Wind Knots: Background information when reading The Witches of Bellinas

Wind Knots

This article relates to The Witches of Bellinas

The coastal California setting of The Witches of Bellinas is often beset by fierce and powerful winds. As the strong gusts rage, Mia, Bellinas's unofficial matriarch, explains to main character Tansy that wind has often been associated with magic. She gives the example of a peculiar, and largely forgotten, bit of history.

Hundreds of years ago, in Scandinavia, Ireland and Scotland, it was thought that witchcraft could control the wind, and savvy sailors tried to wield these powers to their advantage. They would buy strings of knots from self-proclaimed witches, believing that there was wind encased in each knot. If the wind at sea failed them, they would untie a knot to release some.

There are records of this practice dating back as far as the 14th century. One literary depiction of it appears in Shakespeare's Macbeth in reference to the abilities of the play's famous witches: "Though you untie the winds and let them fight / Against the churches; though the yesty waves / Confound and swallow navigation up."

There have also been court cases stemming from the belief in witches with power over the wind. In 1767, a woman in Finland was hanged after sailors who had bought knots from her were lost at sea. She confessed to enclosing winds in a sack in order to create a tempest. Similarly, in 1658, a woman on the Isle of Man was fined because it was believed she had drained a well dry in order to "obtain a favourable winde."

As scientific advancements made it easier to predict the weather and navigate at sea, the practice of selling wind knots died out. But we see remnants of it even today. One website for witchcraft practitioners advocates tying and releasing wind knots as a way to harness the metaphorical winds of strong emotions and particular energies.

Close-up photo of a knotted rope on a beach, by Benjamin Istanbuli via Unsplash

Filed under Cultural Curiosities

This article relates to The Witches of Bellinas. It first ran in the May 15, 2024 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.