Sigils and Servitors

practical experiments in chaos magic

Fritzenglitch: a functional spirit

October 01, 2020 — Glyn F

The first day of the month of my own birth seems like an auspicious date to start a blog about magic… but choosing an appropriate starting point has been a point of procrastination. Since today has so-far been dogged by technical hiccups, I’m taking that as a synchronicity and beginning by introducing you to a functional spirit I made some while ago to mess with computers.


If you’re unfamiliar with the idea, functional spirits are much like servitors or thought-forms; that is to say they are autonomous entities deliberately created by a magician. Unlike the typical chaos-magic servitor, who serves only the appointed person, a functional spirit can be summoned and utilised by any who know how to call them. There’s a detailed description of the idea in Phil Hine’s excellent Chaos Magic primer Condensed Chaos1, the author having been inspired by a frustrating day of traffic snarl-ups in London. The result was the creation of a skateboarding cat-spirit called Goflowolfog, who enjoys making traffic flow freely.

Similarly, witnessing the digitisation of basically everything and the accompanying rise of ubiquitous electronic surveillance gave me the idea for my first venture into functional spirit creation. He’s called Fritzenglitch, and he’s an aspect of the Trickster archetype who delights in wreaking havoc upon computers and other electronic equipment – and will happily do so in ways that benefit magically operant folks like us.

Fritzenglitch

Fritzenglitch appears as a large seagull, often with a monocle, and his presence can sometimes be heard as a particularly objectionable squawking sound. He is pleased by acts of kindness toward gulls (saying good-morning or wishing them well is often sufficient) and enjoys eating chips – both potato and silicon! (I’m sure this goes without saying, but please don’t feed actual computer hardware to living creatures! That includes you, Mr Gates).

For particularly large favours you might consider sacrificing some valuable data, but don’t do this too often or he might come to expect it!

Now is a great time to cultivate a working relationship with Fritzenglitch and maybe butter him up for a favour or two in the future. It’s not like chatting with a seagull or two is a huge imposition – and you might just find that they’re better company than some of your co-workers!

How to Summon

Call upon him at any time by simply speaking his name. Just remember that he’s a gull, and since they can have a bit of an ego thing going on and a dickish sense of humour, it’s probably not a bad idea to throw-in a few supplicating honorifics or a grandiose title or two, just to be safe.

Here’s a worked example, loosely based on a recent (successful) attempt to get a magical discount in a shop:

Oh mighty monacled Fritzenglitch, scourge of technology and devourer of data, I have shown respect to your kin and showered them with gifts of potato snacks. I also invite you to look favourably upon the time during the summer when I completely didn’t punch the one who stole my ice-cream.

Come to me now, if it please you great spirit of digital chaos, and crap all over that point-of-sale terminal, that it might undercharge me for this note-book, which is definitely not worth the 15 Euros these crooks want for it! Then depart in peace, with my good-will to you and all gulls.

So mote it be.

In conclusion, enjoy working with Fritzenglitch. I’m sure you’ll be able to find multiple applications for his own distinctive aspect of the Trickster.

Tags: servitors


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