The Magic of Glastonbury

For those who don't know, Glastonbury is a small town in Somerset England, famous for its music festival and it's Tor. As I live in North England I have never been to Glastonbury before, but when I heard about the Witches Market, being held there this weekend, I knew I'd have to go!

Glastonbury is a magical place with an abundance of fairy tales and myths. The most famous myth of course is that of the Isle of Avalon and King Arthur. In some Arthurian literature Glastonbury is identified with the legendary island of Avalon. An early Welsh poem links Arthur to the Tor in an account of a confrontation between Arthur and Melwas, who had kidnapped Queen Guinevere. According to some versions of the Arthurian legend, Lancelot retreated to Glastonbury Abbey in penance following Arthur's death, and in 1191 some monks claimed to have found the graves of King Arthur and Guinevere in the Abbey.



In the afternoon, with the sun shining we walked up the Tor, which is so beautiful and affords amazing views of the surrounding countryside. The Tor is another magical place in Glastonbury. It has been called a magic mountain, a faeries' glass hill, a spiral castle, a Grail castle, the Land of the Dead, Hades, a Druid initiation centre, an Arthurian hill-fort, a magnetic power-point, a crossroads of leys, a place of Goddess fertility rituals and celebrations and a converging point for UFOs!



Magic is all around. The town centre itself is filled with crystal shops, witches shops and heavenly little cafes. Another favourite place we found was the Glastonbury White Spring Temple. There are two different healing springs in Glastonbury, one touched red with iron and the other white with Calcite and they both rise within a few metres of each other from the caverns beneath the Tor. A temple has been created around an old Victorian well house. It is lit with candles and free to enter and to collect the water... or bathe in it if you so wish!

 

 

The Witches market itself was brilliant and I soon emptied my wallet (& my husband's) on a bagful of faerie books, candles, crystals and cookies! I met some lovely people there, everyone is so friendly in Glastonbury and I hope to blog about them and their work soon. I think I've found my soul-home. I need to live here!

 

The winner of Friday's bookmark is Nancy Allen and if you want a Witchblood bookmark leave a comment below and tell me if you've ever visited a place and felt instantly at home.