prettygoodword: text: words are sexy (words are sexy)
prettygoodword ([personal profile] prettygoodword) wrote2015-07-31 07:54 am

athame

athame (uh-THAYM, AH-thuh-mei, or uh-THAY-mee) - n., a ceremonial dagger, usually with a black handle, used in Wicca and related neopagan religions.


Rarely used to actually cut -- it's more as a guide to channel energy, especially that of the element of fire. Often double-edged. The word is first recorded in the 1930s, and spread in the 1950s through the writings of Gerald Gardner -- of certain origin, though it is sometimes connected to an arthame that appears in a medieval grimoire, Key of Solomon, a garbled version of Medieval Latin artavus, quill knife (that is, used to sharpen pens), of unknown origin.

---L.