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A History of Feri Wicca
Author: Phoenix Willow  Feri is an initiatory tradition of Witchcraft emphasizing "the more natural and wild forms of human magic and sorcery."[1] It contains a multiplicity of initiatory lineages or "lines," all ultimately tracing back to Victor and Cora Anderson. The tradition's name has been spelled in a variety of ways over time. Early initiates used Fairy, Faery, or Faerie, but Victor Anderson later changed the spelling to Feri in order to distinguish our tradition from others using similar terms (Faery Wicca, etc.). This change was not universally adopted and some lines of Feri still use the earlier spellings.
Feri is an oral tradition with no canonical book of rituals and lore. It also places a high value on poetic creativity and individual exploration. This has naturally led to variations between the practices of different lines. What follows is an outline of Feri as it is known and practiced in the Vicia line. (Pronounced vee-chee-ah.) In Vicia, we work with a body of material taught by Victor and Cora Anderson to their direct initiates, primarily during the last decade of Victor's life. According to the Andersons, Vicia was also a very early name for the Feri Tradition.
Origins
The historical origin of Feri has long been debated among Feri Witches, and it's doubtful there will ever be a single universally accepted account. However, almost all agree that the first definitely known modern teachers of the Feri Tradition were Victor and Cora Anderson.
According to Victor, Feri is a magical science that was practiced by a small dark-skinned people who came out of Africa tens of thousands of years ago. These are the original Fairy Folk or Little People, and they turn up in the legends of many cultures under different names. The Fairies were reputed to be strongly psychic and highly skilled in the magical arts. Victor considered himself a direct descendent of these small dark people and used to say, "I was not converted, I am kin to the Fairy race!" Because the Fairy Folk traveled so widely and lived so long ago, there are echoes of Feri to be found in practically every culture. (Some Feri Witches see this as a poetic explanation; others see it as literally true.)
The terminology can be a bit confusing because "Fairy Folk" also refers to certain nature spirits and inhabitants of the etheric region. According to the Andersons, the small dark humans known as Fairies had a particularly close relationship to these spirit beings.[2] Victor once said that he considered Feri a good name for the tradition because it included nature spirits, gods, and the ancestral race of small humans. He also said it can mean someone who is powerfully psychic and a worker of magic.
Modern History
Founder Victor Henry Anderson was born on May 21, 1917, in Clayton, New Mexico. Victor was a gifted Craft priest, shaman, and poet, who had strong memories of past lives as a Witch. An accident in early childhood left Victor legally blind, and he had extremely limited physical sight. He was, however, highly skilled at etheric sight and could clearly see auras and other etheric phenomena.
Victor told of being initiated as a Witch by a woman "of the Fairy race" when he was nine years old. One account of this event can be found in Margot Adler's classic book on neo-Paganism, Drawing Down the Moon. Not long afterward, Victor was introduced to the Harpy coven. Harpy was a pre-Gardnerian group practicing Witchcraft in southern Oregon in the 1920s and 30s. The Harpy coveners recognized the youthful Victor's talents and included him in their rituals. The names of some of the Harpy coven members have been preserved (but are not public), along with something about their professions. Harpy disbanded shortly before Victor met Cora, and Victor doesn't seem to have kept in contact with the members. As a young teen, Victor was also initiated into Vodou by a Mambo from Haiti who had immigrated to southern Oregon.
Victor was always a tireless student of the occult, and had many teachers and collaborators over the years. His memory was phenomenal, and like the Bards of old, he possessed a vast store of memorized lore, poetry, spells, and songs. Victor had a beautiful speaking and singing voice, and also played the accordion professionally. In 1970, Victor published Thorns of the Blood Rose, a book of love poems and poetry rooted in the Feri Tradition.[3]Cora Anderson was born Cora Ann Cremeans on January 26, 1915, in rural Alabama. Cora's family practiced folk magic and she had a grandfather who was a "root doctor." He cured her of a serious illness in her youth and later shared his magical lore with her. Cora is a natural psychic and an authentic kitchen Witch. She worked for years as a hospital cook and would often infuse healing energy into food for the patients. Cora sometimes refers to herself as a simple "hill Witch," but under that simplicity lies a profound understanding of both life and the Craft.
Cora and Victor first met physically in Bend, Oregon, in 1944. Both immediately felt that they'd already met. They soon realized that their previous acquaintance had been on the astral plane, where they'd traveled together and made love many times before. They were married on May 3, 1944, just three days after their first physical meeting. The newly-weds compared notes and found they'd both grown up in families with magical lore. One of the first things they did together was build an altar. In 1945 their son Elon was born. His name was given to Cora in a dream and means "Oak" in Hebrew.
The young family moved to Niles, California, in 1948. They eventually purchased a home and settled for good in nearby San Leandro. In the mid-1950s, Victor and Cora read Gerald Gardner's Witchcraft Today with interest. It seemed that Witchcraft was becoming more public. As a consequence, Victor had the idea of starting a coven based on the Craft knowledge that he and Cora already shared. He also received a letter in 1960 from Leo Martello and several Witches in Italy encouraging him to teach the Craft in California. The result was an early Anderson coven known as Mahealani, which is Hawaiian for "full moon."
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Andersons had "brought in," or initiated, several people. One was Gwydion Pendderwen (Tom DeLong), a young man who was a friend of their son. Gwydion went on to become a major contributor to the developing direction of the tradition. He wrote Craft songs and poetry and co-wrote rituals with Victor. Much was added to the existing practices of the Andersons at this time, including some of the Welsh lore that Gwydion so loved. There are some initiates, particularly those of Gwydion's direct lineage, who consider him a co-founder of the Feri Tradition.
In the early 1970s, the Andersons formed a new coven with Gwydion and Alison Harlow, who was an initiate of Gwydion's. When Gwydion married, his wife was initiated and also became part of the coven. Much of Gwydion's beautiful liturgical poetry was written around this time. The group disbanded after a few years and the coven members went their separate ways. Gwydion continued to teach and initiate Feri Witches; he also began teaching something he called "Faery Shamanism." Alison went on to co-found a Feri coven that is still meeting and teaching today. She also trained an apprentice who has begun her own branch of Feri.
The Andersons had been teaching and initiating a variety of individual students outside of the coven, and they continued to do so. One of these initiates was Starhawk. Her best-selling book, The Spiral Dance, was influenced by Feri Witchcraft and popularized such Feri concepts as the Three Souls, and the Iron and Pearl Pentacles. Another of these initiates was Gabriel Carillo (Caradoc). Gabriel began developing a systematized body of written Feri teaching materials in the late 1970s. Using these materials, he started teaching Feri in a paid class setting in the early 80s. This was a controversial step, as the Andersons taught via oral tradition and never charged money for Craft training. However, Gabriel believed he could reach more people in classes while still remaining true to the tradition. His lineage came to be known as Bloodrose. Gabriel continued to expand and develop his teaching materials over the following decades, and now teaches internationally and via the Internet. Because of his public accessibility, the majority of people now involved in Feri are related to Bloodrose in one way or another.
The Andersons' teaching method was always very right-brained and informal. There were no classes, no handouts, only conversations and the occasional ritual, usually followed by a home-cooked meal. Discussions with Victor were non-linear and overflowing with information. Someone once aptly remarked that talking to Victor was like to trying to drink from a fire hose. Often the connecting threads and underlying patterns of his information didn't become apparent until much later on. There was also a non-verbal component to Victor's teaching. He was a true shaman, and had the ability to shift the consciousness of his students on a level well below the surface of conversation.
Victor and Cora continued teaching right up until Victor's death in 2001, initiating some 25 to 30 people over a span of 40 or so years. In honor of their 50th wedding anniversary in 1984, Cora wrote and published Fifty Years in the Feri Tradition. This book is still the definitive written work on Feri/Vicia thealogy and practice.[4] It should be pointed out, however, that the tradition cannot be learned from a book. Feri is essentially a mystery religion. Its greatest teachings can only be known after initiation and through direct experience.
Despite the various differences between lineages today, there are some Feri commonalities. Most important is the shared bond of initiatory lineage. All the lines of Feri have knowledge of certain secret Names, and we all receive a hands-on passing of Power at initiation. There also seems to be some liturgy in common - mostly materials from Victor or Gwydion. Most lines emphasize direct personal interaction with deities, nature spirits, and other realms of being. There's often a high level of creativity and a love of things wild, beautiful, and poetic. Feri Witches also tend to emphasize the evolutionary and spiritual development of the Self.
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