Wizardry: It's Not Witchcraft
I see all over Witchblr and across the greater magickal Tumblr Community that the general consensus is Witchcraft. I practice Wizardry, not Witchcraft. Most would likely assume that these are different terms for the same thing. You would be wrong.
There is a reason these are separate terms: they are completely different practices. "Wizard" comes from Anglo-Saxon "wysard" ("learned one"). Wizardry translates to "Art of Wisdom." The primary attribute of a Wizard is a thirst for knowledge and a keen mind. Indeed, ALL Wizards are loremasters. We are essentially the Scholars & Philosophers of the Magickal Community. That being said, Wizards often go to colleges to study with other Wizards or seek out a Master to train them in Wizardry, just as I have done. My Master was Jeremy Maloy, a Draconian Wizard who trained me in Merlynean Wizardry. An example of a Wizard college would be the Grey School of Wizardry. I go there on occasion to expand my knowledge and power.
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Our Magick comes from our strong minds & the ability to focus, the ability to learn and gain knowledge. Wizardry focuses on the attainment & preservation of arcane lore. Our power comes from our vast knowledge. We spend our whole lives studying Magick from books that have been passed down by Wizards from Master to Apprentice. The more knowledge we have, the more power we have. The phrase Knowledge is Power was made by Wizards.
Whether Modern Witches like it or not, traditional lore dictates that Witch's power is granted to them by their Familiar Spirit. Witches can do nothing without the aid of spirits. Even Atheist Witches use the Superconscious Mind (a consciousness directly outside of themselves). Witchcraft is bound to the Spirit World & the Astral Plane. A Familiar Spirit is really any spirit that aids the Witch in their Magick (yes..."their" because Witch is still a gender neutral term). Another common entity that aids Witches is their Fetch. There is a good reason for this. Witches don't use Mana. Witches raise power in a Sacred Circle, called the Cone of Power.
However, Wizard's power comes from our knowledge of Magick & ability to absorb Mana from the air we breathe, food we eat, & water we drink. Wizards store mana in what we call the Core, the origin of our power in the center of our being. It (aether) comes from the Wellspring. Since we absorb aether & our bodies use it to generate Mana, that Mana has to be stored. As such, we have a natural capacity for Mana. That means our Magick is Vancian: we have a certain number of times we can cast/certain amount of power for spells before we run out of Mana. We don't "raise power." We use what we have in our Cores.
For the last decade I have done a study on Elemental Magick, and what I found is very interesting! This post is dedicated to exploring the
Even though Witches can specialize if they choose to, Wizards always specialize. In fact, that's the defining trait that separates Wizardry from Witchcraft. Wizardry is divided into Disciplines: areas of magickal concentration. There are 16 of them, each with a color related to the field of study:
• Loremastery (Grey) (my Discipline)
• Thaumaturgy/Sympathetic Magick (Black)
• Ceremonial Magick (White)
• Magickal Practice (Gold)
• Natural Philosophy (Silver)
• Beastmastery (Brown)
• Lifeways (Pink)
• Mathemagicks (Clear)
• Psychic Arts (Aqua)
• Alchemy (Red)
• Performance Magick (Orange)
• Divination (Yellow)
• Wortcunning (Green)
• Healing (Blue)
• Mind Magicks (Indigo)
• Cosmology (Violet)
These Disciplines also have a wavelength of Mana related to them, I call this "Mana flavors." Mana is a spectrum, a color spectrum to be precise! This is often why Wizards always have a Staff made of a specific wood. It's based on the idea that the Staff carries the magickal properties of the tree it is made from. Each tree is aligned to a specific "flavor" of Mana and is so aligned to a specific type of Magick (more on Staves later).
Staples in Wizardry are Numerology & Planetary Days/Hours. Our Magick is highly calculated based on Circumstances. We can't just cast all willy nilly. Because of this, our Magick is very Vancian. That means we have to prepare our spells AHEAD OF TIME in order to cast when we need to. For this reason, we learn the art of Dragoncrafting (for more information, check out Amber Wolfe's Druid Power). This is also why Wizards have always been heavily associated with Dragons. Our spells are often in the shape of Dragons as thoughtforms. This is not always the case but the point is we always shape our energies & spells into thoughtforms with the traits we need. That's why you will often catch me sharing a lot of stuff about Thoughtforms, Servitors, & Egregores.
The last thing of note is the Wizard's Staff. While Witches *can* have a Staff, a Wizard is required to create & use one. The Wizard's Staff is essentially part of their body. It is composed of the very essence of the Wizard who created it. It is the Wizard themselves synthesized into a Staff. Much like the concept of the Witch's Fetch. Just as a Fetch is part of a Witch naturally, the Wizard's Staff is part of the Wizard who makes it.
The Staff also has many other significances:
• Extra Power: The Staff is simply capable of drawing power from the ambient and delivering it to the linked Wizard. A linked Staff simply increases the surface area the linked Wizard has to draw mana from his surroundings.
• Mana Magnification: The Staff is essentially a focusing lens. Think of it like a water hose with a nozzle attached. Without the nozzle the water just flows and pretty much just goes wherever you point the hose. Great for watering gardens, not great when you need to power wash something. Without a Staff, a Wizard's mana flows out of them without resistance. Which is okay if you are just using your powers and don't need a "push." But for the bigger stuff like when you need to project a large amount of energy in one direction, then a Staff is needed to concentrate the Mana into a narrow beam. Like a magnifying glass in sunlight.
• Load Balancing: A Wizard uses mana when casting spells, but his ability to draw mana is probably constant over time. A Staff helps to balance the load of Mana. This prevents "short circuiting. My old Master taught me that "a Wizard's power is measured by how much energy we can continually channel at once." Remember that nerves can be fried if you force too much energy through them. Like trying to force 600 volts though a 60 volt wire.
• Mana Concentration: Instead of collecting mana within itself, the staff attracts it. This essentially creates a high mana field around the Wizard. It would in practice work much like the previous option, but would be more transparent. It would also be useful for non-combat (non-offensive) spells as the level of mana can limit what magick can work.
• Power Filtering: The Staff allows the Wizard to draw clean and stable power. It filters out spikes and "dark mana". It also filters out dips in the mana. This allows the mage to use less of the available power and time to stabilize the spell without increasing the chance of spell failure. It just makes casting spells easier and more efficient.
• Flavor Conversion: Since there are multiple flavors of mana, the Wizard is not equally efficient at using them all. The Staff collects mana the Wizard is bad at and converts it to what the Wizard actually wants. The effect is similar to extra power and power filtering options. This trait acts like a prism to light. We can use our Staves to "split" Mana into a spectrum, then transmute the Mana into what we can use. This is one of the core functions of a Staff, and is based on the type of wood the Staff is made of.
Sources:
Amber Wolfe's Druid Power
Oberon Zell's Grimoire for the Apprentice Wizard
5 years of Training in Wizardry by Jeremy Maloy, a Draconian Wizard
Fairy Tail Anime
Rise of the Shield Hero Anime
Grey School of Wizardry
(I know this was made for RPGs but it's such a great source for my purposes of explanation!)
Similarly to the question How would it make sense that spellbooks or grimoires teach only one spell? I was thinking about typical RPG games