witch balls

Noun

witch ball (plural witch balls)

1. A hollow sphere of plain or stained glass hung in windows in 18th-century England to ward off evil spirits, witches' spells or ill fortune.
   • The dozen or so couples were walking and jiving to their tables and the crimson light was turned off under the glass dance-floor. Instead, pencil-thin lights in the roof came on and hit coloured glass witchballs, larger than footballs, that hung at intervals round the wall. They were of different...1954, Ian Fleming, “Table Z”, in Live and Let Die, London: Pan Books, published 1957, page 55