Strega, Daughter of the Moon, Daughter of Diana: Initiation in a Grove

1873 Torre dei Passeri, Italia
Giuliana told her once she cultivated her relationship with Diana, the trees would speak to her, whisper to her what she must gather for her portable lare shrine. This portable shrine went with a Strega to a birth or a serious situation; otherwise it would stay in her home where she attended to it every morning. This shrine protected the Strega in her work.
There were many oak groves that peppered the area. Giant, ancient trees with wide, spreading canopies of branches, their deep black bodies covered with moss and lichen. Some branches were so large and spreading it was a wonder they remained aloft. Some trunks appeared to be three or four trees melded together as one. In the winter, their bark glistened with the dripping moisture that collected in the crevices. In the summer they offered the kindest shade.
Eva chose one grove to visit daily, listening, getting to know the trees. Eventually they instructed her as Giuliana said they would. “Red coral, dry fennel, always sun, moon, blood, a figure of Diana, acorns, woodpecker feathers, knots of braided yarn, ruta and wolf hair, wolf tooth,” they whispered. Eva listened carefully, then gathered these items for her lare shrine.
Giuliana found carpet scraps at the market in a neighboring village that she thought perfect for Eva’s Strega bag. It was an Armenian carpet with a landscape scene woven into it. Eva delighted in the oak trees, ruta plants, and groups of red wolves dancing together upon it. Although it was very difficult to stitch carpet, it was the preferred fabric because of the sturdiness and durability required of the Strega bag. It needed to be large and strong enough to hold all her tools, but small enough to be carried. Eva stitched love and hope into her bag, crafting pockets inside to separate tools from glass bottles, carefully adding fringe to the outside flaps. She crafted a smaller bag to go within it that held the twenty small glass vials of common tinctures. When it was completed, it served as a communication device to the villagers. When she carried the bag, people knew she was on Strega business and would not occupy her with silly, unimportant conversation. When Eva carried her bag, she was proud.
In the afternoons, when there was extra time, Eva sat and stitched her bag as Giuliana spoke to her of the mysteries. “Eva, the number nine is a power number. If you are ever in danger from anyone, recite the following spell as you tie nine knots. Always carry yarn in your bag for knot tying. Count backwards. Only use the nine spell if you are in serious danger. This is a strong curse.”
Most pressing of all was Eva’s impending initiation, of which she was forbidden to speak about to anyone. She had been given vows to memorize, long vows she needed to recite word for word.
The initiation would take place on the full moon in her beloved oak grove with her mother trees, all her Dianas. Giuliana had been testing small doses of unguent on her; an unguent that on the night of her initiation would cover her entire body. It was an unguent that contained potent, magical herbs. It had to be just right, tailored specifically to Eva’s height, weight, her body composition.
Eva had been told she and Giuliana would be naked, standing unclothed before the moon. Eva had never seen Giuliana naked nor had she exposed herself to anyone other than her sisters, especially since she acquired breasts. She was shy and scared. “Not to worry, dear,” Giuliana assured her, “the moon’s light feels so good upon your skin that you soon lose any feeling of discomfort.”
When the night arrived, it was true. Giuliana undressed, dropping her clothing to the grove floor. She approached an opening in the grove where the moon was clearly visible and lifted her arms to the moon, praying that she would accept Eva. It was September and the harvest moon rose huge on the horizon before them, its swelling whiteness tinged with hues of pink and orange. The moonlight glimmered off Giuliana’s body, reflecting golden light off her olive skin, her rounded buttocks and belly, her large breasts. Eva observed the way the soft light embraced and encompassed her, the way the color of her nipples matched the blackness of her hair. The raw nature of it, the primordial feel of it, of seeing her mentor stand exposed and unashamed before the moon, before herself, radiating beauty, gave Eva a feeling of intense belonging. She belonged to the earth, to this night, to this place, to her life. It was a feeling of belonging unsurpassed for the rest of her life.
“Now you,” Giuliana said.
Eva dropped her clothes to the ground and stood naked under the light of the moon. Its glow met the vulnerable nakedness of her skin, caressed her, making her feel as luxuriant and glowing as Giuliana had looked. It was as though her muscles had been rubbed thoroughly with warm oil. Her entire body tingled from the night air, the moon’s light. She lifted her arms and recited her vows, the ones she had practiced. She said them aloud to the moon.
Giuliana spread the unguent upon her. She spread it all over her body save her face, feet and hands. It was a red color and smelled strongly of herbs that Eva did not recognize. She felt dizzy.
“You shall be transported,” Giuliana advised. “You shall go and ask for acceptance. Lie down on the grove floor and ask to be accepted.”
Eva rested back. Her head was spinning. First there was heat, an intense heat all over where the unguent had been spread, a peaking and then subsiding of that heat, before the cool evening air became one with her skin, the boundary dissolving. She began to rise, lifting slowly off the ground.
She was aware that she wished to ask to be accepted, while simultaneously aware that she was incapable of thinking such clear thoughts. Then she experienced a smile in a way she never had before. It was not a simple curving of the lips, a smile confined to her face, a movement of the cheeks; rather, it was a whole body smile, her entire self curling with the sensation of divine satisfaction.
The moon, continuing its journey upward, was huge, filling her vision. There was nothing else but its curved luminescence, its edges spilling over into her peripheral vision, its light pulsing against her, a drumbeat as it moved toward her. She spread her legs and allowed the moon to enter her. She gasped in delight as its immense, round whiteness filled her, pushing against secret, hidden places, swelling within her. Once inside her womb, its light radiated this heat outward, outward. Hot from within, she radiated this heat until absolute oneness came and ecstasy followed.
She flew to the moon. The moon whispered.
Daughter Eva Daughter Eva Daughter Eva Welcome Eva.
She opened her eyes and saw the face of the moon, old and wise, welcoming her. The moon’s long white hair trailed in the wind behind her. The sudden loud, barking of a dog woke her, jarring her back to reality.
Giuliana was ecstatic. “You’ve been accepted, my dear.”
“No, Giuliana. I want to go back. Why did you call me back here? I want to go back to her. Let me go back to her.”
“And so you will my dear, someday.”
Eva looked up at the moon still white above, her fingers yet pulsing against her skin. Then the unguent started to feel sticky. The dampness of the grass brushed against her. She was aware of the discomfort of a headache. She wanted that feeling back, the oneness, that bliss. She could not endure this jarring cold dampness, this state of being separate.
“No Giuliana,” she said, when Giuliana attempted to wipe her down with a wet cloth.
“Eva,” Giuliana snapped. “What has gotten into you?”
“I don’t want to be here. Let me go back there. I want to be back with her, the moon.”
“No, not now. It is over for now.”
“I cannot bear it, Giuliana. Please, just a little more.” Giuliana slapped her face.
“Snap out of it. Crazy people are called lunatics because they have allowed the moon to possess them, Eva. I will not allow it to possess you. You have work to do here. This, what we did, what you felt, it is for the good of the community, not your own self- satisfaction.”
Eva began to cry. “Giuliana, it was so blissful, so wonderful.”
“Yes. You are lucky, Eva. She gave you a gift. You say, thank you. You don’t go begging for more. What has happened to your manners?”
Eva looked down in surrender. She extended her arm to Giuliana who began to wipe her clean with a cloth. She was ashamed at her begging and at her desperation. She was surprised at her own behavior, but she was not able to control it, as though watching from the outside.
For a full week after initiation, Eva was miserable. She felt utterly dead, devoid, empty. Her life was now terrifyingly lackluster, her town unbearably dusty as it awaited the rains of November. The dust covered leaves of the trees and bushes drooped in weightiness toward the ground. As she made her rounds with Giuliana in the mornings the people seemed flat and boring. When she held a brand new baby in her arms, a deep pit of emptiness formed in her stomach. She wondered how the poor thing would ever learn to endure such the dull and uninteresting life it had just been born into.
Eva tried not to let on how she was feeling to Giuliana, worried that she would once again be scolded for being selfish and ungrateful. How could she come back here, in this village in the Apennines, in the Abruzzi region of Italy, in this time, in her house, crowded with people dominated by an unpleasant mother? One day she finally broke down.
“How do you go on, Giuliana?” she asked one day as they sat stitching poultice wraps together. “Ever since the initiation, life feels bland. How do you continue here, with this day-to-day work, this absolute drudgery when you know that, feel that, want that. How do you endure it?”
“I must apologize, Eva. I never expected it to have this effect on you. For me it was different. It made it easier to endure it here. It gave me an idea of what awaits me on the other side. It helped me no longer fear death. I assumed it would be the same for you. I was mistaken.”
“Death would only be a relief now,” Eva said, so dramatically that Giuliana had to hide her smile. “This town, my life, it is all so dull, so…nothing. I am aching day and night; my body is filled with desire for more. I want more of what I felt that night.”
“Eva, you must calm yourself,” Giuliana said. “I assure you there are other ways of achieving such bliss. When you are older you will understand. For now, you must try to integrate your experience. Let it be what it was. Let it stay there. Eva, you must come back now. Perhaps it is time for me to teach you how to eat the mountain.”
“I know how to eat the mountain.”
“How do you know?”
“I taught myself long ago.”
“Before you were apprenticed to me?”
“Si.”
“Eva, tell me how do you it.”
“Once, when I was younger, I was upset with my mother after she found me reading in Leon’s shed and punished me. I was forced to do the laundry and walk the lane to my home slowly, very slowly, for the wet laundry was so heavy. The lane to my home has a magnificent view of the Maiella. As I rested, I began to study the mountain. I sat and observed the shape of her, noticed changes in her in the light and at different times of day. It felt good. I continued to do it. She began to speak to me. I felt the mountain within me. We were connected. I could taste her. I felt happy. When I began to work with you, I discovered I didn’t need to eat Maiella.”
Giuliana reached across the table and grasped Eva’s hand within hers. “Now you shall learn the deepest mystery of the Strega,” she said. “You will see that so much that you know and have been taught is only half-truth. The mysteries are right beneath the surface, accessible to all. Some find them on their own, as you have with eating the mountain. Though they find them, they may not fully understand.
“The mountain, the grotto, the ocean, all bodies of water, these are all wombs of the earth. We can retreat to these earth wombs while we are alive for nurturing and sustenance, as you already have by eating the mountain. But Eva, women carry this nurturing sustenance within them always. Women have this power in their wombs for far more than creating children.
“As Streghe, we are commissioned to care for the wombs of women. But do you see, by caring for the wombs of women we are doing so much more. We are caring for all earth wombs.”
Giuliana began to sing:
As to a woman’s womb So to all wombs On earth and in the sky. Happy and healthy wombs of women Bring happy healthy mountains, Rivers, oceans, grottoes. When the wombs of women are strong All else thrives.
© Theresa C. Dintino 2012
The above is excerpted from the novel The Strega and the Dreamer by Theresa C. Dintino. The Strega and the Dreamer is the story of a man who is willing to sacrifice everything for a dream, and a passionate woman questioning the confining roles allowed to 19th century women.

Eva is an Italian Strega, a midwife and healer, fully committed to her small hilltop village. Marcello is a man with a dream of America — a dream that Eva does not share. Famine comes to the Abruzzi. Marcello goes to America, leaving his family behind as he searches for a more prosperous life. During their six-year separation, Eva dedicates herself to her Strega duties and the people of the village. Though it is taboo for a woman to do so, with the help of a doctor from the city she secretly learns of modern medicine. When Marcello finally calls for her, Eva has a decision to make. She must choose between staying in her beloved Abruzzi where she has her family and her Strega calling, or moving to America, where midwifery is considered barbaric and is being systematically eliminated.