that you will be as excited as we are about this development. As you can imagine it is very busy at the moment so if you have any queries it would be best to email. Graham will also be presenting further information at the Friends AGM in November. 

"I am so pleased to have found a body of people that have the skills and passion

to take the museum on into the future. I am sure that it will continue to

thrive. I am also sure that its collections will continue to be preserved to

educate and inform future generations."

Graham King

"I am hugely honoured to have been asked by Graham to take the reins of the

museum and greatly look forward to working on its growth and future over the

coming years. The museum holds one of the most unique collections of witchcraft

related material in the world and to be able to play a part in its ongoing

development is hugely exciting. I will do my utmost to ensure that my passion

and understanding of the museum's collection will hold me in good stead for the

next phase of its life'.

Simon Costin

kind regards on behalf of the Trustees of the Friends of The Museum of Witchcraft

Kerriann Godwin

Museum of Witchcraft Learning - Update

Why are witches often imagined as women? How did witch-hunters in 17th century Europe discover witches? Would you be prepared to stab a picture of someone you love, and if not why not? Why do some people think that four-leaf clovers are lucky?

These and many other questions are raised by our new learning resource which can be found at www.mowlearning.org.uk The aim of the project is to use objects from The Museum of Witchcraft Collection to spark conversations and learning about the history of witchcraft and magic, criminality and justice, scapegoating, human psychology and much more.

At the website you'll find pictures of selected objects from the Museum collection. Each photograph comes with a series of questions intended to stimulate discussion and debate (some short films will be added soon, where staff from the museum introduce each object). Weblinks are provided with each object so that students can do their own research. There's information about ways the site can be used for both teachers and learners and of course links to the main Witchcraft Museum site.

We hope that this resource will be useful not only in the history part of the Secondary school curriculum but also in areas such as Personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education, Religious Education and more. We also hope that schools outside Britain and people in many other educational settings (such as youth groups, colleges, adult learners and many others) will make use of this resource.

We've created a survey to capture feedback from users, and we have access to Google data showing the number of people visiting the site. Over time we hope to add more objects and a gallery of work created by people using this resources.

What's next?

The next stage of the project is to encourage people to use the site. This is where your help could be invaluable! If you're a teacher yourself please try using this resource. If you have contacts in education who you think would benefit from the site, please send them the link. We've already got several organisations we plan to approach to raise the profile of what we're doing, but please do get in touch if you have any great ideas about marketing or individuals you feel we really should be speaking to. Thank you!

Julian Vayne

Rumour Mill

One has to wonder at the motives of certain people who are spreading more and more rumours about the museum's collection being broken up and sold off. A very wise person chose to phone Graham this evening to ask him the truth about such rumours. He was able to put this person's mind to rest and ensure them that the museum collection is in trust and can never be broken up. Rest assured that the museum is thriving. It is going from strength to strength and will continue to do so for generations to come.

US Students

It's been a great 2 weeks with our annual group of American interns spending their days cataloguing some our incredible archives, dipping their toes in the local beaches and walking the Cornish coast paths. A bit of a departure from their usual lives in New Jersey. As always they were a lovely group of people who worked very well in the library. They're all heading home this weekend so hope the Heathrow delays won't affect them too  much. We'd like to thank them and their Professor Michelle Tartar for all their hard work. Looking forward to seeing another group next year. There'll be a writeup about their time here in the next Friend's newsletter.

Thanks to Friendly Dragon

Thanks very much to Friendly Dragon in Halifax who have just donated £40 to museum - very generous as they are also looking for new premises for their fabulous shop at the moment. We wish them good luck in their search.

Boscastle, Cornwall: a video guide

@witchmuseum makes it onto 101 Top Twitter Feeds for Learning About World Religions

I'm pleased to let you know that @witchmuseum has been featured on the recently published list of 101 Top Twitter Feeds for Learning About World Religions.

Check out the complete list here:

http://theologydegreesonline.com/world-religion-twitter/

This list has been built to show readers, and current and prospective theology students, some fantastic resources for learning about many religions around the world. While much of their site's focus is on Christianity, the editor believes it's important for anyone studying theology to understand the broader global context of religion. They think our Twitter feed will do a great job of helping our readers diversify their knowledge and broaden their faith.

The editor welcomes feedback and questions, so you can tweet to @TheologyDegree.

New Media Button

Check out the new 'Media', button on the museum's website.....This is just the start - we hope to include archive footage, interviews etc on the site soon.

Click on this link to go straight to the media page.

Request for Museum Stories

I’m Helen Cornish, an Anthropologist at Goldsmiths College in London. I have been carrying out research around the Museum of Witchcraft for a while. I’m interested in collecting stories about people’s encounters with the objects and displays in the museum. Does anyone have any interesting stories, favourite objects, or encounters with the unexpected that you would like to share ...? Please get in touch via:

h.cornish@gold.ac.uk