No Witches In Sight: Apotropaic Symbols Over Hearths—New Ideas And Clarification

Articles by this author from the late 1970s have often used adjectives such as ‘ritual’, ‘protective’ and ‘scribed’ to describe marks or symbols. However, the term ‘apotropaic symbols’, first used publicly at a Vernacular Architecture Group conference in London in 1989, has become a useful reference term.Footnote1 These are cut, scribed or occasionally chiselled and were not random, but carefully and frequently applied to specific locations such as chimney beams and other areas of buildings from the mid sixteenth century onwards. Alternative descriptions asserting that such symbols are etched or scratched into timber are inaccurate, while the term ‘carved’ also implies three dimensions. The earlier articles, whilst not the first by the author on the subject, appear to have become the most frequently cited in associative literature. Consequently, subsequent thinking and publication have tended to be overlooked. This has led to the inadvertent development of a misleading terminology, encouraged by the popular press and heritage industry, which continues to refer to such marking as ‘witches’ warnings’ and ‘witch-marks’. Nearly thirty years later and with further extensive fieldwork, the earlier conclusions need a firmer rebuttal and the many associated marks reassessed in the light of better understanding. To counterbalance the bias in the literature, with words such as ‘daisy wheel’ used for any circular symbol, a relative classification and typology are presented here, together with new and revised interpretations, motives, meaning and dating based on fieldwork observations. Similarly, it should be emphasised that these scribed protective symbols do not fall under the descriptive term, graffiti, which are generally more publicly seen artistic or personal expressions, and likely to be made without permission.