Is Magic More Magical in Latin?

The magic in my WIP is very experimental and coded. I have 8 elements (fire, water, earth, wind, light, dark, metal, and electricity) and two parts for every element (major and minor). First you notate if it is an attack, defense, or support spell. Next you form the words by picking a major and minor part. There are as many words in a spell as you can handle and each word must have a major part followed by a minor part. To cast it you stop.

Edit: I forgot to add that before you say anything, you clasp your hands together and concentrate.

Latin, not so much. I do think rhyme helps.

Most of my magic is based on the idea of it being the will of the caster imposed on the universe. How you do that varies with the caster and how they were trained. The ritual or focus is only a means to get the caster into the right state of mind - a meditative trance state in which they can correctly channel magic. You can do it by chanting (in a dead language if you beleive they have more power or the ritual you found in an old book is in that language) because repetitive chants create a mental state which is trance like. You can also meditate on a candle, drum, do self scarification, take drugs (peyote, hemlock and cannabis having the most magical links with small amounts of the toxic hemlock being the basis for the witches 'flying potion' because it makes you feel as if you are flying), undergo pain (such as through piercing or branding or ritual sacrifice of your own blood), dance (because the dancing or other physical exercise gets you into a trance state by lowering blood glucose, fasting works the same way) and basically any other ritual process which induces self hypnosis or exerts you.

An item of trivia which may be of interest here... it is likely that the basis of the hermetic idea of 'names having power' comes from ancient Egypt where there was a literate elite of priests who kept records on taxes paid. If they knew your name they knew all about you - where you lived, who you were married to, how many children you had and,more importantly, how much tax you owed. To an illiterate and superstitious person this might seem like 'magic'.

As someone who took the equivalent of four semesters of college Latin, the majority of authors who use Latin for their spells make me rage so much I stop reading.

Point 1: You don't need a dead language, or even any language to believably cast spells.

Point 2: Most authors know jack shit about actual Latin, and merely plug together vaguely Latin-sounding terms to make spells. You wanna impress me with your Latin spell-wielding skills? Know some Latin and use it properly.

I think latin, sounds nice, and more magical than our laguage, simply because most of the people don't know latin. Along with that, it sort of shows how ancient magic is.

In my WIP they don't need to speak to cast magic, unless it's for an enchanted item. They sort of 'will' it, though some people use words just to help themselves.

My husband would like me to add the wizard character to my book...he likes the wizard which would cast spells....but I like the sorcerer.....where power of the spell is from within the sorcerer but other unknown elements also control the spell being cast....kinda like when Shmedrick the magician from " The Last Unicorn" would say "Magic do what you will"

My husband said that wizard spell casting is a scientific thing where gestures and sound mixed with the borrowing of energy around them and sometimes it requires alchemic (spelling?)components and materials.....

He did say a language not used anymore would be more mysterious in that one does not know the power locked within that language...

Terminology wise, I'm actually using greek. Ousialurgy (Study of Primary Substance) for example but for incantations? Haven't really thought of using them at least for the evocation type... for brewing up magic well that might be another animal entirely... Hmm.

If I TRY to wrap my brain around it and try to visualize what might happen in such a spell the only thing I can think is that the sounds can cause a reaction to occur...kinda like an atomic bomb activated by certain sound sequence...magic bouncing and controlled by sound.

Then of course I think of the bard .....

but then you have the kind of magic with words that act more like a curse would...but that is something totally different then what I have been talking about....

I like how Dresden Files did it best, words in languages a person doesn't know are means of insulating the mind from damage of the energies as well as prevent them from accidentally casting the spell by using the word fire or ice in every day language.

Darkarma said:

I like how Dresden Files did it best, words in languages a person doesn't know are means of insulating the mind from damage of the energies as well as prevent them from accidentally casting the spell by using the word fire or ice in every day language.

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I love how Jim Butcher walks right up to the edge of how real practitioners do it, and then explodes it all with crazy fantasy. I concur; I really like his approach and making it based on the individual caster.

I think it's okay if you know enough Latin to do it properly, but "pig Latin" is awful IMO.

In my novels my human magus works pretty much the same as a real world ceremonial magician, albeit with rather more tangible results.

It's fun to think about stuff like this. If you look at some of the old "magical grimoires"—The Greater Key of Solomon and stuff like that—they use Hebrew, since they're dealing with angels/demons & spirits from the Judeo/Christian tradition. But any language should suffice; language simply provides a structure for the ritual and names what needs to be named—for once you name a thing, you can control it. (In theory.)

I think what's essential is that the magic seems magical. foreign. Obviously an easy way to do this is to mess with old languages that the average reader doesn't know. And I think that's fine. Sure you're going to have people who are actually smart and have brushed up on their latin/greek etc, and they might groan. But 90% of your readers probably wont. Especially if you do even a bit of research.

And of course you don't need to make the magic language based at all. Elements, powerful objects, runes, music etc. There don't need to be words for the magic to feel like magic. In a lot of cases, probably better without.

Liosse de Velishaf said:

Know some Latin and use it properly.

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And make sure that adjectives and nouns agree in case, number and gender.

If you are going to use words, I think it does help to have a universal language for magic. Whether a foreign language, a made up language, or a certain way of saying things. But if you use Latin (or whatever), I agree with Liosse. KNOW the language. Don't just look up words and use them randomly.

I also love the way Butcher does it in the Dresden Files. Great books.

I dislike it when people use Latin as a magical language. I guess a scholar could use it to express themselves more clearly when spellcasting, but I've just never felt it.