Notable figures

Notable figures

• Gerald Gardner 1884–1964
  Public founder of modern Wicca

  English civil servant, amateur archaeologist, and Freemason who, on his retirement to England in 1936, became involved with esoteric circles in the New Forest area. His Witchcraft Today (1954) and The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959) are the religion’s founding public texts.

• Doreen Valiente 1922–1999
  High Priestess; principal liturgist

  English author and witch, initiated by Gardner in 1953, who rewrote much of the early Book of Shadows. The form of the Charge of the Goddess in widest use today is substantially her work. She later left Gardner’s coven and worked with several other early Wiccan groups.

• Alex Sanders 1926–1988
  Founder of the Alexandrian tradition

  English witch who established the Alexandrian tradition in the 1960s. The tradition draws heavily on Gardnerian material with additions from ceremonial magic, particularly Qabalistic and Enochian sources, and remains one of the two principal initiatory lines.