Sacred Forests

We’re deep into looking at trees these days, but we wanted to share this excerpt about a holy place in Bulgaria from the trees book we’re working on. Are there any such places where you live? Have your grandparents or other older people passed down stories of miraculous healing to you? We’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

The sacred site of Krustova Gora, Holy Trinity Cross Forest, in the Rhodope Mountains in southern Bulgaria, is a place of great spiritual significance and is well-known for its healing power. What gives it this ability is a piece of Christ’s cross, which stories say has been buried in Krustova Gora (Cross Mountain), at a location where the mountain forms the shape of a cross.

It’s interesting to note that the symbolism of the cross predates Christianity. In many ancient cultures, the cross has been viewed as portraying the tree of life, as well as being associated with the sun and fire. Among the ancient Thracians, the four directions of the cross have specific meanings. Although left has often been considered “sinister” in some cultures (and, in fact, the word sinister comes from a Latin word meaning “left), among the Thracians, that direction was the more sacred of the two.

Right and left to them represented the earthly and celestial realms, respectively. Rituals in which actions took place from right to left were ones that took the participant from a lower level of consciousness to a higher one. This was standard practice in blood sacrifice rituals and enabled a sick person to become filled with power.

North and south were also sacred directions among the Thracians. North was the direction associated with mankind and south for immortals and the souls of the blessed. Rituals that included right-to-left and north-to-south movements were an attempt to unify the earthly and heavenly realms with the goal of providing healing.

The holy relic at Krustova Gora is said to be one that Saint Helena gave to her son, Emperor Constantine. According to one story, this piece of the cross made its way to Kurstova Gora after a Russian tsar seized it from a Turkish sultan. Believing that the relic brought his troops and empire victories, the sultan sent his troops after the Russians. The latter had changed their route and arrived at Kurustova Gora and left the relic with the monastery. The monks living there buried the piece of the cross before they were killed during the subsequent invasion.

Church tradition states that Helena had gone in search of Christ’s tomb and discovered it in 326. She placed the cross in the church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, but kept a piece of it. On September 13, 335, the church was consecrated. The next day, the cross was displayed outside the church, where a congregation of people could venerate it.

In honor of this event, on the eve of September 14, Holy Cross Day or Feast of the Cross (official name of Universal Exaltation of the Precious and Life-Creating Cross) many pilgrims travel to Holy Trinity Cross Forest, praying for God’s blessings to cure their illnesses. They climb the mountain peak for a vigil that ends when the sun touches a metal cross that has been erected there. This time of year is associated with the arrival of autumn, when the sun begins its journey toward winter. In mythology, it is the day when day and night crisscross, being of equal duration, called the crossover of the sun.

If you’d like to learn more about the holiday, check out our previous post on the subject: Hope & Miracles.

If you’d like to hear more about trees, we’ll be launching our Magical Healing Trees Kickstarter campaign in early May. The campaign and our eventual webstore will be the only places you can get a digital copy of the book. Print copies will be available later this year on retailers, but you can get an early copy through our campaign, plus other cool stuff we’ll be offering. Click the link to our campaign above to follow it now, so you’ll be notified when it goes live.

Also, we’re part of the Storytellers Oracle Deck project. You can find out more about this and follow the other authors on our website: Storyteller’s Oracle Deck. We will be offering the “Wisdom” card as part of this project.

The Magic of World Trees

Since ancient times, civilizations have considered trees and nature sacred. A Bulgarian saying goes “There is a sacred forest but no sacred field.” Fields were where the people toiled so they could survive. It was a part of their everyday lives. But the forest was the mystical, the unknown. To venture there purposefully was to seek a spiritual awakening.

Whenever I drive through the countryside in the New England area in autumn, I can appreciate why trees have inspired awe. The hillsides are awash with a multitude of colors, God’s patchwork quilt placed lovingly upon the land. Or simply walking in the midst of a forest gives me a sense of peace and security.

Trees rise high above the land, spreading their branches to the sky and digging their roots deep into the ground. Some species, like oak, ash, and walnut, are bestowed with the title of “World Tree,” an honor making them like a supreme god among trees. This deeply venerated tree was seen as a force of strength and protection.

The three parts of the tree symbolize the nature of the universe. The crown represents the heavens and all its inhabitants: birds, as well as divine spirits. The trunk signifies Earth, the home of men, animals, and preternatural creatures like nymphs and fairies. And roots represent the underworld, the realm of the dead and creatures like snakes, fish, and dragons, which may embody demons or other beings of darkness. Since the world tree sat at the boundary of all three realms, it was seen as the means to traverse from one to the other.

World trees and other age-old trees were treated with respect. It was forbidden to break or cut their branches. Those who disobeyed suffered calamities—even death. Instead, people would hold rituals beneath the trees, and let the blood of sacrificial animals soak into the roots.

Perhaps the best-known World Tree to the western world is the Norse Yggdrasil. As far as I know, the Slavs do not give their world trees a particular name, but different trees species are called World Trees, a primary one being the oak. In our middle-grade fantasy series, we call the world tree in Dragon Village (Zmeykovo) the Znahar Tree, since znahar is the word for a wise old woman who heals with herbs and charms. The Firebird roosts in this tree, protecting it. The eagle is another animal you may find within the branches of Slavic world trees. Both birds are considered messengers of the gods.

World Tree. Illustration by Dmitrij Rybin. Stock illustration via Depositphotos.

The following is an excerpt about the Slavic World Tree from our book, A Study of Dragons of Eastern Europe.

World Tree

Prevalent in many of these creation myths is a cosmic tree, or a World Tree, that grows out of the water and supports the land. It’s known by various names: “tree of life, tree of knowledge, tree of the Garden of Eden, tree of the cross, Shaman’s tree.”  It’s also been called “a golden fruit bearing tree,” a “straight tree—tall and lean,” and a tree whose branches are “pure silver, dotted with golden bees.”

Ancient civilizations considered nature sacred, and they deeply venerated the World Tree as a force of strength and protection. The three parts of the tree symbolize the nature of the universe. Branches represent the heavens where divine spirits reside. The trunk signifies Earth, which is the home of men and preternatural creatures like nymphs and fairies. And roots represent the underworld and the dead who dwell there. Like nature itself, all these creatures live in harmony with one another.

Many illustrations display the serpent coiled at the tree’s roots or along its trunk. However, in popular belief, it can also live in the tree’s crown as a dragon—thus showing the creature’s dichotomy of being both an evil viper and a benevolent guardian. Also inhabiting the branches are magical birds, such as the firebird (the messenger of divine will and the protector of the fruit of life, the magic apple), nightingale, falcon, and eagle (the symbol of light and heaven). Other birds found there include doves, swallows, roosters, and peacocks. Even bees make their home in the tree’s branches.

The snake and the bird are the most widespread personifications of a human soul. This belief relates to the shaping of the idea about two worlds of death—one below the earth and another above the clouds. Therefore, the images of snake and bird merge to create the winged dragon.

Over time, the benevolent dragon and the eagle have become interchangeable in folklore, thus associating the dragon with both heaven and earth as a cosmic mediator between the two. And so, from serpent to dragon, the creature becomes connected to all three parts of the universe: the roots and the dead, the trunk and the living, the branches and the divine beings.

• The Dead. The World Tree has been called the “Path to the Souls of the Ancestors,” and it symbolizes “the transformation and transition between the worlds.” It’s a place where the souls of the dead reside, and a place from which one can enter the realm of the ancestors, often called the “other world” or the “beyond.” This is a place where not only the dead, but also mythical creatures, live. (You’ll read more about the other world in the “Dragon Slayers” chapter.)
• The Living. The World Tree has a place in the daily lives of people. It underlines “the inseparable connection between the cosmic balance, life—fertility—marriage—death.” Many life-cycle rituals involve trees—especially fruit-bearing trees, symbolic of this World Tree.
• The Divine. Among the Slavs, the World Tree is often oak and sacred to the god Perun, wielder of thunder (who in later beliefs becomes St. Iliya or Elijah, who fights against destructive dragons). In folklore, the tree may also be a cypress or sycamore.

In particular, a budnik (a special log burned at Christmas to celebrate the rebirth of the Mlada Boga or Young God, when the days begin to be longer after the winter solstice) acts as “a mediator between the heavenly and earthly life.” People perform rituals “to magically strengthen the vitality of the World Tree, during the transitional time between the old and the new year, and to further reinforce the equilibrium and order in the universe.”

The more that is discovered about trees, the more awe-inspiring they become.

Make sure to follow our upcoming Kickstarter campaign for our book, Magical Healing Trees in Slavic Folklore, to discover more fascinating information about trees. The main focus is on Slavic beliefs, but general information about the included trees is also included.

For further reading, check out Iva Kenaz’s Tree Magic: The Path of Druids, Shamans, and Mystics.

Also, be sure to check out the Kickstarter campaigns that are part of the Storytellers Oracle Deck project.

The current project is Tales of Akatsuki: Special Edition Hardcovers, which runs from February 14 to March 2, and the oracle card is for CHARM.

Fierce heroines, brooding heroes, and heart fluttering romance collides with anime and fairy tale influences in this fantasy series.

What Do Baba Yaga and Santa Have in Common?

November was a busy month and so we didn’t get any newsletters out. We were getting the final touches on our Baba Yaga book so we can send it out the rewards to our Kickstarter backers, and we also attended in-person events, craft fairs, and such. Things have settled down a bit now, thankfully.

Looking back, since December 2020 until December 2022, we’ve published 12 books, averaging 6 books a year; whereas before, our average was one or two a year. Needless to say, we’re a bit worn out and will be taking off the month of December before we start on our next projects.

After that, we’ll get going on finishing the final two books in the Dragon Village series and start doing research on the next book in the Spirits & Creatures series: Vampires! We’re hoping to do a Kickstarter campaign for the complete Dragon Village series in September, so be sure to follow our Kickstarter profile so you’re updated. We want to have the books completed this time before we start the campaign, so we’ll be able to ship them out as quickly as possible.

https://www.rawpixel.com/image/4021271/photo-image-nature-red-natural

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Back now to the Santa/Baba Yaga connection. In our research on Baba Yaga, we discovered she has an association with mushrooms, in particular fly agaric, Amanita muscaria. It’s believed that this may be the magical food Baba Yaga feeds to heroes before she sends them off on their journey to the otherworld, the land of the dead. This gave them the ability to unlock the keys to eternity as well as allowing him to become part of the world of the dead, to speak and see there in the same manner as the dead.

So, how does this connect to Santa?

It all relates back to Amanita muscaria, that red-capped, white-spotted mushroom. The toxins in it have psychedelic properties, and shamans (in particular those of the Sami people of Lapland) have used it to put themselves into a trance so they can travel to the other side and get advice from the dead. These shamans didn’t just nibble on the mushrooms to get into this state, they also drank reindeer urine, which contained the mushroom’s compounds that were free of toxins. The rein deer ate this mushroom, but filtered out all the toxic elements.

The Amanita muscaria gives one the sense of flying.

Reindeer… flying…

Are you seeing a connection yet?

People believed that those who ate the Amanita muscaria ended up looking like the mushroom: a big, fat person with red splotches. They traveled to homes on a reindeer-pulled sled in winter. And they came down the chimney to enter the house.

Sounding familiar?

These shamans who ate the mushrooms would perform healing rituals and solve people’s problems from the advice the shamans received from the dead. In return, people gave them lots of food, making the fat man even heftier.

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The source of this information about the Amanita muscaria and Santa comes from this great article and video, “How the Psychedelic Amanita Muscaria Mushroom May Have Inspired the Santa Legend of Lapland,” which you can find here: https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/12/02/mushroom-santa/.

And be sure to check out our book to find out more about Baba Yaga.

Dragon-Repelling Herbs

October 26 is Dimitrovden, St. Demetrius’ Day or St. Dimitar’s Day. This saint is sometimes called the twin of St. George, the mighty dragon slayer. But did you know that St. Demetrius also fought dragons? I bet he never came across Baba Yaga when she was in dragon form, though.

What? You didn’t know she could appear as a dragon or giant snake in fairy tales? She is so huge that when she opens her mouth to swallow the hero, her jaw reaches from the clouds to the ground. Unlike the Bulgarian version of this dragon, this incarnation is always evil. But, there’s no need to worry, unless you’re the hero’s brother. Your sibling may toss you into the dragon’s mouth so he can escape.

In these stories, the dragon is defeated in a couple of ways. One is to toss in so much salt that she has to go to the sea to quench her thirst. Another is to hide in a blacksmith’s shop. When the dragon Baba Yaga arrives, the blacksmith will tell her to stick her tongue through the keyhole and grab the hero. While she does this, the crafty blacksmith will pinch her tongue with red-hot tongs and hold her there while the hero makes his way outside to kill the dragon Yaga.

But there are other ways to defeat dragons. By herbs. A few are used mainly to stop the amorous advances of a dragon, such as Melilotus officinalis (called komuniga in Bulgarian folklore), Gentiana cruciate (called tintyava), and Tanacetum vulgare (tansy). However, if you just want to drive away an angry dragon, such as a Baba Yaga one, you might want to stick with wormwood (Artemisia vulgaris). It’s one of the most effective anti-demonic herbs to protect you from dragons and other evil entities.

Its greatest magical strength lies in its buds and tips. Hang a bunch of the herbs around the house (preferably in a bedroom or hallway), or burn it as incense for a short time and in small doses. Its smell will drive out every unclean, evil force from your home—whether it’s a spirit or simply anger and negative energy. Another way to drive out evil spirits is to gather wild wormwood on Eniovden (Midsummer’s Day, June 24), make a broom with the stalks, and sweep the unwanted beings from your house. If you can’t harvest the herb on that day, do it when the moon is waning. This is when wild wormwood will be more powerful.

Common methods for applying the herbs include:

• Wearing them as a small bouquet or corsage. Bulgarians like to include a geranium (здравец, zdravets) among the flowers. Its leaves smell nice and protect against the evil eye, and bring health and strength to the wearer. Men often pin the herbs onto their shirt, while girls make herbal and floral wreaths to wear in their hair.
• Burning them and spreading the smoke like incense, including burning hay in a field that contains the herbs. The smoke from burning herbs will protect and purify you, and its smell will sicken the dragon so she’ll no longer come near you. It may even kill the dragon.
• Soaking them in water, then sprinkling the water on the victim or the place where the dragon resides.

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We have more interesting topics like this in our book 77½ Magical Healing Herbs. You can get the book here: https://77-1-2-herbs.backerkit.com/hosted_preorders.

Or if you want to find out more about dragons, check out our book A Study of Dragons of Eastern Europe.

And don’t forget to take a look at our campaign about Baba Yaga. It’s ending on November 1, so don’t miss this opportunity: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/a-study-of-baba-yaga?ref=d97tft

If you’ve never logged into Kickstarter before, you’ll have to create an account. But then, you’ll have access to all the great projects going on every day, not just for the Witchstarter program.

The Power of the Rose

We’ll be launching our Kickstarter campaign for Baba Yaga on October 4. In her honor, we’d like to do a series of posts about herbs. Although you may know her as a cannibalistic witch, she has other characteristics. She was also a healer.

Today, we’ll be talking about roses and rose hips (Шипка).

If you have a cold, cough, or laryngitis, you can add honey to a tea made from rose hips to provide fast relief. This tea is also good treatment for people with cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, or diarrhea. It’s one of my favorite teas. It reminds me of the tea made from hibiscus.

 

Rose Hip Tea

Add 1 cup of rose hips to 1 quart of water and boil for 10 minutes.

Filter and add 3 Tablespoons of honey.

Drink a cupful three to four times a day.

 

Rose hips were also used as amulets to inducing love or protecting a home from evil.

First, the love remedies. Making beads from the rose hips is a way to seduce someone of the opposite sex. Or, if you prefer, you can bathe in the rose petals to make yourself more attractive and desirable. This works especially well for married couples. Your love for one another will become even stronger. The fruits will also protect you against love spells from unwanted admiriers.

If you’re not looking for love, but want to keep evil or negative energy, curses, and the evil eye away from your home, rose hips will do that work as well. The thorns are also especially powerful. By planting a rose bush near your home, you can prevent all kinds of evil, supernatural creatures from entering.

If you need to cleanse the inside of your home, gather a bouquet of rosehips. They’ll absorb all that negative energy and calm your nerves and help reduce any domestic problems. You can even scatter dry twigs with roses on them around your home.

Rose Hip Amulet

Dry the fruits and put them into a cotton bag. If you don’t want to carry that, use a scarf of other accessory that has roses, with the fruits and flowers, embroidered on it. But you’ll want to keep it with you for protection.

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We’d love to have you follow our Baba Yaga Kickstarter campaign so you know the moment it launches. You may think you know all about her, but I’m sure we have plenty of surprises that we’ll reveal in our book. We also have some really cool pins and postcards we’ll be offering backers. Illustrations come from Bulgarian artist Alexander Petkov. Click on the link below and set up a Kickstarter account if you don’t already have one.

Baba Yaga Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/a-study-of-baba-yaga.

Article Source: Nikolova, Ani. “Няма да повярвате: Шипката пази от магии и слуги на Сатаната!” December 23, 2020. https://www.topactualno.com/123681/nyama-da-povyarvate-shipkata-pazi-ot-magii-i-slugi-na-satanata/.

Can You Help Us?

It’s down to a little more than a week before we launch our Seababies Adventures campaign. Now’s your chance to get a peek at what we’re offering.

If you are new to our site, we’re launching this book through a Kickstarter campaign. You may or may not be familiar with Kickstarter. It’s a crowdfunding platform. But, unlike many others out there, Kickstarter is a platform where people promote CREATIVE PROJECTS to potential backers. It’s a way to test the market to see if the product is something that consumers desire. It’s not a platform where people are seeking personal funding. No charities or general fund raisers. All backers are helping support a PROJECT with an outcome—whether it’s a book, a game, a movie, or some other creative endeavor. And you get all kinds of cool perks along the way if you back the project to help us achieve our goal of producing this children’s book series.

Here’s where we need your help.

We’d love it if you could look over the preview of our campaign that we plan to launch September 6 and provide us with feedback. Look over the content. Does it make sense to you? Is there anything confusing? Is there something else you’d like to see included? All comments and suggestions are welcome. We want this to be something you are excited about as we are.

Here’s the preview link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/seababies-adventures?ref=2czqkh&token=133502a3.

And don’t forget to click on the “Notify me on launch” button at the top. The moment the campaign goes live, you’ll receive an email from Kickstarter. You don’t want to miss this because we’ll be offering perks along the way. The earlier you back the project, the more perks you’ll receive.

If you’ve never used Kickstarter before, you’ll have to create an account. Once you click on the “Notify me on launch” button, the site will ask you to log in. Scroll down to where it says: “New to Kickstarter? Sign up.” And follow the instructions from there.

Thank you for your support. As the Kickstarter guru who has taught us about this platform says, “We hope to see you behind the backer wall.”

And we’re also gearing up for another campaign in October for Kickstarter’s Witchstater promotion. For that one, we’ll be continuing our Spirits & Creatrues series with a book about Baba Yaga. You can follow that campaign here:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/a-study-of-baba-yaga

Mysterious Rusalki

In Whimsea Wishes Upon a Star, the little mermaid learns that she is a Rusalka, commonly known as a Slavic mermaid. In 2020, we were asked if we would discuss Rusalki, as this Slavic water spirit was going to be a contestant on the Blurry Photos Annual Miss Cryptid Contest. The following is a shortened version of the transcript for that discussion. You can listen to the full podcast here: http://www.blurryphotos.org/miss-cryptid-2020-week-3/. The part about Rusalki starts around minute 27.

Make sure you follow our campaign, so you’ll be notified the moment it goes live. Simply go to our page and select the “Notify me on launch” button and create a Kickstarter account if you haven’t already done so: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/seababies-adventures

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Mankind’s fascination with the sea has sparked imagination since the first person beheld its mighty waters. Curiosity led people to invent the means to travel across the great oceans and eventually explore beneath them, trying to discover their secrets. Throughout the centuries, millennia in fact, people have created myths and legends about creatures living within the sea’s depths. One of the most alluring and formidable beings to inspire writers, artists, children, and adults is the mermaid, who has been forever immortalized in stories such as Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. But there’s more to this sea maiden than that story tells. In Slavic folklore, she’s called a Rusalka and lives mostly in fresh-water bodies or swamps, rather than the sea.

In case you’ve never heard of a Rusalka, she’s a Slavic mermaid. The plural of the word is Rusalki. She is most popular in eastern and southern Europe: Russia, Bulgaria, Poland, Ukraine, in particular.

She’s not your “Ariel” type of mermaid, because she has no tail. In fact, she was once a living, breathing human girl, but she died before she married—often the cause of her death was drowning. I know this sounds odd in today’s world, but the people who believed in them lived in a rural, farming society. Fertility of both the land and people was critical to them for survival. They believed if girls died before they married and had children, then that fertility was lost, and the girls became part of the “unclean dead,” that is, they were cursed. People did have many rituals, though, to entice the Rusalki to return that fertility to them.

Not everyone can see Rusalki, but those who can will tell you they look like normal girls, except they are extremely pale, and they have long, green hair. They can also shape-shift into geese, swans, snakes, silver fish, or frogs. Or they can appear as birds, like the Sirens, and entice men with their songs.

They don’t really eat anything, because they are … well, dead, or undead, after all. But some stories said they like wheat bread with salt, cheese, butter, and eggs. What they are more interested in is getting clothes. They were buried in wedding garments, even though they never married. That’s all part of the whole fertility mindset. So, eventually, those clothes wear out and the Rusalki are left wearing rags, or nothing at all. They beg girls to leave them even a small rag to cover themselves with. Rather sad to think about, really.

Rusalki weren’t always thought of as dead girls, though. They were once considered goddesses or nature spirits. Talk about your kick-ass heroines; they weren’t wimpy, sidekick-to-men-only goddesses, but powerful ones, who ruled the land. But then, the Orthodox Church intervened. They didn’t totally wipe the Rusalki out, but the Church authority repressed the role of these goddesses as much as it repressed the role women played in society. And Rusalki lost their goddess status. Oh, how the mighty have fallen!

You can understand they probably didn’t care to much about this demotion. From goddesses to dead girls, and unclean, cursed dead girls at that. All because some supposedly holy men thought they weren’t worthy of the goddess status. So, they revolted and started their campaign of torturing men… especially any man who jilted them when they were alive, because it was men who decided Rusalki weren’t worthy of exalted status.

Being dead really wasn’t so bad. If they had lived and married, the girls would have lost what the Russians called their “volia,” their freedom. As Rusalki, they could be wild and FREE of male dominance.

They usually didn’t bother women or girls, unless they were jealous of their happy life. And they left children alone, unless they had an overwhelming desire to nurture a child, since they couldn’t have one of their own… they were DEAD after all, but still retained the feelings of the average rural girl. So men were their main targets.

They would either drown them (typical mermaid fashion) or tickle them to death with their breasts… which, I forgot to mention earlier, were huge, even if they had been small during their lifetime. This was just another sign of their unused fertility.

All right, stop laughing. Have you ever been tickled? If so, you know it can be quite painful, especially if prolonged. And a Rusalka most often was accompanied by other Rusalki, so you’re talking about several of these mermaids tickling you…

When you consider that some stories say the Rusalki had iron-tipped breasts, well, just ouch. You wouldn’t want someone to tickle you that way. Okay, laugh if you want to, but I’m glad I’m not male, so I wouldn’t have to endure that torture.

They also loved to dance, and would flatter … or force … a shepherd to play his kaval, a flutelike instrument, for them all night long. He was fortunate if he survived and only had holes in his shoes and blisters on his fingers.

Geeze, you might ask, is there any hope to escape their attention? How could men protect themselves from these assaults? Well, the Russians would tell you to wear your baptismal cross, especially if you go into the forest or near water. You could also wear ferns in your hair when you go swimming; this prevents them from pulling you under. Magical chants are also useful to keep them away from you. Other methods are to prick the Rusalki with a pin or throw wormwood in their eyes. Be sure you DON’T carry anything that ATTRACTS Rusalki, like parsley, roses, birch, and especially not their favorite plant rosen (which is burning bush). You’re just asking for trouble if you do. They’ll think you WANT to be tickled.

Rusalki also love telling riddles. If you have the correct answer, they’ll leave you alone. But if you get it wrong… well, be prepared to be tickled to death.

As to whether or not they do any of this torture maliciously is up for debate. Some people say they are bent on destroying men. Other people claim they’re innocent maidens who are only trying to find the love they never had while alive…

Are they good? Or are they bad? I guess you’ll only ever truly know when you meet one for yourself.

Don’t Touch That Jellyfish

The summer days are getting shorter, and the greens are turning pale and yellow, the pallet of fall coming to life. But August is one of my favorite months to go to the beach. The water is warm, and the sun is not brutally hot. This is also a prime season for one sea creature that loves warm water, the jellyfish.

Since we started the Seababies series, we’ve learned interesting facts about each creature featured in the series. In one of the books, Cupcake is a cute jellyfish. Someone asked me what type of jellyfish. I couldn’t address this question, so I did a little more research. I learned that jellyfish are found worldwide, and swim close to the surface as well as deep in the sea. They come in various shapes and colors. Large, colorful ones abound along coastlines.

These prehistoric creatures lack organs vital to humans: a heart, lung, and brain. They absorb oxygen through their thin skin, and since they don’t have blood, they don’ need a heart to pump it. Nerves below the outer layer of their skin are sensitive to touch and let them be aware of changes in their environment, so they don’t need a brain to do this.

The teeth a beroid comb jelly uses to devour its prey are made up of tiny hairs that pull the food into the jellyfish’s stomach.

A jellyfish’s stinging cells hurt, and thousands of swimmers are injured by them yearly, so you need to be careful when in the water. There are some species whose poison can cause serious harm or even death.  Don’t dive or put your face into the water if you notice them. Unfortunately, many times you can’t see them, because they may be indistinguishable from the color of the water.

If you do ever get stung by one, stay calm and get out of the water slowly. The movement of the salt water around you helps to remove the tentacles and without them releasing more toxins. Rinse the affected area with sea water if any parts of the tentacle remain when you get back on land. Avoid using fresh water, and don’t rub the area. An old home remedy is to rinse the area with vinegar or baking soda for around 30 seconds. But this is not medical advice. Always check with a medical professional. If you get stung near your eyes or have an allergic reaction, seek medical help immediately.

Photo by Aurelien Gauchard licensed CC BY-SA2.0

Interesting Tidbits about Jellyfish

• The medusa stage of a jellyfish is when it is sexually active. They are fast-growing at this point, but die soon after breeding. With their bell and tentacles hanging off them, jellyfish get the name of “medusa” after the Greek Gorgon, who had writhing snakes for her hair. The goddess Athena cursed Medusa into this form. One look at Medusa and a person turned to stone, even after her head had been cut off.

Caravaggio, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

• When I’m busy, I wish I could create a second version of myself. A cool thing about jellyfish is that they can do that. If you cut one in half, the pieces will become two new jellies.

Photo by Aurelien Gauchard licensed CC BY-SA2.0

• Have you ever dreamed of visiting the moon? A moonfish jellyfish beat you to it, as one was aboard the space shuttle Columbia in 1991. It was an experiment to see how microgravity affected the creature. While it was cruising around outer space, the jellyfish multiplied. Upon returning to Earth, the new jellyfish were unable to deal with gravity.
• Every morning I have to spend an hour dealing with my tangled curls. I wonder if I can discover the jellyfish’s secret. Even though some have long tentacles, they never get tangled up or sting them. That’s because the tentacles are slippery and only sting other creatures and other species of jellyfish.
• The lion’s mane jellyfish has tentacles that are more than 27 meters long (88 feet). That’s longer than a blue whale! It sounds like a Rupentzel of the sea. If the Seababies home in MerrowLand has a tower, our jellyfish Cupcake could lower her tentacles down the side and reach the ground.
• Noun collectives are fun to discover. Interesting ones are a gaggle of geese, a murder of crows or a cloud of cats. But groups of jellyfish have even better names: a bloom, a swarm, or a smack. They can congregate in numbers of to 300,000. I especially like the name bloom. It’s hard to imagine a bloom of this many colorful jellyfish moving in the water.
• Jellyfish are made up of around 85 to 98 percent water. I’ve seen them magically disappear on the sand in hours. Not that they are teleporting to another world, but they disappear as their water evaporates.

As you can see, our Cupcake is a member of a complex family. In our story Cupcake’s Heroic Day, she’s a brave master baker, who will take you and your kids into a magical adventure.

The Seababies Adventures was inspired by childhood challenges. Each story brings awareness to a problem holding the character back. The tales teach children to value friendships and teamwork and that it is okay to be unique. The power to change and succeed lies in their own hands.

We’d love for you to follow our campaign that will be launching in a little over three weeks. Click on the “Notify me on launch” button to get an email from Kickstarter as soon as the project goes live. If you don’t have a Kickstarter account, you’ll have to create one first. Here’s the link to our campaign:  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/seababies-adventures.

What’s Special About This Book?

If this is news to you, our campaign is about the book people have been asking for. It provides lots of fascinating information about the herbs that make up a Bulgarian Eniovden (Midsummer’s) wreath.

I, too, was curious what herbs made up the 77½ in the wreath, so I researched old Bulgarian books and articles and finally discovered a list. That is how the idea of “77½ Magical Healing Herbs” was born.

In this unique book, you’ll also learn about well-known healers from Bulgarian history. Baba Vanga is one whom many people these days have heard about. She’s a clairvoyant who’s been called the Nostradamus of Balkans and has predicted many events that have happened in our lifetimes. But she was also an herbal healer. All the healers from the past were not treated kindly or with respect, however. In the tenth century, the Bogomils were burned like the Salem witches. These are only two of the healers mentioned in the book.

I have been blessed to know talented Bulgarian painter Keazim Issinov. With his permission, we have included in the book five of his one-of-a-kind paintings of Bulgarian healers.

The bulk of the book focuses on the Midsummer’s Day herbs—all 77 (and a half) of them. It’s an ultimate guide to tap into knowledge that has been passed down from generation to generation.

More than 200 eye-catching images illustrate the book, including a full-page botanical image, to help you recognize the herbs, along with the descriptions. But the book contains much more information.

Historical facts and traditions will take you back to school days, while medical, culinary, and magical uses will have you heading to the kitchen or garden store. Fun facts, legends, and recipes fill the pages. Or perhaps you’ll just want to forget about everything that’s going on in the world and bury yourself in the book.

The book is for anyone who wants to widen their knowledge about herbs and also learn about Slavic traditions and beliefs. It will satisfy your curiosity and widen the horizons of your mind. It’s the perfect gift that will make a beautiful coffee-table book.

Here’s your chance to learn how to make basic recipes and discover fun facts, lore, and magical beliefs.

But you can only do it if you back this campaign through Kickstarter. The print version won’t be available on any retailer until the end of the year. Backers get advance copies. Head on over to Kickstarter now: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/77-1-2-magical-healing-herbs-the-secret-power-of-herbs?ref=a23n7m

Samodivi – Witches of Darkness or Thracian Goddesses?

We’ve mentioned Samodivi throughout the campaign. They are mentioned only in passing in the herbs book, but we thought you’d like to know a little more about them.

Who are the Samodivi? Where did they come from?

Let’s start with their name. Samo (alone) and diva (wild), so “Wild alone” or “Wildalone.” What exactly does that imply? First off, although diva describes them as wild creatures, the word also comes from divine. In fact, it has been said the Samodivi were daughters of the Thracian goddess Bendis. What samo signifies is they shun interaction with people. When humans come across a Samodiva, the nymph may harm them or befriend them, depending on her mood.

Being the daughters of Bendis (often associated with Artemis, the Greek goddess who was a protectress of nature), Samodivi have a special connection with nature and have the power to heal using herbs, and so their role is to protect the forests and its inhabitants. They are a symbol of the coming spring, the awakening of nature. Each year on Blagovets, March 25, they return from their secret winter village in Zmeykovo (Dragon Village) to the human world and go back to their own world in late fall.

These nymphs are renowned for their beauty, power, and magical seductive voices. Described as blonde women with long, curly hair, they are enchanting mythological creatures who have been portrayed for centuries in Bulgarian folklore — in fairy tales, poems, and legends passed from one generation to another. Numerous legends about them are still alive, and people in Bulgaria claim to still see them in forests and near water bodies.

Most often their eyes are bright and light blue (although sometimes green). People with blue eyes have long been attributed with being able to connect to the spiritual world and cast the “evil eye” to harm others. Samodivi wear white robes made out of moon beams along with a green, golden, or rainbow-colored belt. A wreath of wild flowers adorns their heads and it, along with their clothing, is a source of healing and magical power. The Samodivi carefully guard their clothing so men cannot steal them. Sometimes they are careless when they bathe, and a man captures her source of power, forcing the Samodiva to live with the man and have his children, until she finds the stolen garment and escapes.

On occasion, Samodivi choose to associate with humans. They befriend women who have been kind to them and teach these women how to use nature to heal. A Samodiva may also willingly marry a man and have his children. Those offspring become legendary heroes.

Then why are people afraid of Samodivi?

One reason is because Samodivi love to perform the horo circle dance under the moon in forest glades. Better yet they prefer it if the dancing is accompanied by the music of the kaval, or shepherd’s pipe. In many tales, they seduce and kidnap a shepherd to play for them.

Samodivi entice people who disturb their dance to join in with them until dawn breaks. Humans are unable to keep up with the wild, fast pace of the Samodivi, and die from exhaustion. Or according to some tales, the Samodivi take the fallen person’s eyes and heart. People in remote villages still believe that trespassing on a Samodiva’s special places will cause them harm, even blindness.

Samodivi cause havoc in other ways as well. In remote villages, people pay respect to them and are afraid of these creatures who can seduce men with their beautiful songs. In Bulgaria, small villages have been deserted, locals afraid of the powers of the nymphs. Stories circulate about a man who was found dead in the woods, murdered and left naked. The common belief is that this was done by Samodivi. People see flashes of white among the trees and claim they are the Samodivi.

In another story, the mysterious disappearance of men has often been attributed to them being captured by Samodivi. A story tells of a village where five men disappeared. Two were eventually found, but they had no recollection of what happened.

The existence of Samodivi has not been proven and may never be. Sightings of them may simply represent fear and respect of the unknown and of nature. When we don’t understand something, we call it magic, witchcraft, or evil, but in reality, it’s an issue we don’t want to face.

Don’t Miss Out on these FREE Ebooks

The week 2 perks are coming to an end tonight at midnight, Eastern time. And they won’t be offered again. Get them now while you have a chance. Simply pledge at any level and they’ll be yours after the campaign ends successfully.

Head on over to our campaign if you haven’t done so already: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ronesa-aveela/77-1-2-magical-healing-herbs-the-secret-power-of-herbs?ref=a23n7m