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Silverthorn Press

Queen Mab

Queen Mab, beautiful queen of the fairies. Mab, whose wisdom and splendor are beyond compare. She is goddess; she is Mother Nature; she is defender of the weak; mother to all fairy creatures and muse to all creative beings. Mab, a name both revered and feared in the Nether.

She is a spirit who has been depicted in classic art works and has been immortalized in literature from around the world. Shakespeare said of her “Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut” and “is no bigger than an agate stone”. She was also depicted in the movie Merlin as an evil sorceress who was King Arthur’s nemesis and was responsible, single handedly, for the creation of Merlin the magician. Many have disagreed with this depiction because Mab was never mentioned in the histories of King Arthur.

I will put this thought forward: Think for a moment about the legend of King Arthur. The leading theory, made popular by the movie Arthur, is that Arthur was a Roman general who won the respect of the tribes of Britannia by keeping the Saxons away. As reality turned into legend, stories of this mythical hero interwove with the folklore of the British Isles. Mab would have inevitably been included. In fact, Morgan Le Faye, Arthur’s half sister who was a student of Merlin’s was said to have called upon Queen Mab to give her powers over the King. And so, with magic, Morgan Le Faye seduces her own brother Arthur. A child is conceived, Mordred, who later is responsible for the death of the King. Could it have been Mab who helped Morgan Le Faye? And if it was, what payment did she ask in return?

Queen Mab is not a tiny flower fairy who rides her hazel-nut chariot. No, this queen is a fierce warrior, beautiful, statuesque, powerful, and someone to be feared. Goddess, witch, demon, fairy, call her what you will because she is many things to all who seek her. Mab is benevolent and she is wicked; she loves and she hates; and when she loves she suffocates; she creates and she destroys. She is the equilibrium of all the elements in the Nether, hot and cold, dark and light. Her duplicity is her balance.

Who would dare summon this powerful fairy? Sorcerers, witches, kings and queens, and ordinary men who crave power and glory; all who would desire supremacy; all who would give all they have even if all they have is their life. Oh but the price, the terrible price they must pay. Queen Mab will raise them to the summits of success only to bring them to their knees and remind them who the one true Queen is. She is the devastator, the mother, the concubine, and the conqueror. She is morally ambiguous and at times acts like a jealous child.

But why is she so fickle? Queen Mab knows the intoxicating draw of power. She knows mortals will eventually become inebriated with her drink and will turn away from her, foolishly believing they could exist without the divine. In fact, her name is also known as Maeve, which means intoxicating. Her seekers believe their wisdom comes from their own psyche instead of the goddess they vowed to worship. They are now omnipotent in their own eyes. And at this moment of imagined omniscience, Mab strikes the fatal blow with her hammer of righteousness.

One of the most famous seekers in history of Mab’s grace was Queen Boudica. But Boudica knew Mab as the goddess Andraste. Andraste is a powerful goddess invoked by warriors for courage, luck, safety, and victory in battle. According to Judika Illes, in her book Encyclopedia of Spirits (Harper One, 2009), the name Andraste means invincible, unconquerable, or victory. The Roman historian Cassius Dio, mentions Boudica’s calls on Andraste only once in his histories of the Roman Empire. He tells us that Boudica would perform rituals in her royal tents to invoke the goddess. He also tells us part of the ritual was to release a hare, which was significant, because the hare was a symbol of fertility as well as a bad omen. Maeve, or Mab, was a goddess invoked for fertility in ancient times.

The goddess came to answer Boudica’s call for vengeance against the Romans. They were destroying the land and they had stolen Boudica’s right as Queen. They not only refused to recognize her as queen, but they plundered and burned her villages. Boudica was captured, flogged, and raped, as well as her two daughters. The British recognized the ability and right of women to rule, not only beside their men, but also by their own right. Queen Mab would have defended that concept with a fierceness that would make any man cower.

Boudica led her troops to victory after victory. It is said she was often seen before a battle riding up and down the line shouting ferocious encouragement to her men. But here is the rumor that circulates in the Nether: Boudica, during her rituals to the goddess, is said to have allowed herself to be possessed by the spirit of the one she worshiped, and it is she, the goddess, who fought on the battlefield.

Boudica, of course, met her end in humiliating defeat. She was not outnumbered by the Romans, but instead was out maneuvered. It is said the goddess stopped answering Boudica’s call because Boudica had become a wild woman. She grew progressively worse as her victories grew. The cruelty reached its apex when she attacked London. What happened in London was a massacre of women and children. There was no mercy shown by Queen Boudica, bind with rage and intent on revenge. It is written by historians that Boudica sacrificed the women in the name of Andraste; cutting off their breasts and stuffing them in their mouths, and then had them vertically impaled on great skewers.

Now, we must understand that although Andraste or Mab, whichever you choose to call her, had moments of cruelty and may even be considered to have a mean streak running through her, she would never have allowed a massacre, like the one in London, to be done in her name. To have a woman exact that kind of brutality on other women was unacceptable to the goddess. Within a few short months after the massacre at London, Boudica’s troops were defeated. There is no exact account of how she died, but we can surmise from the writings we have, that Queen Boudica committed suicide in her royal tents, before the altar of her goddess. This was her final sacrifice to Andraste. And it seems Andraste accepted.

It is believed Boudica was delving into darker practices in her worship of her goddess. Another rumor that circulates the halls of the Nether is that Boudica left behind a Grimoire which included magical rights and even her personal understandings of the goddess. No one knows for sure because up to this date, nothing has been found. And why Mab chose the form of Andraste, I can’t say for sure. But you have to understand that Mab is a goddess and she loves to be worshipped. It doesn’t matter to her that her worshippers call her by different names.

by Corbin Silverthorn