Witch trials in the early modern period saw that between 1400 to 1782, around 40,000 to 60,000
were killed due to suspicion that they were practicing
witchcraft
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have us ...
. Some sources estimate that a total of 100,000 trials occurred at its maximum for a similar period. Groundwork on the concept of witchcraft (a person's collaboration with the
devil
A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and religious traditions. It is seen as the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. Jeffrey Burton Russell states that the different conceptions of t ...
through the use of
magic
Magic or Magick most commonly refers to:
* Magic (supernatural), beliefs and actions employed to influence supernatural beings and forces
* Ceremonial magic, encompasses a wide variety of rituals of magic
* Magical thinking, the belief that unrela ...
) was developed by Christian theologians as early as the
13th century
The 13th century was the century which lasted from January 1, 1201 ( MCCI) through December 31, 1300 ( MCCC) in accordance with the Julian calendar.
The Mongol Empire was founded by Genghis Khan, which stretched from Eastern Asia to Eastern Eu ...
. However, prosecutions for the practice of
witchcraft
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have us ...
would only reach a highpoint from 1560 to 1630
during the
Counter-Reformation
The Counter-Reformation (), also called the Catholic Reformation () or the Catholic Revival, was the period of Catholic resurgence that was initiated in response to the Protestant Reformation. It began with the Council of Trent (1545–1563) a ...
and the
European wars of religion
The European wars of religion were a series of wars waged in Europe during the 16th, 17th and early 18th centuries. Fought after the Protestant Reformation began in 1517, the wars disrupted the religious and political order in the Catholic Chu ...
, with some regions
burning those who were convicted at the stake, of whom roughly 80% were women,, mostly over the age of 40.
Medieval background
Christian doctrine
Throughout the
medieval era
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...
, mainstream Christian doctrine had denied the belief in the existence of witches and witchcraft, condemning it as a
pagan
Paganism (from classical Latin ''pāgānus'' "rural", "rustic", later "civilian") is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Judaism. ...
superstition
A superstition is any belief or practice considered by non-practitioners to be irrational or supernatural, attributed to fate or magic, perceived supernatural influence, or fear of that which is unknown. It is commonly applied to beliefs and ...
. Some have argued that the work of the
Dominican Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known wi ...
in the 13th century helped lay the groundwork for a shift in Christian doctrine, by which certain Christian theologians eventually began to accept the possibility of collaboration with devil(s), resulting in a person obtaining certain real supernatural powers.
A branch of the inquisition in southern France
![Pre-1500 map spread](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/94/Pre-1500_map_spread.jpg)
In 1233, a papal bull by
Gregory IX
Pope Gregory IX ( la, Gregorius IX; born Ugolino di Conti; c. 1145 or before 1170 – 22 August 1241) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 19 March 1227 until his death in 1241. He is known for issuing the '' Decre ...
established a new branch of the inquisition in
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 Par ...
, France, to be led by the
Dominicans. It was intended to prosecute Christian groups considered heretical, such as the
Cathars
Catharism (; from the grc, καθαροί, katharoi, "the pure ones") was a Christian dualist or Gnostic movement between the 12th and 14th centuries which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France. Fol ...
and the
Waldensians
The Waldensians (also known as Waldenses (), Vallenses, Valdesi or Vaudois) are adherents of a church tradition that began as an ascetic movement within Western Christianity before the Reformation.
Originally known as the "Poor Men of Lyon" in ...
. The Dominicans eventually evolved into the most zealous prosecutors of persons accused of witchcraft in the years leading up to the Reformation.
Records were usually kept by the French inquisitors but the majority of these records did not survive, and one historian who was working in 1880, Charles Molinier, refers to the surviving records as only scanty debris. Molinier notes that the inquisitors themselves describe their attempts to carefully safeguard their records, especially when they were moving from town to town. The inquisitors were widely hated and they would be ambushed on the road, but their records were more often the target than the inquisitors themselves
'plus désireux encore de ravir les papiers que porte le juge que de le faire périr lui-même''(''better to take the papers the judge carries than to make the judge himself perish''). The records seem to have often been targeted by the accused or their friends and family, wishing to thereby sabotage the proceedings or failing that, to spare their reputations and the reputations of their descendants. This would be all the more true for those who were accused of practicing witchcraft. Difficulty in understanding the larger witchcraft trials which were to come in later centuries is deciding how much can be extrapolated from what remains.
14th century
In 1329, with the papacy in nearby Avignon, the inquisitor of Carcassonne sentenced a monk to the dungeon for life and the sentence refers to... ''multas et diversas daemonum conjurationes et invocationes''... and it frequently uses the same Latin synonym as a word for witchcraft, ''sortilegia''—found on the title page of
Nicolas Rémy'
work from 1595 where it is claimed that 900 persons were executed for ''sortilegii crimen''.
15th century trials and the growth of the new heterodox view
Witch trials were still uncommon in the 15th century when the concept of
diabolical witchcraft
Diabolical may refer to:
* Evil, the profound immorality, especially when regarded as a supernatural force, for example in religious belief
* The Devil
A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and rel ...
began to emerge. The study of four chronicles concerning events in
Valais
Valais ( , , ; frp, Valês; german: Wallis ), more formally the Canton of Valais,; german: Kanton Wallis; in other official Swiss languages outside Valais: it, (Canton) Vallese ; rm, (Chantun) Vallais. is one of the cantons of Switzerland, 26 ...
, the
Bernese Alps
, topo_map= Swiss Federal Office of Topography swisstopo
, photo=BerneseAlps.jpg
, photo_caption=The Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau
, country= Switzerland
, subdivision1_type=Cantons
, subdivision1=
, parent= Western Alps
, borders_on=
, l ...
and the nearby region of
Dauphiné
The Dauphiné (, ) is a former province in Southeastern France, whose area roughly corresponded to that of the present departments of Isère, Drôme and Hautes-Alpes. The Dauphiné was originally the Dauphiné of Viennois.
In the 12th centu ...
has supported the scholarly proposal that some ideas concerning witchcraft were taking hold in the region around western Switzerland during the 1430s, recasting the practice of witchcraft as an alliance between a person and the devil that would undermine and threaten the Christian foundation of society.
The
Perrissona Gappit case
Perrissona Gappit (also Perrussone) was tried for witchcraft in 1465 in Switzerland.
Background
Witch trials were still uncommon in the 15th century when the concept of diabolical witchcraft began to emerge. The study of four chronicles concern ...
tried in Switzerland in 1465 is noted for the thoroughness of the surviving record.
The skeptical
Canon Episcopi
The title canon ''Episcopi'' (or ''capitulum Episcopi'') is conventionally given to a certain passage found in medieval canon law.
The text possibly originates in an early 10th-century penitential, recorded by Regino of Prüm; it was included ...
retained many supporters, and still seems to have been supported by the theological faculty at the University of Paris in their decree from 1398, and was never officially repudiated by a majority of bishops within the papal lands, nor even by the
Council of Trent
The Council of Trent ( la, Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trento, Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italian Peninsula, Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation ...
, which immediately preceded the peak of the trials. But in 1428, the
Valais witch trials
The Valais witch trials consisted of a witch-hunt and a series of witch trials which took place in the Valais (the House of Savoy and the prince-bishopric of Sion), today part of Switzerland, beginning in 1428. The Valais witch-hunt is the firs ...
, lasting six to eight years, started in the French-speaking lower Valais and eventually spread to German-speaking regions. This time period also coincided with the
Council of Basel
The Council of Florence is the seventeenth ecumenical council recognized by the Catholic Church, held between 1431 and 1449. It was convoked as the Council of Basel by Pope Martin V shortly before his death in February 1431 and took place in ...
(1431–1437) and some scholars have suggested a new anti-witchcraft doctrinal view may have spread among certain theologians and inquisitors in attendance at this council, as the Valais trials were discussed. Not long after, a cluster of powerful opponents of the Canon Episcopi emerged: a Dominican inquisitor in Carcassonne named Jean Vinet, the Bishop of Avila Alfonso Tostado, and another Dominican Inquisitor named
Nicholas Jacquier
Nicholas Jacquier (also ''Nicolaus Jaquerius'', ''Nicolas Jacquier'', ''Nicholas Jaquier'') (died 1472 in Lille) was a French Dominican and Inquisitor. He became known as demonologist and proponent of witch-hunting.
Life
Jacquier took part in th ...
. It is unclear whether the three men were aware of each other's work. The coevolution of their shared view centres around "a common challenge: disbelief in the reality of demonic activity in the world."
Nicholas Jacquier's lengthy and complex argument against the Canon Episcopi was written in Latin. It began as a tract in 1452 and was expanded into a fuller monograph in 1458. Many copies seem to have been made by hand (nine manuscript copies still exist), but it was not printed until 1561. Jacquier describes a number of trials he personally witnessed, including one of a man named
Guillaume Edelin Guillaume Edelin , was a confessed male witch, convicted in 1453, and the first person to confess to have flown on a broom.
Life
Edelin was the Prior of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, an Augustinian and a Doctor of Divinity. He promulgated the idea that i ...
, against whom the main charge seems to have been that he had preached a sermon in support of the Canon Episcopi claiming that witchcraft was merely an illusion. Edeline eventually recanted this view, most likely under torture.
1486: ''Malleus Maleficarum''
The most important and influential book which promoted the new heterodox view was the ''
Malleus Maleficarum
The ''Malleus Maleficarum'', usually translated as the ''Hammer of Witches'', is the best known treatise on witchcraft. It was written by the German Catholic clergyman Heinrich Kramer (under his Latinized name ''Henricus Institor'') and first ...
'' by
Heinrich Kramer
Heinrich Kramer ( 1430 – 1505, aged 74-75), also known under the Latinized name Henricus Institor, was a German churchman and inquisitor. With his widely distributed book ''Malleus Maleficarum'' (1487), which describes witchcraft and endorses ...
. Kramer begins his work in opposition to the Canon Episcopi, but oddly, he does not cite Jacquier, and he may not have been aware of his work. Like most witch-phobic writers, Kramer had met strong resistance by those who opposed his heterodox view; this inspired him to write his work as both propaganda and a manual for like-minded zealots. The
Gutenberg printing press had only recently been invented along the Rhine River, and Kramer fully utilized it to shepherd his work into print and spread the ideas that had been developed by inquisitors and theologians in France into the Rhineland. The theological views espoused by Kramer were influential but remained contested, and an early edition of the book even appeared on a list of those banned by the Church in 1490. Nonetheless ''Malleus Maleficarum'' was printed 13 times between 1486 and 1520, and — following a 50-year pause that coincided with the height of the Protestant reformations — it was printed again another 16 times (1574–1669) in the decades following the important
Council of Trent
The Council of Trent ( la, Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trento, Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italian Peninsula, Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation ...
which had remained silent with regard to Kramer's theological views. It inspired many similar works, such as an influential work by
Jean Bodin
Jean Bodin (; c. 1530 – 1596) was a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law in Toulouse. He is known for his theory of sovereignty. He was also an influential writer on demonology.
Bodin l ...
, and was cited as late as 1692 by
Increase Mather
Increase Mather (; June 21, 1639 Old Style – August 23, 1723 Old Style) was a New England Puritan clergyman in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and president of Harvard College for twenty years (1681–1701). He was influential in the administrati ...
, then president of Harvard College.
It is unknown if a degree of alarm at the extreme superstition and witch-phobia expressed by Kramer in the ''Malleus Maleficarum'' may have been one of the numerous factors that helped prepare the ground for the
Protestant Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
.
Peak of the trials: 1560–1630
The period of the European witch trials, with the most active phase and which saw the largest number of fatalities seems to have occurred between 1560 and 1630.
[ Thurston 2001. p. 79.] The period between 1560 and 1670 saw more than 40,000 deaths.
Authors have debated whether witch trials were more intense in Catholic or Protestant regions. However, the intensity had not so much to do with Catholicism or Protestantism as both regions experienced a varied intensity of witchcraft persecutions. In Catholic Spain and Portugal for example, the numbers of witch trials were few because the Spanish and the Portuguese Inquisition preferred to focus on the crime of public
heresy
Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, in particular the accepted beliefs of a church or religious organization. The term is usually used in reference to violations of important religi ...
rather than the crime of witchcraft, whereas Protestant Scotland had a much larger number of witchcraft trials. In contrast, the witch trials in the Protestant Netherlands stopped earlier and they were among the least numerous in Europe, while the large-scale mass witch trials which took place in the autonomous territories of the Catholic
prince-bishops in Southern Germany were infamous in all of the
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to the various nations and state (polity), states in the regions of Europe, North America, and Oceania. , and the contemporary writer
Herman Löher described how they affected the population within them:
[Ankarloo, Bengt, Witchcraft and magic in Europe. Vol. 4, The period of the witch trials, Athlone, London, 2002]
The Roman Catholic subjects, farmers, winegrowers, and artisans in the episcopal lands are the most terrified people on earth, since the false witch trials affect the German episcopal lands incomparably more than France, Spain, Italy or Protestants.
The mass witch trials which took place in Southern Catholic Germany in waves between the 1560s and the 1620s. Some trials went on to continue for years and would result in hundreds of executions of all sexes, ages and classes. These included the
Trier witch trials
The Witch Trials of Trier took place in the independent Catholic diocese of Trier in the Holy Roman Empire in present day Germany between 1581 and 1593, and were perhaps the largest documented witch trial in history in view of the executions. T ...
(1581–1593), the
Fulda witch trials
The Witch trials of Fulda in Germany from 1603 to 1606 resulted in the death of about 250 people. They were one of the four largest witch trials in Germany, along with the Trier witch trials, the Würzburg witch trial, and the Bamberg witch t ...
(1603–1606), the
Eichstätt witch trials
The Eichstätt witch trials was a series of witch trials that took place in the Prince-Bishopric of Eichstätt (German: Hochstift Eichstätt, Fürtsbistum Eichstätt), Bavaria, Germany, between 1532 and 1723. They resulted in the execution of a ...
(1613–1630), the
Würzburg witch trials
The Würzburg witch trials of 1625–1631, which took place in the self-governing Catholic Prince-Bishopric of Würzburg in the Holy Roman Empire in present-day Germany, formed one of the biggest mass trials and mass executions ever seen in Euro ...
(1626–1631), and the
Bamberg witch trials
The Bamberg witch trials of 1627–1632, which took place in the self governing Catholic Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg in the Holy Roman Empire in present-day Germany, is one of the biggest mass trials and mass executions ever seen in Europe, and ...
(1626–1631).
In 1590, the
North Berwick witch trials
The North Berwick witch trials were the trials in 1590 of a number of people from East Lothian, Scotland, accused of witchcraft in the St Andrew's Auld Kirk in North Berwick on Halloween night. They ran for two years, and implicated over seventy ...
occurred in Scotland, and were of particular note as the king,
James VI
James is a common English language surname and given name:
*James (name), the typically masculine first name James
* James (surname), various people with the last name James
James or James City may also refer to:
People
* King James (disambiguat ...
, became involved himself. James had developed a fear that witches planned to kill him after he suffered from storms while traveling to Denmark in order to claim his bride,
Anne
Anne, alternatively spelled Ann, is a form of the Latin female given name Anna. This in turn is a representation of the Hebrew Hannah, which means 'favour' or 'grace'. Related names include Annie.
Anne is sometimes used as a male name in the ...
, earlier that year. Returning to Scotland, the king heard of trials that were occurring in
North Berwick
North Berwick (; gd, Bearaig a Tuath) is a seaside town
A seaside resort is a town, village, or hotel that serves as a vacation resort and is located on a coast. Sometimes the concept includes an aspect of official accreditation based on th ...
, and ordered the suspects to be brought to him—he subsequently believed that a nobleman,
Francis Stewart, 5th Earl of Bothwell
Francis may refer to:
People
*Pope Francis, the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State and Bishop of Rome
* Francis (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
*Francis (surname)
Places
* Rural ...
, was a witch, and after the latter fled in fear of his life, he was outlawed as a traitor. The king subsequently set up royal commissions to hunt down witches in his realm, recommending torture in dealing with suspects, and in 1597, he wrote a book about the menace that witches posed to society, entitled ''
Daemonologie
''Daemonologie''—in full ''Daemonologie, In Forme of a Dialogue, Divided into three Books: By the High and Mighty Prince, James &c.''—was first published in 1597 by King James VI of Scotland (later also James I of England) as a philosophi ...
''.
The
Pendle witch trials
The trials of the Pendle witches in 1612 are among the most famous witch trials in English history, and some of the best recorded of the 17th century. The twelve accused lived in the area surrounding Pendle Hill in Lancashire, and were charged ...
of 1612 are some of the most prominent in English history, resulting in the hanging of ten of the eleven who were tried.
The witch-panic phenomenon reached the more remote parts of Europe, as well as North America later in the 17th century, among them being the
Salzburg witch trials The Zaubererjackl trials or Salzburg witch trials, also known in history as the Magician Jackls process, which took place in the city of Salzburg in 1675–1690, was one of the largest and most famous witch trials in Austria.Heinz Nagl: Der Zaubere ...
, the Swedish
Torsåker witch trials
The Torsåker witch trials took place in 1675 in Torsåker parish in Sweden and were the largest witch trials in Swedish history. In a single day 71 people (65 women and 6 men) were beheaded and then burned.
Background
The witch trial reached ...
and, somewhat later, in 1692, the
Salem witch trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, 19 of whom w ...
in
Colonial New England
The New England Colonies of British America included Connecticut Colony, the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Massachusetts Bay Colony, Plymouth Colony, and the Province of New Hampshire, as well as a few smaller short-lived colon ...
.
Decline of the trials: 1630–1750
There had never been a lack of skepticism regarding the trials. In 1635, the authorities of the
Roman Inquisition
The Roman Inquisition, formally the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition, was a system of partisan tribunals developed by the Holy See of the Roman Catholic Church, during the second half of the 16th century, respons ...
acknowledged its own trials had "found scarcely one trial conducted legally". In the middle of the 17th century, the difficulty in proving witchcraft according to the legal process contributed
Rothenburg Rothenburg is a German language placename and refers to:
Places
*Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Bavaria, Germany
*Rothenburg, Oberlausitz, Saxony, Germany
*Rothenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany
*Rothenburg, Switzerland, Canton of Lucerne, S ...
(German) following advice to treat witchcraft cases with caution.
Although the witch trials had begun to fade out across much of Europe by the mid-17th century, they continued on the fringes of Europe and in the American Colonies. In the Nordic countries, the late 17th century saw the peak of the trials in a number of areas: the
Torsåker witch trials
The Torsåker witch trials took place in 1675 in Torsåker parish in Sweden and were the largest witch trials in Swedish history. In a single day 71 people (65 women and 6 men) were beheaded and then burned.
Background
The witch trial reached ...
of
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
(1674), where 71 people were executed for witchcraft in a single day, the peak of witch hunting in Swedish Finland,
and the
Salzburg witch trials The Zaubererjackl trials or Salzburg witch trials, also known in history as the Magician Jackls process, which took place in the city of Salzburg in 1675–1690, was one of the largest and most famous witch trials in Austria.Heinz Nagl: Der Zaubere ...
in Austria (where 139 people were executed from 1675 to 1690).
The 1692
Salem witch trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, 19 of whom w ...
were a brief outburst of witch-phobia which occurred in the
New World
The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...
when the practice was waning in Europe. In the 1690s, Winifred King Benham and her daughter Winifred were thrice tried for witchcraft in
Wallingford, Connecticut
Wallingford is a town in New Haven County, Connecticut, United States, centrally located between New Haven and Hartford, and Boston and New York City. The population was 44,396 at the 2020 census. The community was named after Wallingford, in En ...
, the last of such trials in
New England
New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...
. Even though they were found innocent, they were compelled to leave Wallingford and settle in
Staten Island, New York
Staten Island ( ) is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Located in the city's southwest portion, the borough is separated from New Jersey b ...
. In 1706,
Grace Sherwood
Grace White Sherwood (1660–1740), called the Witch of Pungo, is the last person known to have been convicted of witchcraft in Virginia.
A farmer, healer, and midwife, she was accused by her neighbors of transforming herself into a cat, damag ...
of
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
was tried by ducking and jailed for allegedly being a witch.
Rationalist historians in the 18th century came to the opinion that the use of torture had resulted in erroneous testimony.
In France, scholars have found that with increased fiscal capacity and a stronger central government, the witchcraft accusations began to decline. The witch trials that occurred there were symptomatic of a weak legal system and "witches were most likely to be tried and convicted in regions where magistrates departed from established legal statutes".
During the early 18th century, the practice subsided.
Jane Wenham was among the last subjects of a typical witch trial in England in 1712, but was pardoned after her conviction and set free. The last execution for witchcraft in England took place in 1716, when Mary Hicks and her daughter Elizabeth were hanged.
Janet Horne
Janet Horne (died 1727) was the last person to be executed legally for witchcraft in the British Isles.
Horne and her daughter were arrested in Dornoch in Sutherland and imprisoned on the accusations of her neighbours. Horne was showing signs of ...
was executed for witchcraft in Scotland in 1727. The
Witchcraft Act of 1735
The Witchcraft Act 1735 (9 Geo. 2 c. 5) was an Act of the Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1735 which made it a crime for a person to claim that any human being had magical powers or was guilty of practising witchcraft. With this, t ...
put an end to the traditional form of witchcraft as a legal offense in Britain.
Those accused under the new act were restricted to those that pretended to be able to conjure spirits (generally being the most dubious professional fortune tellers and mediums), and punishment was light.
In Austria,
Maria Theresa
Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina (german: Maria Theresia; 13 May 1717 – 29 November 1780) was ruler of the Habsburg dominions from 1740 until her death in 1780, and the only woman to hold the position ''suo jure'' (in her own right). ...
outlawed witch-burning and torture in 1768. The last capital trial, that of
Maria Pauer occurred in 1750 in Salzburg, which was then outside the Austrian domain.
Sporadic witch-hunts after 1750
In the late 18th century, the practice of witchcraft had ceased to be considered a criminal offense throughout Europe, but there are a number of cases which were technically not witch trials, but they are suspected to have involved a belief in witches, at least, they may have involved a belief in it behind the scenes. Thus, in 1782,
Anna Göldi
Anna Göldi (also Göldin or Goeldin, 24 October 1734 – 13 June 1782) was an 18th-century Swiss housemaid who was one of the last persons to be executed for witchcraft in Europe. Göldi, who was executed by decapitation in Glarus, has been ...
was executed in
Glarus
, neighboring_municipalities= Glarus Nord, Glarus Süd, Muotathal (SZ), Innerthal (SZ)
, twintowns= Wiesbaden-Biebrich (Germany)
}
Glarus (; gsw, Glaris; french: Glaris; it, Glarona; rm, Glaruna) is the capital of the canton of Glarus in S ...
,
Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
, officially, she was executed for "poisoning" (her employer, who believed that she had practiced witchcraft on his daughter)—a ruling at the time widely denounced throughout Switzerland and Germany as
judicial murder
Judicial murder is the intentional and premeditated killing of an innocent person by means of capital punishment; therefore, it is a subset of wrongful execution. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' describes it as "death inflicted by process of law ...
. Like Anna Göldi,
Barbara Zdunk Barbara Zdunk (1769 – 21 August 1811) was an ethnically Polish alleged arsonist accused of witchcraft. Zdunk lived in the town of Rößel, in what was then East Prussia, and is now Reszel in Poland. She is considered by many to have been the las ...
was executed in 1811 in
Prussia
Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...
, not technically for witchcraft, but for arson. In Poland, the
Doruchów witch trials occurred in 1783, and the execution of two additional women for sorcery in 1793, tried by a legal court, but with dubious legitimacy.
Despite the official ending of the trials for witchcraft, there would still be occasional and unofficial
witch-hunt
A witch-hunt, or a witch purge, is a search for people who have been labeled witches or a search for evidence of witchcraft. The Witch trials in the early modern period, classical period of witch-hunts in Early Modern Europe and European Colon ...
s and killings of those who were accused of practicing witchcraft in parts of Europe, such as the killings of
Anna Klemens Anna Klemens (1718–1800) was a Danish murder victim and an alleged witch. She was lynched and accused of sorcery in Brigsted at Horsens in Denmark, a lynching considered to be the last witch lynching in her country and, most likely, in all Scandi ...
in Denmark (1800),
Krystyna Ceynowa in Poland (1836), and
Dummy, the Witch of Sible Hedingham
Dummy, the Witch of Sible Hedingham ( – 4 September 1863) was the pseudonym of an unidentified elderly man who was one of the last people to be accused of witchcraft in England in the 19th century. He died after being beaten and thrown into a ri ...
in England (1863). In France, there was sporadic violence and there was even murder in the 1830s, with one woman reportedly burnt in a village square in
Nord
Nord, a word meaning "north" in several European languages, may refer to:
Acronyms
* National Organization for Rare Disorders, an American nonprofit organization
* New Orleans Recreation Department, New Orleans, Louisiana, US
Film and televisi ...
.
In the 1830s, a prosecution for witchcraft was commenced against a man in Fentress County, Tennessee, either named Joseph or William Stout, based upon his alleged influence over the health of a young woman. The case against the supposed witch was dismissed upon the failure of the alleged victim, who had sworn out a warrant against him, to appear for the trial. However, some of his other accusers were convicted on criminal charges for their part in the matter, and various libel actions were brought.
[Poulson's American Daily Advertiser, Volume LX, 10 August 1834, Number 17,057 (From the Nashville (Tenn.) Herald, of 22d July) (transcribed at http://www.topix.com/forum/city/jamestown-tn/TPAPB6U4LVF0JDQC8/p2][History of Fentress County, Tennessee, Albert R. Hogue, compiled by the Fentress County Historical Society]
p. 67
transcription
In 1895,
Bridget Cleary
Bridget Cleary (née Boland; ga, Bríd Uí Chléirigh; 19 Feb 1867 – 15 March 1895) was an Irish woman who was murdered by her husband in 1895. She was either immolated or her body was set on fire immediately after her death. The husband's s ...
was beaten and burned to death by her husband in Ireland because he suspected that fairies had taken the real Bridget and
replaced her with a witch.
The killing of people who were suspected of performing malevolent sorcery against their neighbors continued into the 20th and 21st centuries. In 1997, two Russian farmers killed a woman and injured five members of her family because they believed that the woman and her relatives had used
folk magic
In religious studies and folkloristics, folk religion, popular religion, traditional religion or vernacular religion comprises various forms and expressions of religion that are distinct from the official doctrines and practices of organized rel ...
against them.
It has been reported that between 2005 and 2011, more than 3,000 people were killed for allegedly being witches by lynch mobs in Tanzania.
Procedures and punishments
Evidence
Peculiar standards applied to witchcraft allowing certain types of evidence "that are now ways relating Fact, and done many Years before". There was no possibility to offer
alibi
An alibi (from the Latin, '' alibī'', meaning "somewhere else") is a statement by a person, who is a possible perpetrator of a crime, of where they were at the time a particular offence was committed, which is somewhere other than where the crim ...
as a defense because witchcraft did not require the presence of the accused at the scene. Witnesses were called to testify to motives and effects because it was believed that witnessing the invisible force of witchcraft was impossible: "half proofes are to be allowed, and are good causes of suspicion".
Interrogations and torture
Various acts of
torture
Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. Some definitions are restricted to acts c ...
were used against accused witches to coerce confessions and cause them to provide names of alleged co-conspirators. Most historians agree that the majority of those persecuted in these witch trials were innocent of any involvement in Devil worship. The torture of witches began to increase in frequency after 1468, when the Pope declared witchcraft to be and thereby removed all legal limits on the application of torture in cases where evidence was difficult to find.
In Italy, an accused witch was deprived of sleep for periods up to forty hours. This technique was also used in England, but without a limitation on time.
[Camille Naish, ''Death Comes to the Maiden: Sex and Execution 1431–1933'' (London: Routledge, 1991), p. 27.] Sexual humiliation was used, such as forced sitting on red-hot stools with the claim that the accused woman would not perform sexual acts with the devil. In most cases, those who endured the torture without confessing were released.
The use of torture has been identified as a key factor in converting the trial of one accused witch into a wider
social panic A social panic is a state where a social or community group reacts negatively and in an extreme or irrational manner to unexpected or unforeseen changes in their expected social status quo. According to ''Folk Devils and Moral Panics'' by Stanley ...
, as those being tortured were more likely to accuse a wide array of other local individuals of also being witches.
Punishments
A variety of different punishments were employed for those found guilty of witchcraft, including imprisonment, flogging, fines, or exile. Non-capital punishment, especially for a first offence, was most common in England. Prior to 1542, Church courts dealt with most cases in England and most sanctions were directed more to penance and atonement than harsh punishments. Often the guilty party was ordered to attend the parish church, wearing a white sheet and carrying a wand, and swear to lead a reformed life. The
Old Testament
The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...
's book of
Exodus (22:18) states, "Thou shalt not permit a sorceress to live". Many faced
capital punishment
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
for witchcraft, either by burning at the stake, hanging, or beheading. Similarly, in New England, people convicted of witchcraft were hanged.
Estimates of the total number of executions
The scholarly consensus on the total number of executions for witchcraft ranges from 40,000 to 60,000
[. Scarre and Callow (2001) put forward 40,000 as an estimate for the number killed. Levack (2006) came to an estimate of 45,000. Levack, Brian (2006). ''The Witch Hunt in Early Modern Europe'' Third Edition. Longman. Page 23. Hutton (2010) estimated that the numbers were between 40,000–50,000, Wolfgang Behringer and Lyndal Roper had independently calculated the number as being between 50,000–60,000.(; ) In an earlier unpublished essay, Hutton counted local estimates, and in areas where estimates were unavailable attempted to extrapolate from nearby regions with similar demographics and attitudes towards witch hunting. .
] (not including unofficial lynchings of accused witches, which went unrecorded but are nevertheless believed to have been somewhat rare in the
Early Modern period). It would also have been the case that various individuals would have died as a result of the unsanitary conditions of their imprisonment, but again this is not recorded within the number of executions.
Attempts at estimating the total number of executions for witchcraft have a history going back to the end of the period of witch-hunts in the 18th century. A scholarly consensus only emerges in the second half of the 20th century, and historical estimates vary wildly depending on the method used. Early estimates tend to be highly exaggerated, as they were still part of rhetorical arguments against the persecution of witches rather than purely historical scholarship.
Notably, a figure of nine million victims was given by
Gottfried Christian Voigt
Gottfried Christian Voigt (1740–1791, pronunciation ) was an 18th-century German law clerk of Quedlinburg, scholar and antiquarian, author of a 1791 "History of Quedlinburg Abbey" (''Geschichte des Stifts Quedlinburg'').
He is known as the sou ...
in 1784 in an argument criticizing
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his ...
's estimate of "several hundred thousand" as too low. Voigt's number has shown remarkably resilient as an influential
popular myth, surviving well into the 20th century, especially in
feminist and neo-pagan literature. In the 19th century, some scholars were agnostic, for instance,
Jacob Grimm
Jacob Ludwig Karl Grimm (4 January 1785 – 20 September 1863), also known as Ludwig Karl, was a German author, linguist, philologist, jurist, and folklorist. He is known as the discoverer of Grimm's law of linguistics, the co-author of th ...
(1844) talked of "countless" victims and
Charles Mackay Charles (or Charlie) Mackay, McKay, or MacKay may refer to:
* Charles Mackay (author) (1814–1889), Scottish poet, journalist, author, anthologist, novelist, and songwriter
* Charles McKay (1855–1883), American naturalist and explorer
* Charles ...
(1841) named "thousands upon thousands". By contrast, a popular news report of 1832 cited a number of 3,192 victims "in Great Britain alone". In the early 20th century, some scholarly estimates on the number of executions still ranged in the hundreds of thousands. The estimate was only reliably placed below 100,000 in scholarship of the 1970s.
Causes and interpretations
Regional differences
There were many regional differences in the manner in which the witch trials occurred. The trials themselves emerged sporadically, flaring up in some areas but neighbouring areas remaining largely unaffected. In general, there seems to have been less witch-phobia in
Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
and the papal lands of
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
in comparison to
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
and the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a Polity, political entity in Western Europe, Western, Central Europe, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, dissolution i ...
.
There was much regional variation within the
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner and Outer Hebrides, the Northern Isles, ...
. In Ireland, for example, there were few trials.
There are particularly important differences between the English and continental witch-hunting traditions. In England the use of torture was rare and the methods far more restrained. The country formally permitted it only when authorized by the monarch, and no more than 81 torture warrants were issued (for all offenses) throughout English history. The death toll in Scotland dwarfed that of England. It is also apparent from an episode of English history, that during the civil war in the early 1640s, witch-hunters emerged, the most notorious of whom was
Matthew Hopkins
Matthew Hopkins ( 1620 – 12 August 1647) was an English witch-hunter whose career flourished during the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament, a ...
from
East Anglia
East Anglia is an area in the East of England, often defined as including the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire. The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the East Angles, a people whose name originated in Anglia, in ...
and proclaimed himself the "Witchfinder General".
Italy has had fewer witchcraft accusations, and even fewer cases where witch trials ended in execution. In 1542, the establishment of the Roman Catholic
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, ...
effectively restrained secular courts under its influence from liberal application of torture and execution. The methodological Instructio, which served as an "appropriate" manual for witch hunting, cautioned against hasty convictions and careless executions of the accused. In contrast with other parts of Europe, trials by the Venetian Holy Office never saw conviction for the crime of malevolent witchcraft, or "maleficio". Because the notion of diabolical cults was not credible to either popular culture or Catholic inquisitorial theology, mass accusations and belief in Witches' Sabbath never took root in areas under such inquisitorial influence.
The number of people tried for witchcraft between the years of 1500–1700 (by region) include: Holy Roman Empire: 50,000 Poland: 15,000 Switzerland: 9,000 French Speaking Europe: 10,000 Spanish and Italian peninsulas: 10,000 Scandinavia: 4,000.
Socio-political turmoil
![Bamberger Malefizhaus 1627 Staatsbiblithek Bamberg](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Bamberger_Malefizhaus_1627_Staatsbiblithek_Bamberg.jpg)
Various suggestions have been made that the witch trials emerged as a response to socio-political turmoil in the Early Modern world. One form of this is that the prosecution of witches was a reaction to a disaster that had befallen the community, such as crop failure, war, or disease. For instance, Midelfort suggested that in southwestern Germany, war and famine destabilised local communities, resulting in the witch prosecutions of the 1620s. Behringer also suggests an increase in witch prosecutions due to socio-political destabilization, stressing the Little Ice Age's effects on food shortages, and the subsequent use of witches as scapegoats for consequences of climatic changes.
The Little Ice Age, lasting from about 1300 to 1850, is characterized by temperatures and precipitation levels lower than the 1901–1960 average. Historians such as Wolfgang Behringer, Emily Oster, and
Hartmut Lehmann
Hartmut Lehmann (born April 29, 1936) is a German historian of modern history who specializes in religious and social history. He is known for his research on Pietism, secularization, religion and nationalism, transatlantic studies and Martin Lut ...
argue that these cooling temperatures brought about crop failure, war, and disease, and that witches were subsequently blamed for this turmoil.
Historical temperature indexes and witch trial data indicate that, generally, as temperature decreased during this period, witch trials increased.
Additionally, the peaks of witchcraft persecutions overlap with hunger crises that occurred in 1570 and 1580, the latter lasting a decade.
Problematically for these theories, it has been highlighted that, in that region, the witch hunts declined during the 1630s, at a time when the communities living there were facing increased disaster as a result of plague, famine, economic collapse, and the
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (80 ...
. Furthermore, this scenario would clearly not offer a universal explanation, for trials also took place in areas which were free from war, famine, or pestilence. Additionally, these theories—particularly Behringer's —have been labeled as oversimplified.
Although there is evidence that the Little Ice Age and subsequent famine and disease was likely a contributing factor to increase in witch persecution, Durrant argues that one cannot make a direct link between these problems and witch persecutions in all contexts.
Moreover, the
average age at first marriage had gradually risen by the late sixteenth century; the population had stabilized after a period of growth, and availability of jobs and land had lessened. In the last decades of the century, the age at marriage had climbed to averages of 25 for women and 27 for men in England and the Low Countries, as more people married later or remained unmarried due to lack of money or resources and a decline in living standards, and these averages remained high for nearly two centuries and averages across Northwestern Europe had done likewise. The
convents were closed during the
Protestant Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, which displaced many nuns. Many communities saw the proportion of unmarried women climb from less than 10% to 20% and in some cases as high as 30%, whom few communities knew how to accommodate economically. Miguel (2003) argues that witch killings may be a process of eliminating the financial burdens of a family or society, via elimination of the older women that need to be fed, and an increase in unmarried women would enhance this process.
Catholic versus Protestant conflict
The English historian
Hugh Trevor-Roper
Hugh Redwald Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton (15 January 1914 – 26 January 2003) was an English historian. He was Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford.
Trevor-Roper was a polemicist and essayist on a range of ...
advocated the idea that the witch trials emerged as part of the conflicts between Roman Catholics and Protestants in Early Modern Europe. A 2017 study in the ''
Economic Journal
''The Economic Journal'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal of economics published on behalf of the Royal Economic Society by Oxford University Press. The journal was established in 1891 and publishes papers from all areas of economics.The edito ...
'', examining "more than 43,000 people tried for witchcraft across 21 European countries over a period of five-and-a-half centuries", found that "more intense religious-market contestation led to more intense witch-trial activity. And, compared to religious-market contestation, the factors that existing hypotheses claim were important for witch-trial activity—weather, income, and
state capacity
State capacity is the ability of a government to accomplish policy goals, either generally or in reference to specific aims. A state that lacks capacity is defined as a fragile state or, in a more extreme case, a failed state. Higher state capacity ...
—were not."
Until recently, this theory received limited support from other experts in the subject. This is because there is little evidence that either Roman Catholics were accusing Protestants of witchcraft, or that Protestants were accusing Roman Catholics. Furthermore, the witch trials regularly occurred in regions with little or no inter-denominational strife, and which were largely religiously homogenous, such as
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...
,
Lowland Scotland
The Lowlands ( sco, Lallans or ; gd, a' Ghalldachd, , place of the foreigners, ) is a cultural and historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Lowlands and the Highlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowl ...
,
Geneva
Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaki ...
,
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
, and the
Spanish Basque Country
The Basque Country (; eu, Euskadi ; es, País Vasco ), also called Basque Autonomous Community ( eu, Euskal Autonomia Erkidegoa, links=no, EAE; es, Comunidad Autónoma del País Vasco, links=no, CAPV), is an autonomous community of Spain. It ...
. There is also some evidence, particularly from the Holy Roman Empire, in which adjacent Roman Catholic and Protestant territories were exchanging information on alleged local witches, viewing them as a common threat to both. Additionally, many prosecutions were instigated not by the religious or secular authorities, but by popular demands from within the population, thus making it less likely that there were specific inter-denominational reasons behind the accusations.
The more recent research from the 2017 study in the ''
Economic Journal
''The Economic Journal'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal of economics published on behalf of the Royal Economic Society by Oxford University Press. The journal was established in 1891 and publishes papers from all areas of economics.The edito ...
'' argues that both Catholics and Protestants used the hunt for witches, regardless of the witch's denomination, in competitive efforts to expand power and influence.
In south-western Germany, between 1561 and 1670, there were 480 witch trials. Of the 480 trials that took place in southwestern Germany, 317 occurred in Catholic areas and 163 in Protestant territories. During the period from 1561 to 1670, at least 3,229 persons were executed for witchcraft in the German Southwest. Of this number, 702 were tried and executed in Protestant territories and 2,527 in Catholic territories.
Translation from the Hebrew: Witch or poisoner?
It has been argued that a translation choice in the King James Bible justified "horrific human rights violations and fuel
dthe epidemic of witchcraft accusations and persecution across the globe". The translation issue concerned Exodus 22:18, "do not suffer a ...
ither 1) poisoner ''or'' 2) witch...to live." Both the King James and the Geneva Bible, which precedes the King James version by 51 years, chose the word "witch" for this verse. The proper translation and definition of the Hebrew word in Exodus 22:18 was much debated during the time of the trials and witch-phobia.
1970s folklore emphasis
From the 1970s onward, there was a "massive explosion of scholarly enthusiasm" for the study of the Early Modern witch trials. This was partly because scholars from a variety of different disciplines, including
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
,
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...
,
cultural studies
Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...
,
philosophy
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
,
philosophy of science
Philosophy of science is a branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. The central questions of this study concern what qualifies as science, the reliability of scientific theories, and the ultim ...
,
criminology
Criminology (from Latin , "accusation", and Ancient Greek , ''-logia'', from λόγος ''logos'' meaning: "word, reason") is the study of crime and deviant behaviour. Criminology is an interdisciplinary field in both the behavioural and so ...
,
literary theory
Literary theory is the systematic study of the nature of literature and of the methods for literary analysis. Culler 1997, p.1 Since the 19th century, literary scholarship includes literary theory and considerations of intellectual history, mo ...
, and
feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, fictional, or philosophical discourse. It aims to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines women's and men's social roles, experiences, interests, chores, and feminist ...
, all began to investigate the phenomenon and brought different insights to the subject. This was accompanied by analysis of the trial records and the socio-cultural contexts on which they emerged, allowing for varied understanding of the trials.
Functionalism
Inspired by ethnographically recorded witch trials that anthropologists observed happening in non-European parts of the world, various historians have sought a functional explanation for the Early Modern witch trials, thereby suggesting the social functions that the trials played within their communities. These studies have illustrated how accusations of witchcraft have played a role in releasing social tensions or in facilitating the termination of personal relationships that have become undesirable to one party.
Feminist interpretations
Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, various
feminist
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
interpretations of the witch trials have been offered and published. One of the earliest individuals to do so was the American
Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Americ ...
, a writer who was deeply involved in the
first-wave feminist
First-wave feminism was a period of feminist activity and thought that occurred during the 19th and early 20th century throughout the Western world. It focused on De jure, legal issues, primarily on securing Women's suffrage, women's right to vot ...
movement for
women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vot ...
. In 1893, she published the book ''Woman, Church and State'', which was criticized as "written in a tearing hurry and in time snatched from a political activism which left no space for original research".
[ Hutton 1999. p. 141.] Likely influenced by the works of
Jules Michelet
Jules Michelet (; 21 August 1798 – 9 February 1874) was a French historian and an author on other topics whose major work was a history of France and its culture. His aphoristic style emphasized his anti-clerical republicanism.
In Michelet's ...
about the Witch-Cult, she claimed that the witches persecuted in the Early Modern period were pagan priestesses adhering to an
ancient religion venerating a Great Goddess. She also repeated the erroneous statement, taken from the works of several German authors, that nine million people had been killed in the witch hunt.
The United States has become the centre of development for these feminist interpretations.
In 1973, two American second-wave feminists,
Barbara Ehrenreich
Barbara Ehrenreich (, ; ; August 26, 1941 – September 1, 2022) was an American author and political activist. During the 1980s and early 1990s, she was a prominent figure in the Democratic Socialists of America. She was a widely read and awar ...
and
Deirdre English
Deirdre English (born 1948) is the former editor of ''Mother Jones'' and author of numerous articles for national publications and television documentaries. She has taught at the State University of New York and currently teaches at the Graduate S ...
, published an extended pamphlet in which they put forward the idea that the women persecuted had been the traditional healers and midwives of the community, who were being deliberately eliminated by the male medical establishment. This theory disregarded the fact that the majority of those persecuted were neither healers nor midwives, and that in various parts of Europe these individuals were commonly among those encouraging the persecutions. In 1994, Anne Llewellyn Barstow published her book ''Witchcraze'', which was later described by Scarre and Callow as "perhaps the most successful" attempt to portray the trials as a systematic male attack on women.
Other feminist historians have rejected this interpretation of events; historian
Diane Purkiss
Diane Purkiss (born 30 June 1961) is Fellow and Tutor of English at Keble College, Oxford. She specialises in Renaissance and women's literature, witchcraft and the English Civil War.
Purkiss was born in Melbourne, Australia, and was educated at ...
described it as "not politically helpful" because it constantly portrays women as "helpless victims of patriarchy" and thus does not aid them in contemporary feminist struggles. She also condemned it for factual inaccuracy by highlighting that radical feminists adhering to it ignore the
historicity
Historicity is the historical actuality of persons and events, meaning the quality of being part of history instead of being a historical myth, legend, or fiction. The historicity of a claim about the past is its factual status. Historicity denot ...
of their claims, instead promoting it because it is perceived as authorising the continued struggle against patriarchal society. She asserted that many radical feminists nonetheless clung to it because of its "mythic significance" and firmly delineated structure between the oppressor and the oppressed.
Male and Female conflict and reaction to earlier feminist studies
An estimated 75% to 85% of those accused in the early modern witch trials were women,
[Per , "Records suggest that in Europe, as a whole, about 80 per cent of trial defendants were women, though the ratio of women to men charged with the offence varied from place to place, and often, too, in one place over time."][Gibbons, Jenny (1998]
"Recent Developments in the Study of the Great European Witch Hunt" in ''The Pomegranate'' No. 5, Lammas 1998.[Jones, Adam (1999–2002)](_blank)
/ref> and there is certainly evidence of misogyny
Misogyny () is hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against women. It is a form of sexism that is used to keep women at a lower social status than men, thus maintaining the societal roles of patriarchy. Misogyny has been widely practiced fo ...
on the part of those persecuting witches, evident from quotes such as "t is
T, or t, is the twentieth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''tee'' (pronounced ), plural ''tees''. It is deri ...
not unreasonable that this scum of humanity, itches
Itch (also known as pruritus) is a sensation that causes the desire or reflex to scratch. Itch has resisted many attempts to be classified as any one type of sensory experience. Itch has many similarities to pain, and while both are unpleasant ...
should be drawn chiefly from the feminine sex" (Nicholas Rémy
Nicholas Rémy, Latin Remigius (1530–1616) was a French magistrate who claimed in his book to have overseen the execution of more than 800 witches and the torture or persecution of a similar number. His work shows much influence from Jean Bodin. ...
, c. 1595) or "The Devil uses them so, because he knows that women love carnal pleasures, and he means to bind them to his allegiance by such agreeable provocations." Scholar Kurt Baschwitz, in his first monography on the subject (in Dutch, 1948), mentions this aspect of the witch trials even as ''"a war against old women"''.
Nevertheless, it has been argued that the supposedly misogynistic agenda of works on witchcraft has been greatly exaggerated, based on the selective repetition of a few relevant passages of the ''Malleus maleficarum''. There are various reasons as to why this was the case. In Early Modern Europe, it was widely believed that women were less intelligent than men and more susceptible to sin.
Many modern scholars argue that the witch hunts cannot be explained simplistically as an expression of male misogyny, as indeed women were frequently accused by other women,[ Gibbons 1998.] to the point that witch-hunts, at least at the local level of villages, have been described as having been driven primarily by "women's quarrels".["In Lorraine the majority were men, particularly when other men were on trial, yet women did testify in large numbers against other women, making up 43 per cent of witnesses in these cases on average, and predominating in 30 per cent of them.", Briggs, 'Witches & Neighbors: The Social and Cultural Context of European Witchcraft', p. 264 (1998). "It appears that women were active in building up reputations by gossip, deploying counter-magic and accusing suspects; crystallization into formal prosecution, however, needed the intervention of men, preferably of fairly high status in the community.", ibid., p. 265. "The number of witchcraft quarrels that began between women may actually have been higher; in some cases, it appears that the husband as 'head of household' came forward to make statements on behalf of his wife, although the central quarrel had taken place between her and another woman.", Willis, ''Malevolent Nature'', p. 36 (1995). "In Peter Rushton's examination of slander cases in the Durham church courts, women took action against other women who had labeled them witches in 61 percent of the cases.", ibid., p. 36. "J.A. Sharpe also notes the prevalence of women as accusers in seventeenth-century Yorkshire cases, concluding that 'on a village level witchcraft seems to have been something peculiarly enmeshed in women's quarrels.'14 To a considerable extent, then, village-level witch-hunting was women's work.', ibid., p. 36] Especially at the margins of Europe, in Iceland, Finland, Estonia, and Russia, the majority of those accused were male.['The widespread division of labour, which conceives of witches as female, and witch-doctors male, can hardly be explained by Christian influence. In some European countries, like Iceland, Finland, and Estonia, the idea of male witchcraft was dominant, and therefore most of the executed witches were male. As ]Kirsten Hastrup
Kirsten Blinkenberg Hastrup (born 1948) is a Danish anthropologist and professor of anthropology at the University of Copenhagen. She has taken a special interest in the conjunction between the history and culture of both Iceland and Greenland, pu ...
has demonstrated, only one of the twenty-two witches executed in Iceland was female. In Normandy three-quarters of the 380 known witchcraft defendants were male.', Behringer, 'Witches and Witch-Hunts: a global history', p. 39 (2004)
Barstow (1994) claimed that a combination of factors, including the greater value placed on men as workers in the increasingly wage-oriented economy, and a greater fear of women as inherently evil, loaded the scales against women, even when the charges against them were identical to those against men.
Thurston (2001) saw this as a part of the general misogyny of the Late Medieval and Early Modern periods, which had increased during what he described as "the persecuting culture" from which it had been in the Early Medieval. Gunnar Heinsohn
Gunnar Heinsohn is a German author, sociologist and economist and professor emeritus at the University of Bremen. In 1984 he received a ''Lehrstuhl'', a tenured chair in social pedagogy at the University of Bremen.
Heinsohn has published on a wid ...
and Otto Steiger, in a 1982 publication, speculated that witch-hunts targeted women skilled in midwifery specifically in an attempt to extinguish knowledge about birth control
Birth control, also known as contraception, anticonception, and fertility control, is the use of methods or devices to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Birth control has been used since ancient times, but effective and safe methods of birth contr ...
and "repopulate Europe" after the population catastrophe of the Black Death
The Black Death (also known as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality or the Plague) was a bubonic plague pandemic occurring in Western Eurasia and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. It is the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history, causi ...
; this view has been rejected by mainstream historians. The historian of medicine David Harley criticised the notion of the midwife-witch as a prevalent type of victim of witch hunts and commented on Heinsohn and Steiger as belonging to a set of polemicists who misportrayed the history of midwifery.
Were there any sorts of witches?
Throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the common belief among the educated sectors of the European populace was that there had never been any genuine cult
In modern English, ''cult'' is usually a pejorative term for a social group that is defined by its unusual religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals, or its common interest in a particular personality, object, or goal. This ...
of witches and all of those people who were persecuted and executed as such were innocent of the crime of witchcraft. However, at this time, various scholars suggested that there had been a real cult that had been persecuted by the Christian authorities, and it had pre-Christian origins. The first person to advance this theory was the German Professor of Criminal Law Karl Ernst Jarcke
Karl Ernst Jarcke (10 November 1801, in Danzig, Prussia – 27 December 1852, in Vienna) was a German publisher and professor of criminal law, who took a conservative stance towards revolutionary movements in the early nineteenth century.
He ...
of the University of Berlin
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative o ...
, who put forward the idea in 1828; he suggested that witchcraft had been a pre-Christian German religion that had degenerated into Satanism. Jarcke's ideas were picked up by the German historian Franz Josef Mone in 1839, although he argued that the cult's origins were Greek rather than Germanic.
In 1862, the Frenchman Jules Michelet
Jules Michelet (; 21 August 1798 – 9 February 1874) was a French historian and an author on other topics whose major work was a history of France and its culture. His aphoristic style emphasized his anti-clerical republicanism.
In Michelet's ...
published '' La Sorciere'', in which he put forth the idea that the witches had been following a pagan religion. The theory achieved greater attention when it was taken up by the Egyptologist Margaret Murray
Margaret Alice Murray (13 July 1863 – 13 November 1963) was an Anglo-Indian Egyptology, Egyptologist, archaeology, archaeologist, anthropology, anthropologist, historian, and folkloristics, folklorist. The first woman to be appointed as a l ...
, who published both ''The Witch-Cult in Western Europe'' (1921) and ''The God of the Witches'' (1931) in which she claimed that the witches had been following a pre-Christian religion which she termed "the Witch-Cult" and "Ritual Witchcraft".
Murray claimed that this faith was devoted to a pagan Horned God
The Horned God is one of the two primary deities found in Wicca and some related forms of Neopaganism.
The term ''Horned God'' itself predates Wicca, and is an early 20th-century syncretic term for a horned or antlered anthropomorphic god partl ...
and involved the celebration of four Witches' Sabbaths each year: Halloween
Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observanc ...
, Imbolc
Imbolc or Imbolg (), also called Saint Brigid's Day ( ga, Lá Fhéile Bríde; gd, Là Fhèill Brìghde; gv, Laa'l Breeshey), is a Gaelic traditional festival. It marks the beginning of spring, and for Christians it is the feast day of Saint ...
, Beltane
Beltane () is the Gaelic May Day festival. Commonly observed on the first of May, the festival falls midway between the spring equinox and summer solstice in the northern hemisphere. The festival name is synonymous with the month marking the ...
, and Lughnasadh
Lughnasadh or Lughnasa ( , ) is a Gaelic festival marking the beginning of the harvest season. Historically, it was widely observed throughout Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. In Modern Irish it is called , in gd, Lùnastal, and in gv, ...
. However, the majority of scholarly reviews of Murray's work produced at the time were largely critical, and her books never received support from experts in the Early Modern witch trials. Instead, from her early publications onward many of her ideas were challenged by those who highlighted her "factual errors and methodological failings".
However, the publication of the Murray thesis in the ''Encyclopaedia Britannica'' made it accessible to "journalists, film-makers popular novelists and thriller writers", who adopted it "enthusiastically". Influencing works of literature, it inspired writings by Aldous Huxley
Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly 50 books, both novels and non-fiction works, as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems.
Born into the prominent Huxley ...
and Robert Graves
Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...
.
Subsequently, in 1939, an English occultist named Gerald Gardner
Gerald Brosseau Gardner (13 June 1884 – 12 February 1964), also known by the craft name Scire, was an English Wiccan, as well as an author and an amateur anthropologist and archaeologist. He was instrumental in bringing the Contemporary Pag ...
claimed to have been initiated into a surviving group of the pagan Witch-Cult known as the New Forest Coven
The New Forest coven were an alleged group of witches who met around the area of the New Forest in southern England during the early 20th century. According to his own claims, in September 1939, a British occultist named Gerald Gardner was initi ...
, although modern historical investigation has led scholars to believe that this coven was not ancient as Gardner believed, but was instead founded in the 1920s or 1930s by occultists wishing to fashion a revived Witch-Cult based upon Murray's theories. Taking this New Forest Coven's beliefs and practices as a basis, Gardner went on to found Gardnerian Wicca
Gardnerian Wicca, or Gardnerian witchcraft, is a
tradition in the neopagan religion of Wicca, whose members can trace initiatory descent from Gerald Gardner. The tradition is itself named after Gardner (1884–1964), a British civil servant ...
, one of the most prominent traditions in the contemporary pagan
Modern paganism, also known as contemporary paganism and neopaganism, is a term for a religion or family of religions influenced by the various Paganism, historical pre-Christian beliefs of pre-modern peoples in Europe and adjacent areas of No ...
religion now known as Wicca
Wicca () is a modern Pagan religion. Scholars of religion categorise it as both a new religious movement and as part of the occultist stream of Western esotericism. It was developed in England during the first half of the 20th century and was ...
, which revolves around the worship of a Horned God and Goddess, the celebration of festivals known as ''Sabbats'', and the practice of ritual magic. He also went on to write several books about the historical Witch-Cult, ''Witchcraft Today
''Witchcraft Today'' is a non-fiction book written by Gerald Gardner. Published in 1954, ''Witchcraft Today'' recounts Gardner's thoughts on the history and the practices of the witch-cult, and his claim to have met practising witches in 1930s ...
'' (1954) and ''The Meaning of Witchcraft
''The Meaning of Witchcraft'' is a non-fiction book written by Gerald Gardner. Gardner, known to many in the modern sense as the "Father of Wicca", based the book around his experiences with the religion of Wicca and the New Forest Coven. It was ...
'' (1959), and in these books, Gardner used the phrase "the burning times" in reference to the European and North American witch trials.
In the early 20th century, a number of individuals and groups emerged in Europe, primarily Britain, and subsequently the United States as well, claiming to be the surviving remnants of the pagan Witch-Cult described in the works of Margaret Murray. The first of these actually appeared in the last few years of the 19th century, being a manuscript that American folklorist Charles Leland
Charles Godfrey Leland (August 15, 1824 – March 20, 1903) was an American humorist and folklorist, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was educated at Princeton University and in Europe.
Leland worked in journalism, travelled extensivel ...
claimed he had been given by a woman who was a member of a group of witches worshipping the god Lucifer
Lucifer is one of various figures in folklore associated with the planet Venus. The entity's name was subsequently absorbed into Christianity as a name for the devil. Modern scholarship generally translates the term in the relevant Bible passage ...
and goddess Diana in Tuscany
Tuscany ( ; it, Toscana ) is a Regions of Italy, region in central Italy with an area of about and a population of about 3.8 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence (''Firenze'').
Tuscany is known for its landscapes, history, art ...
, Italy. He published the work in 1899 as ''Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches
''Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches'' is a book composed by the American folklorist Charles Godfrey Leland that was published in 1899. It contains what he believed was the religious text of a group of pagan witches in Tuscany, Italy that docume ...
''. Whilst historians and folklorists have accepted that there are folkloric elements to the gospel, none have accepted it as being the text of a genuine Tuscan religious group, and believe it to be of late-nineteenth-century composition.[See for instance Hutton 1999. pp. 142–148 and Magliocco 2002.]
Wiccans extended claims regarding the witch-cult in various ways, for instance by utilising the British folklore associating witches with prehistoric sites to assert that the witch-cult used to use such locations for religious rites, in doing so legitimising contemporary Wiccan use of them.
By the 1990s, many Wiccans had come to recognise the inaccuracy of the witch-cult theory and had accepted it as a mythological origin story.
Witch trials by country or region
*Bideford witch trial
The Bideford witch trial resulted in hangings for witchcraft in England. Temperance Lloyd, Mary Trembles and Susannah Edwards from the town of Bideford in Devon were tried in 1682 at the Exeter Assizes at Rougemont Castle. Much of the evidence a ...
*Salem witch trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, 19 of whom w ...
* Witch trials in Virginia
*Maryland witch trials
The Maryland Witch Trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in Colonial Maryland between June 1654, and October 1712. It was not unique, but is a Colonial American example of the much broader phenomenon of ...
* Pennsylvania witch trials
* Witch trials in Denmark
The Witch trials in Denmark are poorly documented, with the exception of the region of Jylland in the 1609–1687 period. The most intense period in the Danish witchcraft persecutions was the great witch hunt of 1617–1625, when most executions t ...
* Witch trials in England
The Witch trials in England were conducted from the 15th century until the 18th century. They are estimated to have resulted in the death of perhaps 500 people, 90 percent of whom were women. The witch hunt was as its most intense stage during ...
* Witch trials in Finland
The Witch trials in Finland were conducted in connection to Sweden (Finland then being a part of Sweden) and were relatively few with the exception of the 1660s and 1670s, when a big witch hunt affected both Finland and Sweden. Finland differed fro ...
* Witch trials in France
The Witch trials in France are poorly documented, mainly because a lot of the documents of former witch trials have not been preserved, and no number can therefore be given for the executions of witch trials in France or the true extent of them ...
* Witch trials in the Holy Roman Empire
* Witch trials in Hungary The Witch trials in Hungary were conducted over a longer period of time than in most countries in Europe, as documented witch trials are noted as early as the Middle Ages, earlier than common, and lasted until the late 18th-century, which was later ...
* Witch trials in Iceland
The Witch trials in Iceland were conducted by the Danish authorities (Iceland then being a Danish possession), who introduced the belief in witchcraft as well as the Danish Witchcraft Act in the 17th century, and then stopped the persecutions. Simi ...
* Witch trials in Italy The Witch trials in the Italian states of present-day Italy are a complicated issue. Witch trials could be managed by a number of different secular courts as well as by the Roman Inquisition, and documentation has been only partially preserved in ei ...
* Witch trials in Latvia and Estonia
Witch trials in Latvia and Estonia were mainly conducted by the Baltic German elite of clergy, nobility and burghers against the indigenous peasantry in order to persecute Paganism by use of Christian demonology and witchcraft ideology.Ankarloo, B ...
*Witch-hunts in Nepal
Witch-hunts are still occurring in Nepal in the twenty-first century, and the persecution of marginalised individuals of the community, especially women, still persists. Witchcraft is believed to be the exercise of supernatural powers by witches ...
* Witch trials in the Netherlands The witch trials in the Netherlands were among the smallest in Europe. The Netherlands are known for having discontinued their witchcraft executions earlier than any other European country. The provinces began to phase out capital punishment for wit ...
* Witch trials in Norway
* Witch trials in Poland The witch trials in Poland started later than in most of Europe, beginning in earnest in Poland until the second half of the 17th century, but also lasted longer than elsewhere. Despite being formally banned in 1776, the law was not evenly enforced ...
* Witch trials in Portugal The Witch trials in Portugal were the perhaps fewest in all of Europe. Similar to the Spanish Inquisition in neighboring Spain, the Portuguese Inquisition preferred to focus on the persecution of heresy and did not consider witchcraft to be a priori ...
* Witch trials in early modern Scotland
In early modern Scotland, inbetween the early 16th century and the mid-18th century, judicial proceedings concerned with the crimes of witchcraft ( gd, buidseachd) took place as part of a series of witch trials in Early Modern Europe. In the lat ...
* Witch trials in Sicily
* Witch trials in Spain The Witch trials in Spain were few in comparison with most of Europe. The Spanish Inquisition preferred to focus on the crime of heresy and, consequently, did not consider the persecution of witchcraft a priority and in fact discouraged it rather th ...
* Witch trials in the Spanish Netherlands The Witch trials in the Spanish Netherlands (present-day Belgium and Luxembourg minus the Prince-Bishopric of Liège, the Duchy of Bouillon and the Princely Abbey of Stavelot-Malmedy) belonged to the more intense, along with those of the Holy Roman ...
* Witch trials in Sweden
Sweden was a country with few witch trials compared to other countries in Europe. In Sweden, about four hundred people were executed for witchcraft prior to the last case in 1704.Ankarloo, Bengt, Satans raseri: en sannfärdig berättelse om det s ...
See also
*List of common misconceptions
Each entry on this list of common misconceptions is worded as a correction; the misconceptions themselves are implied rather than stated. These entries are concise summaries of the main subject articles, which can be consulted for more detail.
...
*Conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources:
*
*
*
* The term has a nega ...
*List of conspiracy theories
This is a list of conspiracy theories that are notable. Many conspiracy theories relate to clandestine government plans and elaborate murder plots. Conspiracy theories usually deny consensus or cannot be proven using the historical or scienti ...
*False accusation
A false accusation is a claim or allegation of wrongdoing that is untrue and/or otherwise unsupported by facts. False accusations are also known as groundless accusations or unfounded accusations or false allegations or false claims. They can occur ...
*Fear mongering
Fearmongering, or scaremongering, is a form of manipulation that causes fear by using exaggerated rumors of impending danger.
Theory
According to evolutionary psychology, humans have a strong impulse to pay attention to danger because awareness ...
*Gendercide
Gendercide is the systematic killing of members of a specific gender. The term is related to the general concepts of assault and murder against victims due to their gender, with violence against women and men being problems dealt with by human ri ...
* Labeling theory
Labeling theory posits that self-identity and the behavior of individuals may be determined or influenced by the terms used to describe or classify them. It is associated with the concepts of self-fulfilling prophecy and stereotyping. Labeling th ...
* Mass hysteria
Mass psychogenic illness (MPI), also called mass sociogenic illness, mass psychogenic disorder, epidemic hysteria, or mass hysteria, involves the spread of illness symptoms through a population where there is no infectious agent responsible for c ...
*List of mass hysteria cases
In sociology and psychology, mass hysteria is a phenomenon that transmits collective illusions of threats, whether real or imaginary, through a population and society as a result of rumors and fear.Bartholomew, Robert E. (2001). ''Little Green ...
*Moral panic
A moral panic is a widespread feeling of fear, often an irrational one, that some evil person or thing threatens the values, interests, or well-being of a community or society. It is "the process of arousing social concern over an issue", usua ...
*Witchcraft Acts
In England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, and the British colonies, there has historically been a succession of Witchcraft Acts governing witchcraft and providing penalties for its practice, or—in later years—rather for pretending to practise ...
* Role of women in Catharism
*Magic and religion
Magical thinking in various forms is a cultural universal and an important aspect of religion. Magic is prevalent in all societies, regardless of whether they have organized religion or more general systems of animism or shamanism. Religion and ...
*Christian views on magic
Christian views on magic vary widely among denominations and among individuals. Many Christians actively condemn magic as satanic, holding that it opens the way for demonic possession. Some Christians simply view it as entertainment. Conversel ...
*Modern witch-hunts Witch-hunts are practiced today throughout the world. While prevalent world-wide, hot-spots of current witch-hunting are India, Papua New Guinea, Amazonia, and Sub-Saharan Africa. While an unknown problem in vast parts of the Western populations of ...
*Bideford witch trial
The Bideford witch trial resulted in hangings for witchcraft in England. Temperance Lloyd, Mary Trembles and Susannah Edwards from the town of Bideford in Devon were tried in 1682 at the Exeter Assizes at Rougemont Castle. Much of the evidence a ...
*Salem witch trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, 19 of whom w ...
* Pennsylvania witch trials
*Social panic A social panic is a state where a social or community group reacts negatively and in an extreme or irrational manner to unexpected or unforeseen changes in their expected social status quo. According to ''Folk Devils and Moral Panics'' by Stanley ...
*Social stigma
Social stigma is the disapproval of, or discrimination against, an individual or group based on perceived characteristics that serve to distinguish them from other members of a society. Social stigmas are commonly related to culture, gender, rac ...
*Violence against women
Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence and sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), are violent acts primarily or exclusively committed against women or girls, usually by men or boys. Such violence is often consi ...
*Witch-hunt
A witch-hunt, or a witch purge, is a search for people who have been labeled witches or a search for evidence of witchcraft. The Witch trials in the early modern period, classical period of witch-hunts in Early Modern Europe and European Colon ...
*Modern witch-hunts Witch-hunts are practiced today throughout the world. While prevalent world-wide, hot-spots of current witch-hunting are India, Papua New Guinea, Amazonia, and Sub-Saharan Africa. While an unknown problem in vast parts of the Western populations of ...
*Witch-hunts in Nepal
Witch-hunts are still occurring in Nepal in the twenty-first century, and the persecution of marginalised individuals of the community, especially women, still persists. Witchcraft is believed to be the exercise of supernatural powers by witches ...
*Women and religion
The study of women and religion examines women in the context of different religious faiths. This includes considering female gender roles in religious history as well as how women participate in religion. Particular consideration is given to h ...
*Women in Christianity
The roles of women in Christianity have varied since its founding. Women have played important roles in Christianity especially in marriage and in formal ministry positions within certain Christian denominations, and parachurch organizations. In ...
References
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Further reading
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* Levack, Brian P. ed. ''The Oxford Handbook of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America'' (2013
excerpt and text search
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* Gouges, Linnea de (2018). ''Witch hunts and State Building in Early Modern Europe''.
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External links
a series of articles by Jenny Gibbons.
Retrieved April 2011
by James Hannam
Witchcraft
BBC Radio 4 discussion with Alison Rowlands, Lyndal Roper & Malcolm Gaskill
Malcolm John Gaskill FRHistS (born 22 April 1967) is an English academic historian and writer on crime, magic, witchcraft, spiritualism, and the supernatural. Gaskill was a professor in the history department of the University of East Anglia fr ...
(''In Our Time'', 21 October 2004)
Caliban and the Witch — Women, the Body, and Primitive Accumulation
by Silvia Federici. at the Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
.
{{Violence against women/end
Christianity in the early modern period
Early Modern period
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Magic (supernatural)