Why do witches ride broomsticks?

Factual Questions
1

I was watching TV last night and there was a (I think) Geico commercial where a witch was test riding a bunch of brooms at a broom factory. That made me think, what do witches have to do with brooms, especially flying brooms.

I did a search on the SMDB and found nothing (besides a lot of Blair witch threads).

A quick google search uncovered some kind of tree disease nicknamed witches broom.

Can anyone here shed more light on what brooms have to do with witches?

(The commercial also reminded me of the old Woody Woodpecker cartoon where the witch was going through a whole store room of brooms to find her “magic” broom. Her phrase for it to take off was “and away we go”, and when Woody repeated it the broom he was leaning on took off with him attached to it)

2

Cecil’s take:

Whats the deal with witches and broomsticks

3

Of course there was an answer on this site. :smack:

And of course it is sexual. :smiley:

Thanks for the link.

4

They ride brooms because vacuum cleaners are too heavy to fly, and mops get their butts wet.

5

yabob mentioned Harner’s theory about using the broomstick to apply hallucinogenic drugs to vaginal lips (which anthropologuist Marvin Harris supported, too – see his books, notably Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches). I’d just like to add thatsome early depictions show the witches riding the brooms “backwards”, with the bristles in front. The direction of the broom is therefore not as important as having the broom between your legs. (it also suggests that the broom-as-faux-penis interpretation might not be all-important)

You can see some witches riding brooms in engravings by Pieter Brueghel the Elder, back in the 16th century, although I believe the trope is older.

6

The image comes out of literature, not science. Some illustrator decided to portray witches on broomsticks, and the image caught on. The various things Cecil mentions are coincidences that happen to support the image, but have nothing to do with creating it.

The reason for brooms is obvious if you see the earliest portrayals: they are riding the broom because it looks like a horse. You see, early drawings showed the bristles of the broom up, so they resembled the head of a horse. The broom then became a magical hobby horse that flew. (Children used brooms in this manner for their own home-made hobby horses.)

After the connection became standard, artists started portraying the broom the other way around, since the idea of a hobby horse faded away and the reversed broom looked “wrong.”

7

Most stock motorcycle seats turn into torture racks after a short time on the road. I can’t imagine how uncomfortable riding a broomstick would be.

8

That helps explain why broomstick riding witches have reputation for being bad tempered; they’ve got [del]saddle[/del]broomsores.

9

It’s even worse when it’s made with witch-hazel branches. It gives new meaning to burning a witch.

10

I find that hard to believe. I doubt an illustrator came up with the broom imagery without some prior report of witches riding staffs or brooms.