Warlock
A warlock is a male practitioner of witchcraft.
Etymology and terminology
The most commonly accepted etymology derives warlock from the Old English ƿǣrloga, which meant "breaker of oaths" or "deceiver," and was given special application to the Devil around 1000 AD.
In early modern Scots, the word came to be used as the male equivalent of witch (which can be male or female, but has historically been used predominantly for females). The term may have become associated in Scotland with male witches due to the idea that they had made pacts with Auld Hornie (the devil) and thus had betrayed the Christian faith and broke their baptismal vows or oaths. From this use, the word passed into Romantic literature and ultimately 20th-century popular culture.
History of people identified as warlocks
France
Nicolas Flamel (1330 – 22 March 1418) was a French scrivener and manuscript seller. After his death, Flamel developed a reputation as an alchemist believed to have created and discovered the philosopher's stone and to have thereby achieved immortality. These legendary accounts first appeared in the 17th century.
Scotland
Although most victims of the Scottish witch trials were women, some men were executed as warlocks.
In the early 1600s, Scottish mathematician John Napier was perceived as a warlock or magician for his interest in divination and the occult, though his established position likely kept him from being prosecuted.
Croatia
Jure Grando Alilović (1578–1656) was a villager from the region of Istria in modern-day Croatia who was referred to as a štrigon, a local word for something resembling a vampire and a warlock.
Johann Weikhard von Valvasor wrote about Jure Grando Alilović's life and afterlife in his 1689 book The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola. The legend tells that, for 16 years after his death, Jure would arise from his grave by night and terrorize the village. After some exorcism prayers, one of the villagers took a saw and sawed the head off the corpse. As soon as the saw tore his skin, the vampire screamed, and blood started to flow from the cut. According to folklore, peace finally returned to the region after Jure's decapitation.
Chile
The warlocks of Chiloé (Spanish: brujos de Chilo) are people of the Chiloé Archipelago off the coast of Chile who are said to practice witchcraft. The warlocks are said to be able to fly using a macuñ made from the skin from a dead virgin's chest, to turn into certain animals, and to inflict harm upon other men from a distance. Their knowledge of plants and animals also enable them to brew powerful potions. They are said to be weak to salt.
Although these warlocks may have been simply legendary persons, in 1880, Chilean authorities initiated a series of trials against accused warlocks believed to rule the archipelago through a secret society.
Spain
Dámaso Rodríguez Martín (December 11, 1944 – February 19, 1991), better known as El Brujo (The Warlock) or Maso, was a Spanish serial killer and rapist who, in 1991, was responsible for three murders in the Canary Islands. He was a practitioner of ritual magic and left sigils drawn on the wall of an abandoned house where he had been hiding.
After escaping from prison, he was eventually cornered and gunned down by police after unsuccessfully trying to kill himself.
In popular culture
Adam Warlock is a fictional Marvel Comics superhero who debuted in 1967. The character is immortal and has the ability to manipulate cosmic energy.
Warlock was the name of a German heavy metal band founded in 1982 in Düsseldorf. The band gained popularity and some commercial success in Europe in the mid-1980s.
The warlock is a character class in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. It was introduced as a non-core base class who practice arcane magic in 2004.
Warlock film series
Warlock is the name of a 1989 American supernatural horror film directed by Steve Miner and starring Julian Sands stars as the title character, a son of Satan who travels from the late 1600s to modern times with the mission of destroying the world. It spawned two sequels, Warlock: The Armageddon (1996) and Warlock III: The End of Innocence (1999).
On July 8, 1995, 14-year-old Sandy Charles murdered 7-year-old Johnathan Thimpsen. In court, lawyers on Charles' behalf argued that he had become obsessed with the film Warlock and that the murder was based in part on occult concepts from the movie