When I was five years old, I remember my grandmother telling me and my sister to come home before nighttime (6:00 PM), or else the witches will come after us and eat us raw. Since then, I have been terrified to disobey her orders, especially when the movie Hocus Pocus came out. I did not realize that it was a comedy until I reached high school, because I used to cover my face with my hands, leaving a tiny hole where I can peep in. Then in 1999, the popularity of The Blair Witch Project movie skyrocketed, which intimidated a massive number of audiences, enough to make them just believe, and I was never an exception. However, when the news broke out that it was not true, I started to doubt everything about witchcraft. Afterwards, books and movies of Harry Potter came out on the market, making people dream of attending the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry', and being a witch or a wizard themselves. This made me realize that there are several misconceptions about witchcraft, which made people either be fascinated or be afraid of it. Even the thought of witches never fails to bring goosebumps on one's skin, as if they were horrible creatures that people should be warned of. Furthermore, whenever the words witchcraft' and witches' are uttered, two things come into our mind: demonology' and women' respectively. The mystery behind witches and their practices brought a lot of controversy over the years, which led to much research to discover the true story of witchcraft. The history of witchcraft can be divided into three phases: Sorcery, Diabolical Witchcraft, and Modern Witchcraft (Ellwood).
According to Robert S. Ellwood, the first part of the history of witchcraft is sorcery, which refers "primarily to witchcraft in primal and ancient societies- (Ellwood). Its time period dates back from the ancient times to the early thirteenth century, in which witches are deemed practicing the invocation of the spirit, casting spells, concoction-making, and all things related to magic (Guiley, "Witches- 368-369).
