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The Craft: Legacy makes a notable effort to portray its witches as being grounded in the real world and not glued to their smartphones, which might help it resonate with witches whose approach to magic is more Earth-based than digital. It’s clear, at the very least, that the endeavor was approached with research and good intention. “We wanted to be careful and respectful,” says Lister-Jones of the different spells employed both in the film and on-set. A certain caution was necessary for everyone’s peace of mind—Lister-Jones and her actors understood their invocations and rituals were dramatic fiction for the camera, but their words and gestures are still akin to actual witchcraft rituals. As Luna advised her, “Magic doesn’t know you’re making a film.”
In between, the burgeoning internet ushered in a new world of online fringe communities and subcultures, including the contemporary witchcraft movement, which would come to have a significant influence on Hollywood storytelling. In between, the burgeoning internet ushered in a new world of online fringe communities and subcultures, including the contemporary witchcraft movement, which would come to have a significant influence on Hollywood storytelling.
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Toil and Trouble and the Witchcraft Canon
June 1, 2023 3:01 PM Subscribe
I don't personally believe in any sort of supernatural phenomenon, so theoretically I could just make up the witchcraft elements of my novel. However, I am aware that there's a certain canon in existence and that people who believe in witchcraft take it quite seriously. I'd like to learn about that canon and make my novel reasonably consistent with it.
So, what sources can you recommend for my research? What will give me a good understanding of witchcraft traditions and lore? What books should I read? What websites should I visit? What YouTube channels should I check out?
posted by orange swan to Grab Bag (18 answers total) 13 users marked this as a favoriteAre you interested in this tradition as interpreted through modern Western witchcraft/Wicca, which has little or no relationship to witchcraft as historically practiced? Or historical witchcraft as attested through primary sources? If so, a specific region or time period would be helpful.
posted by derrinyet at 3:10 PM on June 1 [2 favorites]
There are so many types of witchcraft, narrowing this down would really really help. Choosing a core set of beliefs, the purpose the witchcraft plays in the narrative ( will the person believe or use curses or hexes as an example) or even a set of gods or goddesses ( if applicable!) Could be really useful.
I would be careful to avoid appropriation of especially native American traditions which can run rampant in the community.
If your looking for some straightforward English Wicca things by Buckland are what to read. For more generalized pagan I'd suggest reading Starhawk's Spiral Dance ( the second half is about building covens which may or may not be applicable). But just like many other spiritual faiths there is a huge range of beliefs, and practices. For example you could really deep dive into Hellinic Polytheism.
posted by AlexiaSky at 3:27 PM on June 1 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: I don't know the difference between the various types of witchcraft. That's one of the things I'm going to have to learn through my research.
posted by orange swan at 3:34 PM on June 1
One book I can easily recommend are Rossell Hope Robbins's Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology. It's exactly what it says but filled with illustrations, primary source quotes, and tons and tons of interesting examples of witchcraft and pagan ritual. It's fairly old but pretty comprehensive and really fascinating reading.
Another interesting perspective you might value is a book called The Cheese and the Worm, which is about how rural non-Christians with their own cosmology and beliefs were systematically hammered into the expected "witch" shape by the Inquisition. It may be interesting for your character to be aware of the fact that witchcraft as commonly understood is in many ways an invention of the contemporary moral authorities, much like McCarthyism had its own convenient and flexible definition of anti-American activities. The Cheese and the Worm examines one of very few records kept of those original beliefs and rites that one pagan group had developed independently, and (although I have only read some) I understand it to be a rather comprehensive and sophisticated worldview very far from the "let's take our brooms to the woods and kiss Satan's asshole" trope.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:02 PM on June 1 [4 favorites]
A friend of mine is into becoming a green witch. Here's a book about that which seems to be very popular.
posted by mareli at 4:06 PM on June 1
And apparently the author has written a bunch of other books on types of witchcraft.
posted by mareli at 4:09 PM on June 1
Here is a little article discussing a few of the popular traditions of Wicca here which can be a guide to some of the things to look into further if you decide to go that route.
Just be forewarned the people may be upset if your characters values don't align with what you chose especially if you are pretty upfront about it.
This is a really big umbrella like tell me about Christianity big umbrella ( okay not that big) especially when witchcraft isn't a super well defined term ( some people mean it to mean basically anything but a particular belief system, usually their own) and to others it can mean something incredibly specific.
It can be more convoluted if you are including indigenous practices.
Also witchcraft can be regional, especially when you get into uses and meaning of plants, or particular practices that arose during a period of time but then fell out of favor.
Anyway, I hope you find what you are looking for!
posted by AlexiaSky at 4:17 PM on June 1 [1 favorite]
Basic Witches is a good 101 that is appropriation-aware. The Witch Wave Podcast also spawned a book called Waking the Witch, with a good bit of background as well as some analysis of the current modern witch wave.
I like The Witch of Wonderlust on youtube, and Molly Roberts, the Art Witch. See also Bri Luna the Hoodwitch on Instagram (and elsewhere, see profile, also an interview here with her and Sarah Faith Gottesdiener, another great modern witch), and The Witch of Southern Light.
My advice as a witch and a writer is to stay away from old established traditions like Wicca and Paganism, mostly because a lot of them run to gender essentialism and/or white supremacy. Chaos Magick has some fucked up roots but also its own strains of more punk-ethos rebirthed traditions. You can find some cool stuff under the terms kitchen witch, garden witch or green witch, hedge witch (which is often a witch with a highly eclectic self-determined path, which is I guess where I fall).
posted by Lyn Never at 4:39 PM on June 1 [5 favorites]
Witches of America is a memoir written by a person also trying to learn about different witchcraft traditions.
posted by corey flood at 4:58 PM on June 1 [2 favorites]
AlexiaSky makes the point I would, which is that it's a very, very large umbrella. Instead of giving names, I'm thinking in chunks here, and semi-historically as best as possible.
Oldest:
- any number of local (folk/indigenous) religions in areas, who develop a set of practitioners of magic separate from the priesthood. Untouched, not sure any of these really exist anymore.
- Those local magical traditions who get colonized and local magical practitioners adapt and hide traditions with new names (folk magic, gods -> saints, etc., common in Europe)
- Local traditions get folded into various sects of Large Religions and transform dramatically (magic becomes province of priests, only certain kinds are allowed, and a new bisection may happen with 'good' and 'bad'.)
- Local magical traditions don't get as overtly colonized but adapt over time with outside contact. South Pacific, parts of SE Asia, Africa and S. America.
For the above, if you have access to the eHRAF, have fun getting lost in it!
Middle:
- New magical traditions come out of Large Religion - here you have your John Dee, astrology/alchemy, other medieval traditions on the 'good' side, and a concept of 'witchcraft' that is an eclectic bunch of 'stuff that doesn't fit in with what we said was OK to do' that is used to sort out another group.
There is probably also stuff here in eastern philosophy/religion but it is not my strong suit so I will leave that aside.
Middle to Current:
- Faux historical traditions emerge - in western history, one could argue this starts in either late-18th, with the rise of fraternal traditions and secret societies, or with the Great Awakening in the mid-19th century. These continue to form to this day, and many of them claim Very Real Traditions that can only be traced to, like, 1890 at best.
Modern:
- New ideas emerge, some of which are syncretic and some of which are pretty. odd.
Chaos (as Lyn Never says); arguably some of the weirder strains of modern magical practice that come from pseudoscientific or fringe science ideas; modern Satanism. A key to this is that these are self-aware and may use old names for psychological purposes (like Chaos folks who use Discordian ideas and use Greek terms) but do not claim authenticity, 'rediscovery,' or an unbroken chain of practice.
Arguably, some of the modern fiction I can think of would ultimately come from this - cstross's books' magic, or Diane Duane's Wizard series. This solves the 'making people upset because you did it wrong' problem better than others. You will still have people who say you are doing it wrong, but it does cut down on some of it.
posted by Weighted Companion Cube at 5:05 PM on June 1 [2 favorites]
My suggestions here are from the perspective of an initiate of Gardnerian/Alexandrian Wicca* (dual lineage).
Books I would recommend for the general history of witchcraft and more specifically of Wicca are as follows:
- Ronald Hutton, The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present (2017) - an academic study of the cultural history of witchcraft (not Wicca).
- Ronald Hutton, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft (1999, second edition 2019) - a detailed historical examination of the threads of influence that came together in the early-to-mid 20th century to give birth to [British Traditional] Wicca.
- Gerald Gardner, Witchcraft Today (1954) - written by the "founder" of modern Wicca. Read the Hutton stuff first, because the historical origins of Wicca as presented by Gardner are basically pure fiction, though they are what was at the time widely believed to be true due to the writings of Margaret Murray, and hence important for understanding the cultural environment in which Wicca arose.
To touch on the magical realism/becoming a witch experiential side of things, you could do considerably worse than to read:
- Phyllis Curott, Book of Shadows: A Modern Woman's Journey into the Wisdom of Witchcraft and the Magic of the Goddess (1999?) - a semi-fictionalized memoir about the author's year-long training (it ends at the point where she is about to be initiated) in the early 1980s in the original Minoan Sisterhood coven in Manhattan (which was an offshoot of Gardnerian Wicca).
- I also second the recommendation above of Starhawk's The Spiral Dance, though I would deprioritize Ray Buckland till you've read a lot of other stuff.
For juicy atmospheric stuff, some good books are:
- Doreen Valiente, Where Witchcraft Lives (1962) - a short personal exploration of witchcraft (mostly non-Wiccan) in Sussex, UK in the 1950s, by one of the founding High Priestesses of Gardnerian Wicca.
- Stewart Farrar, What Witches Do (1971) - a detailed behind-the-scenes account of the Wiccan coven run by Alex and Maxine Sanders as of 1970.
- Paul Huson, Mastering Witchcraft (1970) - an early how-to guide for the solitary witch, kinda lurid in a fun way but really solid magically (not Wicca, but it incorporates some Wiccan material).
If you have specific questions about British Traditional Wicca, ask initiates! The current best online space for that (in my opinion) is the British Traditional Wicca Discord server; MeMail me if you want the link.
*The great majority of us are neither gender-essentialist nor white-supremacist; here are a couple of YouTube channels [1, 2] of nonbinary Gardnerian Priestexes for your viewing pleasure.
posted by heatherlogan at 5:53 PM on June 1
Just to check - your main character is western culture raised and white? Because while there are western POC people doing all the magic discussed above, there is an enormous range of non-western and non-white magic traditions that exist and are actively practiced outside. I did some reading in three Asian magic traditions and they were all very different from the each other and western magic as well. It's also really common outside of the west to have magic practitioners who also combine another religious practice. All the advice above is great if you're writing in a western and mainly white narrative, but it will not extend to other cultures.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 7:42 PM on June 1 [2 favorites]
This is a few decades old but I think is relevant to your questions: Persuasions of the Witch's Craft by T. M. Luhrmann. Its relevance is that it talks about how (British) magicians and witches think from an outsider's POV. (It's not unsympathetic, either. Just it comes from the academic perspective, not the practitioner's perspective.)
posted by gentlyepigrams at 7:52 PM on June 1
I thought of a couple more things to suggest!
If podcasts are your jam, three excellent ones (which address Wicca as well as broader magical, cultural/seasonal, and ecstatic practices) are:
- Circle Talk 4 Witches - hosted by four Alexandrian coven leaders from three continents (come for the erudite content, stay for the adorable accents).
- Feast of Torches - hosted by a Gardnerian High Priest of Dominican ancestry; excellent interviews with practitioners of Black and Caribbean magical traditions.
- Seeking Witchcraft - the longest-running of the three, a real treasure trove of very accessible information, with lots of interviews.
And if your location is accurate and you're not afraid of being turned into a frog ;), you have the geographically-privileged opportunity to:
- chat with the staff at The Occult Shop; and
- experience a public ritual hosted by the Wiccan Church of Canada [not initiatory Wicca, but will give you the flavour of group NeoPagan Witchcraft practice].
posted by heatherlogan at 7:59 PM on June 1
A lot of witchcraft is based on the indigenous folk magic/religions of particular areas. Immigrants then carried those practices with them as they moved or were moved, and practices combined or morphed with local practices in the new area. That's why people are asking you about the ethnicity, culture, and race of your characters.
Obviously, people can decide to adopt folk traditions from cultures other than their own, but there are then all the questions of cultural appropriation that go along with that. It might be helpful to decide if that's something you want to incorporate or address. If not, you'd probably want to stick in general with folk traditions/magic that match your character's general racial categories.
posted by lapis at 8:11 PM on June 1 [1 favorite]
The book BlackLeotardFront describes above is Carlo Ginzburg's The night battles: Witchcraft and agrarian cults in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (1983), not The cheese and the worms, which focuses on the beliefs and reading practices of a 16th-century miller as revealed in his Inquisition trials. BLF gets the title wrong, but their synopsis of the book is accurate, especially the conclusion that "[historical European] witchcraft as commonly understood is in many ways an invention of the contemporary moral authorities."
Historical European and colonial American witchcraft beliefs, trials, and persecutions have been the subject of serious historical research for a half century now--though there are some important precursors, I'd peg the beginnings of sustained, increasingly detailed scholarship in late 60s/early 70s: Robert Mandrou, Magistrats et sorciers en France au 17e siècle (1968); Keith Thomas, Religion and the decline of magic (1971); Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum, Salem possessed: The social origins of witchcraft (1974); Norman Cohn, Europe’s inner demons: An enquiry inspired by the great witch-hunt (1975); and Richard Kieckhefer, European witch trials: Their foundation in popular and learned culture, 1300-1500. Literally thousands of scholarly articles and books have followed in their wake. A good recent collection of essays that provides an overview of this research is Brian P. Levack, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America (2015). A readable introduction focusing on England is James Sharpe, Instruments of darkness: Witchcraft in early modern England (1997). Wolfgang Behringer, Witches and witch-hunts: A global history (2004), is also useful, though still more focused on the European and North American cases than would be ideal--largely because that's where previous scholarship has focused, though anthropologists have long been interested in witchcraft (or analogous beliefs and practices), going back to E.E. Evans-Pritchard in the 1920s and 30s.
It's complicated, but a significant common thread in this literature is that the role of "witch" (usually but not always a woman) was almost always initially ascribed by others, as a way of explaining misfortune, even if in some cases a reputed witch might have drawn upon their reputation and come to accept at least part of the ascription. The witch hunts of the period c. 1550-1700, in which perhaps 100,000 accused witches were tried and about 50,000 put to death (rough estimates, due to the partial destruction of judicial records by accident and war), resulted from the encounter between people who truly believed that their neighbors had harmed them through malicious magic and a judicial apparatus that sought out people willing to make accusations or that took them seriously when they were made. Robin Briggs's Witches and neighbours (1996) gives a good overview of that dynamic.
Few people would have claimed the role of "witch" without substantial persuasion (including judicial torture), and the idea that early modern European witchcraft was an organized, pre- or anti-Christian nature religion, is the invention of 19th-century romantics (e.g., Jules Michelet), Catholic fanatics (especially Montague Summers), and amateur anthropologists. The most important of the latter was Margaret Murray, whose academic training was in Egyptology, but whose book The witch-cult in western Europe (1921) was hugely influential, including on early Wiccans, despite its flaws.
If you want an introduction to popular magic as it was actually practiced in early modern England, I'd recommend Owen Davies, Cunning-folk: Popular magic in English history (2003, confusingly republished in paperback in 2007 with a different title). Cunning folk were local magical practitioners who would help people find lost objects, heal injuries, and perform other forms of beneficial magic. While their practices were officially condemned by church and state authorities, they were in practice often widely tolerated. In many places, one of their roles was witch-finding: that is, identifying the alleged witch who was responsible for misfortune.
Tl;dr: There was no organized witchcraft in early modern England and colonial America. There were traditional magical practices, but those accused, tried, and punished for witchcraft were labeled witches by their neighbors and state or church authorities.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:29 AM on June 2 [1 favorite]
Thanks for the correction, brianogilvie. I was writing from memory and conflating the two.
You certainly got the full can of worms on this ask, orange swan! Lot of interesting reading here for anyone interested in history of witchcraft and magic.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 11:43 AM on June 2
Response by poster: My goodness, I am a little stunned by how very much there is to know. I expected the canon to be smaller than this.
I've put holds on some books from the Toronto Public Library that I think might be helpful:
-- The Oxford Illustrated History of Witchcraft and Magic, by Owen Davies,
-- A History of Magic, Witchcraft and the Occult, by Suzannah Lipscomb
-- The Modern Witchcraft Grimoire: Your complete guide to creating your own book of shadows, by Skye Alexander
-- Witchcraft: Tales, Beliefs, and Superstitions from the Maritimes, by Clary Croft.
And also a National Geographic DVD, Witchcraft: Myths and Legends.
That should do for a start, but this thread is definitely a valuable resource that I'll be using to guide my further research.
Thank you very much, everyone, for your helpful and informed suggestions.
posted by orange swan at 1:07 PM on June 5
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This is a really big umbrella like tell me about Christianity big umbrella ( okay not that big) especially when witchcraft isn't a super well defined term ( some people mean it to mean basically anything but a particular belief system, usually their own) and to others it can mean something incredibly specific.
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