A Brief Overview

  Non-magic peoples have feared witchcraft for centuries. In fact, the first time that witchcraft in any form for any purpose was officially denounced as a sin or crime in history was in the Hebrew Torah, circa 14th and 12th century B.C. Small portions of two books of the Torah (Exodus and Leviticus) were used by Muggle authorities to promote the idea that witchcraft is evil or dangerous as per the twisted idea of witchcraft that they presented within the context of their religion. While this told Muggles that magic was wrong, it was quite a while before open and frequent persecution was recorded in history. In fact, there were early church authorities, including by some accounts St. Augustine, who thought magic no more than delusion.  This was, of course, of great relief to early witches and wizards of Europe, where Christianity (a religion based partially on the laws of the Torah) dominated the minds of men and witches and wizards commonly lived in communities in which their gifts were seen as sinful.  The words of these religious leaders, however, did not always ease the minds of the average Muggles and, for the next several hundred years, witchcraft was acknowledged by Muggles as wrong, evil, dangerous, or frightening, at times believed to be possible and at others denounced as impossible. In the thirteenth century, witchcraft trials in Europe began to gain popularity and by the early fourteenth century burnings were common.

  Non-magic people (more commonly known as Muggles) were particularly afraid of magic in medieval times, but not very good at recognising it. On the rare occasion that they did catch a real witch or wizard, burning had no effect whatsoever. The witch or wizard would perform a basic Flame Freezing Charm and then pretend to shriek in pain while enjoying a gentle, tickling sensation. Indeed, Wendelin the Weird enjoyed being burned so much that she allowed herself to be caught no less than forty-seven times in various disguises.

Many witches, wizards and even Muggles lost their lives due to the Muggles’ fear of both the unknown and the so-called occult.  During the Renaissance, there was a strong sense of religiousness. A chilling result of this orthodoxy was the prevalence of witch burnings, which took place in both Catholic and Protestant countries at the time. It started towards the end of the Middle Ages and peaked in the seventeenth century, though it lasted until the eighteenth century before it began to fade.  Almost all Muggles of the time accepted witches and wizards as a reality. Muggles strictly defined the terms witch and wizard (mostly witch) to mean a person who had sold their soul to the devil. Their evil work was thought to influence aspects of daily life, such as a failed harvest, or if a person fell gravely ill or died suddenly without warning.

According to Muggles of the day, a witch had the power to harm her fellow people or Muggles by giving up her soul’s salvation. Muggles had many outrageous ideas about witches, including that they held meetings on the witches’ Sabbath where they supposedly had sexual intercourse with the Devil, who could take the form of a goat or other animals. In Catholic countries, the Inquisition (run by the church courts) led the witch cases, while in Protestant countries it fell to the civil courts. The interrogation of suspected witches was almost always conducted under torture. It was often so painful that the accused would be more than willing to confess anything, just to escape the pain. The most common punishment was death, by burning at the stakes. Most convicted witches were older women, but some younger men and women were also charged and convicted.

Witch burnings took place throughout Europe. In 1591 in North Berwick in Scotland, 70 people were accused of witchcraft because of the poor weather on the seas, when King James VI of Scotland travelled to Denmark to meet his betrothed.  He was extremely paranoid about witchcraft, and this incident came to be the largest witch-hunt in Britain.  A man by the name Matthew Hopkins was a successful witch hunter in England during 1645-1646. He managed to charge more witches in his career than had been charged combined in the past 100 years. In England, over 500 witch burnings took place, 200 of which Hopkins was directly responsible for.  There were trials and witch burnings held in the American Colonies as well. The Salem Witch Trials, held in Massachusetts Colony in 1692-1693, is particularly well known. More than 150 people were charged with witchcraft, although only 19 people were put on trial and found guilty. Most were hanged for their misdeeds. In 1682, the last accused witch in England was executed. Temperance Lloyd, a Muggle woman who had gone senile with age, was executed in England for witchcraft. We can conclude that people have always been afraid of what they do not know, beasts and humans both.  These stories about witchcraft have flourished for hundreds of years, and the fear of it has made people do horrible things. It is unknown how many lost their lives to the flames, but it is estimated that between the height of the witch hunt from 1500-1660, 50,000-80,000 people were killed (most of them Muggles).

Wizarding Villages Shaped by Witch-Hunts

  When these witch-hunts became more popular in the 1500s, many witches and wizards began secluding themselves in small communities inside larger cities and towns. They did so because their children were particularly prone to having accidental magic outbursts before being properly trained, and there was a very real danger of these small children being accused of witchcraft. Magic folk clung to each other for social support in these troubled times, sharing life updates with those that it was safe to talk to, and scarcely socialising much with the Muggles in the wider community.

  Until 1689, these communities were unofficial and were created by witches and wizards who gravitated together for the social and moral support that came with being surrounded by similar people. However, in 1689, the International Statute of Secrecy was signed, and it went into effect three years later, in 1692. While witch-hunts in England had stopped by 1682, witch-hunts in the wider European continent and even in the British Colonies in the North American continent had not yet ceased. In 1692, in fact, there was a huge outbreak of witch-hunt hysteria in the North American city of Salem, Massachusetts.

  The International Statute of Secrecy aimed to protect witches and wizards globally from the fear and persecution that they faced at the hands of their Muggle counterparts. It urged witches and wizards to seclude themselves and live separately to protect themselves and their children from the misguided ideology that spurred witch-hunt hysteria. Signed by the International Confederation of Wizards, the International Statute of Secrecy was widely believed to be the best possible way to protect both Muggles and witches and wizards from future persecution. It was this document that led the existing wizarding communities to be officially recognised as such, though some had existed for over one hundred years before the Statute was written.