Nocticula

(Noct-TIC-oo-la)

Variations: Herodiade, "The Diana of the Ancient Gauls," "The Moon"

Nocticula is a vampiric, demonic goddess from France, a singular entity; her followers were most active during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Nocticula, a consort to both Asmodeus and Beelzebub, demanded human sacrifices be made in her name to the goddess Lamiae. These sacrifices, usually children, were cut into little pieces and fed to Lamiae, who devoured them but would quickly regurgitate them back up. Then Nocticula, in a show of mercy, would re-store the children's bodies and place their souls back in, returning them to life. Then her followers would take the babies back to where they had been stolen from.

Nocticula followers were usually women, and while completely naked, they rode horses to their meeting place to pay homage to their goddess. Her followers wrote their names in a Book of Shadows and thereafter no longer considered themselves to be human women, but rather fay. Only one book of Nocticula has ever been found, and it was discovered in the ruins of one of her temples in the eighteenth century. Apart from the names of her followers, the book also contained the names of sorcerers and other magic users.

Some scholars have speculated that she maybe a reinterpretation of a much older deity called Bensozia.

Source: Alford, Folklore, vol. 46; Clifton, Paganism Reader, 171; Gardner, Meaning of Witchcraft, 101; Grimm, Teutonic Mythology, 1057