One of the most frequent requests I’ve received for a charm release has been that of one born for the protection of the home and its fortune. With the success of the recent more specialized charms, and Great Lent upon us, I’ve been especially inspired to create a set of charms born of this impulse, but still fully within the spirit of the folk magical traditions I hold dear. I’ve been so deeply grateful for everyone’s support and excitement around my most recent shapeshifting charm, and am excited to finally make available my latest: a charm of household vigilance made under the auspices of St. Theodore Tiron.

Patrons over on our podcast’s Discord already got to see a preview of these when they were first consecrated after the successive feasts of Todorova Subota (Theodore’s Saturday, the first Saturday of Great Lent) and the actual feast of St. Theodore Tiron on March 2nd. These wards were fully born on Todorova Subota, a day steeped in folklore surrounding the enigmatic figure of Veliki Todor as well as his todorci riders. These spirits, well-attested across Serbia and Bulgaria, are spectral riders fused with their horses, who ride forth on the first week of Great Lent, followed by their master, Veliki Todor, who appears pure white and with a lame mount. These avenging wights are said to trample with their hooves any who disobey the taboos associated with this week, leaving their bodies black and blue with the tread of their horseshoes. Worse still, they may cut down with their sickles and blades those who have betrayed, lied, stolen, and refused to make amends before this perilous and fraught time.

On this day, I baked a set of traditional horseshoe shaped buns known as todorčići, made in offering to supplicate these dark forces. While they were baking, I ritually prepared a set of used horseshoes that I washed in herbal waters drawn from plant allies associated with these spirits, and anointed them in an oil of St. Theodore of Tiron, both a key mounted saint participating in the lineage of the Thracian Horseman, as well as the saint mask and namesake of this crucial period of time. Two strands of three serpent vertebrae and one hagstone each were woven to adorn the horseshoe to be the eyes of the saint’s vigilance, and a charm bag was prepared and suspended through the center as his holy lance. The core of the bag is, as with many Balkan folk charms, the bread prepared and risen on the day to capture its “election”, being one of the horseshoe buns divided across the exemplars. To this was added a Thursday Salt born for the protection of the home, the forty-one beans that approved the recipe, and an herbal powder born of those plant allies most conducive to the stalwart protection of t he home under the auspices of the saint.

These charms were then buried by a tree consecrated in the name and image of St. Theodore Tiron on Theodore’s Saturday, and then unearthed together from their box on his very feast. They were prayed over, anointed, adorned, and fumigated in fervent supplication, such that they may embody the dual abilities of both securing the health, wealth, joy, and fertility of the home, as well as aggressively banishing and dispelling any and all threats that might approach one’s door.

The todorci are formidable and terrifying beings, and their week is one of quiet supplication, offerings made in repentance, and debts and amends forged in sincerity and urgency both. These horseshoe charms are enchanted to be hung over the inside of a front door or back door (or, if living with roommates, a bedroom) to show any spirit that functions like a todorac that the dwelling space has already been “trampled” once, and therefore should be passed over swiftly in mercy. While the horseshoe itself promotes leniency from and invisibility before vengeful denizens of the otherworld, restless dead and wandering ghosts, and disturbed land spirits, the hagstone eyes are charmed awake to ceaselessly watch for threats, make ancestors and house spirits aware of them so that they can be relayed to their keepers in vision and dream, and neutralize gossip and the Evil Eye. All the while, the burning charm held between the horns assures for prosperity, protection, and the maintenance of luck.

I’m exceptionally pleased with how these turned out. Born of my training across Serbian folk magical traditions, these are powerful wards and stalwart protectors for your dwelling space. Anoint monthly with an oil of protection of your choice (holy oil will always work in a pinch) and touch it in prayer before you leave when you need to ensure that whatever you return with across the threshold remains a resolute force.

All charms will be shipped within one week of purchase. Tracking information will be updated directly into your order.