Sorgina

Dolmen de Sorginetxe in Arrizala (Álava).

Sorgina means witch in Basque. Legends place them as assistants to the goddess Mari in her fight to make lies pay dearly. As historical figures, the "sorginak" they met on Friday nights in a field often called "akelarre" (field of the goat) or "eperlanda" (Meadow of the Partridge) to celebrate magical-erotic rituals, which have gone down in history especially due to the process of the Zugarramurdi Witches. This term should not be confused with that of a fortune teller, which is called azti.

Etymology

Joxemiel Barandiaran proposes that it derives from sorte + -gin, meaning, therefore, "caster of luck". Its elements would be sorte, from the Latin sors, «luck» and -gin from the Basque verb egin «to do». This construction appears as a semantic calque of the French sorcier/e which is also composed of "luck" and the ending -cier. In Basque the final A does not indicate the feminine, but the article.

Another etymology derives from sor- + -gin, and meaning "creator(a)". She can also be interpreted as the current midwife, also being the healer.

Toponymy

Currently, there are numerous place names in the Basque Country and Navarre that refer to sorginak, such as Sorginaren Txabola (Shanty of the Sorceress) in Elvillar (Álava), Dolmen de Sorginetxe (witch's house) in Arrizala Agurain (Álava) or in Elbete Baztan (Navarra), Sorginzubi (Witch's Bridge) in Abaurrea Alta (Navarra), etc.

Rhetoric

In rhetoric there is the substitution of the proper name by an expression, such as Sorgin herria (Pueblo de brujos) by Zalla, thus the natives of Zalla are called “Witches” par excellence. The reverse process is sometimes named through the use of a style resource, a characteristic attribute is used to be able to particularize it. That attribute then assumes the function of a proper name and, in fact, sometimes replaces the original name.