Unfortunately, you needed a specially signed note from one of the teachers to look in any of the restricted books and he knew he’d never get one. These were the books containing powerful Dark Magic never taught at Hogwarts and only read by older students studying advanced Defence Against the Dark Arts.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
The main thing that paying attention during Defence Against the Dark Arts can offer is protection. In history, defences against dark magic have included amulets, talismans, charms and incantations, just like the kind collected in a rare Ethiopian magical recipe book from 1750.
This kind of book often belonged to a Däbtära, a highly educated religious figure who performed white magic. The talismans contained in such a book were abstract drawings that represented the Ethiopian tradition of magic, not as a figurative icon for worship, but to protect the client – because a demon would see his or her appearance in the talisman and thus be scared away.
These weren’t ‘how-to’ books, because the Däbtära were already familiar with the talismans and would never show the books to the client. Typically a person would consult a practitioner, just as a patient today would consult a doctor, and be prescribed herbal medicine and an incantation to invoke the talisman to cure that person.
Ethiopian magic came under attack in the 15th century from the Christian King, Zara Yaqob, who wanted to stamp out existing magical traditions and get rid of what he saw as superstitions that kept people ignorant of Christianity. In doing so, he showed people that being a Christian was a more effective protection than carrying a talisman – all part of a crusade against the old traditions of folklore.
To this day, Ethiopia remains a Christian country, but despite Yaqob’s efforts, Ethiopians still consult Däbtäras. Talismans were also contained in parchment scrolls, which could be held within beautiful casings, sometimes made of leather or silver. Otherwise known as Ketab, these amulet scrolls have been worn by people in the easternmost part of Africa for thousands of years. They are still worn in the northern highlands of Ethiopia, where amulets are believed to bring health, to protect babies and ward off the evil eye. There are often eyes looking everywhere and the predominant colours are black and red, because demons are not supposed to see colours other than black and red.
Some scrolls can measure up to two metres, and can be stitched into a leather pouch, unable to be opened again lest the talisman doesn’t work. These acted as protection prayers ending with the name of the client, and were not used expressly because people were cursing the client; they were intended for when things went wrong in their own lives. Illness was often attributed to demons, particularly epilepsy, which was known as the illness caused by a demon. Wearing an amulet scroll was a very literal way of defending yourself from dark magic.
‘If we’re staying, we should put some protective enchantments around the place,’ she replied, and raising her wand, she began to walk in a wide circle around Harry and Ron, murmuring incantations as she went.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
The painting The Magic Circle by the 19th-century British artist John William Waterhouse depicts an enchantress drawing a protective circle around herself with a long, thin wand, outside of which is a strange, barren landscape populated by foreboding creatures. The woman is beautiful, quite the opposite of the haggard and ugly cliché of a witch – a representation often used as a means to humiliate and control women who were perceived as unruly.
Waterhouse was associated with the Pre-Raphaelites – an artistic movement from the mid-19th century onwards, which harked back to late-medieval art. He often painted mythological, historical and literary subjects, frequently portraying female characters. The Magic Circle, first shown in 1886, was one of his most popular. It was a near-reverential portrait of a type of woman who was often treated with negativity, if not outright misogyny. The subjects of Waterhouse’s paintings are dynamic, engaged and engaging. You might even call him a feminist…
Harry saw little disturbances in the surrounding air: it was as if Hermione had cast a heat haze upon their clearing.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
That doesn’t mean that witches weren’t capable of mischief. On a beach in Cornwall, England, in the 1950s, three witches attempted to conjure up a spirit without a thought for health and safety. The cauldron they were using exploded and the witches fled in terror. It blasted into the air and was recovered where it landed on the rocks. The cauldron is now battered, lopsided and covered in a congealed tar-like substance, and the ropes it hung from are permanently glued to its charred sides. The basic function of cauldrons was once as cooking pots, but by the 1950s they were exclusively used for the brewing of potions.
These witches weren’t the only ones to struggle with cauldrons, though – just ask Neville Longbottom.
Neville had somehow managed to melt Seamus’s cauldron into a twisted blob and their potion was seeping across the stone floor, burning holes in people’s shoes. Within seconds, the whole class were standing on their stools while Neville, who had been drenched in the potion when the cauldron collapsed, moaned in pain as angry red boils sprang up all over his arms and legs.
‘Idiot boy!’ snarled Snape, clearing the spilled potion away with one wave of his wand.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone