"Expelliarmus!" – "Wingardium Leviosa!" – "Expecto Patronum!"

Almost every child, today, is familiar with these spells from the Harry Potter novels, and even adults have no trouble reciting these tongue-twisters. Harry Potter uses these spells to skilfully disarm his opponents, make things float in the air or provide protection from evil spirits. Fantasy literature is booming, magic stories are on bookshelves everywhere – surprisingly, it seems, during an age of technical advancement where people generally do not believe in magic anymore.

Stories of knights, castles and magic wands – many fantasy novels are inspired by the Middle Ages. Magic appears to be a natural part of the story: People almost expect it in a fantasy book. But what role did magic actually play in stories from the Middle Ages? What did people in that period think about magic and witchcraft? And what are the differences between stories from the Middle Ages and today's fantasy literature? We posed these questions to an expert: Andreas Hammer, a literature scholar from the University of Konstanz. He is the editor of the anthology "Magie und Literature" (magic and literature) focusing on the the narrative functions of magical practices in the Middle Ages and early modern period. Hammer is also a member of the German Research Foundation's (DFG) network "Working Wonders with Words: Language and Power in the Pre-Modern World between Religion, Magic and Medicine". His research focuses on the question of how magic is presented in medieval literary texts.

Magic spells in the monastery
Without a doubt, the theological discourse of the Middle Ages disapproved of magic. In the Christian context, of course, people strictly avoided the matter, as witchcraft was considered to be sacrilegious interference with the Godly order and connected with the devil. However, monasteries were not able to get around magic entirely. Interestingly, many of these spells – like the famous Merseburg incantations – were written down in liturgical prayer books of all places, among the Latin texts.

"We know that these magic spells were in use. Otherwise, we would not have found so many healing spells in writing. They were closely connected to everyday culture and considered to be medical knowledge. This is why we very often find these texts in monasteries – because, at the time, medical knowledge was primarily held by the monks living there."

Andreas Hammer, a literature scholar from the University of Konstanz

"People considered the incantations to be so effective that they wrote them down anyway", Andreas Hammer says. The literature scholar is convinced: Magical acts were deeply rooted in everyday culture of the Middle Ages – even at monasteries. Healing spells were sometimes written on eucharistic bread and eaten like a pill. Magic spells were used for medical purposes, very often for the healing of animals. "Three quarters of these spells have to do with healing horses – the most important animals at the time."

In the Middle Ages, magic spells and Christian benedictions existed side-by-side. Although, theological discourse had a critical view of magic, everyday practice showed people saw no contradiction in using spells in Christian society – even in monasteries.

A young woman, presumably Morgan le Fay, learns magic in a convent. She is a key female figure in the mythology surrounding King Arthur.

William Henry Margetson, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
 

In this context, Hammer observes a "peculiar convergence" of benedictions and magic spells: "They are constructed in the same way." The structure of the texts is strikingly similar. They are each comprised of two parts, the first one being a "historiola" or brief historical anecdote. It provides the narrative framework and often describes a particular past event. The second part is the actual magic spell or benediction that brings this past mythical event into the present, thus putting the spell into effect. The structure of benedictions and spells is the same, with one small difference: The historiolas used in spells generally relate a mythical story, such as the story included in the Merseburg incantations of when Balder's horse becomes lame and Wotan heals it. Benedictions, by contrast, are embedded within a Christian historiola.

Magical objects and creatures
Today, we only have written copies of the magical spells from the early Middle Ages – there are no longer literary narratives that survived from this period. From the High Middle Ages, however, we have written heroic epics and courtly novels in which magic plays a prominent role. Although theological discourse still frowned upon magic, literature provided a viable work-around. "Literature creates a narrative context for magical actions to take place. Since literature creates a fictional distance between a story and reality, people can handle these topics differently." This way, literature made it possible to feel comfortable talking about magic despite the church's critical view of the topic.

How is magic used in these texts? Interestingly, in stories from the High Middle Ages, it is mainly objects that have magical powers. By contrast, literary figures such as Morgan le Fay and Simon Magus, who can actively perform magic, are actually quite rare – and when they do appear in stories, they are often quite dubious characters. "People who actively engage in sorcery are often the antagonists of the stories", Hammer explains. This fits with the view of the time that magic was a means of invoking the devil, and that those who engage in it must be allied with diabolical forces. Such activities, thus, were not fitting for the protagonists of the stories. There are only a few exceptions to this rule in the period's literature; it would have been highly unthinkable at the time to have created a protagonist like Harry Potter.

The death of Simon Magus. 
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. Link
 

Unlike the sorcerers, however, magical objects were not portrayed in a negative light: swords with magical powers and enchanted castles, magical relicts and Siegfried's cloak of invisibility – none of these things were called into question. "Like in fairy tales, no one takes pains to explain them. They are just part of the story, and the hero has to handle them", Hammer says. Often, these magical objects are helpful tools for the heroes – as in the case of Siegfried's cloak of invisibility – or they are obstacles that must be overcome. The objects serve a narrative purpose and then quickly disappear from the story afterwards. For example, after Siegfried's death, his cloak no longer plays an active role in the Nibelungenlied; it is simply never mentioned again. Just as the Nibelungen treasure sinks into the Rhine, the cloak of invisibility disappears into the fog of forgetfulness.

Longing to be somewhere else
It took a long time for sorcerers to become popular heroes and magic to lose its stigma as "the devil's work". Today's fantasy novels portray magic in a much more positive way – also because the religious connection is gone. In the secularized world, magic is no longer viewed as something diabolical. "Magic has lost the appearance of invoking evil powers. In Harry Potter, it is simply a power that you can use either positively or negatively", Hammer explains. This allows the stories to deal more freely with magic – and make the sorcerer into the hero.

Often, the protagonist of a fantasy novel is ripped out of "our world" and transported into another world: into a magical land like Narnia, a school of witchcraft and wizardry like Hogwarts or a boarding school for shapeshifters like the Woodwalkers. These places are governed by different rules, by a different logic from our world. These "other worlds" provide a counterweight to our secularized, technology-based and science-focused society.

"The act of leaving our world is probably the reason behind the fantasy boom. People, especially in our technology-based society, have a general longing to dive into a different world with different rules – where someone like Harry Potter can be a hero, who didn't have the chance to do so in the normal world."

Professor Andreas Hammer

© Kampus Production, pexels

The act of wishing oneself into another reality, engaging in a touch of escapism, is often a large part of today's fantasy novels. This is precisely where there is an important difference between today and the Middle Ages. Did escapism motivate readers, back then? "No, I really don't believe this was the case. I don't think escapism defined the literature of the Middle Ages", Hammer contends. At the time, the supernatural and fantastical elements of medieval literature were interpreted as actually – or at least potentially – being much more real than people, today, would think. People then heard the magical stories but saw them as taking place in their own world, and not in another one. Although there was a certain literary distance in the stories, they were not understood to be purely fictional.

"I am really very cautious about applying the concept of 'fictionality' to medieval literature. We have to presuppose that people then had a different understanding of the concept than we do, today. They certainly must have thought that events like those in the stories could have possibly taken place", Hammer explains. The medieval texts also served more instructional purposes than imaginative ones. Clearly, magic in the literature of the Middle Ages was a form of entertainment, but it also quickly turned into a cautionary tale – bringing readers back down to earth.

Today, we generally no longer believe in magic and can thus talk about it much more openly. It is therefore no contradiction when we see that, in today's science-focused world, magic in literature is booming – while, at a time where people considered magic to be a possibility, the topic was treated with more caution. And although today's fantasy novels are set in medieval worlds, the shape magic takes in literature now contrasts with its use in stories from the High Middle Ages. Then, it would have been unthinkable to create a hero like Harry Potter who was born with magical powers and uses them everyday, as if it was the most normal thing in the world. All the better, that we have his story on our bookshelves, today.

About Andreas Hammer:

Andreas Hammer is a professor of older German language and literature at the University of Konstanz. He studies myths and literature, the literary concept of the sacred as well as mediality and narratives of the Middle Ages and early modern period. In an international collaboration project, he studied the structure and organizational principles used in the Codex Manesse (a medieval songbook that is part of the UNESCO Memory of the World. Andreas Hammer is the editor of the anthology "Magie und Literature" (magic and literature) focusing on the the narrative functions of magical practices in the Middle Ages and early modern period. He is also a member of the German Research Foundation's (DFG) network "Working Wonders with Words: Language and Power in the Pre-Modern World between Religion, Magic and Medicine".