Wishing Well
by Michael Humphries		 Well
Symbolism

Edited by Peter Y. Chou
WisdomPortal.com


Great Britain 1359: Wishing Well
(issued May 2, 1991)

J.E. Cirlot, A Dictionary of Symbols,
Philosphical Library, Inc., New York (1971), 400 pp.
Well, p. 350

Well:
In Christian symbolism, the well is associated with the concept of life as a
pilgrimage, and signifies salvation. The well of refreshing and purifying water
is symbolic of sublime aspirations, or of the "silver cord" which attaches man
to the Centre. Demeter and other deities were shown standing beside a well.
The well is also a symbol of the soul, and an attribute of things feminine.
Power Points of Eleusius: The Demeter Well

J.C. Cooper, An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Traditional Symbols,
Thames & Hudson, London (1978), 208 pp.
Well, p. 190

Well:
The feminine principle: The womb of the Great Mother;
the psyche. Having contact with the underworld, the well
often contains magic water with powers of healing and
wish-fulfilling.

Jean Chevalier & Alain Gheerbrant, The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols,
Penguin Books, London (1996), 1178 pp.
Well, p. 1095

Well:
In all traditions, wells are endowed with a sacred character. They actualize in
a kind of epitome the three cosmic orders, Heaven, Earth, and the Underworld,
the three elements of Water, Earth, and Air, and are a life-giving channel of
communication. They themselves are a microcosm or cosmic synthesis.
They provide a channel of communication with the realm of the dead,
and the hollow echo which comes from their depths and the fleeting
shimmer of rippling water deepen the mystery rather than make it clear. Looked at from
bottom to top, a well is like some giant astronomical telescope pointed from the bowels
of the Earth at the celestial pole. The whole forms a safety-ladder linking the three levels
of the world. Wells are symbols of plenty and sources of life, especially to Children of
Israel, for whom the existence of fresh water was quasi-miraculous. Jacob's Well, from
which Jesus asked the Woman of Samaria to give him to drink, conveys the meaning of
fresh water springing up— a drought of life and knowledge. De Saint-Martin interpreted
Jethro's Well (beur), beside which Moses stopped. as a source of light (ur) and hence as
a spiritual centre. In the Zohar, a well fed by a stream symbolizes the marriage of man
and woman. In Hebrew, the word 'well' carries the meaning of 'woman' or 'bride'.
    Wells, are symbols of secrecy and of dissimulation, especially of that of the truth,
since Truth, as we know, comes naked out of the well. In the Far East wells are also
symbols of the abyss of Hell. The 48th hexagram of the I Ching is called tsing (well).
Commentators seem far too down-to-earth if all that they tell us is that "a well which
is not covered in and has a good supply of water is the emblem of sincerity and
righteousness and a symbol of good fortune."
    The image of the well of knowledge of truth ('truth is to be found at the bottom of a well')
recurs in many esoteric tales. The Bambara, whose social structure and spiritual traditions
invest their initiatory societies with immense importance, make wells symbols of knowledge,
their copings being secrecy & their depths silence. The silence to which they refer is, naturally,
that of contemplative wisdom, a higher stage in spiritual development & self-mastery in which
speech sinks back and is absorbed into itself. Symbolizing knowledge, the well stands for the
individual who has attained to that knowledge. This brings us back to the start of the article:
if the well is a microcosm, it is the human being itself.

G.A. Gaskell, Dictionary of All Scriptures & Myths,
Avenel Books, New York (1960), 846 pp.
Well, pp. 809-810

Well of Waters:
A symbol of the Divine fount of Truth (water)

"Truth lies at the bottom of a well."
    — Heraclitus (535 BC-475 BC)

Wooden Wishing Well

Harold Bayley, The Lost Language of Symbolism,
Citadel Press Book, New York, London, 1912 (1st Ed.), 375 pp.
Well Symbolism in Chapter X: The Star of the Sea (pp. 241-242)

Stories of miraculous healing water are common to the folk-lore of most nations,
and these waters are described in fairy-tale as the "Well of the World",
the "Well beyond the World", the "Water of the Well of Virtues",
the "Well of True Water", and sometimes simply "Living Water".
The quest for this Water of Life is the chief incident in nursery tales. The magic
elixir revives the dead, awakes the sleeping, cures the sick, opens eyes of the blind,
restores the petrified to life, causes a vast accession of strength to the strrong, and
imparts immortal youth and loveliness. The Maoris, Mongols, Indians, Slavs, and every race on earth,
have traditions of an inexhaustible Fountain of Youth, wherein it was maintained the Fairies dipped
children in order to free them from mortality. Such fountains are spoken of in Japan, and one of
them is said to be hidden on top of Mount Fuji: whoever finds and drinks of it will live forever.

Barbara G. Walker, The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols & Sacred Objects,
HarperSanFrancisco (1988), 564 pp.
Well, pp. 163-164; Wishing Well, p. 62

Well:
Well dressings and well-worshipings were among those pagan customs that most
annoyed Christian clergymen throughout the Middle Ages, because they were
known to celebrate the female principle in an overly sexual way. The church
denounced many of the formerly holy wells with the term cunnus diaboli:
"devilish cunt". Martin of Braga said that female devils called nymphs lived
in wells. People used to visit sacred wells to pray to the nymphs for their hearts'
desire, from this habit descended the popular "wishing well", and the custom of throwing coins into
wells as an offering to the resident deity. Wells throughout the British Isles were formerly sacred to
the underground Goddess Hel, and her Celtic counterparts Morgan and Brigit, which is why there
are now so many place names like Hellywell, Hollywell, Holywell, Helen's Well, Morgan's wells,
Brigit's wells, or Bridewell. In Greece, before a wedding, people bathe in the local hagiasma
(sacred well) to gain the power of fertility. A related European superstition said on Christmas Eve
the water in every well or spring would turn to blood (or its sacramental equivalent, wine); but no
one wanted to see this miracle because all witnesses were fated to die within a year. Here we have
both the symbolic manifestation of menstrual blood magic and its accompaning taboo. The pagan
custom of well-dressing, with games and feasts, survived into the modern era and was usually
assigned to Ascension Day, forty days after Easter. One might assume that this was the same day
on which Underworld Goddess gave new birth to the pagan hero. Eventually the church adopted
the festivals that it couldn't eradicate, and monks actually sold love potions at the formerly sacred
Well of Branwen, once dedicated to the Celtic Goddess. (pp. 163-164)
Wishing Well:

The wishing well at left in the Icelandic runic charm, obviously originating
in a lunar context because the four "dippers" into the well are crescent moons.
Iceland retained matriarchal symbols and practices longer than any country
in the European continent, because of its isolation and the age-old tradition
of respect for the priestess or wise-woman. Springs and wells of all kinds
used to be guarded, served, and honored by groups of sacred women. Making
a wish, followed by an offering to the well, was a form of prayer to the resident
Water-goddess. People still throw coins into wells or fountains to make a wish,
but they have forgotten why. The moon-shaped dippers recall the medieval
opinion that even after Christianily become their official religion, women were supposed not to pray to God for what they wanted, but to pray to their own deity, Mother Moon.

Nadia Julien, Mammoth Dictionary of Symbols,
Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. New York (1996), 524 pp.
Well, p. 490

Well (life, truth)
A well is a medium of communication between air, water, and earth, and in every
tradition it is a sacred place. In the Bible, providential encounters, pacts, unions
and alliances, all take place near a well. In the I Ching, a well (ching) symbolizes
the union of the inner self with the secret riches of the unconscious, learning from
the past, the roots of human life, the central place, the bringing to light of whatever is hidden.

E.T.C. Werner, Myths and Legends of China
Graham Brash Ltd, Singapore (1984), 454 pp.
Well: p. 217

The Spirit of the Well
The twelve women each offered Taoist Master Chang Tao-ling [34-156 AD] a jade ring, and asked that they might become his wives. He took the rings, and pressing them together in his hands, made of them one large single ring. "I will throw this ring into the well", he said, "and the one of you who recovers it shall be my wife." All the twelve women jumped into the well to get the ring; whereupon Chang Tao-ling put a cover over it and fastened it down, telling them that henceforth they should be the spirits of the well and would never be allowed to come out. Shortly after this Chang Tao-ling met a hunter. He exhorted him not to kill living beings, but to change his occupation to that of a salt-burner, instructing him how to draw out the salt from salt-water wells. Thus the people of that district were advantaged both by being able to obtain the salt and by being no longer molested by the twelve female spirits. A temple called Temple of the Prince of Ch'ing Ho, was built by them, and the territory of Ling Chou was given to Chang Tao-ling in recognition of the benefits he had conferred upon the people. (p. 217)

Richard Wilhelm, I Ching: The Book of Changes,
translated by Cary F. Baynes, Bollingen Series XIX
Princeton University Press, 3rd Edtion (1967), 806 pp.
Well, pp. 185-186

Hexagram 48: Ching / The Well
Wood is below, water above. The wood goes down into the earth to bring
up water. The image also refers to the world of plants, which lift water out
of the earth by means of their fibers (sap). The well from which water
is drawn conveys the idea of an inexhaustible dispensing of nourishment.

The Judgment:
The Well. The town may be changed,
But the well cannot be changed.
It neither decreases nor increases.
They come & go and draw from the well.
 The Image:
Water over wood: the image of the Well.
Thus the superior man encourages people at work,
And exhorts them to help one another.

Nelson Editors, Complete Concordance to the Bible: NKJV,
Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, TN (1983), 1083 pp.
Well, p. 1039

Well (41 citations in the Bible)

Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O well; sing ye unto it.
    — Numbers 21:17

Drink waters out of their own cistern, and running waters out of their own well.
    — Proverbs 5:15

The mouth of a righteous man is a well of life.
    — Proverbs 10:11

A fountain of garden, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon.
    — Song of Solomon 4:15

Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey,
sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour.
    — John 4:6

But whosoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst,
but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water
springing up into everlasting life.     — John 4:14

Snow White at the Wishing Well in Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a 1937 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney.
Based on the German fairy tale by Brothers Grimm, it is the first full-length cel animated feature film and the
earliest Disney animated feature film. Snow White premiered at Carthay Circle Theatre on December 21, 1937,
followed by a nationwide release on February 4, 1938. It was a critical & commercial success, with $8 million
earnings, the highest-grossing sound film at the time.


Above are film clippings of Snow White at the Wishing Well. She's wishing that her Prince will come.
And her wish and dream do come true. The lyrics to "I'm Wishing/One Song" was written by Frank Churchill
& Larry Morey. They also wrote "Someday My Prince Will Come", which ranks #19 in AFI's top 100 songs in American cinema of the 20th century. Adriana Caselotti was the voice of the title character Snow White.
I'm Wishing/One Song
by Frank Churchill & Larry Morey—
Want to know a secret?
Promise not to tell?
When you're standing by a wishing well
Make a wish into the well
That's all you have to do
And if you hear it echoing
Your wish will soon come true
 I'm wishing for the one I love
To find me today
I'm hoping
And I'm dreaming of
The nice things he'll say...
One song
My heart keeps singing
Of one love
Only for you.



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