The Cunning-Folk of England
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deathtocapslockA while back, I read Cunning-Folk: Popular Magic in English History by Owen Davies, and I've been mulling over how the author's contentions might fit into the Potterverse.
To (very, very) briefly summarize, Davies says that the cunning folk were distinct from other classes of magic workers (though there is always some overlap). For instance, he contrasts them with those who were solely fortune-tellers and with charmers, who depended entirely on using a magical artifact of some sort for their work. He defines the cunning folk as the more full-service magic workers: they could find lost objects, help you scry for your true love, perform love charms/potions, heal, and--this is one of the biggest services--protect you against malevolent witchcraft.
One of the really interesting points Davies makes is that whatever the church said, most of the common people were insistent that the cunning folk were not witches. He claims that according to the records he studied, cunning folk were rarely prosecuted for witchcraft, and their neighbors often defended them. He also hypothesizes that the final decline of the profession in the late 19th/early 20th centuries was due to people no longer believing in witchcraft as a cause of many problems (even if they did believe in other occult phenomena) and so no longer needing anti-witch services.
(Other points of interest: they charged for their work, but often had another profession; they were often of the artisan/trade classes rather than farmers and laborers; they were usually at least semi-literate and used this as a mark of distinction; cunning men outnumbered cunning women; though many were rural, some worked in cities too; they usually worked alone unless training their children in the business.)
Pre-Statute of Secrecy, of course, this is no problem. The father in "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot" was probably the local cunning man, and he earned enough to allow his son to attend the full seven years at Hogwarts (whether or not they charged at the time, losing his son's labor for so long could be tough on the household). Said son then proved to be too high-and-mighty after his fancy education and needed to be taught a lesson about the value of work. Oh, and sure, do some good for the neighbors in the bargain.
But after? The idea of magic workers being paid for performing magic who are not witches, absolutely not, post-Statute of Secrecy, raises some interesting questions.
Some--perhaps many--could be charlatans, of course, and the Ministry might be happy to let them continue. Their failures could reinforce the idea that magic isn't real, so let them keep failing!
But were they all?
One possibility is that the original Statute was less restrictive than the present-day Code of Secrecy, and allowed for non-flashy types of magic such as potions and paper charms to shove in the doorjamb. Things that aren't visible magic. This would allow some witches and wizards to continue earning their livelihoods the way they traditionally had, with perhaps a few restrictions.
Another involves Squibs. We know that Squibs like Filch do have some small amount of magic; they just can't reliably channel it through a wand to perform dramatic spells like making pineapples tap-dance. Could they still brew basic potions or make weak protective charms? At least some of the time? Or even, did they believe they could? Squibs who were cast out of the wizarding world, or even those who kept in touch with their families but just couldn't make a living there, might or might not have other marketable skills to support themselves. Scraps of half-remembered magic could form the basis for a career. If they were careful. Same for charmers (who might have genuinely charmed objects), fortune tellers, and the like.
Bitter Squibs might even have good reasons to specialize in providing anti-witch protections. Those awful, cruel witches, casting out their children! Um, I mean, sickening livestock. The Ministry might not be so happy about witches being cast as the baddies, though...
Even if wizarding-born Squibs wouldn't or couldn't risk that, what about our hypothesized Muggleborn Squibs? If a number of supposed Muggles are born with minor talents--minor enough not to register with the Hogwarts Quill--they might realize it, and parlay their skill into a career, mightn't they? There would still be enough half-remembered pre-Statute lore both written and oral for them to scrape together the varied patchwork of magical practices the cunning folk used (and Davies makes the point that there was no overarching model or theory to unify them). The Ministry might not notice such low-level magical workings. Even when they did, they might brush them off as too minor to cause trouble, especially when they had so many bigger problems to deal with.
However it worked out, anyone involved--the Ministry, witches and wizards, wizarding-born Squibs, Muggle-born Squibs, and Muggles who found the services useful--would all have good reasons to insist that these magic practitioners were not witches, you got that?
It's all still a muddle of possibilities for me, so I'm curious to hear others' thoughts.
To (very, very) briefly summarize, Davies says that the cunning folk were distinct from other classes of magic workers (though there is always some overlap). For instance, he contrasts them with those who were solely fortune-tellers and with charmers, who depended entirely on using a magical artifact of some sort for their work. He defines the cunning folk as the more full-service magic workers: they could find lost objects, help you scry for your true love, perform love charms/potions, heal, and--this is one of the biggest services--protect you against malevolent witchcraft.
One of the really interesting points Davies makes is that whatever the church said, most of the common people were insistent that the cunning folk were not witches. He claims that according to the records he studied, cunning folk were rarely prosecuted for witchcraft, and their neighbors often defended them. He also hypothesizes that the final decline of the profession in the late 19th/early 20th centuries was due to people no longer believing in witchcraft as a cause of many problems (even if they did believe in other occult phenomena) and so no longer needing anti-witch services.
(Other points of interest: they charged for their work, but often had another profession; they were often of the artisan/trade classes rather than farmers and laborers; they were usually at least semi-literate and used this as a mark of distinction; cunning men outnumbered cunning women; though many were rural, some worked in cities too; they usually worked alone unless training their children in the business.)
Pre-Statute of Secrecy, of course, this is no problem. The father in "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot" was probably the local cunning man, and he earned enough to allow his son to attend the full seven years at Hogwarts (whether or not they charged at the time, losing his son's labor for so long could be tough on the household). Said son then proved to be too high-and-mighty after his fancy education and needed to be taught a lesson about the value of work. Oh, and sure, do some good for the neighbors in the bargain.
But after? The idea of magic workers being paid for performing magic who are not witches, absolutely not, post-Statute of Secrecy, raises some interesting questions.
Some--perhaps many--could be charlatans, of course, and the Ministry might be happy to let them continue. Their failures could reinforce the idea that magic isn't real, so let them keep failing!
But were they all?
One possibility is that the original Statute was less restrictive than the present-day Code of Secrecy, and allowed for non-flashy types of magic such as potions and paper charms to shove in the doorjamb. Things that aren't visible magic. This would allow some witches and wizards to continue earning their livelihoods the way they traditionally had, with perhaps a few restrictions.
Another involves Squibs. We know that Squibs like Filch do have some small amount of magic; they just can't reliably channel it through a wand to perform dramatic spells like making pineapples tap-dance. Could they still brew basic potions or make weak protective charms? At least some of the time? Or even, did they believe they could? Squibs who were cast out of the wizarding world, or even those who kept in touch with their families but just couldn't make a living there, might or might not have other marketable skills to support themselves. Scraps of half-remembered magic could form the basis for a career. If they were careful. Same for charmers (who might have genuinely charmed objects), fortune tellers, and the like.
Bitter Squibs might even have good reasons to specialize in providing anti-witch protections. Those awful, cruel witches, casting out their children! Um, I mean, sickening livestock. The Ministry might not be so happy about witches being cast as the baddies, though...
Even if wizarding-born Squibs wouldn't or couldn't risk that, what about our hypothesized Muggleborn Squibs? If a number of supposed Muggles are born with minor talents--minor enough not to register with the Hogwarts Quill--they might realize it, and parlay their skill into a career, mightn't they? There would still be enough half-remembered pre-Statute lore both written and oral for them to scrape together the varied patchwork of magical practices the cunning folk used (and Davies makes the point that there was no overarching model or theory to unify them). The Ministry might not notice such low-level magical workings. Even when they did, they might brush them off as too minor to cause trouble, especially when they had so many bigger problems to deal with.
However it worked out, anyone involved--the Ministry, witches and wizards, wizarding-born Squibs, Muggle-born Squibs, and Muggles who found the services useful--would all have good reasons to insist that these magic practitioners were not witches, you got that?
It's all still a muddle of possibilities for me, so I'm curious to hear others' thoughts.
