Bulgarian Magical Healers: Don’t Call Me a Witch! Ronesa Aveela
Is healing outside of modern medicine No day is more important for healers than miraculous or perhaps even magical? Midsummer, or Eniovden, a celebration of the summer solstice. Beginning at Do you know where Bulgaria is? It’s dusk on the previous evening, women nestled along the western side of the Black and healers collect herbs because they’re Sea, just north of Greece. The country is most potent on this day. Although it perhaps best known to the Western world may sound strange, they collect seventyfor the city of Varna, the place where seven and a half herbs. It’s said this is the Dracula set sail on the Demeter. But the number of illnesses that exist, with country has so much more to its acclaim the half herb designated for unknown — Thracian tombs, rose oil, yogurt, ailments. (No, I don’t know how they honey, and herbs. Not to mention all the determine a half herb. Perhaps they break creatures who call it home — vampires, one in half. Like so many other rituals, it’s witches, dragons, and nymphs. You’ve secretive.) most likely heard of Veelas from Harry Potter stories. In Bulgaria these nymphs, or fairies, who can charm men are called Samodivi and inhabit forests. Their sisters the Rusalki thrive in water bodies. You’d probably call them mermaids. Bulgarians are steeped in superstitions, with numerous ways to ward off illness and curses caused by the “evil eye,” but they are also believers in the divine. Orthodox and pagan practices combine into unique perspectives on every aspect of life from birth to death. Folk medicine is widespread — in cities as well as in tiny, remote villages. Herbs play an important role in these cures. A popular saying is that an herb exists for every ache. Even during the time of the Roman Empire, Thrace (modern Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey) was known for its vast richness of medicinal plants.
Girls stepping through an Eniovden wreath, by Nelinda, used with permission of the artist
Women who gather the herbs use some to create a giant wreath that young girls pass through. This protects them from being captured by a zmey, a male dragon who easily falls in love with a maiden and desires to have her for a bride. (Lest you
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