Movim • Ashburton casts a spell as witches and writers gather for folklore festival

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Ashburton casts a spell as witches and writers gather for folklore festival

news.movim.eu / TheGuardian • 1 May 2026

Myth, ritual and community are drawing new energy and believers to Devon town on edge of Dartmoor

Stroll through the Devon town of Ashburton, or pop into the Old Exeter Inn on West Street, and you’re almost bound to bump into a storyteller, a mythologist, a pagan – perhaps even a friendly witch.

The town on the edge of craggy Dartmoor, home to about 4,000 people, is becoming a magnet to those drawn to the old folky ways and the reimagining of 21st-century versions of earthy rural traditions.