What Is Your Familiar?

Hi all and welcome to Spirit’s blog. Today is Witchy Wednesday, I figured we could talk about familiars. I’m sure you have all heard of a witch’s familiar. Movies and television have given them a rather bad connotation, but how did this all begin?

Well magical animals, animal guides and spirits have been around long before movies and television. In the beginning familiars were seen as a witch’s protector or guardian. These animals possessed their own magical gifts and could be used in conjunction with the witch’s natural gifts for magic spells.

During the Medieval time period in Europe there was panic and widespread hysteria over familiars and witches. This prompted the execution of witches and many, many pets. They believed the pairing of an animal and a human was unnatural.

In the 14th century, Europe had killed so many cats that they had a shortage. This shortage of cats is believed to be one of the causes of the Black Death. There were rodents everywhere carrying fleas with the plague on them. There were no cats to kill these rodents, so therefore people started contracting the disease. The Black Plague killed an estimated 25 million people in this time.

In Ancient Roman myth a spirit animal was a protector. It would protect it’s home and all those within it. Due to the respecting of animals and their believed powers, they…