Gerald Gardner
1884 – 1964 English civil servant, folklorist, founder of modern Wicca
Founder of modern Wicca, the contemporary Pagan witchcraft religion.
- Religion
- Wicca, the modern Pagan witchcraft religion he founded, centered on a Goddess and God, seasonal festivals, and ritual magic.
- Affiliations
- Claimed initiation into a surviving witch coven. Member of several esoteric bodies and briefly connected to Crowley's OTO.
Gerald Gardner was a retired British civil servant and amateur folklorist who claimed to have been initiated into a surviving coven of witches in the 1930s. After the repeal of the last witchcraft laws he published Witchcraft Today and openly promoted a religion he called the Craft, now known as Wicca. He drew on ceremonial magic, folklore, and material connected to Aleister Crowley, whom he met near the end of Crowley's life.
Connections
- associate of Aleister Crowley — Met Crowley late in his life and received an OTO charter from him.
- associate of Aleister Crowley — Met Gardner late in life and chartered him in the OTO.
- influenced Anton LaVey — Modern Wicca and Gardner's revival helped shape the wider occult scene LaVey later drew on.
In the timeline
- 1954 Gerald Gardner launches modern Wicca central figure
- 1954 Gardner founds modern Wicca mentioned
- 1954 Wicca adopts the upright pentagram as a sacred symbol mentioned