Why do witches ride on brooms?

Answer 1

As I'm guessing you're not asking about wiccans but about WITCHES in the usual sense, ignore all those people saying "witches don't ride brooms!" as anyone who has read a Harry Potter book can say quite differently.

According to wikipedia, it has to do with brooms being a useful way to disguise a magic wand, but that sounds dodgy to me.

According to "Man, Myth and Magic: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Supernatural," brooms were associated with women because they were used for domestic tasks, and "in many medieval pictures of witches' gatherings the women hold brooms and the men or the devils hold pitchforks." Despite the feminine association, the earliest known case of a witch confessing to riding on a broom was in 1453, confessed by Mr. Guillaume Edelin, though there are earlier examples of female witches claiming to use greased sticks to ride on. There also seems to have been a known tendancy, at least in superstition, for witches to dance and jump with sticks between their legs that may have helped this rumor along.

The fact that a broom is long and somewhat phallic, and witches were known to be an especially horny bunch, may also well have helped the rumor, though the book does not specifically say that.

This web page also has some more information, including an interesting mention of a picture of the Norse goddess Frigg riding a broom: http://crypt.eldritchs.com/bos/crafttools/broomsticks.html

Answer 2

Witches don't ride brooms. The broom is part of a clensing ceramony in which it is used to sweep all the negativity and impurities out of the circle and/or to cleanes an area in which we would like to hold a celebration.

the riding part came from the over exaggeration of and observation also we all know hopw much a story changes from person to person let alone hundreds of years.

Answer 3

I do (I'm a witch)? Umm, where is it? I've looked all around my house and I don't see a broom. Maybe I can ride the vacuum cleaner. Do you think that would work?

Don't be ridiculous. Witches don't ride brooms. That's just a myth.

Answer 4

i have heard that the tale started because of the myth that a horses would become skittish around a witch. so the witch needed a non animal means of transportation that would not bring attention while in the home. so a broom was pwefect.

many modern Wiccan rituals invilve the use af a ritual broom to sweep negative energy out of the house.

as a Magi (male witch) i choose to ride on my broom just because the vacuum cleaner would look funny and the toilet brush is simply too small.

Answer 5

If you find out that other than witches can't ride brooms...give me a call.. I know someone who knows someone who can make you a witch temporarily, just until the price of gas goes down..

Answer 6

That is mostly myth. Exaggerated by those that converted to Christianity either by threat or own choice.
A haloucagentic salve is applied and gives you the sensation of flying.
The broom is used to clean the sacred space and chase evil spirits out.

Answer 7

I read somwhere that it comes from the medieval times where witches used to practice ' sexual magic' the broom was simply a phallic symbol

Answer 8

A broom is a symbolic form of the god's phallic member connected to the bristles, which is the goddess' pubic area. just as the cauldron is the symbolic form of the goddeses womb.

Answer 9

We don't. Witches use brooms to ritually sweep away negativity from our homes and ritual spaces.

Answer 10

this has to do with the harvest. It used to be thought that the higher the jump the higher your corn will gorw. Peolple found that they could jump higher with a broom so they thought that the people jumping must be witches.