Wicca

The story

1. Proto-West Germanic · derived from*wikkō“sorcerer”
2. Old English · learned borrowing fromwiċċa“male witch”
3. English todayWicca

A twentieth-century borrowing of Old English wiċċa (“male witch”) (from Proto-West Germanic *wikkō (“sorcerer”)) with a spelling pronunciation. The modern use of the term was introduced first as Wica, mentioned briefly in the tenth chapter of Gerald Gardner's book Witchcraft Today (1954), as a collective noun ("the Wica"), allegedly used as a self-designation by practitioners of witchcraft. The spelling Wicca, again as a collective noun, was introduced and popularized by Gerald Gardner's later book, The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959).

Words from the same roots