Witch marks
Protection marks; apotropaic marks; daisy wheels
- Known today as
- Symbols scratched or burned near doors and fireplaces: compass-drawn daisy wheels, overlapping Vs for the Virgin, and burn marks.
- Kind
- Amulet, in 1 older authority
- Earliest authority here
- The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York, 1907–1914)
Revised October 3, 2026: An authority added from a text read in full. Checked against its sources, each read in full, in part, or in its abstract. Version 1, first published September 28, 2026.
Witch marks: what was it used for?
To guard the openings of a house or church against evil spirits and witches, and, Hoggard notes, against more than witchcraft.
Witch marks: what does modern science say?
Now recorded by building historians and by surveys such as the English Medieval Graffiti Survey.
What Medicine Makes of It
- The Wandering Womb and the ConvulsionsSuffocation of the mother, hysteria, and functional neurological disorder.
- The Marks on the BodyStigmata, the witch’s mark, and what the mind does to the skin.
- The Child WitnessThe children of Salem and Mora, and the suggestibility of memory.
Witch marks: what lore surrounds it?
At Knole in Kent, marks were cut in the beams and fireplace surrounds of a room prepared for James I in 1606, in the months after the Gunpowder Plot. In 2016 Historic England asked the public to help record such marks.
Witch marks: what did the older authorities say?
- The Catholic Encyclopedia
- The Catholic Encyclopedia recalls the canon in the De ecclesiasticis disciplinis ascribed to Regino of Prüm (906), that it “is the duty of priests earnestly to instruct the people that these things are absolutely untrue and that such imaginings are planted in the minds of misbelieving folk, not by a Divine spirit, but by the spirit of evil,” and Burchard of Worms, who rejected “the nocturnal riding through the air, the changing of a person's disposition from love to hate, the control of thunder, rain, and sunshine, the transformation of a man into an animal,” treating “the very belief in their possibility … as a sin.” Gregory VII in 1080 forbade King Harold of Denmark to put witches to death “upon presumption of their having caused storms or failure of crops or pestilence.”
Sources
- Hoggard, B. (2019). Magical House Protection: The Archaeology of Counter-Witchcraft. New York: Berghahn. Read in part · the text read
- The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York, 1907–1914), “Witchcraft.” newadvent.org/cathen/15674a.htm Read in full · the text read
- Hoggard, B. “Protection marks.” Apotropaios, apotropaios.co.uk/protection-marks.html. Read in full · the text read
- Hoggard, B. “Circles and daisy-wheels.” Apotropaios, apotropaios.co.uk/circles-and-daisy-wheels.html. Read in full · the text read
- Hoggard, B. “Deliberate burn marks.” Apotropaios, apotropaios.co.uk/deliberate-burn-marks.html. Read in full · the text read
- Hoggard, B. “Marian marks.” Apotropaios, apotropaios.co.uk/marian-marks.html. Read in full · the text read
- National Trust. “Witchmarks at Knole and the Gunpowder Plot.” nationaltrust.org.uk. Read in full · the text read
- Newser (2016). “UK wants help finding ‘witches’ marks.’” newser.com, 31 October 2016. Read in full · the text read
Verification
- Checked
- October 1, 2026, and October 3, 2026
- Passes
- Every dated or regulatory claim checked by category across the database
- Each quotation from the older authorities checked word for word against the text, read in full
- Every source read, in full, in part, or in its abstract, and every sentence checked against what was read (October 3, 2026)
- Sources
- 8 cited: 7 read in full, 1 read in part.
- Corrections
- None were needed.
What was checked, how, and what was found is set out on the Verification page. A checked source is one whose record was found; it does not make the entry medical advice.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published September 28, 2026 · last revised October 3, 2026
- Chicago
“Witch marks.” In Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1. The Thinking Press, 2026–. Last modified October 3, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/witch-marks.
- MLA
“Witch marks.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 3 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/witch-marks. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Witch marks. (2026, October 3). In B. C. P. Statema (Ed.), Materia medica (Version 1). The Thinking Press. Retrieved October 8, 2026, from https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/witch-marks
Club members keep entries on a shelf with private notes, print the plates as cards, and receive an entry by email each week. Create a free account before January 1, 2027 and all of it is yours for good. About the Club
See Also
Also in The Catholic Encyclopedia
Abracadabra in The Catholic Encyclopedia · Witch bottle in The Catholic Encyclopedia · AGLA in The Catholic Encyclopedia · Witch ball in The Catholic Encyclopedia · everything The Catholic Encyclopedia names →
Drawing on the same sources: Hoggard
Nearby in the alphabet
Witches’ butter (Black or yellow jelly fungi that swell on dead branches after rain) · Woad (Isatis tinctoria) · Wood sorrel (Oxalis acetosella) · Winter-grain mould (Pink and white moulds of grain left in the field over winter) · Woodlouse · Wild rue (Peganum harmala)
Historical description, not medical advice.