Incantation

In the world of magic, wizards, witches, and fairies are common performers of incantations in culture and folklore.

[1] In medieval literature, folklore, fairy tales, and modern fantasy fiction, enchantments are charms or spells.

The Latin incantare, which means "to consecrate with spells, to charm, to bewitch, to ensorcel", forms the basis of the word "enchant", with deep linguistic roots going back to the Proto-Indo-European kan- prefix.

Examples of traditional magic words include Abracadabra, Alakazam, Hocus Pocus, Open Sesame and Sim Sala Bim.

In such stories, incantations are attached to a magic wand used by wizards, witches and fairy godmothers.

One example is the spell that Cinderella's Fairy Godmother used to turn a pumpkin into a coach, "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo", a nonsense rhyme which echoes more serious historical incantations.

Bronisław Malinowski, in Coral Gardens and their Magic (1935), suggests that this belief is an extension of man's basic use of language to describe his surroundings, in which "the knowledge of the right words, appropriate phrases and the more highly developed forms of speech, gives man a power over and above his own limited field of personal action.

A. Richards's (1923) categories of speech, is distinct from scientific language because it is emotive and it converts words into symbols for emotions; whereas in scientific language words are tied to specific meanings and refer to an objective external reality.

[8]: 189 Malinowski argues that "the language of magic is sacred, set and used for an entirely different purpose to that of ordinary life.

Sacred modes of language often employ archaic words and forms in an attempt to invoke the purity or "truth" of a religious or a cultural "golden age".