“Salagadoola mechicka boola,” sings a frumpy fairy as she transforms Cinderella from boho-chic into belle-of-the-ball. “Put ‘em together and what have you got?” Sing it with me now: Bippity-boppity-boo!

Salagadoola means mechicka boola? Well, thanks for the linguistics lesson, fairy godmother! Indeed, this incantation is no more than the nonsensical brainchild of some mid-twentieth-century songwriters. But not all of the strange words you might hear thrown about this Halloween are pulled from nowhere: Some have storied histories.

These days, the idea of magicians tends to conjure up images of creepy men in vests, Gob from Arrested Development, or bunny-killers. But—we are told—magicians actually have an illustrious history. Think of Houdini! And Merlin! A little linguistic lesson to put magic in historical perspective: Hocus Pocus is more than just a terrifying movie starring Carrie Bradshaw; it was also the incantation muttered by a seventeenth-century conjuror as he performed tricks before King James. According to the Online Etymological Dictionary, hocus pocus was a corruption of hoc est enim corpus meum, which means “for this is my body” and is spoken during the taking of Communion at Latin Mass. According to Thomas Ady, who wrote a treatise on witchcraft in 1655, this magician, “…at the playing of every Trick…used to say, ‘Hocus pocus, tontus tabantus, vade celeriter jubeo,’ a dark composure of words, to blinde the eyes of the beholders, to make his Trick pass the more currantly without discovery. [sic]”

You know what one of the lamest things about the Harry Potter series was? The spells. In the first book, there was that awesome moment when you realized that the script under the mirror was backwards for “I show not your face but your heart’s desire.” You could feel brilliant for discovering this and sharing your knowledge with fellow eight-year-olds. (For those who never picked up on this fact: You’re welcome.) But throughout the rest of the series, the majority of the incantations were quite straightforward: Lumos got you light, and the Confundus Charm, you know, confounded people. Latin, as the root language of a whole lot of recognizable words, hardly leads to the most magical-sounding phrases. Plus, it is so Western-normative. Where’s all the Sanskrit, Zulu, and Akkadian?

Well, J.K. Rowling actually did go outside the Western linguistic tradition for one notable spell: that most unforgivable of the Unforgivable Curses. Avada Kedavra doesn’t just sound like abracadabra; Rowling purposefully based her incantation on that silly magical expression—which, as it turns out, is not so silly. Michael Quinion of World Wide Words explains that the familiar phrase was first recorded in Latin sometime in the second century. In order to get well again, wrote Quintus Serenus Sammonicus, an ailing person should write a formula on a piece of parchment and wear it in an amulet. The triangular formation of the word could act like a funnel to drive the sickness out.

But wait, you say, that’s more Latin! While it is true that there is no written record for this word before good old Serenus Smmonicus, many theories suggest Semitic roots. In Aramaic, avra kehdabra meant, “I will create as I speak,” a powerful concept for a supposedly magical word. Alternatively, if you’ve ever wondered how to say, “Perish like the word,” in Chaldean, the answer is abbada ke dabra. Rather than a creative, healing force, this meaning is much more sinister—and a more exciting basis for a fictional killer curse than “mortus”!

These incantations may now be as meaningless as bippity-boppity-boo, but next time you watch Hocus Pocus, you’ll be able to share your knowledge about the title’s origins with your fellow college students and feel brilliant. (You’re welcome.)