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It is important to note that the Witchcraft movement of modern day Wicca is in fact a revival movement. Few people can boast actual lineage to our spiritual ancestors of hundreds of years ago. Rather than this, modern-day followers of Wicca can offer our thanks to a few Craft Pioneers who lived in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Some say it began with Charles Leland's book: "Aradia, Gospel of the Witches" which Leland supposedly wrote from direct communication with an Italian Witch named Maddalena in 1897. The book is an account of how Witchcraft came to be, explaining that the Goddess Diana gave birth to Aradia who was then sent to Earth to live as a mortal woman and teach Witchcraft to the world. Aradia, then, is considered the first Witch.6 It is in this book where the Charge Of The Goddess is first seen, although it differs somewhat from the version we use today.
It is alleged that Gerald Gardner is the person who essentially started the Witchcraft revival. Claiming to be a hereditary Witch, Gardner spent his life involved in metaphysics, finally coming to be initiated into the Coven of Dorothy Clutterbuck in 1939 in New Forest, England. It is alleged that Clutterbuck belonged to a Coven that had not been disturbed in its practice even throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance. In 1946, Gardner was made a member of the Ordo Templi Orientis of which Aleister Crowley was at the time a leader. Because Witchcraft was still illegal in England at this time, Gardner's novel "High Magic's Aid" of 1949, which contained rituals from the New Forest Coven, had to be published under his pseudonym of Scire.7
In 1951 the Witchcraft laws in England were repealed, making Witchcraft no longer a crime. With this change, Gardner broke from the New Forest Coven and formed his own. In 1953 Gardner initiated Doreen Valiente into his Coven. They worked together from 1953 to 1957, forming the Book Of Shadows which is what is referenced today as being the authority on what is the Gardnerian Tradition of Witchcraft.7
In 1954 Gardner wrote his first nonfiction book on Witchcraft entitled: "Witchcraft Today". In 1959 he published his final book: "The Meaning Of Witchcraft".7
In 1960 he met Raymond Buckland who was subsequently initiated into Gardner's Coven by High Priestess Monique Wilson (Lady Olwen). Raymond Buckland is responsible for bringing the Gardnerian Tradition of Witchcraft to America.7
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