The King in Winter

Protector against the dark

a mature man sits on a throne with carved horses in front of a dark background, lit by candlelight. He wears scarlet and brown fur. He looks worried. He holds a rod of office, and on the table in front of him is a candle and an empty plate
by haptalaon

Overview

Elements:

Land. Lunar-Solar; or Solar (Lunar aspect). Mortal. Dry.

Spirits

Characteristics

Prudence. Restraint. Plenty in the midst of want. Courage when there is no hope. Resolute. Endurance. Thanksgiving, Harvest, hardship. Survival. Acceptance.

Image

An older man with a red beard and a serious expression sits stiffly on a wooden throne, in a hall filled with retainers. They are feasting and making merry, but there is a tension in the hands of the king as he holds his sceptre firmly. He is cloaked with furs and the fire is blazing, but the winter storm outside the window is black.

Sun King Cycle

The Sun King goes beneath the earth at Lammas. The period which follows is known as The Land Without A King, where we celebrate fairy-feasts and witch sabbats and the mystery-night of the goddesses. The Sun King of the Green returns around Easter-tide.

After the death of the Sun King, the Winter King claims his kingdom. The King-under-the-Holly can be understood as the King-under-the-Oak’s brother, but also as an “older” face of the same spirit – the mature King, shaped by experience . He is a philosopher king – his watchwords are prudence, care, determination, and an iron-will. The Sun King is lord over boundaries and of his people, and this is especially true of the Winter: he has drawn his people inside the walls, where the wolves of winter howl from outside.

We can understand the Winter King as the Sun King’s lunar aspect (internal rather than external; focused on the mind over the body; fairy-like and wizard-like qualities). What’s important about our Winter King, as opposed to Graves, is that we don’t see the two Kings fight (the mortal Kings are laid low not by other mortals, but by the infinite and the dark). Each King rises and falls in his own half-year-cycle, and those two cycles echo one another.

a landscape in muted brown and red tones. A hart looks over a barren landscape with a dead tree at a foggy sunset.
Antoine-Louis Barye (1796-1875)

The Winter King’s Cycle

This is not yet complete.

The Winter King is initially autumnal – he himself is garbed in browns and reds, rather than whites and blacks. For this reason, we know he continues to have land elements. He rides in at around Mabon, accompanied by his daughter (?) who is syncretised to Snow White at this stage of the year.

The Winter King may or may not be the Sun King’s brother, but he is certainly his echo. He presides over the harvest of fruit and nuts, and the meat-harvest of Halloween. He is king in the midst of want – so salting meats and creating preserves are especially ruled by him. Unlike the King of Summer, he knows that plenty will not last. He is survival: he holds his people within the walls through diplomacy and strength of will. He knows some will not live out the winter, but is ready for the long, patient endurance. He is the king under siege.

Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men.

As autumn turns to winter, survival becomes harder. At the beginning of his narrative, the Winter King is surrounded by a retinue of loyal retainers – towards the end, however, he isolates himself, becoming more paranoid, more private, relying on more cunning and cleverness in his court-games. In other words, he moves towards the Lunar end of his spectrum. Like the Sun King, the Winter King makes a truce with with a powerful fairy-witch of winter – another increase of the Lunar. These are represented on the earth by the coming of the snows. He is ferocious – he has to be; ruthless, at times; and embodies a deep courage created by need.

The Winter King is not killed: instead, he is slowly drained, becoming more frail and foolish. The witch of winter is greedy: she demands from him his knowledge, his power, the supplies of the harvest. The winter witch’s cycle is between Christmas and Candlemas: the long, depressing January blues. We see this narrative in the story of Morgana/Merlin, in the story of Snow White’s father and the wicked queen, in the story of the Fisher King, the story of Theoden/Grima. We might see the Winter King fading and becoming frail, being literally trapped in a tree or barrow, or becoming isolated in his tower, alone with his books. Candlemas can be celebrated as a “healing waters which rejuvenate the king” festival, permitting the Winter King to at last pass away, as the land itself is healed (as water relates also to death)

The Winter King, naturally enough, is a spirit of the autumn and wintertide - but he can, of course, appear at any time the king is failing. Famines at any time of year, war, or social horrors of any kind. His interplay with the Winter Witch is an anthropomorphism of the Solar and Lunar-Stellar relationship - that is, the cosy happy world within man's control, and the terror of being mastered by things outside of it. Pandemic times are Winter King times.

I love the Winter King very deeply; being on society's margins means his strength in survival never stops being needed. My yearly pattern does not include much work with the Sun King - I'm happy he's there - but his absence is felt bitterly. Where the Sun King is the 'perfect man' or 'perfect king', the Winter King is failing and unequal to the times - but fighting anyway. In our own lives, we aspire to be one, but will more often be the other. The Winter King is braver, because the challenge is going to devour him.

Aspects

Here are the aspects of the Winter King:

Solar

The King of the harvest, defender of his people, lord of the golden hall, surrounded by a retinue of grim retainers. Present from around Harvest. This figure is still distinct from the Sun King; a mature man who is somewhat more grim and thoughtful than his joyful summer counterpart, for whom plenty is effortless.

Lunar

The Philosopher King, wise and careful, reliant on his books, astrology, his diplomacy and wits. He may be represented by a wizard or hermit at this stage, or an old king. The crossover point is imprecice, but think about when it stops feeling autumnal and begins to be wintery. As a more Lunar spirit, the Winter King is always concerned with retreat to the self and the interior - for example, thinking a lot (or too much), and engaging in individual pursuits (thinking, writing, reading, reflecting) which then shapes his kingship.

Stellar

The King’s dotage – he is either trapped, frail, or gone deep into his own mind and magic. Regardless, in this period between Yule and Candlemas the King is truly absent. The Winter King is not Stellar, so this represents his inversion or negation - the horrors of winter night, of becoming trapped in powerlessness.

Landscape

When we imagine the Winter King, it is the contrast between the warmth of his hall and the bitterness of the weather outside. It represents the Solar as hearth and home, and the Lunar of the storms and snow. For this reason, the Winter King’s hall exemplifies safety and cosiness – warm woods, fires, feasts and filled with people

He’s also represented by the lighthouse in a storm, and by any warmly-lit, isolated cabin or house standing alone at night, or in snow or wet weather. A much-needed inn on the road. That feeling of safe-harbour is the presence of the Winter King. Winter King as bearded lightboatman, bravely coming out into the waters to rescue the lost? I can see it.

As weather and land, he is nice autumns and winters. 'Nice' is not pretty, enchanting or magical - those are the Changeling or other wintertide fairyspirits - but when it's a straightforwardly nice winter or autumn day, with a cold but bright winter sun.

an overhead photo of Avebury village surrounded by a circular mound of earth. Everything is covered in snow, under a bright winter sun.

Beasts

Bears, Wolves, Badgers, and an old, tired dog, or a dog who is asleep (usually an irish wolfhound). The hart. Imagine particularly the behaviour of an old wolf who has been cornered. And because the wolf is associated with hunger and survival, and with the protection of her pack - being part of a group surviving together, through their joing skill and strength. We see in these animals the winter themes of white-black. The Winter King is not a bear or master of bears, but he is often portrayed wearing furs: he is warmth and protection from harm.

His foil, the Winter Witch, also has furred animals as her token - one might assume this represents her skinning him.

Plants

The Larch - the pine tree which, quite unexpectedly, goes yellow-brown in winter. The larch is not an evergreen. His colours are like the browns of mountain ferns and heathers and grasses, a rich red-brown that speaks of warmth.

Again, like his bears and wolves, he doesn’t personify the natural world, but he is depicted amidst it.

Initially, I assumed he was Yew and Holly, conifers and other evergreens - following Graves pattern of the Oak and Holly kings. But i think those are both the same king. What the evergreen pine and the magical abundance of green holly communicate in winter is the green's return, a memory of the Sun King and his momentary presence. And so, the holly isn't really the Sun King's shadowself. Perhaps it is also the Changeling, she-of-the-berries. But he is brown and spindly and crunchy underfoot.

Foods

Think rich and warm. Mulled wine and mead; turkey, gravy, roast vegetables. Mince pies, red wine, port. Hearty. Good veg soups. Especially if you have travelled through the snow or cold to get to them. Preserves.

Activities

The Winter King is the lord of being-indoors-at-wintertime. Board games, story-telling, song, riddling, reading, all in front of a warm fire. We can use medieval and viking board games, if we prefer; or supplement modern rituals like doing a jigsaw or watching the Great Escape. Whereas the Sun King is plenty and relaxation, the Winter King’s joy is never unmixed. It is tactical: playing at riddles and games keeps our spirits up, and this is a necessity, not a luxury.

Other symbols

Christmas stuff and the feelings it evokes: the light of a candle, the excitement of gifts, the happiness of time spent together. A staff, a lantern. A point of light – a sunset or sunrise in the winter with a cold sun; an inn in the dark; a lighthouse. The feast. In the absence of living things, he is associated with material things – wood rather than trees; gold rather than wheat.

a mature man with a beard sits on a throne in a wooden hall. He looks stern. Beside him is a shaggy dog. The room is lit by burning torches and in front of him is a table with food. He holds a sheathed sword.

Colours

Brown and gold, deep red, rarely green. Often portrayed in the wintery landscapes of black/white/grey.

Tides and Times

Indoors in the warm by the fire, while a gale howls outside. He arrives at Harvest, but wait until the rushing sensation of the autumn is gone. Wintery landscapes under a bright winter sun: frost underfoot, brown undergrowth; bright, crisp winter mornings. The Winter King is rarely far from home – he is not Stellar, so his landscapes are still quite domestic or, if he has travelled out into the wood, it is in hope of catching a stag and heading home to the feast.

When it is not his tide, he may be summoned with a candle at night; or sought on cold, crisp mornings; or any time where weather or circumstance makes you in need of, or glad of a warm, safe place. Like other Sun Kings, he can be worshipped at actual churches provided they are old and strange-feeling.

I remember that winter because it brought the heaviest snow that I had ever seen. The snow had fallen steadily all night long and in the morning I awoke in a room filled with light and silence. The whole world seemed to be held in a dreamlike stillness.

As times of day, I find him particularly on cold, bright mornings; in the 3am insomniac despair; and in the practice of "second sleep", the Medieval routine of waking during the night for contemplation and prayer, before returning to bed.

Feast Days

Lessons

The Sun King is lord of plenty. His winter face is plenty in the midst of want. He wouldn’t actually approve of the lavishness of our commercialised Christmases, because his mystery and bounty is feasting and gifting at a time of want. That sense of longing, of endurance and hope which trusts in that which it cannot see, is his province.

More than any other King, he teaches gratitude for what one has – gratitude for food, for shelter, the giving of mighty gifts. Figures like Hrothgar and Theoden are called mighty kings because they give generous gifts to their company; and Father Christmas, who also gives gifts which appear out of nowhere. The feast on Christmas Day is literally a miracle: a feast when there ought to be none.

The Winter King exemplifies the hope and great courage of Solar-Lunar – at a time when it is most needed. He has a degree of acceptance: you can’t save everyone, you just need to survive. But he has not lost the fight, and does not back down. He does not grant mercy at once, but teaches patience to endure. When one is alone in the snow, one does not need rescue so much as the strength of will to survive until the rescue comes. It’s important to note that the Winter King himself is not hope: other spirits have that role, as personifying hope. The Winter King is a seeker of hope, and so he teaches us *how* to hope, acting as a kind of way-opener if simply summoning hope itself is not possible.

Here is an archetypal image of the Winter King: he is looking out of a window or towards the horizon. This represents his trust that the dawn will come. And note the sleeping wolf/dog. The Winter King can be interpreted through a Christian lens as an analogue for the Wise Men/Three Kings, seeking hope/light in the dark of winter. Incidentally, gold is Solar, frankencense Lunar and myrrh is Stellar.

He is often depicted sitting on his throne – sat rigidly, or with an intensely furrowed brow. Control of the self and of others is another Winter King skill. If you have seen Das Boot, you may be familiar with the character of the grizzled, steely captain who has to hold it together for his entire submarine crew under pressure: this is a very Winter King narrative position to be in. The Winter King must judge that rationing is necessary, say; have the decisive and ruthless qualities to impose it; and the sheer strength of will to bring everyone along with him, seeing off challengers.

Perhaps more than any other spirit, the WInter King has a sense of “my people”. After all, if one is to set a boundary one must be sure of who is on either side of it. He presides over the ritual giving and receiving of loyalty and gifts, the making of pacts – and although he rarely asks for a heavy cost, he does expect repayment to be made, often in the form of service at need. Despite being married, having a daughter and being lord of loyal retainers – the Winter King is depicted as profoundly, necessarily alone. These are relationships – but they are also ritualised political pacts. The Winter King usually arrives with a retinue: his court and personal guard. Despite this, he is not cosy: these are bonds of loyalty and necessity. And as the winter progresses, he is increasingly isolated. Note that – as his wife and daughter are spirits in their own right, they do not appear as part of his retinue.

The Winter King also teaches necessary acceptance. This is not the full, healing catharsis which other lunar spirits offer: it’s a temporary thing. One cannot be distracted by grief: if the supplies have been destroyed, then they are destroyed, and one must look forward. There’s no crying over spilt milk here. There isn’t the time.

Where now are the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the harp on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow.
Who shall gather the smoke of the deadwood burning,
Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?

Surviving Anglo Saxon poetry is often deeply evocative of loss and hardship. Both the Seafarer and especially the Wanderer describe the mighty halls and great kings – passed away, passed away into nothingness. These are very Winter King poems: they evoke both the emptiness and lack that we are in, and the dream of a kind lord and his warm hall that we seek.

The Winter King can be approached as The Spirit Of Christmas – and if you’ve ever done Christmas, you already know what that looks and feels like: the colours, scents, foods and experiences. Using imagery from Victorian, Baroque or Medieval Christmases can help you detach the festival from your current associations and de-christianise it, while still participating in those parts you enjoy. Reading about the Holly King of other pagans, I want to emphasise that our mythic cycle has a far more desperate quality. Images of the king which are fat and jolly are not the right tone, except perhaps on Christmas Day itself, where he can be associated momentarily with Father Christmas/Lord Bertilak as a fairy figure whose gifts or castle arrive without warning and bring good cheer. For we will feast and make merry, but the king himself is haggard and trying not to show his strain. The winter is not a time of bounty, but of want; and we celebrate what bounty we have in contrast to the cold and dark, which the King also brings with him when we call him. As discussed above, these feelings are really more resonant with the Sun King's plenty - but I tend to see this character as a Winter King regardless - we can grant him a single day to bring flourishing, though it may be the only one and that through saving, scrimping, patience and longing.

Yule has a powerfully “ancestorly” vibe to me. This is particularly true on Christmas Eve, which has its own festival. Still, when we think of the Winter King – an old king – we cannot but think of the kings of old as present and crowding around him, waiting for him to join them. He has one eye on his ancestors, another on his legacy, knowing what he does in the dark will not be judged merely by the men around him but by memory and eternity. In Fencraft, the dead when considered as “ancestors” are Solar. The Sun Kings have access to the ancestors specifically by repeating and re-affirming ancient rituals. They are not Stellar – they cannot ask the ancestors for guidance directly or open the doors of night – but by performing the duties of kingship appropriately and correctly, they make themselves and their people right with the ancestors. The Winter King is never far from death.

Music & Prayer

Choice of prayer depends on what you wish to evoke. The below are a selection of appropriate pieces.

(Note: this section has been somewhat superseded by the Commonplace Book)

Age, regret and loss

These poems are especially good for evoking his presence

I think about Marcus Aurelius' Meditations. That's a Winter King energy - an austere old man passing on his precepts for a good life. Something about the act of that equally reminds us that values are not easy or intuitive, and we hold them in defiance of challenges.

Hope

You simply cannot beat Sol Invictus by Thea Gilmore for Yule morning. I also use it as a Lightbringer song, but her phrase day stretching weary wings is so evocative of this King. We've all had that morning.

Feast and charity

Narratives

Beowulf is a surviving Anglo-Saxon poem, about the dark coming to get you at home. Hrothgar is a Winter King: he is master of the hall, and does not leave it to seek the monster. Instead, he bars the doors and accepts the loss of some of his people, and waits for the hero Beowulf to go out and defeat the creature.

Hrothgar is the model for Theoden, appearing in the Lord of the Rings from the second book. Both demonstrate the qualities of a mighty king: they take oaths from their retainers and reward them richly with rings. We also see Theoden first retreating to safety, instead of riding directly to war – but who rides with courage when it is necessary. I'm also quite devoted to Denethor who, in his own way, is also a Winter King - whose slip towards the Lunar makes him sorcerous and isolated. Narratively, because feudalism has a real magical expression in Middle Earth, Denethor can never be a good leader because inherently - as a steward, not a king - he will never have that particular magical quality of good kingship. It's leery. But I've always liked Denethor for this Winter Kingish quality - he is a person trying his best and doing badly, in contrast to Aragorn's supernatural advantages, which the narrative hand simply will not permit Denethor to access.

I am not a Game of Thrones person, but I also see this narrative in the Night’s Watch – whose grim and lonely task is to prevent the outside getting in.

The Winter King is primarily a solar sort of thing, an ancestor spirit of a long dead mortal; but as is common in Fencraft, can also wear a fairy-face. I think about jolly Lord Bertilak from Gawain and the Green Knight in this role, as well as Father Christmas (especially in the Narnia books, in which his appearance is a magical manifestation that suggests a coming spring)

I am extremely devoted to John Boorman's Excalibur, which has much to answer for in how I see the King cycles. To fit the narrative into a compact running time, Arthur takes on the role of the fading Fisher King in the second half of the film. I also see the Winter King's capture and fading in the many stories of Merlin enslaved and hollowed out.

The King in Winter can play the role of the archetypal Beloved, Kindly, Doomed father in fairy tales where an evil stepmother takes power.

Currents of Power

The Winter King is a Solar-Lunar spirit. He flows between a more Solar aspect – where he is surrounded by the retainers he protects, in a warm and hearty hall – to a more Lunar one – where he is sat alone, isolated, wandering abroad, lost in his books and spells, or focused on survival at all costs. The Sol-Lun position is opposed by the Stellar. The Winter King exists in the context of the Stellar time of year: the darkness outside, the chaos, the inability to survive in the wild all surround him. We must therefore light candles and pull that hope out of the darkness, for like all Solar things he must be created and maintained.

Note also that another theme of the Yule period is the ancestors, another pulling out of the Stellar dark.

Here is when the Winter King is present. Rising from Harvest, and fading after Yule. Note that the presence of the king does not control/prevent/defeat the Witches ball at Halloween or the mystery nights in November or the fairy feasts. Unlike the Sun King, he doesn’t keep his people safe by making the dark things go away. He keeps them safe indoors, and does not challenge the night company or woodland folk – ensuring only that they do not enter our hall.

The Winter King is not dominant at this time of year. He is an echo of the Sun King, not his rebirth. He is not the lord of these months – he is present if you need him, or if your practice is centered around him. But this is the Stellar/Lunar time of year, and so the Mothers, the Night Company, and creatures of storm and sky are predominant.

Return to Index