Looking for somewhere unusual to visit?

We have been included in a worldwide list of niche Museums to visit.  This includes the International UFO Museum in Roswell, New Mexico and the Parasite Museum in Tokyo, Japan.  Have a look at the full list and our section here:
https://www.justcollecting.com/miscellania/nine-incredibly-niche-museums-to-visit-this-summer

Once upon a time....

There was a witch on a door, drawn by Cecil Williamson when the museum first opened in Boscastle in 1960. We decided to reinstate her as the previous one was in need of a re-paint and the decorative hinges had rusted. Marti and Simon, (mostly Marti!) put their art school training to good use and using a photograph taken in the early years of the museum, Cecil's witch was reborn.

From the Museum archive

Our visiting students have played detective today and made lots of connections between old Museum information cards written by the Museum's founder Cecil Williamson and objects which are still on display today.  They each picked an interesting thing to share with the readers of our blog - here are some of today's discoveries...

Record Number 8454 was catalogued by Steven.  It describes a brass knife used by witches.  Stephen said "What makes it so cool is that in the text Cecil writes that the knife was a tool for killing but the word killing is crossed out with different ink."  This card is pictured below with the different drafts clearly visible.

Record Number 7324 "A text on the Doll of Death" was catalogued by Isabelle.  It is a fascinating account and is copied in full below.

THE DOLL OF DEATH The making of juju idols or figures is not the prerogative of the native races of Africa and Asia. The people of Europe have their own traditions and skills in this field of the magical arts. This attractive doll, fabricated in the form of a night-club show girl hostess is an ill wishing doll created for the express purpose of bringing retribution to those who caused her untimely death in appalling circumstances. The details are too long to set out here other than to state that a young woman died. Her mother, a French woman born and bred in the town of Clermont-Ferrand situated in the Puy-De-Dome, a district steeped in the old traditions of witchcraft, sought the services of a witch woman lying in nearby Royat. The outcome of their meeting was strange, frightening and bizarre. This doll, modeled and dressed in a copy of the working clothes of the murdered hostess was charged with an evil spirit and commanded to seek out and kill those responsible for her death. What followed was beyond belief, with death befalling four people. Although all this took place in the mid 1920's, some of those involved are still living and wish to remain anonymous. The doll came to this collection because its owners were disturbed by unnerving incidents which over the years they came to associate with this death dolls. As every occultist knows, when such jujus are made the makers charge that whosoever destroys the figure shall himself be destroyed. It is all part of the magic compact made with the captive spirit force bound to the figure.

Sami catalogued Document Number 7649 which talks about a Chinese sorcerer's holed stone charm for fishermen.  Made to ensure a good catch of fish.  "I would really like to know what it looked like" Sami said.

Heather said, "The most interesting thing I found today is now catalogued as Document Number 8040.  It discusses coins used for making silver water - coins that could very well still be in the Museum!"

The students have been quite successful in matching up old cards with objects which are still on display in the Museum today.  Some truly excellent research has been done so far.  More from the archive tomorrow...

Two interesting visitors in one weeked

This weekend, the Museum was visited by a documentary film maker who is investigating Wicca.  Simon and Joyce were both interviewed and answered questions such as "Describe the evolution of Wicca in the past fifty years" and "What are the underlying tenets of the contemporary Wicca tradition?"

We were also visited by a Rational Satanist who left us with a signed copy of this book - Rational Satanism, Futureproof Adaptability pictured below.

Upcoming Folklore Conference looks good

This day of talks will include a talk on the Warboys witch case.  It isn't run by the Museum but it looks interesting.

Student visit gets off to a great start

This morning, seven students arrived from New Jersey.  They are going to help us by doing some cataloguing of items in the Museum archive.

To start the day, they had a tour of the Museum (led by Simon and Peter).

Then they had a talk on the history of the Museum (led by Judith) and then they were introduced to the art of cataloguing by Peter.

Above: Peter introducing the archive.

Below: students looking studious (on the whole!)

Above: Tom found the brainwork exhausting.

The students made a start cataloguing some old notes about animals and their folklore made by Cecil Williamson, the founder of the Museum.  Here are some of the interesting things they found out today:
Killing a daddy long legs was considered to be bad luck when the harvest comes around.
It is thought that is you accept money from the Devil you will find a species of black horny beetles in the palm of your hand.  This beetle is a sign of corruption in Ireland.

One of the most interesting items was this document on crabs in Cecil's handwriting.

It was transcribed by one of the students, here it was it says:

In Manipur crabs in a pot of water can make rain. In New Caledonia a goddess in the form of a giant hand crab hates married people, and causes elephantiasis, little crabs are her messengers. She lives in a tree in a special grove, and offerings of food are hung on the tree for her. In Tahiti crabs are regarded as the shadows of local gods. The sea hermit-crab is god himself, and to eat him under the wrong circumstances causes swollen glands or even death. A Tahitian legendary hero once escaped from his pursuers on the back of a fresh-water crab Hence the fresh water crab is held to be the shadow of the god of fugitives. Bahama Negroes pour water from the claw of a crab into the earlobe to cure earache. The famous Gullah Jack the witch doctor man of the 1882 South Carolina Vesey Insurrection made himself and others invulnerable by means of a crabclaw held in the mouth. An old and universal belief has it that it is no good to go crabbing on a moonlight night that is the one time when crabs are "poor" i.e. not meaty.

Follow their progress this week - keep an eye on the blog.

Enjoying a busy season...

The Museum has been incredibly busy so far this season.  Joyce calculated that on Sunday 19th July the till recorded a transation every two minutes!  Can the till cope with all this action?  Will it explode?  Let's hope not and also hope that we stay this busy all summer...

Cat stops by for a visit once a year

Patchouli, the Witch's Cat is a very popular item in our shop and online shop.  She is really cute and smells lovely (well she is stuffed with patchouli).  These items have been made for us with love by Mother Moon for the past few years.  Pictured here is one of the first patchouli cats ever created.  It was bought by a member of our Friends of the Museum organisation.  They visit every year and bring their cat with them!  Thanks for sharing your story and love for the Museum with us.

OF SHADOWS - preview of forthcoming book about the Museum

OF SHADOWS
One Hundred Objects from the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic
by Sara Hannant and Simon Costin

Work is progressing on a new book about the museum and its collection, to be published by Strange Attractor Press this coming autumn. Simon is down at the museum again for a week to finish off the writing and Sara has been busy colour checking the prints. It promises to be a unique photographic record of some of the museum's objects and will give people unfamiliar with the museum an overview as to its history and the key people involved with its creation and ongoing life in Boscastle.

Listen to Joyce on BBC Radio 4's 'Natural Histories' series

You can listen to Joyce's explanation of mandrake root history using a mandrake from the Museum's Richel collection online here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02wzkqj

The full programme is available here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05w9b5n

Marti helps out at the Museum

Marti Dean, the artist who crafted the magnificent Stag's Head window display, has been mucking in at the Museum this week.

First on the agenda was a new coat of Danish Oil for the decorative door carving outside the Museum.  Here it is in all its glory:

The green man and horseshoe (with Steve Patterson's insignia)

Oakleaves, Celtic triangle and knotwork, toad and labyrinth...

Strix/Owl of Athena (in pewter)

The music-loving and ultimately irresistible Mermaid of Zennor (with lily)

Thanks Marti!

Positive comments from a recent visitor

We get many positive comments from our visitors - often when they leave and say "that was amazing" or words to that effect.  We get lovely reviews on Trip advisor and people leave nice comments in our visitor comment box (some of which we then display outside the Museum on our Visitor Comments board).  This recent visitor took the time to email us their comments.  They may go on to join our Friends of the Museum organisation to continue their support and involvement with us. 

http://museumofwitchcraftfriends.blogspot.co.uk/p/joining-friends.html

Here are their comments:

"I just wanted to say that I visited the museum for the first time in June and was amazed by it, such an important subject to many whether on a spiritual level or a historical level was handled with respect and intellect and I'm looking forward to visiting it and spreading the word as much as I can to let others know what a great place it is visit."

We're glad you enjoyed your visit, thanks for the positive comments and we look forward to seeing you here again!

Imminent Archiving

Every year, we are visited by American students who generously give up their time to help us with the Museum archive.  These visits are organised by Michele Lise Tarter (Professor at the Department of English, The College of New Jersey).  To get ready for this, first we purchased many folders and mylar sleeves (which the documents go into for preservation).  Here they are ready for use...

Then we spent a good few days taking boxes of semi-organised papers into neatly organised folders ready to be catalogued onto our online database.  This year, the students will be archiving Cecil Williamson's information cards from the early days of the Museum and trying to identify which cards go with which objects.  This should be very helpful to the Museum in understanding the history of our collection.  

Expect more blogs about our findings as the archiving commences in earnest from Monday.

Generous gift to the Museum as part of hand fasting celebrations

The Museum was visited by Laura and James Roberts at the weekend.  They presented us with a very generous donation which was raised by their family and friends at their recent hand fasting.  Everyone at the Museum was surprised and delighted with their thoughtfulness and generosity!  They just dropped the money off without any fuss but we felt that such a lovely gesture deserved a little celebrating so we asked them to let us share some of the details of their day and some photos - here they are!

They stayed at stayed at South Penquite farm Near Blisland for 3 nights and had the handfasting was on Saturday July 11th.  There were around 100 guests in total both Pagan and non-Pagan.

The ceremony was held at 2.30 and then luckily the sun was shining so there were picnics and games in the afternoon before the fire in the evening. They held a raffle and also did a 'Mr and Mrs' pub quiz to help raise funds for the Museum.   Andy Norfolk and Leonore Newson were celebrants helped by Gail, Shelley, Fred,  Sally and Kathy.

We wish Laura and James every happiness and we promise to use their gift wisely to preserve and enhance the Museum collection. 

Museum Director to receive award

Simon Costin, the Director of the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic received an Honorary Fellowship from the University of the Arts London.  Well deserved!

http://www.arts.ac.uk/study-at-ual/awards-ceremonies/honorary-awards-2015/

http://www.arts.ac.uk/study-at-ual/awards-ceremonies/honorary-awards-2015/simon-costin/

Trip Advisor Comments

We get lots of fantastic reviews on Trip Advisor (thanks to anyone who wrote one for us!)  We now have a space in the front window which we regularly update (see photo below).

Here are some recent reviews, more can be read online.  If you haven't reviewed us before - we'd like to hear your views.
http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g528825-d612699-Reviews-The_Museum_of_Witchcraft-Boscastle_Cornwall_England.html

We have also got new cards which encourage visitors to review us after they have visited.

Now stocking Witchcraft and Wicca magazine

The other magazines that we have started to stock are selling well and we now have a new magazine in our Museum shop - Witchcraft and Wicca.

This is the most popular Witchcraft magazine in Europe, with articles by many leading authors on almost every aspect of the Craft. The magazine is full colour throughout, with a clear and attractive layout, illustrations are superbly reproduced and it has high gloss cover. The small A5 size is convenient and is ideal for storing on your bookshelf, this is a future collectors item so start your collection now.

Information taken from http://witchcraft.org/witchcraft-wicca-magazine/  

Bagpipes outside the Museum

Thanks to the Bideford Youth Pipe Band for their free performance on the bridge in Boscastle today.

German Rosamund Pilcher TV show shot in Boscastle

This week a film crew set up to shoot a scene for a new TV adaptation of a Rosamunde Pilcher story.  It was all fairly hush-hush, but informants report that it was a German film crew (with a penchant for sparkling bottled water; four stray bottles of which are now being 'enjoyed' by Museum staff).

Interesting love custom:  Ribbons and love-locks (padlocks) were strung up on the bridge, indicating that some sort of romantic bridge scene is in the offing (shock!):

Fake sun:  As the weather closed in, artificial sun light was brought in to serenade the lovers in what will almost certainly be a fantastic scene filmed outside the tremendous Harbour Light Cafe.

Dogs are always welcome at the Museum

The Museum welcomes well behaved dogs on leads.  We now have this sign on our noticeboard in the entranceway to communicate this to our visitors.