After the ice age, forests slowly covered much of Europe. This took millennia, but eventually Britain and much of Europe was covered in forest, probably much of it closed canopied and dense. This would have made overland travel difficult and dangerous, and is one reason for concentrated coastal settlements in early Europe. People positioned themselves for the best of both worlds - abundant fishing and abundant firewood and game. They also lived near the best source of travel and trading - the sea. It was only when they made the gradual shift from hunter-gatherers to herders that their relationship to the forest changed.

This changed the forest, too, gradually widening the open areas into pastures, and gradually taking more wood products out as lifestyles changed and populations increased. This new way of living was carried further and further inland. As natural clearings were enlarged for settlements, and growing crops became more important, people began to have a new relationship with the forest. Paths through it connected hamlets and villages and people had more business in the woods. It still remained a place of mystery and possible danger, yet slowly became a place much loved and depended upon, as well.

As Europe moved into the middle ages, the age of kings, things changed again. Laws of the forest were enacted from Russia to England which decreed that the chief products of the forest - wood and game - were the property of the kings. This, too, was a gradual process arising from feudalism, which reached its height in Britain and France under the Norman kings. Yet, unfair as it was to the native peoples of the land, it slowed the clearing process.

Out of these various times, different heroes, monsters and lore of the woods developed, and while moorland and coastline can also be wild and mysterious places, the forest retained a hold on the imagination in a unique way. That might be partly because so much remains hidden from view there, but I suspect a kind of ancestral or collective memory also plays a part. Even though our earliest European ancestors may have been loathe to venture into the woods without good reason, we ultimately look back to a time when the all encompassing forest was the norm. As each era sees more felling and clearing, each generation looks back, often with longing, to a time of more trees, of deeper woods. In this way, the forest becomes our past, holding our ancestors under its canopy, decaying and being reabsorbed under its leaf litter and moss.

Trees are a kind of sister race to mankind. We live amongst them, journeying through our lives side by side, yet at such a differing pace. So many of the trees we meet were old when we were born, will live on after we die. We are relative mayflies and gadflies - with our short lives and great mobility, compared to the static, stable and stoic trees. Yet the spirit of the woods is more than the sum of its parts. There is a peace there. It contains the sum of abundant life and abundant passing and decay in an endless circle. A microcosm of our lives, our spiritual yearnings, our fears, our connection to nature and to the past.

I know that many of you are filled with these longings, and the desire for these connections. Go to the woods if you can. Go deep enough that you don't see out into that other normal and mundane world. Sit. Listen. Meditate. Dream. Walk.

Further reading:
British ancient forests were patchy by Sara Coelho - results of a scientific survey, which gives an easy-to-read overview of the long history of British woodland.
Into the Woods: On British Forests, Myth and Now by Ruth Padel - a really wonderful read, looking at the many roles played by woodland and nature in the British psyche, and beyond. Highly recommended!

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You don't have to be Pagan, Wiccan, or any other kind of religious to do this. It isn't about calling up the dead or anything spooky, really! Perhaps you'd like to take a walk somewhere nice near your home. If you'd rather not, indoors is fine, too.

Try to give a little thought to the following three things -
Ancestors of place - those who lived before you in this area. This could go right back to antiquity, and equally could include previous generations who lived in your house or village, etc.

Ancestors of kin - That would include your blood relations but might also include those who go back in your family history via ties of marriage, adoption, fostering and very close friendships.

Ancestors of your heritage or culture - this could be ethnic, cultural, religious... Those with whom you perhaps still align yourself, or to whom you owe a debt in this area of life.

If you like, you might light a candle of remembrance, or set an extra place at the table (or not) - just whatever feels right and easy. Think about your gratitude to these groups of people, think of sending them loving and appreciative thoughts down the years, and know that they send you the same. And if you don't believe in life after death - the gratitude will still do you good!

Monday night being the Hunter's Moon, I had plans to spend some time outdoors enjoying nature, honouring my ancestors and communing with any spirits who came my way. However, in a quiet moment on Monday afternoon, while I was thinking about my plans, some very strong impressions came to me. They unfolded almost like a story in my mind, as if someone was telling me this. I found it quite odd, and to be honest, wondered whether my writer's imagination was filling in the details a little, although I did my best to avoid that.

This is the story -

I was hardly more than a boy. I was walking up the hill from the river. The moon was as it is now and the sun had set in silver and coral. As I walked, the grass tops, before my eyes on the horizon, were like many small crescent moons. Deer had been seen. My older sister was to be married and I wanted a soft skin for her. She had always been kind to me.

The land was not as it is in your time. The land was whole and beautiful, like the skin of a fine animal, shaggy with autumn grass. Now it is a confusion of trees and the false rivers and streams that white men make. They sicken the land with water and salt and big machines. I know you do not like this. I think you can see a little into the old time.

I could find no deer. Not even a rabbit or badger moved about. I never saw the bear before she ended my life. I travelled to the world of spirits and it was a good world. I asked to be an eagle, and I think they laughed quietly at me. I became a sandhill crane, and lived a good life until I was old and sick, when I froze to death. After that I lived many lives and saw many wonderful lands. I have not walked the earth in a breathing body for a long time. There is other work to do. But you reached out to me, so near to the place where I was looking for deer.