The Beech Tree In Magic

History, Learning, Writing, Chronicling, Genealogy, Wisdom of the Ancestors,
The Family Tree, Time and its passing,  Planet: Mercury, Saturn
Element: Air, Earth. Beech is the feminine consort to the masculine Oak.

Fagus sylvatica or any of the 11 other species of beech are easily
distinguished. The tree canopy casts dense shade, and carpets the ground
with a dense litter of golden-brown leaves while their massive trunks are
clothed in a smooth silver-grey bark.

Throughout the beech forests of England there are trees hundreds of years
old that are marked with the initials of lovers long passed. It was known
that, when a couple was in love they could carve their initials into a beech
tree and enclose them with a heart and in so doing, they made known to the
Gods that they wished to stay in love forever and to be blessed in marriage.
These are living examples of beech trees being used for magic and for recording
family lines.

The wood of the beech has a fine, short grain that splits easily and evenly
providing an excellent surface for risting and carving. Beech trees are the
favored trees for wood upon which the Runes are carved. To make yourself a
talisman of beech you can create your own Runetine by fashioning a small slip
of beech wood (about 1" wide by 4" long with the grain going lengthwise) and
upon it carve a wish dear to your heart. Carve against the grain. I suggest
you use The Runes as they are more powerful than an alphabet, they are first
and foremost magical symbols. When your desire is risted (carved) you will
redden them with a red paint or ochre. Advanced Rune Magicians use their own
blood to give the Runes life from their very veins. Then the tine is breathed
into life by blowing on it three times. Carry this with you until your desire
is manifested and then, burn or bury it with your thanks.

Beech is a good wood for recording and recovering the wisdom of the ages, and
beech wood or leaves should be burned as an offering if you are a scholar or a
clairvoyant chronicler who receives messages from the Gods about the past or from
Spirits of those long dead. Genealogies can be compiled upon paper made of beech
pulp so as to keep for posterity the order of the family line.

The word book has come down to us from the word for beech. "The Old English bōc
and Old Norse bók both have the primary sense of “beech” but also a secondary
sense of “book”, and it is from bōc that the modern word derives. In modern German,
the word for “book” is Buch, with Buche meaning “beech tree”. In Swedish, these
words are the same, bok meaning both “beech tree” and “book”." Wikipedia.

It makes an excellent pulp for magical paper. The tri-lobal beech nuts yield
an oil that is used in lamps for magical rites. And beech groves are wonderful
places to hold rites to the Ancestors.