Spiders

Spiders have often been linked with death, who build their webs in things long abandoned. The word arachnid comes from the classic myth of Athene’s jealousy of the maiden Arachne, which caused her to turn Arachne into a spider who continued to practice her incomparable skill in spinning and weaving. The spider was a totemic form of the Greek Fate Clotho, She Who Spins the Thread of Life.

Later in England during the middle ages, spiders came to be regarded as the Familiars of witches. During the witch hunts of 1645 in the county of Suffolk, at one trial Mirabel Bedford admitted to possessing a Familar Imp in the form of a spider called Joan. In another case, the accused “witch” almost swayed the court in favour of his innocence when the prosecutor noticed a spider crawling close to the prisoner’s lips and cried out “See who prompts him!”. The poor man was sentenced to death.

In Italian and Romanian folklore, witches were thought to take the form of spiders to steal young females away for sacrifice at Havest Time; in Anglo-Saxon folklore these were known as Goblin Spiders.

In nature, it is usually the female spider who cleverly weaves her beautiful web, which she uses to catch her prey; some females even devour their mate after coupling.