A chapter from a book in progress by Gary R. Varner, "Hecate - The Witches' Goddess."

Contrary to popular Neo-Pagan literature, Hecate was much more than a Dark Goddess focused purely on death and sorcery. As with many divine figures her nature changed as time progressed. Each age viewed her in a manner which was comfortable to the time and fit the current societal view. Her origins most likely were in North Africa as her name appears in early Nubian texts and next she appears in Egypt as Heqat.

Hecate was an only child, born to the star-goddess Asteria, a virgin Titan (for many gods and goddesses were born of virgin mothers). Zeus destroyed the Titans however; he held Hecate in great respect and allowed her to live on. According to myth, she was born fully formed and powerful on the earth as well as in the heavens and under the seas. Her mother was a creatress known as the Queen of Heaven. Hecate was, according to Michael Stapleton, “one who retained her great powers for good in the fortunes of mankind.” (1) To be fair Hecate was an earth-goddess and so connected to the dead and the underworld. In addition, she is goddess of the dark of the moon who is not only the destroyer of life but also the restorer of life. But she was much more than the Dark Goddess sought after by sorcerers. One of her many aspects was the Queen of the Elfin or Faerie—this in Scotland. She was also recognized in Medieval South Wales as the mother of nine “wild women” who terrorized any male caught trespassing in their territory.

Hecate was a triune goddess well known as the goddess of crossroads and protector of entrances. In many ways, she was similar to the Roman god Janus who was also regarded as the opener and fastener of all things. Both gods were able to see the past as well as the future.

The Greeks set poles at every three-way crossroad with masks of Hecate in her triune role facing in each direction. Her role as goddess of the crossroads undoubtedly originated in her ancient position as goddess of the wilderness and the untamed land. This practice is also similar to the erection of posts with the likeness of Hermes which marked boundaries. These posts, or rather columns, were called hermaii and were described as “simple columns tapering towards the ground and surmounted by a head of the god. From the centre of the column an erect phallus protruded…giving…the Greeks a feeling of reassurance…” (2)

Hermes, like Hecate, was regarded as a pastoral deity linked to the Earth and to fertility in both humans and animals. And, like Hecate, his association with the earth linked him as well to death. As Buffie Johnson noted, “It seems inevitable that Hermes, the messenger to the underworld, would meet Hecate and fall in love with her.” (3)

Hermes shared many things in common with Hecate, including skill in sorcery and a close association with dogs.

Hecate and Hermes had a child, Circe, who was skilled in enchantment like her parents. Circe, the Moon Goddess, passed her knowledge on to her niece Medea.

Goddess of the Crossroads

Hecate was foremost the goddess and guardian of the crossroads. One reason for this is the belief in ancient times that crossroads, above all other places, were haunted at midnight, as they were places where the dead gathered. Travelers would offer sacrifice to her at these locations to assure their safe transit. She was known to look in the three directions at crossroads at the same time.

According to legend, it was believed that Hecate would appear in the intersection of crossroads on clear nights in the company of her dogs and supernatural beings. Sacrifices were placed at crossroads not only to ask Hecate for safe passage, but to ask for her help to avoid madness which was believed to be caused by wondering souls. Part of this fear may have been caused by a darker use of the crossroads other than travel.

According to Cooper, “Burials of suicides, vampires and felons at crossroads ensured their confusion of ways and prevented their return to haunt the living.” (4) They obviously were confined to the crossroads to haunt.

Due to this fearsome use of the crossroads as well as their association with Hecate, they were viewed as places where sorcery was performed as well as where pacts with Satan were made. Russell speaks of one woman’s confession to charges of witchcraft during the Middle Ages:

“Catherine Delort confessed that ten years previously she had an affair with a shepherd who had persuaded her to make a pact with Satan. He took her at midnight to a crossroads at the edge of a forest. There they built a fire, putting on it the remains of human bodies they had taken from a cemetery. She cut her left arm and let a few drops of her blood fall onto the burning mess, while speaking strange words which she did not now remember. Thereupon a demon named Berit appeared in the shape of a purplish flame, which evidently conferred upon her the power to do all kinds of maleficium.” (5) Catherine Delort was given over to the secular authorities and burned after implicating others as witches.
Why does something that is viewed as a traverse between worlds looked upon with fear and trepidation? It isn’t because of Hecate, as she is actually the guardian of the gateway. Most likely it is because of the horrible things that man has done to man at these places to create an atmosphere of dread, to cause the souls of the punished to linger where they died, to cause man to invoke a guardian goddess to protect him as he crosses the pathway.

However, the tradition of Hecate survived for hundreds and thousands of years—along with those of her dogs. “The Highland witches in the eighteenth century,” wrote Margaret Murray, “saw the devil as a dog; he was ‘a large black ugly tyke’, to whom the witches made obeisance; the dog acknowledged the homage ‘by bowing, grinning, and clapping his paws.” (6)
Hecate herself was referred to as the “Black she-dog.” She was also described thusly: “They say that she was excessive tall, her Head was covered with frightful Snakes instead of Hair, and her Feet were like Serpents.” (7)

In addition, Hecate was, according to Howey, “Diana on earth” whose priestesses were to become the later witches.” (8)

Barbara Walker wrote that Hecate was “One of the oldest Greek versions of the Trinitarian Goddess…derived from the Egyptian midwife-goddess Heqit, Heket, or Hekat, who in turn evolved from the heq or tribal matriarch of pre-dynastic Egypt: a wise-woman, in command of all the herkau or ‘mother’s Words of Power.’” (9)

There is no doubt that Hecate was a “foreign” goddess, ancient before her advent into Greek culture. Her arrival in Greek religion was not an easy transition as many of the roles that she filled were already occupied by important goddesses in the Greek pantheon—such as Artemis. Originally a Mother Goddess, Hecate changed as her cult grew.

The mythology which surrounds Hecate indicates this gradual change in her stature. Early myth tells of Hecate as a mortal priestess who commits suicide. After her death the goddess Artemis adorns Hecate’s body with jewels and whispers to her to rise up—to become the goddess Hecate. In this way, the Greek myths allow the foreign goddess into the pantheon purely on the basis of being “adopted” by a primal Greek deity. As her followers grew and her cult became more important other myths were created for Hecate, including the birth of Zeus and Hecate’s role in protecting the infant god.

There are strong indications that Hecate was a Nubian-Egyptian goddess—the most important of the Egyptian deities, not only as Heqat but as Isis.

Second century Roman author Apuleius wrote a lengthy, possibly autobiographical, piece in his book, Metamophoses, or The Golden Ass about a convert to Isis. Isis addresses the convert:

“In one land the Phrygians, first-born of men, hail me as the Pessinuntian mother of the gods; elsewhere the native dwellers of Attica call me Cecropian Minerva; in other climes the wave-tossed Cypriots name me Paphian Venus; the Cretan archers, Dictynna Diana; the trilingual Sicilians, Ortygian Proserpina; the Eleusians, the ancient goddess Ceres; some call me Juno, other Bellona, others Hecate, and others still Rhamnusia. But the peoples on whom the rising sun-god shines with his first rays—eastern and western Ethiopians, and the Egyptians who flourish with their time-honoured learning—worship me with the liturgy that is my own, and call me by my true name, which is queen Isis.” (10)

Notes
1.Stapleton, Michael. Library of the World’s Myths and Legends: Greek and Roman Mythology. New York: Peter Bedrick Books 1986, 89.
2. Ibid, 104.
3. Johnson, Buffie. Lady of the Beasts: The Goddess and Her Sacred Animals. Rochester: Inner Traditions International 1994, 160.
4. Cooper, J.C. An Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Traditional Symbols. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd. 1978, 46.
5. Russell, Jeffrey Burton. Witchcraft in the Middle Ages. Ithaca: Cornell University Press 1972, 184
6. Murray, Margaret A. The Witch-Cult in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1921, 68.
7. Quoted by M. Oldfield Howey in The Cat in Magic, Mythology, and Religion. New York: Crescent Books 1989, 21.
8. Ibid., 86.
9. Walker, Barbara G. The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets. Edison: Castle Books 1996, 378.
10. As quoted in Women’s Religions in the Greco-Roman World: A Sourcebook. Edited by Ross Shepard Kraemer. Oxford: Oxford University Press 2004, 440.