Most sorceresses in that universe enhance their beauty/youthfulness with magic. Most sorcerers do not because they're taken more seriously as they age. It's essentially a commentary on what each gender derives power from. Yennefer is like 80 years old by the time the main story begins.

[–] Shareni@programming.dev 40 points 5 months ago (3 children)

It's far more simple than that. The students are predominantly nobles, and they pretty much completely cut all ties to their previous lives.

So why would you send a hot daughter to become a witch when you can marry her and make political gains? You send the disfigured one so you don't have to waste any more money on her.

The 5th son doesn't need to be disfigured to be essentially useless in the political world.

[–] thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world 48 points 5 months ago

that would be a decent assumption to jump to if you didn't know the real answer i guess...

sorceresses in the Witcher were largely discarded children that were sick or disfigured. they eventually use magic to "fix" their bodies. many of them are obsessive about thiz and use magic to be the most beautiful person in the room because of their disfigured past.

there is very little connection between high birth and being a sorceress in the Witcher. all of the specific examples we hear are of farm peasents being scooped up just to take the burden off their parent's hands.

this is a bleak story, many of the sorcerers and sorceresses in it are at Best morally grey. it is not beyond most of them to take that child and experiment on them if they don't have the aptitude for magic. they are also sterile. much like witchers, they must take in outsiders to propagate.

unless the show has its own lore or something. IDK i stopped watching after season 2 was completely its own story, unrelated to the books at all.

[–] DrBob@lemmy.ca 25 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Tell me you that you haven't read the books without saying " I haven't read the books".

[–] hellofriend@lemmy.world 12 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Honestly trying to figure out if they're an LLM or not

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 2 points 5 months ago

They are not. They just aren't in traditional pacing.

[–] hellofriend@lemmy.world 22 points 5 months ago

Not sure where you're getting that from. As far as I know none of the sorceresses' familial backgrounds are explored aside from Yennefer's. Either in the Netflix show, the books, or the games. Additionally, magical ability is exceedingly rare and not confined to the nobility. The chances of the majority of the sorceresses being from noble families is extremely low.