witch (word)

The word ''witch'' derives from the Old English nouns ('male witch, warlock') and ('female witch'). The word's further origins in Proto-Germanic and Proto-Indo-European are unclear.

History

Throughout history there has not been a consistent definition of the term ''witch''. Johannes Nider and other 15th century writers used the Latin term to mean witch—a person who performed , harmful acts of sorcery, against others. The witch hunts of medieval Europe differed from pre-Christian practices in condemning the witch as a moral corruption, rather than focusing on whether the act of sorcery was harmful, expanding the customary understanding of the concept. The introduction of the idea of demonic forces empowering the acts of gave the term ''witch'' new connotations of idolatry and apostasy that were adopted by , but these remained disputed despite papal injunctions to take action against witches.

Germanic etymology

The Old English verb has a cognate in Middle Low German (attested from the 13th century, besides 'to bewitch'). The further etymology of this word is problematic. It has no clear cognates in Germanic outside of English and Low German, and there are numerous possibilities for the Indo-European root from which it may have been derived.

*The OED states that the noun is "apparently" deverbal (derived from ), but for the verb merely states that it is "of obscure origin".
*Grimm, connects the " Ingvaeonic word" with Gothic 'sacred' ( Proto-Indo European (PIE) 'to separate, to divide', probably via early Germanic practices of cleromancy such as those reported by Tacitus).
*Grimm also considers 'to curve, bend' (which became 'hop, dance') and 'to move' (in a sense of 'to make mysterious gestures').
*R. Lühr connects 'prophetic, mantic', 'to practice divination' (Middle Low German 'bewitch', 'soothsayer') and suggests Proto-Germanic , geminated (c.f. Kluge's law) to . The basic form would then be the feminine, < < with palatalization due to the preceding ''i'' and the following ''*æ'' < ''*ōn'' in early Ingvaeonic. The palatal ''-cc-'' in would then be analogous to the feminine.
**An alternative possibility is to derive the palatal directly from the verb < . Lühr conversely favours derivation of this verb from the noun.
*'' The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'' connects PIE 'rouse' (English ''wake''), and offers the Proto-Germanic reconstruction 'one who wakes the dead'.

From Old to Modern English

The Middle English word did not differentiate between feminine and masculine, however the masculine meaning became less common in Standard English, being replaced by words like " wizard" and " warlock". The modern spelling ''witch'' with the medial 't' first appears in the 16th century. In current colloquial English ''witch'' is almost exclusively applied to women, and the OED has "now only dialectal" for the masculine noun.

Figurative use to refer to a bewitching young girl begins in the 18th century, while ''wiche'' as a contemptuous term for an old woman is attested since the 15th century. "A witch of Endor" (alluding to ) as a fanciful term for a medium appears in 19th-century literature.

The meaning "an adherent of Wicca" (male or female) is due to Gerald Gardner's purported " Witch Cult", and now appears as a separate meaning of the word also in mainstream dictionaries. For example, ''Merriam-Webster'' currently distinguishes four meanings of the noun ''witch'',
:1. "a person (especially a woman) who is credited with having usually malignant supernatural powers"
:2. "a practitioner of witchcraft especially in adherence with a neo-pagan tradition or religion (such as Wicca)"
:3. "a mean or ugly old woman: hag crone"
:4. "a charming or alluring girl or woman"

Other suggestions for the underlying root are untenable or widely rejected:
* Grimm reject a connection with 'speak', suggested by P. Lessiak (ZfDA 53, 1912).
* Walter William Skeat derived the word from PIE , Old English 'wise man, wizard' and 'to know', considering it a corruption of an earlier . No Old English spelling with ''-t-'' is known, and this etymology is not accepted today.
*Robert Graves in his 1948 ''The White Goddess'', in discussing the willow which was sacred to the Greek goddess Hecate, connects the word to a root which connotes bending or pliance, by saying: "Its connection with witches is so strong in Northern Europe, that the words 'witch' and 'wicked' are derived from the same ancient word for willow, which also yields 'wicker'." This confounds English and Scandinavian evidence, since the ''weak'' root in English has no connection with willows, and Old Norse has no word for ''witch'' cognate to the English.

Old English

Old English also had 'witch, fury', whence Modern English ''hag'', of uncertain origin, but cognate to German , from an Old High German , Proto-Germanic ( OED), perhaps from a 'to mar, damage', meaning 'field-damager' (the suggestion of Grimm). The element ''hag-'' originally means 'fence, wooden enclosure', and hence also 'enclosed fields, cultivated land'.

Other Old English synonyms of and include , , .

The Old English plural form for both the masculine and feminine nouns was ('witches') and was 'witchcraft'. The earliest recorded use of the word is in the ''Laws of Ælfred'', which date to about 890:

In the homilies of the Old English grammarian Ælfric, dating to the late 10th century we find:

In both these examples is the plural noun, not an adjective. The adjective ('foul') can mean 'physically unclean' as well as 'morally or spiritually unclean' or 'wicked'.

In Old English glossaries the words and are used to gloss such Latin terms as , , , and , all of which mean 'diviner, soothsayer', which suggests a possible role of fortune-teller for the witch in Anglo-Saxon times.

The word is associated with animistic healing rites in Halitgar's Latin Penitential where it is stated that
:Some men are so blind that they bring their offering to earth-fast stone and also to trees and to wellsprings, as the witches teach, and are unwilling to understand how stupidly they do or how that dead stone or that dumb tree might help them or give forth health when they themselves are never able to stir from their place.

The phrase ('as the witches teach') seems to be an addition to Halitgar's original, added by an 11th-century Old English translator. Petterson cites Halitgar's Penitential, II.22, as in Die Altenglische Version des Halitgar'schen Bussbuches, ed. Raith, p29; quoted in North, Richard, ''Heathen Gods in Old English Literature'', Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1997, p. 276.

Other languages

Dutch has a few fairly common words that are related to English ''witch'', such as ('dowsing rod') and ( astrologer).

See also

* Etymology of Wicca

Notes

Further reading

* Includes a table of Old English laws on perjury, magic, ''lybblac'', secret murder, prostitution and idol worship listing terms used in each law.

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Etymology
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English words