Why are witches uniquely compelling as figures in history? (Guest Post by Zsofia Lazar)

They hold the power to both hurt and heal; to wreak havoc and restore. They are figures of both good and evil, and so hold all the capacity in the world for the reader to identify with. Morgan Le Fay, for example, was said to be a powerful and ambitious sorceress. Hermione Granger, in contrast, shares similar traits, but equally uses those talents for good, and so epitomises the idea of the wise woman who helps the hero along on his quest. The image of the woman who helps the man to succeed through magic can be seen in hundreds of stories: Circe in the Odyssey, Baba Yaga in Russian myths, and even Zatanna in the DC comics. 

These narratives have been present for centuries. Witches, if not controlled or actively using their power for good to further a ‘moral’ cause, have been ostracised, persecuted and burned. From the 16th century onwards, women across Europe were branded witches and killed for many different reasons - some for the crime of knowing too much, and some for the crime of nothing at all. Witch burnings reached their peak in the 17th century, where trials by fire and water, or stonings, were commonplace. The first systematic European witch-hunt began in Valais, Switzerland, in 1428, which lasted for eight years and resulted in the deaths of 367 people. In Hungary, in contrast, witch hunts took place over shorter periods, but were no less brutal, dying out towards the end of the 18th century in Hungary. This included the Szeged witch burnings of 1728, on a little peninsula on the banks of the Danube. The villagers, blaming the years of bad weather and famine on witchcraft, burned 13 people on the Boszorkánysziget (‘Witch Island’), a strip of land and forest that stretched out into the river, which was thereafter said to be haunted by the voices of those burned there. 

‘Witchsong’ attempts to reconcile these ideas of witches as figures in a period that is traditionally associated with modernity and innovation - the Industrial Revolution, in a non-western, central-Eastern European setting. The world of Zöldgömb reflects the historical transition that Hungary went through from a mostly agricultural society, reliant on and appreciative of the earth, into a world that prioritises progress, technology and ‘enlightenment’ in a brutal, exclusionary way. It uses the act of witch ‘burning’ as a way of excluding minorities that have typically been oppressed in history, and questions the religious zeal that, despite the progress of ‘rational thought’ in the Enlightenment, persisted. 

Hungarian folklore plays a large part in the book both in the ‘settler’ ideology, which in turn mirrors the mythical conquest of the Carpathian basin by the Hungarians, as well as the folk tales that are still alive and well in Hungary today such as the myth of the Pelikánmadár, a mysterious singing bird that brings youth to those who hear its song, to the Turul bird, the symbol of the royal house of Hungary, to even the lidérc, a demon that steals your life force. In these folk tales, witches were sometimes shown as evil beings, servants of the devil or demons, or wise women, helpers, and even princesses in disguise. They had a thousand faces (sometimes literally), and each was a lense through which disobedient, sometimes rebellious or cursed women could be seen. This may in some ways have been a substitute for Pagan Hungarian mythology, which mentions witches as servants of the Devil, and was thought to corrupt animals and bring illness. Though the pagan tradition has not been widespread in Hungary since the introduction of Christianity in 1000 AD, traditional ceremonies and beliefs gave strength to those elemental gods that have been pictured in many Hungarian cultural epics such as the Szélatya, Boldogasszony, Hadúr and Napkirály. Spiritual figures and shamans, named Táltos in Hungarian mythology, were able to channel the energies of these gods and navigate, in their dreams, the places between the Upper World, where such gods dwelt, to the Middle World, where humans live, and to the Lower World, hell, where the Devil and demons live. Connecting them all was the World Tree, a concept which may seem similar to Norse mythology. The Tree of Life, as it is otherwise known, is a motif that has survived the fall of paganism and is present in many iterations throughout Hungarian tales, showing up in stories such as ‘Az Égigérő Fa’ (‘The Tree that Reached the Sky’) and others. Though, as previously mentioned, witches were often seen in mythology as servants of evil, ’Witchsong’ imbues witches with the powers of these gods, connected as they are to the earth and nature, and gives their powers a material link with their physical world.

As a result, witches remain full of the potential for both good and evil in ‘Witchsong’, but they are also completely human. They may wield the elements, but only by the grace of others who are divine; they retain the grey morality of those necessary decisions that we must make in our day-to-day lives. This allows them to be both the archetypal ‘wise women’, but also characters that grow and fail, are driven by a variety of different goals, and who are flawed. They keep all the traits that make a witch so fascinating to the reader, and which have captured audiences’ imaginations as far back as Shakespearean England, Ancient Greece, and Medieval Europe. Readers love them for what they could be: they contain the world and all its magic, and make the impossible possible.

About the Author: 

Zsofia Lazar is a London-based writer and legal and compliance analyst. A graduate of UCL and holder of an MA in Law, she draws inspiration from modern history and Hungarian folklore. Her writing blends cultural, historical, and fantastical themes influenced by her studies and lifelong love of storytelling. 

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