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Dumb question. Can witches be male? And if so are they still called witches?
Yes, and yes.
Somewhat unrelated, but the founder of what we call the Wiccan religion was a man (Gary Gardener, I believe his name was.) and several men were also picked up during the Inquistion under suspicion of performing witchcraft. While it's true that historically women were (absurdly, of course) considered more susceptible to Satan's influence and therefore more likely to be witches, it was generally a gender-neutral term for most of its existence.
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Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.
Yes, they can be. Also as Cheapy mentioned, they get to punch things with their mustaches. There's also this to point out
Prehensile Hair (Su): The witch can instantly cause her hair (or even her eyebrows) to grow up to 10 feet long or to shrink to its normal length, and can manipulate her hair as if it were a limb with a Strength score equal to her Intelligence score. Her hair has reach 10 feet, and she can use it as a secondary natural attack that deals 1d3 points of damage (1d2 for a Small witch). Her hair can manipulate objects (but not weapons) as dexterously as a human hand. The hair cannot be sundered or attacked as a separate creature. Pieces cut from the witch’s elongated hair shrink away to nothing. Using her hair does not harm the witch’s head or neck, even if she lifts something heavy with it. The witch can manipulate her hair a number of minutes each day equal to her level; these minutes do not need to be consecutive, but must be spent in 1-minute increments. A typical male witch with this hex can also manipulate his beard, moustache, or eyebrows.
As for whether they are still witches or no, not sure... Maybe warlocks? Sheesh I don't think there's even a term for a male witch, the best I can think of as an opposite would be a wizard, and they seem well-respected rather than despised unlike witches.
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Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.
What stops female witches from punching things with their mustaches?
Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.What stops female witches from punching things with their mustaches?
Well, unless they're dwarves, physiology.
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Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.Is Tom Selleck a witch then?
Does he weigh the same as a duck?
Well, unless they're dwarves, physiology.Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.What stops female witches from punching things with their mustaches?
If you don't think females can have mustaches, you're in for an awful surprise the first time you're part of a conversation that includes the words "lip waxed".
Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.Is Tom Selleck a witch then?
That's just silly. The presence of a mustache (even one with as high of a CMB as Tom Selleck's) doesn't mean a person is a witch... it's if they weigh the same as a duck, are made of wood, etc. etc.
Dang, ninja'ed... people on this board are fast.
yeah I have seen some whiskers on women. Believe it or not. They were hardly noticeable, though.
If you don't think females can have mustaches, you're in for an awful surprise the first time you're part of a conversation that includes the words "lip waxed".Well, unless they're dwarves, physiology.Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.What stops female witches from punching things with their mustaches?
Sir or madame, you are insulting glorious mustaches everywhere to even think to call peach fuzz a mustache.
Sir or madame, you are insulting glorious mustaches everywhere to even think to call peach fuzz a mustache.
If you think female facial hair is limited to "peach fuzz", women must be very, very careful around you. :-)
In fantasy worlds, sometimes the male gendered witch is referred to as a warlock. This comes from a scottish usage, but is not a universal distintion in all english dialects or languages. Codification of magic using classes in 3.0+ DnD would just cause further confusion using gender as a distinction between witch and warlock. Since Pathfinder does not have a Warlock class though, it shouldn't be too big an issue. Legends,religions, myths and mythos of witches tend toward heavy female emphasis but it is rarely a hard and fast rule.
According to SKR, the class names are not modified my gender. A female wizard is called a "wizard" a male witch is called a "witch" and a female sorcerer is called a "sorcerer."
Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.
I am sure that some female witches can too. We just don't talk about it.
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"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+
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Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.I am sure that some female witches can too. We just don't talk about it.
Actually no she can't. This ability is unique in that it's the only ability out there that specifies which Gender can use it.
Only MALE witches can beat you to death with his beard, mustache or eyebrows. Female witches have to use other hair sources for this power.
Only MALE witches can beat you to death with his beard, mustache or eyebrows. Female witches have to use other hair sources for this power.
Erm... so female witches are assumed to have no eyebrows?
Plus, the day I see a boggard witch, male or female, that delivers attacks with a moustache is the day I will stop drinking. Honestly.
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Erm... so female witches are assumed to have no eyebrows?Only MALE witches can beat you to death with his beard, mustache or eyebrows. Female witches have to use other hair sources for this power.
That's an exception in the original posting of the power.
It goes back and specifies female Witches can use eyebrows in a different line of the power. Beards and mustaches are male only.
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The English word "witch", comes from the Old English words "wicce" (feminine) and "Wicca" (masculine). We can thank the thought that all witches are female to Disney.
That's it...I am making a male witch character that attacks people with his chest hair....
I always thought a male witch was called a Warlock, but I grew up watching Sabrina the Teenaged Witch so that probably wasn't the definitive source.
On the other hand, EVERYONE was a witch back in the Crucible.
Depends on where you are from.
Warlock is a Scottish word, and was, and still is used to specify a male witch.However soon the Wiccans will be on here complaining that it means "oathbreaker".
3...2....1....
Somewhat unrelated, but the founder of what we call the Wiccan religion was a man (Gary Gardener, I believe his name was.)
That's Gerald Gardner ;)
"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+
Bonus points for you, Sir. Well played.
"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+Bonus points for you, Sir. Well played.
One does not contradict the other.
"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+Bonus points for you, Sir. Well played.One does not contradict the other.
** spoiler omitted **
Not if your wife might see it ;)
"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+Bonus points for you, Sir. Well played.One does not contradict the other.
** spoiler omitted **
it's a Movie quote.
It's at about the 1:50 mark.
Warlock is a scottish term for 'oathbreaker' coined, ironically, during the christian endeavors to convert the heathens in that country. Witches, at least by today's standards, are male or female. there is no differentiation. The class really doesn't reflect anything wiccan though, and warlock's already been abused in title to reflect a different style class.
"Return of the King" is on and literally Gandalf just called the head wraith that rides the wyvern thingy, the "Witch King on Angoth" (or something). JRRT must have saw it as a gender neutral term.
Warlock is a scottish term for 'oathbreaker' coined, ironically, during the christian endeavors to convert the heathens in that country.
Not true.
Warlock was not associated with the word Wearloga (oathbreaker) till Tolkien.
Both Scottish, and Scandinavian peoples prior to that associated it with a male witch, or Vard'locker (Spirit chanter).
All early text use the term "warlock" as a form of spell caster...example
"Sorcerers and Warlocks come from Ville, Wizards come from Ve"...
The association with wearloga (oath-breaker) is only attested to in modern usage, and primarily in modern wicca.
During the days when the English were still killing witches, the term "witch" was used for a female who got magical powers from the Devil and the term "wizard" was used for a male who did. These days, warlock is most commonly used as a masculine form of witch and if I were to make a male witch, I'd probably just call him a warlock.
The English word "witch", comes from the Old English words "wicce" (feminine) and "Wicca" (masculine). We can thank the thought that all witches are female to Disney.
That's it...I am making a male witch character that attacks people with his chest hair....
And has a high Strength score and a halfing bard cohort... (I blame your mention of Disney.)
Warlock was not associated with the word Wearloga (oathbreaker) till Tolkien.
Etymology of warlock: "Old English wǣrloga 'traitor, scoundrel, monster', also 'the Devil', from wǣr 'covenant' + an element related to lēogan 'belie, deny'. From its application to the Devil, the word was transferred in Middle English to a person in league with the Devil, and hence a sorcerer. It was chiefly Scots until given wider currency by Sir Walter Scott."
Unless J.R.R. Tolkien was around sometime from the mid-5th to mid-12th centuries....
My goofy friend suggested a witch with...
The English word "witch", comes from the Old English words "wicce" (feminine) and "Wicca" (masculine).
Having flashbacks to Old English Language and Lit classes - so many wasted years of my life. But yes, there is nothing about the linguistic root of the word, or its use in Pathfinder, that stops men being witches.
"I'm not a witch, I'm your wife!"+Bonus points for you, Sir. Well played.
I do love that scene!
Warlock was not associated with the word Wearloga (oathbreaker) till Tolkien.Etymology of warlock: "Old English wǣrloga 'traitor, scoundrel, monster', also 'the Devil', from wǣr 'covenant' + an element related to lēogan 'belie, deny'. From its application to the Devil, the word was transferred in Middle English to a person in league with the Devil, and hence a sorcerer. It was chiefly Scots until given wider currency by Sir Walter Scott."
Unless J.R.R. Tolkien was around sometime from the mid-5th to mid-12th centuries....
The etymological link to waerloga was established by Tolkien.
The word Warlock was obviosly in use much earlier.What is currently in dispute among ethnologist and linguists is it's connection to the English term waerloga (oathbreake), which is historically and culturally unattested.
There are also reliable patterns as to how one culture will mangle another cultures word.....as explained in this snippet form Niklas Gander a Phd in germanic languages.
"If, as is posited in many Modern English dictionaries, the word"warlock" comes from a ME "warloghe" from OE "w¾rloga", then the Modern form we should expect to see would be something like warlow, or werlow, since the tendency to move from 'gh' to 'w' is strong in English, and from 'gh' to 'ck' unknown.
This is a trait it shares with Danish, and to provide an example, the Old Swedish "lagh" (meaning"law") is spelled in Modern Danish "lag" but pronounced "law" and in English, orthography and pronunciation are again in sync, with the form "law." That "gh" in the Middle English form "warloghe" indicates a uvular fricative, that is a g that is pronounced as if one were gargling (as in Dutch "gulder"). That aspirated "g" is what, in English, is usually exchanged for a "w". Other examples in English:"through", "drought", etc.
When one also considers the semantic shift,i.e., from "traitor, oathbreaker" to "sorcerer, conjurer", this all begins to introduce an element of doubt as to the actual etymology.
Now, when I find corroboration for this hypothesis in dictionaries of Old Norse (Cleasby, Vigfusson and Craigie), I must, as a trained linguist, seek another more satisfying etymology.
In the Old Norse tale, Eiriks saga RauÝa (The Saga of Eirik the Red,mid 14th century), the term "varÝlokkur" appears in the context of a prophecy-session at a farm in Greenland.
It is used to mean a song of conjuring.
When the two constituent terms are split, we see "varÝ"which had by that time the sense of a spirit, and "lokkur" or a song of luring or attracting.
In Modern Swedish, the term "lock" is used for the pastoral songs that are sung to call the cows home from the meadow -- "kolock".
In just this same way, the song to attract or call the "varÝ" or spirit, was the "varÝlokkur".
Gradually, with time, the term for the song and for the singer became interchangeable, i.e., the same term was used for both.
Semantically, we can interpret the term as "enchanter, conjurer." Now, is all of this linguistically feasible? Yes, and here's why: The term varÝlokkur is a compound noun.
The consonantal combination "rÝl" could never occur otherwise.
As it is,this consonantal cluster is very difficult, even in Norse, so the tendency is to simplify.
Since in Old Norse, the rolled "r" followed by the liquid "l" would have organically produced the medial "Ý",this consonant is the most likely candidate for deletion.
Also, word initial "v" was commonly anglicized into word initial "w" in English.Examples: vOErd = ward, vurm = worm, vatten = water, ved = wood, etc.
And finally (and in my mind, most convincingly) the geminate "k" at the end of the Norse is reflected in the "ck" of the English."