Written By: Liz Ronk
Fifty years ago, in the fall of 1964, LIFE magazine published what must have felt to the venerable weekly’s long-time readers like a strikingly weird feature. Titled “Real Witches at Work,” the piece included photographs of modern-day British pagans doctors, housewives, nurses, teachers celebrating their ancient rites, dancing around fires and generally behaving like perfectly normal, faithful worshippers of the sun, the moon and Mother Nature have been acting for thousands of years.
Today, when magic, the supernatural and the occult are central elements of some of pop culture’s most familiar franchises (see Potter, Harry), and Wiccans are more likely to be found serving on the local school board or city council than practicing their beliefs in secret for fear of being “found out,” the shock has been tempered for many. But in the early 1960s, the notion of grown men and women getting naked in order to practice their religion would likely have blown a goodly number of puritanical minds.
Mrs. Ray Bon, a British housewife and the pagan high priestess in the story, offered a nicely reasoned defense in that long-ago issue of LIFE: “It seems obvious to me that people can be just as immoral with their clothes on as with them off.”
Ray Bone, high priestess of the London witch coven, raised a sword and asked ‘Mighty Ones of the East’ to protect the ritual circle in which they gathered near Chipping Norton. Witches behind her held up knives.
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In a thousand-year-old rite, the witches danced around a bonfire within a prehistoric Rollright stone circle in Oxfordshire.
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At climax of the dance they leapt over the fire, honoring the sun as the source of life.
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Beneath cabalistic symbols, nude witches raised ritual knives to invoke their gods at a meeting. The witches claimed that their nudity represented the putting aside of worldly things.
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English pagan, 1964.
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A witchcraft initiation ceremony, England, 1964.
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High priestess Artemis stirred a salt and water mixture which was used to ‘purify’ the sacred circle in all witchcraft rites. On the table were an incense burner, cord and a statue of a goddess. At right is an herb chest containing incense.
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Items in an English ruin, 1964.
Terence Spencer / Getty Images
A witch studied in a museum, England, 1964.
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The story “Real Witches at Work” as it appeared in LIFE magazine, November 13, 1964.
LIFE Magazine
The story “Real Witches at Work” as it appeared in LIFE magazine, November 13, 1964.
LIFE Magazine
The story “Real Witches at Work” as it appeared in LIFE magazine, November 13, 1964.
LIFE Magazine
The story “Real Witches at Work” as it appeared in LIFE magazine, November 13, 1964.
LIFE Magazine
The story “Real Witches at Work” as it appeared in LIFE magazine, November 13, 1964.
LIFE Magazine
