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boss ass witch
by Fenella MacLennan - February 2021
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Witches have become a symbol of female empowerment, strength and independence, enchanting literary works, film and TV with their spellbinding fashion, charming confidence and wicked magical abilities. From Sabrina Spellman and Hermione Granger to the witches of Oz, Maleficent, Melisandre, the Sanderson sisters and the White Witch of Narnia, their presence epitomises immense power in each of their respective realms, whether good or evil. So, what is it about witches that captures the attention of pop culture and feminists around the world?
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In a time well before Christianity and the onset of male supremacy, deities and goddesses were worshipped. The Norse Freya, Greek Hecate and Celtic Ceridwen were just some of the many revered in ancient history. Their ability to bring life into the world was considered miraculous and women were praised and respected, and were symbolic of life, strength and fertility. Their moon-linked menstruation and deep connection to nature, through gathering and preparing food, led to the belief that women were divine, above humanity and nothing short of goddesses.
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When Christianity took hold of Europe in the middle ages, women were demonised, and the power they previously held was usurped by a male alternative, God. In 500AD Christian emperors suppressed worship of the goddess and the last of her temples were demolished. The early Christian religion transformed what were once the embodiment of female power into Mother Mary and more passive, submissive types. Powerful women were seen by Christianity as demons, like Lilith and the Great Whore of Babylon and their sexuality and influence were seen as a threat. And so, ended the glorification of womanhood, for the enduring time of men had come.
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The early Middle Ages was when the stirrings of witchcraft began and by the 1400s, witch-hunting had taken Europe by full force, bringing with it an uncontrollable hysteria, predominantly due to the publication of a book known as 'Malleus Maleficarum'. Translated, it means 'Hammer to Witches' a witch-hunters guide to identify and hunt women of the night. Its beliefs were beyond sexist and it encouraged an intense, generalised fear of women, with quotes such as ‘Women are more credulous…women are naturally more impressionable…through the first defect in their intelligence they are more likely to abjure the faith…for men, being by nature intellectually stronger than women, are more apt to abhor such practices.’ Being the second-most sold book (after the Bible) during that time, it’s no wonder that Europe was rife with suspicion and sexism.
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MALLEUS MALEFICARUM
A witch-hunter's guide to the art of discovery, interrogation and condemnation of witchery.
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The portrayal of witches by artists as ugly and hag-like, with huge, crooked noses, wild eyes and untamed hair, only added to the immense fear of them. They were often naked, riding demons and dismembering children around a fire, sometimes in the presence of the Devil himself. These images were demeaning and hugely exaggerated and, just like modern media, depicted women who held power over men as hideous and unruly. In essence, they posed such a threat to Christianity that they were depicted visually as orgiastic and cruel, and written about as gullible and weak.
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Widowers, natural healers, women who were unsociable or impoverished, ALL those who were on the fringes of society were targeted and accused of being practitioners of black magic and worshippers of the Devil. However, at this time, women were burned for much less. A woman who missed Church, bore any sort of mark, or owned a pet that could pass as a familiar, could be burned at the stake. The panic concerning satanic witches soon reached the shores of New England igniting perhaps the most famous witch trial of all in Salem Massachusetts in 1692.
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These women threatened patriarchal society because they were mysterious, uncontrollable and dangerous. But most of all, because they were women who threatened the power of the masculine world. The Church and state antagonised and fuelled mass hysteria from within society, using witch-hunting as a means of oppressing women. And while it’s more or less acceptable to romanticise witchcraft in today’s society, it is important to remember that: one, there is no evidence to suggest a ‘witch’ religion actually existed; two: thousands of innocent women and men died horrific deaths; and three: some cultures in the South Pacific, Asia and Africa still consider witchcraft a crime. People still die to this day.
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There is no denying, that the witch has made an impressionable mark on the world’s history, and its continuation into the modern age has brought positives, and negatives. While it has been used as a degrading label for powerful women, like politicians, Julia Gillard and the famous 'Ditch the witch' signs and Hilary Clinton, it has taken on an immensely empowering connotation too. One that sees female heroines using physical strength, bravery and control to save the day. One that reconnects women to nature, self-empowerment and individuality through the pagan based religion of Wicca, and the grunge and gothic aesthetic that gives modern women a chance to be different. And one that reignites the fire of ancient feminine power held by women in a time long ago.
From her lowly status, as a demonic and evil cannibal, covered in warts with a hunchback and hideous cackle, vulnerable and poor, to a powerful feminine force, with mystical power, heroism and formidability, the witch has transformed. It's fitting, that the very type of woman persecuted for centuries, should now be a symbol for female strength.
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'Someone should have warned them
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that magic cannot be tamed.
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Because you cannot burn away
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what has always
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been aflame.'
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-Nikita Gill
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LISTEN TO SOME BEWITCHING TUNES ON OUR ON SPOTIFY PLAYLIST
a teenage witch
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REFERENCES
Davies, A 2019, Be More Witch, Quadrille, London.
Gill, N 2017, Wild Embers: poems of rebellion fire and beauty, Orion, England.
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History.com Editors 2020, History of Witches, viewed 5/02/21, https://www.history.com/topics/folklore/history-of-witches
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Hutton, R 2017, The Witch, Yale University Press, New Haven.
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Insitoris, H., Sprenger, J., & Mackay, C. S, 2006, Malleus Maleficarum, Cambridge, UK, Cambridge University Press.
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Millar, C (n.d.), Women as witches: past, present and future, viewed 5/02/21,
https://shorthand.uq.edu.au/small-change/women-as-witches/
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Miles, R 1989, Who Cooked the Last Supper?, Three Rivers Press, New York.
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IMAGES
Hermione gif: We Heart It
Purple cauldron: Created by Fenella MacLennan
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