Magic is the unspoken reason for everything, as any schooling witch and wizard would know. Following the introduction of the 1692 International Statue of Secrecy, which sent Wizardkind into hiding and forced us to adapt to the Muggle way of life, our place in the history of mankind has been hidden from the Muggle historians, who did not even witness the celebrations following the Second Wizarding War and whose history books explain the “unexplainable”—those things of which magic is the real cause—by citing unseen forces that can manipulate the natural balance of life. The magical community has succumbed to the dire fact that, despite our memorable and very influential contribution to mankind, it would be best that we keep it a secret from our non-magic counterparts. Although human effort is still very important, magic has played its part in shaping human society.

But then, what is magic? Young wizarding children know about magic even before they mutter a word. Magic is a term used to describe both the good and the bad.

According to renowned magical historian Augustus Racscol, magic is actually

‘…nature’s ability to provide humans with the power to manipulate and modify conditions accordingly. It is a gift blessed to witches and wizards alone for they hold the knowledge and wisdom to use it to aid and not to destroy.’

It is upon this statement that wizard historians and researchers base all their premises and discoveries about magic. The primary goal of every witch and wizard is to promote the continuity of the human race by ‘tweaking’ the balance of nature in an effort to give non-magic beings the chance to survive and propagate their society.

Magical historians believe that magic has its roots long before the documentation of human existence. Wizard scholars have devoted their lives to the search and rescue of our ancient lineage. Quite a number of discoveries have been made in mountain ranges in the Himalayas and the Canadian mountains where wizard archaeologists have uncovered cave dwellings that depict signs of magical influence in the lives of the dwellers that used to live there. It was believed that the caves dated back to the time of the Great Lizards, a time when man first emerged on earth. Magic always leaves traces, and the caves were full of magical presence. In Professor Utoipius Black’s book Uncovering Magic, he shares an instance during his excavations in a Russian mountainside, where one of the necklaces that were left inside the caves attempted to strangle the wizard who touched it. It appeared to have been bewitched with an Anti-Thievery spell, so that only the owner could touch it. Magic was present long before man, but it needed man to be harnessed into something useful and practical.

Wizards have always been an influence to society-building. In the country of Vietnam in 1975, when the Vietnam war ended, a group of Vietnamese wizards, known to magical history as the ‘Viet năm,’ who sought sanctuary in the country of India returned and helped stabilize the crippled government, making reforms and assisting the populace with their uncanny and almost impossible feats. They do not appear in any Vietnamese history books because they went against the government’s decision to install a single-party state. They were exiled back to India where they are currently residing.

As future society-builders, young wizards must immerse themselves in our history and enhance the development of Wizarding kind. Our success as a society lies in our ability to promote our good values and hinder the growth of our bad beings. Indeed, the magical community, like any other community, is prone to success and failure, but knowledge of our past will prepare us for future endeavours. An example of this would be the Wand Wars during the 1500s. Many witches and wizards died in an effort to protect the ancient secrets of wandlore from the Muggles who sought to acquire it. Witch-hunting was rampant then, and the fate of our treasured wands was left to the hands of our able wizard ancestors who ran into hiding, while their wives, sisters, daughters sacrificed their lives for their escape.

Wizards can be traced back to the very beginnings of mankind, even during the time of the Neanderthals. Displays in the Australian museum of magic show rock paintings of people in loincloths brandishing one regular arm and one long, oddly-shaped arm. Australian wizards have studied their Aboriginal ancestors and their acquisition of what looks suspiciously like a wizard’s wand. Professor Milano Sundarian of the Australian Academy for Magic has always believed that magic was first born in the Australian outbacks, but was it really?

In the 17th century, up north in the mountains of the Himalayas, a team of European wizards set up a campsite, initially to observe the habitat of the Yeti, and discovered remains of an ancient tunnel that led deep into the mountain, where it is believed that Himalayan wizards had set up a community before abandoning it for unknown causes. The tunnels date back to the time of the Ice Age. What kind of wizards lived in these tunnels? Were they as advanced as their Australian counterparts?

Research is still ongoing to predict the moment that the first wizard came to life. Theories have been proposed over the years, but none have yet proved the period when the first wizard emerged. There are three controversial theories that have their supporters and their detractors.

The Uno Mas Theory

The Uno Mas Theory is the most popular of all theories of Wizarding beginning. The theory implies that all magical blood came from one man who was christened Uno Mas. Uno Mas was born at the Time of the Reptiles, which Muggles call Dinosaurs. He was a stocky, built man with a head shaped like a gorilla’s head. He slouched and walked dragging his abnormally long limbs on the ground. Uno Mas manifested the same communication traits as those who lived during his time, communicating in grunts and pokes. Some theorists believe that Trolls also stem from Uno Mas but have not evolved as quickly as wizards did.

Unlike the Muggle men of that time, Uno Mas had a keen sense of discovery. He would pick up pieces of wood and stone and fashion them into items which, at that time, meant nothing, but were the beginning of the wizards’ aspiring quality to improve and to develop. While the Muggle men focused more on food acquisition and mating, Uno Mas was busy creating many things. Some believe he developed the first wheel, but no solid proof has been found to back up this claim.

The theory also explains that Uno Mas made the first wand. Stories have circulated that it came from the bonfire from which fire began. Others say that it belonged to a very high, prehistoric tree, a branch from which Uno Mas picked up and threw, frustrated that the fruit did not fall when he shook the tree, hitting a fruit and causing it to fall. Full details about the Theory of Uno Mas can be found in The First Wizard: Uno Mas, written by renowned wizard archaeologist, William Marangue. Its counterpart, The Anti-Uno Mas Theory, written by wizard activist Josiah Loppet, also sheds some light on the theory’s shortcomings.

The Great Migration Theory

As seen in animal behaviour, migration is a normal survival method. Migratory routes As seen in animal behaviour, migration is a normal survival method. Migratory routes have been monitored to discover the whereabouts of our wizard ancestors’ birthplaces and their burial grounds. In this theory, wizards, unaware of their abilities and still mingling with the Muggles in an effort to survive the natural conditions, would travel with them to wherever the food source would travel. Sometime during the Descent of Blizz, called by Muggles “the Ice Age,” these wizards, having discovered their unique gift, set up their own group, left their non-magical brethren, and began their own journey around the world. They still followed the migratory routes, which are still being researched by wizards and Muggles alike, but the wizards’ tracks lead into non-existence.

In 1535, a Chinese explorer named Ho Mao Tseng followed these tracks before stopping in the middle of a deserted area in the shadow of the Swiss Alps. At the time, Prior Incantato had not yet been invented, so Tseng only deduced that the entire group died in an avalanche, but in the early 1800s, a group of Gringotts’ curse breakers unearthed the spells that hid their lair from the world. An underground chamber, much like the Himalayan tunnel, was discovered, and a few artefacts remained intact, encased in a block of ice. Tools, clothing, and a few of their other items held magical properties, including a vanishing cloak that held a number of diricrawl feathers and unicorn horns made into necklaces. Bodies were never found, but it is believed that these ancient wizards abandoned the tunnel and decided to go their separate ways and thus created the societies that exist today.

The Theory of Hocus Pocus

The Theory of Uno Mas focuses on the first wizard. The Theory of Hocus Pocus focuses on the first encounter with magic. According to historians of the Brussels Museum of Ancient Magical History, magic was first encountered even before that fateful first controlled fire. The museum has a very broad collection of ancient note-taking materials and documents. Markings were written on bark, and researchers constantly make new discoveries for every new piece of evidence given to them. One tree bark told the story of how men chose their women, and it wasn’t the Muggle interpretation of hitting your woman with a giant club and dragging her by her hair. It was actually a very simple test. Women prefer strong men, so naturally, the strongest man would have his pick of women to choose from. However, men of that time also wanted a particular kind of woman: submissive, but with a great deal of talent. The writing goes on to say that it was the women who chose the men by presenting their chosen mate a tamed man-eating, giant lizard. At that time, women were naturally gifted with the power of persuasion. The woman with the most powerful sense of persuasion, the one who could win the heart of a man-eating, giant lizard and live to show it off to her future in-laws, would gain the honour of claiming that man. Muggles who were able to decipher the tree barks were considered mad or ‘loony,’ and thus, this theory gained little support from the Muggles who believe that magic exists.

Young wizards should bear in mind that without magic, there would be no witch or wizard, and it should be given great respect and used for the promotion of the human race.

The indigenous peoples of the Americas, also known as Native Americans, were a highly diverse group of people, spanning from what is now modern Canada down to what is now modern Chile and Argentina. All of these societies had integrated tribes of both magic and non-magic (“Muggle”) peoples, with witches and wizards holding traditionally important roles in their communities. Of particular interest to magical history are the Clovis culture throughout the Americas, the Olmec peoples of Mexico, and the Maya of southern Mexico and northern Central America. The customs, cultures, and histories of each of these tribes are varied and rich. This section will provide an introduction to the influences that witches and wizards have had on these cultures and how these cultures have influenced current magical communities, particularly in the areas that the tribes were formerly concentrated.

Migration to the Americas

The first peoples were believed to have migrated to the Americas between 28,000 and 10,000 B.C.E. Muggles commonly believe that the first peoples migrated from Asia to a far-northern part of North America by a land bridge that has since been covered by the modern day Bering Strait. Magical historians agree on this point as the migration occurred prior to the invention of broomsticks and before the development of the Apparition method of transportation. It is, however, believed by prominent magical historians that the migration would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible, without witches and wizards who assisted the ancient Muggles by providing Healings, multiplying existing food supplies, and using a primitive Point Me spell for navigational support. Once in the Americas, the peoples migrated across the entirety of the North and South American continents, creating separate civilisations with different cultures and belief systems, but in all of them, high importance was placed on the magical peoples in the communities, partly because of the help that primitive witches and wizards gave to their Muggle companions on the journey.

Clovis Culture

The Clovis people are widely believed to have been the very first people to live in the Americas, though there is some recent debate among Muggles as to the accuracy of that fact, due to new Muggle dating methods in the field of ‘science.’ The noted magical historians who specialise in ancient times remain of the persuasion that the Clovis were, in fact, the first civilisation in the Americas that involved witches and wizards. The name ‘Clovis’ is fairly recent, originating in the 1930s with discoveries of various artefacts by Muggle archaeologists. While witches and wizards had pre-existing evidence of the existence of these people, to minimise confusion, magical historians chose to adopt the Muggle name for records. In this way, the study of history can be unencumbered by the barrier between magic and non-magic communities. The hope is that this will give future magical historians the option of using Muggle records to solidify and expand their knowledge, because, as science improves, it has proven more and more useful to the field of history for both magic and non-magic peoples.

The Clovis peoples are known to have used both bone and ivory for tools; bone is believed to have been a Muggle idea, but the use of ivory appears to stem from Wizarding contributions in an effort to encourage their Muggle counterparts to use every part of slain animals, including the tusks of woolly mammoths. Many magical historians believe that, in addition, it was a primitive wizard who suggested the woolly mammoth as possible prey, offering his skills in magic to his fellow men to take down the mighty beast. Some magical historians believe that, without the aid of magic, Muggles would have been unable to kill such huge animals, though this is a source of contention among many historians who debate whether witches and wizards give less credit than is possibly due to Muggle peoples.

The Clovis people migrated all across North and South America and settled in many areas. Eventually, however, they began to decline. Magical historians believe that the decline was due to a combination of a decreased availability of megafauna, or big game, such as mastodons in the Americas, and a massive climatic cooling that made it difficult for the non-magic peoples to survive. While witches and wizards could perform simple Warming Charms, the Muggles often died due to complications of the cold, and the witches and wizards dispersed into other populations of people over time. When the Clovis people died out, some of their culture lived on in other primitive American peoples, but it was not until the 1930s that Muggles finally gave a name to this first culture that migrated across two vast continents.

Olmec Peoples

The Olmec was the first major civilisation in Mexico. The Olmec peoples lived in the tropical lowlands of south-central Mexico, where now are the modern-day states of Veracruz and Tabasco. The civilisation thrived during what is called the Mesoamerican Formative period, from about 1,500 B.C.E. to 400 B.C.E. From as early as 2,500 B.C.E., pre-Olmec civilisations had thrived in this area, but the Olmec did not really come into their own until 1,600 B.C.E. to 1,500 B.C.E.

Importantly, the Olmec had a very structured society, far more so than the more ancient Clovis peoples, who seem to have been less hierarchal. The Olmec were one of the first civilisations, along with the Maya (to be discussed below), to put witches and wizards in their own elite class of people within their communities, above the artisan, labourer, and farming classes.

In the Olmec civilisation, witches and wizards made up the top two elite classes—the ruling class and the shaman class—and were just above the Muggle priest class. The ruling class was seen to have a direct link to deities worshipped by the Olmec, but many of these perceived links to the gods are thought now to have been accidental magic by young witches and wizards in the Olmec society. When these young people, with no control over their abilities, accidentally showed their magic, it was seen as a direct act by the gods to acknowledge them as the next ruler, and because even witches and wizards had very little knowledge of where their power came from at the time, it was widely believed to be divine intervention. Magical historians, through ancient records, have found this to be the most likely explanation as to how rulers with what were assumed to be direct links with gods were chosen, though there is still some debate among leading experts.

The witches and wizards of the Olmec had a love of jade, obsidian, and magnetite luxury goods. Some evidence exists that points to witches and wizards using these materials in symbolic shapes for magical assistance, to enhance their power with the help of natural substances. Indeed, there have even been primitive obsidian- and jade-topped wands found by magical historians, though current research shows that these decorative tips may have actually inhibited magical power in the wands rather than enhanced it. Magnetite was a common material used for mortars and pestles by witches and wizards in the Olmec culture for it was believed that it enhanced the potency of draughts, but it has since been proven that, while some materials do work better with potions, magnetite is not one of them and that this was merely a superstition among the Olmec people based on the shininess and prettiness of the material.

The Great Pyramid is the most important feature of the Olmec people and marks one of the most important influences that witches and wizards had on the Muggles in Mexico at that time. Today, it is 112 feet tall and conical in shape, but when it was originally built, it was rectangular with stepped sides and inset corners. This pyramid was the largest Mesoamerican structure, and it would not have happened without magical assistance. To this day, Muggles puzzle over wonders such as the pyramids, but magical historians know that magic peoples helped the non-magic peoples of the time build tributes to their mutual gods. Primitive witches and wizards used sorcery to lighten the loads of Muggle labourers and also to help perfect the shape and symmetry of such monuments. The Great Pyramid was the largest Muggle-magic collaboration in the Olmec civilisation.

A large part of culture is art, and the Olmec had a striking artistic feature that makes their artefacts stand out from other art from the time period: they made colossal heads, often over 9 feet tall. While Muggles have puzzled over this for centuries, magical historians know that this is another important example of the influence that witches and wizards had on their Muggle tribesmen. Witches and wizards had encouraged idolisation of the head because they had already come to understand that the brain was what separated humans from animals, and the witches and wizards of the day believed that there were key differences in the brains of magic and non-magic peoples that separated them in terms of ability.

Between 400 B.C.E. and 350 B.C.E., the Olmec civilisation faded. Muggle research points to the reasons for this being mostly environmental, but many magical historians are of the belief that the magic and non-magic peoples of the Olmec ceased to exist together as peacefully as they had before. Some evidence points to the non-magic peoples choosing to branch out and live separate from the ruling and shaman classes, but, after such reliance on magical help in every aspect of life–from agriculture to building to medicinal needs–they found themselves woefully unprepared. The magic peoples, likely insulted by the insinuation that their peers no longer wanted their help, had moved on by the time that the Muggles changed their minds, and the Olmec society fell apart, their decline sped up by the environmental changes that Muggle science says is the main reason behind the Olmec decline.

Maya Peoples

The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilisation that occupied southern Mexico and northern Central America around the same time that the Olmec culture was thriving in south-central Mexico. However, the Mayan culture lasted much longer, having had their zenith in the Common Era (C.E.), and are, in fact, still in existence today. The Maya are noted for being the only Mesoamerican civilisation to have had a fully formed written language and also for significant mathematical, architectural, artistic, and astronomical advances, much of which can be attributed to the Wizarding influence in Mayan culture.

The Mayan civilisation can be divided into several historical blocks of time. Of interest in this chapter are the Early Preclassic period, which covers roughly from 2,000 B.C.E. to 1,000 B.C.E., and the Middle Preclassic period, which spans from 1,000 B.C.E. to 400 B.C.E.

The Early Preclassic period is significant because this marks the time when the Mayan peoples began to change their lifestyle from hunter-gatherer nomadic peoples to agricultural village societies. Magical historians are of the belief that this gradual change was, in part, due to the magic peoples in the Mayan culture who found it more profitable to plant food than chase after it. It is believed that the witches and wizards in the Mayan civilisation used their magic to assist the Muggles in their farming and benefited from such by being able to use extra ingredients in their potions, an art the Mayan witches and wizards were very interested in advancing, but had been unable to do so properly when their people had been constantly moving from place to place.

Due to the proximity of the Olmec, the two fledgling civilisations traded with each other and each influenced the other. Both societies had written systems, though the Mayan system was more advanced and based on phonetics rather than symbols that represented ideas (like Egyptian hieroglyphs), and both made important mathematical and astronomical advances; both civilisations used the concept “zero” and both used calendars.

By the year 1,000 B.C.E., the Middle Preclassic period had begun. The society had become more complex as it developed roots in a community rather than moving about as nomads. Luxury goods for the elite began to surface, such as jade mosaics and, notably, obsidian mirrors. Magical historians believe that ancient wizards experimenting with the art of Divination used these mirrors as primitive scrying tools. There is evidence that they were very popular among the “fortune-tellers” of the day, though current Diviners would have laughed at such a material being used for Divination today. During this period, the Olmec were at their cultural zenith, their highest point, and the Maya were on their way up. The relations between the two trading civilisations is thought to have been positive as the Maya were heavily influenced by Olmec culture, in everything from diet (maize and, notably, the cocoa plant) to worship (jaguars were central to both religions), and even language.

The architecture of the Mayan civilisation was fairly advanced for the time period. Most important to magical history is the notion that the temples and pyramids of Mayan civilisation were remodelled every 52 years, in accordance to their calendar. Muggles have speculated on this and are, to date, unsure whether or not this happened, but magical historians are of the mind that it did. In fact, the magical historians believe that it was the witches and wizards of the Mayan community that initiated this idea, because, in numerology, 52=5+2=7. Seven is and, even in ancient times, was an important number in magic, and the Mayan witches and wizards recognised that, consciously using it in their temple and pyramid upkeep.

Another important aspect of Maya culture that is rich with the influence of the ancient witches and wizards who lived among them is the importance of astronomy, and the advanced knowledge that the Mayans had of the skies. The lunar cycle was extremely important to them, primarily because of the influence that it had on potions with which the Mayans experimented. The influence of ancient witches and wizards gave primitive Muggles insight into the importance of such cycles.

The integration of society is the primary cause of the extraordinary advances such ancient civilisations made. The influence magic peoples had on a primarily non-magic society cannot be ignored. Without primitive witches and wizards, these cultures likely would not have lasted as long as they did, nor would they have made many of the advances in astronomy and mathematics that they did without the influence of magic peoples.

Throughout North, Central, and South America, the civilisations prior to 350 B.C.E. that migrated to the continents were strongly integrated. Witches and wizards, particularly in the Olmec and Mayan cultures, were held as elite members of society, revered for their abilities and their talents in astronomy and other magical arts. While less is known about the Clovis culture, the Mayan and Olmec both lived in agricultural villages and towns with a structured societal hierarchy, with most witches and wizards near the top or at the top of these chains. Materials such as obsidian, jade, and magnetite were frequently used in primitive magical tools, such as ancient wands, scrying mirrors, and mortars and pestles. The joint influence of non-magic peoples on magic peoples and vice versa led to a rich tapestry of culture that would have been nonexistent without such crucial cooperation among these now-segregated groups.

One of the earliest known civilizations in the world, Mesopotamian civilization consisted of a variety of city-states. Although there is evidence for wizarding presences throughout all of these city-states, the city-states that show the most signs of early complex magic and potion-making are Sumer and Akkad. Archaeologists found an amulet in Sumer that had retained its magic for several millennia and was still so powerful that the archaeologists spent several months in St. Mungo’s, recovering from the magic’s effects.

Indeed, Muggles in these societies revered their magical neighbours as Healers and Seers. Many of these witches and wizards were so powerful that they earned a permanent place in the civilizations’ religions and were thought to be divine beings by their Muggle neighbours. Take, for example, the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess Ishtar. Legends speak of her as having an all-consuming attractive force, making both animals and people fall madly for her and fall into depression once she left them. Magical historians believe that Ishtar brewed a primitive form of Amortentia and fed it to all of the people whom she desired.

Another example of a wizard who became ingrained in Mesopotamian legend is Gilgamesh, the leading figure in one of the earliest known works of literature. In the Sumerian text, Gilgamesh is described as two-thirds god and one-third mortal and goes on an epic journey to find immortality. Archaeologists have found traces of extremely weak immortality potions in Sumer, suggesting that Gilgamesh attempted to extend his life magically. The Epic of Gilgamesh also features Gilgamesh’s fight against a fire-breathing beast called ‘Humbaba.’ Many historians believe this beast to actually have been an early ancestor of the Hungarian Horntail, which would correlate with their discovery of several large fossilized bones in the area.

On the other hand, Mesopotamians also feared the influence of dark magic and occasionally slaughtered groups of wizards. Of course, these wizards are probably not entirely free of blame. A Babylonian Muggle’s text speaks of the severe pain that she endured at the hands of a wizard, who eventually managed to gouge out both of her eyes and several of her teeth without touching her face. Many magical historians believe that this incident inspired Hammurabi to create his famous code, featuring the law ‘eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’

Phoenicia

The Phoenicians, a group of people who engaged in excessive maritime trading, are perhaps most known for their written alphabet. While Muggle historians have attempted to decode this alphabet, they have overlooked several key phrases that indicate that this alphabet was actually an early attempt at sharing discovered Charms. It is doubtful that the Phoenicians ever created wands, suggesting that these spells were meant to be performed wandlessly. (Phoenicians probably used various wand woods to engineer their sturdy boats, but did not discover their uses as wands.) One spell reads ‘rir-rir or wal lat ick nur geg’ and includes an introduction that suggests that it was an early form of ‘Vipera Evanesca,’ the Snake-Banishing Spell, used to fight against the serpents that tormented them from the steppes. Modern Charms experts have been unable to replicate the effects of this spell. The spells were formulated by priests in Byblos, but appeared in Egypt a few decades later, suggesting interaction between the two magical communities.

Indus River Valley

Magic practices had such a strong hold in the Indus River Valley civilizations that almost 80% of their artefacts show traces of magic. They’d managed to channel magic through their bangles, beads, and vases. Although historians are unsure of the purpose of this magic, they speculate that the magic was for purposes other than defence. One small, etched bracelet carries traces of magic with a great resemblance to the Cheering Charm.

As the caste system began to form, wizards gained a position at the top of society, alongside priests, or Brahmin. These wizards were central in protecting the village from the large community of Lahoo vampires, who terrorized the ancient Indians for several centuries. These wizards crafted highly advanced methods of warding off vampires, some of which are still used today, thus saving India. One Muggle wrote, ‘The demon man, with blood dripping from his fangs came to my home today, but he could not enter because of the garlic that the divine one, Lahsun, gave to me.’ Many suspect that the Indus River Valley civilization would not have endured without these wizards.

Asian Steppes

Magical historians did not care much about the Huns, a group of Asian nomads, until the late 1970s. Previously, magical historians had thought that the Hun society was too crude to have had any magical presence. That all changed when one magical historian, Robert Meddleweb, stumbled across a Muggle historian’s account of the Huns, which described a strange phenomenon: ‘Some believe that the Huns just appeared in the Eastern Asian steppes. Of course, that’s impossible. However, archaeologists have been unable to find any artefacts explaining where the Huns came from,’ wrote Anna Zakowsky.

Meddleweb quickly interpreted these findings to mean that the Huns had Apparated from some other area of China, leaving no trace of their travel—at least, none that Muggles could understand. Other historians doubt Meddleweb’s theory, including Harrison Byproo: ‘Apparating is not something that just happens by accident. Think about how difficult it is for sixth years to Apparate. Suggesting that an entire nation could Apparate successfully is outrageous.’

To this, Meddleweb countered, ‘Think of magic as an animal. Right now, we’ve managed to domesticate it, make it respond to certain words and behave predictably, more or less. Back then, it was far more uncontrollable but also significantly more powerful. We’ve toned it down to make it safer.’ Thus, the magic of the Huns allowed the entire community to spontaneously relocate. Of course, this incident would have also led to a great deal of adverse effects, for which Meddleweb has located substantial evidence.

Much of the remnants of Hun skeletons show significant signs of deformation. Muggle archaeologists explained this away as ‘the wear of time,’ but magical historians understand these irregularities as signs of Splinching. However, the most impacting effect of the botched Apparition was the resulting magical hyperactivity from which the Huns suffered, as the Apparition had adverse effects on their intellectual and magical capabilities. Magical hyperactivity is a condition that has endured to this day, causing magic folk to release their magic in strong, uncontrollable bursts. This explains the brute force of the Huns as they invaded and destroyed neighbouring territories.

As time went on and the Huns mixed with surrounding people, magical potency decreased in their communities. While magic became a rare talent, the Huns continued to respect those in their community who could perform magic. In fact, Atilla the Hun, the most notorious leader of the Huns, a Squib himself, surrounded himself with a staff of magical advisors and valued magic folk within his community. Atilla even went so far as to reconsider murdering the people whom he encountered if they performed a magic trick for him.

China

Perhaps the most important role of ancient wizards in China was controlling the Yellow River. Early Chinese society was so harmonious and successful due to its mastery of the Yellow River, which was primarily a result of the work of wizards. Using Levitation Charms to build a dam and powerful Nature Spells, Chinese wizards managed to prevent the Yellow River from flooding. During periods of drought, these same wizards managed to sustain most of the civilization’s crops with an early form of Aguamenti. Chinese wizards also helped fend off the aforementioned Huns and other nomadic groups. However, Chinese magic was typically much more controlled and weaker than the brute force of the nomads’ magic, leading to constant foreign invasions.

After the Warring States Period and the creation of Legalism, Chinese emperors began to create laws restricting wizards’ powers, claiming that the wizards were threatening the order of things within the community. Thus, wizards were forced to stop practicing magic, unless authorized to do so by the government. Any wizard in violation of this restriction was either exiled or banned.

For great periods of time, Africa has been home to some very mysterious and powerful branches of magic, some of which might be considered somewhat dark. Since the continent’s earliest days, the African people are said to have witnessed many mystical phenomena: from black shooting stars in the middle of the day, seeds that sprouted fully grown trees overnight, and animals that spoke, to smoke that changed colours during tribal dances, possession, and sometimes even resurrection. Of course, those of us in magical society now know well enough that reports from so long ago have been greatly exaggerated. Take resurrection for example; it isn’t possible. But in the past the peoples of Africa thought it quite the opposite. All of these strange happenings would normally be attributed to fantasy or a bad dream, but the frequency with which these events took place left no doubt in the minds of the ancient Africans that there was something more going on.

The general consensus seems to have been that spirits were channelling their energy into earthly things to prove their power and scare mortals into granting them certain favours. These ‘spirits’ would choose one member of the tribe and speak through them, and, in turn, the spirit would grant its host healing powers to help the rest of the tribe. These ‘chosen ones’ were called shamans which, translated into modern English, means ‘someone who knows,’ a name given to them because of their ability to know and understand the spirits and channel their magic.

Their method of communicating with these spirits was through out-of-body experiences, and to reach this out-of-body state they would make special teas to initiate momentary lapses in their sanity which then allowed them to see these ‘almighty beings.’ (Muggles who study science, which comes from the Latin word for knowledge and is the Muggle study and organization of the natural world into logical and rational explanation, throughout time have proved out-of-body experiences to be no more than common hallucinations.) Through the research done over time by herbologists, potioneers, et cetera, however, we have discovered through analysis of ingredients and examination of the results of these teas that most of the time they’re very poorly executed brews of Aberration Draught and mind-altering potions.

Further research did conclude that the shamans were of magical blood, but not knowing how to use or control their powers, they ended up using badly brewed potions as their gateway into the magic that resided within them. These interesting people were no more than primitive wizards who lacked the ability to concentrate the force in their blood, which resulted in a very hit-or-miss system to try to understand it. It’s impressive enough that they managed the potions that they did with absolutely no prior knowledge on anything magical at all. Despite all of this, though, the superstitions that dark forces from the beyond existed in our world and that there were some humans that could use them lasted throughout the years with devastating results for the innocent people involved. The worldwide hunting and burning of Muggle women believed to be witches is proof enough of that.

Witchcraft became, in later years, somewhat of a religion and is still one of the most dreaded superstitions in Africa. Africans believe that witches are powerful, seductive beings that can use magic to alter the course of human life for better or worse–though more often for worse than for the better–and thus they accept magic as an explanation for any mystical or mysterious phenomenon, even when their Muggle common sense is telling them otherwise.

Whether these mystical attributes and mysterious beings were real or imagined, it’s safe to say that ancient African civilizations understood magic to be powerful and frightening, and thus it was worshipped beyond any deity. Ancient Egypt, the most developed magical community in the country, gives us exceptional information about how magic turned into such religious belief.

Ancient Egyptian mythology states that magic, or heka as they called it, was the mighty force that created the universe and was therefore more powerful than even the gods themselves. By using magic, symbolism would turn into reality and help Egyptians join the gods in paradise. Magic in Egypt was seen not only as another field of knowledge but a force created solely for the benefit of mankind and so was used to manipulate the gods for human purposes.

Egyptian Magic

Egyptians were amongst the first civilizations to study magic and create rules and rituals as to how it would be used; they laid a basic foundation for the rest of us to build upon. Priests were sacred because of their ability to communicate with the gods (a reflection of the African shamans), and therefore, they were the ones who were allowed to practice magic without restrictions in order to obtain the power of the god that they were invoking. Of course, those with true magical blood were hard to ‘restrict;’ instead there were severe punishments for anyone caught practicing that hadn’t the right. To avoid punishment, some wizards would seek apprenticeship with the priests while others used their gifts away from the public eye, but because it was widely believed that some had more power than others, those practicing in secret rarely attempted complex magic and usually everyone was “kept in place.” But we all know that sometimes uncontrolled magic is difficult to keep hidden, and, while rare, magical practice outside of the priest class wasn’t unheard of.

Having unlimited legal access to magic, Egyptian priests began to study the possibility of certain objects making it easier to channel their mystical powers for the greater good. Purity was a legal requirement for a person to be able to perform a spell. Because ivory was already known to be a purifying substance and natural shield from negative energies, it became necessary for wizards of ancient Egypt to carry ivory amulets with them as proof that they were pure and could call upon the gods to make them do their bidding. The need for the ivory item to be practical, unique, and efficient in its channelling of pure magic gave birth to the continent’s first magical wands. These magic wands were nothing like our current and comparatively superb wands with magical cores and the added power of the wood; they were merely semi-circular pieces of ivory with carvings of the most powerful beings slaying dark creatures from end to end.

Wandmakers and wandlore scholars debate to this day whether or not these ivory wands had any magical properties. It is still customary for the wandmakers of Egypt, and even of most of Africa, to use ivory in their wands. Regardless of this debate, all parties agree that the old style ivory wand does balance the power within the wizard using it, helping him to perform more stable spells and stopping dark magic from being used; as African wizards believe that ivory keeps their minds pure, they have no desire to explore the darker side of their power.

Egyptian Secrecy

Egyptian wizards were very keen on keeping their magic to themselves. Considering the religious belief that good deeds were what granted or denied someone the chance to join the gods in the paradise of the afterlife, wizards from Egypt made sure that they performed as much good magic as possible, and the most effective way to achieve that was to make sure that they were the ones that the people sought out to sort out whatever troubles or illnesses came along. In order to do this, they had to keep their spells and rituals a secret so that other wizards weren’t privy to take over their practice. The ancient Egyptians kept books that they passed down from generation to generation full of useful spells that only they knew, not to be shared with anyone, just like some families in today’s world, mostly those of spellmakers. The ancient Egyptian wizards even came up with strange combined words and secret names for the gods that had to be pronounced in certain way or the spell would not work, effectively doing exactly as spellmakers do today, putting words and actions together to make new spells. Thus, if someone stole or peeked into the journals in which they wrote the proceedings of their enchantments and rituals, the culprit would not be able to understand the words needed to make the magic happen, and therefore, no one but the wizard who’d written it or one whom he had taught would be able to perform it to aid others. This practice of casting spells by muttering nonsensical words that somehow brought out the magic within them became quite popular and soon all of Egypt and parts of Africa into which the practice had bled were teeming with papyrus scrolls full of spells that no one but the person who wrote them could perform.

There is a faction of wizards that work alongside the curse breakers for Gringotts that visit Egypt to see if they can find any of this lost magic, translate it, and find use for it. Curse breakers are necessary in Egypt because greed provoked ancient wizards to place curses upon tombs. Most people in Egypt were entombed with riches and luxury, believing that the soul would return to the body, taking everything left with it into their next life. However some wizards who had discovered their power but were not or had not pursued the path to become a priest soon discovered that the ancient Egyptian belief system was inaccurate. Only those with magical blood can become and see ghosts, so from the imprints left by deceased wizards these ancient Egyptian wizards found out that the afterlife that they all so prepared for didn’t work at all how they had thought, and thus, all the gold and riches left in the tombs were going to waste. Banded together in this knowledge that none of the others knew, the wizards of ancient Egypt set curses and traps for any thieves that might enter so that the wizards themselves could return to claim things as they needed them. Also, some of those born of magic truly did believe in their theory of an afterlife, regardless of any extra knowledge that they might have been given by ghosts, and they set their own traps and enchantments on the tombs to keep the treasures inside safe from intruders, to ensure that the deceased inside got to keep their things for when they returned.

The need for international magical cooperation in later times, along with the discovery of nonverbal spells, led the Egyptian practice of creating new words for magic rituals to its demise. However, the fact remained that a standard spell wording of sorts had to be created, not just because of the language barrier between wizards of so many different places, but also because of the growing number of Muggle-born wizards all over the world. To remain hidden has been our world’s greatest task for a very long time, and if the language and words in which magic used to be performed was not regulated, Muggle-born children, oblivious to their abilities, could cause a disaster simply by saying one or two words out loud in their common tongue. It is because of this that an international summit of wizarding leaders from all over the world took place back in the early days. This meeting lasted an extremely long time because the people involved took to investigating and retelling the history of our world in order to find a solution, and this, in turn, led to the standardization of Latin as the language for most spells, enchantments, and spoken magic in general. This council debated, discussed and tested the aforementioned magic in an effort to determine an official, or at least agreed upon by the majority, list of spells for the wizarding world. They collected the most potent words from a myriad of cultures and languages to form The Standard Book of Spells, which is still used in schools today.

If you’ll take notice, however, the etymology for spells is rarely Egyptian. This is not because their words for magic are less powerful than another cultures, per se, but is mostly due to the fact that Egyptians have maintained a strict secrecy about their spells and magic. In present times they are much more open and accommodating to the council, but discovering their lost magic has proven extremely difficult and is one among many reasons Egypt is known as the ‘Land of Secrets.’

To the ancient Greeks, it was quite important that citizens honour the gods. If something abnormal or bad happened, it was usually blamed on the wrath of a certain deity, when, actually, it was a person of magical blood being less subtle than normal. Because most everything out of the ordinary was blamed on the gods, witches and wizards had an easier time blending in with the Muggle population in ancient Greece than they did in the European Middle Ages, when witch-hunts were quite popular. Not only did they blend in more easily, some wizards and witches were quite helpful to the Muggles, although that term was not then used to describe non-magic folk. For example, in 447 B.C., Perikles began to plan a magnificent building that would later be named the Parthenon. This was a temple dedicated to goddess Athena. Because of it was a massive undertaking, no one was quite sure how it would be possible to build such a temple. But Perikles was of magical blood, and therefore, every night, after the workers left, he could build with magic just enough to keep alive the hope that something of this scale could be built. There are many other instances of witches and wizards helping their non-magic brethren, particularly in war. If not for magical blood, the Greeks could have very well lost the Greco-Persian Wars in the fifth century B.C. of which the famous battles of Marathon and Thermopylae are a part.

As a prisoner of the Greeks, Phillip II of Macedonia observed their military tactics. Returning to his own country, he used his newly acquired insights to strengthen Macedonia to the Greeks peril. By the time of his death in 336 B.C., Sparta and a small colony near Byzantium was all of Greece that remained free of Macedonian rule.

Phillip II’s son Alexander the Great expanded the Macedonian empire to enormous proportions, but the bickering of his sons tore the empire apart, and left the way open for Rome, which had conquered both Macedonia and Greece by 145 B.C., to become the dominant Mediterranean and world power.

Ancient Rome

The Romans were a little less lenient about magic than the ancient Greeks, however they were still a very deity-centred society, so most magic still passed unnoticed. At its very beginning, in the 8th century B.C., Rome was just many huts filled with men. Because of the lack women, they knew that their race would eventually die out. Those men learned in the magical arts, prominent among them Romulus, Rome’ founder, made love potions and gave some to women of the neighbouring Sabine tribe. Under the potions’ power, the Sabine women became the mothers of the future Roman race. Although it may seem unethical to a modern audience to use a love potion simply to procreate, in those times it was not frowned upon, and the potions masters were even celebrated as heroes. (In Muggle legend, the men just kidnap the Sabine women because the Muggles at the time could not understand why the women were suddenly interested in the Roman men.)

Roman wizards and witches did not remain the heroes of Rome forever, however. By 451 B.C., magic was curtailed by Roman law. The Twelve Tables of the decemviri legibus scribundis forbid harmful incantations and the use of magic to move a neighbour’s crops to one’s own field. The dictator Sulla in 81 B.C. imposed further bans on magical practices, including love-spells and poisons, with his Lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficis. Laws against magic escalated and culminated in numerous calls for the banishment of all magic folk, which Roman wizards and witches circumnavigated by using their powers secretly or with discretion; banishment was decreed by numerous Roman rulers at different times.

In 133 B.C. the senator Tiberius Gracchus, a wizard whose senatorial career is better remembered by Muggles for his radical ideas of land redistribution to the plebeian masses, proposed to the wizards that Muggles needed to learn their place under wizards. This is the first time that a wizard publically claimed superiority over his non-magic fellow Roman citizens. Although he convinced a few, his ideas were so unpopular that he was killed. Whether the senators, including his own cousin, Scipio Nasica, who clubbed him to death were against his pro-plebeian or his anti-Muggle radicalism is a question no history books answer.

Rome at its height dominated most of the then-known world with an empire stretching from the shores of the Caspian Sea west to modern-day Spain, from the Northern African coast to Hadrian’s Wall, the original border between Britain and the unconquered land of the Picts (modern-day northern Scotland). In the midst of this domination, wizards and witches of different cultures, brought together by learning of the empire’s language, Latin, shared information. This trade of ideas led to the first meeting of the Consilium Imperii Magi (CIM or the Council of the Empire’s Wizards), which met in Rome in 132 A.D. This council of international wizards examined magical history and culminated in the creation of the original Standard Book of Spells, a compilation of the most potent spells of the different cultures, comprising of spells for every action yet done by magic. This first Book of Spells was published in Latin. Latin being the dominant language of the time, many of the spells included were based on this tongue. Other spells come from Aramaic and Greek to name a few. This Standard Book of Spells forms the basis for our modern Book. Additions are made by CIM, which has met every fifty years since for this purpose.

The first known culture to have practiced a modicum of magic in Europe was known as the Bell-Beaker culture, which occupied both the European Stone and Bronze ages, ending around 1900 B.C.E. Best known today as a simple people who made their mark on history through a curious pottery style, not much is recorded about their origin. During this time, the most beneficial contribution to society that can be contributed to Wizardkind is the idea of symbols becoming text. Young witches and wizards practiced drawing the shapes that wands make during particular spells. When questioned, they introduced the idea of using symbols to convey words. For a while their advice was brushed off as quirky nonsense, but the idea eventually took hold.

Several unexplained phenomena occurred during Bell-Beaker times which baffle Muggles to this day, but these can be illuminated by lesser-known wizarding folklore. The most notable of these phenomena, perhaps, is Stonehenge in England, known by Muggles as one of the “Seven Ancient Wonders of The World.” They have proposed several theories as to how the landmark came to be, but the theory that occasionally touches the truth lies in a legend about Stonehenge’s heel stone, known as “The Friar’s Heel.”

Muggle Frank Stevens, curator of the Salisbury Museum, records the legend of the Friar’s Heel in his book Stonehenge—To-day & Yesterday. It is in sum this:

In his wanderings, the Devil, the villain of many Muggle myths of the time, had seen some huge stones in the back garden of an old Irish woman, and he thought to move these stones from her garden to the stoneless Salisbury Plain so as to sew confusion in men’s minds for all time. Before he could begin his mischief, he needed to obtain the woman’s permission, but she met his petitions with refusal until finally he played upon her greed and, knowing that the old woman’s mathematical skills were poor, agreed that she could have all the money that she could count in the time that it took him to remove the stones from her garden. He handed her a pitiable sum in coins and set to work. The poor woman had had time to add barely two coins together before the Devil had prised the stones from the ground, tied them neatly together, and slung them across his back.

Having obtained the stones, the Devil flew away to the Salisbury Plain, but the stones were so heavy that the willow strap cut into his shoulder. The Devil bore the pain as long he could, but finally had to shift his bundle. One stone fell from the pack and lies at the bottom of the River Avon. This stone near Bulford, England is offer as supposed verification of the tale’s truth.

Arriving at the Plain, the Devil deposited his heavy burden and set to work arranging the massive stones. Revelling in his mischief, the Devil boasted aloud that he would puzzle men for all time with this project.

His cry was overheard by a passing friar (a Muggle of the Christian faith who lives according to certain rules), who replied and was unfortunately heard in turn by the Devil. The Devil, enraged by the discovery of his mischief, hurled a stone at the friar as the man fled from the Devil. The stone struck the friar’s heel, but the friar was unhurt while the stone still bears the imprint of the friar’s heel.

Just then, the sun rose and the Devil, who cannot abide sunlight, had to stop, and the stone remained where it had fallen.

While this story shares the same outcome and a similar theme as the true story, the main character was a wizard, not the Devil, and is the ‘good’ character, while the old woman is the ‘bad.’ Gerbert DeBolbec, a well-off wizard who lived near the Salisbury Plain with his wife Josselyn, practiced magic quite subtly, but strengthened his skills by affecting nature rather than typical inanimate objects. His lands were inordinately prosperous but not so much as to arouse alarm in surrounding townspeople. One neighbour, a hag by the name of Cedany, resented his fortune. As a hag, she was only able to produce rudimentary magic, but she often reached beyond her means with unpredictable results. Josselyn, in an attempt to improve relations between their households, came to Cedany with an offer to extend magical protections to her land. In a fit of jealous rage, Cedany insisted that she was powerful enough to protect herself, and in her effort to prove herself she turned the contents of her grounds—trees, bushes, and Josselyn—into stone. Realizing her mistake—and knowing that Gerbert would be unforgiving—she fled. When Gerbert deduced the whereabouts of his wife, he destroyed Cedany’s house, and, grief-stricken and unable to tell which one was his wife, loaded the large stones into a pack that he enchanted with an Undetectable Extension Charm and went in search of the hag. The bag had a loose seam, and one of the rocks—incidentally, the one that was formerly Gerbert’s wife—fell out to land in the River Avon. He realized much later that one of the stones was missing. Helplessly, he wept bitter tears, which soon turned to mindless tears of fury. Upon finding the hag, he cast the most powerful spell that had been attempted in history thus far, entrapping Cedany in an enchanted circle of the stones. He then continued hurling stones in an attempt to squash his enemy. The stone that dealt her death blow ricocheted to land farther away as the heel stone, carrying with it the imprint of her body later known as the Friar’s Heel. When the magnitude of the magical energy that he had spent caught up to him, the broken wizard died of exhaustion.

(Legends like that of the Friar’s Heel were created when Muggles could find no other explanation. Unlike other areas whose religions embraced magic, prevailing European churches of the Common Era, from which their legend of the Friar’s Heel comes, shunned magic as an explanation, preferring instead a clerical “because I said so” mindset. Scientific explanations were unacceptable as well, and many of that era’s most groundbreaking scientists were incorrectly labelled as sorcerers.)

Christianity began its rapid spread across Europe early in the Common Era (C.E.). Most of the technological advances of the time were made by Muggles, as wizards and witches lived too far from one another and were too and were too fearful of religious fallout to draw too much attention to themselves. This explains why technology moved so slowly.

Pagans and occultists made up most of those who practiced magic in Christian Europe, and they were a spurned minority. There were also rare instances of shamanism, but the influence of Abrahamic religions and their conflict with the supernatural kept most witches and wizards in hiding. Many Roman and Egyptian laws of the time reflected this belief.

This lack of tolerance, more than anything, contributed to the eventual detachment of wizarding and Muggle societies. The dangers of revealing oneself were so great that they eventually led to the International Statute of Secrecy.

Early Magical Advances

Separate from the prying eyes of Muggles, magical theory and skills were being advanced at a glacial pace. Some of the most impacting developments were made in wandlore. Without the creation of the written word, most prehistoric findings on wandlore have been lost. What we have today are legends and rumours that have been built upon to create the theories of modern society.

Because wandlore is such an inexact and involved science, the Ollivanders are worth mention in prehistoric wizardry. Wandlore is passed down from master to apprentice, and it is often a family business. Geraint Ollivander was one of the most skilled wandmakers in history, and he, along with his ancestors and descendants alike, created a lucrative wandmaking business that is considered the best of all time, with the possible exception of Gregorovitch’s wand shop in more modern times.

The adoption of international businesses such as wandmaking and the increasing ease of travel with the rise in Muggle trading during the Common Era began to unite witches and wizards from all ends of the globe. A cesspool of knowledge resulted in rapidly evolving magical theory, which was readily available. Before these times, magical knowledge was sectionalized by geography, and hard to build upon. Naturally, the evolution of magic would require some necessary changes to wizarding lifestyles, beginning with education.

The need for wizarding schools became apparent as society changed. Schools would make it possible for young witches and wizards to accumulate more knowledge in one year than could ever be taught by parents who knew only what their parents had shown them.

Since the earliest recorded history, nonmagic peoples (“Muggles”) have defined magic as a mystical power derived from the gods and goddesses of their culture. They explained away this natural phenomenon by attributing it to the supernatural, to their religious deities, in an effort to explain what could not be explained. Indeed, even some witches and wizards of ancient times believed that their own powers came from the gods and goddesses, for they lacked the knowledge and intense study in the pathways of magic that have been since studied. In the beginning, most cultures respected and even revered witches and wizards living in their societies, elevating them to ever-higher statuses – priests, shamans, rulers. Eventually, however, the Muggles began to fear and condemn the practises of their fellow witches and wizards. The rise of Judaism and Christianity were especially well known for a dramatic change in Muggle-Wizard Relations.

In Buddhism, suffering is made into an automatic part of life, while pleasure is seen as something fleeting that, if pursued, can lead its hunter into a never-ending quest to quench a thirst for bliss that will never be satiated, as it will only grow stronger. The seeking of pleasure, be it through sexual urges, riches, or immortality, is one of the roots of suffering, according to Buddhists. They see these cravings as desires that will never be satisfied; therefore, having them will only bring suffering. The other root is ignorance, for it is the inability to understand the world as it is, to grasp the nature of things, and that brings along a stream of negative emotions (anger, envy, hatred, etc.) that, again, will only bring suffering.

This is why the followers of the Buddhist religion try to find perpetual peace through meditation; to be able to know and understand the world and rid themselves of their earthly desires so they can live without suffering and be reborn into a better life instead of reaching the afterlife full of the despair they fear so much.

The truth about the end of suffering relates to two different things: the end of physical suffering through death, or the end of emotional or mental suffering through reaching Nirvana, a state of spiritual enlightenment that can only be achieved by carrying an impeccable moral conduct. It is the belief of the Buddhist people that once the suffering in this life has ended, they are sent to another plane, good or bad, depending on how they behaved during their time on Earth. If sent to one of the three positive planes, they can be reborn as demigods, gods, or men.

In earlier times, Muggles who reached Nirvana often turned out to be magically gifted, and their spiritual revelation was nothing but the magic they had in them all along finally making itself present after being suppressed by a lifestyle full of meditation and the neglect of one’s emotions, which are known to bring out the magic in those who possess it when they are at a peak.

This is not to say that meditating is bad by any means. It has been known that many Buddhist monks who have said to have achieved Nirvana are actually Squibs who, through deep concentration and faith, have managed to feel the magic they are incapable of using. Some have even managed to perform simple spells when concentrated hard enough on what they want to achieve, but nothing beyond that. As wizards, it can be somewhat difficult to understand why someone would seek such things when there’s a spell for practically everything, but it is, some say, one of the most admirable qualities of the Muggle world to have faith in something pure and mighty that can explain every single thing in the universe.

We’ve established, then, that Buddhism is mainly about understanding the world as it is and dealing with suffering, its cause and its end as a part of life on this earth in order to be reborn into a plane where suffering does not exist. Or, if one is reborn into the world of men, to have a second chance to achieve Nirvana. Taking all this into account, we could say that wizards are, in fact, considered part of the privileged few who have reached that state of spiritual freedom, seeing as how the many interpretations of Nirvana always lead back to the most basic forms of magic. To be able to use and channel magic gives a person the ability to make their life easier while also giving them a quality to understand the world in a much better way than a Muggle could. That is admired by Buddhists, even when they don’t truly grasp the concept of wizardry and mainly see our kind as admirable, reborn spirits of some ancient life who were blessed enough to be sent back and show this world how to end suffering. Buddhist monks even show their admiration by wearing robes not unlike a wizard’s. It is, we should say, a subliminal part of their religion to be in awe of wizards, as we symbolize the better life they seek to be reborn into.