Familiars

There are two great different myths concerning the "Familiar" or "Family" spirits. Some legends regard it as a little evil but powerful creature, others believe it's just like a genius obeying his master, but everyone agree in that the Familiars are beings that act as their master wants them to act, for wither good or selfish purposes.
In ancient Rome and Greece, the Familiars were spirits of the Hearth sometimes related with the goddess Hestia. Every home had to count with a special altar in which libations and offerings should be placed in order to preserve the health, happiness and safety of the home. If there was anything wished, any request could be addressed to the spirit of the house wither on the form of a prayer or by carrying some specific charms. The lares and penates of the house could be lower spirits or the souls of the ancestors not having found rest and wanting to help their family.
Germanic civilizations had also familiars of this type, but with the form of goblins giving prosperity to those taking them into account and honouring them with a great variety of attentions, but, as the general Germanic goblins and those of Italy after the fall of Rome, they were quite capricious and could be quite destructive if the family didn't behave as it supposed it should or if any mortal dared to bother it in any way... Leaving no live coals or the trash in the house at night, not collecting all the old ashes from the fire before nightfall or simply invading the familiar's zone could have consequences that varied from death to a drastic change in the fortune.
Later in history, around Middle Ages, the two main branches of nowadays familiars appeared, with the enlightened Catholicism of a Powerful Church and the fear of all that was strange or couldn't be explained. The devil was behind all the reproving acts of mankind, and everyone was to be careful: the demons had spread in the world and their evil was not that of bothering or torturing the mortals, but of pleasing them for a brief period of time to then torture them beyond the frontiers of Death. After the Black Death, the will of mankind was weak and, not finding suitable explanations for the illness in the Bible, and being impossible to take it as a divine punishment, they started seeking someone to blame for their miseries.
Pagans, Jewish, Gypsies were chased and murdered, as it also were the witches.
As pagans with dealings with things common people did not understood, they were feared and chased. A witch, for those living in those times, could tempt and confuse the best Christian with the use of herbs of common appearance but that had dark unsuspected powers. The person, then, fell in love, was killed or bewitched without even knowing it and breaking the equilibrium of free will. But witches were simple humans, so how could they have powers. God couldn't have given special gifts to them, since they used it in occasions were they have been taught to pray and call a priest. So the only way in witch those happenings and beliefs could be explained was with an alliance with Lucifer and with the use of helpers. And this helpers were supposed to be the familiars.
The familiar could have the shape of a black cat, an owl, a frog, or any small creature with a fearful presence (a raven, for example). They helped the witches in their tasks and as spies. They informed them on the habits and doings of their victims and could even protect them in some cases.
Of how the ancient witches regarded these spirits there's not able to be told, since there aren't many documents on the subject. Of the thousands of women and men tortured, burnt and imprisoned, only a few percent had any idea of what was witchcraft and only a few really believed in familiars and praised them, but the happenings of the epoch silenced many "Pagans".
That's how we reach the XIX without many clues of the familiars but what the revival of spiritualism unburied, most of what had been invented or made up for profits of various kinds. The general matter was finally settled as familiars being, yes, helpers used by the witches to increase their knowledge on certain aspects. They were colourful balls of energy with a shape given by the witch depending on the task it was to perform. There was not devil in the process, no license of use extended by the Prince of the Darkness to harm and have an ethereal slave, as it had been believed, but a way of giving shape to energy. Finally, when the subject was ended, the energy was again released to the cosmos and the familiar ceased to be.
This one is one of the most widely believed theories, but there's another one, even more famous than the previous one, that prays that the Devil, the master of masters, holds gatherings in the holes formed by the mountains, deep caves where the legend says there are valuable lessons taught- tehy may be called "Salamancas" as one of the most famous universities of Europe- and music, and where many landowners go to acquire familiars.
To these men the spirits are quite useful since they will never have but good luck to their owner if a fresh victim is offered to them every year. How's this? Well, in exchange of the wealth and promising fortune, the familiar has the right to devour at least a working man from the owner's lands. A certain night of the year, the owner sent one of the lowest employees of the lands to a place far from the others with any pretext and the victim was supposed to disappear.
The familiars here take the shape of a big hound, a deadly snake, a frog, a puma, a lamb and people living in isolated rural regions even say they've seen the familiar take the shape of a beautiful woman. In some lands with rich soils, the familiars were thought to be counted by hundreds and any strange spider was looked at with respect and horror. Being as it was believed to be a demon or a servant of the devil, people finding one of them on their way home could protect themselves with amulets, a special knife or even a cross.
In some American countries, the familiars were even believed to be made specially by witches and sold; and animal sacrifices could be held in the name of the familiars of the Earth so that they would take care of the crops. This last version resembles those of the goblins, that may resemble but were always regarded as different beings from the familiars.

Links: Lares and Penates: http://www.pantheon.org/articles/l/lares.html Familiars and Spirits: http://www.crosswinds.net/~cerrikai/kaibits/path/magipages/m6.html Seek "Thoughtform". A pagan point of view. Main Page: The Sword and the Chalice http://www.crosswinds.net/~cerrikai/index.html
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