"She turned me into a newt!.... I got better"

It's a funny thing how the image of the witch has changed over the years from an allegedly existent evil doer with a pointy hat that people fear to a cultural norm that people actually aspire to be. I am not sure how the history of witchcraft looks, but I know that it dates back to pre-medieval times. In Welsh lore, as told in The Mabinogion (yes, I am taking a course on medieval romances, how did you know?) there are women who possess seemingly magical powers, but are not directly referred to as witches. In Macbeth (and I hope that you're not reading this aloud in a theatre), there are the infamous three witches (the ones with "double double toil and trouble") who foretell Macbeth's rise to and fall from power. Wow this is really disorganized... try to stick with me here.

It is these witches that children could be found dressing up as on Halloween, with the pointed nose, pointed hat, robe, broomstick, and everything. People still dress up as witches, but instead of being told "oh look at the scary witch," they are asked "which house are you in?" That's right, Harry Potter has corrupted the classic image of the witch. Now that's not to say that this corruption is a bad thing, in fact it is quite a good thing. But here's something to think about:


It's a good thing that
Harry Potter isn't set in
Puritan Salem


Seriously, have you ever considered that? The potential death toll would be huge! I can just imagine the constant screams of "she's a witch, burn her!" The problem is that any of the tests that the peasants would impose on the witches would be passed. Well, unless the witch didn't have her wand, then the younger witches would fail. But getting the wand in the first place would be an issue.... you'd have to do it while they sleep or something...

Wow, once again I am rambling on. I am terribly sorry. I realize that my past 5 or 6 posts have had far too much text. I have decidedly decided to considerably cut down on the amount of text in each post.




The title of this post is from none other than Monty Python's Holy Grail.