11/01/2025
Thought to date back to Pagan rituals, the h**p seed charm is believed to show its user the ghostly site of their true love. The charm is simple enough to perform, at midnight on a special night a person wishing to see their true love only needs to sow h**p seed while chanting a small spell three times aloud…
If the spell was performed correctly, looking back over their left shoulder would reveal a ghostly vision of their true love mowing or weeding the h**p behind them!
One of the earliest accounts of the h**p seed spell is found in the 1714 pastorals of John Gay’s ‘The Shepherds Week’. On Thursday, also known as ‘The Spell’, a young village girl misses her true love who was away on business. Wishing for just a glimpse of him, she employs the h**p seed spell on a lonely Midsummer’s Eve.
“At eve last midsummer no sleep I sought,
But to the field a bag of h**p seed I bought;
I scattered around the seed on every side,
And three times in trembling accent, cried:
This h**p seed with my virgin hand I sow,
Who shall my true love be the crop shall mow
I straight looked back, and if my eyes speak truth,
With his keen scythe behind me came the youth.”
‘H**pseed I sowe, h**pseed I sowe and he that my true-love shall be come’ by Annie French
By the 19th century the spell could be found chanted in the moonlight by giggling groups of school girls throughout much of Europe. The spell had been simplified, commonly to some variation of the verses,*1 “H**pseed I sow, H**pseed grow, She (or he) that will my true love be, Come rake this h**pseed after me”.
The H**p Seed Halloween Spell This Halloween anyone can find their one true love, no need for that high priced party you only need a pocket full of h**p seed! Tam O’Shanter and the Witches, illustr…
