Love, Madness, and Scandal: The Life of Frances Coke Villiers, Viscountess Purbeck. Johanna Luthman. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. xxii + 216 pp. $27.95.
further investigation. Much of her interpretation rests on the nature of the evil spirits, or “familiars,” that feature in the pamphlets. In the chapter on these creatures she acknowledges their fluid and problematic representation, while suggesting that they originated in the belief that the devil could appear in animal form. This may be true, but questions and ambiguities remain. It is hard to explain why this very particular manifestation of the demonic—small animals that suckled on human bodies—existed only in the context of witchcraft. Prudently, Millar points out that the precise nature of witches’ spirits was less important to contemporaries than it is to historians. Her broader argument that these unpleasant creatures had diabolical characteristics is well made. Ultimately, this book points to the messy and complicated relationship between learned ideas about evil spirits and the beliefs of ordinary people. By reassessing one of the major sources for English witch beliefs, Millar also offers an important and refreshing addition to scholarship on the subject. For this shemust be commended, and deserves to be widely read.