Ellen Dugan - The Enchanted Cat: Feline Fascinations, Spells and Magick

About the Autho r

Ellen Dugan, also known as the Garden Witch, is a psychic-clairvoyant who lives in Missouri with her husband and three children. A practicing Witch for over twenty years, Ellen also has many years of nursery and garden center experience, including landscape and garden design. She received her Master Gardener status through the University of Missouri and her local county extension office. Look for other articles by Ellen in Llewellyns annual Magical Almanac , Witches Calendar , Witches Datebook , and Witches Spell-A-Day Almanac . Visit her website at: www.ellendugan.com

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

The Enchanted Cat: Feline Fascinations, Spells & Magick 2006 by Ellen Dugan.

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First e-book edition 2012

E-book ISBN: 9780738717616

Book design and editing by Rebecca Zins

Cover design by Kevin R. Brown

Cover illustration 2005 Rick Lovell

Interior illustrations 2005 Kerigwen

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

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Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

For my daughter,
Erin Kathleen,
with love.

And for the enchanted cats that have
added humor and magick to my life,
in both the past and the present:
Skippy, Samantha, and Jasmine.

acknowledgments

As usual, a few words of appreciation need to be said here. A special thank-you to my circle mates and friends who have helped me brainstorm on this book. They offered suggestions for reference materials and happily loaned out books from their own magickal librariesand who, most importantly, were excited and enthusiastic when they found out what new book project I was conjuring up.

Also, a special thank-you to the cat-loving ladies at Llewellyn: Natalie Harter, Andrea Neff, Nancy Mostad, and of course to my editor Becky Zins, who shared great stories of her new son and her three enchanting cats. Thanks also to Kerigwen, for the beautiful illustrations.

To my husband Ken with love, and to our children Kraig, Kyle, and Erin, who are now all young adults, off to college and following their dreams. We are so very proud of the three of you. Remember what Ive always taught you: if you believe in yourself and are willing to work hard, then nothing is impossible.

Contents

The Wisdom of Cats

Cat Deities and the Feminine Mystique

Elemental Feline Folklore and Divination

Cat Magick, Candle Spells, and Astrology

Feline Power Animals

The Feline Familiar

Charms and Spells for Your Cat

introduction

The
Wisdom
of Cats

The idea for this little cat book leapt onto my desk one day and simply would not budge. Surprised and slightly annoyed, I treated it the same way I would as if one of my own cats had jumped in the center of my writing desk: I firmly but gently picked up the idea and set it aside. Then, taking a deep breath, I told myself to focus and get back to the project at hand.

Being a Virgo, Im usually good at organizing things, making lists, and sticking to my plans. After all, my next book project was outlined and there were a few chapters finished. I had even gone so far as to send in the outline to my editor to see if she liked it. The deadline for several annual articles was coming up soon, so I had plenty to keep me occupied. I should just ignore this feline nudge and get busy on my other writing projects. Pleased with my own plan, I worked diligently on my various articles and then found myself inspired to include spells featuring cats. How curious.

Thinking that this would ease the itch, so to speak, I sat down, said a little prayer to the Goddess, and asked her to help me focus. I cleaned off my desk, sent in the articles, and prepared to get back to business.

Then an interesting thing happened. While I was putting my office to rights, my sixteen-year-old daughter walked into the room and asked to read one of the articles I had written. I handed it to her and, while she read, made out a list of reference books that I wanted to track down at the local library. She gave back the article and told me that she especially liked the ritual that featured working with your pet cat.

Mom? she asked me.

Hmmm? I answered, distracted as I made my list.

I wish you would write a book about cats and magick.

I set down my pen and goggled at her. Actually, I was sort of thinking about it... I admitted, with a surprised laugh. Then I reminded her about my current book project, to which her response was classic teenage girl. She rolled her eyes and sighed at me loudly. (Nobody does a roll-their-eyes-and-sigh-disgustedly better than a teenager.)

Yes, it would be a lot of fun to write, I agreed with her. Sensing my weakness, she started an impassioned speech. I sat and listened to her, only to be interrupted by my tabby cat, who decided she wanted attention by jumping on the desk and then sitting right in the middle of my notebook. I nudged her aside, picked up my ink pen, and laughingly ordered both cat and daughter out of my office.

Neither of them budged. I looked at my daughter, who was standing there with arms crossed and one eyebrow raised. Its a fairly impressive poseshe learned it from me, after all.

Ill think about it, I promised my daughter, and then I gave the cat a nudge and told her to get off the desk. I picked up the pen to finish my list of reference books, which only seemed to encourage the cat to playfully try and bite at the end of the ink pen. Samantha, cut it out, I grumbled and then ordered the cat firmly off the desk.