What Makes a Wizard?
It’s a Magic-User of 11th level or higher, stupid.
Jokes Aside I’ve really been fascinated by the terminology of magic users, mainly due to personal belief that all magic-user titles are wibbly-wobbly. But why has wizard specifically stuck in our collective psychosphere for so long? What the fuck do the numbers words mean?
Origin and Meaning
Wizard, in most general definitions, is “a guy that can do magic”.
The word itself is Middle-English in origin, coming from the spelling Wysard/Wysarde, roughly meaning “wise man” (-ard being a suffix to denote someone of a trait, IE: drunkard, dullard, etc).
Notably, it doesn’t have any direct cognates in the Germanic family, but it is related to Proto Indo-European weyd- (to see), which is cognates with Proto-Celtic druwits (“Oak-Seer”, which eventually gets us to the modern English word Druid) and the Proto-Slavic vědьma (“Witch” or “Seeress”, which gets us the Polish and Ukrainian words wiedźma and відьма, respectively).
Usage
The term wizard didn’t specifically mean a type of Magic-User until the English renaissance. Note John Dryden’s Translation of Vergil’s Georgics:
“The Wily Wizard Must be Caught”
Specifically he is referring to the god Proteus, who knows the arts of divining and magic. Put a pin in this.
Now rip this pin out. In modern fantastical literature, there are several characters also classed as wizards noted for mastery and knowledge:
- Thoth-Amon of Conan Fame is the High Priest of Set and a Wizard.
- Sparrowhawk/Ged from the Earthsea Cycle gains the title once he finishes his training at the isle of Roke.
- Elric of Melniboné becomes a wizard after spending 10,000 years in a dream learning the secrets of magic.
- The Wizards of the Legendarium are the sole practitioners of their school of magic. This particular connotation of mastery is something that tickles my brain too.
My Meaning
From this I’ve grappled a meaning:
A wizard is a person of a magical tradition who has completed the metaphoric “Blackening” of the Magical Journey: they have exposed themselves to all the knowledge available within a magical tradition and soaked it all in. Any magical training they now seek is the second leg of the Magnum Opus, to be purified and have their understanding of magic and existence wiped blank and reset for the next stage in to occur.
Notably this also includes Religious casters like High Priests and Heresiarchs 1, for what is magic if not working the supernatural and what is not supernatural than a god?
In either case, Wizards reach the plateau stage of knowledge: they thin out in rough power, as someone consigned to full wizardry is fundamentally content with their understanding of magic. And yet, like Goethe’s Faust, a magician will never truly be content with their understanding.
Sources
Online Etymology Dictionary: https://www.etymonline.com/word/wizard
Dryden’s Translation of Vergil: https://archive.org/details/drydenworksofvirgil/page/n5/mode/1up
Mormon-friendly retroclone outside of CoC dropped. I’m patenting this btw HMU with 20 big ones every time you use the name.↩