When I hear the word witch, a specific image is conjured up in my mind: old, probably short and bends down a lot, a long nose and a wart or two on her face. This image of a witch has been drilled into me since childhood through different fairy tales. It was only as I grew older, I was able to see that a witch was essentially someone who did not fit the conventional standards of what society deems appropriate to be a women.This subsequently sent me down a rabbit hole of different types of witches and it seems that every culture has a name for theirs. Let’s go through a few, shall we?
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1.Baba Yaga
Found in slavic folklore, she is known to imprison and eat children in her hut that is apparently built on chicken legs with her choice of transport being a mortar and a pestle. While she seems similar to the witch from Hansel and Gretel, there is no apparent connection between them. Her story seems as a cautionary tale for children to prevent them from running off alone in the forest. The modern Russian equivalent of her name is grandmother witch and once again points to how society deems single, old and women without children to be dangerous. I must point out that she is not always seen as evil and sometimes helps people in their quest. Interestingly even though she is seen as dangerous, she is increasingly being perceived as a symbol of female independence.
2. BrujerĂa
This term originates from a mix of Latin, Native and African beliefs which included Catholic beliefs and herbalism. Accusations of practicing spells were hurled at anyone who seemed even slightly suspicious and this often included widows, spinsters and even midwives.The spells ranged from winning their husband’s affection to catching thieves using everyday ingredients like herbs,coal,chocolate.These accusations landed the women in jail or exile.This is reminiscent of the salem trials where certain illnesses which could have been explained by logic and reason were often blamed on the most vulnerable target that is a women from marginalised community. An article states how the student perceives her heritage flipping the negative connotations of the word and instead remembering the healing power of the women.
3.Mchawi
Originating in Tanzania, it is a term for witches who again are mostly older women. The telltale sign being women having red eyes. Now, the logical conclusion seems to be that old women who have spent years tolling away in the kitchen have red eyes due to the smoke produced from cooking with firewood. However, it was instead used as a sign to accuse women of witchcraft and…murder them. Anything that seems even slightly mysterious be it a death or a failed harvest was blamed on these specific women because how could someone of old age even begin to defend themself? And then they were executed. Projects have been launched to raise awareness about this amongst the community while also providing social support to the women so that they have a means to protect themselves.
4.Dayaan
Found in the tribal villages of Jharkhand,this is once again a term for women who were blamed for a failed crop, mysterious illness or unexplainable death. A study identified that Land-owning women, especially single and/or old women and widows are the usual targets during witch-hunts in a bid to usurp their land and other monetary resources under the guise of witch-hunting.They were then hunted and abused by these witch doctors called ojhas/badwas. While acts are being introduced to protect these women, there is a long way to go before these witch hunts stop occurring in the villages.
Each culture has a different name and persona for what they call a witch but the similarities are too hard to ignore. Anything which might seem unexplainable to people is blamed on supernatural causes and these supernatural causes are blamed on the ones who the community finds suspicious. Unfortunately the suspicion is placed on women: women who don’t fit the mold society has put in place for them. If they are not young, married, or have kids then they are going against every societal norm in place. This independence scares the community making it easy to blame them for any unexplainable incidents because how would one even begin to defend themselves. I just want to leave you with this quote that Halsey said, “I’m here to say that I’m not sorry for being… inconvenient. You were not put on this earth to make everybody else’s life easier. So please, be inconvenient.” All these fairytales taught us to be scared of witches but maybe they were not these scary villains we were led to believe, maybe they were just…women.