Las meigas gallegas - "haberlas Haylas": the reframing of the witch's image in Galicia

Abstract

This article presents the Galician meiga, who over the centuries has ceased to be the woman whose conduct oscillated between goodness and evil and has come to represent the protection of those who believe in her powers, without losing her original features as a manipulator of energy according to her interests. This study is valid because it is a bibliographic survey that demonstrates how the conception of the Galician witch has changed over time and, especially in the last century and a half. To anchor our considerations, we rely on prestigious scholars of the area. We conclude that the study of Galician meigas deserves a closer look by the Academy, as it reflects the economic-social and historical-cultural changes that Galicians have been going through in the last century and a half and that reverberate in old beliefs that are current, in a context lends them a new meaning in addition to the original. Studying the Galician meigas represents a dip in the most genuine sources of Galician culture, which influences us indirectly, since the Iberian has been with us for over five hundred years.