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From: tim@toad.com (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan,alt.magick
Subject: Re: Drawing Down the Moon
Message-ID: <82764@toad.com>
Date: 24 Jan 96 06:05:50 GMT
References: <jsneadDLCCtH.Ht5@netcom.com> <82611@toad.com>
Reply-To: tim@toad.com.UUCP (Tim Maroney)
Organization: As Little As Possible
Lines: 60
Xref: shell.portal.com alt.pagan:142179 alt.magick:64712

jsnead@netcom.com (John R. Snead) writes:
>>OK, I'm fairly well-read in Greco-roman history and myth, and I haven't
>>run into the Greco-roman version of drawing down the moon.  

tim@toad.com.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>I don't know if the ritual was performed as opposed to being a subject
>of mythology. Ovid's depiction of Medea in the Metamorphoses contains a
>lovely thaumaturgical prayer to Hekate.

By popular demand:

Invocation of Hekate

(from Ovid's Metamorphoses)

O night, most faithful guardian of my secrets,
and golden stars who, moon-wed, succeed the brightness of the day;
You, Hekate, three-formed goddess, who knows my achievements and ordeals
and comes to aid my spells and works of magick art;
And you, O earth, you garden of herbs potent for the wise in sorcery;
you also, breezes and winds, mountains, rivers and lakes;
all spirits of the groves and of the night, come forth!

With your aid I can turn rivers to run backwards to their source
between their astonished banks;
I can soothe the stormy seas,
or rouse their placid surface with my songs;
The clouds will flee or thicken at my whim;
The winds will howl or disappear;
My spells and incantations could burn a dragon with its own fire
or harness it for me to ride.
The living rocks and trees would march if I willed it,
the oaks would uproot themselves, even whole forests;
At my bidding the mountains tremble,
the earth is twisted by dull rumblings,
and the ghosts arise from their tombs.

I draw down the bright blue moon from the sky,
though brazen cymbals crash and thunder to keep her in her place.
Even the chariot of the Sun, my grandfather, grows pale at my song,
and I drain the colour from the Dawn for my potions.

Lo!  I am Medea, the sorceress, your adorer, great Hekati!
It was you who dulled for me the fiery breath of the bulls,
and harnessed to the crooked plough those necks which had never drawn a load.
You turned the warriors of the dragon's teeth to fight among themselves,
you lulled to sleep the guardian serpent,
you sent the Fleece across the waters in my care.

Now, patron, give me this:
the spells of immortality, to make a man or woman like thee,
to restore the blush of youth to a cheek covered in furrows,
to turn weak sinews to engines of bronze,
to stoke the fiery breath of youth in withered lungs!
This you will do!
Not for nothing have the stars flashed in answer to my call!
Not for nothing have you sent your chariot,
drawn by a dragon-team!
-- 
Tim Maroney.  Please CC all public responses to tim@toad.com.