An ABC of Witchcraft Past and Present - Doreen Valiente 2018

Witch Balls

The term ’witch ball’ is given most frequently to those bright reflecting balls of glass that one often sees hanging up in antique shops. They look larger and more durable versions of the shining balls that are sold to decorate Christmas trees.

Their use in old houses and cottages was to hang suspended in a window, or in some dark corner; or sometimes a standing version was made, to be placed where it would reflect the light. They are often quite large and heavy, and need a chain to hang them by. A particularly huge silver witch-ball used to hang in an old shop in the Brighton Lanes, nearly filling the little dark window, and surrounded with all kinds of small antiques and Victoriana.

One finds, however, that not many antique dealers can tell you what a witch ball really is. In fact, a good deal of curious lore surrounds these mysterious globes. Their main purpose as house decorations was to avert the much-feared influence of the Evil Eye. (See EVIL EYE.)

The shiny, reflecting globe cast back the influence of the malign glance of the Evil Eye, upon the person who sent it forth. Hence the popularity of witch balls hung in windows. However, their attractiveness as ornaments in themselves and their ability to lighten a dark corner by reflecting a cheerful ray of sunlight, have given witch balls continued popularity after their original use has been forgotten.

There are other kinds of witch balls, beside the mirror-bright reflecting ones. A very attractive variety was made of Nailsea glass. This consists of a ball of many colours, semi-transparent when the light shines through it, and presenting a swirl of different hues, somewhat like the patterns which have come to be called ’psychedelic’. These Nailsea glass balls are generally smaller than the reflecting ones.

These in their turn are probably an imitation in glass of a still older type of witch ball. I have one of this earlier type in my own collection. It came from an old house in a Sussex village, and consists of a hollow sphere of thick glass, slightly greenish in colour. It has a small hole, plugged with a cork; and inside is a mass of teased-out threads of different colours. It must have taken someone long ago a great deal of patience, to introduce thread after thread through the little hole, until the ball was filled.

The effect of these many threads, which were probably bright-coloured originally, though faded now with age, was that of an intertwining, mazy pattern. In my opinion, when the Nailsea glass-makers started their famous manufacture in 1788, this is the pattern they copied in making witch balls of coloured glass.

The object of the bright swirl and maze of different colours, like many other forms of decoration which involve a pattern of twisting lines, was again to counteract the glance of the Evil Eye. The idea was, that instead of falling directly upon some person, the dangerous glance would be diverted to follow the twisting pattern, and thus its power would be dissipated.

From late in the seventeenth century glassmakers had been producing hollow glass globes, or globular bottles, for people to hang up in their houses as a protection against evil influences. Devout Christians filled the bottles with holy water; but others preferred the older device of the mazy threads and twining colours.

It was believed that the glass ball would attract to itself all the influences of ill luck and ill wishing that would otherwise have fallen upon the household. Hence every so often the witch-ball would be wiped clean. The same belief and treatment was accorded in the West Country to the glass ’walking sticks’ made with a swirl of bright colours in them, or hollow and filled with tiny coloured beads. These too were originally hung up in houses as an amulet against the Evil Eye, and wiped clean by careful housewives to wipe the bad luck away. They were called ’witches’ sticks’, and many of them were also a product of Nailsea glass.

The Nailsea glassmakers produced all kinds of fancy articles, which were sold at country markets and fairs. People bought the many-coloured witch balls to give their friends and relatives as presents. They were regarded as luck-bringers as well as protective amulets; and some people call them ’wish balls’, because they were given with a wish for good luck and prosperity.

Returning to the bright mirror globes, these were also sometimes called ’watch balls’; the idea being that if you watched them long enough the mirrored scene in them would fade out, and change into a visionary picture. Some authorities consider these names to have been corrupted into ’witch balls’; but in my opinion they are merely variants of the term ’witch ball’, as the ideas behind them are basically connected with witchcraft.

The brighter mirror globes were originally imported from the Continent. They are often depicted in old Dutch paintings. However, from about 1690 English glassmakers started producing them, and their products were less fragile than the Continental ones. The early silvered witch balls were coated inside with an amalgam containing bismuth, lead, tin and mercury. They were not very durable, as the reflection was liable to damage by damp; nor was their reflection very clear. (Incidentally, damp is still an enemy to the brightness of any reflecting witch ball, if it gets inside the glass; and anyone who owns an antique of this kind should wipe it clean, not wash it.)

Later, in the early nineteenth century, improved methods of manufacture were evolved, including one of coating the glass inside with real silver; and in this period very fine reflecting globes were made, of mirror-like perfection. Coloured witch balls of this type began to be made also. In my own collection are witch balls of both dark and pale green, and of gold colour, as well as silver; and a very beautiful blue is sometimes seen also.

In the early nineteenth century the witch ball began to be more of a decoration, and its old magical significance faded into the background. Witch balls were made with everything on them from Scriptural texts to hunting scenes.

But their original significance was not entirely forgotten. In 1930 The Times had some interesting correspondence on the survival of belief in witchcraft; so much, in fact, that on 20th September 1930 it published a leading article on the subject, saying it was plain that this belief had by no means died out. In the course of this correspondence, one writer mentioned that she had seen witch balls for sale in a shop near the British Museum, and had been told that there was a ready sale for them. They were believed to turn aside the effects of hostile witchcraft.

Today, with the renewed popularity of all sorts of bric-a-brac and Victoriana among collectors, one now and again sees attempts at making modern reproductions of the old-fashioned witch balls; though so far these are by no means as pleasing as those with the real patina of age upon them. What is not certain is whether their purchasers only want them for decoration, or whether they realise the time-honoured magical significance of the witch ball.