Angéle de la Barthe (c. 1230–1275) was allegedly a woman from

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Pa ...

, France, who was tried for witchcraft and condemned to death by the

Inquisition The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...

in 1275.Carus She has been popularly portrayed as the first person to be put to death for heretical sorcery during the witch persecutions.Anthony North Recent scholars have proven that her story, and trial, were fabricated by a 15th-century writer.

Narrative

According to the account of her trial, Angéle de la Barthe was accused by Inquisitor Hugues de Beniols (the supreme chief of the Toulouse Inquisition) of having habitual sexual intercourse with the Devil and giving birth, seven years prior at age 53, to a monster with a wolf's head and a serpent's tail.Lea, Henry Charles. 1888. History of the inquisition of the middle ages Vol. 3. New York, NY: Harper & Brothers
384
The monster's sole food consisted of babies, which were either slain by Angéle de la Barthe or dug up from their graves in remote churchyards.Summers, Montague. 1958. The geography of witchcraft. Evanston

ll. Ll/ll is a digraph that occurs in several languages English In English, often represents the same sound as single : . The doubling is used to indicate that the preceding vowel is (historically) short, or that the "l" sound is to be extended ...

University Books
362
She confessed to having fed it babies for two years, before the monster ran away in the middle of the night. She also boasted of having had commerce with the Demon, and of being a constant attendant at the Sabbat. Hugues de la Beniols did not inquire if it was true that for two years a large number of babies had disappeared. Angéle de la Barth was found guilty and burned alive at Place Saint Stephen, in Toulouse.

Legacy

Contemporary scholars have cast doubt on the truth of the Angèle de la Barthe story since there is no mention of her trial in the Toulouse records of the time. Additionally, in 1275, congress with demons was not yet considered a crime. Ultimately, the fifteenth-century chronicle from which her story derives is considered fictional.

Notes

References

Witchcraft in the Middle Ages
By Jeffrey Burton Russell, page 164, at Google books

– Part 2 by Paul Carus, retrieved October 2007
Angéle de la Barthe
at the Dinner Party database, Brooklyn Museum, retrieved October 2007
The witchhunts
Anthony North in Beyond the Blog, 18 July 2007. {{DEFAULTSORT:Barthe, Angele De La 1210 births 1275 deaths Persecution of Christian heretics People executed for witchcraft Executed French people Legal history of France Executed French women 13th-century French women 13th-century French people People executed by the Medieval Inquisition People executed by France by burning People from Toulouse Executed people from Midi-Pyrénées Witch trials in France