Which Witch

The three witches—also known as the “weird sisters” in Shakespeare’s play—have been an object of fascination for artists and audiences alike for centuries. Verdi took a special interest in these supernatural figures. In his operatic adaptation of Macbeth, he quite literally expanded the witches’ role so that each of the three witches is played by a small chorus of at least six singers. “The roles in this opera are three and no more than three,” the composer wrote to French impresario and publisher Léon Escudier in 1865. “Lady Macbeth, Macbeth, and the chorus of the witches.”

By including these characters, Shakespeare was both echoing contemporary social issues and recognizing the peculiar interests of James I, the King of England who sponsored the playwright’s work and whose putative lineage Macbeth was written to honor. Indeed, in early modern Europe, anxieties about witchcraft were widespread. Between 1500 and 1650, roughly 100,000 people were put on trial for witchcraft; about half of those accused were ultimately executed. In England, an estimated 90% of those put to death were women.

James I was no exception to this anti-witch sentiment. In 1589, he married Anne of Denmark by proxy. When she set sail for Scotland to be with James, her ship was beset by storms—not once, but twice she was forced to seek refuge in Norway. James eventually made his way to Denmark to retrieve his wife, but the pair once again endured turbulent storms on their return voyage. In Denmark, these maelstroms were thought to be the work of witches. A number of women were accused, put on trial, and executed in Copenhagen in 1590. In Scotland, more women were accused of conjuring the storms to harm James and Anne; another trial ensued, leading to at least one execution.

Several years later, and perhaps prodded by these events, James published Daemonologie (1597), a treatise on witchcraft that argues for the existence of witches, outlines how to identify them, and suggests how best to punish them. According to James, some witches could be identified by a mark or spot hidden on their bodies. (Recall Lady Macbeth: “Out, damned spot!”) James and his contemporaries did not insist that only women dabbled in the occult, but they did believe that women were constitutionally weaker than men and thus more vulnerable to demonic possession. And despite these broader agreements, demonologists of the early modern period never achieved consensus on what exactly made a witch a witch.

Macbeth is just as ambiguous. Shakespeare’s witches appear both masculine and feminine: “You should be women,” Banquo remarks, “And yet your beards forbid me to interpret / That you are so.” When Lady Macbeth is herself in the process of becoming a witch, she commands “spirits” to “unsex” her. The weird sisters are at once seemingly prophetic and vulgar. They can bend the future to their will yet speak in gibberish. They are twisted but goofy. In Verdi’s hands, they are perceived as menacing, but their music is plainly ordinary. Perhaps it is from this profound uncertainty that the witches draw their supernatural force.