Who was Aradia??? (From "Occult World")

 

WHO WAS ARADIA???...

The Tuscan legend of Aradia, the Beautiful Pilgrim, the daughter of the moon goddess Diana, was published by the American folklorist, Charles Godfrey Leland, in 1889. Leland said the legend had been passed on to him by a woman named Maddalena. Godfrey said the name Aradia is a corruption of Herodias, or Queen Herodias, the wife of Herod, with whom Diana came to be identified by the 11th century.

Leland went to Tuscany in northern Italy in the 1880s. There he met a “sorceress” named Maddalena, whom he employed to collect from her “sisters” old ways and traditions. In 1886, he heard about a manuscript that supposedly set down the old tenets of the Craft. A year later, Maddelana gave him a document in her own handwriting.

Leland translated it into English and published The Gospel Of Aradia. He was struck by the references to Diana and Lucifer, and offered it as evidence of the Old Religion. In his preface, hacknowledged drawing from other, unspecified sources. He never produced Maddalena or any documentation to verify her existence.

Aradia recounts the story of Diana's daughter and of Diana's rise to become a Queen. Diana is created first among all beings and divides herself into light and darkness. She retains the darkness and makes the light into Lucifer (whose name means “light-bearer”), her brother and son. She falls in love with him and seduces him by changing herself into a cat. Their daughter from that union, Aradia, is destined to become a "Messiah” figure. Aradia lives for a while in heaven and then is sent to earth by Diana to teach the Arts. When Aradia's task is finished, Diana recalls her daughter to heaven and gives her the power to grant the desires of the meritorious of the Craft who invoke Aradia. Such requests include success in love, and the power to bless friends and curse enemies, as well as:

To converse with spirits.
To find hidden treasures in ancient ruins.
To conjure the spirits of priests who died leaving treasures.
To understand the voice of the wind.
To change water into wine.
To divine with cards.
To know the secrets of the hand [palmistry].
To cure diseases.
To make those who are ugly beautiful.
To tame wild beasts.

The invocation for Aradia is given as follows:

Thus do I seek Aradia! Aradia! Aradia! At midnight, at midnight I go into a field, and with me I bear water, wine, and salt, I bear water, wine, and salt, and my talis- man — my talisman, my talisman, and a red small bag which I ever hold in my hand — con dentro, con dentro, sale, with salt in it, in it. With water and wine I bless myself, I bless myself with devotion to implore a favor from Aradia, Aradia.

The truth about the origins of Aradia may never be known. Some skeptics believe that Leland fabricated the entire story, or that he was duped by Maddalena, who made it up. A more likely scenario, put forward by scholar Ronald Hutton, is that Maddalena, pressed to deliver, collected some authentic bits of lore and embellished them. Leland, who is known to have embellished his other folklore accounts, probably added his own flourishes. Contemporary folklore scholars do not accept Aradia as authentic.

Aradia had little impact on contemporary European Craft, but enjoyed more prominence in America. In contemporary Craft, Aradia is one of the most often used names for the Goddess.