Agatha Harkness is a witch of unknown age who claims to be several centuries old. In the seventeenth century, she served as the leader of the witches of Salem, Massachusetts, and initially sought to organize them against their persecution, believing that only resistance would ensure their survival. Intervention by the time-traveling mutant Angelica Jones (Firestar), combined with dissent among her own people, ultimately persuaded Agatha that open conflict would lead only to destruction. She abandoned the idea of war and instead led the majority of her followers westward into isolation. Not all chose to follow her; her young relative Abigail Harkness fled with her lover, Obadiah Shaw. Those who remained loyal to Agatha founded a hidden city, New Salem, high in the Rocky Mountains of what would later become Colorado, shielding it from the outside world through powerful magic.
Centuries passed in secrecy. Agatha married and bore a son, Nicholas Scratch, but eventually grew disillusioned with New Salem’s isolation, believing that any society cut off from the world was destined to stagnate. She left the city, settling at an old estate known as Whisper Hill in the Adirondacks of upstate New York. There, she trained gifted children in the use of their powers, including Jack Holyoak. Although she later retired, Agatha sensed the vast latent power of Franklin Richards, the infant son of Reed and Susan Richards of the Fantastic Four. She deliberately drew the family’s attention and was hired as Franklin’s nanny, initially without revealing that she was a witch. During Franklin’s early years she protected him from numerous dangers, eventually revealing her magical nature when she used sorcery to rescue Reed Richards from the Negative Zone. While still concealing her origins, she repeatedly aided the Fantastic Four, including consulting the Watcher about the Over-Mind, enabling Reed to speak simultaneously to every human on Earth in their native languages, and returning the team from the Negative Zone after Annihilus forced her to assist in the abduction of Susan Richards and Franklin. When Franklin was briefly left comatose, Agatha became his primary caregiver. After his recovery, she resigned her post and began training Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch.
Wanda’s powers were dangerously unstable, having been shaped in part by the influence of the elder demon Chthon. Agatha hoped that disciplined magical training would help stabilize Wanda, though she concealed the true origin of her abilities. She tutored Wanda until Wanda’s marriage to the Vision, at which point Agatha concluded that her student had absorbed all the instruction she was prepared to accept.
Meanwhile, in New Salem, Nicholas Scratch had fathered seven super-powered children, collectively known as Salem’s Seven. With their aid, Scratch turned the city against his mother, convincing its inhabitants that Agatha’s involvement with the outside world threatened their secrecy. Agatha was captured, and Franklin Richards was abducted as well. The Fantastic Four intervened and ultimately exposed Scratch as the true source of the danger. The townspeople banished him to another dimension, though he soon returned, briefly possessing the Fantastic Four and much of New York City before Franklin defeated him. Agatha erased the city’s memories of the event. After Scratch returned yet again and possessed Franklin, Agatha judged herself too great a risk to the child and chose to remain permanently in New Salem. There, Salem’s Seven apparently severed her access to her powers and executed her by burning her at the stake.
Agatha soon reappeared in astral form to Wanda, guiding her and the Vision in defeating Salem’s Seven and later advising Wanda on conceiving children. She confirmed that she had indeed died and assisted Wanda when the demon Samhain attempted to influence the unborn twins. After their birth, Wanda endured severe emotional trauma, losing her husband and falling under the influence of That Which Endures, a collective entity seeking to exploit her powers. Agatha reappeared alive and assumed care of Wanda’s newborn children. When the twins were revealed to be fragments of the demon Mephisto, Agatha altered Wanda’s memories to help her survive the loss. She remained with Wanda during a period in which Wanda was kidnapped by both Magneto and the time-manipulator Immortus. Agatha uncovered Immortus’ long-term scheme to manipulate Wanda’s power and helped restore Wanda’s memories, enabling the Avengers to thwart the plan. Agatha stayed with the Avengers until Wanda’s strength and mental stability were restored, during which time she helped reverse Tigra’s transformation.
When the Magus, the dark counterpart of Adam Warlock, threatened the universe, Agatha joined Wanda and other mystics, including Doctor Strange, Shaman, and Anthony Druid, to oppose him. An alternate version of Doctor Strange known as the Necromancer intervened, forcing Agatha to temporarily merge her soul with her familiar, Ebony, to survive. Following this conflict, she returned to the Fantastic Four and sensed that Franklin’s growing powers once again endangered him. She resumed her role as his governess but was briefly diverted to assist Wanda when a Darkhold prophecy led to Wanda’s possession by Chthonic forces. Agatha, Doctor Strange, and the Darkhold Redeemers prevented the prophesied catastrophe. Despite her efforts, Franklin’s powers ultimately overwhelmed him, and Agatha allied with his grandfather, Nathaniel Richards, to send the child into the future to master his abilities. Franklin later returned as a young adult to the exact moment he had departed. Susan Richards, furious over Agatha’s actions, banished her from the Fantastic Four, and Agatha withdrew once more to Whisper Hill.
Wanda later sought Agatha’s help when the extradimensional entity Lore attempted to drive her insane, and together they defeated the threat. Agatha eventually reconciled with Susan Richards after Franklin was kidnapped by Onslaught and Agatha revealed that he still lived. Shortly thereafter, the Fantastic Four and the Scarlet Witch were seemingly killed, though they were actually trapped in a pocket dimension, and a weary Agatha retired again. When the Silver Surfer became infected with a soul-destroying virus, Agatha summoned him to Whisper Hill and, with the aid of Scrier, an ancient cosmic being she had encountered millennia earlier, purged the infection. The Surfer briefly died but was resurrected; during the process, Agatha was momentarily possessed by Mephisto before Scrier expelled the demon.
After Wanda’s return from the pocket dimension, she was exposed to the magic of Morgan Le Fay, greatly amplifying her powers. Agatha helped her manage the after-effects, warning of the dangers posed by uncontrolled Chthonic energy, which she euphemistically called “chaos magic.” Agatha later joined Wanda and several mystics in confronting Ego the Living Planet, though the crisis was resolved without magical intervention.
Despite Agatha’s continued guidance, Wanda’s mind gradually destabilized as her powers increased, and she eventually forgot that she had ever had children. Agatha tried to protect her, but when the Wasp inadvertently triggered Wanda’s suppressed memories, Wanda suffered a complete psychological collapse and attacked the Avengers using magical constructs drawn from her past. With Doctor Strange’s help, the Avengers uncovered the truth, though Strange himself had been partially affected by Wanda’s memory alterations. Wanda was defeated, and in the aftermath Nick Fury discovered what appeared to be the long-dead, desiccated body of Agatha Harkness. Wanda later vanished, and when Hawkeye eventually found her, she had no memory of her life with the Avengers and was once again under the care of her “Aunt Agatha.” Whether Agatha Harkness is alive, dead, or something else entirely remains uncertain.
