The Witches

Who They Are

The three witches of the heath, called the Weird Sisters in the play, and Hecate, their queen, who appears twice: she rebukes them in Scene 5 of Act III and approves the cauldron in Scene 1 of Act IV. They open the play, speak of Macbeth before he enters, and give him and Banquo the prophecies that move the plot: the crown for one, a line of kings for the other. They never order anyone killed and tell the truth in every word, and that is what makes them dangerous.

Trajectory

In Scene 1 of Act I, amid thunder and lightning, they arrange their next meeting on the marsh, after the battle and before sunset, where they will come upon Macbeth. One answers the call of the gray cat, and all of them answer the croaking toad, and the scene ends with a chorus line that mixes the beautiful and the rotten.

In Scene 3 of Act I, on the heath, they talk of petty revenges until a drum announces Macbeth and Banquo. They greet Macbeth as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and future king, promise Banquo sons who will be kings, and vanish into the air. Macbeth wishes they had stayed, and Banquo wonders whether they have eaten the root that holds reason in place. Ross and Angus arrive and name Macbeth Thane of Cawdor, which confirms the second greeting.

In Scene 5 of Act I, Lady Macbeth reads in her husband's letter that the witches have in them more than mortal wisdom, and decides to act before his hesitation spoils the opportunity. In Scene 1 of Act II, Banquo tells Macbeth that he dreamed of them, and Macbeth says he does not even think of them.

In Scene 5 of Act III, on the marsh, Hecate rebukes them for having dealt with Macbeth without calling her, and for serving someone who loves his own ends and not them. She tells them to meet her at dawn at the Acheron, where Macbeth will come, and promises to prepare illusions that will lead him to despise Destiny and to trust himself too much.

In Scene 1 of Act IV, in a cave on the marsh, they prepare the cauldron, and Hecate approves the work. When Macbeth arrives and demands answers, three apparitions appear: an armed head, which tells him to fear Macduff; a bloody child, which says that no one born of woman will harm him; and a crowned child holding a tree, which says that he will fall only when Birnam marches against Dunsinane. He also sees eight kings, with Banquo at the end.

Themes Embodied

The play's Supernatural does not command: it informs, and mixes truth with deception. The apparitions of Scene 1 of Act IV tell the truth, and it is Macbeth's reading that makes them deceptive: no one born of woman and a moving wood sound to him like impossibilities, so he takes them as guarantees. In Scene 4 of Act V and Scene 7 of Act V, the promise comes true to the letter, and by human means.

Banquo and Macbeth hear the witches together in Scene 3 of Act I and read their promises in opposite ways. On the heath, the witches do not speak of killing: they say what will be, and the reasoning that links the prophecy to the crime is Macbeth's. In Act IV, Scene 1, already after the crime, the second apparition they call up urges him to be bloodthirsty. This is the point where Fate and Free Will open up as a question.

The witches open the play by inverting good and evil, and this inversion stays in the structure. In Scene 1 of Act I, the beautiful is rotten and the rotten is beautiful, and from then on it is hard to tell, in each scene, what is condemnation and what is grace. They do not appear after Scene 1 of Act IV, but what they promised keeps working on Macbeth to the end.

In Scene 5 of Act III, Hecate sets out the plan before it is carried out, saying that excessive confidence is man's greatest enemy, and the witches' next scene, Scene 1 of Act IV, assembles it: the armed head that kindles fear, the children that give false security, the kings that show the price. In the Power the play describes, every guarantee is bait.

Relationships

• Macbeth: the man they greet in Scene 3 of Act I and who, unlike Banquo, comes back to seek them out in Scene 1 of Act IV.
• Banquo: the captain to whom they promise sons who will be kings, and who has distrusted them since Scene 3 of Act I.
• Lady Macbeth: she reads the encounter with them in the letter of Scene 5 of Act I and uses the prophecy as a reason to act.
• Duncan: the king whose death is born from the thought the prophecy kindles in Macbeth, without Duncan ever hearing them.
• Macduff: the baron whom the first apparition tells Macbeth to fear.
• Malcolm: the heir whose naming in Scene 4 of Act I Macbeth sees as a step, right after hearing them.