One of the biggest features of the Halloween season are the presence of witches and magic. With their portrayals ranging from helpful hands in touch with the supernatural to spiteful beings out to curse humanity, the concept of witches has been loaded with many implications in both fact and fiction.
However, many witches across time share some similarities. Let’s take a brief look at the two examples below:
“But she with a newly cut spray of juniper, dipping and drawing untempered charms from her mystic brew, sprinkled his eyes, while she chanted her song; and all around the potent scent of the charm cast sleep” (Argonautica, Book 4)
and once again:
“Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.”
(from Macbeth by William Shakespeare)
These two pieces of literature are from time periods that are centuries apart, yet they both involve a witch creating charms and curses that emit a strong smell. As we take a look at how the identities of witches have evolved over the centuries, we can see how scent has been tied to the concept as well.
Sorcery and Spells: The First Origins
One distinction to make was that not all “magic” was considered negative. There are a few texts in the ancient world that reveal there were magicians that could foretell the future, summon the gods, and invoke miracles. Others would often create magical tools like talismans and amulets. These were often considered positive forms of magic as they were meant to ward off evil and provide protection. Most of the texts noted that these magicians were men.
Meanwhile, the moniker of “witches” has a significantly different connotation. Often, these witches were found in poems, literature, songs, and art. Their role in these tales were almost always antagonistic in some shape or form, and they were almost exclusively women. The characters in these works would often use herbs, perfumes, and other concoctions in order to achieve their ambitions, seduce men, or cast curses on others.
The fact that they were primarily women was partially due to the Greco-Roman beliefs about women. Often misogynistic in nature, witches were regarded as embodying the worst negative qualities of women – weaker in morals and strength, and prone to leading men astray. Some famous Roman figures, including Pliny the Elder and Ovid, suggested that perfumes and other cosmetics were tools used by women to charm men into doing things that they would not normally do.
As a result, this reflected in their artistic work as well. Medea (who is quoted above) is arguably the most notorious case of a woman using magic to pursue their own goals. Besides the incident where the scent of her charm put the dragon to sleep, she also uses sorcery and her herbalist skills to make potions of protection for Jason. More negative portrayals of her magic are shown when she uses the scent of herbs to ambush her own brother, and when she crafts a poisoned robe for Jason’s new bride after the man abandons her.
Circe from The Odyssey is another key example. While she does help out the hero Odysseus in the end, the entire arc is filled with tension and mistrust as she schemes to trap the men on her island. She is also portrayed as seductive with a vast knowledge in herbs and potions; the key example of this usage is when she makes a potion that turns the men on Odysseus’s crew into pigs. This knowledge is so ingrained into her identity that it is a Homeric epithet – polypharmakos, or “one who knows many drugs or charms”.
From these two examples it can be deduced that the Greeks and Romans saw women who had too much knowledge of herbs, scents, and perfumes as untrustworthy. Someone who was well-versed in scents was often associated with being unscrupulous and seductive, using their wiles to derail the goals of men.
Christianity and the State: The Persecution of Witches and the Connection to Sulfur
While those early depictions of witches and their association with scent were already rooted in a mix of misogyny and distrust, depictions grew more negative once Christianity spread across Europe. During this time period, women performed many domestic duties. This included caring for the sick and the livestock, and it often required a high understanding of herbal remedies and medicines. However, due to environmental and social factors mortality rates were high. This led to women often being scapegoated for these deaths, where one of the outcomes was being accused and then executed for witchcraft. Others were accused of being witches due to personal grudges or due to being perceived as outcasts – women who didn’t conform to social norms or lacked a key role in mainstream society were regarded with more suspicion.
Christianity fueled these factors as they brought in a religious stigma against women who fit into these categories as well. First, as a newer system that brought a newer set of rules, witchcraft accusations were a convenient way of disempowering women who had knowledge, land, or power. It also created a sense of solidarity among those who were Christians, and generated suspicion towards those who were not Christians. Finally, Christianity came with new beliefs of what a witch looked like.
This is where the smell factor comes in. not only were the smell of herbs still seen as a sign of engaging in potions making and witchcraft, but there was also the new association of witches with sulfur. This is due to the fact that many texts associated sulfur (or brimstone, as it was referred to in the texts) with demons and hellfire. These beliefs tied witchcraft to demonic activity, and so witches themselves became associated with sulfur.
One important fact to know is that while the Middle Ages did have some witch trials, the witch hunts themselves originated in the Renaissance. The matter of witches became matters of state, which changed the scope of the trials. One instance of this is through Jean Bodin's work on witchcraft, particularly his 1580 book Démonomanie des sorciers (The Demon-Mania of Witches). In his four book series, he includes descriptions of spirits, magic, witches, and legal policy regarding these subjects. The last part is particularly important since many societies eventually viewed the problem of witches as a problem that would harm society, ultimately culminating in the witch hunts between the 15th and 18th centuries.
Once again, scent played an important role. Perfumery was very popular during this era so the use of scents was commonplace, especially among upper classes. As a result, sulfur aside specific smells were targeted less, and the act of witchcraft was more involved in the powers that were “concocted” as a result of making perfumes, medicines, incense, and brews. Cultural works would reinforce this notion too – as seen with Shakespeare’s passage above, witches were portrayed as beings that experimented with the uncanny, the vulgar, and the taboo.
Eventually, the witch hunts died down due to a combination of factors. The more the witch hunts went on, the more skeptical people became of their accuracy. Later, as the principles of rationality and the Age of Enlightenment took root, belief in magic and witches began to die down. As a result, the labor women did as midwives, herbalists, and healers were regarded with less suspicion. Though it was gradual, intellectuals promoted reason and science as principles society should follow instead.
To briefly summarize, times of religious extremism, political and social tensions, and wariness of the “other” led to many women being accused of witchcraft. These women were often persecuted relentlessly on account of baseless accusations. One of the factors that led to their ill treatment was due to perceived smell. This perception was based on both the earlier associations of witches and herbs, as well as the newfound belief that witches, demons, and sulfur were all connected.
Witches Today
Arguably, the status of witches today encompasses a bit of everything from its storied history. Unfortunately, accusations of witchcraft are still present in some countries, which can lead to women being arrested or subjected to mob violence. Organizations like Amnesty International and the United Nations currently track these patterns as part of a wider issue of violence against women.
Other countries like the United States witches have reinvented what it means to be a witch. Modern witches exist, with many of them following the principles of Wicca (a modern pagan movement). Meanwhile, many scholars are challenging the negative connotations of being a witch. Instead, many of the witches in literature and art are now viewed under feminist lenses, featuring interpretations that are far more sympathetic to the struggles these fictional women endured in their stories. One such example in the past decade is Madeline Miller’s “irce, where the author dives into Circe’s background and evolution in more depth in an attempt to make her more nuanced and sympathetic to audiences.
Pop culture has made strides to explore witches in various ways too, making them more ubiquitous. TV series like Charmed, American Horror Story: Coven, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina are some examples that feature witches in the past few decades. More recently, the remakes of Wicked have taken the internet by storm, sparking art and other ideas in their fanbase (the book that it was based on, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire was also a positive reinterpretation of witches as well). And of course, every Halloween it is very common to see people dress up as witches, or feature witch-themed décor in their yards.
Finally, people have been finding new inspiration in witches and the scents they’re associated with. One instance of this is through the work done to reclaim witches and scents. Companies use the name of witches and the scents of herbs and spices they were associated with. However, this time it is not as a mark of stigma or shame. Instead, to wear a witch-inspired fragrance is to wear something that shows how witches are beings that are confident in themselves and take pride in the work they do.