The Witchy History of This Viral Decor Item
You may have seen it on your underground commute, or in your local bank. More recently it’s gone viral as a funky feature piece for flats, it’s the convex mirror and it has a bewitching backstory you may not have known.
The clue is in the name. The convex mirror is an outward facing, rounded mirror, encapsulating a fish-eyed like image in its reflection. These mirrors are often used for surveillance, hence their common name “banker’s mirror”, or to make a space appear bigger than it actually is. However, they also go by another name… the “witch’s eye”.
Reportedly used in witchcraft and black magic, these mirrors were believed to hold back the soul. Witches used these to cast negative spells onto those who wronged them, transferring this energy held within the reflection. Witches were also said to use this mirror to predict the future, form certain spiritual connections and “reveal hidden truths”.
The spooks don’t stop there. Mirrors, even in their most basic form, have a long-lived dark history, dating back to Ancient Egyptian times. The Egyptians believed mirrors could allow them to contact the dead and even recognise themselves in the afterlife, so much so that many were buried with mirrors.
Even in today’s media, mirrors are often represented as scary objects. Probably the most famous of them all being: “Mirror, mirror on the wall”, where the item acts as The Evil Queen’s accomplice in Snow White. Not to mention, the countless jump scares in horror movies as the demon appears in the mirror’s reflection.
I think it’s pretty fair to say, mirrors hold first-place as the spookiest household item. So next time you look into yours, remember (or maybe try not to remember) all its seen before.
