{{Multiple issues|{{refimprove|date=July 2023}} {{religious text primary|date=September 2023}}}} {{Short description|Italian-American neopagan tradition}} '''{{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}}''' ({{IPA|it|streɡeˈriːa}}) is a neo-pagan tradition similar to Wicca, with Italian and Italian American origins.<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://www.academia.edu/150897|title=Who Was Aradia? The History & Development of a Legend|first=Sabina |last=Magliocco|website=academia.edu|access-date=11 April 2018}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=White |first=Ethan Doyle |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Wicca/VV6VEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0 |title=Wicca: History, Belief & Community in Modern Pagan Witchcraft |date=2015-10-01 |publisher=Liverpool University Press |isbn=978-1-78284-255-2 |language=en}}</ref> While most practitioners consider {{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}} to be a distinct tradition from Wicca, some academics consider it to be a form of Wicca or an offshoot. Both have similar beliefs and practices. For example, {{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}} honors a pantheon centered on a Moon Goddess and a Horned God, similar to Wiccan views of divinity.
Author Raven Grimassi has written on the topic. Grimassi taught what he called the '''Aradian tradition''' from 1980. He discusses elements of 'Italian witchcraft' adopted by Gardnerian Wicca with ideas inspired by Charles G. Leland's ''Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches'' (1899). The name "Aradia" (a version of Herodias) is due to Leland, who claimed she was venerated by a "witch-cult" in medieval Tuscany.
==Names== The word {{lang|it|stregheria}} is an archaic Italian word for "witchcraft", the most used word in modern Italian being {{lang|it|stregoneria}}.<ref name="ndil">''Nuovo Dizionario Italiano-Latino'', the Società Editrice Dante Alighieri (1959)</ref> {{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}} is sometimes referred to as {{lang|it|la Vecchia Religione}} ("the Old Religion").<ref>''A New history of Witchcraft'', Jeffrey Russell & Brooks Alexander, page 152, "the old religion" was first used in Leland's ''Aradia''</ref>
==Raven Grimassi== {{main|Raven Grimassi}} Raven Grimassi is the pen name of an Italian-American author, born in 1951 as the son of an Italian immigrant who was born and raised in the area of Naples, Italy. He became involved with a coven presenting itself as Gardnerian Wicca in 1969 in San Diego.<ref>{{cite web | title=Biography of Raven Grimassi | url=http://www.ravengrimassi.net/bio.htm | access-date=October 13, 2005 }} {{cite web | title=Arician tradition | work=Witchvox | url=http://www.witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=usca&c=trads&id=3644 | access-date=February 7, 2006 | archive-date=July 7, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220707022356/http://witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=usca&c=trads&id=3644 | url-status=dead }}</ref> He is the founder of the Aridian and Arician traditions of Italian-based witchcraft. He stepped down as the directing elder of Arician Witchcraft in 2004. As of 2009, Grimassi lived in Massachusetts and is the directing elder of the Ash, Birch and Willow tradition, and co-director of the Fellowship of the Pentacle. He was formerly co-director of the College of the Crossroads. He died in 2019.<ref>{{cite web | title=College of the Crossroads | url=http://www.collegeofthecrossroads.org/ | access-date=February 7, 2006 | archive-date=March 29, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329234524/https://collegeofthecrossroads.org/ | url-status=usurped }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web | title=In Memoriam: Raven Grimassi {{!}} Mat Auryn | url=https://www.patheos.com/blogs/matauryn/2019/03/11/in-memoriam-raven-grimassi/ | access-date=2025-08-22 | website=www.patheos.com}}</ref>
His later interest in Neo-paganism began in 1969, and he was initiated into a system claiming to be Gardnerian Wicca in San Diego though the tradition's claim eventually proved to be false. Ten years later, Grimassi began teaching the "Aridian Tradition"{{Ref|bio}}, which he describes as a "modern system"{{Ref label|FAQ|1|a}} of Italian Witchcraft or {{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}}, that he created for non-initiates. Grimassi also studied Kabbalah and other traditions of Wicca such as Brittic and the Pictish-Gaelic system{{vague|date=July 2023}} in which he received third degree initiation in 1983 according to the ''Encyclopedia of Wicca & Witchcraft''.<ref>''Encyclopedia of Wicca & Witchcraft'', Raven Grimassi, Llewellyn Publications, 2003</ref>
===Views on a historical "religion of witchcraft"=== {{Further|Benandanti|Witch-cult hypothesis}} Grimassi shares in common, in his books, the general "Witch-cult hypothesis" that appears in the writings of Charles G. Leland (''Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches'', 1899), a discredited theory that European witchcraft was the continuation of an ancient pre-Christian religion.
Grimassi describes the roots of {{Lang|it|Stregheria|italic=no}} as a syncretic offshoot of Etruscan religion that later blended with "Tuscan peasant religion", medieval Christian heresy, and veneration of saints.<ref name="faq">{{cite web | title=Stregheria.com FAQ | url=http://stregheria.com/FAQ.html | access-date=October 14, 2005 | archive-date=May 22, 2006 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060522185828/http://www.stregheria.com/FAQ.html | url-status=dead }}</ref> Grimassi views Leland's book ''Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches'' as a "Christianized and distorted version" of the original story of Aradia, whom he believes to be a mortal woman named Aradia di Toscano.<ref name="faq"/> However, Grimassi does endorse a number of elements from Leland's Aradia material, such as the inclusion of a full moon ritual and a sacred meal at the Tregenda, or Sabbat, along with the pantheon of a goddess and god figure.
Grimassi writes that Aradia di Toscano passed on a religion of witchcraft, based on ancient Etruscan paganism, to her followers (whom Grimassi calls "The Triad Clans"). The Triad Clans are referred to as "an alliance of three related Witch Clans known as the Tanarra, Janarra, and Fanarra".<ref name="faq" />
===Claims of family tradition=== Reports that Grimassi claims to belong to a "family tradition" of religious witchcraft has attracted criticism.<ref>Magliocoo, Sabina "...this state of affairs, along with the lack of ethnographic evidence to corroborate the reports of Martello, Bruno and Grimassi, makes the existence of an Italian witch cult among Italian-Americans extremely unlikely." in {{cite web | title=Spells, Saints, and Streghe: Witchcraft, Folk Magic, and Healing in Italy | url=http://www.stregoneriaitaliana.com/stregoneria_italiana-000180.htm | access-date=October 13, 2005 | url-status=usurped | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060222040659/http://www.stregoneriaitaliana.com/stregoneria_italiana-000180.htm | archive-date=February 22, 2006 }}</ref> Grimassi responds by saying that, although he wrote about such a family tradition, he intentionally never specifically mentions his own family in his books, but that Llewellyn's marketing department designed text depicting him as being raised in a family tradition .<ref>{{cite web | title=Common misunderstandings about my writings | url=http://www.ravengrimassi.net/about.htm| access-date=October 13, 2005 }}</ref> Grimassi does not deny being the bearer of a family lineage but chooses to protect the privacy of his family by not mentioning or referencing specific members (hence his use of a pseudonym).
Sabina Magliocco, who has criticized some of Grimassi's claims, does point out that "Grimassi never claims to be reproducing exactly what was practiced by Italian immigrants to North America; he admits Italian-American immigrants "have adapted a few Wiccan elements into their ways".<ref>{{cite journal | author=Magliocco, Sabina | title=Spells, Saints, and Streghe: Witchcraft, Folk Magic, and Healing in Italy | journal=The Pomegranate: The Journal of Pagan Studies | year=2001 | volume=13 | url=http://www.stregoneriaitaliana.com/stregoneria_italiana-000180.htm | url-status=usurped | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060222040659/http://www.stregoneriaitaliana.com/stregoneria_italiana-000180.htm | archive-date= 2006-02-22}}</ref> After personally meeting Grimassi, Magliocco writes in her letter to the Pomegranate Reader's Forum: <blockquote>I had the pleasure of meeting Raven Grimassi during the summer of 2001, unfortunately after the final draft of my article had already been submitted to ''The Pom''. He was very gracious and helpful to me. From information he revealed during our interview, I can say with reasonable certainty that I believe him to have been initiated into a domestic tradition of folk magic and healing such as I describe in my article.<ref>{{cite journal | author=Magliocco, Sabina | title = retraction | journal=The Pomegranate: The Journal of Pagan Studies | year=2001 | volume=16 | pages= 48}}</ref></blockquote>Grimassi's tradition centers around a duotheistic pair of deities that are regarded as divine lovers, and they may go by many different names, including: Uni and Tagni, Tana and Tanus, Diana and Dianus, Jana and Janus, and more.<ref>''The Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism'', Shelley Rabinovitch & James Lewis, page 262, (2004)</ref>
According to Grimassi some Stregheria rituals take place in a circle, with an altar facing North. Ritual actions include prayer, and the blessing of food.<ref name="ways">{{cite book | first=Raven | last=Grimassi | title=Ways of the Strega | publisher=Llewellyn Publications | year=1994 | isbn=978-1-56718-253-8 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/waysofstregaital00grim }}</ref>
In comparing Stregheria to Wicca, Grimassi notes both similarities between the two and differences. He has defended his material as being significantly different from Wicca<ref name="notice">{{cite web | title=Common misunderstandings about my works | url=http://www.ravengrimassi.com/notice.htm | access-date=October 14, 2005 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051106213921/http://ravengrimassi.com/notice.htm |archive-date=2005-11-06}}</ref> at the roots level, and asserts that many of the foundational concepts in Gerald Gardner's Wicca can be found earlier in works on Italian Witchcraft and ancient Mediterranean mystery sects.<ref name="iw">{{cite book | first=Raven | last=Grimassi | title=Italian Witchcraft | pages=281–285 | publisher =Llewellyn Publications | year=2000 | isbn=978-1-56718-259-0 }}</ref><ref name="hw">{{cite book | first=Raven | last=Grimassi | title=Hereditary Witchcraft | pages=13–22 | publisher =Llewellyn Publications | year=2001 | isbn=978-1-56718-256-9 }}</ref>
==Academics== Some academics, such as Ethan Doyle White, consider Stregheria to be an offshoot of Wicca.<ref name="White50">{{cite book |last1=White |first1=Ethan Doyle |title=Wicca: History, Belief, and Community in Modern Pagan Witchcraft |date=2015 |publisher=Sussex Academic Press |isbn=978-1845197551 |page=50}}</ref> Professor of anthropology and religion Sabina Magliocco has described Stregheria as "a religion similar to Wicca in structure and practice, with Italian flavor added through the names of deities, spirits, and sabbats."<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Strmiska |editor1-first=Michael |title=Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives |date=2005 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |location=Santa Barbara, California |isbn=1851096086 |page=61}}</ref>
Recent ethnographic work has also highlighted enduring indigenous healing traditions in Italy that operate alongside or within Stregheria, notably the practice of Segnature, a folk healing system based on sacred gestures (segnature), prayers, and secret formulas. According to Dr. Angela Puca, these vernacular practices—performed by Segnatori—represent a living form of Italian shamanism deeply embedded within rural communities. They blend pre‑Christian folk beliefs with Catholic symbolism and continue to be transmitted through familial or community lineages, often in secrecy, with renewed visibility via social media networks.<ref name="Puca2024">Puca, Angela (2024). Italian Witchcraft and Shamanism: The Tradition of Segnature, Indigenous and Trans‑cultural Shamanic Traditions in Italy. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV. ISBN 978‑90‑04‑69417‑0.</ref> Puca’s research emphasises the coexistence and syncretism of these healing traditions with contemporary strands of Stregheria, where some practitioners integrate Segnature into their repertoire or draw upon similar gestures and verbal formulas. While Stregheria in its modern form often looks to reconstructionist and neopagan sources (such as Etruscan, Roman, or medieval witchcraft traditions), Segnature demonstrates the survival of distinct local traditions rooted in folk medicine and spiritual healing, marking an important example of indigenous Italian magical practice.<ref name="Puca2024"/>
==See also== * {{anli|Witches of Benevento}} * {{anli|European witchcraft}} * {{anli|Neopaganism in the United States}} * {{anli|Etruscan mythology}} * {{anli|Tages}} * {{anli|Vegoia}}
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Sources== *Sabina Magliocco, "Italian American Stregheria and Wicca: Ethnic Ambivalence in American Neopaganism," in Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives, ed. Michael Strmiska (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006), 55–86.
{{Neopaganism}} {{witchcraft}}
Category:Italian-American culture Category:Modern paganism in the United States Category:American witchcraft Category:Witchcraft in Italy Category:Modern pagan traditions Category:1970s in modern paganism