A discussion we had recently at COFF was on Hedge Witchery and the unfortunate redefinition of the term. It has become common practice to consider a hedge witch to be an herbal, green witch, simply that just isn’t true.
A Hedgewitch is a person who “rides the hedge” between worlds a person that travels through meditation into the otherworld’s. The hedge row is the tween place, a place that is neither in the world of the wild forest nor the formal cities it is a place that represents a portal into a new world. A hedge witch can “ride the hedge” to visit those worlds. A couple of books written by Joanna van der Hoeven, Eric DeVries, Harmonia Saille (an Amazon search will help) can be a good start for headge riding.
The modern definition for a hedgewitch is a green, herbal, garden, and even a bit of kitchen, it is true that all of these meld into each other they too are stand-alone practices. A green witch tends to be a person who is into healing the plant taking big and small steps to set the ecological path back to its true course. The herbal witch loves using herbs and is usually an herbalist or alternative healer. A garden and kitchen witch are self-explanatory with many visions of wonderful floral and herbal paths to walk through and a wonderful magical meal waiting when you are done with your walk.
These different disciplines tend to blur into one another and rightfully so. I, myself have a garden in which I grow herbs and use them. I try very much to use healthy safe fertilizers and reusable products to help get the plant back on track, plus I enjoy cooking. You see how all of these can work with each other especially when you put up your own winter stock and herbs for medicines or the medicines themselves that you made they all go hand and hand.
Now that I explained the true definition of a Hedge Witch and what the modern definitions tend to be how did they get put together? That stems back to the hedge row and the witch that lived out in the woods on the other side of it, a lot of them didn’t necessarily ride the hedge. Those witches were the healers of their time, and where did they get their herbs from? The hedgerows since most of them are considered weeds the hedge row is a place where the herbs thrive. With that you have a modern definition of a green, herbal, kitchen, hedge witch, now that you are aware of the difference I am sure you will look a bit deeper into which definition is the correct one for you, understanding that a true hedge witch rides the hedge not gathers from it.
