# Why does water make the witch die **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [November 29, 2002, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565 "2002-11-29T23:30:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![cdutchhill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d6d6ee/32.png) [@cdutchhill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cdutchhill)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2002, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/1 "2002-11-29T23:30:20Z")
Let’s look at this from the religious context of good verses evil. I do believe that we have to conclude that L.F.Baum intended the wicked witch of the west to be the evil character. Thus, the relationship of water represents a baptism and pure evil “shrinking” from the “purity” of righteousness.:smack: ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2002, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/2 "2002-11-29T23:37:39Z")
From the Staff Report, [Why does water make the Wicked Witch of the West melt?](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mwickedwitch.html): > [@](#): > > On a more symbolic level, there’s a long tradition of water being antithetical to witches. A commonly prescribed trial for an accused witch was the ordeal by water: the suspect was tied up and tossed into a river. If she floated, she was guilty, and would be burned at the stake (hence, the water-and-fire making a neat little symbolism). If she sank and drowned, shucks, guess she wasn’t a witch after all. Water is associated with baptism, and thus the water of the river rejects the witch as satanic. This type of trial was carried out as late as the 1690s. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2002, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/3 "2002-11-30T02:18:29Z")
Welcome to the Straight Dope Message Boards, cdutchhill, glad to have you here. It’s helpful if you provide a link to the Staff Report upon which you are commenting, helps keep everyone on the same page. Thanks, Duck, for providing the link. ---
**Author:** ![SlowMindThinking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@SlowMindThinking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlowMindThinking)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/4 "2002-12-03T17:49:44Z")
I recently listened to a set of tapes entitled “Great Ideas in Philosophy” from the [TheLearningCompany.com](http://TheLearningCompany.com). There is a lecture on the witch trials. (No, the lecture was not suggesting that the witch trials were a great idea in philosophy. One of its points that the “Renaissance”, in which the witch trials mostly occurred, did not come close to living up to its hype, and that the Middle Ages were not the desert of intellectual thought often espoused.) One point the lecturer made was that the trial was not just throwing a witch in the water and seeing if she drowned. The suspected witch was tied to ropes. If I remember correctly, the trial was an attempt to measure the existence of a soul. I guess that if you sold your soul, you would weigh less, and so float more. ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/5 "2002-12-03T22:58:03Z")
For what it’s worth, L. Frank Baum was not particularly religious, and was definitely not a small-o orthodox Christian. He even dabbled a little with Theosophy. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2002, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/6 "2002-12-07T22:08:29Z")
In _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_ Sir Bedivere posits that witches float because they’re made of **wood.** In the movie \*The Wizard of Oz, \* Dorothy points out that wizards are also made of **wood!** Dorothy and company sing, “We’re off to cedar Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz.” (Nott runs in serpentine fashion, so as to dodge the hail of brickbats and zucchini) ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/7 "2002-12-10T22:45:01Z")
Here’s another relevant quote from the canon, from Baum’s “The Tin Woodman of Oz”. The Witch in question is the Wicked Witch of the East. ``` ************* ``` “I suppose so.” replied the Tin Woodman. “In the Land of Oz no part of a living creature can ever be destroyed.” “If that is true, how was that Wicked Witch destroyed?” inquired Woot. “Why, she was very old and was all dried up and withered before Oz became a fairyland,” explained the Scarecrow. “Only her magic arts had kept her alive so long, and when Dorothy’s house fell upon her she just turned to dust, and was blown away and scattered by the wind.” ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/8 "2002-12-11T00:16:14Z")
I simply thought the “Wicked Witch of the West” was an allegory for the prairie drought. ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/9 "2002-12-11T21:31:46Z")
The whole notion of “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” as allegory was exploded years ago. The man who invented it didn’t even mean it – it was a classroom exercise on “What if WWoO were an allegory?” that somehow escaped from the laboratory and ran wild through the general population. The so-called “allegory” doesn’t make sense, and, even worse, doesn’t correspond with Baum’s known politics. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-water-make-the-witch-die/139565/10 "2002-12-12T00:19:33Z")
Sigh. [Is " The Wizard of Oz" a satire of the French Revolution?](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_392.html)