Zelda Spellman is a fictional character featured in the classic Archie

Archie Comics

Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the Village of Mamaroneck, Town of Mamaroneck, New York, known for its many series featuring the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle and Jughead Jones. The characters were created by...

 comic book Sabrina the Teenage Witch. She is a full witch (as opposed to half or fully mortal

Human

Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...

) and lives in the fictional town of Greendale ("Westbridge, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

" in the sitcom). She lives with her sister Hilda Spellman

Hilda Spellman

Hilda Spellman is a character featured in the classic Archie comic book Sabrina the Teenage Witch. She is a full witch who live in the fictional town of Greendale...

 and their niece Sabrina and the family cat Salem, who (in the sitcom) is serving time as an animal as a punishment for his attempt at world domination. In the live-action TV series, she is portrayed by Beth Broderick

Beth Broderick

Elizabeth Alice "Beth" Broderick is an American actress famous for her portrayal of the character Zelda Spellman in the television sitcom Sabrina, the Teenage Witch from 1996–2003 on ABC and then the Warner Bros. network.-Early life:Broderick was born in Falmouth, Kentucky and grew up in...

.

(The following two sections pertain only to the sitcom. In the original comics, and in other portrayals, other than being over 500 years old, their background is otherwise unexplored.)

Childhood

Zelda P. Spellman was born in 1346. Zelda grew up during the 14th century

14th century

As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was the century which lasted from January 1, 1301 to December 31, 1400.-Events:* The transition from the Medieval Warm Period to the Little Ice Age....

 in Europe, with at least four other siblings: Vesta, being the oldest; and Edward, and Hilda, Sophia being the youngest.

Vesta was terribly jealous of all the attention that Hilda and Zelda got when they were little. So, she turned their parents into pigs. The Witches Council decided that people with pigs feet could not raise children and so when Vesta refused to turn them back Hilda and Zelda were adopted out to a family in the country.

While the children were living in the farm house the parents stayed in the barn. Their father was "getting very good at working an instamatic with his snout". When their mother headbutted Vesta about a month later, they were turned back into humans. In order to legally get Hilda and Zelda back, they had to adopt them.

Their overbearing mother, Grandma Lydia, spent 200 years of violin lessons on Hilda, while Zelda won trophies, "Winner of the Other Realm Science Fair", "Outstanding Student of the Decade" and "Best of the Best".

Adulthood

As Zelda reached adulthood she went off to college. Zelda attended Harvard.

Zelda, during the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

, lived in Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

 and met a man named Benvolio. Though her father disliked Benvolio, Zelda married Benvolio anyways, though their marriage only lasted three days. At some point, Zelda woke her Aunt Dorma up and was turned into a porch swing.

Both sisters bounced from one job to another over the centuries while trying to find what they wanted to do. Zelda worked as a coal miner when she lived in Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

, rating this as her worst job. During the early 19th century

19th century

The 19th century was a period in history marked by the collapse of the Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Holy Roman and Mughal empires...

, Hilda and Zelda worked together at a saloon. They were run out of town, but fortunately found a way to maintain some financial security: junk

Scrap

Scrap is a term used to describe recyclable and other materials left over from every manner of product consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has significant monetary value...

. In the early 1990s

1990s

File:1990s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: The Hubble Space Telescope floats in space after it was taken up in 1990; American F-16s and F-15s fly over burning oil fields and the USA Lexie in Operation Desert Storm, also known as the 1991 Gulf War; The signing of the Oslo Accords on...

, before Sabrina came to live with Hilda and Zelda, they had manservants, spent late nights on the town, weekends in Tuscany

Tuscany

Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....

, took part in Formula One

Formula One

Formula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1 and referred to officially as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of single seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" designation in the name refers to a set of rules with which...

 racing, and originally had a disco on the second floor of their house.

In the Archie comic books

Aunt Zelda first appeared in Archie's Mad House

Archie's Mad House

Archie's Mad House was a comic book published by Archie Comics from 1959 to 1982. The series went through a number of overhauls and name changes. Classic stories have occasionally appeared in digest magazines.-History:...

#65 (December 1968). In the original comics, Zelda was short and stout with green hair. Zelda acted as a good-natured and somewhat gullible. She was less prominent in the comic than her sister Hilda, and didn't appear in as many stories.

In the newer comic books, Zelda has her respective green hair, but appear to be only a few years older than Sabrina.

In the Filmation animated series

She was generally the same as in the comics, with a typical "witch" appearance and attire. Additionally, she and Hilda disapproved of Sabrina doing good deeds, and thus (as ordered by Della the head witch) were always trying to get her to do bad deeds (like all the other witches); they even force her hand a couple of times.

In the live-action television series

Zelda was blonde and a down-to-earth scientist

Scientist

A scientist in a broad sense is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the scientific method. The person may be an expert in one or more areas of science. This article focuses on the more restricted use of the word...

 who tries to keep Sabrina and Hilda out of trouble. As a stark contrast to early portrayals, she insists that Sabrina only use her magic for good. As a witch, her magical abilities often manifested as a stream of violet magical particles (similar to Sabrina's golden red magical sparkles) whenever she would transfigure an object or being, conjure an object or teleport

Teleportation

Teleportation is the fictional or imagined process by which matter is instantaneously transferred from one place to another.Teleportation may also refer to:*Quantum teleportation, a method of transmitting quantum data...

 herself from one place to another.

In the DIC animated series

Zelda appears as a character in both Sabrina: The Animated Series

Sabrina: The Animated Series

Sabrina: The Animated Series is an American animated television series based on the Archie Comics character Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. It was produced by DIC Entertainment, which was owned by Disney at the time...

and Sabrina's Secret Life

Sabrina's Secret Life

Sabrina's Secret Life is an American animated television series based on the Archie Comics character Sabrina, the Teenage Witch produced by DiC Entertainment in partnership with Sony Pictures Television. It originally aired in syndication in 2003 as a spin-off of Sabrina: Friends Forever, Sabrina,...

, appearing radically different from her comic book appearances; Zelda had strawberry blonde hair. She had the same basic personality as on the live-action sitcom. Zelda along with Hilda are depicted as teenagers (instead of the usual middle-aged adults), despite being the same age as in other media (hundreds of years old). It is mentioned in passing that they have temporally been changed into teenagers by head witch Enchantra as punishment for minor crimes, but the situation is never fully explained. In Sabrina, the Animated Series both attend high school and are not considered legal adults on the mortal world, which is why Uncle Quigly lives with them. In Sabrina's Secret Life (set two years later) they are out of school and able to run the household (and Uncle Quigly is no longer in the cast).

External links