Good magic school names sound old and a little grand, usually a place name plus Academy, College or Hall, like Hollyholme Academy or Quillford College, and the best ones come with a motto. Every young spellcaster needs somewhere to learn. This magic school name generator gives you grand academies, witch schools, old wizard colleges, hidden schools and cosy schools for little witches and wizards, with a motto or a short description if you want one.
Eight good magic school names
All eight came from the generator, across its five kinds of school:
- Hollyholme Academy of Wandcraft: a grand academy with a subject in its name.
- Lindenley Royal Academy, motto “Sic itur ad astra”: "thus one goes to the stars", a line from Virgil.
- Dame Nettlebed's Academy for Young Witches, motto “Stir clockwise, think twice”: a witch school with practical advice.
- Heronhurst College of Familiars, motto “Festina lente”: "make haste slowly", good advice for anyone with a familiar.
- The College of Runes at Quillcliffe: an old wizard college named like a university.
- The School of Locked Doors: a secret school that tells you how hard it is to find.
- Number Twenty-Two, Candle Row: a hidden school disguised as an ordinary address.
- Toadstool Hill Charm School: a cosy school for the youngest witches and wizards.
Academies, colleges and mottos
Fictional magic schools borrow from real ones. Hogwarts has a Latin motto, Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus, "never tickle a sleeping dragon", and Terry Pratchett's Unseen University is named like an old university with a joke attached. Words like lyceum go back further still: the Lyceum was the school in Athens where Aristotle taught.
- Grand academies are royal, ancient or sovereign: The Sovereign Academy of Transmutation.
- Witch schools are named after herbs and headmistresses: Vervain House, Dame Sloe's School for Witches.
- Wizard colleges sound like Oxford or Cambridge: Lanternford College.
- Secret schools are under, behind or beyond something: The Academy Below the Library.
- Little ones are nurseries and charm schools: Ladybird Magic Nursery.
Choose With a motto for a school motto. The Latin mottos are real Latin, many of them famous lines, and come with a translation: Sapere aude, "dare to be wise", is from the Roman poet Horace. The witch and little-ones schools get English mottos instead, like Brew kindly.
Building a magic school
- Give it houses or colleges named after its founders, so students have a side to be on.
- Use the description as a hook: a clock that runs backwards on feast days is the start of a mystery.
- Choose the motto last, once you know what the school values.
For the students and staff, try the Wizard and Witch name generators. For what they learn, there's the Spell Name Generator, and for the witches who meet after hours, the Coven Name Generator.
For more, see all the world-building name generators.