This Week in Magick 3/9 - 3/15

The moon wanes dark. Last Quarter in Sagittarius hits Wednesday (March 11, 5:39 AM EDT), then descends into Waning Crescent. But this isn't quiet shadow work time. This week is packed. Hellenic Mysteries. Egyptian fertility rites. Roman expulsion magic. Hindu purification. And on March 15th, everything converges: the Ides, Anna Perenna's festival, Cybele and Attis rising, and two Hindu observances. This is the week the old year gets beaten out and the new one breaks through.

MARCH 9: MIN RISES, GNOSTICS COUNT

In Kemetic reconstruction circles, March 9th marks the Procession of Min, god of fertility, sexuality, and agricultural quickening. Min is depicted with an erect phallus, lettuce (sacred aphrodisiac to the Egyptians), and raised arm holding a flail. His procession celebrates the potency returning to the land, the sexual energy of spring, the rising sap.

Modern reconstructionists carry Min's statue through fields or gardens, make offerings of lettuce and grain, and perform fertility rites.

Meanwhile, Gnostic communities mark the Twelfth Sunday of Winter, continuing the count toward the equinox and eventual Pascha. The number twelve carries weight: twelve aeons, twelve disciples, the completion before transformation.

MARCH 10-16: THE LESSER MYSTERIES BEGIN

The Hellenic Lesser Mysteries start March 10th and run through mid-month. In ancient Athens, these were preliminary initiations at Agrae (a suburb) before the Greater Mysteries at Eleusis in autumn. The Lesser Mysteries prepared initiates for the deeper work ahead. Purification. Instruction. Ritual bathing in the Ilissos River. Sacrifice to Persephone, who has just returned from the underworld (it's spring).

The Mysteries dealt with death and rebirth, the grain cycle, Demeter's grief and Persephone's return. This week the waning crescent moon moves through Sagittarius, the archer aiming toward the galactic center, the quest beyond death. The timing aligns: descent into darkness (waning moon), preparation for transformation (Lesser Mysteries), movement toward renewal (spring).

Modern practitioners observe by ritual bathing, meditating on Persephone's themes (descent, sovereignty in darkness, return), making offerings to Demeter (barley, honey, wine), and preparing for deeper Mystery work at the autumn equinox.

MARCH 11: LAST QUARTER MOON, BANISHING POWER

Last Quarter Moon occurs at 5:39 AM EDT on March 11, squaring the Pisces Sun. Moon in Sagittarius creates the greatest need to search for something, to have a goal or philosophy that gives life meaning. But in Last Quarter phase, question everything.

What beliefs no longer serve? What dogma needs release?

This is peak waning moon power for banishing, uncrossing, and releasing work.

The moon is exactly half-dark. The tide pulls away. Use it.

MARCH 13: DIASIA AND THE UNDERWORLD ZEUS

Hellenion's 2026 calendar adds the Diasia on March 13th, still within the Lesser Mysteries period. Diasia honors Zeus Meilichios ("Zeus the Kindly"), an underworld aspect of Zeus depicted as a snake. This isn't the sky-father Zeus of thunder. This is chthonic Zeus, the Zeus of the earth's depths, the Zeus who receives sacrifices to appease angry spirits and avert curses.

Ancient sources describe whole sheep being burned (holocaust offerings, nothing kept for human consumption), wine poured into the earth, placating the underworld powers. The Diasia had an expiatory, purifying function. Getting right with the gods below before spring fully blooms.

MARCH 14: MAMURALIA AND HEPHAISTOS

March 14th brings the Mamuralia, a Roman rite of expulsion. A figure representing Mamurius Veturius (the "Old Mars" or the old year incarnate) was ritually beaten and driven from the city. Sources describe someone dressed in skins being struck with long white rods and expelled beyond the city boundary. Symbolic scapegoating: all the accumulated staleness, bad luck, and pollution of the dying year beaten out and sent away.

This is threshold magic. Boundary work. The old must be expelled before the new can enter. March was the original Roman new year (hence September/October/November/December being the 7th/8th/9th/10th months). Mamuralia clears the way.

Meanwhile, Hellenion marks March 14th as the monthly libation to Hephaistos, god of forge, fire, craft, and transformation. Pour wine or oil. Light a flame. Honor the smith who shapes raw material into something new.

MARCH 15: THE DENSEST DAY

March 15th is when everything hits. Five major observances converge:

1. The Ides of March (Roman)

The term Ides derives from Latin iduare (to divide), with the full moon serving as the division point in the middle of each month. Romans honored Jupiter on the Ides by holding feasts and sacrifices. The Flamen Dialis, Jupiter's high priest, led the Ides sheep in procession along the Via Sacra for sacrifice.

The Ides of March marked the traditional day for settling debts. Then came 44 BCE. Julius Caesar was assassinated by approximately 60 conspirators led by Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. A haruspex named Spurinna warned Caesar, who joked "Well, the Ides of March are come," to which Spurinna replied, "Aye, they are come, but they are not gone."

Lucius Tillius Cimber grabbed Caesar's toga. Publius Servilius Casca struck the first blow. Stab wounds numbered 23-35. "Et tu, Brute?" The knife from inside the circle.

2. Anna Perenna (Roman)

Anna Perenna's festival also falls on March 15th. She's the goddess of the year's turning, the circle of time, renewal and endurance. Her name means "enduring year".

Romans celebrated with picnics in her sacred grove, drinking as many cups of wine as years they wished to live, singing bawdy songs, and sexual license.

Anna Perenna represents cyclical time versus Caesar's linear ambition. She's the wheel that keeps turning. The year that renews regardless of who dies. While Caesar fell, Anna's festival continued. Time outlasts tyrants.

3. Cybele and Attis Festival Opens (Roman/Phrygian)

March 15th marks the beginning of the Cybele-Attis spring festival cycle (running through March 27th). Day one: the finding of Attis, the Great Mother's beloved who will die and be reborn. Cybele, the Magna Mater (Great Mother), was a Phrygian goddess imported to Rome in 204 BCE. Her mysteries involved ecstatic worship, self-castration of priests (the Galli), wild drumming and dancing, and the death and resurrection of Attis.

The full cycle includes: Arbor Intrat (March 22, bringing in the sacred pine), Dies Sanguinis (March 24, the Day of Blood with self-flagellation and mourning), and Hilaria (March 25, the joyful celebration of Attis's resurrection). But it begins on March 15th with the Canna Intrat (Reed Enters), when reed-bearers process to commemorate Cybele finding the infant Attis in the reeds by a river.

4. Papamochani Ekadashi (Hindu)

Papamochani Ekadashi falls on March 15, 2026. Ekadashi is the eleventh lunar day, observed twice monthly (waxing and waning). This particular Ekadashi is considered especially purifying. "Papamochani" means "destroyer of sins." Observants fast, meditate, chant Vishnu mantras, and seek liberation from karmic burdens. The fast breaks the next morning after sunrise.

5. Meena Sankranti (Hindu)

Also on March 15, 2026: Meena Sankranti, marking the Sun's ingress into Pisces in the sidereal zodiac. Sankranti days are threshold moments when the Sun changes signs, considered powerful for spiritual practice, charity, and ritual bathing. Meena (Pisces) Sankranti specifically relates to water, compassion, dissolution of boundaries, and spiritual seeking. Offerings to ancestors, donations to the poor, and bathing in sacred rivers are traditional observances.

CONVERGENCE INTERPRETATION

March 15, 2026 brings together:

• Jupiter's sovereignty (Ides)

• Caesar's fall (political collapse)

• Anna Perenna's renewal (cyclical time)

• Cybele-Attis resurrection cycle beginning (death and rebirth)

• Papamochani purification (sin-destroying)

• Meena Sankranti threshold (Sun entering Pisces)

The themes align: power structures collapsing, time renewing, old forms dying, purification, thresholds, the dissolution necessary before resurrection. This is liminality at maximum intensity.

WORK WITH IT

For the Procession of Min (March 9): Honor returning fertility. Lettuce offerings (sacred to Min). Walk your land or garden. Speak aloud what you want to quicken and rise. If you work sex magic, this is the day.

For the Lesser Mysteries (March 10-16): Ritual bathing for purification. Meditate on Persephone's return from underworld. What did you learn in your own darkness? What sovereignty did you claim? Offerings to Demeter: barley, honey, wine poured on earth.

For Last Quarter Moon (March 11): Peak banishing time. Salt bath with hyssop and rue. Crossroads offerings: whiskey, coins, cigars, red cloth. Call on Legba, Eshu, Hekate to remove obstacles and open roads.

For Diasia (March 13): Appease the underworld powers. Pour wine into earth. Light a black candle. Address Zeus Meilichios (or your tradition's chthonic deity) and ask forgiveness for offenses, known and unknown. Request protection from curses.

For Mamuralia (March 14): Expulsion work. Write everything you're releasing from the old year on paper. Beat it (literally, with a stick or your hands) while speaking what you're driving out. Burn it. Carry the ashes to a boundary (property line, crossroads, river) and scatter them away from you.

For Hephaistos (March 14): Pour wine or oil into fire. Honor transformation through craft. What are you forging? What raw material becomes art?

For the Ides/Anna Perenna/Cybele-Attis/Papamochani/Meena Sankranti (March 15): This day needs multiple workings.

• Morning: Fast if following Papamochani Ekadashi. Bathe ritually for Meena Sankranti. Face east, meditate on thresholds and dissolution.

• Midday: Honor Jupiter with white candles and frankincense. Settle debts (literal and symbolic). Watch your back (the Ides).

• Afternoon: Picnic for Anna Perenna. Drink wine outdoors. Toast to as many years as you wish to live. Sing. Be bawdy if moved.

• Evening: Begin Cybele-Attis observances. Offerings to the Great Mother: pomegranates, pine, wine, drumming. Acknowledge what must die to be reborn.

• Night: Break Ekadashi fast after sunset. Offerings to ancestors. Charity to those in need.

TOOLS FOR THE JOURNEY

Lettuce and grain for Min / Barley and honey for Demeter / Black candles for waning moon and Diasia / Salt, hyssup, rue for uncrossing / Crossroads offerings (whiskey, coins, cigars, red cloth) / Wine for libations / White candles and frankincense for Jupiter / Drums for Cybele / Pomegranates and pine for Cybele-Attis / Fasting supplies for Ekadashi / Water for ritual bathing

What old year are you beating out? What resurrection begins when power falls?

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