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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.T av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1137 Application File p ower of exo rcism. In sixty-one pages, he described a approximately 72 percent were women. Executions p ro c e d u re, lasting nine days, called the antiwitches remained relatively infrequent in many parts of the bath. First, the bewitched person had to confess his or county, particularly to the west, where the earliest her sins and then attend a Mass of the Holy Trinity.The burnings took place only in 1623. In the Italian- and bath had to be in a secret place and the tub had to be Ladin-speaking areas of the county around Brixen and filled with clear spring water, to which consecrated soil, Trent (today part of Italy), executions were more ashes, salt, and nine different blessed herbs were added. f requent (Byloff 1934; Dienst 1987a, 286–289; A piece of dough, formed from consecrated salt and Tschaikner 1992, 231). water, was wrapped in a cloth that covered the afflicted In the late Middle Ages, a total of four trials p a rt of the person. While the bewitched was praying, o c c u r red at Enn (1296 and 1433), Br i xen (1371), and the ritual of exorcism took place. The priest, while con- Meran (1436–1437) (Dienst 1987a, 286–289). At juring the demons, circled the tub twice, first with his In n s b ruck, a notew o rthy trial involving some fif t y back to the tub and then turned tow a rd it. Using a suspects was prosecuted in 1485 by Heinrich Kramer, f reshly cut frond, the priest sprinkled the sick person the author of the Malleus Ma l e fic a rum (The Ha m m e r with consecrated water and then blessed some wine, of Witches, 1486); but the bishop of Br i xen and which the patient was to drink for nine days. A mixture A rchduke Sigismund arranged for the release of all of consecrated wax, thirty-eight powders, red coral, and s e ven imprisoned suspects and drove the Do m i n i c a n holy water was shaped into a cross, put into a walnut inquisitor from their territory (Dienst 1987b). In shell, sealed, and sewn into a cloth that the patient was comparison, the sixty-seven subsequent trials in the to wear around his neck. Additional crosses we re county remained limited in scope, but they occurre d formed and put on his doors, bed, and table. T h e in increasing numbers during the sixteenth century patient was to attend Mass eve ry day. Tr i t h e m i u s and the first half of the seventeenth century, although claimed to have applied this pro c e d u re successfully to they never generated a territory-wide witch hunt. Few several patients. trials occurred after 1650, the last being an isolated Trithemius intended to write a systematic treatise on case in 1728. T h e re f o re, witchcraft trials in Ty rol fol- demons, but the outline of De demonibus ( On l owed the typical chronological pattern of we s t e r n De m o n s ), written between 1507 and 1514, only gave Eu ropean territories, with prosecutions peaking its table of contents. b e t ween 1580 and 1640, a pattern applicable as we l l to the contiguous Habsburg territory of Vo r a r l b e r g CHRISTA TUCZAY (today Austrian) and in Swabian Austria (Schwäbisch- See also:DEMONOLOGY;FAUST,JOHANNGEORG;MAGIC, Ö s t e r reich, today part of Germany). In contrast, the NATURAL;MAXIMILIANI,HOLYROMANEMPEROR. d y n a s t y’s eastern lands experienced a different pattern References and further reading: of trials, with a high point between 1660 and 1690 Arnold, Klaus. 1988. “Humanismus und Hexenglaube bei ( Dienst 1987a; Tschaikner 1992, 230–231). Johannes Trithemius.” Pp. 217–240 in Der “Hexenhammer”: Accusations stemming from fears of simple sorc e ry Entstehung und Umfeld des “Malleus Maleficarum” von 1487. or maleficia (harmful magic) seem to have been central Edited by Peter Segl. Cologne: Böhlau. in most Ty rolean cases. Trial re c o rds re veal that the ———. 1991. Johannes Tr i t h e m i u s. 2nd ed. W ü rzburg: Schöningh. Brann, Noel L. 1981. The Abbot Trithemius (1462–1516): The inhabitants of Ty rol feared debilitating illnesses for Renaissance of Monastic Humanism. Leiden: Brill. t h e m s e l ves or their animals, bad weather and cro p ———. 1999. Trithemius and Magical Theology: A Chapter in the f a i l u res, or other types of misfortune, just as did ru r a l Controversy over Occult Studies in Early Modern Europe. Albany: populations elsew h e re in Eu rope. On occasion, such State University of NewYork Press. anxieties translated into suspicions of either neighbors or outsiders. Only sixteen of seventy-two trials included Tyrol, County of significant evidence of diabolical activity, though a few Throughout the early modern period, trials for witch- f e a t u red elaborate tales of the witches’ Sabbat. Local craft remained relatively infrequent in the Alpine coun- magistrates exe rcising their own discretion, it seems, ty of Tyrol, located west of most Austrian Habsburg i n t roduced such elements. Only in 1637 did the hereditary lands. Their total number and intensity In n s b ruck government introduce diabolical elements never came to rival those of neighboring lands in south- into its regulations for conducting witchcraft trials— western Germany. Trials for witchcraft throughout but it did so in order to limit their influence upon court Tyrol appear to have reflected the ethnic, social, and p roceedings. T h roughout the entire period of the political diversity of the county. Although a thorough, witchcraft trials, the Ty rolean government sometimes systematic analysis of the prosecutions is still lacking, acted to mitigate the effects of overzealous prosecution available scholarship suggests that at least seventy-two of accused witches, even if it did not eliminate the trials, involving some 200 or more accused witches, practice entirely. took place; of those suspects whose gender is known, EDMUND M. KERN Tyrol, County of 1137

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.T av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1138 Application File See also:AUSTRIA;AUSTRIANWESTERNTERRITORIES;GOLSER, Pp. 265–290 in Hexen und Zauberer: Die grosse Verfolgung-ein GEORG;INNSBRUCK;KRAMER(INSTITORIS), HEINRICH;RURAL europäisches Phänomen in der Steiermark. Edited by Helfried WITCHCRAFT;SALZBURG,PRINCE-ARCHBISHOPRICOF; Valentinitsch. Graz: Leykam. VORARLBERG. ———. 1987b. “Lebensbewältigung durch Magie: Alltägliche References and further reading: Zauberei zu Innsbruck gegen Ende des 15. Jahrhunderts.” Benedikter, Hans. 2000. Hexen und Zauberer in Tirol. Bolzano: Pp. 80–116 in Alltag im 16. Jahrhundert: Studien zu Verlagsanstalt Athesia. Lebensformen in mitteleuropäischen Städten. Edited by Alfred Byloff, Fritz. 1934. Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung in den öster- Kohler and Heinrich Lutz. Vienna: Verlag für Geschichte und reichischen Alpenländern. Berlin: de Gruyter. Politik. Dienst, Heide. 1986. “Magische Vorstellungen und Evans, R. J. W. 1979. The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, Hexenverfolgungen in den österreichischen Ländern (15. und 1550–1700. Oxford: Clarendon. 18. Jahrhundert).” Pp. 70–94 in Wellen der Verfolgung in der Tschaikner, Manfred. 1992. “Damit das Böse ausgerottet werde”: österreichischen Geschichte. Edited by Erich Zöllner.Vienna: Hexenverfolgung in Vorarlberg im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert. Österreichischer Bundesverlag. Bregenz: Vorarlberger Autoren Gesellschaft. ———. 1987a. “Hexenprozesse auf dem Gebiet der heutigen ———. 2002. “Die Zauberer- und Hexenverfolgung in Tirol von Bundesländer Vorarlberg, Tirol (mit Südtirol), Salzburg, 1637 bis 1645.” Tiroler Heimat66: 81–112. Nieder- und Oberösterreich sowie des Burgenlandes.” 1138 Tyrol, County of

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1139 Application File U Ukraine, Witchcraft Male witches were rarely mentioned in popular sto- According to popular stories collected by Ukrainian ries. They we re mentioned as either a “male witch,” ethnographers of the nineteenth and early twentieth v i d’m a k , or a “va m p i re , ” o py r i a k a . A male witch wore centuries, Ukrainians did not explicitly differentiate his hair long in order to hide a small horn. He was men- b e t ween witchcraft and sorc e ry. The term most fre q u e n t l y tioned as the head of the witches’ gatherings, and he used to describe all magic practices in both popular was able, as a natural-born witch, to undo the evil done stories and trial records was chary. The difference by other witches. between witchcraft practitioners was more essential. A The re p e rt o i re of Ukrainian witches was similar to sorceress, charivnytsia,was rarely mentioned in popular that of witches in other parts of Eu rope. Their most stories; their main character was a witch, v i d’m a . popular activity was stealing milk from their neighbors’ Ukrainians, however, distinguished between two types c ows. Witches we re especially attracted to milk and of witches. The first was a “natural-born witch,” rodyma were able to extract it from such creatures as dogs, cats, vid’ma;the second was a “taught witch,” vchena vid’ma. rats, and frogs and even from some trees. Uk r a i n i a n Both were female witches, but the origin of their power witches could rule the elements of nature. They stole was different. clouds from the sky and then turned them into fro g s , The natural-born witch, as her name suggests, was which they hid in pots to cause a drought. They called born as a witch. She could be re c o g n i zed by physical locusts and sparrows to the fields to spoil the harvest or characteristics: She was supposed to have a short tail made special magic knots in grain crops for the same and a strip of dark hair going down her back. purpose. Sometimes a witch in popular stories was Sometimes she might lack one breast. She was often referred to as a “star-grasper,” zirokhvatka, because she described as an unfortunately fated being who did not e n j oyed stealing stars and the moon from the sky and want to do evil but who was unable to change her hiding them in pots and wells in order to spoil impor- n a t u re. Among her unavoidable responsibilities we re tant Christian holidays. They could steal babies fro m teaching the learned witches magic and attending the cradles at night or scare lonely passers-by, but rare l y w i t c h e s’ Sabbats. This latter activity was more we re they mentioned, at least in popular stories, as abhorrent to her, because she could not refuse the duty. causing illness or death to people. Yet it was the natural-born witch who helped people, In order to move to the stage of crime at night unno- practiced white witchcraft, and could undo the evil ticed, the witch had to be able to shapeshift. The most done by other witches. common metamorphosis was into a dog or a cat. The taught witch, on the other hand, who practiced Sometimes such an animal was mentioned as having a low magic as opposed to high or learned magic, was the female face. Other examples included a mouse, a frog, a embodiment of evil because she had consciously horse, a fly, a haystack, a wheel, a needle, a wall, bread, decided to become a witch. Because any woman could and a sieve. T h e re are many stories in which a man become a taught witch, it was impossible to re c o g n i ze returning home late at night meets a suspicious animal her by natural means. However, such a woman had to or a moving object. He strikes it with a sharp knife or a perform an initiation ritual such as the act of sacrilege, saber, and next morning he discovers that a woman in a usually late at night, on the border of a village, on the village (most often his close relative) has lost her hand, bank of the rive r. This ritual was free of the De v i l’s has fallen ill, or has been severely wounded, and so he i n vo l vement. After she had performed such a ritual, a discovers that she was a witch. natural-born witch would teach her. Resistance to witchcraft is an important part of many Another important character, k y j i vs ’ka vid’m a ,or “t h e stories about witches. Because in many cases it was witch of Kiev,” was mentioned not only in Ukrainian but difficult to distinguish between a witch and nonwitch, also in Russian, Be l a rusian, and Polish folklore. Wi t c h e s it was first necessary to identify a witch. T h e re we re f rom Kiev we re thought to be the most powe rful, dan- numerous methods. The swimming test (water ordeal) g e rous, and knowledgeable of all witches in the re g i o n . was used only in cases when a witch re p resented a Ukraine, Witchcraft 1139

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1140 Application File danger to the whole village community. When a witch See also:ANIMALS;COUNTERMAGIC;DOGS;FLIGHTOFWITCHES; was stealing milk from somebody’s cow, that person had FOLKLORE;IDENTIFICATIONOFWITCHES;MALEWITCHES; to take care of his or her own interests. All methods of METAMORPHOSIS;MILK;RUSSIA;SABBAT;SORCERY;SWIMMING recognizing a witch could be divided into two main TEST;UKRAINE,WITCHCRAFTTRIALS;WITCHANDWITCHCRAFT, groups: (1) Rituals that made an alleged witch come to DEFINITIONSOF. References and further reading: the house of an offended person and propose to remedy Hnatiuk, Volodymyr. 1912. “Znadoby do ukrajins’koji demonolo- the harm; and (2) rituals that allowed the recognition of hiji.” Etnohrafichnyj zbirnyk34, no. 2: 93–153. a witch when she was among other women (most often Ivanov, Petr. 1891. “Narodnyie razskazy o ved’makh i upyriakh.” she would appear with a milking bucket on her head). Sbornik Khar’kovskogo istoriko-filologicheskogo obshchestva Once a witch had been re c o g n i zed, it was re c o m- 3: 156–228. mended that she be seized and punished (beating her Ryan, W.F. 1999. The Bathhouse at Midnight: An Historical Su rve y up was the most widespread method of punishment). of Magic and Divination in Ru s s i a .Un i versity Pa rk: Pe n n s y l va n i a This was considered a dangerous enterprise, so those State Un i versity Pre s s . who could pay were advised to go to a healer, znakhar, Worobec, Christine D. 1995. “Witchcraft Beliefs and Practices in Prerevolutionary Russian and Ukrainian Villages.” The Russian for assistance. Anyone who had once succeeded in seiz- Review54 (April): 165–187. ing a witch was considered a healer. Howe ve r, those Zguta, Russel. 1977. “The Ordeal byWater in the East Slavic who could not afford to pay a healer had to face the World.” Slavonic Review36: 220–230. witch in person. Because that was a dangerous pro c e- dure (performed at night and at the risk of being frozen Ukraine, Witchcraft Trials until morning by the witch), one could not fight a witch with bare hands. The best weapon against a witch Ukraine has only recently come to be included among was a magic rope, ochkur. In addition, a certain type of the countries traditionally perceived as part of the his- dog was able to seize a witch. Such a dog was born only tory of European witchcraft trials. Its witchcraft trials once in three generations and was called i a rc h u k , b u t were mentioned never as a separate phenomenon but the owner of this valuable dog had to take care when it only in connection with Russian or Polish trials. In was a puppy because local witches would try to steal either case, Ukrainian trials were regarded as something and kill it. Some people, such as the seventh son of a foreign: To Polish witchcraft experts, Ukrainian trials seventh son, could also resist witchcraft. Such plants as were different because of the influence of the Orthodox poppies, hemp, and nettles were supposed to protect a tradition in its southeastern crown lands; from a house from witches. Russian perspective, Ukrainian trials showed Polish Ukrainian witches regularly gathered for Sa b b a t s . characteristics and indirect German and thus Western Prior to their journey, they had to come to the house of legal and cultural traditions in these lands. a local natural-born witch; there, they prepared for the Such confusion was compounded by insuffic i e n t journey. Popular stories mentioned about two methods study of Ukrainian witchcraft trials. A Ukrainian histo- of flying to the Sabbat. One was the traditional method rian of Polish origin, Vladimir Antonov i c h of using a flying salve; the other involved somersaulting (1830–1908), produced the first detailed study of over a knife. The main gathering place for Uk r a i n i a n Ukrainian witchcraft trials in 1872. His study contained witches was in Kiev on the Bald Hill, Lysa Hora(schol- materials about Ukrainian witchcraft trials from 1700 to ars disagree about which of four alleged Bald Hills in 1768 taken from the Kiev central arc h i ve; it was soon Kiev was the authentic one). The Devil was not men- published as a separate book (Antonovich 1877). tioned as being present at such gatherings; instead, a Although a pioneering re s e a rc h e r, Antonovich did little male witch sometimes headed them. Ac c o rding to the to analyze his information, apart from emphasizing the popular stories, during the Sabbats witches danced, e n t i re lack of tort u re and death sentences in Uk r a i n i a n played with dolls, and attacked each other with wooden trials and claiming that Ukrainians never connected swords. witchcraft with the Devil and demons. Afterw a rd , Se veral stories described the horrible death of a Ukrainian witchcraft was studied mainly by ethnogra- witch. In order to reduce her suffering, she had to pass phers, who produced much fruitful work (Ku ro t s h c k i n her knowledge on to someone. She could do this mere- 1991–1992). Historians re c ycled Antonov i c h’s materi- ly by touching someone or passing any object fro m als, comparing them favorably to western Eu ro p e a n hand to hand. Because of this belief, people were afraid trials (because Ukraine had re l a t i vely few witchcraft to approach an alleged witch on her deathbed. So m e trials and executions), while adding ethnographic stories claimed that relatives sometimes had to make a evidence. The only new angle to the problem was a short hole in a ceiling in order to make the witch’s death less study of 1903 about the “d rowning of witches,” the painful. Such a hole allowed the soul of the witch to swimming test or water ordeal (used in Zguta1 9 7 7 a ) . leave her body easily. The information we possess remains limited to about KATERYNA DYSA ninety Ukrainian witchcraft trials, almost 70 percent of 1140 Ukraine, Witchcraft Trials

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1141 Application File which come from the palatinates of Podolia and i n vo l ved; witnesses who could testify about a defen- Volhynia, with a few from the palatinates of Br a t s l a v dant’s past witchcraft were not usually summoned. and Kiev and from a hetmanate (the domain of the This lenient attitude has traditionally been attrib- hetman, the leader of the Ukranian Cossacks of the uted to the influence of the Orthodox Church, which Dnieper River region). Materials from the Ru t h e n i a n allegedly failed to create a significant demonological Palatinate, although well pre s e rved, have not yet been tradition or to establish any connection between the researched. Magistrates’ courts in Podolia treated witch- Devil and witches. Such an explanation is unsatisfacto- craft accusations more leniently than in Vo l h y n i a . ry for two reasons. First, the treatises, pamphlets, and Judicial tort u re was used rarely in Podolia but more sermons of seve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry Ukrainian Ort h o d ox often in Volhynia; all death sentences, except for one theologians, for example, Antonij Radyvilov s’kyj and 1667 trial, also come from Volhynia. At least eleve n Ioanikij Ha l i a t ov s’kyj, demonstrated that both devils people we re executed during the seventeenth and and c h a rov n i t s y (witches) we re ve ry popular subjects. eighteenth centuries. The most notorious trial occurred Bogi poganskia ( Pagan Gods), a demonological pam- at Hadiach in 1667, where six witches accused of an phlet by Haliatows’kyj published in 1686, made a clear attempt on the lives of the local hetman and his wife connection between the deeds of witches and sorcerers were burned. and the De v i l’s invo l vement. Second, the Uk r a i n i a n The first re c o rded Ukrainian accusation of witchcraft t owns in which the majority of the known witchcraft took place in 1578 in Volyhnia against Princess Ma r i a trials originated were ethnically and religiously hetero- Kurbskaia. To date, only a handful of seve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry geneous, melting pots of Ort h o d ox, Uniates, Ro m a n cases have been studied; the vast majority (85 perc e n t ) Catholics, Monophysites, and Jews, places where the come from the eighteenth century. The last known trial influence of Catholicism was quite strong. However, it o c c u r red in 1829 at the town of Ly p ove t s’, where is true that the concept of a diabolical witch sect was K a t e ryna Ma rtynivska, a lawye r’s wife, was accused of absent from Ukrainian lands. b ewitching a local priest. Death sentences persisted far into the eighteenth Ukrainian witchcraft cases we re almost entire l y century, often in cases where there were accusations of under secular jurisdiction; only in the late eighteenth witchcraft in conjunction with other crimes. In 1720, century, when witchcraft was labeled a superstition, did during some epidemics in the small town of Krasyliv, the Spiritual Consistory of Kiev hear a few cases. Pro´ska, a peasant woman (re p o rtedly 120 years old!), Charges were usually brought to the magistrates’ courts, was accused by a soothsayer from a neighboring village but cases involving the szlachta(nobility) were taken to of causing epidemics and was burned. Later, the victim’s the h rodskyj sud (castle court). The diversity of legal re l a t i ves, considering the decision unfair, appealed to codes used in Ukrainian lands created a certain flexibil- higher authorities to punish the local court for ity in legal approaches to witchcraft. The two most fre- sentencing an innocent woman to death. Ten ye a r s quently cited sources for dealing with witches—the later, another peasant woman was accused of bewitch- Magdeburg law (introduced in Ukrainian cities at dif- ing her master’s family and was sentenced to beheading ferent times since the fourteenth century) and the 1588 by the magistrates’ court of Kre m e n e t s’. In 1748 the statutes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania—both pre- same court sentenced a servant to beheading for scribed execution by burning for convicted sorcerers. In e m p l oying sorc e ry and fraud against his master; in practice, burning was often replaced with beheading, 1753 and 1755 the court sentenced two women to although the judges invariably stressed that the culprit death, primarily for infanticide but also for witchcraft. should have been burned. They warned prisoners who Gender analysis of Ukrainian trials shows that almost re c e i ved more lenient sentences for practicing witch- equal numbers of men and women we re accused of craft (defamation by whipping, “public tort u re,” or witchcraft. But a closer examination reveals that many banishment) that a second conviction would lead to men we re accused on behalf of their wives and that their being burned alive. The most frequent punish- most actual witchcraft practitioners were in fact female, ments we re merely fines and church penances, and although a substantial minority of male practitioners many trials ended by acquitting the alleged witches and remains. punishing their accusers for slander, imposing a fin e Ukrainian witchcraft trials we re predominantly urban; and requiring a public apology. only a handful of peasants participated. Most accusations An important feature of the Ukrainian judicial o c c u r red among craftsmen and tow n - d wellers of mid- tradition affecting court attitudes toward alleged witch- dling status. Another distinct professional category of es was that in the majority of cases, courts we re not p a rticipants included Ort h o d ox priests and their wive s . i n t e rested in the previous criminal history of the A third group consisted of soldiers; the remainder includ- accused. T h e re f o re the questions asked during such ed various marginal groups, such as beggars, Jews, and trials we re strictly connected to the conflicts that had other minorities, who re c e i ved harsher treatment in o c c u r red at a certain time between the two part i e s c o u rt. For conviction for the same crime, craftsmen paid Ukraine, Witchcraft Trials 1141

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1142 Application File fines and performed public penance whereas members of Iefimenko, Pavel. 1883. “Sud nad ved’mami.” Kievskaia starina marginal groups we re usually imprisoned, whipped, and 11: 374–401. exiled. In most cases that ended with a death penalty, the Kurotshckin, Aleksandr V. 1991–1992. “Hexengestalt in der Ukrainischen Folklorentradition.” Acta Ethnographica person convicted of witchcraft and executed was socially Hungarica37: 191–200. inferior to his or her accuser. Ryan, William F. 1998. “The Witchcraft Hysteria in Early The urban character of the trials is also re flected in Modern Europe: Was Russia an Exception?” The Slavonic and the nature of the accusations: no cases of stealing milk East European Review76, no. 1: 49–84. f rom cows, turning milk sour, or causing storms and Shtepa, Kostiantyn. 1928. Pro kharakter peresliduvannia vid’om v d roughts appear in court re c o rds. Howe ve r, after 1700, starij Ukrajini. Kiev: Pervisne hromadianstvo. c o u rts investigated cases when local village authorities Zguta, Russell. 1977a. “The Ordeal byWater in the East Slavic illegally organized water tests during droughts. Ma n y World.” Slavonic Review36: 220–230. accusations we re based on actual magical practices. ———. 1977b. “Witchcraft Trials in Seventeenth-Century Craftsmen often accused each other of attempting to Russia.” American Historical Review82, no. 5: 1187–1207. a c h i e ve business success by magical means. Although one finds numerous cases of love magic, accusations of Universities m a l e ficent magic predominated. Fears of bew i t c h m e n t Universities played a central role in the history of witch plus familiarity with magical practices explained the hunts. This applies both to the belief in witches and to high percentage of pre ve n t i ve accusations, made before witchcraft trials. Nu m e rous proponents as well as any actual harm had been done but after witnessing opponents of witch hunts worked as professors in suspicious rituals or the cooking of strange concoc- faculties of theology, law, and medicine. Academic the- t i o n s . ology made an important contribution to the fusion of Night flights and witches’ Sabbats we re mentioned the individual components of the cumulative concept in only one Ukrainian trial. In vestigating a case of of witchcraft in the early fifteenth century. Medieval infanticide in the village of Sh c h u rovichi in 1753, the scholastic theology busied itself with questions of satan- magistrates of Kremenets arrested Orz y s z k a ic pacts, human sexual intercourse with the Devil, and Liczmanicha, accusing her of witchcraft. Under torture the reality of nocturnal secret meetings of witches in she confessed that she belonged to a group of witches. remote places. Because of the universities’ teaching She was the least experienced among them, so they had activities and through the clergy’s sermons, elements of to teach her everything—how to fly, milk cows magical- the scholarly belief in witches also influenced the l y, spoil crops, and cook concoctions. During her fir s t general public’s concept of witches and witchcraft. In flight to a neighboring Ukrainian territory, she had an Estonia, which had perhaps 100 parishes, Ta rt u accident at the border and fell down, wounding her University, created in 1632, educated 242 clergymen nose and knees. Because she never reached her b e t ween 1625 and 1720 and thus disseminated destination, we still have no description of a Ukrainian Swedish official ideas about witchcraft. The well-known Sabbat. s e ve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry Swedish witch hunters Ni l s Psilander and Johan Gezelius had studied at Tartu KATERYNA DYSA University. See also:COURTS,SECULAR;EXECUTIONS;FEMALEWITCHES;LAWS Howe ve r, past assumptions that academic theology ONWITCHCRAFT(EARLYMODERN); LITHUANIA,GRANDDUCHY b o re the main responsibility for witch hunts have OF;ORTHODOXCHRISTIANITY;POLAND;RUSSIA;SLANDER; proved untenable. Theological faculties did not directly SOCIALANDECONOMICSTATUSOFWITCHES;SWIMMINGTEST; i n fluence witchcraft trials, particularly the large-scale TRIALS;UKRAINE,WITCHCRAFT;URBANWITCHCRAFT. witch hunts starting in the late sixteenth century. References and further reading: Antonovich, Vladimir. 1877. Koldovstvo: Dokumenty—Protsessy— Previously, university statements had provided authori- Izsledovanie[Witchcraft: Documents—Trials—A Study]. St. ty for witch hunters. In the Malleus Maleficarum (The Petersburg: Tipografiia. Hammer of Witches, 1486), Heinrich Kramer Dysa, Kateryna. 2001. “Attitudes Towards Witches in the Multi- ( Institoris) cited the condemnation of ritual magic by confessional Regions of Germany and Ukraine.” Pp. 285–290 the University of Paris theological faculty in 1398. in Frontiers of Faith: Religious Exchange and the Constitution of Discussion within theological faculties about the Religious Identities.Edited by Eszter Andor and István György nature of witchcraft became livelier in the seventeenth Tóth. Budapest: Central European University Press, European c e n t u ry; an impre s s i ve example was the skeptical Science Foundation. p rofessor Adam Tanner of Ingolstadt. The second ———. 2003. “U tsaryni plitok: rol’ shchodennoho spilkuvannia edition (1510) of Ulrich Te n g l e r’s L a ye n s p i e g e l i reputatsiji v ukrajins’kykh sudakh pro chary XVIII st.” (A Mi r ror [of Law] for Laymen) clearly indicated the Socium2: 185–196. Hnatiuk, Volodymyr. 1903. “Kupanie i palenie vid’m u transmission of issues concerning witchcraft from the Halychyni.” Materialy do ukrajins’ko-rus’ko? etnolohiji11, no. 2: realm of theology to then-contemporary jurisprudence. 1–16. The publisher of L a ye n s p i e g e l , Ul r i c h’s son Christoph 1142 Universities

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1143 Application File Te n g l e r, wrote that although the Church did have a Germanic law, for which David Mevius (1609–1660), certain right to conduct witch hunts, it was not appro- Benedict Carpzov, and Samuel Stryk (1640–1710) are priate to burden the clergy with this re s p o n s i b i l i t y best known. In Switzerland, a main zone of witch hunt- because of the cruel punishments required by the crime ing, universities played only a marginal role in the of witchcraft. This was in keeping with the usual trial witch hunts. Only the law faculty at the University of practice in early modern Eu rope. T h e re f o re, in any Basel (founded in 1460) taught Roman law. The discussion of the role of universities in witchcraft trials, regional witch hunts in the Swiss cantons for the most the main focus falls upon faculties of law. part occurred without relation to scholarly discussions After a short ove rv i ew of the establishment and of witchcraft. s p read of universities, this entry will discuss thre e f u rther aspects: the integration of law faculties into Integration into the Court System the court system, the jurisdiction of universities in the Faculties of law became invo l ved in witchcraft trials matter of witchcraft, and scholarly literature written by p a rticularly through so-called A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g— t h e university professors. practice of sending the files of a pending pro c e d u re to a legal faculty to seek advice. Beginning in the six- Establishment and Spread of teenth century, A k t e n ve r s e n d u n gwas a typical manifes- Universities tation in the early modern court system and applied to The oldest European universities date from the High both civil and criminal trials. In the Holy Ro m a n Middle Ages, centuries before witch hunts began. Em p i re, where most witch hunts took place, Those of Bologna and Paris were established before A k t e n versendung was based on two late medieval mod- 1200, followed by Oxford, Cambridge, and els: traditional trial pro c e d u re rooted in imperial and Montpellier a short time later. Most early universities lay assessor courts, and Italian jurists with consultative were in southern Europe; the first universities in central responsibilities. Local fif t e e n t h - c e n t u ry lay assessor Europe (Prague, Vienna, Heidelberg) were established c o u rts usually turned for advice to another court , in the fourteenth century.Theology and jurisprudence, which was staffed by legally trained but nonacademic as well as medicine and philosophy, were the dominant local dignitaries. This court then suggested a decision fields at medieval universities. Important areas for the of the case in question, which the lower court normal- field of witchcraft research are the development of ly accepted and pronounced as its own ve rdict. T h e jurisprudence through the reception of Roman law and s c h o l a r l y - c o n s u l t a t i ve activity, the second root of the development of the doctrine of witchcraft within A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g , dates from fourt e e n t h - c e n t u ry It a l y. theology.The work of Bologna’s school of law was trail- At the time, individuals as well as courts often con- blazing, beginning with Irnerius, who revived Roman sulted distinguished professors for legal advice, either law, and Gratian, who first compiled canon law in his generally or concerning an individual case. Unlike tra- C o n c o rdantia discordantium canonum ( C o n c o rd of ditional courts, university jurists based their decisions Discordant Canons), known as the Decretum, around on standard Roman law and contemporary scientific 1130 (revised 1140). Professors of civil law adapted l i t e r a t u re. Older literature falsely attributed a testimo- common law (ius commune), while canonists concerned nial calling for burning witches to death to the famous themselves with canon law (ius canonicum). Civil law f o u rt e e n t h - c e n t u ry jurist Ba rtolo of Sassoferrato (d. concentrated mainly on interpretation of the Roman 1337), a consultant who never actually encountere d Corpus juris civilis(Body of Civil Law), the compilation witchcraft trials. issued in 530 by the Byzantine emperor Justinian. In the Holy Roman Empire, the connection between Criminal law did not develop until later and is often the traditional courts and scholarly consilia ( j u r i d i c a l attributed to Albertus Gandinus’sTractatus de malefici- advice) is clearly visible in Em p e ror Charles V’s is(Treatise on Crimes) of 1298. Historically, researchers C a rolina Code, the criminal-law ord i n a n c e s of 1532. distinguish different epochs of scholarly jurisprudence. This code often referred explicitly to advice from legal The glossators, whose specialty was describing and scholars, including in article 109, sentence 2, concern- explaining Roman law texts, were active up until the ing benign witchcraft. Article 219, the last clause in the time of Accursius (d. 1263). The commentators wrote Carolina Code, described whom a court should consult long treatises on individual legal questions. In the Holy for advice and when. Here, imperial law differentiated Roman Empire, in contrast to Italy and southern b e t ween accusatory trials and inquisition trials. In France, reception of Roman law did not develop fully a c c u s a t o ry trials, lower courts we re either to consult until around 1500. At the time of the witch hunts, the higher imperial courts or to turn to their local govern- Usus modernus pandectarum (The Modern Use of the ment for legal advice. Howe ve r, in inquisition trials, Pandects—the D i g e s t , one of the three parts of judges in doubt we re advised to turn to a qualifie d Ju s t i n i a n’s code) pre vailed, a mixture of standard faculty of law. In practice, the distinction between high Ro m a n - Italian juristic traditions with traditional courts, lay assessor courts, and law schools was minimal Universities 1143

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1144 Application File by the mid-sixteenth century, as the first two we re 1672 a member of the law faculty served on a commis- increasingly filled with university-trained legal scholars, sion to investigate legal pro c e d u res a local court some of whom also taught at universities. For example, employed in witchcraft trials in Hälsingland. C a r p zov was simultaneously senior lay assessor of Outside the Holy Roman Em p i re, A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g Leipzig, chairman of the law faculty of Leipzig’s to law faculties was common. The Un i versity of Ba s e l university, and a member of Leipzig’s appellate court. in the mid-seventeenth century consulted for the The integration of the universities into the court French-speaking canton of Vaud and demanded com- system was appropriate for several reasons. First, the pliance with the p rocessus ord i n a r i u s ( o rd i n a ry pro c e- e m p i re possessed no supraregional superv i s o ry bodies d u re). In 1718, during the Hungarian witch hunts, the comparable to Fr a n c e’s Pa rl e m e n t of Paris (sove re i g n city magistrates of Na g y s zeben (He r m a n n s t a d t ) judicial court, with jurisdiction over approx i m a t e l y requested opinions of the law faculties of the unive r s i- one-half of France). Second, the Re i c h s k a m m e r g e r i c h t ties of Vienna and Leipzig re g a rding the credibility of (imperial chamber court) had been forbidden to hear confessions extracted under tort u re. The Hu n g a r i a n appeals in criminal cases by a law of the Holy Roman Un i versity of Na g y s zombat was noticeably influ e n c e d Em p i re in 1530. The nullification of ve rdicts and by the doctrines of Carpzov, professor of law at individual trial pro c e d u res was thus only possible in L e i p z i g . special circumstances, so-called trivial cases and The practice of A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g did not exist in mandate trials. Third, urban and sovereign courts often England, where legal pro c e d u res we re based on com- remained staffed by untrained laymen well into the mon law, even though the law faculties of Oxford and early modern period. A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g thus invo l ve d Cambridge taught only Roman law. The unive r s i t i e s’ u n i versity-educated, professional judges with individ- teachings there f o re had limited practical re l e vance for ual witchcraft trials. In such proceedings, advice was witchcraft trials, although some faculty, especially in g i ven purely on the basis of a written criminal trial Cambridge, authored demonological works. (quod non est in actis non est in mundo [what is not kept in re c o rds does not exist—Roman law]). All nonjudi- Jurisdiction in Witchcraft Trials cial trial pro c e d u res we re documented in files, which How much influence universities had on witch hunts the court formally locked (called inrotulation) and sent remains open to controversy. Some claim that universi- to a faculty of law. T h e re we re usually at least two ties perpetuated witchcraft trials into the second half of Aktenversendungenin the course of a criminal trial. The the seventeenth century (Schormann 1977), but large fir s t concerned the question of whether suffic i e n t parts of the legal community are said to have constant- c i rcumstantial evidence existed to justify the use of ly demanded adherence to the processus ordinarius.The t o rt u re. At the trial’s end, jurists had to reach a fin a l following differentiation is probably correct: Judgments ve rdict and determine whether there was enough by faculties of law always took place in certain trial sit- evidence to justify a severe sentence. uations. In every case, legal scholars answered only Written trial re c o rds and the invo l vement of those questions the lower courts asked. Their decisions i m p a rtial, distinguished academic jurists led to a were based primarily on weighing circumstantial evi- professionalization of criminal trial procedures. Because dence to permit torture and on evaluating evidence for documentation was the responsibility of lower courts, a punishment; statements about individual aspects of danger existed that the defendant’s defensive possibili- witchcraft rarely appear in their opinions. ties could be deliberately impaired. If conviction Concentration on procedural law as well as on criminal depended on the contents of documents, overly zealous law led to a further decisive criterion: Whether an indi- judges in witchcraft trials could distort those contents vidual faculty of law favored or opposed persecution to achieve their goals. Sove reigns faced another depended crucially on whether its professors considered p roblem with A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g e n . If foreign lawye r s the processus ordinariusthe relevant principle for witch- decided local criminal trials, a judge’s duties as head of craft trials. If, instead, they followed common legal his local court could be greatly impaired. T h e re we re principles from Roman law, the rules designed to pro- two possible ways to escape this situation. Sove re i g n s tect defendants could be ignored in severe criminal either founded their own universities or created inde- offenses (in delictis atrocissimis more propter criminis pendent public authorities or ministries of justice, enormitatem iura transgredi licet [in atrocious crimes or which took over the task of consultation from lowe r on account of the enormity of the crime, it is legal to c o u rts. Thus, in 1551, the duke of W ü rt t e m b e r g transgress the law]). This latter viewpoint had serious o rd e red that all criminal courts, when in doubt, must consequences for evaluating circumstantial evidence, seek advice from the college of law in T ü b i n g e n ; particularly for determining whether a prisoner could A k t e n versendungen to foreign universities was pro h i b i t e d . be tortured because of indicting testimony alone. The In Sweden, the law faculty at the Un i versity of defense possibilities of suspects also depended on Uppsala was likewise involved with witchcraft trials. In whether law colleges demanded processus ordinarius in 1144 Universities

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1145 Application File full or whether witch hunters had been granted broad- (the excepted crime). At Rinteln, 347 decisions in er powers. witchcraft trials include only 19 judgments in favor of Fu rther differentiation is necessary because of the large the accused. The doubts expressed by Pro f e s s o r number of individual sources of law. The common crim- Hermann Goehausen in 1630 concerning the too-gen- inal law teachings pre vailed at universities, but because of erous acceptance of denunciation as evidence were not c e rtain clauses it contained, the Carolina Code was often widely shared by his colleagues. AtTübingen, however, c o n s i d e red secondary to local penal codes. In such cases, p rocessus ordinarius became the general guideline in the lower courts determined the re l e vant legal code to be witchcraft trials after the mid-seventeenth century. applied by the universities in reaching their decision. Erich Mauritius (d. 1691), a professor in Tübingen at Di f f e rent evaluations of evidence by various scholars and the time, showed an attitude generally critical of perse- schools usually re flected the va rying individual standard s cution after becoming a professor at Kiel (1665) and of the court of inquiry. For instance, Professor Carpzov then assessor at the Reichskammergerichtin 1671. Many of Leipzig considered the satanic pact worthy of the universities also gave advice about the details of torture, death penalty, according to electoral Sa xo n y’s 1572 con- for which the Carolina Code only contained a recom- stitutions. What seems like an aggravation of common mendation (article 58). Following Italian jurists, many legal theory and deviation from article 109, sentence 2 of universities differentiated between the threat of torture the Carolina Code only proves Carpzov’s connection to and its actual execution, which they further divided locally valid Sa xon law. into three degrees. The questions of whether a revoked At the time of the witch hunts, central Eu ro p e confession permitted torture to be repeated or whether contained twe n t y - t h ree universities. The decisions of particular tortures could be repeated up to three times s e veral law schools in witchcraft trials are well know n we re sharply debated. The answers depended on and seem to indicate that rulings before 1570 equated whether a specific faculty of law followed the processus witchcraft with the concept of m a l e fic i u m ( h a r m f u l ordinarius or the crimen exceptum theory. We must not magic), which appeared in article 109, sentence 1 of the forget that large numbers of the accused were executed Carolina Code. Toward the end of the sixteenth centu- despite A k t e n ve r s e n d u n g , although this practice pro b a- ry, a more elaborate concept of witchcraft gained gener- bly inhibited even larger-scale persecutions. Fo r al acceptance within German universities, even among suspects, university involvement at least gave hope of an p rofessors, such as Johann Georg Goedelmann of impartial judgment. Rostock, who maintained that the guidelines of the processus ordinariusshould be adhered to even in witch- Scholarly Literature craft trials. For a full century, eve ry legal scholar fully Apart from their involvement in individual witchcraft f o l l owed the communis opinio (common opinion). trials, universities also produced some important schol- Christian Thomasius was the first jurist to ove rc o m e arly literature about witches, both general academic the concept that witchcraft is real—and older treatises, and literature oriented toward practical deci- colleagues such as Samuel St ryk outvoted him in his sion making. Both kinds of works played a central role u n i ve r s i t y’s faculty. During the main phase of the in contemporary debate. Most major demonologists witchcraft trials, university scholars fully shared the were not university professors, but scholarly treatises dominant concept of crimen magiae (crime of magic). and manuals on witchcraft came from both Protestant In procedural questions, numerous unive r s i t i e s and Catholic theologians. They range from the upheld strict standards. The law colleges in Lu t h e r a n Tübingen theologian Jakob Heerbrand (d. 1600), who Rostock and Greifswald spoke out as early as the turn of used the Bible to deny substantial elements of scholar- the seventeenth century for maintaining the p ro c e s s u s ly witch theory, to Cologne professor Peter Ostermann, o rd i n a r i u s in witchcraft trials. Not only Go e d e l m a n n who wrote a commentary on the Devil’s mark in 1629, but also his colleague Ernst Cothmann (d. 1624) and they culminated in the theses of Mauritius and expressly rejected Jean Bodin’s proposed easing of crim- Thomasius. The universities’ published appraisals and inal trial procedures. Beginning in 1654, the faculty of decisions were, however, decidedly more important for law in Catholic Mainz upheld the processus ordinariusin the legal process. The medieval Italian counselors had witchcraft trials, explicitly disagreeing with the looser already collected their legal opinions (consilia), which trial procedures of canon law in cases of heresy. By then, reached a larger audience with help from the printing the high point of witchcraft trials had already passed. press. Literature oriented toward practical decision Pre v i o u s l y, the Mainz faculty of law—like many making reached its apex in the early modern era. Many others—had still permitted tort u re based on gossip, professors published their own collections of decisions extralegal confessions, and allegations of having or published verdict collections on behalf of their attended Sabbats with other witches. colleges. Depending upon the author’s reputation, his The universities of Helmstedt and Rinteln seem to viewpoint could have notable influence on witchcraft h a ve largely pre f e r red the theory of crimen exc e p t u m trials. The University of Mainz, for example, referred Universities 1145

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1146 Application File during a witchcraft trial in 1654 to a 1597 decision by Pp. 241–320 in Hexenverfolgung.Edited by Sönke Lorenz and Rostock professor Ernst Cothmann. This was no isolat- Dieter R. Bauer.Würzburg: Königshausen and Neumann. ed case, but followed the usual practice that lawyers and ———. 1996. “Zur Spruchtätigkeit der Juristenfakultät Mainz in Hexenprozessen.” Pp. 73–87 in Hexenglaube und Hexenprozesse universities supported their rationes decidendi (reason im Raum Rhein-Mosel-Saar.Edited by Gunther Franz and for the decision) in significant decisions with examples Franz Irsigler. 2nd ed. Trier: Spee. f rom previous literature containing decisions. Lück, Heiner. 1998. Die Spruchtätigkeit der Wittenberger Individual jurists could attain almost canonical author- Juristenfakultät: Organisation—Verfahren—Ausstrahlung. ity in this way. Used regularly by universities as well as Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna: Böhlau. appellate courts, academic jurisprudence thus Schormann, Gerhard. 1977. Hexenprozesse in Nordwestdeutschland. influenced various levels of the legal system during Hildesheim: Lax. witchcraft trials. Wilde, Manfred. 2003. Die Zauberei- und Hexenprozesse in Kursachsen.Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna: Böhlau. PETER OESTMANN; Urban VIII, Pope TRANSLATED BY JONATHAN STICKNEY (1568–1644) See also:CAROLINACODE;CARPZOV,BENEDICT(II); COURTS, The pope best remembered for persecuting Galileo had SECULAR;CRIMENEXCEPTUM;GOEDELMANN,JOHANNGEORG; f ew connections with witches but many intimate GRATIAN;HOLYROMANEMPIRE;LAWSONWITCHCRAFT(EARLY dealings with learned magicians and astro l o g e r s , MODERN); LAWYERS;LAYENSPIEGEL;OXFORDANDCAMBRIDGE principally the we l l - k n own Dominican utopian UNIVERSITIES;PARIS,UNIVERSITYOF;REICHSKAMMERGERICHT Tommaso Campanella. (IMPERIALCHAMBERCOURT); ROMANLAW;TANNER,ADAM; THOMASIUS,CHRISTIAN;TORTURE;TRIALS. Born Maffeo Barberini, the future pope belonged to References and further reading: one of Florence’s most prominent and wealthy mercan- Ankarloo, Bengt. 1990. “Sweden: The Mass Burnings.” Pp. tile families. Educated by the Jesuits, he attended their 285–317 in Early Modern European Witchcraft: Centres and Roman College and studied law at Pisa. Gre a t l y Peripheries. Edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Gustav Henningsen. i n fluenced by humanist thought, he developed a keen Oxford: Clarendon. i n t e rest in history, art, and classical antiquities. Coing, Helmut. 1976. Handbuch der Quellen und Literatur der Throughout his pontificate, he continued his youthful neueren europäischen Privatrechtsgeschichte. Munich: Beck. practice of devoting an hour each day to composing his Gehring, Paul. 1937–1938. “Der Hexenprozess und die Tübinger own brand of Ba roque poetry, in Latin, Greek, and Juristenfakultät: Untersuchungen zur Württembergischen Italian. Moreover, he developed a very strong belief in Kriminalrechtspflege im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert.” Zeitschrift the efficacy of astrology. für Württembergische Landesgeschichte.1 (1937): 157–188; 370–405; 2 (1938): 15–47. Barberini’s legal acuity made him a rising star within Gehrke, Heinrich. 1974. Die privatrechtliche Entscheidungsliteratur the papal Curia after 1592, and an enormous legacy Deutschlands. Frankfurt: Klostermann. f rom an uncle in 1600 made him we a l t h y. Ba r b e r i n i Hammerstein, Notker. 1998. “Universitäten.” Vol. 5, Cols. took holy orders in 1604, swiftly becoming papal 492–506 in Handwörterbuch zur Deutschen Rechtsgeschichte. nuncio in Paris. He was made cardinal in 1606 with Edited by Adalbert Erler and Ekkeherd Kaufman. 5 vols. emphatic French support. Returning to Rome in 1614, 1971–1978. Berlin: Schmidt. he amassed an enormous personal library and built a Heikkinen, Antero, and Timo Kervinen. 1990. Pp. 319–338 in palatial residence that remains a Roman landmark . Early Modern European Witchcraft: Centres and Peripheries. After an extremely acrimonious enclave, Ba r b e r i n i Edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Gustav Henningsen. Oxford: emerged as the strongest candidate and was elected Clarendon. pope on August 6, 1623. Si g n i fic a n t l y, he chose to Kahk, Juhan. 1990. “Estonia II: The Crusade Against Idolatry.” Pp. 273–284 in Early Modern European Witchcraft: Centres and name himself after the great French pope Urban II Peripheries.Edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Gustav Henningsen. ( reigned 1088–1099), who unified all of we s t e r n Oxford: Clarendon. Christendom against the Turkish invaders of the Holy Klaniczay, Gábor. 1990. “Hungary: The Accusations and the Land. The new Urban VIII clearly viewed himself as a Universe of Popular Magic.” Pp. 219–255 in Early Modern modern crusader whose mission was to heal the breech European Witchcraft: Centres and Peripheries.Edited by Bengt caused by the Protestant Reformation and to convert all Ankarloo and Gustav Henningsen. Oxford: Clarendon. the peoples of the world to Roman Catholicism, unit- Lorenz, Sönke. 1982–1983. Aktenversendung und Hexenprozess, ing them within one all-embracing church. A dargestellt am Beispiel der Juristenfakultäten Rostock und Dominican monk and magician, Tommaso Campanella, Greifswald (1570/82–1630).2 vols. Frankfurt, Bern: Lang. who soon came to Ur b a n’s notice, encouraged this ———. 1994. “Der Hexenprozess.” Pp. 67–84 in Hexen und ambitious ideal. Hexenverfolgung im deutschen Südwesten.Edited by Sönke Lorenz. Ostfildern: Cantz. Astrology preoccupied the pope. He had horoscopes ———. 1995. “Die Rechtsauskunftstätigkeit der Tübinger cast for many cardinals resident in Rome and made a Juristenfakultät in Hexenprozessen (ca. 1552–1602).” habit of openly predicting the dates and circumstances 1146 Urban VIII, Pope

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1147 Application File of their deaths. But Ur b a n’s Spanish foes turned this Pastor, Ludwig Feiherr von. 1938. The History of the Popes,from technique back on him: From 1626 onward, riva l the Close of the Middle Ages.Vols. 28–29. London: Routledge a s t rologers we re predicting the date of the pope’s and Kegan Paul. Scarre, Geoffrey, and John Callow. 2000. Magic and Witchcraft in demise. Consequently, he turned increasingly to Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century Europe.Basingstoke, UK: C a m p a n e l l a’s expertise in order to prolong his life. Palgrave. Throughout 1628 there were frequent reports of Urban Walker, D. P. 1958. Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to VIII and Campanella meeting together in order to Campanella.London: Warburg Institute. practice magic and necromancy. In particular, the lunar eclipses predicted for Ja n u a ry 1628 and De c e m b e r Urban Witchcraft 1630 were thought to pose direct threats to the pope’s health and well-being. At these critical junctures, the Although the vast majority of Eu ropean witchcraft trials pope confined himself in a sealed room with began in rural villages, a not insignificant share originat- Campanella; they attempted to restore harmony to the ed in cities; one even finds a few urban witch panics h e a vens through elaborate rituals, sprinkling the flo o r i nplaces as widely separated as Arras in northern Fr a n c e with herbs and re-creating the light of the seven planets (the mid-fif t e e n t h - c e n t u ry Va u d e r i e) and Sa l z b u r g (shut out by the eclipse) with the flames of candles and ( t h e l a t e - s e ve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry Za u b e re r - Ja c k l - Pro ze s s e torches. The pair surrounded themselves with servants [ So rc e re r - Ja c k - Trials]). Howe ve r, trying to isolate any whose own horoscopes were not affected by the eclipse; s p e c i fically urban dimensions within Eu ropean witch- music was played and spirits were drunk in an attempt craft is an extremely difficult task. to stimulate the properties of the good planets (Jupiter The existence of “urban witchcraft” as a separate and Venus) and dispel the effects of such hazard o u s category cannot be assumed. But if we define witchcraft ones as Mars and Saturn. Campanella and the pope as a doctrine or system that re q u i res both evil and relied on Neoplatonic philosophy, not unbridled b e n e volent witches, pivoting around the crime of superstition (Walker 1958,207). m a l e fic i u m (harmful magic), then urban and ru r a l A re l i e ved Urban VIII emerged unscarred after witchcraft might differ noticeably. When we compare each eclipse. He was quick to employ Campanella’s rural with urban witchcraft, the scattered re s e a rc h talents again when the son of his nephew fell serious- about specific cities suggests the existence of a lame or ly ill. Howe ve r, the pope’s favor did not ultimately abridged urban “system.” In fact, we cannot tell to what help the magusin fulfilling their dream of making the extent any “natural contro l” (Larner 2000) of witch- Roman Church universal, especially after Campanella craft operated within European cities. d rove Urban to a state of rage by publishing an How should we define a city? A most ancient symbol account of his magical pursuits in As t ro l o g i c aat Lyo n s re p resenting it was a cross within a circle. But walls in 1629. High (learned) magic may well have been a alone are an insufficient criterion, even if the feeling of fitting and necessary private pursuit for them, but the safety they provided distinguished tow n - d wellers fro m pope felt it was not something to be openly pro p a g a t- peasants in Old Régime Eu rope. For contemporaries, ed. Indeed, Urban VIII published his own bull the possession of specific political and economic privi- (In s c ru t a b i l i s) against astrology in 1631. In it, he leges was probably more important. Howe ve r, for our s p e c i fically forbade speculation about the deaths of purpose, simple demographic factors were probably the popes and princes and the members of their families single most important separator affecting the practices on pain of death, damnation, and the confiscation of of witchcraft, because the re l a t i ve anonymity of larger p ro p e rt y. agglomerates of people created circumstances quite Re a s s u red by Campanella’s rites, Urban VIII live d different from those of small-scale villages with respect until July 1644, criticized mainly for indulging the to a neighborhood crime like maleficium. b reathtaking graft of his nephews. His faithful magus A summary of the demographic pattern of early re c e i ved permission to found a new college in Ro m e , modern cities is thus indispensable. The percentage of the Collegio Barberino, in order to train missionaries. Europeans living in cities at the end of the seventeenth Few of the earnest young men schooled there knew c e n t u ry (about 15 percent) was no higher than it had about the secret world of magical incantations that lay been a century earlier. At the end of the sixteenth- behind the college’s creation. c e n t u ry demographic expansion, western and central Eu rope we re dotted with some 200 cities of ove r JOHN CALLOW 10,000 inhabitants, a number that remained substan- See also:ASTROLOGY;CAMPANELLA,TOMMASO;MAGIC,LEARNED; tially unchanged a century later. Eu rope was also NECROMANCY;PAPACYANDPAPALBULLS. swarming with towns of only 2,000 to 3,000 inhabi- References and further reading: tants. But a significant demographic change was Kirwin, William Chandles. 1997. Powers Matchless: The Pontificate of Urban VIII, the Baldachin and Gian Lorenzo Bernini.New occurring: Larger cities grew at the expense of smaller York: Lang. ones. In the seventeenth century, the number of Urban Witchcraft 1147

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1148 Application File m e t ropolitan centers of over 100,000 inhabitants witch hunt occurred in 1603). “The Dutch zo n d e rwe gi n increased from eight to thirteen. Because aggregates can witchcraft trials was celebrated early and often, centuries be misleading, we must distinguish betwe e n b e f o re such scholars as [Johan] Huizinga labelled it as Mediterranean areas, where both Spain and It a l y one aspect of the triumph of a bourgeois spirit in the experienced a marked urban decline, and some centers h e a v i l y - u r b a n i zed northern Ne t h e r l a n d s” (Monter 2002, in nort h western Eu rope, which saw demographic 35). Although Huizinga has followers, Marijke Gi j s w i j t - explosions in Paris, London, and a cluster of cities in Hofstra has questioned the idea of considering Ho l l a n d’s the province of Holland. h i g h - s e ve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry pro s p e r i t y, and especially the European towns required a steady influx of peasants p redominance of towns over countryside and the victory immigrating from the countryside throughout the of an urban culture, as the crucial factors in ending preindustrial period. The half-hidden agrarian roots of witchcraft trials. It is certainly an intricate task to ve r i f y early modern urban centers weakened the impact of h ow different social classes thought about witchcraft ove r other demographic factors. Ties of kinship and time. But if the central focus of the historian “is on the g o d p a rentage, not to mention weekly markets, often e volving conception of witchcraft of various socio-cultur- linked villagers with towns. Such short - d i s t a n c e al groups and their interactions” (Gi j s w i j t - Hofstra 1991, migrants generally maintained significant contacts with 9), then the impact of a possible “m o d e r n i z i n g” urban the moods and minds of people in their home villages. factor cannot be dismissed so easily. For instance, using But at the same time, we must also ask to what extent s o u rces from seven Dutch towns, Hans de Wa a rdt has the impact of a new urban way of life stimulated the s h own that the belief in witchcraft could still be found process of “modernization,” overcoming the tyranny of among broad strata of Dutch society, although cert a i n traditional agrarian societies. Did a specific demograph- categories of people had stopped participating in the dis- ic threshold erase or erode some of the circ u m s t a n c e s course about witchcraft. For example, unive r s i t y - t r a i n e d connected with a specifically neighborhood crime like doctors and lawyers admitted that witchcraft was possi- m a l e fic i u m ? We re even “re l a t i vely small urban popula- ble, but in the course of the seventeenth century, they t i o n s . . . just sufficiently mobile and anonymous to became less inclined to re c o g n i ze it as a cause of illnesses. discourage the long build-up of hostility characteristic It also seems that deficiencies in food production we re no of witchcraft accusations in tight-knit rural societies” longer associated with m a l e fic i u m ,a change attributed to (Briggs 1996, 265)? This assertion badly needs further economic development. The Dutch area also seems to research, because contradictions abound. s h ow a connection between a decline in witchcraft accu- On the one hand, there are plentiful examples in sations and a rise in slander cases for being called a witch which an urban district might have created exactly the (Wa a rdt 1991). same malefic atmosphere of envy, backbiting, and Un f o rt u n a t e l y, no other Eu ropean state enjoyed the calumny typical of small-scale village communities. On stimulating Dutch coincidence of social, economic, and the other hand, why is there no trace of any large witch cultural primacy with an early dwindling away of witch- persecution in ve ry large cities like Amsterd a m , craft prosecution. T h e re f o re, the workability of the Hamburg, London, Vienna, Venice, Paris, or Ma d r i d , impact of an urban factor should be approached ran- sociological “monsters” where traditional ways of living d o m l y, guided by H. C. Erik Mi d e l f o rt’s now - ve n e r a b l e and thinking we re likely to be quickly altered and methodological re m a rk that witchcraft cannot be where practitioners of various types of magic proliferat- c o n s i d e red a monolith. William Mo n t e r’s equally ed? The crucial question seems to be this: At what point venerable Ge n e van evidence serves the purpose. did early modern cities become centers of innova t i o n Demonstrating that villagers dwelling near Ge n e va and cre a t i v i t y, where their size and “c u l t u re” affected accounted for about half of all witches tried in the city everyday life strongly enough to transform the attitudes (a common feature: for example, a large number of of their inhabitants tow a rd such basic issues as love , Scottish cases said to come from Ab e rdeen, Du m f r i e s , b i rth, and death? City-dwellers inhabited a milieu Stirling, or Edinburgh we re merely tried there), he w h e re the opportunities available for better worship, argued that “in Ge n e va, as in many other places, witch- schooling, medical care, and policing made a differ- craft was not static but dynamic. The typical form of this ence. Historians have yet to ask how far such factors crime changed considerably between 1527 and 1652, contributed to shaping an entirely different frame of [mostly] in the form of the witch’s m a l e fic i a” (Mo n t e r mind, undermining a belief system that included spells 1976, 56). The changes consisted mostly in simplific a- and countermagic. tions that eliminated such details as orgies at Sa b b a t s , We take the example of Holland as a starting point. In while Ge n e va’s most common m a l e fic i u m after 1605 Johann We ye r’s time, the Low Countries ranked among became demonic possession, a phenomenon that Eu ro p e’s most active witch-hunting zones. But after o c c u r red first in the city itself. 1590, executions abruptly ended first in Holland, then in The phenomenon of demonic possession was not Ut recht, Groningen, and Gelderland (where the last unique to Ge n e va. Though no general synthesis of 1148 Urban Witchcraft

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1149 Application File witchcraft in France has yet replaced Robert Mandrou’s medical care, or policing affected German urban a n t i c i p a t o ry Ma g i s t rates et sorciers en France au XVIIe milieus sooner and more strongly than rural zones. siècle(1968), the phenomenon of urban possession that For instance, granted that accusations of killing he emphasized remains a relevant French feature. Cases livestock or raising hailstorms through witchcraft were of collective possession took place mostly in nunneries e x t remely rare in urban environments, it could be and hospitals. Demoniacs, mostly women and children, m e a n i n gful to compare data linking charges of witch- blamed witches as the cause of their possession and craft with infanticide in urban and rural settings. It has attracted crowds of spectators. The cases of Loudun and been shown recently that the judicial reclassification of Aix spread across the kingdom and became food for charges against accused witches “invo l ved the judicial intellectual debate; howe ve r, in the capital at Pa r i s , abandonment of the general word for witchcraft (hex- highly publicized exorcisms like that of Marthe Brossier e rei, sorcellerie, brujeria, stregoneria, toverij, tro l d o m , in 1599 apparently failed to convince. Although the hekseri, trolldom, noitus) and its replacement with more impact of such widely publicized urban exo rcisms on specific terms” (Levack 1995, 81). A clear illustration of the popular classes is difficult to assess, in the short run this “m o d e r n i z a t i o n” of witchcraft concerns infant we should probably view them as a strong antidotes to m o rt a l i t y. Be t ween 1550 and 1750, did a gre a t e r urban “modernization.” The actual diffusion of French p ro p o rtion of tow n - d wellers view the sudden and e xo rcisms is difficult to re c o n s t ruct because, unlike strange death of a baby as a less reasonable cause for witchcraft trials, they rarely left written traces (Walker charging a suspected person with maleficium? We note 1981). This remark applies equally to seventeenth-cen- that “the central government of W ü rttemberg in the t u ry It a l y, where this phenomenon was certainly rife eighteenth century dealt repeatedly with cases of simple but where we presently have no way to assess its relative poisoning. Si m i l a r l y, infanticide came to be detached u r b a n - ve r s u s - rural intensity beyond copying the asser- f rom its association with witchcraft” (Mi d e l f o rt 1972, tion, referring mostly to sixteenth-century Ge r m a n y, 83). But more information of this kind is needed in that “the Devil was equally active in towns and in the order to assess whether such “modernization” was more countryside” (Midelfort 1989, 120). relevant in an urban milieu—where, admittedly, infant It has been maintained that “First or reasons which m o rtality was also higher. Si m i l a r l y, in the late-seve n- remain obscure, the urban milieu does not seem to have t e e n t h - c e n t u ry German cities, it became “incre a s i n g l y generated many witchcraft cases in most parts of common for persons to be found guilty of casting Eu rope. The obvious exceptions are the pandemics charms (Se g e n s p re c h e n), fortune telling (Wa h r s a g e n) , which afflicted some German towns and the more rou- and magical tre a s u re hunting (S c h a t z g r ä b e re i)” rather tine persecutions found in parts of the southern than being accused of devil worship (ibid.,82). Because Netherlands, the latter an exceptionally urbanize d such magical activities are known to be equally wide- region suffering from seve re economic dislocation” spread in villages, such a trend might appear to confirm ( Briggs 1996, 305). Witchcraft in early modern the “s i m p l i fic a t i o n” theory already noted in Ge n e va . Ge r m a n y, even more than elsew h e re, was an unstable We know that in Augsburg, one of Ge r m a n y’s largest mixture of maleficent magic and devil worship. Because imperial free cities and a place where trials for witch- the roles played by these two components differe d , craft remained sporadic, a tycoon like Jacob Fu g g e r extracting any particularly urban trends from studies dabbled in crystal-ball gazing, but we have no idea how that almost never addressed this problem is no easy w i d e s p read this recourse to supernatural economic task, both despite and because of the impressive prolif- information was among his fellow urban merchants. eration in recent German witchcraft re s e a rch. Fo r In re g a rds to Poland, further re s e a rch may clarify example, if the cumulative demonological concept of whether any particular urban tonality lies hidden witchcraft was certainly strongly contested in south- behind the statistic that 19 percent of the people western and Bavarian areas, as Midelfort and Wolfgang accused of witchcraft lived in urban areas in a land Behringer have demonstrated, was it, after all, “princi- w h e re city-dwellers comprised only 5 percent of the pally a construction which was (or could be) called population. upon during judicial interrogations, but which did not In Mediterranean cities,the activities of re vealing the play a significant role in the context of daily life” f u t u re, telling fortunes, finding lost objects, and attract- ( Gi j s w i j t - Hofstra 1999, 164)? We know that many of ing lovers we re rife. Love magic was a typically urban Ge r m a n y’s numerous free cities (for example, phenomenon in Castile and southern Spain, as in larger N ö rdlingen, Ro t t weil) conducted re l a t i vely fre q u e n t Italian towns. Un f o rt u n a t e l y, except for Venice, no thor- witchcraft trials, and some of the largest and most ough re s e a rch on urban witchcraft has been done to i m p o rtant among them (for example, Au g s b u r g , date. To generalize from a single example is always a Strasbourg) continued to execute witches long after risky pro c e d u re, and in the case of Venice, these dangers 1650. But we lack specific research about whether such multiply because the city was so gigantic (140,000 modernizing factors as better schooling, worship, inhabitants), because it was so extraord i n a r i l y Urban Witchcraft 1149

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1150 Application File cosmopolitan, and not least because its policy fostered a but by subsequent historians. A career option rather s p e c i fic type of inquisition. Still, the wide range of the than a fate or destiny, witchcraft may be considered as a vailable information tempts one into venturing a few having a place alongside labor and family studies, rather speculations. As the papal nuncio re p o rted in 1580, than being an exotic or aberrant growth of the social these Venetian cases “did not arise from any inclination body (Scully 1995, 865, 857). t ow a rds heresy; rather they we re directed tow a rds two Such recent opinions evoke echoes of Ja c o b ends, love and gain, which wield great power over emp- Bu rk h a rd t’s nineteenth-century suggestion that the ty-headed people” (Monter 2002, 47). Infant deaths and Italian witch, like her famous fifteenth-century Spanish deliberately diabolical forms of witchcraft attracted literary counterpart, La Celestina, practiced a real job scant attention here. Instead, Venetian witchcraft activi- and needed money and mostly self-aware n e s s . ty centered on money. Ne c romancy concentrated on Sometimes ancient insights still hold a measure of t re a s u re hunting; conjuration, divination, and many truth. charms and incantations we re employed for gambling OSCAR DI SIMPLICIO ( Ma rtin 1989). About 70 percent of the persons accused of witchcraft we re women, not infrequently court e s a n s , See also:AUGSBURG,IMPERIALFREECITY;CELESTINA,LA; while among the men, some 40 percent of the accused COLOGNE;EXORCISM;GENEVA;GERMANY;LOVEMAGIC;MILAN; belonged to the clergy. Charms and incantations for love POLAND;POSSESSION,DEMONIC;RURALWITCHCRAFT;SIENESE magic we re mostly practiced by women, either as a trade NEWSTATE. References and further reading: or by unmarried or immigrant women. Though the city Behringer,Wolfgang. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: must be seen as a sprawling collection of smaller Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early communities likely to re p roduce the neighborhood Modern Europe.Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. crimes of rural environments, the extent to which super- Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. stitious remedies we re practiced was perhaps limited Briggs, Robin. 1996. Witches and Neighbors: The Social and both by the concentration of opportunities for medical Cultural Context of European Witchcraft.NewYork: Penguin. c a re in Venice and by agencies of control (the Davies, Owen. 1997. “Urbanization and the Decline of Inquisition, police); one provided alternatives for Witchcraft.” Journal of Social History30: 597–617. witchcraft, the other brakes upon it. Di Simplicio, Oscar. 2000. Inquisizione, stregoneria, medicina: Siena e il suo stato (1580–1721).Monteriggioni, Siena: Leccio. How far this possible Venetian evolutionary pattern Gijswijt-Hofstra, Marijke. 1991. “Six Centuries of Witchcraft in could be extended to other Italian cities remains an the Netherlands: Themes, Outlines, and Interpretations.” Pp. open question; sheer lack of information makes it 1–36 in Witchcraft in the Netherlands from the Fourteenth to the impossible to say anything about long-term changes. A Twentieth Century.Edited by Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra and similar pro file of illicit magic probably pro l i f e r a t e d Willem Frijhoff. Rotterdam: Universitaire Pers. between 1580 and 1660 in every major Italian city.We ———. 1999. “Witchcraft After the Witch Trials.” Pp. 95–189 in k n ow that the number of trials conducted in Re g g i o The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.Vol. 5 of The Athlone Emilia for such illicit and diabolical magic in the History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe. Edited by Bengt decade 1595–1604 surpassed 200. How many of those Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Athlone accused lived in cities? Wherever witchcraft trial papers and University of Pennsylvania Press. have survived and a concentration of urban opportuni- Labouvie, Eva. 1991. Zauberei und Hexenwerk: Ländlicher Hexenglaube in der frühen Neuzeit.Frankfurt am Main: Fischer ties such as those described above was present, it is Taschenbuch. w o rth trying comparisons. The interpre t a t i ve specula- Larner, Christina. 2000. Enemies of God: The Witch-Hunt in tion suggested for Venice seems to find some confirma- Scotland.2nd ed. Edinburgh: Donald. tion at Siena, where a long series of trials suggest that Levack, Brian P. 1995. The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe. t ow n - d wellers stopped accusing witches of causing 2nd ed. London and NewYork: Longman. strange illnesses or deaths of infants a half century Mandrou, Robert. 1968. Magistrats et sorciers en France au XVIIe sooner than did the contado ( p e a s a n t ry). Could these siècle.Paris: Plon. remarks be extended to all Mediterranean cities? Martin, Ruth. 1989. Witchcraft and the Inquisition in Venice, Most re c e n t l y, this Venetian evidence has pro d u c e d 1550–1650.Oxford: Oxford University Press. the hypothesis that the word “w i t c h” was and is an Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1972. Witch Hunting in Southwestern interpretive category that may not be useful and could, Germany, 1562–1684.Stanford: Stanford University Press. ———. 1989. “The Devil and the German People: Reflections on in fact, obscure historical investigation and understand- the Popularity of Demon Possession in Sixteenth-Century ing. The noun stregais rarely used in the trials surveyed Germany.” Pp. 99–120 in Religion and Culture in the and never by the prosecutor or defendant: it designates Renaissance and Reformation.Edited by Stephan Ozment. a trade, like “baker” or “prostitute,” not an identity. It is Kirksville, MO: Sixteenth Century Journal. vocational, occasional, and external, not an internal, Monter,William. 1976. Witchcraft in France and Switzerland: The dominant, and determining characteristic. The witch is Borderlands During the Reformation.Ithaca, NY, and London: an identity constructed, not even by contemporaries, Cornell University Press. 1150 Urban Witchcraft

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46049 Golden Chap.U av First Pages 10/10/2005 p.1151 Application File ———. 2002. “Witch Trials in Continental Europe, 1560–1660.” of Holland before 1800.” Pp. 91–102 in Witchcraft in the Pp. 1–52 in The Period of the Witch Trials.Vol. 4 of The Netherlands from the Fourteenth to the Twentieth Century.Edited Athlone History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe.Edited by by Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra and Willem Frijhoff. Rotterdam: Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Universitaire Pers. Athlone and University of Pennsylvania Press. Walker, Daniel P. 1981. Unclean Spirits: Possession and Exorcism in Scully, Sally. 1995. “Marriage or a Career? Witchcraft as an France and England in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Alternative in Seventeenth-CenturyVenice.” Journal of Social Centuries.London: Scolar. History28: 857–876. Waardt, Hans de. 1991. “Prosecution or Defence: Procedural Possibilities Following a Witchcraft Accusation in the Province Urban Witchcraft 1151

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1153 Application File V Vaduz, County of So in 1680, the estates made no protest against the In the early modern period, today’s principality of trials under a new L a n d vo g t , Joseph Andreas Wa l s e r, Liechtenstein consisted of the county of Vaduz and the which claimed twenty-five victims altogether. dominion of Schellenberg, both governed in personal A first step to pre vent further witchcraft trials was union since 1507 first by the counts of Sulz and later by taken by Maria Eberlin of Planken after she escaped the counts of Hohenems. Vaduz and Schellenberg expe- f rom the castle of Vaduz, where she had been impris- rienced intense witchcraft prosecutions; those of 1679 oned on the charge of assumed witchcraft, and found and 1680 rank among the most extensive witch hunts assistance from a notary in Fe l d k i rch, in Ha b s b u r g in German-speaking countries in the late seventeenth Vorarlberg. Soon thereafter the parish priest of Triesen, century. Valentin von Kriss, also argued against witchcraft trials. As in many other nearby regions, numerous witch- Howe ve r, his objections saved only one woman fro m craft trials occurred in both small territories (probably burning, in December 1680; others we re exe c u t e d . containing no more than 5,000 people together) from Shortly afterward, the priest and five other people, who 1595 to 1600, again in the 1630s, from 1648 to 1651, had fled from the county of Vaduz because of the witch in the mid-1660s, and from 1678 to 1680. The fir s t p rosecutions, contacted the Holy Roman Em p e ror in episode claimed between ten and twenty victims; the Vienna through the Habsburg government at second, in the 1630s, led to some arrests but no death In n s b ruck. Their petitions incriminated the count, sentences. The quantitative peak of witch pro s e c u t i o n already in a precarious political situation. Soon he was in Vaduz and Schellenberg was reached from 1648 to forbidden to continue the inquisitions and trials. A 1651. Several series of trials, emphatically demanded by commission appointed by the emperor sent the Vaduz the territorial estates, claimed about 100 casualties. It documents to the law faculty of the Un i versity of seems that the prosecutions finally stopped when the Salzburg, which declared in its report that all cases from accusations of witchcraft reached the upper strata of 1679 and 1680 were to be regarded as illegal and there- local society. Ap p roximately fifteen years later, in the fore invalid. mid-1660s, further witchcraft trials took place, causing Nu l l i fication of the judgments and prohibition of the execution of at least nine people. f u rther trials did little to re s o l ve the conflict betwe e n These and the next prosecutions, at the beginning of s u p p o rters and opponents of witch persecutions at 1678, are poorly documented. More exact source mate- Vaduz. Although no new legal proceedings were begun rial exists for the last phase of witch hunting, in 1679 against witches, suspicion and agitation persisted. Local and 1680. In spring 1679, the Landvogt (governor), Dr. conflicts continued generations-long enmities between Romaricus Pr ü g l e r, conducted witchcraft trials in the families of the victims and those of former prosecu- Vaduz that resulted in the execution of twenty people. tors or informers, who we re ostracized as To b e l h o c k e r Although the court, in accordance with the law, had (people banished into a wild ravine) until the end of the submitted its documents of inquisition to a lawyer, the t wentieth century. Altogether, witch hunting in the trials soon encountered broad resistance. Because of his regions that became Liechtenstein after 1719 claimed assumed abuse of authority, the Landvogt made a spec- about 200 casualties. tacular escape. The conflict between the representatives MANFRED TSCHAIKNER of the people and the count was then settled by an arrangement whereby the deeply indebted count left his See also:APPEALS;CONFISCATIONSOFWITCHES’PROPERTY; income to the estates in return for the payment of inter- HOHENEMS,FERDINANDKARLFRANZVON;HOLYROMAN est on their debts and repayment of the credits they had EMPIRE;NUMBEROFWITCHES;UNIVERSITIES;VORARLBERG. References and further reading: taken for him. He n c e f o rth, the re p re s e n t a t i ves of the Tschaikner, Manfred. 1998. “‘Der Teufel und die Hexen müssen people would also re c e i ve the income from furt h e r aus dem Land...’: Frühneuzeitliche Hexenverfolgungen in witchcraft trials. Under these conditions, former critics Liechtenstein.” Jahrbuch des Historischen Vereins für das of the trials became proponents of fresh pro s e c u t i o n s . Fürstentum Liechtenstein 96: 1–197. Vaduz, County of 1153

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1154 Application File ———. 2002. “Die Vaduzer Hexenprozesse am Ende des 16. During this persecution, local assemblies decre e d Jahrhunderts.” Jahrbuch des Historischen Vereins für das rules for judicial pro c e d u re in cases of witchcraft, Fürstentum Liechtenstein101: 147–152. specifying the sharing of jurisdiction among va r i o u s ———. 2005. “Die ersten bekannten Hexen, Landvogt c o u rts and authorities. In 1428 in Loèche (Leuk), the Sandholzer und der verschuldete Graf.” Jahrbuch des Patriots (that is, the diet) defined how to handle Historischen Ve reins für das Fürstentum Liechtenstein 104: 69–83. denunciations or specific accusations, how to open a case, when and how tort u re was to be used, how con- Valais fiscated goods we re to be shared, and so on. Like other regions of the western Alps, such as the Communal statutes of Mo e rel in 1430 and of Raro g n e duchy of Savoy, the Dauphiné, and the diocese of in 1434 specified further rules of pro c e d u re . Lausanne, Valais was one of the first regions where per- Witchcraft gradually came to be seen as a collective secutions started as the “new” heresy of the witches crime, perpetrated by a sect. Consequently, some took form around 1430. The present canton of Valais, adaptation of traditional legislation was necessary. located in the southwestern Swiss Alps, is bilingual Howe ve r, during the witchcraft trials, frequent con- (called Valais in French, Wallis in German). Beginning flicts of jurisdiction occurred between the prince-bish- in the tenth century, it was a diocese led by the bishop op of Sion or his bailiff and the mayors or the local of Sion, who was also the temporal lord (the count) of communities, each claiming competence over the pro- Haut-Valais (Upper Valais). He led an assembly, or diet, ceedings and the right to confiscate the goods of the representing the nobility, the clergy, and the rural culprits. Witchcraft trials played a major role in the communities, or D i z a i n s . In the west, Ba s - Va l a i s competition for both judicial and political powe r, (Lower Valais) belonged to the territory of the duke of a b ove and beyond economic interests. Savoy. In episcopal Valais, the repression of sorcerers or The novel phenomenon of the witch hunts in Valais witches was mostly handled by secular courts controlled progressively spread throughout Switzerland. Sometime by the bishop, whereas in the Sa voy a rd part , between 1444 and 1450, Felix Hemmerlin (Malleolus), Dominican inquisitors judged heretics. At the begin- a canon from Zurich, wrote in his Dialogus de nobilitate ning of the fifteenth century, the Valais was already well et rusticitate(Dialogue Between a Noble and a Peasant) Christianized. Like the nearby Simmental valley, the that the diocese of Sion was an accursed land, where a Valais was highly developed economically, with some g reat many people, both men and women but mostly political tensions (Borst 1988, 267–270). rural people, had been burned after publicly confessing their crimes (Hansen 1901, 111). Hans Fründ’s Report and the First Witch Hunts 1450–1500: Proceedings and Conflicts of The first important testimony about witchcraft and Jurisdiction diabolical sects in Valais comes from the chronicler Ha n s After the first Valais witch hunt of 1428–1436, persecu- Fründ of Lucerne, who, around 1430, re p o rted the fir s t tions continued in the second half of the fifteenth centu- persecution of witches, which had taken place in Va l a i s ry; more than fifty cases are presently known. Among f rom 1428 to 1430. He gave a detailed account of how these is that of Françoise Bonvin, a rich widow who was witches and sorc e rers gathered around an evil spirit—one accused of witchcraft in the spring of 1467. Her lawye r, of the first descriptions of the witches’ Sabbat. Ac c o rd i n g Heyno Am Troyen, petitioned the prince-bishop of to him, these s o rt i l e g i( s o rc e rers), both men and women, Valais, Walter Su p e r s a xo (ruled 1457–1482). Using a list we re discove red first in 1428 in the Val d’Anniviers and of fourteen questions, Troyen interrogated sixty-seve n in the Val d’ H é rens, two French-speaking valleys of witnesses in order to establish the innocence and L ower Valais, and then in the eastern, Ge r m a n - s p e a k i n g respectability of his client, who had been denounced by regions of Upper Valais. Fründ claimed to have based his t h ree “s o rc e re r s” who had been burned a few months account on trial re c o rd s . b e f o re. This petition offers a highly skeptical contempo- Part of those proceedings and related evidence (local r a ry view of the witchcraft theory propagated by the local accounts, death sentences, and so on) have been found c o u rts and authorities (St robino 1996). In 1484, the next in the local arc h i ves by Chantal Ammann-Do u b l i ez prince-bishop of Sion, Jost de Silenen (ru l e d (Fründ 1999, 23–98). Her evidence confirms that this 1482–1490), started proceedings against Peter Eschiller, first witch persecution began in 1428 and lasted until who had fled Valais a few years before in order to escape 1436 throughout all of Valais, leading to the death of a r rest at a time when his pre d e c e s s o r, Su p e r s a xo, was nearly 100 men and women. Fründ did not inve n t leading a witch hunt. When Eschiller returned home, he anything; for example, in 1428–1429, Agnès Lombarde was incarcerated and questioned by the prince-bishop of and Pi e r re Chedal we re accused, re s p e c t i ve l y, of being Sion, acting simultaneously as inquisitor and ove r l o rd familiar with wolves and of riding on their backs, (with m e rum et mixtum imperium, “m e re and mixe d exactly as Fründ had said (ibid. 86–89). p owe r”—the highest kind of jurisdiction and competence 1154 Valais

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1155 Application File in medieval Roman law). At the end of the inquisitorial Fründ, Hans. 1999. “Rapport sur la chasse aux sorciers et aux sor- p ro c e d u re, after being forced to confess his part i c i p a t i o n cières menée dès 1428 dans le diocèse de Sion.” Edited by in many diabolical “synagogues,” Eschiller was handed Chantal Ammann-Doubliez with a French translation and comments. Pp. 23–98 inL’imaginaire du sabbat: Edition over to the secular arm and burned at the stake (Ammann critique des textes les plus anciens (1430 c.–1440 c.). Edited by and Chantal 1996). Martine Ostorero, Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Kathrin Utz In this period, the prince-bishops of Sion incre a s- Tremp, and Catherine Chène. Cahiers lausannois d’histoire ingly claimed jurisdiction over witchcraft trials, médiévale 26. Lausanne: Université de Lausanne. which had previously been handled by lay court s , Hansen, Joseph. 1901. Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte leading to numerous conflicts. Around 1488, a gener- des Hexenwahns und der Hexenverfolgung im Mittelalter.Bonn: al inquiry into the beneficiaries of the culprits’ goods Georgi. 1963. Reprint, Hildesheim: Georg Olms. during the fifteenth century showed some abuses in Kämpfen, Peter Joseph. 1867. Hexen und Hexenprozesse im Wallis. jurisdictional rights. Stans: von Matt. ———. 1894. “Etwas zur Hexengeschichte.” Walliser Witch Hunt from the Sixteenth to the Monatsschriftfür vaterländische Geschichte 3: 57–59, 67–69. Eighteenth Centuries Strobino, Sandrine. 1996. Françoise sauvée des flammes? Une Valaisanne accusée de sorcellerie au XVe siècle.Cahiers lausannois Although at present the historical re s e a rch re m a i n s d’histoire médiévale 18. Lausanne: Université de Lausanne. ve ry incomplete for this period, it appears that a reduction in the witch craze occurred in sixteenth- c e n t u ry Valais. Re p ression was no longer a collective Valencia, Pedro de phenomenon, and there we re no further massive trials (1555–1620) like those of the fifteenth century. In the seve n t e e n t h Valencia was a Spanish humanist whose skeptical com- c e n t u ry, witchcraft trials resumed, perhaps because of m e n t a ry on the confessions of witches at the auto de fe( a c t the troubles caused by the Reformation, which tried of faith) in Logroño in 1610, several of whom had been to establish itself in Valais, and maybe sparked by seri- e xecuted, helped reestablish the Spanish In q u i s i t i o n’s ous outbreaks of the plague. Be t ween 1590 and 1654, almost century-old practice of not burning witches. in Lower Valais, the lands governed by the abbey of St . From a wealthy family in Zafra in southern Sp a i n , Maurice held witchcraft trials with more than fort y Pedro de Valencia studied with the Jesuits at Cordoba, victims. The synodal constitutions of the diocese of but when he matriculated in theology at the same Sion, promulgated in 1626 and published in 1635, u n i versity to become a priest, his parents sent him to explicitly forbade all forms of superstitions and magic Salamanca, where he studied classical languages and and urged the priests to control the faith of their flo c k . literature. He worked closely with the priest and philol- The last sorc e rers convicted in Valais we re burned at ogist Benito Arias Montano, who taught him He b rew Bagnes in 1730. Other proceedings we re opened after- and biblical exegesis. At the age of thirty-two, he was w a rd, but none ended with a death sentence. granted a papal dispensation to marry a cousin, and Ne ve rtheless, in 1790 the penal code of Lower Va l a i s they had four children. In 1607 he was appointed royal still contained a chapter punishing magic spells and historiographer (c ro n i s t a) by Philip III, and he later still followed the Carolina Code, the imperial criminal became a censor at the Council of Castile. In this code of 1532 (Be rtrand 1920–1921, 180–194). c a p a c i t y, he asked the Spanish Inquisitor General in 1611 for permission to comment on a written account MARTINE OSTORERO of the confessions of the witches at an auto de fe in the n o rthern Spanish town of Logroño the previous ye a r, See also:CAROLINACODE;CONFISCATIONSOFWITCHES’PROPERTY; w h e re several of them had been burned. The account COURTS,SECULAR;DAUPHINÉ;DOMINICANORDER;FRÜND, HANS;GEOGRAPHYOFTHEWITCHHUNTS;HERESY;LAUSANNE, was published in 1611 by the Logroño printer Juan de DIOCESEOF;MOUNTAINSANDTHEORIGINSOFWITCHCRAFT; Mongastón and described the rituals of the abominable ORIGINSOFTHEWITCHHUNTS;RURALWITCHCRAFT;SABBAT; witch sect down to the minutest detail. The Inquisitor SAVOY,DUCHYOF;WITCHHUNTS. General not only granted Valencia his permission but References and further reading: explicitly ordered him to offer his comments. Ammann, Chantal, and Hans-Robert Chantal. 1996. “Un procès The learned humanist called his Discursoacerca de los de sorcellerie devant Jost de Silenen, évêque de Sion: Le cas de cuentos de las brujas (Concerning the Tales of the Peter Eschiller, de Münster (1484). Introduction, édition et Witches); he commented on the printed account and traduction française et allemande.” Vallesia51: 91–161. c r i t i c i zed the Inquisition for allowing this matter to Bertrand, Jules-Bernard. 1920–1921. “Notes sur les procès become public knowledge. Fo r, as he argued in the d’hérésie et de sorcellerie en Valais.” Annales valaisannes “First Discourse of Pedro de Valencia,” 3: 151–194. Borst, Arno. 1988.“Die Anfänge des Hexenwahns in den Alpen.” Pp. 267–286 in Barbaren, Ketzer und Artisten, Welten des although on the whole it must be assumed that the Mittelalters.Munich and Zürich: Piper. witches have confessed to the truth, some of the Valencia, Pedro de 1155

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1156 Application File things they have admitted are so improbable that Valencia’s prudent discurso remained unprinted until many people will refuse to believe them and instead the twentieth century, but it circulated in manuscript would consider the whole story to be something within the closed circle of the Holy Office. the witches have dreamed up. For such things have GUSTAV HENNINGSEN; never been heard of before, except in poems and fairy tales [libros fabulosos] which are written to TRANSLATED BY JAMES MANLEY entertain and terrify children and simple folk. See also:BASQUECOUNTRY;FLIGHTOFWITCHES;INQUISITION, (Valencia 1997, 257) SPANISH;OINTMENTS;SABBAT;SKEPTICISM;SPAIN; ZUGARRAMURDI,WITCHESOF. In his analysis of the printed account, Valencia tried References and further reading: to view the witches’ Sabbat in the context of the history Henningsen, Gustav. 1980. The Witches’ Advocate.Reno: of religion, pharmacology, and theology. He posited University of Nevada Press. three hypotheses: (1) The witch meetings took place in Serrano y Sanz, Manuel. 1981. Pedro de Valencia: Estudio biográfico-crítico.[1910.] Badajoz: Institución Cultural re a l i t y, and the participants abandoned themselves to “Pedro de Valencia.” f r i volous and depraved activities. The journey to the Valencia, Pedro de. 1997. “Discurso acerca de los cuentos de las Sabbat was made on foot, and the Devil was only one of brujas.” (April 4, 1611) in Obras completas. Edited by Manuel the participants disguised with horns and a gru e s o m e Antonio Marcos Casquero and Hipólito B. Riesco Álvarez. mask. In this guise he had intercourse with the women, Vol. 7. 255–308. Leon: Universidad de Leon. either in the normal fashion or with the use of an artifi- cial phallus. (2) The meetings took place in dre a m s . Vallées, Marie des The witches anointed themselves with a certain kind of (1590–1656) ointment in order to fly to the Sabbat, but they did not The so-called saint of Coutances, Vallées was a charis- really go anywhere. Instead they fell into a deep sleep matic Norman laywoman who experienced her lifelong during which the Devil made them experience the possession by demons as a sign of divine favor. delights of the Sabbat in dreams. He saw to it that the Marie des Vallées was born into a peasant family in individual dreams corresponded to one another, so that Saint-Sauveur-Lendelin, in the diocese of Coutances in when the witches awoke they were convinced that what western No r m a n d y. As a teenager she experienced the they had experienced had actually happened. It was symptoms of demonic possession, related to sexual e ven possible, added Valencia, that the dream experi- attraction to a young man. Her state of possession last- ences we re caused entirely by the ointment, which ed for over forty years, during which time she deve l- affected everyone in the same way so that their dreams oped her own brand of holiness, which emphasized the agreed and did not need to be coordinated by the Devil. v i rtue to be found in the pains of possession. Sh e (3) The Devil sometimes transported people to a became known as a local visionary, miracle worker, and Sabbat, so that they were present there in person, and at mystic. Vallées never aspired to a life in a religious order other times he deceived them and caused them to and spent most of her adult life as a housekeeper for dream the whole experience. two priests. She is widely cited as an influence on the Valencia discarded the first hypothesis because he reformer St. Jean Eudes. c o n s i d e red it impossible to conceal an activity invo l v- Marie des Vallées’s father died when she was twelve. ing so many people. Nor could he accept the third As a teenager, Marie left her mother and violent stepfa- hypothesis, which was generally accepted among the- ther to live as a domestic. She began to experience the ologians: that the Devil sometimes took people to the symptoms of possession by demons in 1609, after a Sabbat body and soul, because the same theologians passing encounter with a young man on a religious hol- a s s e rted that this happened extremely rare l y, where a s iday. She suffered violent physical contortions, wailing, the Sabbat journeys in this specific case had taken and—a classic sign of possession—an inability to fulfill place several times a week. Valencia there f o re ended her devotional duties. In 1612, after three years during up with a compromise between the second and third which Vallées said she did not sleep, relatives took her hypothesis: The Sabbat was an illusion pro d u c e d to the bishop of Coutances. But his exorcisms did not either by the witch’s ointment or by the Devil, but in d e l i ver her. In 1614 Vallées accused a nobleman (not either case it was a dream phenomenon. His long the original suitor from 1609) of causing her continued discourse to the Inquisitor General ended with the a f flictions by demons. He in turn reputedly had her recommendation that in eve ry concrete witch case, it arrested as a witch. She came to interpret the injustice was always necessary to search for a palpable corpus of the accusation, and her pain when being tested for delicti in order to ensure that no person was sentenced physical indices of witchcraft, as part of a mart y rd o m for actions or injuries that had never been committed planned for her by devils. or that could be explained as natural occurrences or Unlike such prominent demonically possessed accidental misfort u n e s . d é vo t e ( d e vout, a Catholic known for great piety and 1156 Vallées, Marie des

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1157 Application File a n t i - Protestantism) noblewomen as Jeanne des Devoucoux, Marikka. 2000. L’oeuvre de Dieu en Marie des Vallées. Anges or Elisabeth de Ranfaing, Vallées never tried Paris: Guibert. to distance herself from her initial state of posses- Ferber, Sarah. 2004. Demonic Possession and Exorcism in Early Modern France.London: Routledge. sion. Instead, she absorbed her possessed state into a Milcent, Paul. 1992. Saint Jean Eudes: Un artisan du renouveau m o re or less ro u t i n i zed alternative form of devo t i o n- chrétien au XVIIe siècle.Paris: Cerf. al life. In part i c u l a r, her suffering whenever demons kept her from confession and Communion became, p a r a d ox i c a l l y, the source of her greatest claim to Vampire s a n c t i t y. She did not take Communion or confess for Belief in vampires blood-sucking demons, still survives over thirty years, remaining possessed from 1609 in some areas and in some modern ritual practices, par- until 1655, one year before her death. Va l l é e s’s ticularly in southeastern Europe. Words for “vampire” a p p a rent decision to avoid the Churc h’s traditional exist in Polish (wampir, wapierz, upiór), Czech (upír), channels of grace smacked of spiritual arro g a n c e , Ukrainian (opyriaka), Bulgarian (upir), and Albanian p a rticularly given her peasant origins, and her (dhampir); words originally denoting werewolves in distance from the sacraments and the ministrations southern Slavic languages (vukodlak, vurkolak, valkod- of the Catholic clergy became a source of vulnerabil- lak), Greek (vurkolakas), or Albanian (vurvollak) have i t y. In 1651, she faced a tribunal of local clergy, who come to signify primarily vampires in modern times. suspected that she had been deceived by the De v i l ; Among Slavic peoples, traces of the vampire concept they ord e red her to comply with the re q u i rements of have existed since the Middle Ages, and the concept the Church. After her death in 1656, one of the same probably spread to their neighbors. Following four- priests continued to attack her conduct, trying to teenth-century Polish, Moravian, and Serbian vampire p re vent others from following her example and cases came vampire trials in Russia, various southern s t i fling a thaumaturgic cult that had deve l o p e d Slavic regions, Albania, Silesia, Germany, Armenia, and a round her. He also wondered whether her devil had Greece. e ver left her, which implied that possession was a The shared characteristic of all variants of vampires is diminished rather than an elevated spiritual state. their aggre s s i ve behavior, especially their practice of Notwithstanding the hostility she sometimes faced, sucking blood, bringing sickness or death to the victim. Vallées was consulted by members of No r m a n d y’s The vampire usually attacks a local community (family, reforming religious elite: Her close friends included tribe, or village); its victim can be a single person, a d é vo t noblemen Ba ron Gaston de Renty and Jean de whole family, sometimes even an entire village (in the Be r n i è res, and she is particularly re m e m b e red as the s e venteenth and eighteenth centuries, epidemics we re friend and inspiration of St. Jean Eudes, founder of the often considered consequences of the action of Congregation of Jesus and Mary (the Eudists). Her own vampires). Its two main subtypes are a living person (a spiritual influences included Angela of Foligno, Be n e t va m p i re since birth through inheritance) and a corpse of Canfield, St. Te resa of Avila, and the Jesuit Pi e r re rising from its grave. Living va m p i res attack either Coton, whose Occupation In t é r i e u re ( Inner Pu r s u i t , personally or (in archaic variants) through a spiritual 1608) influenced her controversial choice to “exchange double separated from the body; as such, they can also her will” (as she described it) with that of God in order take animal form. to avoid sin. Renty and Eudes each wrote biographies of Notions of corpses rising from their grave derive fro m her, based on their conversations with her. the idea that the earth rejects certain dead bodies, which Almost twenty years after her death, enemies of do not perish. These dead bodies, which retain their Eudes used his association with Vallées to undermine vital fluids and do not dry out, are re v i ved (usually fort y his cre d i b i l i t y, implying she had been tainted with days after burial) either by the dead person’s soul, which witchcraft. Eudes defended Vallées, replying that it was lingers among the community of the living, or by the no crime for her to have been possessed. Investigations Devil. Because this “dead va m p i re” appears in formal in 1869 preceding Eu d e s’s canonization in 1925 con- variants similar to living ones and their activities are s i d e red his relations with Vallées and clearly found in identical, the two types seem interrelated. Both Sl a v i c their favo r, placing Vallées among the signific a n t and Romanian people believe that a person who is a woman mystics of her era. va m p i re when alive will remain a va m p i re after death. Beliefs and rituals related to va m p i res seem quite SARAH FERBER homogenous throughout eastern and southeastern Europe wherever vampire belief has remained intense in See also:B O DYO FT H EW I TC H; C OTO N, PI E R R E; E XO RC I S M; LO U D U N modern times. Marginal people (the illegitimate, those N U N S; P O S S E S S I O N, D E M O N I C; R A N FA I N G, E L I S A B E T HD E. c o n c e i ved on feast days, people excluded by the References and further reading: Dermenghem, Emile. 1926. La vie admirable et les révélations de community or excommunicated by the Churc h ) Marie des Vallées.Paris: Plon-Nourrit et Cie. become va m p i res, as do dead people without clear Vampire 1157

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1158 Application File status in the otherworld (those who died a violent (with we rewolf characteristics). T h roughout eastern death, who remained unburied, or who died unbap- Eu rope we find close connections between va m p i r i s m tized or excommunicated). If an animal walks across a and witchcraft. corpse before burial, the dead person will also become a Vampire belief sometimes played a similar social role vampire. to that of witchcraft cases in attributing re s p o n s i b i l i t y Some antiva m p i re rites try to pre vent a person fro m for unexplained misfortunes. By the late eighteenth becoming a va m p i re after death (this applies part i c u- c e n t u ry, Hu n g a ry and particularly Tr a n s y l vania had larly to people suspected of being va m p i res while become notorious throughout central Europe for their a l i ve). The usual pro c e d u re is to guard the corpse until vampirism. Romantic novels, particularly Bram Stoker’s burial, placing sanctified objects in its body crevices (to D ra c u l a , re i n f o rced Tr a n s y l va n i a’s association with p re vent the Devil from inhabiting it). In many places, vampirism. The most notorious cases occurred not people customarily pro t e c t i vely “fence in” a dying among Hungarians, but among the Serbian, Romanian, person with lighted sacred candles or place an iro n and Ruthenian population of the Au s t ro - Hu n g a r i a n object on the body or in the coffin. Such practices as Empire, in connection with the great epidemics of the cutting the sinews or piercing the heart (or nailing the mid-eighteenth century. Holy Roman Em p ress Ma r i a body to the ground by a wooden pole), as well as that T h e resa ord e red investigations, while the press spre a d of laying people face down in the coffin, occurre d the fear of vampires to western Europe (Calmet 1751). during the burial of people suspected of being After the persecution of witches had ended, “vampire- va m p i res during their lifetime. e p i d e m i c s” burst out precisely in reaction to Another large group of antiva m p i re rituals of the Enlightenment rationalism exemplified in medical and past tried to render dead va m p i res harmless. s c i e n t i fic literature (for example, by Maria T h e re s a’s Ac c o rding to va m p i re trials that became widely Dutch physician, Ge r a rd van Swieten) and the conse- k n own, suspicion of vampirism peaked after quent prohibitions of Habsburg rulers. epidemics or other serial deaths. Antiva m p i re rituals responded by exhuming the corpse of a suspected ÉVA PÓCS; va m p i re, mutilating its body, piercing its heart, and TRANSLATED BY ORSOLYA FRANK finally burning the corpse and re b u rying it, thus completing the death of a body that had not “f u l l y” See also:BLOOD;GHOSTS;HUNGARYANDSOUTHEASTERNEUROPE, died. Ac c o rding to early data, the Pr a voslav churc h MAGIC;HUNGARYANDSOUTHEASTERNEUROPE,WITCHCRAFT; LYCANTHROPY;MARIATHERESA,HOLYROMANEMPRESS; willingly cooperated in re b u rying such corpses as we l l METAMORPHOSIS;NIGHTMARES;REVENANTS;SWIETEN, as resanctifying both the graves and the grave y a rd , GERARDVAN. until nineteenth- and twe n t i e t h - c e n t u ry debates References and further reading: about handling cases of suspected vampirism ended Boulay, Juliet du. 1982. “The Greek Vampire: A Study of Cyclic with prohibitions. In the Balkans, the Serbs have pre- Symbolism in Marriage and Death.” Man17: 219–238. s e rved a number of church regulations for curbing Burkhart, Dagmar. 1966. “Vampirglaube und Vampirsage auf dem a n t i va m p i re rituals into the nineteenth and twe n t i e t h Balkan.” Pp. 211–252 in Beiträge zur Südosteurope-Forschung: centuries. In cases of suspected vampirism, Bu l g a r i a n Anlässlich des I. Internationalen Balkanologen-Kongresses in Sofia and Macedonian villages frequently used the serv i c e s 26. VIII.–1.IX.1966.Munich: Trofenik. Calmet, dom Augustin. 1751. Traité sur les apparitions des esprits et of va m p i re-seers, who could see and chase away sur vampires ou les revenants de Hongrie, Moravie etc.Paris. va m p i res because they we re born on a Sa t u rd a y. English translation, Vampires of Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia Beginning in early modern times, va m p i re belief and Silezia.Translated by M. Cooper. London, 1759. expanded rapidly, particularly in southeastern Harmening, Dieter. 1983. Der Anfang von Dracula: Zur Geschichte Eu rope, transforming fig u res of popular beliefs not von Geschichten; Quellen und Forschungen zur europäischen p reviously associated with vampirism. This expansion Ethnologie I. Königshausen: Neumann. was related to the demonization of belief in ghosts, Klaniczay, Gábor. 1987. “Decline of Witches and Rise of Vampires witches, and we rew o l ves. The great affinity betwe e n in Eighteenth Century Habsburg Monarchy.” Ethnologia these fig u res of popular belief and va m p i res had the Europaea 17: 165–180. effect of coloring belief systems, particularly in south- Klapper, J. 1909. “Die schlesischen Geschichten von den schädi- eastern Eu rope. Death demons and “p re s s i n g” night- genden Toten.” Mitteilungen der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Volkskunde 11: 58–93. demons known as witches, we rew o l ves, and the Lawson, John Cuthbert. 1910. Modern Greek Folklore and Ancient u n b a p t i zed demons of m o ra all assumed va m p i re Greek Religion: A Study of Survivals.Cambridge: Cambridge traits; this is why words originally denoting we re- University Press. w o l ves in southern Slavic languages, Greek, or Lecouteux, Claude. 1999. Histoire des vampires: Autopsie d’un Albanian have come to signify primarily va m p i res in mythe. Paris: Imago. modern times. Si m i l a r l y, modern Polish s t rzyga a n d Perkowski, Jan C., ed. 1976. Vampires of theSlavs.Cambridge, Romanian s t r i g o i mean both “va m p i re” and “w i t c h” MA: Slavica. 1158 Vampire

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1159 Application File Wiegelmann, Günter. 1966. “Der ‘lebende Leichnam’ im coincidences between witch hunting and unsettled Volksbrauch.” Zeitschrift für Volkskunde 62: 161–183. rights had preceded the Bernese conquest: In Do m m a rt i n in the 1520s, for instance, they were concomitant with Vaud, Pays de the re t reat of the Dominican Inquisition (Choffat The heartland of French-speaking Switzerland, the Pays 1989, 145–164). de Vaud was not only the scene of some of Europe’s In this context, one question re q u i res furt h e r earliest witchcraft trials, but also one of the regions research: whether and to what extent witch hunting was where witch persecutions were most intense in early also instru m e n t a l i zed by both the local seigneurs and modern Europe. The best estimate is that at least 1,700 the Bernese authorities in the context of the centraliza- witches were executed here over the course of about tion of jurisdictional matters. In fact, Leurs Exc e l l e n c e s 150 years, in a population estimated in a 1558–1559 de Berne (the city fathers of Bern), already alarmed by census to have been between 70,000 and 80,000. On a the number of executions in their newly acquire d per capita basis, nowhere else in Protestant Europe were possessions, published a mandate in 1543 forbidding anywhere near this many witches tried and executed. any of their vassals to execute a person for witchcraft Until about 1680, when the trials stopped, there were b e f o re the sentence had been ratified by the city continual small-scale panics, which resulted in up to council. Two years later, this measure was extended to seventy-four people being sentenced to death in 1599. all capital punishments in the Pays de Vaud (Von der There were several smaller peaks, with fifty or more Mühll 1960, 66). Ac c o rd i n g l y, the Bernese council witchcraft executions per year, between 1580 and 1665, re g i s t e red all death warrants for witchcraft in Be r n e’s for which data are available (Kamber 1998, 249). French-speaking territories. In spite of these steps, the A peculiarity of the witchcraft phenomenon in the rate of death penalties remained high, because Be r n Pays de Vaud was the high rate of men sentenced, r a rely ove rturned them. Peter Kamber counted about amounting to one-third of all witchcraft cases. T h e 1,700 death sentences between 1580 and 1655 most frequent explanation offered relates to the fact (Kamber 1998, 249). He based his re s e a rch on the that in the Pays de Vaud, the persecution of witches s h o rt entries in the city of Be r n e’s re c o rds, the s t a rted with the Dominican Inquisition well before Ratsmanuale,which are often our only available source, 1450, a time when the witch stereotype was not ye t as transcripts of trials are comparatively rare. clearly dissociated from the archetypical heretic, who Further attempts to reduce the ongoing witch perse- was more often male than female. cutions we re made in 1600, 1609, 1616, 1634, 1651–1652, and 1664. Without denying the existence A Fragmented Judicial Framework of witchcraft, the authorities tried to check the prolifer- During the ancien régime, the Pays de Vaud consisted ation of denunciations and to regulate the use of of the old Savoyard possessions north of Lake Geneva t o rt u re. Yet these measures had almost no noticeable and the lands of the former prince-bishopric of effect. Lausanne, both of which came under the rule of the city-state of Bern after a short military campaign in The Conjuncture of Persecution 1536. In the same year, Bern forcibly introduced the Before the persecution ended around 1680, the Pays de Reformation. Bernese rule also led to an administrative Vaud experienced endemic witch hunting with numer- and judicial reorganization of the Pays de Vaud. The ous peaks. If one were to graph the numbers of witch- degree of interference in judicial matters, however, craft trials, the high points would coincide with rising varied. Possessions that had been ruled directly by the prices and plague years, when lingering social tensions duke of Savoy or the prince-bishop of Lausanne were culminated in specific accusations. The year the administrated by the Bernese baillis (bailiffs) and their persecution reached its climax, 1599, when seventy- local castellans; however, Savoyard vassals accepting four people were burned as witches, was also a plague Bernese overlordship retained their judicial preroga- year in the Pays de Vaud. In 1629 and 1630, when forty tives, including that of high justice. and sixty-three putative witches we re burnt, both The consequent atomization of high justice provides plague and an economical crisis were raging at the same a key factor for understanding the re m a rkably high time (Kamber 1998, 248–252). By contrast, the repeat- intensity of witch hunting in the Pays de Va u d : ed threat of war against the duke of Savoy and the Between 1581 and 1620, there were no less than nine- ensuing mobilizations resulted each time in a decline in ty-one different courts sentencing suspected witches to the number of trials (Kamber 1982, 27). death (Kamber 1982, 22–23). As suggested for the village of Gollion during the 1620s (Taric Zu m s t e g Alleged Crimes 2000, 88–89), it can be assumed that witchcraft trials Unlike the medieval persecution in the diocese of were instrumental in firmly demonstrating a seigneur’s Lausanne, early modern witch hunts in the Pays de judicial rights when others contested them. Si m i l a r Vaud have not yet received a thorough microanalysis, Vaud, Pays de 1159

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1160 Application File except for a recent study about the village of Gollion Vaudois(Waldensians) (Taric Zumsteg 2000). That study showed that the The question of how Waldensians became witches has stereotype of the witch, as it had been inherited from long interested scholars. Although it has not played a the fifteenth century, survived with minor changes into p rominent part in the historiography of Wa l d e n s i a n i s m, the first half of the seventeenth century. Manifestly new historians of witchcraft have shown a long-standing developments included the insistence on the Devil’s interest in the subject. The liberal historian Joseph m a rk, echoing Protestant preoccupation with the Hansen, the leading scholar of the rationalist school diabolical pact, and the sober, almost sanitized descrip- (which held that witchcraft was a nonexistent crime) tions of the Sabbat, which contrast with the lurid and head of Cologne’s municipal archive, promoted the accounts of earlier trials. In Gollion at least, the Sabbat idea that rustic Waldensians were forced into witchcraft was merely an occasion for nocturnal singing and confessions by the intellectual and physical coercion of dancing, a fact that should be seen in the context of the the Inquisition. Hansen became a precursor of the strenuous attempts by Reformed clergymen to ban such so-called labeling theory, because he believed that forms of popular entertainment. Throughout the entire Waldensian heretics were simply labeled—by the pop- period, we find great importance placed on evil spells ulace as sodomites and by Catholic theologians as against people or livestock and a particular terror of witches—without having themselves given their alleged spreaders of the plague (Taric Zumsteg 2000, accusers any reason for doing so. Hansen’s explanation 126–146). is still widely accepted—with some modifications—by several recent publications (for example, Cohn 1975; GEORG MODESTIN Monter 1976; Blauert 1989). This theory, howe ve r, remains unsatisfying because See also:DEVIL’SMARK;GENEVA;GEOGRAPHYOFTHEWITCH HUNTS;HERESY;LAUSANNE,DIOCESEOF;MALEWITCHES; it cannot explain why Waldensians, who would have NUMBEROFWITCHES;PACTWITHTHEDEVIL;PLAGUE; been burned anyway as heretics, should have also been PROTESTANTREFORMATION;SABBAT;SAVOY,DUCHYOF;SPELLS; labeled as sorc e re r s , and specifically as having been SWITZERLAND;WARFARE;WITCHHUNTS. capable of flying through the air. An explanation for the References and further reading: equation of Waldensians and witches cannot be logical- Choffat, Pierre-Han. 1989. La sorcellerie comme exutoire: Tensions ly derived from the range of absurd interpre t a t i o n s et conflits locaux, Dommartin 1524–1528.Cahiers lausannois characterizing the so-called romantic approach (which d’histoire médiévale 1. Lausanne: Section d’Histoire, Faculté e m p h a s i zes the importance of women, seeing them as des Lettres. incarnations of popular culture or of popular resistance) Kamber, Peter. 1980. “Die Hexenverfolgung im Waadtland in the historiography of witchcraft. Although Carlo (1581–1620).” Lizentiats thesis, University of Zurich. Ginzburg (1991) opened new paths to “d e c i p h e r” the ———. 1982. “La chasse aux sorciers et aux sorcières dans le Pays de Vaud: Aspects quantitatifs (1581–1620).” Revue historique w i t c h e s’ Sabbat with his emphasis on ecstatic experi- vaudoise90: 21–33. ences, he was unable to integrate Waldensians into his ———. 1998. “Croyances et peurs: La sorcellerie dans le pays de concept. As a prelude to the revival of popular myths, Vaud (XVIe–XVIIe siècles).” Pp. 247–256 in De l’Ours à la he reconstructed the scapegoating of lepers and Jews in Cocarde: Régime bernois et révolution en pays de Vaud fourteenth-century France to explain why Jewish terms (1536–1798).Edited by François Flouck, Patrick-R. like “synagogue” or “Sabbat” played such a prominent Monbaron, Marianne Stubenvoll, and Danièle Tosato-Rigo. part in early witchcraft terminology. Lausanne: Payot. Indeed, Ginzburg could point to a 1409 letter of Monter,William. 1976. Witchcraft in France and Switzerland: The Pope Alexander V that confirmed to the inquisitor Borderlands During the Reformation.Ithaca, NY, and London: Ponce Fe u g e y ron: “We have recently and sadly heard Cornell University Press. that some Christians and perfidious Jews within the Morerod, Jean-Daniel. 2002. “Mortelle sincérité: Un appel à l’aide en terre protestante (Avenches, 1595).” Pp. 279–288 in boundaries of your jurisdiction have founded new sects Histoire et herméneutique: Mélanges pour Gottfried Hammann. and perform rites that are repugnant to the Christian Edited by Martin Rose. Histoire et Société 45. Geneva: Labor religion. They also often teach hidden doctrines, et Fides. p reaching and affirming them” (quoted in Kors and Taric Zumsteg, Fabienne. 2000. Les sorciers à l’assaut du village: Peters 2001, 153). The Jews and Christians in this Gollion (1615–1631).Études d’histoire moderne 2. Lausanne: strange new sect, which operated in the Dauphiné and Zèbre. other parts of the French Alps and in southeastern Von der Mühll, Maurice. 1960. Maléfices et cour impériale: Les France, used sorc e ry, divination, and devil worship réformes bernoises de la justice criminelle dans le pays de Vaud au (Hansen 1901, 16–17). The letter with its mandate was XVIe siècle.Bibliothèque historique vaudoise 23. Lausanne: c o n firmed twice for the same inquisitor in the same Jaunin. region, in 1418 by Pope Martin V and again in 1434 by Vuilleumier, Henri. 1929. L’orthodoxie confessionnelle.Vol. 2 of Histoire de l’Eglise réformée du Pays de Vaud sous le régime Pope Eugenius IV. Within five years, howe ve r, a bernois.4 vols. 1927–1933. Lausanne: La Concorde. decisive change in the perception of this enigmatic new 1160 Vaudois(Waldensians)

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1161 Application File sect occurred. In 1437 Eugenius IV issued a general As far as we know, not until the 1430s was worship d e c ree to all inquisitors about devil worshippers, who of the Devil in the form of an animal transferred to the committed m a l e fic i a (harmful magic) through word s , “n ew sect” of witches. The connection betwe e n touches, or signs (Hansen 1901, 17–18). T h ree ye a r s Waldensianism and witchcraft in learned demonology later, the same pope issued a bull, Ad perpetua rei memo- began with the anonymous treatise Errores Gazariorum riam (For Eternal Remembrance of the Thing), against (Errors of the Gazars or Gazarii [the term Gazariiwas a the former Duke Amadeus VIII of Sa voy (ru l e d synonym for Cathars or Waldensians]). Pre s u m a b l y 1416–1451), who was elected by the Council of Basel written by an inquisitor in the duchy of Savoy around as Felix V (ruled 1439–1449), and subsequently was 1435, it gave the first elaborate description of a witches’ k n own as an anti-pope or counter-pope to the legiti- Sabbat. In late-fourteenth-century Savoyard heresy tri- mate pope. The bull connected the council’s new pope als at Pinerolo, a small town in the Piedmontese moun- with all the heretics in his former duchy, devil worship- tains, a Dominican inquisitor, Antonio di Se t t i m o , pers and sorc e rers, “who are now commonly called forced a Waldensian named Antonio Galosna into con- s t regule o r s t regones o r Wa u d e n s e s” ( Hansen 1901, 18, fessions in which nocturnal gatherings, devil worship, 408–415). This finally became the name for the new and sorc e ry played an important role (Hansen 1901, sect: They we re neither Christians nor Jews, but 118–122). It has been suggested that George de Waldensian witches. Saluces, bishop of the Sa voy a rd valley of Aosta in the The papal bull used this terminology for the fir s t Italian Alps from 1433 to 1440 and then bishop of time in 1440, explicitly maintaining that it was the Lausanne from 1440 to 1461, played an important role popular terminology of a specific region, namely the in importing the ideas of “synagogues” of the “Gazzarii” duchy of Savoy. This label was no mere invention but into parts of French-speaking Switzerland belonging to was based on something resembling subjective percep- the duchy of Savoy. But even earlier Dominicans, such tion, as trial re c o rds demonstrate. It was precisely this as Ulric de To r renté, inquisitor for the diocese of region, including the Swiss dioceses of Ge n e va, Si o n , Lausanne (circa 1420–1445), preferred to use the term and Lausanne, where the term Va u d e r i e Vaudoisduring his investigations, at least since the early (Waldensianism) was being used for witchcraft by the 1430s. The soil for the fusion of witchcraft and early fifteenth century and remained pre d o m i n a n t Waldensianism may have been pre p a red by the t h roughout the sixteenth century. Monter re c o g n i ze d Dominican preacher Vincent Fe r rer (ca. 1350–1419), long ago that “the lands which used ‘here t i c’ or whose apocalyptic sermons between 1399 and 1409 ‘Waldensian’ as a synonym for witch after 1425 formed had excited exactly the region where the fusion took a contiguous geographical zone,” and he concluded place: Piedmont, Lombard y, Sa voy, Dauphiné, and that “these conciliarist and Sa voy a rd dioceses we re the p a rts of Sw i t zerland including Lausanne, Ge n e va, and geographical center of the first popular fusion of heresy Fribourg. As in later descriptions of Sabbats, devil wor- and sorc e ry, which would later be cemented into ship and sexual orgies played a prominent role at early accepted theory” (Monter 1976, 22–23). “synagogues.” This is not surprising, since Gui had If we turn away from official documents to examine a l ready made these deviations necessary ingredients in demonological treatises, we find almost no connection charges against Waldensianism. b e t ween Waldensianism and witchcraft before 1435, Howe ve r, a new and decisive re q u i rement in the although earlier inquisitors included chapters about linkage of heresy to devil worship and the Sabbat was s o rc e ry in their handbooks; the Pra c t i c a i n q u i s i t i o n i s the here t i c’s ability to fly through the air. Ma rt i n e h e retice pra v i t a t i s (The Practice of the Inquisition of Ostorero and colleagues connect this idea to a specific He retical De p r a v i t y ; c i rca 1324) of Be r n a rd Gui con- inquisitorial trial, mentioned only in the Basel manu- tained such a chapter. In a much larger chapter about script of the ErroresGazariorum,conducted by Ulric de Waldensian here s y, howe ve r, Gui never mentioned To r renté at Ve vey in 1438, whose re c o rds surv i ve at magical rituals or spiritual fantasies. Devil worship was Lausanne (Ostorero et al. 1999, 348–351). But it seems an exception, for its practitioners adored the Devil in rather unlikely that the original fusion occurred in this the form of a cat. This form of latria(the honor due to trial; the idea of night-flying female streghehad certain- God) assumed enough importance to generate the term ly been a traditional ingredient of Alpine and other for heretics in several languages, for example, the f o l k l o re. This can be demonstrated from early- German Ke t ze r ( f rom K a t ze , “c a t”) or the It a l i a n fifteenth-century demonology.While the inquisitors in Gazzari (from gatto, “cat”). However, although sorcery the diocese of Lausanne imagined witchcraft as the had potentially implied devil worship ever since the m o d e r n i zed version of Waldensianism (m o d e rn o ru m time of St. Augustine, the influential D i re c t o r i u m hereticorum Waldensium), other authors, such as Alonso inquisitorum (Directory of Inquisitors) of 1376 by the Tostado, we re already suggesting that the majority of Spanish Dominican inquisitor Nicolas Eymeric still the new sect were females, whom Tostado labeled with lacked this detail. the popular Castilian term b ru x a s ( Hansen 1901, Vaudois(Waldensians) 1161

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1162 Application File 105–109). During the same years, the local Swiss term Traité de Vauderie (Treatise on the Waldensians) was He xe n rose to prominence in German-speaking are a s . printed at Bruges as early as 1477 (Hansen 1901, Although this connection was not yet implied in 133–195). One of its manuscripts was illustrated with a c o n t e m p o r a ry papal bulls or in the earliest tre a t i s e s famous early representation of the witches’ Sabbat, with about the new sect, its members tended to be portrayed men and women flying through the air, supported by as predominantly female. And the illustrator of one devilish monsters. manuscript felt clearly attracted by this interpre t a t i o n Another echo of events at Arras was a manuscript of Waldensianism. He sketched witches riding through entitled La Vauderye de Lyonois en bref (Waldensianism the air on sticks and broomsticks. Although they could in Lyons, in Sh o rt), describing the dyabolica synagoga h a ve been called s t re g h e , the traditional term in It a l y, (diabolical synagogue [Sabbat]) of the witches. He xe n in Sw i t zerland, or b ru x a s in Spain, the scribe Ironically, it located the “synagogue” in the very region identified them as Vaudoises(Hansen 1901, 101). where the Waldensians, the “Poor of Lyons,” had origi- C e rt a i n l y, the use of the term Va u d o i s irritated and nated centuries earlier (Hansen 1901, 191–195). T h i s confused contemporaries: The chronicler En g u e r r a n d g e n re of demonological literature apparently ended de Mo n s t relet mentioned that he could not explain with a similar treatise on night-flying “Va u d o i s ,”De why these witches were now called Vaudois.Some con- h a e resi Valdensium seu pauperum de Lugduno (T h e s e rva t i ve theologians deliberately chose not to equate Heresy of the Waldensians, or the Poor of Lyons), writ- witchcraft with Waldensianism: Nicolas Ja c q u i e r, who ten by an anonymous Carthusian in 1485—just one participated in the famous persecution of the Vauderie year before the publication of the Malleus Maleficarum at Arras and was convinced that a new sect of witches (The Hammer of Witches, 1486). Heinrich Kramer existed, pre f e r red to call them h a e retici fascinarii, i g n o red the association of Waldensianism with witch- “ b ewitched here t i c s” (Hansen 1901, 124–130, craft, although (or because) he had been engaged in an 133–145). Ne ve rtheless, between 1430 and 1460 a inquisitorial trial against the Waldensian bishop m o re general fusion of witchcraft and Wa l d e n s i a n i s m Friedrich Reiser. Presumably overshadowed by Kramer’s p redominated in French-speaking Eu rope. Fo l l ow i n g Malleus Maleficarum, the confusing term Vauderie was the Sa voy a rd paradigm, a whole series of trials against no longer used in learned demonological discourse as a Waldensian witches took place in eastern Sw i t ze r l a n d synonym for witchcraft. It persisted in some regions as ( Bl a u e rt 1989, 36–50) and France. Even a distin- a popular term, for example, in the southern guished theologian, Dr. Guillaume Adeline, confessed Netherlands until the seventeenth century and in under tort u re at Ev reux (Normandy) in 1453 that he southwestern Switzerland until the present day. had flown on a broomstick to the “s y n a g o g u e” of the Historians of Waldensianism simply deny any con- “Waldensians,” where he had worshipped a he-goat nections with witchcraft. With its biblicism, antipapal- (Cohn 1975, 230). At Arras in the duchy of Burgundy, ism, antifeudalism, and pacifism, Waldensian theology the campaign against the Va u d e r i e reached its climax in no way resembled witchcraft. On the contrary, between 1459 and 1461 (Singer 1975). Former partici- many examples showed the pauperes Christi(the poor of pants at the Council of Basel tried to frame their Christ) denying the wonders of the saints, the power of experiences in terms of demonological theory. An relics and of holy water and salt, or the efficacy of anonymously written Recollectio casus, status et condicio- pilgrimages. In other words, they actively opposed nis Valdensium ydolatrarum (Record of the Case, Status, superstition. As a persecuted minority trying to re v i ve and Outcome of the Waldensian Idolatries, 1460), a the apostolic spirit of the early Christians against the defense of the persecution from May 1460, simply Roman Church, the Waldensians aroused the sympathy equated witchcraft and Waldensianism without further of many researchers as “enlightened” evangelical precur- explanation and blamed Valdensesfor all the maleficiaof sors of the Reformation. And this is why historians of the witches (Hansen 1901, 149–183). Waldensianism have made few useful contributions to Another participant at the Council of Basel, Johann the debate. Waldensians we re certainly not support e r s Ti n c t o r, canon at Tournai and later professor at the of exotic folk beliefs, much less founders of ecstatic Un i versity of Cologne, summed up his perception of cults. the new heresy in a sermon Speculatio in secta Va l d e n s i u m Ne ve rtheless, it seems appropriate to ask what ele- (Speculation on the Sect of the Waldensians,ca. 1460). ments in Waldensianism could have stimulated or legit- For him, the sect was more terrible than paganism, i m i zed its identification with witchcraft. For instance, Islam, or simple heresy: It implied apostasy, the destruc- was it suspicions that this religious movement opposed tion of Christianity, and the end of the world. Several any form of killing, even the execution of sorc e re r s ? copies of his sermon surv i ve in French, Belgian, and Waldensian masters came and left at night, as believers German libraries; there was even a contemporary readily admitted (Kurze 1975, 97), because of the risk translation into vernacular French, unusual for of suppression. Nocturnal gatherings with non-Roman fif t e e n t h - c e n t u ry demonological treatises, and his rites were certainly one tertium comparationis(the third 1162 Vaudois(Waldensians)

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1163 Application File [part] of the comparison, that which two things have in managed to demonstrate their spiritual superiority by common) with witchcraft. Se c recy automatically establishing contacts with the “other world.” Although a roused suspicion (it characterized rebellious peasants, evangelically trained Waldensian theologians, like many s e c ret lovers, and robber gangs), but it was obv i o u s l y of their Catholic counterparts, rejected the idea of insufficient to provoke papal inquisitors to invent a new ecstasies, at least in some areas spiritual contacts with crime. On the other hand, popular magic in itself could paradise, prophets, angels, or even God himself we re never challenge the machinery of suppression. Its rites thought to be peculiar to Waldensians. we re well known, having been classified in peniten- Arnauld Gélis established contact with the deceased, tiaries. Even if its m a l e fic i a was approximated to devil with revenants, around 1312, and he could eventually worship, it remained separate from traditional heresies. see the dead not only in dreams but also while awake. A Celestine monk and inquisitor, Peter Zw i c k e r, His inquisitor Jacques Fournier (1285–1342), who though pointing to the Wa l d e n s i a n s’ devil worship in became pope Benedict XII in 1334, reported that Gélis his 1395 treatise Cum dorm i rent homines (W h i l e served as a courier for the deceased and received orders Humans Sleep), explicitly admitted that they were not f rom the living before visiting the realm of the dead. “ Luciferans,” and he did not confuse Wa l d e n s i a n i s m This Waldensian worked as an intermediary betwe e n with witchcraft (Biller 1989, 223–225). the living and the dead, and he was well known for his Most Waldensians came from the lower orders, and abilities in the region, serving clients who wanted to get their persecution resulted in the so-called marginaliza- into contact with the otherworld. His spiritual qualities tion of Waldensianism as it became increasingly strong far exceeded those of local Catholic priests and met the among peasants and herdsmen in mountainous areas. It demands of the common people in a very singular man- is thus unlikely that the average Waldensian was any n e r. Maybe this was especially interesting for less superstitious than his Catholic neighbor. If suspi- Waldensians who denied the existence of purgatory and cions of sorc e ry played an important role in trials could there f o re do nothing to benefit their deceased against Waldensians even in towns like Bern or re l a t i ves. On the other hand, the beings of the other- Fribourg, what was to be said about the peasants in the world could help the living, and Gélis was commis- high Alpine valleys of Piedmont, Dauphiné, Valais, or sioned to ask them about past and future events. Gélis the Pays de Vaud? These are exactly the places where was not the only Waldensian with these abilities, even preachers in the high and late Middle Ages, sixteenth- within his own family. He was continuing the custom c e n t u ry reformers, seventeenth- or eighteenth-century of his cousin, thus suggesting that this ability was rationalists, and nineteenth- and twe n t i e t h - c e n t u ry h e re d i t a ry within his lineage. As he explained during folklorists would all expect to find the most exo t i c his trial in Ma rch 1320, his cousin had been able to forms of folk beliefs. And there is certainly historical “walk” (of course, this meant fly) with the dead, some- evidence to support this stereotypical assumption. times going with them for three or four days. Fi n a l l y, From the Cathar village of Montaillou in the Pyrenees, Gélis acquired the same ability himself. After a while he we learn about love magic, harmful magic, belief in began to “walk” with the “good women and the souls of spirits, and the charming tale of an ecstatic experience: the deceased” (“bonis dominabus seu animabusdefuncto- a soul leaving the body in the form of a snake, walking ru m”), who visited the cleanest houses, ate there, and over a silvery bridge, and visiting a castle in a mountain. drank good wine in the cellars, but without any loss Although historians of Waldensianism carefully try to (Utz Tremp 1994, 125–134). keep witchcraft and Waldensianism separate by treating Most historians of Waldensianism would claim that them in separate chapters to avoid any interre l a t i o n s , Gélis had no connection with it. But there is other numerous trials for magic and sorcery were held in the evidence of his association with Waldensianism. During Waldensian valleys of Dauphiné. And magic and an inquisition in Austria between 1312 and 1315, the divination were practiced byWaldensians as well as by i n t e r ro g a t o ry protocol summarized some typical other mountain farmers and herdsmen. Waldensian errors: Two “brothers” had to go to paradise T h e re f o re, it seems worth reconsidering the role of every year to receive the priestly power of binding and Waldensian spiritual leaders: the barbes(brothers), who, loosing (Matt. 18:18), which they could afterw a rd s like the Cathar p e rfecti (the perfect ones), managed to transmit to their followers (Maleczek 1986, 36). Many establish a peculiar spiritual elite outside the Latin witnesses elsewhere in Europe claimed that their “mas- C h u rch. These bre t h ren we re trained by each other. t e r s” possessed this power (Merlo 1977, 43–44, Despite all attempts to re c o n s t ruct their training and 48–49). Further reports of otherworldly experiences by the customs of their secret society, we know little about Waldensian brethren were also made three generations either.What we do know is that they had to be accept- later, during Zwicker’s extensive campaigns in Bohemia ed voluntarily by their communities. This suggests and Austria. In Zw i c k e r’s re c o rds from Br a n d e n b u r g charismatic abilities that could meet the specific spiritu- and Pomerania (today in Poland) between 1392 and al demands of their followers. At least some of them 1394, where nearly half of the 450 original pro t o c o l s Vaudois(Waldensians) 1163

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1164 Application File s u rv i ved (Ku rze 1975), one standard answer to Zuanne delle Piatte, a wandering witch doctor in the questions about the teachings and religious practice of Italian Alps, well known in many villages of the the Waldensian “m a s t e r s” was that they went to Dolomites, who claimed to visit regularly the Ve n u s paradise to re c e i ve their power from an angel. T h e re Mountain (Venusberg; mons ve n e r i s), where the fairy were, however, differences about whether the brethren queen lived; his confessions led to a witch hunt aro u n d actually entered paradise or only stayed at the gates, and C a valese in the Val di Fiemme. Another example is about what exactly happened there or what they could Diell Breull (d. 1632), who visited Frau Holle (or actually obtain from God. For instance, Claus Walther Holda, leader of women who traveled at night, who a n s we red in Fe b ru a ry 1393 that the masters acquire d l i ved on Venus Mountain; Frau Holle is the title of a their wisdom there. We can conclude from the bulk of f a i rytale by Jacob Grimm) in her mountain castle and evidence that whenever Waldensians touched upon the was able to foresee the future. His tales caused a large special relation between their masters and God, they witch hunt that claimed almost 200 victims in the meant far more than merely reading the Gospel. They small Calvinist county of Isenburg-Büdingen. Fi n a l l y, hinted at ecstatic experiences, raptures, or spiritual Chonrad Stoeckhlin, a herdsman from Ob e r s t d o rf in journeys of the soul (if not a physical one of the body) the German Alps, provoked a similar persecution with t h rough the air to the gates of paradise. In nort h e r n his stories about the Na c h t s c h a r (phantoms of the Germany, Richard Kieckhefer has correctly concluded, night) with whom he traveled to paradise (Be h r i n g e r ecstatic experiences we re commonly considered a 1998). All of them visited the “other world,” and their Waldensian affair (Kieckhefer 1979, 63). peculiar position as messengers between the living and The Waldensian masters’ journeys to the otherworld the dead was an obvious precondition for their ability are indisputable. There were, however, many variations to heal and foretell the future . in detail re g a rding the circumstances of the trave l s , Despite lacking medical training, the Wa l d e n s i a n their frequency, and their purpose. This probably sug- b re t h ren we re expected to cure diseases. As re p o rted in gests some debate among c re d e n t e s ( b e l i e vers) about fif t e e n t h - c e n t u ry Dauphiné, they provided clients such things. Perhaps different masters told different sto- with recipes and herbs, using prayers that might have ries about the supernatural origins of their spiritual been understood (or misunderstood) as magical spells p owe r. Historians should be aware of the possibility ( Biller 1982, 55–77). In healing their clients, the that within the oral culture, these stories would have b a r b e s p robably thought they we re fulfilling an eva n- been much more elaborate than they we re in inquisi- gelical mission (Matt. 10:8), but in the view of the tors’ protocols. But even the protocols offer hints. One common people, this ability aided the bre t h re n’s re p u- elaborate story was told by Aley Takken fro m tation for holiness. One of their characteristics was an Baumgarten in the Polish diocese of Poznan. In March asceticism that contrasted sharply with the comport- 1394 she confessed ment of their Catholic counterparts. This stimulated some peculiar forms of veneration and unusual expec- that she had heard from a certain woman, that two tations: The b a r b e s we re re p o rted to be sancti viri of their apostolic and heresiarch Brethren went to (holy men). The Passau Anonymous, writing aro u n d Hell, and heard the pitiable cries and saw the devils 1315, mentioned their “g reat appearance of holiness.” attacking the souls in Hell and saying, “that one Be r n a rd Gui noted the term “holy men,” a phrase was an adulterer, that one a usurer, that one a c o n firmed by Waldensian believers in trial re c o rd s tavern-haunter,” and so on of all the other sorts of f rom Pomerania, Bohemia, Austria, Alsace, Pi e d m o n t , vice-laden souls; and afterwards they came to and Da u p h i n é . Paradise and heard the voice of the Lord God Of course, the phenomenon of “living saints” was we l l giving them wisdom and learning, with which they k n own in the Roman Church, where people like St . were to instruct the people committed to their care Francis adve rtised the power of Catholicism. On the oth- on earth. (Kurze 1975, 241) er hand, the phenomenon is also well known to social a n t h ropologists outside Christianity. They describe “re l i- Such stories sound familiar to historians of witch- gious specialists” who remind us of people like Arnaud craft. Some of the most aggre s s i ve witch hunts in Gélis, Hans Tscholi, Zuanne delle Piatte, or Chonrad Eu ropean history we re launched after confessions by Stoeckhlin, who served their communities as healers, witch doctors with otherworldly experiences. Aro u n d diviners, and messengers to the otherworld. These kinds 1500, Hans Tscholi from Kriens (between Lucerne and of superior spiritual qualities are characteristic features of Bern in Sw i t zerland) had to “w a l k” (that is, fly) with shamanism. And although this might have been contrary the souls of the deceased. From their re velations he to the intention of the Gospel, at least some Wa l d e n s i a n d e r i ved his authority as a witch doctor. Like Gélis, b rothers we re treated as, and seem to have worked as, Tscholi was not the only member of his family with shamans. Gabriel Audisio (1999) has pointed out that this kind of ecstatic experience. Another example is some narratives about the b a r b e s h a ve been amplifie d 1164 Vaudois(Waldensians)

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1165 Application File with additional popular beliefs concerning the liminal References and further reading: experiences of fear, pain, or death, experiences that Audisio, Gabriel. 1999. The Waldensian Dissent: Persecution and resemble typical initiation rites of shamans. Survival, ca. 1170–ca. 1570.Translated by Claire Davison. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Waldensian brothers, as living saints, we re called Behringer,Wolfgang. 1998. Shaman of Oberstdorf: Chonrad boni homines or bons hommes (good men) by their Stoeckhlin and the Phantoms of the Night.Translated by H.C. f o l l owers. This seemingly harmless term, mentioned Erik Midelfort. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. a p p rovingly by distinguished scholars of here s y, Behringer,Wolfgang, and Günter Jerouschek, eds. 2000. Heinrich requires further interpretation. Good menor good people Kramer (Institoris), Der Hexenhammer. Malleus Maleficarum. are exactly the same terms used for certain supernatural Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch. beings in contemporary folk belief: good ladies, good Biller, Peter. 1982. “Curate infirmos:The Medieval Waldensian men,and good peoplewere ambivalent terms, describing, Practice of Medicine.” Studies in Church History19: 55–77. for instance, fairy people or powe rful benign spirits ———. 1989. “Les Vaudois dans les territoires de langue alle- opposed to demonic beings. Such terms we re also mande vers la fin du XIVe siècle: Le regard d’un inquisiteur.” applied to the deceased, who according to popular Heresis13–14: 199–228. Blauert, Andreas. 1989. Frühe Hexenverfolgungen. Ketzer-, belief visited the houses of people whom their neigh- Zauberei- und Hexenprozesse des 15. Jahrhunderts.Hamburg: bors then called “blessed.” Great ambivalence lurk e d Junius. behind terms like good people or good men; they could Bonomo, Giuseppe. 1971. Caccia alle streghe: La credenza nelle even be euphemisms, because any supernaturally pow- streghe dal sec. XIII al XIX con particolare riferimento all’Italia. erful being could be dangerous, able to harm as well as Palermo: Palumbo. heal. We can see this ambivalence as early as 1241, Centini, Massimo. 1995. Streghe, roghi e diavoli: I Processi di stre- when a Waldensian believer admitted that Ma s t e r goneria in Piemonte.Cuneo: L’arciere. Pe t rus de Vallibus, who also served as a healer, was Cohn, Norman. 1975. Europe’s Inner Demons: An Enquiry Inspired “loved like an angel of God” (Biller 1982, 66). by the Great Witch-Hunt. NewYork: Basic Books. In conclusion, the association of witchcraft and Döllinger, Johann Joseph Ignazvon. 1970. Beiträge zur Waldensianism goes far beyond a mere labeling process. Sektengeschichte des Mittelalters.2 vols. Munich, 1890. Reprint, NewYork: Franklin. Be yond the “heresy-topos,” with Waldensians kissing Erbstösser, Martin. 1984. Heretics in the Middle Ages.Translated by devil-cats under their tails, the secrecy of their noctur- Janet Fraser. Leipzig: Edition Leipzig. nal gatherings suggested associations with negative l y Ginzburg, Carlo. 1991. Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches’ Sabbat. connotated animals like bats or toads and could be Translated by Raymond Rosenthal. NewYork: Pantheon. linked to evil behavior, sexual deviance, or evil itself. Grundmann, Herbert. 1995. Religious Movements in the Middle The importance of women in the Waldensian move- Ages:The Historical Links Between Heresy, the Mendicant Orders, ment—some “s i s t e r s” acted as equivalents to the and the Women’s Religious Movement in the Twelfth and b rothers, and women frequently substituted for Thirteenth Century, with the Historical Foundations of German Magistri (masters) during their absence—suggested Mysticism.Translated by Steven Rowan from the 2nd ed., associations with the importance of women in popular Hildesheim, 1961. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre magic. Some believers, like Galosna in Pi n e rolo, eve n Dame Press. Hansen, Joseph. 1900. Zauberwahn, Inquisition, und confessed that magic was taught at Waldensian “s y n a- Hexenprozessen im Mittelalter und die Entstehung der Grossen gogues,” and that women exercised it. Finally, and most Hexenverfolgung.Munich: Oldenbourg. i m p o rtant: Not only for inquisitors but for the Hansen, Joseph, ed. 1901. Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Waldensians’ neighbors and maybe even for themselves, Geschichte des Hexenwahns und der Hexenverfolgungen im the holiness of the masters and their supernatural Mittelalter.Bonn: C. Georgi. 1963. Reprint, Hildesheim: abilities and shamanistic qualities, especially the bre t h re n’s Georg Olms. journeys to the otherworld, provided the missing l i n k Kieckhefer, Richard. 1979. The Repression of Heresy in Medieval between Waldensians and witches. Germany.Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Klaniczay, Gábor. 1984. “Shamanistic Elements in Central WOLFGANG BEHRINGER European Witchcraft.” Pp. 404–422 in Shamanism in Eurasia. See also:ANIMALS;ARRAS;ARTANDVISUALIMAGES;BASEL, Edited by Mihály Hoppál. Göttingen: Herodot. COUNCILOF;CATS;DAUPHINÉ;ERRORESGAZARIORUM;EUGENIUS Kors, Alan Charles, and Edward Peters, eds. 2001. Witchcraft in IV,POPE;EYMERIC,NICOLAS;FEUGEYRON,PONCE;GINZBURG, Europe, 400–1700: A Documentary History.2nd ed. Revised by CARLO;GUI,BERNARD;HANSEN,JOSEPH;HERESY;HISTORIOGRA- Edward Peters. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. PHY;HOLDA;INQUISITION,MEDIEVAL;LAUSANNE,DIOCESEOF; Kurze, Dietrich, ed. 1975. Quellen zur Ketzergeschichte LIVINGSAINTS;MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;MONTER,WILLIAM; Brandenburgs und Pommerns.Berlin and NewYork: de Gruyter. MOUNTAINSANDTHEORIGINSOFWITCHCRAFT;ORIGINSOFTHE Lambert, Malcolm D. 2002. Medieval Heresy: Popular Movements WITCHHUNTS;PAPACYANDPAPALBULLS;PEOPLEOFTHENIGHT from the Gregorian Movement to the Reformation.3rd, rev. ed. (NACHTVOLK); REVENANTS;SAVOY,DUCHYOF;SHAMANISM; Oxford and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell. STOECKHLIN,CHONRAD;TINCTOR,JOHANN;TOADS;TORRENTÉ, Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. 1979. Montaillou, the Promised Land ULRICDE;TOSTADO,ALONSO. of Error.Translated by Barbara Bray. NewYork: Vintage. Vaudois(Waldensians) 1165

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1166 Application File Lecouteux, Claude. 1986. Fantomes et Revenants au Moyen Age. Family interests had driven Frederick II (1365–1454) Paris: Imago. into an unsuccessful marriage with Elisabeth of Leff, Gordon. 1967.Heresy in the Later Middle Ages: The Relation Frankopan (Elizabeta Frankopanska), but the couple of Heterodoxy to Dissent, c.1250–c. 1450.2 vols. Manchester had allegedly lived separately since 1415. Fre d e r i c k and NewYork: Manchester University Press and Barnes and either killed Elisabeth or ord e red her murd e red in 1422. Noble. T h ree years later, in 1425, he secretly married Ve ro n i k a Maleczek, Werner. 1986. “Die Ketzerverfolgungen im österreichis- of Desenice, whose origins we re noble but signific a n t l y chen Hoch- und Spätmittelalter.” Pp. 18–39 in Wellen der l ower than those of his first wife. They settled in the cas- Verfolgung in der österreichischen Geschichte. Edited by Erich Zöllner.Vienna: Österreichischer Bundesverlag. tle of Friedrichstein, newly built by Frederick. Merlo, Grado G. 1977. Eretici e inquisitori nella società piemontese Fre d e r i c k’s father Herman was greatly displeased by the del Trecento: con l’edizione dei processi tenuti a Giaven dall’in- n ews of the wedding, which did not remain concealed for quisitore Alberto De Castellario (1335) e nelle Valli di Lanzo long. Frederick asked the Venetian Republic for sanctuary, dall’inquisitoreTommaso Di Casasco (1373).Turin: Claudiana. but the Venetian Senate refused. Fo l l owing an order by ———. 1984. Valdesi e valdismi medievali.Turin: Claudiana. Em p e ror Sigismund of Lu xemburg, Frederick was cap- Molnár, Amadeo. 1993. Die Waldenser: Geschichte und europäisches t u red and brought back to Herman, who imprisoned him Ausmass einer Ketzerbewgung.Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder. in the castle of Upper Celje (Zgornje Celje), destroyed his Monter,William. 1976. Witchcraft in France and Switzerland: The castle at Friedrichstein, and dispossessed him of all other Borderlands During the Reformation. Ithaca, NY, and London: castles and estates that Herman had previously given him. Cornell University Press. Ve ronika fled to Frederick IX of Ptuj, who hid her in ———. 1994. “Poursuites précoces: La sorcellerie en Suisse.” In Magie et sorcellerie en Europe du Moyen Age à nos jours.Edited Vu r b e rk, but Herman soon discove red the fugitive and by Robert Muchembled. Paris: Armand Colin. c a p t u red and imprisoned her. Ochsenbein, Gottlieb F. 1881. Aus dem schweizerischen Volksleben Herman brought Ve ronika before his court, accusing des XV. Jahrhunderts: Der Inquisitionsprozess wider die Waldenser her of witchcraft and attempted poisoning, but she was zu Freiburg im Üchtland im Jahre 1430.Bern. allegedly acquitted. Herman then locked her up in Ostorero, Martine, Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Kathrin Utz Ojstrica castle and later had her drowned. Be c a u s e Tremp, and Catherine Chène, eds. 1999.L’imaginaire du sab- Em p e ror Sigismund was He r m a n’s son-in-law and his bat: Edition critique des textes les plus anciens (1430 c.–1440 c.). most reliable pro t e c t o r, Herman did not fear reprisals for Cahiers lausannois d’histoire médiévale 26. Lausanne: the act that he had committed. The emperor had pre v i- Université de Lausanne, Section d’histoire. Faculté des Lettres. ously pardoned Frederick after he had been accused of Patschovsky, Alexander, and Kurt-Victor Selge, eds. 1973. Quellen having murd e red his first wife Elisabeth. The witchcraft zur Geschichte der Waldenser.Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Mohn. trial was undoubtedly a result of He r m a n’s anger with his Schacher, Josef. 1947. Das Hexenwesen im Kanton Luzern nach den son. Fo l l owing the murder of his first wife, Frederick had Prozessen von Luzern und Sursee, 1400–1675.Lucerne: Druck married a lower-class noblewoman and there by disgraced Räber. family honor. After Ve ro n i k a’s death, Frederick was Singer, Gordon A. 1974. “La Vauderie d’Arras, 1459–1491: An released from jail. (He later had Ve ro n i k a’s corpse trans- Episode of Witchcraft in Later Medieval France.” PhD diss., f e r red to the Carthusian monastery at Ju rk l oˇster). T h e University of Maryland. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms. s t o ry of Ve ronika of Desenice remains one of the most Utz Tremp, Kathrin. 1994. “Waldenser und Wiedergänger—Das popular historical motifs in Sl ovene literature . Fegefeuer im Inquisitionsregister des Bischofs Jacques Fournier von Pamiers (1317–1326).” Pp. 125–134 in Himmel, Hölle MATEVˇZ KOˇSIR Fegefeuer: Das Jenseits im Mittelalter.Edited by Peter Jezler. See also:POISON;SLOVENIA. Zürich: Katalog des Schweizer Landesmuseums. References and further reading: ———. 1999. Waldenser,Wiedergänger, Hexen und Rebellen: Dolenc, Metod. 1930. Kazenska pravda zoper Veroniko Deseniˇsko. Biographien zu den Waldenserprozessen in Freiburg im Üchtland Ljubljana: Zalozˇba rektorata univerze. (1399–1439).Freiburg, Switzerland: Freiburger Grafenauer, Bogo. 1982. “Veronika Desenisˇka.” Slovenski Geschichtsblätter, Sonderband. biografski leksikon4: 412–413. ———, ed. 2000. Quellen zur Geschichte der Waldenser von Jevnikar, Martin. 1965. Veronica di Desenice nella letteratura Freiburg im Uchtland (1399–1430). Hannover: Hahnsche slovena.Padova: Marsilio. Buchhandlung. Roth, Franc Otto. 1987. “Die HexeVeronika: Liebeszauber, Adelspolitik und Renaissance-Menschen im steirischen frühen Veronika of Desenice 15. Jahrhundert.” Mitteilungen des Steiermärkischen (d. –1425/1428) Landesarchivs37: 57–69. The second wife of Frederick II, Count of Celje, Veronika of Desenice was murdered on October 17, Vervain 1425 or 1428, after being accused by Frederick’s father, Not all “m a g i c a l” herbs associated with sorc e ry or witch- Herman II, of attempting to kill him with poison and craft are poisonous or malignant. Such is the case with of bewitching his son into marriage. the herbVerbena offic i n a l i s ,commonly known as ve rva i n , 1166 Veronika of Desenice

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1167 Application File a perennial that produces lilac-colored flowers at the tops See also:DRUGSANDHALLUCINOGENS;HERBALMEDICINE. of long stalks. Other common names for ve rvain are herb References and further reading: of grace, herbe sacrée,and herba ve n e r i s .These names are Culpeper, Nicolas. 1990. Culpeper’s Complete Herbal and English Physician Enlarged. 1814. Reprint, Glenwood, IL: Meyerbooks. s u g g e s t i ve of its long-standing traditional usage in magic Cunningham, Scot. 1990. Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Magical and medicine. Other common names that re veal the Herbs.St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn. p l a n t’s traditional uses include enchanter’s plant, herb of Müller-Ebeling, Claudia, Christian Rätsch, and Wolf-Dieter Storl. enchantment, holy herb, and simpler’s joy. 2003. Witchcraft Medicine: Healing Arts, Shamanic Practices, The word ve rva i n is derived from a Celtic word , and Forbidden Plants.Translated by Annabel Lee. Rochester, f e rf a e n , meaning to “d r i ve away a stone.” This name VT: Inner Traditions. may be related to its traditional herbal-medicine use as Slater, Herman. N.d. Magickal Formulary Spellbook Book II.New a diuretic to treat calculus and other bladder afflictions. York: Magickal Childe. The word ve r b e n a d e r i ves from the Latin word for Vicente, Joan plants used on an altar. Christian herbal lore held that vervain grew on Mount Calvary and that it was used to Vicente was a cleric tried by the Inquisition in staunch Je s u s’s wounds. Certain species of Ve r b e n a d o Saragossa (Zaragoza) in 1511 for heresy, witchcraft, and have astringent properties. In more modern times, the n e c ro m a n c y. Although settled in Saragossa as a herb was employed to treat neurological diseases, but beneficed priest of the church of San Pablo, Joan this practice seems to have ended by the middle of the Vicente came from Perpignan (then part of Catalonia). nineteenth century. Many men subsequently tried in Aragon for crimes Like many medicinal and “m a g i c a l” herbs, ve rva i n related to witchcraft or necromancy were also immi- lore is included in many old herbals. For example, it is grants, often from southern France and particularly included in the 1814 Cu l p e p e r’s Complete Herbal and from regions like Béarn or Gascony, ill-famed for their English Physician En l a r g e d . This famous book drew abundance of witches. The inquisitorial trial against upon a number of much earlier works. Culpeper noted Vicente provides very early and rich evidence of the that vervain was an herb of Venus and that it was excel- effervescence in Spain of magical practices associated lent for treating the womb. He further pointed out its with invocations of demons that filled the pages of the traditional use for bladder disorders, such as calculus. grimorios (grimoires), or magic books, frequently found The Druids may have used ve rvain in magical and in the hands of clerics. Unlike feminine magic, whose hallucinogenic concoctions. One reads this information practitioners, like the fictional Celestina (a procuress rather commonly in modern books dealing with herbal and enchantress), were mainly illiterate persons of lore, although the magical uses of the plant do not seem humble social status from Mediterranean coastal zones, to be associated particularly with satanic witchcraft. masculine magic in sixteenth-century Aragon was prac- But the supposed magical and hallucinogenic uses of ticed principally by secular and regular clergy, like ve rvain by the Greeks, Romans, and Druids have Vicente, accustomed to dealing with infernal spirits. caused this plant to appear in the occult pharmacopoeia As opposed to the erotic character of the majority of of modern times. Vervain is held to be a “compelling” feminine spells, whose final aim was to secure the love plant by those who practice the religions of Sa n t e r i a , of or the seduction of a desired man, the principle Voodoo, and Wicca. Its alleged magical effects include objective of masculine necromancy was the acquisition bringing good fortune, health, money, good dre a m s , of material wealth that would permit one to live we l l and even everlasting youth to its users. One may com- without effort. The most elaborate and thoro u g h pound incenses, liquids, or contents of herbal pouches method for this magic was to perform certain cere- using ve rvain in order to help produce happiness, monies for invoking demons. These rituals re q u i red a peace, and joy. A recipe for protective incense will suf- number of ingredients, detailed in early manuals of fice as an example: One compounds ve rvain, galagal, magic. A good example of the complexity of these cere- peppermint, rue, and cinnamon into a powder used monies is the conscientious preparation that the priest a c c o rding to the formulary to protect against hexe s . Vicente and his three accomplices (a we a ver and a Some modern Wiccans believe ve rvain capable of notary and his servant) carried out, beginning in 1509, bringing visions of the future, enabling its user to fore- with a view to tracing a great magic circle (cerco gener- tell whether someone who is ill is going to die or recov- a l), where they intended to conjure various spirits “s o er and to assist in finding stolen pro p e rt y. It also may that they would come and bring them money” (Tausiet protect one’s home from lightning and bad storms, and 2000, 505). one may use it to invoke spirits. Such beliefs repeat the Like their Italian or German counterparts, these traditional ancient folk usages of vervain, such as those Spanish necromancers used magic circles to perf o r m attributed to the Druids. the most sophisticated form of spirit invocation. T h e magic virtue of the circle acted as a bulwark to whoever JANE P. DAVIDSON was inside it, protecting them from eve ry type of evil Vicente, Joan 1167

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1168 Application File attack. But meticulous pre l i m i n a ry preparations we re served as the Inquisition’s prison, leaving a note in his re q u i red before such magic circles could be drawn. cell filled with threats against the inquisitors. First, the participants (whose number could not exceed Vicente’s revenge did not end with these threats. His four) undertook purification rituals that included path led him to Rome, where, after three years, he baths, fasting, and participation in confession and Holy s e c u red a papal pardon and retained his benefice. No t Communion. Next, unless the building intended to content with this, he returned to Aragon and sued the house the circle was new, it had to be exorcised to elim- inquisitors of Saragossa (who had obtained permission inate any possible negative influences from its previous from King Ferdinand to confiscate his property), win- owners. Fi n a l l y, certain objects and substances we re ning a judgment (which they ignored) ordering them to necessary to complete the ceremony. pay him the sizable sum of 500 ducats as restitution. Fo l l owing the C l a v i c u l a Solomonis (the Key of MARÍA TAUSIET; Solomon), a book of incantations for summoning demons, Vicente and his accomplices first pro c u red a TRANSLATED BY THOMAS SIZGORICH w a rd robe (white clothes, underclothes, and shoes), See also:ARAGON;CELESTINA,LA;CLERGY;COURTS,ECCLESIASTI- which had to be new. The garments we re marked CAL;COURTS,INQUISITORIAL;DEVILBOOKS;GRIMOIRES;INQUISI- with certain magical characters and fig u res, using a TION,SPANISH;INVOCATIONS;LOVEMAGIC;MAGIC,LEARNED; plume taken from the right side of a large goose, MAGICCIRCLE;NECROMANCY;RINGS,MAGICAL;RITUALMAGIC; the plume sharpened with a knife with a black and SPAIN;SPELLS;WATER,HOLY. white handle that had been previously tempered with References and further reading: the blood of the same goose.The ink used to mark their Monter,William. 1990. Frontiers of Heresy: The Spanish Inquisition from the Basque Lands to Sicily.Cambridge: Cambridge garments had to have been previously exo rcised. All University Press. other essential objects had to be fabricated specially, Tausiet, María. 2000. Ponzoña en los ojos: Brujería y Superstición en sometimes from unborn animals or by the hands of a Aragón en el siglo XVI.Saragossa: Institución Fernando el pure virgin. They included four knives (which would be Católico. used, after sharpening the plumes, to draw the circ l e and would then be thrust into it), four swords (which Vienna also had to be stuck into the circle), a magic ring made Although few trials for witchcraft occurred in the of silver (made an hour or two after noon, the period capital of the Austrian Habsburgs, the city is best during which Me rc u ry reigned), some rods and canes remembered for the so-called Plainacher trial of 1583, (to flay the skins that would be used as parc h m e n t ) , a notorious episode put to use in service of the candles of holy wax, aromatic substances (incense, Counter-Reformation. aloe), new coals, parchments on which to draw small Early in 1583, a sixteen-year-old girl named Anna c i rcles made from the skin of aborted animals (pups, Schlutterbauer was transferred to the city hospital in kids, and calves), and—last but not least—a holy water Vienna, where her condition soon drew the attention of s h a k e r, with which to shake holy water over all of the the local bishop and even of the Holy Roman Emperor participants and each one of the objects present in the Rudolf II. Although exo rcists had already sought to ceremony of invocation. c u re her fits (perhaps caused by epilepsy) at both the From testimony in Vicente’s trial in 1511, we know m o n a s t e ry of St. Pölten in Lower Austria and the pil- that these objects were collected in the cleric’s house; he grimage site of Mariazell in Styria, it was not until her told the judges he had previously hidden them in a arrival in Vienna that the Jesuit Georg Scherer was able cabinet in the church of San Pablo, where he kept his to drive 12,652 demons from her. He described the clerical garments. But the experiment of the circle, for p rocess in detail in a sermon published in 1584, which the four men had so carefully pre p a red, was Christliche Er r i n e rung, bey der Historien von jüngst never consummated. Two participants quarreled fierce- beschehener Erledigung einer Ju n c k f ra wen (A Christian ly over economic issues and “because each one pretend- Recollection of the Tales of the Recently Completed ed to better understand this art of necro m a n c y” Exorcism of a Young Woman). The story and its after- (Tausiet 2000, 512). One of them finally informed the math we re widely re p o rted throughout Catholic Aragonese Holy Office, which proceeded to arrest, try, Europe, becoming a telling example of the power of the and condemn all four would-be necromancers to death, Church and a warning to Protestants drawn away from “relaxing” them to the secular authorities. the “true” faith. Two prisoners (the priest and the notary) managed to Although the girl emerged from the episode escape from jail, so their executions could only be unharmed, her grandmother Elsa Plainacher was not so carried out in effigy at the 1511 auto de fe (act of faith) lucky. Although the seventy-year-old woman repeatedly where the other two were burned. Vicente managed to denied her granddaughter’s claims that she had surren- l ower himself from the window of the high tower of dered Anna to the Devil some twelve years earlier, after Sa r a g o s s a’s old Muslim palace of the Aljafería, which the death of the girl’s mother, she was unable to 1168 Vienna

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1169 Application File withstand the judicial torture to which she was subject- Little is known of Vi n e t’s life. In 1435, this Fre n c h ed. Elsa Plainacher ultimately confessed to making a Dominican graduated from the faculty of theology at pact with the Devil and to murdering her own husband the University of Paris, where he taught between 1436 and their long-deceased children. She was burned at the and 1438. Appointed inquisitor of heretical depravity stake in September 1583, an event witnessed by large for Paris in 1443, he subsequently carried out this func- crowds. tion in Carcassonne from 1450 to around 1470. We Although the term Pl a i n a c h e r became a common cannot describe his specific activities as inquisitor of the insult among the Viennese in subsequent years, few faith. T h ree manuscripts of Vi n e t’s Tractatus contra other cases of witchcraft occurred in the Austrian city. demonum invo c a t o re s h a ve been pre s e rved (in the Besides two late medieval episodes in 1425 and 1498, Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, in the Bi b l i o t h è q u e incomplete re c o rds re veal six more trials, in 1588, Royale in Brussels, and in the Stadtbibliothek in Trier), 1601–1603, 1643, 1695, 1706, and 1708. Ove r a l l , as have five incunabula. Vinet composed one of the first these early modern trials involved at least three women, treatises on demonology to integrate new reflections on three men, and two whose gender is unknown. At least s o rc e rers who consorted with or summoned demons, one man was executed (in 1695), another suspect com- analyzing the new phantasm of the Sabbat from the mitted suicide (in 1601), and another died in prison p e r s p e c t i ve of Scholasticism and proposing an accept- (1603). In the early-eighteenth-century trials, one able doctrinal framew o rk for witchcraft trials. He was woman and one man were fined, publicly beaten, and convinced of the reality of demons. exiled. Nine of the ten additional trials took place in His treatise on demon conjurers contained four n e a r by Wiener Neustadt in the sixteenth century, but parts. Vinet first defined the nature of demons and their Vienna never experienced a large-scale witch panic d i f f e rent names, relying principally on Augustine and ( Dienst 1987, 286–289). As the seat of the Ha b s b u r g Thomas Aquinas. Next, he described apparitions and g overnment, Vienna was home to the eighteenth- the abilities of demons to intervene in the eart h l y century rulers and officials who brought witch hunting world, discussing both contractual and carnal relation- to an end throughout the Habsburg monarchy. ships between humans and demons. He devoted a long third section to the magic arts, their effectiveness, and EDMUND M. KERN demonic participation in such acts. Vinet ended by See also:AUSTRIA;EXORCISM;POSSESSION,DEMONIC;RUDOLFII, describing physical damage inflicted on men and ani- HOLYROMANEMPEROR;URBANWITCHCRAFT. mals by evil spirits, most notably demonic possession References and further reading: and its remedy, exorcism. Byloff, Fritz. 1934. Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung in den öster- The Sabbat does not occupy a central place in his reichischen Alpenländern. Berlin: de Gruyter. treatise, but it appeared several times during discussions Dienst, Heidi. 1987. “Hexenprozesse auf dem Gebiet der heutigen of specific issues, notably in the second part. HereVinet Bundesländer Vorarlberg, Tirol (mit Südtirol), Salzburg, i n vestigated the possibility of sexual relations betwe e n Nieder- und Oberösterreich sowie des Burgenlandes.” Pp. 265–290 in Hexen und Zauberer: Die grosse Verfolgung—ein women and demons. He then examined the question of europäisches Phänomen in der Steiermark.Edited by Helfried s o rc e re r s’ magical flights to demonic assemblies, or Valentinitsch. Graz: Leykam. “synagogues of demons.” Vinet was one of the fir s t Evans, R.J.W. 1979. The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, authors to distance himself explicitly from the authority 1550–1700. Oxford: Clarendon. of the Canon Episcopi(ca. 906). He clearly differentiat- Kern, Edmund M. 1999. “An End to Witch Trials in Austria: ed “women who aspire to ride in the night with Diana, Reconsidering the Enlightened State.” Austrian History goddess of the pagans” from these “n ew idolaters” Yearbook30: 159–185. (moderni ydolatreorheretici), whom the Canon Episcopi Lackenberger, Anita. 1998. Ein teuflish Werk: Die Torturen der never mentioned. As Vinet described them, these “new Hexe von Wien.N.p.: Freya. i d o l a t e r s” summoned demons, worshiped them by Vinet, Jean (Vineti, Johannes) sacrificing newborn babies, rendered homage to them, (d. ca. 1470) and paid them tribute. He believed such heretics should A Dominican inquisitor working in Carcassonne, Jean be killed without mercy. Vinet composed a Tractatus contra demonum invocatores In the section devoted to the magic arts, Vinet care- (Treatise Against Demon Invokers) around 1450. His fully distinguished natural magic from devilish magic text was among the first to provide a theological and t h rough lengthy discussions of the opinions of doctrinal approach to the possibility of the witches’ Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Albertus Ma g n u s Sabbat. Together with Nicolas Jacquier, Johann Tinctor, (Albert the Great). This section is notable for its range and Petrus Mamoris, Vinet represented the current of of topics, including necromancy, astrology, divination, French thought that inserted the early doctrine of the enchantments, visions, and spells. Fo l l owing Aq u i n a s , Sabbat, formulated in Alpine regions, into the larger Vinet condemned all arts practiced with the assistance doctrinal framework of demonology. of evil spirits or through pacts concluded with them. Vinet, Jean (Vineti, Johannes) 1169

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1170 Application File Vinet submitted the Sabbat to the test of Thomism Vi rtue), a discussion of virtues and vices, which he by searching principally in the works of the “A n g e l i c completed in 1411. In the poem he described many pop- Doctor” (that is, Thomas Aquinas) for answers to ques- ular magical practices, including conjuration, divination, tions about the practices confessed by sorcerers during l ove magic, and weather sorc e ry, and he also re f e r red to a their trials. Vinet contributed to defining and qualify- p a rticular group of sorc e rers called witches (u n h o l l e n) . ing the crimes committed by these devil-worshipping The Buch der Tugend was published at Augsburg by “n ew heretics.” Drawing on Scholastic demonology, Johann Heidegker of Bl a u b e u ren (commonly called Vinet redrew the boundaries between the possible and Johann Blaubirer) in 1486; it also survives in six manu- the impossible and between the acceptable and the scripts written both before and after this date. Modeled unacceptable. Instead of depicting himself as an unre- on a widely disseminated Italian treatise of ca. 1300, lenting defender of the struggle against these “modern the Fiori di virtu ( Fl owers of Vi rtue), Vi n t l e r’s work h e retics,” he adopted a critical position. Faithful to examined seventeen different virtues and their Scholastic training, his arguments aimed to discover the c o r responding vices as part of his call for moral “truth”among different propositions. i m p rovement. He devoted a substantial section to the Vinet stressed human free will, which re n d e re d vice of superstition (u n g l a u b e n), drawing on a Latin people responsible for their acts. He held people to be confessional translated by Ma rtin von Amberg in the capable, through reason and will, of resisting demonic late fourteenth century. Vintler complained about the temptations, although the powers of the spirits we re w i d e s p read contemporary belief in magic and sorc e ry, immense. For Vinet, any human being must ultimately more general beliefs about signs of misfortune, as well be judged by his acts. Having demonstrated the possi- as a range of popular magical practices and maleficent bility and existence of demonic assemblies, howe ve r, sorcery. Healing and protective magic received particu- Vinet supplied some much-needed doctrinal and lar attention, as did storms, invisibility, stealing milk, theological justification necessary for carrying out and impotence, nor did he overlook such forms of fifteenth-century witch hunts. learned magic as divination and necromancy. All man- ner of plants, animals, and body parts were used in this MARTINE OSTORERO; magic, as well as verbal spells, blessings, ecclesiastical TRANSLATED BY KARNA HUGHES objects, and wax fig u res. Although Vintler generally called the effects of such magic “imagination” or See also:AQUINAS,THOMAS;AUGUSTINE,ST.; CANONEPISCOPI; DEMONOLOGY;FLIGHTOFWITCHES;INQUISITION,MEDIEVAL; “deception,” he occasionally presented the Devil and INVOCATIONS;JACQUIER,NICOLAS;MAGIC,NATURAL;RITUAL other figures drawn from folk literature as authors of or MAGIC;SABBAT;SEXUALACTIVITY,DIABOLIC;TINCTOR,JOHANN. collaborators in such human delusions. References and further reading: The considerable attention given to magic and Hansen, Joseph. 1963.Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte sorcery in Vintler’s original text was further emphasized des Hexenwahns und der Hexenverfolgung im Mittelalter.Bonn, in the printed version of 1486, which included 236 1901. Reprint, Hildesheim. woodcuts spread over its 214 pages, no fewer than fifty- Lea, Henry Charles. 1957. Materials Towards a History of two of them illustrating its re l a t i vely short section Witchcraft.Edited by Arthur C. Howland. 3 vols. NewYork: d e voted to superstition (Schramm 1943, fig s . AMS. 487–719). Most images are similar to the illuminations Rosario Lazzati, Maria. 1984. “Jean Vinet († 1470 ca.).” in a richly illustrated Gotha manuscript of circa 1500 Pp. 66–70, 356, in La stregoneria: Diavoli, streghe, inquisitori dal Trecento al Seecento.Edited by Sergio Abbiati, Attilio that seems to have used the same now-lost model. The Agnoletto, and Maria Rosario Lazzati. Milan: Arnaldo s i g n i ficance of this unusually large and varied visual Mondadori. compendium of contemporary magic clearly suggests Stephens, Walter. 2002. Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the that by the 1480s printers such as Bl a u b i rer believe d Crisis of Belief. Chicago and London: University of Chicago that images of popular sorcery, magic, and superstition Press, chapter 12. would sell. Vinet, Jean. Circa 1450. Tractatus contra demonum invocatores. The Vintler woodcuts do not re p resent actual Bibliothèque Nationale (Paris), ms. lat. 3445, folios 2–57; magical practices but instead offer us an educated Bibliothèque Royale (Brussels), 11449–11451, folios 53–93v; a u t h o r’s view of the world of popular magic. One key Stadtbibliothek (Trier), 613, folios 34–50. characteristic is the close relationship they posit between popular magic and the natural world. Animals Vintler, Hans (d. –1419) f e a t u re frequently as portents of fortune and misfor- A member of a leading south Ty rolean noble family, tune, instruments for fortunetelling, objects of special Hans Vintler became a legal official in a territorial court blessing, or symbols of village inequity and strife. The and by 1416 was an official in the administration of a s t rological powers of the heavens—sun, moon, and Duke Friederich of Ty rol. He is best known as the author stars—also fill important roles, as do herbs, plants, of a long didactic poem, Buch der Tugend (Book of earth, water, and fire. 1170 Vintler, Hans

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1171 Application File A second significant characteristic of the woodcuts Lombardy during this period, he discussed the validity is the gendering of magical practices in a manner of the charges imputed to witches and demonstrated re flecting traditional divisions of labor. Women fig u re why they should be judged as heretics. as both castrators and general healers, who dealt in Descended from the noble Milanese family of the body parts and protect domestic animals, where a s Visconti, he was ordained a friar while young and spent men charm weapons, search for tre a s u re, and heal most of his life in the Dominican monastery of horses. Sa n t’ Eustorgio in Milan, where he taught logic after A third characteristic is the minimal re f e rences to 1448. He served as provincial of Upper Lombardy from diabolical association and influence, which appears 1465 until his death around 1478. Aside from these unambiguously only in two woodcuts: one a scene of works, he also wrote a Compendium quaestionis de oblig- diabolical invocation, the other an act of sorc e ry identi- atione papali ( Su m m a ry of the Question of Pa p a l fied as idolatry. The large compendium of magical acts Obligations) around 1470. Visconti’s two brief treatises contains only one re f e rence to witches, female sorc e re r s on witchcraft we re published as a single volume at who drink wine from other people’s cellars—a re f e re n c e Milan in 1490. Three manuscripts of both treatises (in to traditional stories about people of the night with their the Biblioteca Casanatensis in Rome, in the Biblioteca wild and destru c t i ve night rides and processions. It is Un i versitaria in Pavia, and in the Cornell Un i ve r s i t y puzzling that the accompanying illustration introduce a Library in Ithaca, NewYork) have transmitted versions case of shapeshifting, possibly an indication of contem- of these two texts on witchcraft that differed from the p o r a ry popular beliefs about unhollen in 1486. Although incunabulum of 1490. both text and images re p resent a world of magical forc e s Visconti dedicated his first treatise to Fr a n c e s c o and practices that are being condemned as vice, they S f o rza, duke of Milan. It might have been written largely ignore the widespread demonization of such a round 1460, a time when witchcraft trials we re practices that occurred around 1500. becoming more frequent in Lombard y. In the ye a r s f rom 1418 to 1422, nearly twenty trials for bestiality, CHARLES ZIKA sorcery, and witchcraft took place in his own monastery See also:ARTANDVISUALIMAGES;CHARMS;CUNNINGFOLK; of Sa n t’ Eu s t o r g i o. The imprecise procedural and leg- FOLKLORE;GENDER;IMAGINATION;IMPOTENCE,SEXUAL;MAGIC, i s l a t i ve framew o rk of that time allowed contradictory POPULAR;NIGHTWITCH,ORNIGHTHAG;PEOPLEOFTHENIGHT; positions, sometimes favoring abuses or displaying SORCERY;WEATHERMAGIC. g reat tolerance tow a rd the accused. Having attended References and further reading: n u m e rous trials, Visconti tried to provide a doctrinal Ebermann, Oskar, and Max Bartels. 1913. “Zur Aberglaubensliste s t ru c t u re for such proceedings. After presenting argu- in Vintlers Pluemen der Tugent (v. 7694–7997).” Zeitschrift des ments for and against the existence of witchcraft, Vereins für Volkskunde23: 1–18, 113–136. Schramm, Albert. 1943. Die Drucker in Augsburg.Vol. 23 of Der demonstrating the liveliness of the debate, he sought to Bilderschmuck der Frühdrucke.Leipzig: Hiersemann. Figs. s y n t h e s i ze such a priori i r reconcilable elements as the 487–719. Canon Ep i s c o p i (ca. 906) and the reality of nocturnal Schweitzer, Franz-Josef. 1993.Tugend und Laster in illustrierten flight. Visconti certainly considered it possible that didaktischen Dichtungen des späten Mittelalters: Studien zu Hans witches actually went to the “g a m e” (that is, the Vintlers “Blumen der Tugend” und zu “Des Teufels Netz.” Sabbat), because demons we re capable of transport i n g Hildesheim, Zürich, and NewYork: Olms Weidmann. them. On the other hand, if persons merely dreamed of Vintler, Hans. 1874. Die Pluemen der Tugen.Edited by Ignaz von attending a Sabbat, their bodies could not actually be Zingerle. Innsbruck: Wagner’schen Universitäts-Buchhandlung. found there, because they could not occupy two Zika, Charles. 1999. “‘Magie’—‘Zauberei’—‘Hexerei’: Bildmedien different places at the same time. und kultureller Wandel.” Pp. 317–382 in Kulturelle Like most Italian authors, Visconti distinguished Reformation: Sinnformationen im Umbruch 1400–160. Edited by Bernhard Jussen and Craig Koslofsky. Göttingen: va m p i re-witches (s t r i g e s) from less dangerous kinds Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht. (l a m i a e), and he described the Sabbat as a “g a m e” (ludus) where ghouls came to dance, drink, and eat and Visconti, Girolamo to find ways to harm their enemies by worshipping the (Hieronymus Vicecomes) “lady of the game” (dominam ludi). In his first treatise, (d. ca. 1478) he seemed to present the “lady” as retaining the benefi- The Milanese scholar Girolamo Visconti participated cent character associated with the goddess Diana; the in the debate about the existence of witchcraft practices Sabbat still contained traces of some ancient beliefs in with two brief treatises written around 1460, the ghouls and Diana, which Visconti progressively helped Lamiarum sive striarum opusculum (A Brief Work on transform. Lamia or Witches) and the Opusculum de striis (A Brief In his briefer second treatise, the Opusculum de striis, Work on Witches). An outside observer of the witch- his tone became more incisive and pere m p t o ry. craft trials that we re increasingly numerous in Visconti primarily addressed the judges responsible for Visconti, Girolamo (Hieronymus Vicecomes) 1171

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1172 Application File determining if witches we re heretics. This time, the rule, these spaces are parts of the religious imaginary “lady of the game” was clearly likened to Satan, the ( h e a ven, hell, purgatory, or symbolic rooms). An appari- g reat protagonist of the cere m o n y. Christian tion, on the contrary, is the sudden emergence of a demonology had transformed ancient beliefs. T h e re person, animal, or something usually not found in the was no doubt: Witches we re manifestly here t i c a l same space where the seer’s body is located. In this case, because they acted in re a l i t y, not dreams, and in full space does not change, but its content does (apparitions conscience. The “s e c t” of devil worshippers, to which of Jesus, Ma ry, the Lamb, saints, and so on); the seer they belonged, especially attracted women, but men, usually remains conscious and in control of his bodily e ven noblemen, who had their own familiar demons, functions. Today both phenomena would be called psy- were also drawn to it. Several of their acts proved that chic hallucinations, illusions, or fantasies experienced this sect was heretical: Its adepts we re apostates who during altered mental states. had renounced their faith and baptism, who worshiped Visions formed a typical part of the model of mystic the Devil and offered him sacrifices. Consequently, they sanctity, which predominated especially among spiritu- had to be punished. al women in late medieval and early modern While during the same period French authors such Catholicism. Eve ry famous saint of that epoch— as Nicolas Jacquier or Jean Vinet tried to distinguish Elizabeth of Hungary, Bridgit of Sweden, Catherine of clearly between followers of Diana and the “n ew” Siena, and Teresa of Avila—experienced ecstatic revela- h e resy of devil worshippers, Gi rolamo Visconti, like tions. Impostors like Sybilla of Marsal (thirt e e n t h such other Italian authors as Bernardino of Siena, John century) or Anna Laminit (fifteenth century) pretended of Capistrano, or Jordan of Bergamo, transformed the to receive visions regularly, because otherwise they had old beliefs in l a m i a e and Diana by twisting them no chance to be re c o g n i zed as holy women. A va s t toward the witches’ Sabbat, thus reinterpreting ancient corpus of religious writings, vision literature, developed folkloric legacies in terms of Christian demonology. f rom the Early Middle Ages onward, comprising both t r a vels to the other world—like the famous Vi s i o MARTINE OSTORERO; T n u g d a l i (The Vision of Tnugdalus [an Irish knight]; TRANSLATED BY KARNA HUGHES 1148/1149) or St. Francesca Romana’s ecstatic voyages through hell and purgatory—and mystical visions such See also:BERNARDINOOFSIENA;CANONEPISCOPI;DEMONOLOGY; DIANA(ARTEMIS); FLIGHTOFWITCHES;HERESY;JACQUIER, as the revelations of Henry Suso or Julian of Norwich. NICOLAS;LAMIA;MILAN;SABBAT;STRIX,STRIGA,STRIA;VAMPIRE; As late as the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a VINET,JEAN. rich corpus of mystical visions was produced by References and further reading: Emanuel Swedenborg, Anna Katharina Emmerick and Bonomo, Giuseppe. 1985. Caccia alle Streghe. La credenza nelle others. The fine arts were often influenced by visionary streghe dal sec. XIII al XIX con particolare referimento all’Italia. texts upon which some iconographical innova t i o n s Palermo: Palumbo. were based, namely, the scene of the Nativity following Hansen, Joseph. 1963. Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte a revelation of St. Bridgit. The detailed hell paintings of des Hexenwahns und der Hexenverfolgung im Mittelalter.Bonn, Simon Marmion, Hi e ronymus Bosch, Pieter Bru e g h e l 1901. Reprint, Hildesheim. the El d e r, and others derived many elements fro m Kaeppeli, Thomas O.P. 1993. Scriptores ordinis praedicatorum vision literature. medii aevi.Rome: Istituto Storico Domenicano. Lea, Henry Charles. 1957. Materials Towards a History of It seems indubitable that the witches’ re c o rds of Witchcraft.Edited by Arthur C. Howland. 3 vols. NewYork: encounters with the Devil and the ride to the Sabbat in AMS. reality were to some extent the consequences of visions, Rosario Lazzati, Maria. 1984. “Girolamo Visconti († 1478 ca.).” trances, and dreams. Heinrich Kramer, the author of Pp. 86–99, 358, in La stregoneria: Diavoli, streghe, inquisitori the Ma l l e u s Ma l e fic a rum (The Hammer of Wi t c h e s , dal Trecento al Settecento.Edited by Sergio Abbiati, Attilio 1486) and many other demonologists we re convinced Agnoletto, and Maria Rosario Lazzati. Milan: Arnaldo that the details of the Sabbat could be experienced Mondadori. imaginaria visione when sleeping on the left side Visconti, Girolamo. Circa 1460. Lamiarum sive striarum opuscu- (Ma l l e u s Ma l e fic a rum I, 17), though many authorities lumand Opusculum de striis. Biblioteca Casanatensis (Rome), thought real flights with a witch’s broom possible. 1480, folios 1–12v; Biblioteca Universitaria (Pavia), Aldini T h e re was, howe ve r, a marked difference between the 418, folios 1–15; Cornell University Library (Ithaca, New York), Ms. 45. experiences of women saints and those of the witches: W h e reas the former entered an appropriate psyc h i c Visions state through ascetic techniques such as self-fla g e l l a- A vision may be defined as an extranormal psyc h o s o- tion, insomnia, fasting, and meditation, but neve r matic experience, the feeling of being transported bodily t h rough the use of drugs, the latter re versed the and spiritually into another space while the body actual- p re p a r a t o ry pro c e d u re by swallowing hypnologic ly lies in a catalepsy, trance, ecstasy, or deep sleep. As a substances or anointing the body with hallucinogens. 1172 Visions

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1173 Application File For contemporaries, the same problem arose as with such as Laurent Bordelon, Lu d ovico Muratori, and miracles: Who caused these visions a woman claimed to Gi rolamo Ta rt a rotti, became openly critical of “s u p e r s t i- see? If the content of the vision was unmistakably t i o n s” and witch beliefs. Others, like Fr a n c i s diabolic, matters we re clear. But how should they judge Hutchinson, Scipione Maffei, Montesquieu, and— the numberless re velations where God or a saint appeare d a b ove all—Vo l t a i re, not only dismissed witch beliefs but to command some act or give judgment on someone? T h e also condemned the prosecutions themselve s . case of Joan of Arc, who was executed as a sorc e ress, is In his D i c t i o n n a i re philosophique ( Ph i l o s o p h i c a l only the best known of many similar dilemmas. He r Dictionary, 1764),where 25 of the 600 articles concern defenders held her apparitions of angels and saints to be magic, Vo l t a i re ridiculed witchcraft as the fantasy of authentic and her military mission to be the fulfillment of poor and ignorant women, deceived by some cro o k s Go d’s explicit order; her enemies denounced them as dev- and even more by their feeble minds. These women, ilish fantasies, guided by merely political and personal a c c o rding to Vo l t a i re, thought they we re able—after i n t e rests. The complex theological literature on the dis- saying the magical word a b raxa and putting horrid cernment of spirits shows how difficult it was to find out unguents all over their bodies—to fly to the Sa b b a t , whether God or his adve r s a ry produced such visions. where they met and worshiped the Devil in the shape of a goat. Vo l t a i re also dismissed the books supposedly PETER DINZELBACHER meant to help the magicians practice their rituals: the See also:BRUEGHEL,PIETERTHEELDER;DISCERNMENTOFSPIRITS; so-called g r i m o i re s , which Vo l t a i re claimed we re DRUGSANDHALLUCINOGENS;FLIGHTOFWITCHES;JOANOF absolutely meaningless, full of indecipherable signs. ARC;KRAMER,HEINRICH;MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;MIRACLES. The manuals written by inquisitors and witch hunters References and further reading: were just as silly as the grimoires. Voltaire chose Martín Benz, Ernst. 1969. Die Vision.Stuttgart: Klett. Del Rio’s Disquisitiones magicae libri sex (Six Books on Dinzelbacher, Peter. 1991. Révélations: Typologie des sources. In vestigations into Magic, 1599/1600) as his main Turnhout: Brepols. example of this genre, probably because Del Rio was a ———. 1993. “Nova visionaria et eschatologica.” Mediaevistik 6: 45–84. Jesuit, and Jesuits had become a main target of ———. 1998. “Vision Literature.” Pp. 668–693 in Medieval Enlightenment thought. Latin.Edited by F. Mantello and A. Rigg. Washington, DC: Vo l t a i re estimated that more than 100,000 witches Catholic University of America Press. had been condemned to death all over Europe (a figure ———. 2001. Heilige oder Hexen? Schicksale auffälliger Frauen. c u r rently accepted as a plausible number of trials, but 4th ed. Düsseldorf: Albatros. not deaths). The only way to stop this carnage, he ———. 2002. Himmel, Hölle, Heilige: Visionen und Kunst im w rote, was for p h i l o s o p h e s to teach judges that “t h e y Mittelalter.Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. should not burn idiots at the stake.” As for magicians, Dinzelbacher, Peter et al. 1997. “Vision.” Pp. 8:1730–1748 in Vo l t a i re wrote, “Nothing is more ridiculous than con- Lexikon des Mittelalters.8. Munich: LexMA. demning a real magician to burn at the stake; because Petroff, Elizabeth A. 1986. Medieval Women’sVisionary Literature. we should assume he would be able to extinguish the Oxford: Oxford University Press. fire and twist judges’ necks.” Voltaire (1694–1778) In his C o m m e n t a i re sur le livre des délits et des peines Though Fr a n ç o i s - Marie Arouet, better known as ( C o m m e n t a ry on the book concerning crimes and pun- Voltaire, was not the most vocal critic of witchcraft ishments, 1766 [Caesare Be c c a r i a’s Dei delitti e delle prosecutions in the eighteenth century, his fame as a p e n e , 1764].), Vo l t a i re discussed a trial that occurred in philosophe (forward-looking thinker) made him a sym- Ge n e va around 1652. A peasant woman named Mi c h e l l e bol of the Enlightenment’s rejection of witch beliefs C h a u d ron was condemned to death for making a pact and condemnation of witchcraft trials. with the Devil, who had ord e red her to bewitch two During the seventeenth century, witchcraft prosecu- girls. Vo l t a i re gave a short but moving description of how tions intensified in many European areas. But the most she was forced to confess under tort u re, but once again famous among the philosophers of that age, those now his explanation of the phenomenon went no further than seen as the formulators of the new rationalism, such as the usual binary opposition between idiocy-ignorance on René De s c a rtes, Ba ruch Spinoza, and Go t t f r i e d one hand (including both victims and persecutors) and Wilhelm Leibniz, stood silent about this phenomenon, philosophy-rationalism on the other. perhaps because they considered the belief in witchcraft MARINA MONTESANO too contemptible and misguided to warrant comment. See also:BEKKER,BALTHASAR;BORDELON,LAURENT;DECLINEOF The rejection of witch beliefs and the condemnation of THEWITCHHUNTS;DELRIO,MARTÍN;DESCARTES,RENÉ;DEVIL; the trials came mainly from theologians like Ba l t h a s a r ENLIGHTENMENT;GRIMOIRES;HUTCHINSON,FRANCIS;JESUITS Bekker and jurists like Christian Thomasius. (SOCIETYOFJESUS); MAFFEI,SCIPIONE;MURATORI,LUDOVICO After witch hunting had entered a period of decline in ANTONIO;SKEPTICISM;SUPERSTITION;TARTAROTTI,GIROLAMO; the eighteenth century, some Enlightenment thinkers, THOMASIUS,CHRISTIAN. Voltaire 1173

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1174 Application File References and further reading: c o u rts to tort u re prisoners on their own. It also Besterman, Theodore. 1976. Voltaire.Oxford: Blackwell. demanded more compre h e n s i ve evidence before mak- Libby, Margaret Sherwood. 1966. The Attitude of Voltaire to Magic ing further arrests and claimed the right to make all and the Sciences.1935. Reprint, NewYork: AMS. final decisions in witchcraft trials. This first series of Parinetto, Luciano. 1974. Magia e ragione: Una polemica sulle trials may have led to thirty or more executions. streghe in Italia intorno al 1750. Florence: La Nuova Italia. The next witchcraft trial took place at Bludenz in Porter, Roy. 1999. “Witchcraft and Magic in Enlightenment, 1570; the victim was a woman from the valley of Romantic, and Liberal Thought.” Pp. 191–282 in The Montafon. Fi ve years later, four women fro m Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.Vol. 5 of The Athlone History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe.Edited by Bengt Altenstadt were probably burned as witches, and three Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Athlone women we re executed in Bludenz at that time after a and University of Pennsylvania Press. p rofessional witch expert from Ur s e ren in Sw i t ze r l a n d Russel, Jeffrey B. 1986. Mephistopheles: The Devil in the Modern had convicted them on testimony obtained thro u g h World.Ithaca, NY, and London: Cornell University Press. harsh tort u res. In 1585 a woman was burned in Trevor-Roper, Hugh Redwald. 1967. “The European Witch-Craze Dornbirn; in 1586 and 1588 trials involving four of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries.” Pp. 90–192 in people from the valley of Klostertal ended with one Religion, the Reformation and Social Change.London: execution at Bludenz. Macmillan. After 1595, witch hunting in all counties of Voltaire. 1766. A Commentary on the Book, “Of Crimes and Vorarlberg reached a second peak, as in many other Punishments,” areas of central and western Europe. There were numer- http://www.constitution.org/volt/cmt_beccaria.htm (accessed March 6, 2004). ous connections with extreme agrarian crises. In 1597 ———. 1984. Philosophical Dictionary.Edited byTheodore and later, witch hunting in the dominion of Feldkirch Besterman. NewYork: Viking. led to a number of sharp conflicts between some local ———. 2000. Treatise on Tolerance and Other Writings.Edited by inhabitants and officials, especially at Dornbirn, where Simon Harvey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. u n o f ficial committees tried to circ u m vent the re g u l a r c o u rt and take control of both interrogations and Vorarlberg t o rt u re pro c e d u res. T h e re, the persecution of witches In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, officials on caused endless difficulties: When local authorities behalf of the Habsburgs administered most parts of carried out the persecutions requested by large parts of today’s Austrian federal state of Vorarlberg. A few terri- the population, they violated legal instructions or tories were self-governing members of the Holy Roman financial restrictions of the In n s b ruck government. If Empire, ruled by the counts of Ems and the abbots of they refused persecutions because of legal orders fro m We i n g a rten (Ba d e n - W ü rttemberg) and Ei n s i e d e l n In n s b ruck, they provoked bitter reactions from local ( Sw i t zerland). Neither clerical possession held any people, sometimes even rebellions. On the one hand, witchcraft trials. However, between 1528 and 1657 at this conflict saved the lives of many people; on the oth- least 170 people (approximately 80 percent of them e r, almost all executions we re carried out after trials women) were put on trial for witchcraft in the Austrian regarded as problematic by the Innsbruck government. territories and in autonomous territories, and at least The largest witchcraft trial in southern Vo r a r l b e r g 130 (or over two-thirds) of them were sentenced to was conducted at Bludenz in June 1597: Fi ve women death. lost their lives, and a man was burned some months The first victim of witch hunting who came fro m l a t e r. In 1604 two more women we re executed in Vorarlberg was a shoemaker’s wife in Bregenz; she died Bludenz. The most extensive series of trials in the histo- in a dungeon in Constance in 1493. Fi ve years later ry of Vorarlberg took place at Bregenz in 1609: Fro m another woman from Bregenz was imprisoned for a April through July, sixteen people from the surrounding long time after having been identified as a sorceress by region we re burned as witches or sorc e rers. The trials fellow citizens, who had practiced magic themselves in obviously started with the capture of Melch Schnell, a o rder to “d i s c ove r” her. The first witchcraft trial in healer from Ammenegg near Dornbirn. The gove r n- Vorarlberg took place at Bludenz in 1528; a woman ment had already recommended his arrest in 1602 from a nearby village was suspected of being a witch but because of his activities. During the second largest series was finally set free. T h e re we re a few more individual of witchcraft trials, ten more people were sentenced to trials in the following decades, but these did not lead to death at Bregenz in 1615. e xecutions. By the mid-sixteenth century, howe ve r, But the years following saw only individual trials. In whole groups of witches were being prosecuted, first in Vorarlberg, four executions we re re c o rded during the the region of Bregenzerwald and then in other parts of whole of the Thirty Years’War. A man from Hohenems the dominions of Fe l d k i rch as well as Bregenz. T h e was put on trial for magic at Bregenz in 1622—the only judicial prosecutions ended in spring 1551 when the prosecution in Austrian Vorarlberg that can be regarded Habsburg government at In n s b ruck forbade the local as social disciplining by the authorities (the magician 1174 Vorarlberg

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46049 Golden Chap.V av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1175 Application File was the only person who was not a Habsburg subject, s o rc e rer-priest for three years at Chur and Milan, he although he was not actually a foreigner). When the was finally found innocent and vindicated by papal local population complained about evil sorc e ry, the authority. Nevertheless, his former parishioners did not authorities usually did nothing or reacted with modera- tolerate his reinstatement. tion. But when crimes like abortion or the murder of a One of the main reasons for the relatively early end child were suspected, the authorities also took vigorous of witch hunting in the Austrian dominions in action regarding sorcery. Such circumstances led to the Vorarlberg was the particular stru c t u re of administra- execution of a woman from Scheffau in 1626. tion that complicated and hindered the pro s e c u t i o n s . Unlike the dominion of Bregenz, where witchcraft In Habsburg lands, the state did not inhibit trials, but trials continued after 1615, the south of today’s federal its legal pro c e d u res we re controlled more strictly. T h e state of Vorarlberg was apparently free of further trials last “successful” witchcraft trials, therefore, occurred in after 1604. Ne ve rtheless, women and men we re still territories beyond the reach of the government in suspected of witchcraft and ostracized as witches or sor- Innsbruck. c e rers there. In 1642, the supreme official of Bl u d e n z Nu m e rous slander trials showed that many people was even forced by threats against his person to bring a felt threatened or damaged by witches, even long after woman from Bürserberg to trial, notwithstanding all the last witchcraft trials. In Vorarlberg, it also becomes legal regulations, after a possessed woman had called a p p a rent in the context of eve ryday conflict strategies her a witch. that an accusation of women as witches represented the In the mid-seventeenth century, Vorarlberg experi- counterpart to accusing men of bestiality.Whereas men enced a third cycle of witch hunting. Executions now we re re g a rded as having positive magical abilities like took place only in those territories where local authori- healing, women we re ove rwhelmingly re p resented as ties had considerable autonomy, particularly the city practicing damaging magic. Such damages dominated and dominion of Fe l d k i rch, then governed by Karl the confessions in Vorarlberg. References to witchcraft Friedrich, Count of Hohenems. Under his rule, the last as a satanic cult are rare and rudimentary. In some very recorded death sentences in witchcraft trials in Austrian early testimony, there appear connections to pagan territories we re pronounced in 1651 against eight beliefs concerning fertility cults or the journey into the women by the court of Rankweil-Sulz. In the same year, world of the dead, similar to the beliefs of the an old woman died during interrogations in Bre g e n z . benandanti(do-gooders) of northeastern Italy. There the last witchcraft trial conducted by an Austrian MANFRED TSCHAIKNER c o u rt ended with acquittals for all defendants in 1656–1657. In the following decade, howe ve r, the See also:AGRARIANCRISES;AUSTRIA;BENANDANTI;FEMALE authorities faced further attempts to start prosecutions. WITCHES;HOHENEMS,FERDINANDKARLFRANZVON;HOLY These we re still possible in the county of Ho h e n e m s , ROMANEMPIRE;MALEWITCHES;SLANDER;TRIALS;VADUZ, including Lustenau, where the first known judicial COUNTYOF;WITCHHUNTS. References and further reading: proceeding occurred in 1631. From 1649 to 1653, no Tschaikner, Manfred. 1992. “Damit das Böse ausgerottet werde”— f ewer than twe n t y - t h ree people stood trial for sorc e ry. Hexenverfolgungen in Vorarlberg im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert. Eighteen of them we re put to death. In 1677 the last Bregenz: Vorarlberger Autoren Gesellschaft. witchcraft trials on Vorarlberg soil took place in ———. 1997a. “Die Hexenverfolgung in den Herrschaften Hohenems and Lustenau, claiming four women’s lives. Feldkirch und Neuburg um die Mitte des 17. Jahrhundert.” The last known sorc e rer from Vorarlberg was in Montfort49: 114–119. Schaan, a parish priest who came from the neighboring ———. 1997b.Magie und Hexerei im südlichen Vorarlberg zu village of Frastanz. Arrested and investigated as a Beginn der Neuzeit.Constance: Universitätsverlag. Vorarlberg 1175

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1177 Application File W Wagstaffe, John (1633–1677) that belief in witches derived from pagan superstition; Wagstaffe is author of The Question of Wi t c h c raft De b a t e d third, that Catholicism encouraged this belief in order (1669, with a second expanded edition in 1671). We to extend its powe r, while introducing new elements k n ow little about Wa g s t a f f e’s life, except that he was edu- (the pact with the Devil, flight through the air, the cated at St. Pa u l’s School and Oriel College, Oxford . Sabbat); and fourth, that belief in witchcraft was inter- Anthony à Wood claimed in his Athenae Oxonienses ( A n nally inconsistent because it presented witches as Exact Hi s t o ry of All the Writers and Bishops who have p owe rful, though they we re penniless, and devils as had their Education in the Un i versity of Oxford fro m omnicompetent, although God alone was omnipotent. 1500 to 1690, 1691–1692) that Wagstaffe was a dru n k- Wagstaffe insisted that he believed in spirits (mean- a rd. In 1660, Wagstaffe wrote the antipapal Hi s t o r i c a l while noting that someone who did not believe in Re flections on the Bishop of Ro m e ,and he also contributed spirits would be foolish to deny their reality) and thus a Greek poem to a volume, Britannia Re d i v i va ,c e l e b r a t- accepted the stories of poltergeists that Glanvill and ing the restoration of Charles II. others re p o rted. But in the first edition of his major In the Question of Wi t c h c raft De b a t e d , Wa g s t a f f e w o rk, Wagstaffe claimed that belief in spirits who n ow h e re acknowledged any previous attacks on belief played “mad pranks” (1669, 60) and “malicious tricks” in witchcraft (for example, those by Johann We ye r, (63) and who were “frolick and gamesome in doing us Reginald Scot, or Thomas Ady), although we can m i s c h i e f” (63) in no way implied belief in a demonic assume he had read at least some of them. The only pact between witch and demon. skeptical author he mentioned was Girolamo Cardano, It is hard not to suppose that Wagstaffe expected his whose skepticism was extremely cautious. Wa g s t a f f e’s readers to adapt his arguments against witches into good classical education had acquainted him with attacks on belief in spirits and on religion itself. He major works defending belief in witchcraft; in this ridiculed the argument that one should believe in re g a rd, he mentioned Johannes Ni d e r, Ba rt o l o m e o witches because “so many thousands of wise men in the della Spina, Paulo Grillando, and Martín Del Rio. He world have believed,” for “the various religions that had evidently read a contemporary defense of belief in h a ve been in the world, are more than enough to witchcraft, Joseph Gl a n v i l l’s A Bl ow at Mo d e rn convince one, how absurd and ridiculous the wisest of Sadducism (1668), from which he took the story of the men are in matters of opinion and belief” (67–68). demon drummer of Ti d w o rth. Among modern And while ostensibly rejecting the view that re l i g i o n authors, Wagstaffe showed the most respect for the was the result of irrational fear, he held that this was Venetian historian and propagandist Paolo Sarpi, on indeed the origin of belief in witchcraft and that this whose History of the Inquisition he drew freely, using the belief was fostered by “wise politicians” (70)—a line of 1639 English translation. argument he developed through a general survey of Wa g s t a f f e’s private beliefs are hard to ascertain. He pagan religion, attacking Platonism in part i c u l a r denied Gl a n v i l l’s central claim that skepticism about (though he acknowledged that Platonism was much witchcraft implied skepticism about the existence of a d m i red by the first Christians). He concluded that spirits and even of God—although his attack on witch- attacking belief in witchcraft could help to save the lives craft might have been intended to encourage his readers of those tortured into false confessions and that “under to start down the slippery slope Glanvill identified. It this side Heaven, there is nothing so sacred as the life of has been argued that Wagstaffe was indebted to man, for the preservation whereof, all policies or forms Thomas Hobbes, whose materialism certainly extended of government, all laws and magistrates, are most to skepticism about witches and spirits and was general- especially ord a i n e d” (80), an argument that seems ly thought to imply atheism; Wagstaffe’s arguments are straightforwardly Hobbesian. certainly compatible with Hobbism. Despite the denials and equivocations, it seems prob- His core arguments we re, first, that the Bible was able that Gl a n v i l l’s insistence that denial of witchcraft mistranslated when taken to refer to witchcraft; second, led straight to atheism inspired Wagstaffe to write an Wagstaffe, John 1177

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1178 Application File attack on belief in witchcraft that surreptitiously incul- To d a y, so-called modern witches try to re l a t e cated atheistical principles. It is surely no coincidence Walpurgis Night to witchcraft through the Celtic that the first edition was accompanied by a translation feast of Beltane, a fertility celebration to we l c o m e of a dialogue by Lucian of Samosata, widely understood spring. They claim that Christian doctrine tried to to be opposed to all religious belief; in the second edi- extinguish the memory of this feast or at least re d u c e tion of his work, Wagstaffe acknowledged that “t h e re its popularity by encouraging the distribution of are some who wonder that I would offer to annex unto s c a ry tales about witches coming together on this spe- my book, a Dialogue of Lucian, who as they say was a cial night to dance and to worship the Devil. In fact, known atheist” (1671, 151). His response to the charge historical sources provide no evidence that any pagan of atheism was that “the assertors of witchcraft do fre- spring festival surv i ved beyond the Early Mi d d l e quently object atheism unto those that deny it. But I Ages. Re c o rds of witchcraft trials dating from the age am still of the opinion, that such a ridiculous slander is of the great Eu ropean witch persecution (that is, in not worthy to be answered” (1671 preface, A3rv). How Germany from the middle of the fifteenth to the mid- influential Wagstaffe’s views were is hard to assess. They dle of the seventeenth centuries) re veal that the inve s- we re quickly attacked by R. T. in The Opinion of tigators always inquired about the exact locations Witchcraft Vindicated (1670). Yet Wagstaffe’s work was w h e re the so-called devil’s dances (the term w i t c h e s’ translated into German in 1711, and his arguments Sabbat o c c u r red ve ry rarely in the sources) took place. re a p p e a red in William Pi t t i s’s The Impossibility of Yet even under the cruelest tort u res, the suspects did Witchcraft(1712). not name Walpurgis Night as a special occasion for meeting the De v i l . DAVID WOOTTON Instead, they confessed that the De v i l’s worshippers See also:BIBLE;CARDANO,GIROLAMO;ENGLAND;GLANVILL, danced almost eve ry week. They could meet on any JOSEPH;HOBBES,THOMAS;POLTERGEIST;SKEPTICISM;SUPERSTI- day of the week, at any time of night or day, and in TION. any place inside or outside the town or village. References and further reading: Howe ve r, they clearly pre f e r red Thursday to other Elmer, Peter, ed. 2003. The Post-Restoration Synthesis and Its days and darkness to daytime. Most of the places they Opponents.Introduction and facsimile reprint of The Question chose for dancing we re situated on the tops of hills or of Witchcraft Debated(1669). Vol. 4 of English Witchcraft, mountains or in clearings or meadows. Consequently, 1560–1736.Edited by James Sharpe. 6 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto. o rd i n a ry people imagined that witches met either on Hunter, Michael. 1995. “The Witchcraft Controversy and the e l e vations or in spots that served as dancing places for Nature of Free Thought in Restoration England: John local villagers. The confessions contained no hint of Wagstaffe’sThe Question of Witchcraft Debated.” Pp. 286–307 any specific witch festival on Walpurgis Night. In the in Science and the Shape of Orthodoxy.Edited by Michael context of witchcraft trials, even the Blocksberg (or Hunter.Woodbridge: Boydell. Brocken) was seldom re f e r red to as the site of witch meetings. The same is true for another mountain Walpurgis (Walpurigs) Night called Blocksberg in the Black Fo rest. Like its counter- In popular belief,Walpurgis is the night between April p a rt in the Ha rz Mountains, it was said to be a place 30 and May 1 when all witches meet at the top of the w h e re witches flew and gathered in order to celebrate. Blocksberg (now called Brocken) in the Harz Mountain A witchcraft trial in Cologne in 1653 was the only Range in central Germany. case in the city when a beggar confessed that the De v i l The occasion is named for the Anglo-Saxon princess himself had taken her through the air to the Walburga, who was the niece of St. Boniface and abbess Bl o c k s b e r g . of a nunnery at Heidenheim in Ge r m a n y, where she The second half of the seventeenth century brought died in 777. On May 1, 870, her corpse was transport- about a change in the scenario for witch dances—the ed to Eichstätt, and this date became her feast day. In “d i s c ove ry” of Walpurgis Night. Hans Jacob Christo most parts of Sweden, people used to light bonfires on von Grimmelshausen did not connect the scenario of Walpurgis Night ( Va l b o r g m a e s s o a vo n d) to we l c o m e the witches’ Sabbat that he depicted in his nove l , spring. Traditionally, May 1 was the first day of the year Ab e n t h e u e rlicher Si m p l i c i s s i m u s (The Ad ve n t u res of a when the cattle and the sheep were driven out of their Simpleton, published in 1668), to any particular date stables to graze in the meadows and woods. Bonfire s or location. But Johannes Prätorius, in his book and noise would, it was believed, protect the livestock Bl o c k e s - Berges Ve r r i c h t u n g (The Bl o c k s b e r g against wild animals or evil powers. It is quite possible Pe rformance, also published in 1668), was the first to that the custom of the Freinacht in southern Germany determine that Walpurgis Night was the time and the (when young people play tricks on eve ryone) is Brocken was the place where all the witches gathere d . connected with this traditional moment of driving out Although Gottfried Vogt followed Pr ä t o r i u s’s example the cattle. in his De conventu sagarum ad sua s a b b a t a ( On the 1178 Walpurgis (Walpurigs) Night

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1179 Application File Gatherings of Witches at the Sabbat), published in that Kramer’s persecution of witches was unive r s a l l y Wittenberg in 1678, the notion of Walpurgis Night as rejected in Tyrol becomes clear from a letter of October a witch festival did not become part of general 21, 1485, from Paulus Wann to Konrad Airimschmalz German lore until after 1800, when Goethe published (1425–1495), prior of the Benedictines at Tegernsee in his Fa u s t , containing a highly influ e n t i a l Ba varia. Wann pointed out that the women we re “Wa l p u r g i s n a c h t” scene. Basing his witch-dancing fan- accused without reason and suggested that these inqui- tasies on Prätorius, Goethe contributed a great deal to sitions had seve rely damaged the pope’s reputation. A establishing Walpurgis Night as the exc l u s i ve time for series of sermons, which Wann promised to design, witches to meet. would be necessary to restore confidence. Although we do not know whether these sermons we re eve r THOMAS P. BECKER d e l i ve red, the experienced pre a c h e r’s announcement See also:FAUST,JOHANN;PRÄTORIUS,JOHANNES;SABBAT. s t rongly suggests that preachers in Ty rol and Ba va r i a References and further reading: may have spread the ill fame of Inquisitor Kramer— Behringer,Wolfgang. 1999. Shaman of Obertsdorf: Chonrad and possibly of witch hunting in general—even before Stoekhlin and the Phantoms of the Night.Translated by H. C. the Reformation. Erik Midelfort. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. Biesel, Elisabeth. 1998. “Die Pfeiffer seint alle uff den baumen WOLFGANG BEHRINGER gesessen: Der Hexensabbat in der Vorstellungswelt der See also:AUSTRIA;BAVARIA,DUCHYOF;GOLSER,GEORGE;KRAMER ländlichen Bevölkerung.” Pp. 289–302 in Methoden und (INSTITORIS), HEINRICH;MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;MOLITOR, Konzepte der historischen Hexenforschung.Edited by Gunter ULRICH;TYROL,COUNTYOF. Franz and Franz Irsigler.Trier: Spee. References and further reading: Mengs, Maria. 1979. Schrifttum zum Leben und zur Verehrung der Behringer,Wolfgang. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: heiligen Walburga (+ 779). Eichstätt: Kirchliche Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early Gesamthochschule. Modern Europe.Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wann, Paulus (ca. 1420–1489) Werlin, J. 1961. “Paul Wann, ein berühmter Passauer Prediger im Wann was a noted preacher who opposed the early per- 15. Jahrhundert.” Passauer Jahrbuch, Ostbairische Grenzmarken secution of witches. Born in the Upper Palatinate, he 5: 64–66. studied theology at the University of Vienna after 1441, receiving his master’s degree in 1448 and starting to lec- Warboys, Witches of (1593) ture. After Wann took his doctorate in 1460 at Vienna The affair of the witches of Warboys, resulting in the (then part of the large diocese of Passau), Bishop Ulrich e xecution of three people in 1593, ranks among III of Passau appointed him as his cathedral preacher England’s most important witchcraft cases. In many and also made him a canon at the cathedral chapter of respects, it set a pattern that would often recur in later Passau in 1477. By then, manuscripts of Wann’s ser- witchcraft episodes, most famously at Sa l e m , mons were already widely spread among Bavarian and Massachusetts, in 1692. Austrian monasteries. Some of his sermons had been The case centered on the sufferings of the children of printed as early as 1460; several others were often pub- RobertThrockmorton, a gentleman living in the parish lished afterward. Acknowledged as a leading Church of Warboys (Huntingdonshire). In November 1589, his official during his lifetime, Wann is still remembered at daughter Jane, almost ten, developed strange symp- Vienna for his foundation of a scholarship, the Bursa toms, including violent sneezing, trances, and bodily Pauli; Catholics know him for his defense of the c o n t o rtions. Two doctors based in nearby Cambridge Immaculate Conception, and historians of witchcraft were consulted, and being unable to find natural causes know him for his early opposition to this new concept. for young Ja n e’s sickness, they suggested witchcraft as Wann had seemingly been invited by Bishop Georg the cause: At an early stage in her sufferings, Jane had Golser of Br i xen to serve as an external witness in indeed called a village woman named Alice Samuel, a Golser’s attempt to terminate the inquisition conducted visitor to the T h ro c k m o rton household, a witch. Tw o by Heinrich Kramer, author of the Ma l l e u s other of Throckmorton’s daughters (he had seven chil- Ma l e fic a rum (The Hammer of Witches, 1486). Wa n n d ren in all) fell ill and also accused Alice Sa m u e l was appointed a member of the tribunal that assembled of bewitching them. A little later, yet two more at Innsbruck on October 29, 1485. After three days of -daughters, the oldest being fifteen, developed the same i n t e n s i ve discussions with Kramer and the inquisitor’s symptoms, as would various household serva n t s assistants, the bishop’s vicar, Christian Turner, nullified thereafter. the trials and ord e red the liberation of all imprisoned The girls’ sufferings lasted well over three ye a r s , women. Kramer suggested in the Ma l l e u s that these attracting considerable local attention. A re l a t i ve , trials had been successfully completed and had the bish- Gilbert Pickering, supposedly the girls’ uncle, played a op’s support. That exactly the opposite was the case and leading role in confirming that their sufferings we re Warboys, Witches of 1179

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1180 Application File attributable to witchcraft; it is probably no accident References and further reading: that he was member of a rising No rt h a m p t o n s h i re DeWindt, A. R. 1995. “Witchcraft and Conflicting Visions of the Puritan gentry family. The parish re c t o r, Dr. Fr a n c i s Ideal Village Community.” Journal of British Studies 34: 48–71. The Most Strange and Admirable Discoverie of the Three Witches at Dorington, also became convinced of the reality of Warboys Arraigned, Convicted and Executed at the Last Assizes at Alice Sa m u e l’s witchcraft. Members of the Cro m we l l Huntingdon. 1603.London. family we re lords of the manor of Wa r b oys, and Lady Tatem, Moira. 1993. The Witches of Warboys.March, Susan Cromwell was supposedly bewitched to death by Cambridgeshire: Cambridgeshire Libraries. Samuel after forcing a confrontation with the supposed witch. Alice Samuel was more or less kept prisoner in the T h ro c k m o rton residence and put under heavy Warfare psychological pressure until she was induced to confess Wa rf a re and witch persecution we re both defin i n g to Ro b e rt T h ro c k m o rton. She subsequently re t r a c t e d f e a t u res of the early modern period; thus, historians this confession but was tricked into repeating it before h a ve examined the connection (if any) between them. hidden witnesses. She, her daughter Agnes, and her To what extent and in what ways did warf a re provide a husband John we re eventually sentenced to death for context of “c r i s i s” in which popular anxiety about witch- witchcraft at the Huntingdon assizes in April 1593. craft rose and the likelihood of witch hunts incre a s e d ? Re s e a rch has demonstrated that Wa r b oys, a small Wa rf a re was commonplace in early modern Eu ro p e village of some seventy families, was essentially run by as the religious divisions produced by the Reformation the more successful farming families and that the arrival added another cause for conflict to the traditional of a gentry family such as the Throckmortons upset the factors of dynastic riva l ry and territorial disputes. In p a r i s h’s political balance. The Samuel family was we l l western Europe, the early sixteenth century was marked established in the area, and John Samuel, although a by the Ha b s b u r g – Valois wars in Italy; after the troublesome and possibly violent man, had served as a Reformation, religious conflict provoked the Ge r m a n j u ror on the manorial court of Wa r b oys. Perhaps the Schmalkaldic Wars (from 1546 to 1547 and in 1552), context of the case was provided by differing visions of the French Wars of Religion (between 1562 and 1598), h ow a village community should function, with the and the Revolt of the Netherlands against Spain (from incoming, well-connected, and possibly Puritan gentle- 1566/1567 to 1609). In the seventeenth century, civil man opposing the more relaxed view of an established war affected Spain (in 1640), France (from 1648 to farming family. 1653), and England, where civil war after 1642 culmi- The case was described in a fairly lengthy tract, prob- nated in the execution of Charles I in 1649. Germany ably coauthored by a number of people with firsthand became the theater of devastating Eu ropean re l i g i o u s experience of the events. It gave lengthy descriptions of and political conflict in the Thirty Years’War. Religious the girls’ sufferings, providing a model for similar later conflict calmed down thereafter in western and central cases in which children and adolescents demonstrated Eu rope, but warf a re remained endemic in the early alarming symptoms that allegedly resulted from witch- modern world, with Poland and New England suffering craft. Mo re ove r, in the Wa r b oys case, as in many later especially in the late seventeenth century. In fact, ones, the bewitched claimed to have been troubled by Eu rope was free from international wars for only a spirits sent into them by witches, thus allowing for a handful of years in the seventeenth century. c o n flation of bewitchment with demonic possession. Witch hunts we re, in fact, rare during periods of Interestingly, both William Somers, who was allegedly actual warf a re, because people we re too pre o c c u p i e d schooled in being possessed by John Darrell, and Anne with saving their own lives and livelihoods to worry Gu n t e r, who was at the center of a witchcraft case about witches and also because war disrupted the com- between 1604 and 1606, had read the tract describing munity networks necessary for effective legal pro s e c u- the Wa r b oys case and modeled their simulated suffer- tion of witchcraft. Communities we re more likely to ings on those of the Throckmorton girls. prosecute witches in the aftermath of war, because the The Wa r b oys affair did not end with the exe c u t i o n long-term psychological effects of the experience of war of the three supposed witches. It was commemorated could increase the communal anxieties that we re an by annual sermons, delive red into the nineteenth cen- essential, if intangible, factor in witch hunts. Probably t u ry, on the evils of witchcraft, preached at All Sa i n t s for this reason, witchcraft trials intensified in parts of C h u rch in Huntingdon eve ry Lady Day (Ma rch 25) early modern France, Hungary, and Poland shortly after by a doctor of divinity from Queens College, a war or internal uprising had ended (Levack 1995). C a m b r i d g e . T h reats of war also had a psychological impact on early modern communities that might stimulate witch JAMES SHARPE hunts. The increased scale and frequency of tro o p See also:BEWITCHMENT;ENGLAND;GUNTER,ANNE;PAMPHLETS m ovements (which not only re p resented the immi- ANDNEWSPAPERS;POSSESSION,DEMONIC;PURITANISM;SALEM. nence of war but also spread disease and caused dearth) 1180 Warfare

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1181 Application File likely contributed to the exceptionally seve re episodes trials: Many cases were left to local justices of the peace, of witch persecution that devastated some Catholic who were unable or unwilling to resist popular pressure ecclesiastical territories of southeastern Germany dur- to act against witches. The activities of Hopkins and his ing the T h i rty Ye a r s’ Wa r. In the prince-bishopric of partner, John Stearne, in fanning the flames of popular W ü rzburg, for example, as many as 900 individuals witch-hunting zeal would have been quashed much we re executed for witchcraft between 1625 and 1630. m o re rapidly by the central authorities in peacetime. Here, however, the threat of war was the final straw for The re m oval of press censorship also helped incre a s e a population already adversely affected by plague epi- anxiety about the threat of witchcraft. In fact, many demics and inflation since 1606 and by harvest failures pamphlets on this and related themes were published as during the 1620s; more ove r, the people had alre a d y “witchcraft and ancillary popular beliefs now came to experienced one prewar episode of severe witch hunting be recognised as a useful means of promoting political in 1616 and 1617. Anxieties caused by the vicissitudes or religious issues” by the opposing sides (Valletta 2000, of the Thirty Years’War up to 1635 also contributed to 217). The Civil War may also have caused a crisis of some outbreaks of witchcraft trials in parts of we s t e r n m a s c u l i n i t y. Men whose fears of losing control ove r Germany, including the city of Cologne (Irsigler 1996). their own lives increased as a result of the threat of war Even if warf a re increased popular anxieties about or the experience of battle, it has been argued, used witches and the desire to make witchcraft accusations, actual or fantasized acts of violence against witches as a the crucial factor dictating whether witch hunts would way of reasserting normality and their masculine identi- occur was the willingness of judicial elites to acquiesce ties (Pu rkiss 1997). This thesis seems plausible to an to communal demands for trials. For instance, fears extent, but it was surely the case that the terror of pow- about witchcraft did intensify for some members of the erlessness that was so marked in wartime was far from l ower orders of the German imperial free city of gender specific. Rothenburg ob der Tauber and its rural hinterland in Ma ry Beth No rton has maintained vigorously that the aftermath of the T h i rty Ye a r s’ Wa r. The confli c t’s the scale and intensity of the Salem crisis was due to the devastating impact had made them more anxious about fact that Puritan New England experienced two devas- their ability to survive; it had also created a mentality of tating wars in the late seventeenth century—the Fi r s t “e ve ry household for itself,” weakening the bonds of and Second Indian Wars (from 1675 to 1676 and from good neighborliness that usually helped restrain witch- 1688 to 1699, re s p e c t i vely), during which pre v i o u s l y craft accusations. In addition, new ideas about witch- p ro s p e rous settlements along the coast northeast of craft and magic had been spread in this region by the Massachusetts we re ravaged by the Wabanakis, often many troops who had marched through it or been acting in alliance with the French. These wars, Norton q u a rt e red there. Because the Rothenburg city council has asserted, had a psychological impact on various key maintained a legally restrained approach to witchcraft groups involved in the Salem crisis. Some of the afflict- trials, howe ve r, popular anxiety never translated into ed accusers we re girls and young women who we re large-scale witch panics. Nonetheless, we should be refugees from the wars. Their stories of being attacked w a ry of overgeneralizing about the psyc h o l o g i c a l by witches’ specters thus represented a way for them to impact of warfare: For some Rothenburg peasants, sim- a rticulate their own guilt at having surv i ved the ply surviving the Thirty Years’War increased their piety Wabanaki attacks that had killed their families. T h a t and trust in God rather than their anxiety and fear of their accusations against men such as the minister witches (Rowlands 2003). George Burroughs or the wealthy Jersey-born merchant Two (in)famous episodes of witch persecution for Philip English were taken seriously can also be under- which a strong causal link to warfare has been suggested stood in the context of the wars: Burroughs generated we re the largest to occur in their re s p e c t i ve countries: suspicion that he was in league with the Devil and thus the 1645–1647 East Anglian witch hunts, instigated by the Wabanakis, in part because he had an uncanny England’s self-styled “Witch-Finder General,” Matthew talent for surviving the latter’s attacks unscathed, while Hopkins, and the Salem witchcraft crisis of 1692 in suspicion that English may have been in league with the America, which saw 20 executions and over 150 accusa- enemies of Puritan New England was raised because he tions of witchcraft. The East Anglian witch hunts, va s t l y was a native French speaker with many trading links to larger than anything else of the kind in English history, the French. New En g l a n d’s judicial and clerical elites claimed at least 100 and possibly as many as 200 lives; were (at least initially) willing to lend full support to the the witch hunts occurred during the English Civil War witchcraft trials as a means of compensating for their and would no doubt not have escalated so far if they failure in dealing effectively with the Wabanaki threat, had not taken place at a time of such political, religious, and the idea that there was a large, organized group of and social upheaval. The distractions of war meant that witches in the process of attacking New Englanders in the usually restraining influence of the assize court spectral form made sense to people who already felt judges was absent in the crucial early months of the t h e m s e l ves under siege at the hands of their visible Warfare 1181

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1182 Application File enemies (Norton 2002). Norton’s work has been criti- heresy. But over time, royal administration broke down, cised for overemphasizing the Indian Wars as the only plunging France into virtual anarchy. re l e vant explanatory context for the Salem witchcraft Starting, like the religious wars themselves, in 1562, trials (Karlsen 2003). Howe ve r, the work that No rt o n executions of witches began spreading across the king- and others have done on the links between warfare and dom. They escalated after 1580, especially in the witch hunts in New England, England, and Ge r m a n y appellate courts of northern France. Meanwhile, the fir s t demonstrates both how important it is to contextualize major French demonology, by Jean Bodin, appeare d . these episodes as carefully as possible and the extent to Catholic propagandists argued, stridently and insistent- which psychological factors need to be integrated into l y, for an underlying connection between re l i g i o u s explanations of specific witchcraft trials. warfare and the simultaneous spread of diabolic witch- craft in France. While the military wars sputtered on ALISON ROWLANDS and off, the propaganda war was ceaseless. Very early in See also:AGRARIANCRISES;ENGLAND;FEAR;HOPKINS,MATTHEW; the religious wars, Catholic polemicists adopted the IMPERIALFREECITIES;NEWENGLAND;PANICS;POPULAR v i ew that the Protestant heresy was the work of the PERSECUTION;SALEM;SPECTRALEVIDENCE;WARSOFRELIGION Devil. In turn, they argued, the heretics helped the De v i l (FRANCE); WITCHPANICS;WÜRZBURG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF. in his attempt to lead humankind to damnation. T h e References and further reading: religious turmoil and violence we re seen as signs of Irsigler, Franz. 1996. “Zauberei- und Hexenprozesses in Köln, the presence of Antichrist; the Apocalypse was near. 15.–17. Jahrhundert.” Pp. 169–193 in Hexenglaube und These propagandists often conflated heresy and witch- Hexenprozesse im Raum Rhein-Mosel-Saar.Edited by Gunther Franz and Franz Irsigler.Trier: Spee. craft in their sermons and tracts. The battle against Karlsen, Carol. 2003. “Devils in the Shape of Good Men,” a witches and the battle against heretics became the same review of Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare,in Common- fig h t . Place3, no. 2 (January), http://common- These themes first surfaced with the “Miracle of place.dreamhost.com//vol–03/no–02/reviews/karlsen.shtml Laon” in 1566. Dramatic public exorcisms ended with (accessed August 10, 2004). the successful expulsion of the demons possessing Levack, Brian. 1995. The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe.2nd Nicole Obry, and her demons revealed themselves to be ed. London and NewYork: Longman. leaders of the Protestant heretics. Re p o rts of the inci- Norton, Mary Beth. 2002. In the Devil’s Snare: The Salem dent depicting the successful exorcism as a great victory Witchcraft Crisis of 1692.NewYork: Knopf. for Catholicism circulated throughout France. Fro m Notestein, Wallace. 1968. “Matthew Hopkins.” Pp. 164–205 in that time on, Catholic demonology in France was his History of Witchcraft in England.NewYork: Crowell. Purkiss, Diane. 1997. “Desire and Its Deformities: Fantasies of directed against the existence of Protestantism as well as Witchcraft in the English Civil War.” Journal of Medieval and the eradication of witches. Early Modern Studies27: 103–132. Another significant development followed the Peace Rowlands, Alison. 2003. Witchcraft Narratives in Germany: of St. Germain in 1570, which the Protestants seemed Rothenburg, 1561–1652.Manchester: Manchester University to win at the conference table despite losing eve ry Press. major battle. In this troubled atmosphere, the Je s u i t Sharpe, James. 1996. “England’s Mass Witch-Hunt: East Anglia, Juan Maldonado, professor of theology at the 1645–7.” Pp. 128–147 in his Instruments of Darkness: University of Paris, gave a long and very popular series Witchcraft in England, 1550–1750.London: Hamish of lectures. Maldonado, who described himself as a sol- Hamilton. dier in the war against heresy, regarded witchcraft ideas Valletta, Fredreick. 2000. Witchcraft, Magic and Superstition in as orthodox and also emphasized the close relationship England, 1640–70.Aldershot, Burlington, Singapore, and Sydney: Ashgate. between the Devil and the heretics. Among his auditors we re several men who later became authorities in Wars of Religion (France) demonological matters, including Ma rtín Del Rio, In the second half of the sixteenth century, France, like Pi e r re de Lancre, Louis Richeome, and Jean Boucher. most other western European countries, intensified the Ma l d o n a d o’s lectures, which demonized the pursuit of witches. Between 1562 and 1596, France was Protestants, might have contributed to the fury of the torn by bitter and often brutal civil and religious wars St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacres in 1572. between Catholics and Protestants (Calvinists, known One of Maldonado’s pupils, Jean Boucher, became a as Huguenots). Religious allegiances merged with a founding member and active participant in the Sixteen, struggle for power among the great nobles. Sectarian the group of men who ran Paris from 1588 to 1594. violence escalated into organized warfare early in 1562, During this time, priests preached violently against and a pattern of open warfare followed by short-lived h e retics and witches and threatened anyone who peace treaties persisted until early 1596. The monarchs seemed to be insincere in their commitment to generally tried to act as peacemakers, and French Catholicism. T h roughout this period, the number of parlements (sovereign judicial courts) stopped trials for witchcraft cases appealed to the Pa rl e m e n t of Pa r i s 1182 Wars of Religion (France)

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1183 Application File s t a yed fairly level, at eight to ten per ye a r. But during Macfarlane 1970, 20). The procedure was clearly aimed these years, the rates of death penalties the court meted at exhausting the witch so that she or he was no longer out rose. Over the six or seven decades that the able to deny the accusations. parlementapplied the death penalty for witchcraft, few- “Watching and walking” was not the only psycholog- er than one-tenth of the witchcraft cases that we re ical expedient to break a witch’s will. Exorcism was used h e a rd ended in the application of capital punishment. long before the Reformation to sever all connections During the years of the Catholic League, however, this b e t ween the suspect and her or his demonic accom- rose to over one-quarter of the trial cases. This percent- plices, and it remained a standard pro c e d u re in many age of death penalties in witchcraft cases was still fairly Catholic regions. Suspects we re sprinkled with holy l ow in a Eu ropean context, but it re p resented a sharp water (or even forced to drink it) or sacred objects were i n c rease in the court’s usual approach to this crime. hung around their necks while priests read elaborate ( Meanwhile, witchcraft cases actually dropped sharply anathemas to expel their devils. The psyc h o l o g i c a l in the Pa rl e m e n t of Rouen, also staffed by Catholic effect of such actions in a culture intensely convinced of zealots, because few people obeyed the zealots.) the effectiveness of sacred rituals can hardly be underes- The last major incident pertaining to witch- timated. This observation also applies to practices such craft—the demonic possession of Ma rthe Brossier in as searching for the Devil’s mark. Several demonologists 1599—occurred shortly after the wars had finally end- claimed that the Devil clawed out Go d’s mark placed ed. Catholic zealots hated the settlement imposed by on the foreheads of the faithful during confir m a t i o n . King He n ry IV. Bro s s i e r’s exo rcisms, performed in a The Devil was then supposed to replace it with his own ve ry tense Paris during the quarrels over the Edict of m a rk, which could be located anywhere on a witch’s Nantes (which had granted legal recognition to body. As a result, it was deemed necessary to shave sus- Calvinists in 1598), were a clear attempt to repeat the pects all over their bodies and then look for the Devil’s Miracle of Laon and to pre vent a religious truce. T h e m a rk; the suspects we re often blindfolded, and they king, recognizing the danger, intervened. After a we re searched by pricking conspicuous spots to see if medical inquiry found Ma rthe to be a fraud, the they we re numb. Such actions, certainly if applied in exorcisms were suppressed, and she was sent home. combination, caused the accused individuals to lose all sense of reality: The techniques broke their re s i s t a n c e JONATHAN L. PEARL and made them ready to confess. See also: ANTICHRIST;APOCALYPSE;APPEALS;BODIN,JEAN; Not every hangman or executioner was familiar with BROSSIER,MARTHE;DELRIO,MARTÍN;DEMONOLOGY;EXORCISM; this technique, and as a consequence, it took this skill FRANCE;HERESY;LANCRE,PIERREDE;MALDONADO,JUAN;OBRY, some time to spread. This process has been analyzed in NICOLE;PARLEMENTOFPARIS;POSSESSION,DEMONIC;WARFARE. detail for the northern Netherlands. In 1491, the mag- References and further reading: istrates of Zutphen, a town in the eastern province of Holt, Mack. 1995. The French Wars of Religion.Cambridge: Gelderland, asked their colleagues in Cologne for prac- Cambridge University Press. tical information. They had submitted three women to Pearl, Jonathan L. 1999. The Crime of Crimes: Demonology and heavy tort u re and exo rcism but to no avail. The out- Politics in France, 1560–1620.Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfred come of this trial is unknown, but a few years later, the Laurier University Press. executioner of Zutphen had become an acknowledged Soman, Alfred. 1978. “The Parlement of Paris and the Great Witch Hunt (1565–1640).” Sixteenth-Century Journal9, no. 2: e x p e rt in such matters and was hired by other court s 31–44. farther west to extort confessions. In 1513, the authori- ties of the city of Nijmegen asked the hangman of Watching and Walking C l e ves to probe three women, and six years later, Many suspected witches were forced to confess not by “master Sy m o n” was again employed to that end by being physically tortured, but through types of brain- Nijmegen and also by the city of Utrecht. In 1528, the washing. Sleep deprivation was the most frequently new technique was first applied in the coastal province used means to that end. In England, the self-styled of Holland by a Gelderland exe c u t i o n e r. The tow n witch finder Ma t t h ew Hopkins applied this mental pre s- court of Amsterdam employed the secretary of Utrecht s u re with considerable success in the 1640s. T h ro u g h and a Franciscan friar named Geryt of Zutphen to help sleep deprivation, immersion in water, continuous them force a witch to confess in 1541. A year later, the questioning, and prolonged solitary confinement, a bailiff of the small town of Schoonhoven asked his witch was, to quote Hopkins, “brought into a sad colleague in Ut recht for similar advice, as did the city condition . . . and knowing the Devil’s malice and sub- magistrates of Haarlem in 1549. tle circumventions, is brought to remorse and sorrow The Protestant Reformation did not immediately for complying with Satan for so long, and disobeying end exo rcistic practices. In 1585 and 1586, two small God’s sacred Commandments, doth then desire to t owns in Holland, Schiedam and Go e d e reede, we re unfold her mind with much bitterness” (quoted in advised by a Flemish lawyer named Frasinus Zoetius to Watching and Walking 1183

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1184 Application File s h a ve the suspects; exchange their clothes for ve s t s since Christian antiquity, “those possessed by devils are sprinkled with holy water; and add blessed salt, wax delivered when sprinkled with it; and . . . this miracle is from a blessed candle, and a fragment of a priest’s stole often re n ewed today among the In d i a n s” (180). Like to their food. Afterw a rd, they we re to be kept awake witches, Indians we re often considered the intimates and then finally submitted to torture. Later, Protestant and confidants of demons; citing the sixteenth-century countries discarded exo rcism, but Protestant ministers Historia Me x i c a n a ( Mexican Hi s t o ry) of Fr a n c i s c o still exe rted psychological pre s s u re on incriminated L ó p ez de Gomara, Gu a z zo affirmed that “among the parishioners. In nort h western Ge r m a n y, for instance, Indians there are three chief remedies against the Lutheran pastors pre s s u red suspected witches to illusions and apparitions of demons” — c o n s e c r a t e d confess, and in Scotland, Calvinist ministers played a hosts, the sign of the cross, and holy water—and he similar role. added that “the cacodemons themselves have confessed as much to the Indians more than once” (202). HANS DE WAARDT In a related chapter, Gu a z zo gave examples of See also:BODYOFTHEWITCH;CONFESSIONS;DEVIL’SMARK; baptism driving away demons that tormented Peruvian EVIDENCE;EXECUTIONERS;EXORCISM;EXPERIMENTSANDTESTS; Indians, Japanese, and Jews, and he described a mon- HOPKINS,MATTHEW;NETHERLANDS,NORTHERN;PRICKING; strous child born to the Armenian wife of a Tartar king. PROTESTANTREFORMATION;TORTURE;WATER,HOLY. When baptized at his Christian mother’s behest, “by a References and further reading: miracle, [the boy] at once became so exceedingly come- Bl é c o u rt, Willem de, and Hans de Wa a rdt. 1991. “‘It is no sin to ly and beautiful that the King and many others we re put an evil person to death’: Judicial Proceedings Concerning moved wholly to turn to God, and the Christian cause Witchcraft during the Reign of Duke Charles of Ge l d e r l a n d . ” P p. 66–78 in Wi t c h c raft in the Ne t h e rlands from the Fo u rt e e n t h was very greatly advanced in the land” (182). In anoth- to the Twentieth Ce n t u ry.Edited by Marijke Gi j s w i j t - Ho f s t r a er story, a cautious demon warns a boy “to abstain from and Willem Fr i j h o f f. Ro t t e rdam: Un i ve r s i t a i re Pe r s the use of Holy Water and from adoring the Ro t t e rd a m . Consecrated Host (which he contemptuously called Gijswijt-Hofstra, Marijke, and Willem Frijhoff, eds. 1991. ‘The Little Cake’)” (185). Witchcraft in the Netherlands from the Fourteenth to the As with other sacraments and sacramentals, explana- Twentieth Century.Rotterdam: Universitaire Pers Rotterdam. tions were periodically required when holy water failed Larner, Christina. 1981. Enemies of God: The Witch-Hunt in to produce the desired result automatically. Gu a z zo Scotland.London: Chatto and Windus. quoted from Peter the Venerable (d. 1156) to explain Macfarlane, Alan. 1970. Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart England: A why holy water could not cure a monk tormented by a Regional and Comparative Study.London: Routledge and Kegan demon. As a punishment for mortal sin, Gu a z zo said, Paul. Schormann, Gerhard. 1977. Hexenprozesse in Nordwestdeutschland. his torment could not be cured by holy water, a merely Hildesheim: Lax. “external sacrament[al],” until the monk had per- Sharpe, James. 1996. Instruments of Darkness: Witchcraft in formed an internal sacrament by confessing his sins, England, 1550–1750.London: Hamish Hamilton. “and after he had confessed he at once ceased to be Waardt, Hans de. 1991. Toverij en samenleving: Holland, tormented” (186). 1500–1800.The Hague: Stichting Hollandse Historische The basic idea behind the use of holy water as a Reeks. demonifuge (a charm against evil spirits) is the opposi- tion between afflictions as the works of the Devil and Water, Holy sacramentals as the works of God. Thus, other sacra- Standard monographs on witchcraft and demonology mentals—such as the sign of the cross, the Agnus Dei(a (see Thomas 1971, 25–77 and passim; Clark 1997) disk of blessed wax), blessed salt and palm leaves, and provide numerous examples and anecdotes about the sacramental materials, particularly the consecrated use of holy water against witchcraft and other opera- eucharistic Host and chrism oil—are often described or tions of demons. p roposed as demonifuges (Gu a z zo gave examples in A rich and systematic contemporary source is book book 3, chap. 4 of his C o m p e n d i u m). The Ma l l e u s 3, chapter 4 of Francesco Maria Guazzo’s Compendium Ma l e fic a ru m (The Hammer of Witches, 1486) also Ma l e fic a ru m (A Su m m a ry of Witches, 1608; 2nd ed. recommended making accused witches drink holy 1626). Guazzo listed holy water as the ninth of twelve water in order to break their demonically induced “divine and supernatural re m e d i e s” against witchcraft refusal to confess (Kramer 1971, 230). Reginald Scot, and praised its “w o n d e rful effic a c y.” He distinguished among other Protestants, mocked the entire complex of between holy water intended for baptism and “lustral” Catholic beliefs in The Discoverie of Wi t c h e s ( 1 5 8 4 , holy water, which “is consecrated at Prime on eve ry book 12, chap. 10). Su n d a y” and “is avowedly for repelling the attacks of Water as a holy element was also important in the the devil and for averting other dangers” (Guazzo 1988, ordeal by cold water, also called “swimming the witch.” 179). He gave a short history of its use, claiming that It was assumed that a person bound hand and foot and 1184 Water, Holy

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1185 Application File t h rown into water would sink if innocent or float if influence over the weather is as old as the tradition of guilty because water, as a pure element (which was weather prophecies. sometimes blessed by an ecclesiastic for the express pur- Incantations and rites affecting the climate have pose of this test), would “a c c e p t” an innocent person usually been practiced with good intentions—in order ( a t the risk of drowning). Likely deriving from pre - to call forth favorable winds and good weather on land Christian rituals and closely related to the symbolism of and sea. Folk culture commonly used pro t e c t i ve baptism, this ordeal was used on suspected heretics cen- weather rituals, that is, magical practices intended to turies before the invention of demonic witchcraft. prevent inclement or dangerous weather. Furthermore, Usually illegal, it continued to be employed here and the general population often believed that sudden there in Europe into the eighteenth century (led by the changes in the weather and unseasonal weather condi- bishopric of Münster, which had more than 200 such tions were caused by magic. It was this latter belief that ordeals from 1590 to 1650) as a test to determine the found expression in the age of witchcraft trials. T h e re guilt or innocence of supposed witches. During the first is, in other words, a rich and varied folklore surround- half of the nineteenth century, use of this ordeal persist- ing various ways of influencing the we a t h e r. Cu l t u r a l ed in the Netherlands, Ukraine, and England. traditions show that this phenomenon has had a long and significant effect on common opinion in European WALTER STEPHENS farming and fishing communities. See also:CHARMS;CLERICALMAGIC;EXPERIMENTSANDTESTS; GUAZZO,FRANCESCO-MARIA;MALLEUSMALIFICARUM;MIRACLES; Folk Belief and Learned Views of MÜNSTER,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;SACRAMENTSANDSACRAMEN- Weather Magic TALS;SCOT,REGINALD;SCRIBONIUS,WILHELMADOLPH; European elite culture long interpreted folk reliance on SWIMMINGTEST. local weather magicians as primitive superstition. References and further reading: Medieval canons asserted that neither demons nor Clark, Stuart. 1997. Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft humans could control the weather. In the Middle Ages, in Early Modern Europe.Oxford: Clarendon. canon law punished those who believed magicians Guazzo, Francesco Maria. 1929. Reprint 1988. Compendium could call forth or calm storms. And for a long time, Maleficarum.Translated from the first edition (1608) by E. A. the Christian Church condemned those who believed Ashwin. Edited by Montague Summers. NewYork: Dover. Kelly, Henry Ansgar. 1985. The Devil at Baptism: Ritual, Theology, in the reality and efficacy of weather witches. Belief in and Drama.Ithaca, NY, and London: Cornell University Press. Kramer, Heinrich. 1971. Malleus Maleficarum.Edited by Montague Summers. NewYork: Dover. Leclercq, H. 1913. “Sacramentals.” Pp. 292–293 in The Catholic Encyclopedia,vol. 13. Edited by Charles G. Herbermann. London: Universal Knowledge Foundation. Pihlajamäki, Heikki. 2000. “‘Swimming the Witch, Pricking for the Devil’s Mark’: Ordeals in the Early Modern Witchcraft Trials.” Journal of Legal History21, no. 2: 35–59. Scot, Reginald. 1886. The Discoverie of Witchcraft.Edited by Brinsley Nicholson. London: Stock. Stephens, Walter. 2002. Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the Crisis of Belief.Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Thomas, Keith. 1971. Religion and the Decline of Magic.New York: Scribner’s. Weather Magic Since ancient times, weather magic has been the most common form of both benevolent and harmful witch- craft in all societies. In preindustrial societies all over the world, weather and climate have been of vital importance for the growth of crops. It has always been vital for people to know what kind of weather they can expect, and throughout history, we find stories of divin- ers who could predict the weather. Besides their need to Witches place a cock and a snake in a brew in a cauldron to cause a know something in advance about the weather, people hailstorm. From Ulrich Molitor, De Laniis et phitonicis mulieribus have always sought to influence and control meteoro- (Concerning Witches and Fortunetellers),1489. (Glasgow University logical conditions. Indeed, trying to exercise magical Library, Department of Special Collections) Weather Magic 1185

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1186 Application File the efficacy of magic could itself be dangerous, as it was witches and demons were capable of achieving with the considered an affront to God. Learned clerics such as weather became important topics of debate in intellec- Bernardino of Siena found many folk beliefs they could tual circles. Belief in this kind of magic took various ridicule, including the following: “To chase away a forms. The main dividing line was whether or not one storm that might threaten your crops, you must bare believed that certain people could influence the weath- your bottom to the approaching clouds. . . .There was er for better or worse by performing a particular ritual. a certain woman in Genoa who, seeing the bad weather Within folk culture, there was a belief in a direct coming and wanting to chase it away with a spell, raised connection between the tempestarii (witches who raise up her skirts from behind and pointed her rear end storms) and weather conditions. The other tradition toward the bad weather. Just at that moment lightning focused on a more indirect link: No human could influ- struck and killed her, because she had faith in such ence the natural elements, but people could summon foolishness” (cited by Mormando 1999, 97). up demons that, in turn, could influence the course of But from time to time, learned treatises appeare d nature. In other words, demonological teaching held that agreed with some popular beliefs. Adam of that no direct link existed between witches and their Bremen, an eleventh-century German bishop, claimed rites and changes in meteorological conditions. Evil that wild, ravenous women lived in the Nordic moun- people could, however, influence the weather indirectly tains, in a land occupied only by females (t e r ra femi- through a pact with Satan, who was often described as narum). Beautiful women turned out to be monstrous a prince of the air. Satan and his demons were “airy fig- witches, and the whole natural world appeared to be ures” and hence experts in manipulating the elements. populated with demonic females possessing extraord i- Indeed, devils were the power of motion. Sorceresses nary abilities to control weather conditions. Menacing could also make demons produce rain, storms, light- natives, who could call up evil weather, hid in the rocky ning, thunder, and hail and thus destroy crops or cliffs and mountains. Without the slightest warning, drown people at sea. these terrible gluttons could conjure forth horre n d o u s Ac c o rding to the learned view, all types of we a t h e r storms. No rdic women’s magical conjuring was re p u t- magic we re ineffective by themselves. Their rituals edly strong enough to control the forces of chaos; in could, howe ve r, be construed as signals to demons to other words, they could control or raise the sea at will. take action. Thus, it was important in the trials to look Ac c o rding to Adam of Bremen, even the most skillful for signs that could be interpreted as invocations of sailors had few remedies for the nort h e r n e r s’ satanic Satan and his demons. Witness testimony from ord i- tampering with nature. Nautical sorcery was a specialty n a ry people about suspicious threats, rituals, and of witches and sorcerers from the north. behavior was taken seriously, but it was not interpreted After 1480, when the Church accepted the view that as the direct connection the accuser tended to see weather witches existed, accusations of weather magic b e t ween witches and their weather rituals and subse- ranked among the most important charges in quent storms. The reason why only Satan, not human Eu ropean witchcraft trials. Heinrich Kramer, the beings, could produce stormy weather was that the author of the infamous Malleus Ma l e fic a ru m (T h e Devil could “bring hailstorms precisely because they Hammer of Witches) of 1486, devoted an entire chap- have natural causes and because all natural phenomena ter to informing readers that, beyond doubt, witches are at his command. No accompanying ritual can phys- could easily make hailstorms and cause thunder and ically affect this; it merely symbolizes the demonic lightning. Kramer had weather witches burned at the entanglement of its performers” (Clark 1997,196). stake during his mission to Ravensburg in the mid- 1480s. He related the story of a weather witch named The Importance of Weather Magic in Agnes (which reads like a popular tale spiced with a bit Witchcraft Trials of priestly demonology) primarily to show that witches The element of weather-related magic was quite sub- could not cause storms of their own accord. Fi r s t , stantial in witchcraft trials all over Europe. Accusations Agnes dug a little hole in the ground and poured water of magical manipulation of weather conditions were into it. Then, she stirred the water with her finger but among the most important charges brought against in the name of the Devil and of all her other devils—at suspected witches. Storms and bad weather at sea, cold which point, the water disappeared and the Devil ro s e summers, frosty nights in spring, floods, thunder and up into the air to produce the hailstorm (Ma l l e u s lightning, unusual quantities of snow, and extreme Ma l e fic a ru m , p a rt 2, Question 1, chap. 15; see also hailstorms that destroyed crops all provided important Broedel 2003, 64). triggers for many important European witchcraft trials. Wolfgang Behringer (1995, 25) wrote of a “fundamen- Weather Witches or Weather Demons? tal social-historical correlation” between accusations of During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, ques- witchcraft and dangerous weather caused by witches. tions about what weather magic really was and what Other scholars, too, have pointed to a general overlap 1186 Weather Magic

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1187 Application File in the time periods of the witchcraft trials and segments she had tied three knots in a piece of cloth, then untied of the Little Ice Age period. them while spitting on them “in the name of the evil Popular ideas about climatic conditions re fle c t e d man.” Late one evening, the women threw the bundle social and living conditions in various parts of Europe. into the sea, shouting the names of the men who had People living along the seaboard tended to focus on infuriated them. Se veral fishermen drowned in the wind magic. In typical farming districts, the notion that storm that arose in the wake of the witches’ curses. magic could cause frost damage, lightning, and hail- The day before Christmas Eve in 1653, Ma r i t storms that would damage grain crops and grapes was Andersdatter pleaded guilty to charges of unleashing more widespread. Charges of causing intense hailstorms the autumn storm that had caused so much damage in that ruined crops in early summer we re prominent in Vardø, another fishing village in northeastern Norway. many brutal witchcraft trials in Germany and other She admitted doing this in the company of other p a rts of central Eu rope. A common feature of these women. The witches had carried wind in a bag, which trials was that accusations we re presented as coming they then untied; according to court records, the storm from the entire local community. Witness testimony at was unleashed immediately. Marit confessed that they such trials thus had a collective stamp and differed from had sent a storm across the island in order to settle an the many cases of individual testimony directed against old score with the district governor (Lilienskiold 1998, one particular individual. When weather magic affected 163). To d a y, the inhabitants of Va rdø still describe the whole community, it was easy to express suspicions sudden changes in the weather by referring to winds of a dangerous conspiracy. Weather magic there f o re being let out of a bag. often appeared in conjunction with so-called chains of cases, in which accusations were made by a community Good and Bad Winds for Sailing and tended to be scapegoating reactions directed at a One story, taken from a witchcraft trial on the g roup of witches suspected of conspiracy. We a t h e r Norwegian coast, shows some elements that are quite making and storm raising we re re g a rded as offenses typical of such cases. In this story, we encounter a man against the whole community and were associated with known to be able to call up a good sailing wind for the plotting of witches’ covens. fishermen. The fishermen believed in his art and often In addition to cases from central Eu rope, we fin d approached him to get help in traveling quickly at sea. weather magic in a wide range of trials from northern But one day, something went wrong. The wind maker European coastal communities, including the east coast lost control of his powers, a sign that external forces— of Scotland, the Channel Islands, and the Nordic coun- that is, demonic powers—played an important role in tries. Accusations of inclement weather from coastal the conspiracy. communities and fishing villages had a slightly different On May 9, 1627, the local court was in session at character from those originating in the continental Hasvåg, a little fishing village in Arctic No rw a y. T h e interior of Europe—focusing less on causing damage to bailiff questioned a Sami shaman, Qu i we Ba a r s e n , a g r i c u l t u re and more on provoking stormy weather at about what he had done when he had made sailing sea, resulting in shipwrecks and death. But other accu- wind for Niels Jonsen two years earlier. Qu i we sations from fishing villages accused witches of destroy- explained that Niels approached him eight days before ing people’s livelihood; for instance, witches we re All Saints Day, in 1625, and asked for a benevolent and charged with causing storms that drove the fish away. f a vorable wind to get him to Hasvåg, saying that he Further south, a frequent accusation against witches in would pay him well on his return. Quiwe agreed to this, Catalonia was that flying women hurled hail and fog took off his right shoe, and washed his bare foot in calm f rom the sky, destroying fruit crops, killing live s t o c k , sea waters, saying, “Wind to land, wind to land! “ Niels and damaging buildings. In 1621, a Catalan witch and his fishermen then got a good wind for sailing. explained how she and some other witches went to a On the Sa t u rday before All Saints Da y, a woman lagoon and threw some powder onto the water, after called Trine went to Qu i we and asked him to make a which clouds suddenly rose up and great pieces of hail sailing wind so that her husband, who had sailed with fell to cause damage (Knutsen 2004, 94–95). Niels Jonsen, might come home soon. She promised to Raising enough wind to cause sailing ships to give him a keg of beer if he would raise the wind. Again, founder was a specialty of female No rwegian witches. Quiwe agreed, and this time, he took a piglet and threw Wind magic appeared frequently in the widespread sor- it into the sea, invoking the winds with the word s , c e ry trials in the far northern county of Fi n n m a rk ; “Wind to sea, wind to sea!” But the piglet squirmed too t h rough diabolical conspiracies, sorc e rers re p o rt e d l y much in the sun, and the wind became too stro n g . c o n j u red storms that sank fishing boats and sailing Quiwe said to Trine: “God have mercy on them. I am ships. Synnøve, from the fishing community of Vadsø, afraid that they have left prematurely and that the wind was convicted of using evil weather magic and was will be too strong. If they sailed at the beginning of the burned at the stake in 1632. Along with other witches, storm, may God have mercy, or they will not return.” Weather Magic 1187

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1188 Application File Niels Jonsen and four other fishermen perished in that theme include images of half-naked women standing storm. The bailiff asked if Qu i we had raised the wind outdoors around a cauldron, stirring up a terrible on other occasions. Qu i we replied: “Yes, I have often storm. In a famous 1555 woodcut by Olaus Magnus, made wind for people. Four years ago I made wind for we see a woman dumping the vile contents of her a ship from No rdlandene which was at Karc k e n , cauldron into the sea to raise harsh winds. because the men on board requested that I make wind RUNE BLIX HAGEN; for them. So I washed my foot and stirred a gentle south wind.” TRANSLATED BY ANNIKEN TELNES IVERSEN In May 1627, Quiwe was burned at the stake for his See also:ACCUSATIONS;ARTANDVISUALIMAGES;ASTROLOGY; weather magic. This case shows that it was the abuseof BALDUNG[GRIEN], HANS;BAVARIA;BERNARDINOOFSIENA; weather magic that caused him to be taken to court . CAULDRON;DEMONS;DIVINATION;DÜRER,ALBRECHT; When the sellers of wind magic ended their lives at the FOLKLORE;JAMESVIANDI,KINGOFSCOTLANDAND stake, it was usually because something had gone wrong ENGLAND;KRAMER(INSTITORIS), HEINRICH;LITTLEICEAGE; with their magic. MAGIC,POPULAR;MAGNUS,OLAUS;MALLEUSMALIFICARUM; NECROMANCY;NORTHBERWICKWITCHES;POPULAR A Famous Witch Storm PERSECUTION;SORCERY;TRIALS;WINDKNOTS. References and further reading: Wind magic of the kind just mentioned also played a Adam, von Bremen. 1959. History of the Archbishops of major role in a trial concerning one of the most famous Hamburg-Bremen.Translated and Edited by Francis J. Tschan. storms in the annals of Eu ropean witchcraft trials. NewYork: Columbia University Press. Scots presumed to be witches threw cats into the ocean Behringer,Wolfgang. 1995. “Weather, Hunger and Fear: Origins in order to raise a storm against a sacred monarch, the of the European Witch-Hunts in Climate, Society and Scottish St u a rt King James VI. The 1589 we d d i n g Mentality.” German History13: 1–27. b e t ween the Danish and Scottish royal houses had to ———. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: Popular Magic, be moved because No rth Sea witches conspired against Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early Modern Europe. the St u a rt monarc h y. During later witchcraft trials in Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. Cambridge: both De n m a rk and Scotland, it emerged that a cove n Cambridge University Press of Scottish, No rwegian, and Danish witches had been ———. 1999. “Climatic Change and Witch-Hunting: The Impact of the Little Ice Age on Mentalities.” Climatic Change t rying to pre vent the marriage of James VI to the 43: 335–351. Danish princess Anna by causing a huge storm in the Broedel, Hans Peter. 2003. The “Malleus Maleficarum” and the No rth Sea. The extreme winds of this storm pre ve n t e d Construction of Witchcraft, Theology and Popular Belief. Anna from crossing the sea, and the couple was forc e d Manchester and NewYork: Manchester University Press. to marry in Oslo in November 1589. The storm was Clark, Stuart. 1997. Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft c o n s i d e red a treasonable plot to sink the royal Da n i s h in Early Modern Europe.Oxford: Clarendon. fleet as it sailed from Copenhagen, bound for Hagen, Rune. The Shaman of Alta: The 1627 Witch Trial of Quiwe Ed i n b u r g h . Baarsen,http://www.ub.uit.no/fag/historie/shaman.html James VI reacted by proclaiming himself the mortal (accessed June 2004). a rchenemy of Satan. In 1597, he wrote a book on James VI. 2000. Daemonologie in Form of a Dialogue.(Originally demonology describing how to combat sorc e ry, based published in Edinburgh, 1597.) Pp. 353–425 in Witchcraft in Early Modern Scotland: James VI’s Demonology and the North on his own painful experiences. Because of this book, Berwick Witches.Edited by Lawrence Normand and Gareth King James became the foremost expert of the early Roberts. Exeter: University of Exeter Press. modern era on the connection between sorc e ry and Knutsen, Gunnar W. 2004. Servants of Satan and Masters of m e t e o ro l o g y. He had much to say concerning the Demons. Oslo: Unipub. plague of northern witches. The De v i l’s worst havo c Lilienskiold, Hans H. 1998. Trolldom og ugudelighet i 1600-tallets o c c u r red in “such wild parts of the world, as Lapland Finnmark.Edited by Rune Hagen and Per Einar Sparboe. and Finland,” the monarch wrote with great pathos, Tromsø: Ravnetrykk. mentioning also the horrible roar of the oceans, the Mook, Reinhard. 1988. “Vrtrolldom.” Været12, no. 1: 3–10. demons of the air, and storm-making witches (James VI Mormando, Franco. 1999. The Preacher’s Demons: Bernardino of 2000, 414). Siena and the Social Underworld of Early Renaissance Italy. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. The Woodcuts Oster, Emily. 2004. “Witchcraft, Weather and Economic Growth in Renaissance Europe.” Journal of Economic Perspectives Such artists as Hans Baldung [Grien] and Albrecht 18: 215–228. Dürer are important in regard to the visual representa- Strauss, Sarah, and Ben Orlove. 2003. Weather, Climate, Culture. tion of weather magic. Their many woodcuts depicting Oxford: Berg. weather witches of different kinds became stereotypical Summers, Montague, ed. and trans. 1971. The “Malleus representations of witches during the late fifteenth and Maleficarum” of Heinrich Kramer and James Sprenger. early sixteenth centuries. Other variations on the same NewYork: Dover. 1188 Weather Magic

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1189 Application File Webster, John (1610–1682) in English court cases—must always be fictitious. The We b s t e r, a former chaplain and surgeon to the true working of the Devil in the world (here Webster’s Parliamentary armies during the civil war, published his argument rejoined his more radical position during the The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft in 1677. Back in Civil War) was within our minds, tempting us to sin. 1654 he had attacked the universities and defended We b s t e r’s argument contained subtle equivo c a t i o n s . empirical science in his Academarium Examen.After the For example, he denied that he rejects the existence of Restoration, he became a country physician in witches, but he believed there were none, except those Lancashire. In 1671, he published Metallographia: or, who pretended, or we re deluded into believing, they an History of Metals. During the Civil War he had had powers they did not have. He treated devils as cor- maintained that the Devil, hell, witchcraft, and the poreal, while insisting that their bodies had none of the Antichrist were all essentially metaphors for evil within qualities that ours had, because they could not deceive man—views echoing those of Reginald Scot in his the sense of touch. D i s c overie of Wi t c h c ra f t(1584). In The Displayinghe still For modern commentators, We b s t e r’s book formed wanted us to fear the devil within, but in other re s p e c t s , one side of a debate on witchcraft conducted among his arguments we re more ort h o d ox than pre v i o u s l y. s u p p o rters of the Royal So c i e t y, the founding institu- At the heart of The Displaying was the experience of tion of modern experimental science. His book the apostle Thomas, who was convinced that Jesus had w a s published with the i m p r i m a t u r of Jonas Mo o re , risen from the dead only after placing his fingers in his Vice-President of the Royal Society.The fact that emi- wounds. T h o m a s’s experience provided convincing nent scientists like Ro b e rt Boyle defended belief in p roof of the Re s u r rection, because angels and devils demons and spirits undermined traditional accounts of could not fabricate a tangible reality; they could deceive the supposedly antagonistic relationship between mod- sight, but not touch. It followed that incubi and s u c c u b i , ern, scientific rationality and witchcraft belief. familiars who sucked blood from witches, and similar We b s t e r’s Displaying was partly a response to the the- tangible demonic presences must be entirely mythical. ologian Meric Casaubon’s Of Credulity and In c re d u l i t y To believe in witchcraft as conventionally described (1668), but his target was also the clergyman and scien- was, Webster asserted, to doubt the unique importance tist (a member of the Royal Society) Joseph Gl a n v i l l , of the Re s u r rection, when Je s u s’s tangible body gave whose Some Philosophical Considerations To u c h i n g incontestable proof that he was no mere spirit. Witches and Witchcraft (1666) had become a best seller. We b s t e r’s argument did not re q u i re that spirits we re The posthumous, revised and expanded version of incorporeal, merely that their bodies were ethereal, and Gl a n v i l l’s Saducismus Tr i u m p h a t u s (1681), edited by this was his line of argument. Henry More, contained an extensive attack on Webster; In order to dismiss the evidence advanced by demo- Benjamin Camfie l d’s Theological Discourse of An g e l s nologists, Webster developed a sophisticated view of (1678) also contained an appendix attacking We b s t e r. testimony, dismissing the testimony of single witnesses A German translation of The Displaying of Su p p o s e d or of many interested witnesses as unreliable. He was Witchcraftappeared in 1719. m o re cautious when considering the (supposedly DAVID WOOTTON disinterested) evidence produced by Joseph Glanvill to s u p p o rt the existence of spirits (well-attested polter- See also:CASAUBON,MERIC;CORPOREALITY,ANGELIC geists), and was pre p a red to accept further re l i a b l e ANDDEMONIC;DEMONS;ENGLAND;FAMILIARS;GLANVILL, JOSEPH;INCUBUSANDSUCCUBUS;JESUS;METAMORPHOSIS; evidence of the existence of “apparitions.” Webster even POLTERGEIST;SCIENCEANDMAGIC;SCOT,REGINALD; accepted that certain spells or charms could be effic a- SKEPTICISM. cious (perhaps because of the purely natural rhythmic References and further reading: impact of their sounds), and argued that the ethere a l Bostridge, Ian. 1997. Witchcraft and its Transformations, c. 1650–c. spirit of humans (composed of body, soul, and ethereal 1750. Oxford: Clarendon. spirit) lingered long enough after death to cause such Elmer, Peter. 1986. The Library of Dr. John Webster: The Making of phenomena as corpses bleeding in the presence of their a Seventeenth Century Radical(Medical History,Supplement No. m u rd e re r. Howe ve r, he disputed at length Jo h a n n 6). London: Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine. Baptista van Helmont’s view (a matter of lively debate Elmer, Peter, ed. 2003. The Post-Restoration Synthesis and Its ever since Johann Weyer in the late sixteenth century) Opponents.Introduction and facsimile reprint of The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft.(1677). Vol. 4 of English Witchcraft, that objects were often found within human beings that 1560–1736.Edited by James Sharpe. 6 vols. London: Pickering could only have been introduced by demonic means. and Chatto. Webster denied that there was any reliable evidence for Jobe, Thomas H. 1981. “The Devil in Restoration Science: The witchcraft; he insisted that devils we re of necessity Glanvill-Webster Witchcraft Debate.” Isis72: 343–356. limited to natural actions, and therefore that transmu- Webster, Charles. 1982. From Paracelsus to Newton: Magic and the tation into cats, dogs, or other animals could safely be Making of Modern Science.Cambridge: Cambridge University dismissed as impossible—familiars, almost ubiquitous Press. Webster, John 1189

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1190 Application File Wenham, Jane Wenham. The knowledge that such solid local authori- Jane Wenham, from Walkern in He rt f o rd s h i re, enjoy s ty fig u res thought Wenham to be a witch might have the dubious distinction of being the last person know n influenced the trial jury in deciding to convict. to have been convicted for witchcraft in England, at the Mo re unusually, the case became enmeshed in He rt f o rd assizes in 1712. She had a long-standing re p u- c o n t e m p o r a ry elite politics. In 1712 the “rage of par- tation for witchcraft, although her troubles really began t y” between Whig and To ry was in full swing. Among when a local farmer, John Chapman, thought she had other issues, the two parties differed in their d e s t royed £200 worth of his cattle through witchcraft; conceptions of the Christian commonwealth and, he was also convinced that Wenham had bewitched one u n e x p e c t e d l y, a witchcraft case gained prominence as of his servants who refused to give her some straw she a political issue. The case prompted at least eight had asked for. Chapman waited for a suitable occasion pamphlets (the one offering the most detail about to prosecute, but events moved forw a rd when Anne We n h a m’s witchcraft and her trial is listed below) that Thorne, a maidservant of the vicar of Walkern, Go d f re y split along party lines, with the Whigs taking a skep- Ga rd i n e r, began to show strange symptoms, which local tical line and the Tories (notably the high churc h opinion attributed to bew i t c h m e n t . pamphleteer Francis Bragge) arguing for the reality of Wenham was committed to prison, and on March 7, We n h a m’s witchcraft and of witchcraft more general- 1712, stood trial before Sir John Powell, a judge who l y. It is no accident that Wenham finally died on the was obviously unconvinced of the reality of witchcraft. estate of a Whig magnate. Powell was clearly unimpressed when Thorne fell into JAMES SHARPE fits in court, and he disparaged some of the materials p roduced in court as evidence of witchcraft. He also See also:COUNTERMAGIC;ENGLAND;EVIDENCE;LORD’SPRAYER; bullied prosecution witnesses. There is also a tradition PAMPHLETSANDNEWSPAPERS;RURALWITCHCRAFT; that claims that at this trial, Powell, on being informed SWIMMINGTEST;WITCH’SMARK. Rreferences and further reading: that Wenham was able to fly, cheerfully commented Anon. 1712. A full and impartial Account of the Discovery of that there was no law against flying in England. Despite Sorcery and Witchcraft practis’d by Jane Wenham of Walkerne in the judge’s best efforts, Wenham was convicted, but Hertfordshire, upon the Bodies of Anne Thorne, Anne Street, andc. Powell rapidly secured her a reprieve. London. The Wenham case is interesting on several leve l s . Bostridge, Ian. 1997. Witchcraft and Its Transformations, c. 1650–c. First, it demonstrated how witchcraft was still a ve ry 1750.Oxford: Clarendon. live issue in the village life of the period. Wenham had a Guskin, Phyllis J. 1981–1982. “The Context of English well-established reputation for witchcraft, and had been Witchcraft: the Case of Jane Wenham (1712).” a focus of local fears for many years. These fears Eighteenth-Century Studies15: 48–71. prompted various forms of countermagic. At one stage Wesley, John (1703–1791) Chapman had burned a bundle of sticks thought to have magical properties, believing that this would force Usually regarded as the most influential believer in the Wenham to reveal herself as a witch. Wenham was also reality of witchcraft in eighteenth-century England, b rought before Anne Thorne to be scratched, in the John Wesley was the leading figure in the founding of expectation that drawing a witch’s blood would bring the Methodist movement from the mid-1730s onward. relief to her victim. One of the pamphlets prompted by His personal belief in witchcraft, apparitions, and spir- the case said that Wenham, hoping to clear her name, its, reflected in the journals of his life that he published voluntarily offered to submit herself to being searched contemporaneously, would have influenced his many for the witch’s mark, or to the swimming test (water followers; so would the numerous accounts of such ordeal), repeating the latter offer when she was brought phenomena, past and present, published in the period- b e f o re a Justice of the Peace. He refused, because the ical he founded in 1778 (called the Arminian Magazine, test was illegal and unjustified, but a clergyman who later the Methodist Magazine) and in other Methodist was present, a Mr Strutt, asked her to repeat the Lord’s publications. Wesley thus played a key role in main- Pr a ye r. She was able to do this until she came to the taining traditional arguments for the reality of witch- ‘forgive us our trespasses’ passage, a place where witches craft and legitimating continued belief in it among his were generally thought to stumble. Belief in Wenham’s followers and other ordinary people. In practice, like status as a witch was not limited to what could be many other eighteenth-century intellectuals, Wesley described as ignorant villagers. Anne T h o r n e’s showed no interest in particular witchcraft cases; he e m p l oye r, the vicar Go d f rey Ga rd i n e r, and two other judged the usefulness of the spirit world by evangelical clergymen who examined Wenham we re convinced of standards and as part of his defense of scriptural her guilt, as we re the justice invo l ved in the case, Si r religion against infidelity. Contemporary critics and Henry Chauncy, and his son Arthur, who took the lead subsequent historians have portrayed him as strength- in employing several traditional “p ro o f s” against ening the credulity and enthusiasm of his followers, 1190 Wenham, Jane

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1191 Application File with witchcraft providing a classic instance of his satanic origins, this episode re flected his primary old-fashioned fundamentalism. i n t e rest in the reality of a spirit world, rather than an We s l e y’s belief in witches arose directly from his i n t e rest in witches. Fi n a l l y, Wesley shared with his belief in the authority of the Scriptures, upholding followers a providentialist concern to document God’s earlier interpretations of Christian theologians and direct intervention in his daily affairs. traditional views of Christian history as showing the Wesley was not a propagandist for witchcraft beliefs existence and activity of the Devil, witches, and spirits. but a religious leader who expressed (when many others Wesley believed that deists and atheists satirized belief remained silent) a widespread attitude among those in witches and spirits as a means to undermine belief in who feared the effects of abandoning traditional the Bible, and he scorned Christians who accepted this authorities supporting such providentialist beliefs as c o n t e m p o r a ry fashion and compromised their beliefs. witchcraft. Insofar as these attitudes coincided with Thus, he found himself concurring closely with popular beliefs and fears of the supernatural, they may post-Restoration apologists for witchcraft and the spirit h a ve helped to spread the appeal of Methodism; in world. turn, Methodist preachings and writings sustained such Like these writers, however,Wesley also believed that attitudes in their followers. After Wesley’s death, main- he was defending an empirically open attitude to s t ream Methodism tended to emphasize the cautious nature, as well as confirming religious truth, by provid- aspects of its founder’s attitude, leaving the appropria- ing well-attested cases of witchcraft and the spirit world tion of supernatural phenomena to primitive and rejecting claims that such instances must necessari- Methodism. ly be impostures because witchcraft was theore t i c a l l y JONATHAN BARRY impossible. Wesley’s favorite argument was that he had never personally seen a murder, any more than a case of See also:ENGLAND;ENLIGHTENMENT;EXORCISM;GHOSTS; witchcraft, although he believed the weight of evidence SKEPTICISM. References and further reading: that murder occurred; it was skeptics, not believe r s , Barry, Jonathan. 1985. “Piety and the Patient.” Pp. 145–175 in who dogmatically refused to accept facts. Whether any Patients and Practitioners.Edited by Roy Porter. Cambridge: particular case was explicable by natural or supernatural Cambridge University Press. causes was an empirical question for each person to Davies, Owen. 1997. “Methodism, the Clergy, and the Popular decide, and Wesley could himself be neutral or equivo- Belief in Witchcraft and Magic.” History82: 252–265. cal, as when witchcraft was suspected at the Lamb Inn Rack, Henry D. 1982. “Doctors, Demons and Early Methodist at Bristol in Ma rch 1762 (Wo rk s 21: 352). Ju d g i n g Healing.” Studies in Church History19: 137–152. f rom his journals, he never actively investigated or ———. 1989.Reasonable Enthusiast: John Wesley and the Rise of treated a case of witchcraft. There is no evidence that he Methodism. London: Epworth. ever sought to provoke fears of or action against witch- Wesley, John. 1984–present. The Bicentennial Edition of the Works es, although his followers may have used his comments of John Wesley.Edited by Frank Baker. 36 volumes. Oxford: Clarendon, 1975–1984; Nashville: Abingdon, 1984–present, to justify their own fears. including vols. 18–24—Journals and Diaries 1–7(Nashville, Wesley was more directly connected with cases of 1988–2003) and vols. 25–26—Letters 1–2(Oxford, 1980 and convulsions during conversion experiences, which both 1982). preachers and laity sometimes interpreted as the strug- gles with and eventual expulsion of devils. He was clear- ly reluctant to reject this view but not particularly upset when such ecstatic phenomena became less common: Westerstetten, Johann Unlike other evangelicals, he always emphasized the Christoph Von (1563–1637) subsequent piety and activity of his followers, not the K n own for his persistent witch hunting, Jo h a n n drama of their conversion. Clergymen (both Anglican Westerstetten represents the fundamentalist type of and dissenting) linked to Methodist circles we re far C o u n t e r - Reformation German ecclesiastical prince. readier to carry out exorcism with the biblical means of First, he initiated a long-running persecution in the p r a yer and fasting than those who felt bound by the t e r r i t o ry of the prince-abbey (F ü r s t p ro p s t e i) of canons of 1604. Wesley’s direct influence in this regard Ellwangen, which he ruled from 1603 to 1613, with no is not obvious. He was directly invo l ved in re p o rt i n g fewer than seventy-five days of execution (in which ghosts and spirits warning of deaths or other future groups of four to twelve people were burned). Then, he e vents, for example, the experiences of El i z a b e t h added another sixty group burnings in the Hobson re c o rded in his Jo u rn a l in May 1768 (Wo rk s prince-bishopric of Eichstätt, which he ruled from 22: 135–146). His family background included a ghost 1613 to 1637. If Jonathan Durrant’s revisionist figures that haunted his father’s re c t o ry at Epw o rth when (2002) are accurate and Westersetten’s reign saw “only” young John was away at Charterhouse School in 1716 240 executions in Eichstätt, he would still be responsi- and 1717. If Wesley was convinced of its reality and ble for about 550 burnings, including the Ellwangen Westerstetten, Johann Christoph Von 1191

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1192 Application File persecutions. However, the surviving sources probably Dillingen, the young canon must have received instruc- do not represent the entire persecution; the number of tion from the Jesuits dominating the theological faculty, victims in Eichstätt could rise to 400 or more, and Pe t rus Canisius and Gre g o ry of Valencia, both ard e n t perhaps 700 were executed in both ecclesiastical princi- s u p p o rters of witch hunting. From then on, palities. Undeniably, Westerstetten ranks among the Westerstetten was a close ally of the Jesuits, whom he most bloodthirsty witch hunters in European history. introduced in both Ellwangen and Eichstätt. Born into the minor Franconian nobility, the son of As a canon, Westerstetten experienced El l w a n g e n’s Wolfgang Rudolf von Westerstetten and Ursula vo n first witchcraft trials in 1588 and the first serious witch- Riedheim, Johann Christoph was dedicated to a clerical craft trials in the prince-bishopric of Eichstätt in 1590; c a reer early on, like other members of his family. because both cases are poorly documented, it is impos- Originally clients of the counts of Helfenstein, they had sible to discover whether he was already active l y managed to rise in importance, taking their name from involved. Clearly, witch hunting did not dominate the a small castle near Ulm. Johann Christoph’s father prince-abbot’s agenda; it was simply part of a universal served as an official and district judge at Wasseralfingen, s t ruggle against diabolical sins and heresies. In the one of seven districts of the Benedictine prince-abbey of eighth year of his rule at Ellwangen, a major scandal Ellwangen. The son re c e i ved an ambitious education, during Easter Mass triggered serious suspicions of entering the Un i versity of Dillingen at age ten, before witchcraft against an old woman, Barbara Ru e fin moving to Ingolstadt in 1581 and to Dole in Burgundy (1541–1611), who had had a sinister reputation in her in 1584, without taking a formal degree. His ecclesias- village of Rindelbach for many decades. We s t e r s t e t t e n tical career began when he was appointed canon of the promptly launched a massive witch hunt. He appointed cathedral chapter of Ellwangen in 1575; subsequently, an old friend, Carl Kibler, who had already gained a he was made canon of the cathedral chapter of Eichstätt reputation for conducting witchcraft trials in Sw a b i a n in 1589 and of Augsburg in 1600. Residing first at Austria, as his court councillor and witch commission- Ellwangen, Westerstetten had moved to Eichstätt by er. Kibler was entitled to bypass the traditional judicial 1589, where he served as a dean of the chapter fro m structures of the prince-abbey (which by 1802 counted 1592 to 1602. By then, he had been elected coadjutor roughly 20,000 inhabitants and possibly had that many of the prince-abbot (F ü r s t p ro p s t ) , Wolfgang vo n before the Thirty Years’War). Westerstetten knew from Hausen (who ruled from 1584 to 1603); he succeeded his father how cumbersome these structures were. von Hausen in 1603. Ruling the small ecclesiastical Su p p o rted by Westerstetten, Kibler centralized the territory until 1613, Westerstetten also became a coun- trials in the capital, hired foreign executioners for tor- cillor to the prince-bishop of Eichstätt, and in turing from the prince-bishopric of Augsburg, and by December 1612, the cathedral chapter elected him as May 1611 assembled a task force of lawyers in order to prince-bishop Johann Christoph I of Eichstätt. After conduct the trials as effectively as possible. In practice, Pope Paul V confirmed the election in Ja n u a ry, the the trials we re shortened by a massive use of tort u re . prince-bishop of Augsburg, Heinrich V von Knöringen, Barbara Ruefin was imprisoned on April 7 and executed consecrated Westerstetten bishop in March 1613. on May 15; most later trials were shorter. Confessions In both Ellwangen and Eichstätt, We s t e r s t e t t e n became so standardized that the commissioner found it began a determined policy of state building and confes- easier to replace the names of the suspects with num- sionalization, utilizing the decrees of the Council of bers. Except for one man who managed to flee fro m Trent to discipline the clergy as well as his lay subjects. prison, not a single suspect surv i ved these El l w a n g e n Mo re than an instrument, the Counter-Re f o r m a t i o n trials. Some died in prison after massive torturing, and became the motor of We s t e r s t e t t e n’s political agenda: some committed suicide, but most of them lost their He was among the founders of the Catholic League of lives at the stake—as far as we know, an unprecedented the Holy Roman Empire, and it was within his diocese conviction rate. Every fortnight after July 1611, a new that Prince Wolfgang Wilhelm von Pfalz-Ne u b u r g , group of convicted witches, usually more than 10, was Count Gottfried Heinrich von Pappenheim, and the ready for a collective burning. In the second half of Upper Palatinate were converted to Catholicism. 1611, about 126 persons we re burned, as at least 143 Westerstetten’s career was lit with witch burnings. At we re in 1612. By Fe b ru a ry 1613, when We s t e r s t e t t e n age ten, he witnessed the first serious trials within the was elected prince-bishop of Eichstätt, a minimum of prince-bishopric of Augsburg at Dillingen in 1575. In 280 people had been burned in thirty-six bonfires. that same year, he also inherited his seat as a canon in Westerstetten managed to find an appro p r i a t e Ellwangen from Johann Egolf von Knöringen, the late successor at Ellwangen, and it seems likely that witch prince-bishop of Augsburg, whose death was reportedly hunting was by then the main criterion. Jo h a n n caused by witchcraft; because this prebend prov i d e d Christoph I appointed Dr. Carl Kibler, chancellor of We s t e r s t e t t e n’s financial basis for studying, one could the prince-abbey and witch commissioner; conducting claim that witchcraft had launched his care e r. At severe witch hunts was his main qualification. The new 1192 Westerstetten, Johann Christoph Von

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1193 Application File abbot, Johann Christoph II von Freyberg und witch commissioner, Dr. Schwarzkonz, was transferre d Eisenberg (who ruled from 1613 to 1620), was almost a to the service of the prince-bishop of Bamberg for clone of Westerstetten, appropriately calling himself witch hunting in 1628. The Eichstätt persecution had Pr i n c e - Abbot Johann Christoph II, thus underlining first re a l i zed the somber dream of unconditional perse- the continuity of government. And there was indeed cution, of persecution without re g a rd for political, continuity: After a pause of five months, the new abbot social, or humanitarian obstacles. Nu m e rous new tor- resumed the burnings in the summer of 1613. He con- t u res we re devised, and some victims denounced more tinued collective witch burnings, although with smaller than 200 accomplices. Because no taboo pre vented the groups put on the stakes. By 1618, at least 75 collective trials from reaching into the upper classes, one fin d s burnings can be proven in Ellwangen’s sources. burgomasters, councillors, priests, and even the wife of When Westerstetten arrived in Eichstätt in 1613 to the governing chancellor among those exe c u t e d . g overn a territory of about 50,000 to 60,000 inhabi- Howe ve r, there was still an uneven gender distribution, tants, his reputation preceded him. The Jesuit Ja c o b with the share of female victims close to 80 percent, as Gretser had celebrated his successful Ellwangen burn- in Ellwangen. The last documented witch burning in ings in 1612 in the dedication to his book De festis Eichstätt took place on July 30, 1630, pre s u m a b l y C h r i s t i a n o rum ( On Christian Fe s t i vals). As at because Westerstetten decided to flee shortly after- Ellwangen, witch hunting was not the top priority on w a rd, fearing an imminent Swedish invasion. In his Westerstetten’s agenda. Only in 1616 and after simulta- final years, Westerstetten remained in the fort i fie d neous demands from the population did witch hunts Ba varian town of Ingolstadt, and he never again begin simultaneously in the Franconian prince-bish- e xe rcised power as he had before his flight; until his oprics of Bamberg, Würzburg, and Eichstätt, all clearly death, it seems that his prince-bishopric was actually modeled on the Ellwangen example. This was particu- ruled by administrators. larly true in Eichstätt, where Westerstetten started a WOLFGANG BEHRINGER permanent witch hunt. Although the persecutions eventually stopped in Bamberg and Würzburg and even See also:AUGSBURG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;BAMBERG, in Ellwangen in 1618, Westerstetten kept on burning PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;BAVARIA,DUCHYOF;CANISIUS,PETER; witches until Swedish troops we re about to invade his ECCLESIASTICALTERRITORIES(HOLYROMANEMPIRE); EICHSTÄTT, prince-bishopric during the Thirty Years’ War. PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;ELLWANGEN,PRINCE-ABBEYOF; EXECUTIONS;FULDA,PRINCE-ABBEYOF;GERMANY, By then, witch hunting had become a symbol or SOUTHWESTERN;GREGORYOFVALENCIA;GRETSER,JACOB; even a benchmark of Catholicity in Westerstetten’s eyes, HOLYROMANEMPIRE;INGOLSTADT,UNIVERSITYOF;JESUITS an opinion not shared within the Catholic League. (SOCIETYOFJESUS); NUMBEROFWITCHES;TANNER,ADAM; Ba varian politicians saved Ei c h s t ä t t’s chancellor, Dr. TORTURE;TRIALS;WITCHHUNTS. Ba rtholomäus Richel, after his wife, Maria, had been References and further reading: accused and burned in 1621. Richel was soon promot- Behringer,Wolfgang. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: ed to vice-chancellor in the prince-electorate, and his Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early insider knowledge certainly added to the hesitation Modern Europe.Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. about witch hunts in Ba varia. Ba varian Jesuits eve n Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Durrant, Jonathan. 2002. “Witchcraft, Gender and Society in the dared to challenge the prince-bishop’s conduct publicly, Early Modern Prince-Bishopric of Eichstätt.” PhD diss., in Ingolstadt as well as in the Eichstätt Jesuit College. University of London. Kaspar Hell, SJ (1588–1634), in particular, preached so Mährle, Wolfgang. 1998. “‘O wehe der armen seelen’: sharply from his pulpit in 1625 that the Jesuit general Hexenverfolgungen in der Fürstpropstei Ellwangen Claudius Aquaviva felt obliged to intervene and silence (1588–1694).” Pp. 325–500 in Zum Feuer verdammt: Die him. Although Hell courageously continued his Hexenverfolungen in der Grafschaft Hohenberg, der Reichsstadt campaign against the Eichstätt killings, he was neve r Reutlingen und der Fürstpropstei Ellwangen.Edited by Johannes punished within his order but instead was appointed Dillinger,Thomas Fritz, and Wolfgang Mährle. Stuttgart: rector of the new Jesuit College in Amberg (Up p e r Steiner. Palatinate). Possibly in reaction to He l l’s attacks, the Bamberg suffragan Friedrich Förner dedicated his Weyer, Johann (1515–1588) collection of sermons, Panoplia Arm a t u rae De i In the second half of the sixteenth century, Johann (The Splendid Armour of God, Ingolstadt, 1625), on Weyer, a physician to the duke of Cleves, became the witchcraft to Bishop Westerstetten. first major advocate of Europe’s witches—the first who As in Ellwangen, Westerstetten appointed witch opposed the witch hunt with a combination of philo- commissioners in Eichstätt, and one of them, Dr. logical, philosophical, scientific, and legal arguments Wolfgang Kolb (commissioner from 1624 to 1628), and who dared to expose his ideas in print. Sigmund boasted in 1629 of having examined 274 witches, all of Freud saw Weyer as a forerunner of modern psychiatry, whom we re subsequently executed. Another Ei c h s t ä t t a physician affirming his right to cure his patients Weyer, Johann 1193

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1194 Application File and from his contemporaries in his belief that demons can act in the physical world. After this training period, We yer studied medicine at the Un i versity of Pa r i s , arriving in 1533 and taking his degree in 1537. He was subsequently employed as a town physician, first at R a venstein and then in Arnhem. In 1550, he was appointed personal physician by the tolerant (and later, mentally disturbed) Duke William V of Cleves, Jülich, and Berg, whose father had pro g re s s i vely re f o r m e d religion in his duchy under the influence of Erasmus. In these territories, some attempts we re made to improve the laws on witchcraft, as We yer emphasize d . A very important and still open question in Weyer’s p ro file invo l ves his religious creed and views: Scholars d i s a g ree on this point because of We ye r’s contradic- tions. H. C. Erik Midelfort (1988, 238–239) saw him as an Erasmian Lutheran, although We ye r’s last word s in De pra e s t i g i i s d a e m o n u m ( On the Tricks of De v i l s ) seem an appeal to the Catholic Church, while in the German translation he praised the Lu t h e r a n Reformation. Hans de Waardt proposed the hypothesis of We ye r’s adherence to the Family of Love, which could explain his refusal to take part in an increasingly confessionalized society (Valente 2003). In 1563, Weyer published his most important work, De praestigiis daemonum, ac incantationibus ( On the Tricks of Devils, Incantations, and Poisoners), choosing as his publisher Johann Oporinus, a well-known Basel Johann Weyer, physician, skeptic, opponent of witch hunting, and printer as well as a former pupil of Paracelsus. Un t i l author of De Praestiguies Daemonum (On the Tricks of Devils), 1583, there we re six Latin editions of the work, with 1563. (TopFoto.co.uk) enlargements and other significant changes. In 1568, he added a sixth book. Meanwhile, there were three edi- rather than burn them. This assessment was not greatly tions in French and two German translations. In 1577 inaccurate: Weyer indeed wanted to end what he came an abridged version, De lamiis ( C o n c e r n i n g considered a bloodbath of innocent people. Witches), aiming at a larger readership. We yer was born in an area of mixed German and We yer actually assigned more power to the De v i l Dutch culture (his surname was variously spelled Weyer than his adversaries ever had, as his title emphasize d . or Wier). His interest in demons began early, when he The extent to which his work participated in tradition- lived with his family, which, according to him, was pro- al demonological discourse is clearly indicated by both tected by a d a e m o n (a spiritual being intermediate his readers and his opponents. His style of argument between God and humans). Living in one of the most was original, and as Gerhild Scholz Williams has under- Erasmian corners of Eu rope, Johann was educated on lined, his work formed a demonological trilogy with the principles of d e votio moderna (modern, or new, Jean Bodin’s later De la démonomanie des sorciers ( On d e votion); his younger brother Matthias became a the De m o n - Mania of Witches, 1580) and He i n r i c h Protestant mystic. At age fifteen, Johann became an Kramer’s earlier Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of a p p rentice of the great Renaissance magus and physi- Witches, 1486). Like Bodin and Kramer, We ye r cian Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim. For e m p l oyed a large mass of widespread popular and t h ree years, he studied with this famous (and, to him, cultural anecdotes to enrich his analysis, although he beloved) teacher, who moved frequently because of his reversed the causal relationship between demonic activ- u n c o n ventional behavior and controversial publica- ity and witches. He subve rted Scholastic tradition by tions. The most important thing Agrippa taught him incorporating challenges to the authority of the Malleus was the model of an Erasmian man imbued with into an often fundamentally traditional demonology Renaissance ideals (Midelfort 1988, 238). (even borrowing the Malleus’s explanations for gender- Like Agrippa, Weyer wanted to defend the innocence ing witchcraft). Weyer did not deny the Devil’s powers, of witches on the basis of physical evidence, supple- so adversaries such as Bodin found his arguments weak mented by scriptural exegesis. He differed from A g r i p p a and tried to demolish his contentions. Ac c o rding to 1194 Weyer, Johann

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1195 Application File Weyer, the world was a set of contingencies depending because the evidence against them was never sufficient only on God’s will in order to keep the Devil’s power at to justify their death; We yer agreed with the idea that a lower level: Everything depended on God’s will, and the only infallible tribunal was that of Jesus. He fol- devils acted without trespassing against divine prov i- l owed the Erasmian tradition, and in fact, Er a s m u s’s dence. Witches were not responsible because they were role among the most important sources of De praestigi- weak, ignorant, ill, poor, and sometimes melancholic; iswas remarkable. Weyer borrowed a large section from the Devil had persuaded them they could do things that one of Er a s m u s’s own works, Apologia adversus mona- we re impossible and against natural and divine law. chos ( Defense Against Monks, 1528), to assert that Even if some witches we re guilty, We yer denied that witches and heretics needed better religious instruction, they should be punished with death, because they were not death sentences. essentially victims. Magicians, by contrast, freely tried Throughout his life, Weyer practiced medicine, and to subvert natural laws because they made a pact with in his own lifetime and during the century after his demons. death, his medical works found appreciative readers (his We yer led an assault on superstition and ignorance Me d i c a rum observa t i o n u m [ Medical Ob s e rva t i o n s , by maintaining that witches were not possessed by the 1567] was republished). His medical training provided Devil but instead suffered from mental illness and him with cultural and scientific material pert a i n i n g needed medical treatment. Because of such statements, specifically to witchcraft. In his treaty on anger, De ira Gre g o ry Zilboorg long ago considered We yer “t h e (1577), he attempted to prove that Europe’s contempo- founder of medical psychiatry.” However, this interpre- rary political and religious troubles derived from anger, tation was exc e s s i ve: We yer merely tried to establish and he recommended Senecan stoicism. Er a s m i a n that madness and melancholy could explain some themes also proved useful in We ye r’s fight against witches’ confessions. He was undeniably the most thor- Satan. It is well known that medicine faced dramatic ough opponent of witch hunting in his century. Yet he challenges after the publication of Paracelsus’s complete b e l i e ved deeply in demonic activities, which seems a works (also by Weyer’s publisher, Oporinus), although contradictory feature. Weyer was neither temperamen- We yer opposed Paracelsian medicine and defended tally nor intellectually suited for denying the De v i l’s Galen to the point of naming his son Galenus. interference in the world, as Balthasar Bekker would do We ye r’s mission was not successful in his lifetime. a century later, because We yer continued to share the Toward the end of his long reign, Duke Wilhelm V of common worldview of his contemporaries. C l e ves reinstituted tort u re in witchcraft cases. We ye r’s defense of the essential innocence of witches Protesting against the Spanish invasion of the fit with his larger goal of refuting and rejecting any Netherlands, We yer re t i red to his estates and died in kind of magic as a product of superstition in order to Tecklemburg, although his son inherited his position. establish a new kind of religion without cre d u l o u s After his death, his complete works we re published in f e a t u res. His pro g re s s i ve use of philology linked him to Latin at Amsterdam in 1660, but otherwise, there were the best humanistic tradition. His defense was based no reprintings before a French translation appeared at on a new biblical hermeneutics: Against this, all his Paris in the late nineteenth century (in 1885), edited by opponents struggled because We yer asserted that Go d a pupil of Jean Ma rtin Charcot, D. Bourneville. No t had ord e red Christians to prosecute magicians but not too long afterward, Sigmund Freud ranked Weyer’s De witches. His works, quickly opposed by such adve r- p raestigiis daemonum of 1563 among the ten most saries as Bodin, King James VI of Scotland, and his important books he had read. f e l l ow physician Thomas Erastus, aroused a storm of c o n t rove r s y, lasting until the second half of the nine- MICHAELA VALENTE teenth century. His opponents included the most See also:AGRIPPAVONNETTESHEIM,HEINRICHCORNELIUS; f o rceful advocates of punishing diabolical witchcraft. ALCIATI,ANDREA;BEKKER,BALTHASAR;BODIN,JEAN; We yer became notorious as a s a g a rum patro n u s DEMONOLOGY;DEMONS;DEVIL;ERASMUS,DESIDERIUS; (defender of witches), as Dudith Sbardellati, an imper- ERASTUS,THOMAS;FAMILYOFLOVE;FREUD,SIGMUND; ial ambassador in Poland, defined him. JAMESVIANDI,KINGOFSCOTLANDANDENGLAND; We yer was among the first to approach witchcraft MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;MEDICINEANDMEDICALTHEORY; with skepticism and originality. Andrea Alciati and MELANCHOLY;MENTALILLNESS;MONTAIGNE,MICHELDE; Gi ovanni Francesco Ponzinibio had made pre v i o u s PARACELSUS,THEOPHRASTUSBOMBASTUSVONHOHENHEIM; attempts, but We yer was radically different because of PONZINIBIO,GIOVANNIFRANCESCO;SKEPTICISM; WILLIAMV,DUKEOFCLEVES. his originality; he was the first to marshal four different References and further reading: perspectives (philosophical, legal, natural-scientific, and Binz, Carl. 1896. Doctor Johann Weyer: Ein rheinischer Arzt, der theological) in support of his goal. His book laid a erste Bekämpfer des Hexenwahns.Berlin: Hirschwald. foundation for later skeptics such as Michel de Cobben, Jan Jacob. 1976. Jan Wier: Devils, Witches, and Magic. Montaigne, who opposed executing alleged witches Philadelphia: Dorrance. Weyer, Johann 1195

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1196 Application File ———. 2002. Duivelse Bezetenheid: Beschreven Door Dokter Then, in early July 1562, a large, nocturnal fore s t Johannes Weir, 1515–1588. Rotterdam: Erasmus. meeting of Anabaptists was discove red in a wooded Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1988. “Johann Weyer and the ravine near Katzenbühl Castle outside Esslingen, lead- Transformationof the Insanity Defense.” Pp. 234–261 in The ing to a series of investigations throughout July and German People and the Reformation.Edited by Ronnie Po-Cha August that re q u i red the assistance of neighboring Hsia. Ithaca, NY, and London: Cornell University Press. authorities. Lutheran and Catholic preachers had long ———. 1999. A History of Madness in Sixteenth-Century Germany. warned authorities of the demonic threat of even a Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. small remnant of Anabaptists, and Count Ulrich fre- Valente, Michaela. 2003. Johann Wier: Agli albori della critica razionale dell’occulto e del demoniaco.Florence: Olschki. quently attended their interrogations. During this Weyer, Johann. 1991. Witches, Devils, and Doctors in the re v i ved governmental anxiety about secret meetings of Renaissance: Johann Weyer, “De praestigiis daemonum.”Edited by Anabaptists, a ruinous hailstorm destroyed the wine George Mora. Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance h a rvest across much of the region on August 3. T h i s Texts and Studies. time, angry people pressured their authorities to arrest ———. 1998. OnWitchcraft: An Abridged Translation of Johann suspected witches and appease Go d’s wrath. News of Weyer’s“De praestigiis daemonum.”Edited by Benjamin G. Kohl the nocturnal Anabaptist gatherings apparently blended and H. C. Erik Midelfort. Asheville, NC: Pegasus. with popular belief in weather magic, escalating into a Zilboorg, Gregory. 1935. The Medical Man and the Witch During hunt for a large, diabolical conspiracy. Only after the the Renaissance.Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. July 1562 arrests did Dreytwein begin recording stories of large groups of witches attending diabolical dances. Wiesensteig One of those convinced by such rhetoric was Count Wiesensteig, the major city of the small county of Ulrich, who at this moment was searching for Helfenstein in southwestern Germany, was the site of confessional truth. He rejected the orthodox Lutheran the first known Reformation-era witch panic in the position of Johann Brenz—which dominated Holy Roman Empire, a hunt that consumed sixty-three W ü rttemberg. Brenz opposed capital punishment for victims between 1562 and 1563. Although the actual h e retics and argued that even assisted by demons, trial records are no longer extant, contemporary pam- witches could not alter the we a t h e r. Instead, Ul r i c h phlets and chronicles provide sufficient information for listened to the unconventional pastor of Esslingen, a general overview. Thomas Naogeorgus (1508–1563), whose enthusiastic The Wiesensteig panic originated when re l i g i o u s witch-hunting sermons had earned him a re p r i m a n d c o n flict intersected communal agricultural disaster. from Esslingen’s magistrates. Ulrich immediately arrest- Unlike their more powe rful neighbor, Duke Ulrich of ed a number of women in the region of Wi e s e n s t e i g , W ü rttemberg (d. 1550), the Counts of He l f e n s t e i n , whose initial protests of innocence we re soon bro k e n Sebastian (d. 1564) and Ulrich (d. 1570), had resisted d own in the tort u re chamber. When Duke Christoph reformation impulses until 1555, when they invited of W ü rttemberg asked his neighbor for further infor- Lutheran ministers into the county. Their fli rt a t i o n mation, he was told the count had already executed six with the Reformation, howe ve r, was hampered by witches, some of whom had confessed to seeing disputes between pro t o - Reformed (Calvinist) and Esslingen citizens at their Sabbat. The duke arre s t e d o rt h o d ox Lutheran preachers and by considerable three people but later released them. Catholic pre s s u re. In 1567, Count Ulrich succumbed Count Ulrich ultimately approved the execution of to his family’s urging to return Helfenstein to sixty-three accused witches who apparently confessed to Catholicism. Religious discord, combined with ongo- m u rdering twenty-nine older adults and robbing a ing efforts to neutralize anticlerical sentiment, worries number of children of their “holy baptism,” the latter about large Anabaptist meetings, and an appare n t l y being a crime strongly associated with Anabaptists. sudden deterioration in the weather, sparked increased Enduring horrible imprisonment, interrogations, and fears of demonic activity. torture, the accused conformed their confessions to the Ac c o rding to Dionysius Dre y t wein (1498/1504–ca. traditional stereotype of demonic witches: making pacts 1585), a chronicler from Esslingen (W ü rt t e m b e r g ) , with the Devil, renouncing God and their baptism, weather in the region was indeed worsening in the taking demonic lovers, attending witches’ Sabbats or 1550s and 1560s. In 1560, a horrible famine formed dances, making horrible blasphemies against God, and, the backdrop to the trial and burning on July 13 of two of course, performing m a l e fic i a (harmful magic) that witches who confessed to making diabolical pacts and included infanticide and weather magic. p e rforming much weather magic. In 1562, hailstorms The Wiesensteig mass trials raised expectations of r a vaged the area, with a pre-Easter one inspiring the demonic, conspiratorial witchcraft across the empire. In a r rest of two accused witches in the county of the wake of Wi e s e n s t e i g’s mass executions, witchcraft Helfenstein, who had used magic to kill the yo u n g e r trials spread across the German southwest, affecting woman’s husband. fifty separate locales in the 1570s, with larger clusters 1196 Wiesensteig

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1197 Application File replacing individual trials as the norm. Wi e s e n s t e i g Wilhelm managed to install his younger brother, Ernst experienced another panic in 1583 that saw twenty-five of Ba varia (1554–1612), who had previously become witches executed; fourteen more died around 1605 and prince-bishop of Freising, Hildesheim, Liège, and five others in 1611. M ü n s t e r, as the new archbishop and prince-elector of Cologne. Together with several prince-bishoprics and GARY K. WAITE prince-abbeys, Cologne was ruled by younger brothers See also:AGRARIANCRISES;ANABAPTISTS;BRENZ,JOHANN; of the Bavarian dukes (Sekundogenitur) from then until GERMANY,SOUTHWESTERN;LITTLEICEAGE; 1756, securing the Lower Rhine region for the Roman POPULARPERSECUTION;PROTESTANTREFORMATION; Catholic Church. WEATHERMAGIC;WÜRTTEMBERG,DUCHYOF. Religious considerations guided Wi l h e l m’s foreign and References and further reading: domestic policies. Killing heretics at home complement- Behringer,Wolfgang, ed. 1988. Hexen und Hexenprozesse in ed the destruction of Protestant enemies by warf a re. In Deutschland.Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch, esp. pp. the 1580s, several Anabaptists we re burned or drow n e d 136–139. Levack, Brian P. 1995. The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe. because the main lines of Anabaptist migration to 2nd ed. London and NewYork: Longman. Mo r a v i a — f rom Swabia via the River Danube and fro m Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1972. Witch Hunting in Southwestern Ty rol via the River In n — c rossed Ba varian territory. Germany, 1562–1684: The Social and Intellectual Foundations. Ingolstadt re n ewed its propaganda against Anabaptism, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. until an even more dangerous enemy was discove red: the Oyer, John S. 2000. “They Harry the Good People Out of the witches. It may have been coincidence that the fir s t Land”: Essays on the Persecution, Survival and Flourishing of re c o rded witch burning in the Ba varian capital of Anabaptists and Mennonites.Edited by John D. Roth. Goshen, Munich occurred in 1578, the same year when the IN: Mennonite Historical Society. Marian Congregations we re founded there. Infected by a Waite, Gary K. 2003. Heresy, Magic and Witchcraft in Early w a ve of persecution farther west in the neighboring Modern Europe.Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan prince-bishopric of Augsburg, Ba va r i a’s western district ———. Forthcoming. ”Eradicating the Devil’s Minions: Anabaptists and Witches in Reformation Europe, 1525–1600.” c o u rts experienced a rising number of witchcraft accusa- tions in 1589. Duke Wilhelm and his zealous chancellor Wilhelm V “the Pious,” Ottheinrich von Schwarzenberg (1535–1590) consented Duke of Bavaria to a massive witch hunt, conducted largely by district (1548–1626, ruled 1579–1597) judges with little support from the Court Council, quite Wilhelm was a zealous witch hunter and Counter- an extraord i n a ry pro c e d u re by Ba varian legal customs. Reformation absolutist duke. The son of Du k e The importance Wilhelm gave to witch hunting can be Albrecht V of Bavaria, who ruled from 1550 to 1579, guessed from the fact that he asked Gre g o ry of Va l e n c i a and his wife, Anna of Austria, the daughter of the Holy to take his son and future successor Maximilian, then a Roman Emperor Ferdinand I, Wilhelm was educated s i x t e e n - year-old student at Ingolstadt, to the tort u re within the confines of post-Tridentine Catholicism. In chambers to instruct him about witch hunting. 1568, he married Renée of Lorraine (1544–1602), Some resistance in his duchy seems to have led to daughter of Duke Francis I of Lorraine and Christina of Wi l h e l m’s April 2, 1590, decree on witchcraft, justify- Denmark. The young couple held an illustrious court at ing the hunts while asking for an official opinion fro m the Bavarian castle at Landshut, but in 1575, the prince his councillors. Four days later, they explained that the suffered from a severe disease, leading him to a conver- existing discourse on witchcraft, based largely on sion experience and a decision to alter his life funda- Johann We yer and Johann Brenz, was irre l e vant for mentally. Not long afterward, he succeeded his father, Catholics, and they suggested on April 6, 1590, that a who had defeated the Bavarian Protestant Estates in the m o re general opinion should be commissioned fro m 1560s and who had begun a vigorous Counter- the Un i versity of Ingolstadt. The joint opinion of its Reformation, thus moving Bavaria toward a relatively theology and law faculties, issued three weeks later and early confessional absolutism. s t retching over fourteen pages, justified the re c e n t Wilhelm not only continued his father’s policy but Ba varian persecutions because an extraord i n a ry crime also devoted his country’s fate even further to re q u i red extraord i n a ry measures. Its authors (including Catholicism by sacrificing all his revenues to an ambi- Gre g o ry of Valencia) recommended the Ma l l e u s tious foreign policy. In 1583, he sent troops in order to Ma l e fic a ru m(The Hammer of Witches, 1486) and the depose the Cologne archbishop and Pr i n c e - El e c t o r recent demonology of Peter Binsfeld as guidelines for GebhardTruchsess von Waldburg, who had converted witch hunting. A few weeks later (between May and to Protestantism, in order to prevent the Holy Roman June 1590), the faculties’ recommendations we re Em p i re from becoming Protestant, for Cologne’s elec- transformed into a general instruction to all judges toral vote would tip the next emperor’s election in favor detailing how to handle suspicions of witchcraft. of a Protestant candidate. After the Cologne Wa r, In 1591, a Ba varian lawyer published a Ge r m a n Wilhelm V “the Pious,” Duke of Bavaria 1197

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1198 Application File translation of Bi n s f e l d’s Tractatus de confessionibus William V of Cleves did not persecute witches, in part m a l e fic o rum et sagarum (Treatise on Confessions of because of his personal physician, Johann Weyer, the So rc e rers and Witches, 1589), which was reprinted the famous skeptic of witchcraft trials. William’s extremely f o l l owing ye a r. Howe ve r, some leading members of large territories extended from the Netherlands to the Ba va r i a’s Privy Council, as well as re p re s e n t a t i ves of west German hill country, playing a key role in the C o n ventional to the Ba varian estates, remained dissat- power structures of the old Reich, a fact that deter- i s fied with these persecutions and opposed the idea mined the duke’s unusual political and re l i g i o u s that religion took precedence over customary law. In policies. Defeated by Emperor Charles V in 1543, the spring of 1590, Hans Georg He rw a rth vo n William was compelled to restrict himself to territorial Hohenburg (1553–1626), chancellor of the estates and policy. Toward the end of his long rule, he suffered a correspondent of Johannes Kepler (whose mother from mental debilitation, though (unlike his son and had been accused of witchcraft a few years earlier), successor) he was never diagnosed as bewitched. replaced Schwarzenberg as lord chancellor; the skeptics William V had the benefits of a humanistic educa- gained the upper hand. This faction managed to inter- tion; his tutor, Konrad von He resbach (d. 1576), rupt the “e xc e p t i o n a l” hunts and return to ord i n a ry a d m i red both Erasmus of Ro t t e rdam and Ph i l i p Ba varian legal pro c e d u res. Fu rt h e r m o re, they used the Melanchthon, and William’s Church policy was conse- d u k e’s weakness after his defeat to urge him into an quently moderate. The complicated dynastic situation early re s i g n a t i o n . in his territories permitted an expansion of Wilhelm V “the Pious” overstretched the patience of Lutheranism and later of Calvinism, both of which the his subjects and his estates, as well as their fin a n c i a l duke tolerated. In the confessional conflicts after 1555 capacities, by waging religious wars, thus bringing between Lutheran territories and those loyal to Rome, Bavaria close to bankruptcy. In 1594, he agreed to hand his duchies remained unaligned. Until around 1567, he over political administration to his son Ma x i m i l i a n , pursued a policy of denominational concession toward then age twenty-one; three years later, Wi l h e l m Protestantism. After the uprisings in the Ne t h e r l a n d s , resigned. For another thirty years, the former ruler lived his policy became more repressive. a pious life in a new residence bordering the large com- Against this background, one finds several human- plex of Munich’s Jesuit College, which he had commis- ist—and officially Protestant—scholars at his court in sioned. Wilhelm continued to participate actively in D ü s s e l d o rf, including the philologist Andreas Ma s i u s such forms of Jesuit piety as Marian Congre g a t i o n s , and the cosmographer Ge r a rdus Me rc a t o r. The most Jesuit plays, and Corpus Christi processions, and he famous of them was undoubtedly Weyer, who lived and indulged himself in such extravagant religious rituals as w o rked in Düsseldorf from 1550 until his death in washing the feet of twe l ve poor men on Good Fr i d a y 1578 and wrote his famous work against the persecu- and self-flagellation. But at least he was no longer dan- tion of witches there. Because of these men, there was gerous to others. It is quite unlikely that any of his con- consistent opposition to witchcraft trials in the united stant rituals of repentance included the hundreds of vic- duchies of Jülich, Cleves, and Berg. Ap a rt fro m tims he had condemned to the stake as Anabaptists or the electoral Palatinate, William V ruled the only large suspected witches. block of lands in the western parts of the empire where no witches were executed before 1600. Not until after WOLFGANG BEHRINGER the duke’s death did sporadic witchcraft trials occur, in See also:ANABAPTISTS;AUGSBURG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF; the early seventeenth century. BAVARIA,DUCHYOF;BINSFELD,PETER;BRENZ,JOHANN; The example of Johann We yer and William V re ve a l s COLOGNE;DENMARK;GREGORYOFVALENCIA;INGOLSTADT, h ow strongly personal relations at court could influence a UNIVERSITYOF;JESUITS(SOCIETYOFJESUS); KEPLER,JOHANNES; territorial ru l e r’s re c o rd on witchcraft trials. Howe ve r, LORRAINE,DUCHYOF;MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;MAXIMILIANI, We ye r’s impact could not pre vent the subsequent pro s e- DUKEOFBAVARIA;WEYER,JOHANN;WITCHHUNTS. cution of witches in William V’s various territories in References and further reading: later generations, although no major panics ever eru p t e d Behringer,Wolfgang. 1988. Mit dem Feuer vom Leben zum Tod: t h e re. Mo re ove r, Wi l l i a m’s personally motivated toler- Hexengesetzgebung in Bayern.Munich: Hugendubel. ance certainly provided We yer with the opportunity to ———.1997.Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early Modern Europe. fight the persecution of witches through his writings eve n Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. Cambridge: b e yond the boundaries of the sizable territory of Cleve s. Cambridge University Press. JÖRG HAUSTEIN; William V, Duke of Cleves TRANSLATED BY HELEN SIEGBURG (1539–1592) See also:ERASMUS,DESIDERIUS;GERMANY,WESTANDNORTHWEST; Ranking among the most prominent territorial princes HOLYROMANEMPIRE;PROTESTANTREFORMATION;SKEPTICISM; in the Holy Roman Empire in the confessional era, WEYER,JOHANN. 1198 William V, Duke of Cleves

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1199 Application File References and further reading: Biarmians, controlled the elements of nature and used Becker,Thomas P. 1997. “Hexenverfolgung im Herzogtum magic instead of weapons to defend themselves. Saxo Jülich.” Neue Beiträge zur Jülicher Geschichte 8: 54–75. w rote about weather magic as primarily a No rdic specialty. Dietz, Burkhart, and Stefan Ehrenpreis, eds. 1999. Drei As examples of No rdic sorc e ry, Olaus Magnus mentioned Konfessionen in einer Region: Beiträge zur Geschichte der wind magic, spell casting, the ability to foresee the future , Konfessionalisierung im Herzogtum Berg vom 16. bis zum 18. signing, and the brewing of witches’ stews that re p o rt e d l y Jahrhundert.Cologne: Rheinland-Verlag. b rought good fortune. Both insisted that No rdic peoples Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1994. Mad Princes of Renaissance Germany. could interpret and affect the we a t h e r. Olaus described Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. Pauls, Emil. 1898. “Zauberwesen und Hexenwahn am h ow the inhabitants of the far north attached wind knots Niederrhein.” Beiträge zur Geschichte des Niederrheins: Jahrbuch to straps and used their magical powers to protect them- des Düsseldorfer Geschichtsvereins 13: 134–242. s e l ves against harm. Olaus claimed that “the entire world is irresistibility fascinated by this devilish art. Sailors are Wind Knots f o rced to buy wind because of the wind conditions in the The magic of tying and untying knots is know n north, and for a little money they get three bewitched t h roughout Eu rope, and it is not confined to part i c u l a r knots tied to a strap. Bad things happen to those who regions or to weather magic. T h ree knots we re known to doubt the power of the knots, who are thus forced into h a ve been tied during French wedding ceremonies to seeking advice from sorc e re r s” (Magnus 1996, 173–174). make the husbands impotent. By the mid-sixteenth cen- The Sami conjured weather and wind by hocus-pocus, t u ry, symbolic fears of castration became so widespre a d w rote the No rwegian poet, vicar, and fire - that couples even got married secretly outside of their and-brimstone preacher Petter Dass (1647–1707) in T h e local church to avoid this affliction. Leading Fre n c h Trumpet of No rd l a n d .If a countervailing wind kept yo u r intellectuals at the time, such as Jean Bodin, feared pop- ship from sailing, he wrote, you could find a Sami to buy ulation decline as a consequence of this diabolical art . a pliant wind through his secret knowledge. His wind Nonetheless, the magic of knots is best associated magic would be fixed by three knots on a cloth. To untie with wind force and fishing communities. Sk i l l s one knot meant unleashing adequate wind for sailing, designed to raise destructive winds or sometimes to pre- but when untying the second knot, “the sail must be vent them by knot magic have been known since pulled down to half mast.” And if you untied the third ancient times. In European coastal areas, where sea knot, “then she goes too quickly—and with the pump t r a n s p o rtation, fishing, and trade we re import a n t , you must bail” (Dass 1954, 72). The opening of a rag’s witches could undo knots to raise storms, frighten off t h i rd knot brought on a destru c t i ve storm to ove rw h e l m the fish, and sink fishing boats and larger trading ships. those dealing with the agents of the Devil. Stories of We know, for instance, of the story of Aeolus—the king knotted ropes and wind sorc e ry we re retold again and of winds—who gave a bag filled with wind to Ulysses a g a i n . in Homer’s Odyssey. The knot on the bag was to be Ever since Olaus Magnus, there has been a close opened when Ulysses needed fair sailing winds. Bodin connection between wind knots, witchcraft, and the told about a Sardinian captain who bought a rope with n o rthern peoples. In a 1616 treatise on witchcraft, three wind knots. There were fifty vile ways of using Alexander Ro b e rts, the militant Protestant vicar of them, he added. Wind knots were widespread in K i n g’s Lynn in No rfolk, described many of Ol a u s Iceland and other coastal parts of northern Europe. In Ma g n u s’s stories about northern witches and their his world chronicle, Polychronicon, a fourteenth-centu- weather magic as “meere fictious, and altogether incred- ry English monk, Ranulph Higden, described a barren i b l e” at first sight. Howe ve r, he went on to say that island west of Denmark, whose inhabitants sold wind these stories could be trusted because “by the experi- in knotted ropes to sailors who arrived there. For cen- ence of our owne Navigators, who trade in Fi n l a n d , turies afterward, the northern peoples were renowned Denmarke, Lapland, Ward-house (Vardøhus), Norway, throughout Europe for their mastery of wind magic. and other countries of that climate, and have obtained Numerous reports circulated about foreign traders who of the inhabitants thereof, a certaine winde for twenty had purchased wind from the natives. d a yes together, or the like fixed periode of the time, Two authors, in part i c u l a r, played a part in giving the according to the distance of place and strings tied with No rdic peoples a reputation for sorc e ry related to wind three knots” (Roberts 1971, 20–21). Roberts added the magic: the Danish chronicler Saxo Grammaticus (ca. we l l - k n own story of what would happen when the 1150–ca.1220) and the Swedish Olaus Magnus, an exiled knots we re untied, using it to convince his readers of Catholic bishop. Their accounts of the tenacious beliefs in the reality of witchcraft and to justify the execution of a sorcery among the Sami and Nordic peoples spread local witch called Ma ry Smith who was hanged in t h rough Eu rope during the sixteenth century, simultane- January 1616. ously with the golden age of Eu ropean demonology. Sa xo RUNE HAGEN; told how some northern peoples, such as the Finns and the TRANSLATED BY MARK LEDINGHAM Wind Knots 1199

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1200 Application File See also:IMPOTENCE,SEXUAL;LAPLAND;MAGNUS,OLAUS; s u r re n d e r. On Fe b ru a ry 1, King Gustav II Adolf of SORCERY;WEATHERMAGIC. Sweden entered the capital. Howe ve r, a month later, References and further reading: Catholic troops drove the Swedes out, and the re t u r n i n g Bodin, Jean. 1975. Colloquium of the Seven About Secrets of the witch commissioners accused Winter of treason. He was Sublime.Edited by Marion Leathers Daniels Kuntz. Princeton, a r rested and remained in prison until December 1632. NJ: Princeton University Press. While the commissioners continued to collect evidence Dass, Petter. 1954. The Trumpet of Nordland.Translated by against witches, Winter protested against their inve s t i g a- Theodore Jorgenson. Minneapolis, MN: Lund. tion. His name disappears without a trace in 1633, Frazer, James George. 1922. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion. London: Macmillan. when a second Swedish invasion led to major changes in Hagen, Rune. 2002. “Early Modern Representations of the Far Ba m b e r g’s regular administration. We do not know North.” ARV—Nordic Yearbook of Folklore 200258: 19–42. whether he was formally indicted, or tried, or liberated Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. 1981. “The Aiguillette: Castration by by the Protestants. But if he was not executed in early Magic.” Pp. 84–96 in The Mind and Method of the Historian. 1633, Winter most likely died during the bubonic Translated by Siân Reynolds and Ben Reynolds. Brighton: plague of 1634, when almost half of Ba m b e r g’s people Harvester. perished, their bodies thrown into mass grave s . Magnus, Olaus. 1996. A Description of the Northern Peoples, 1555. Vol. 1. Edited by P. G. Foote. London: Hakluyt Society. WOLFGANG BEHRINGER Roberts, Alexander. 1971. ATreatise of Witchcraft. First published See also:BAMBERG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF; in 1616. Printed in Witches and Witch-Hunters.Edited by J. W. ECCLESIASTICALTERRITORIES(HOLYROMANEMPIRE). Brodie. Wakefield: S. R. Publishers. References and further reading: Saxo Grammaticus. 2000. Saxos Danmarks historie.Translated by Behringer,Wolfgang. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: Peter Zeeberg. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Gad. Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early Modern Europe.Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. Winter, Anton Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (d. 1633/1634) Gehm, Britta. 2000.Die Hexenverfolgungen des Hochstifts Bamberg An imperial lawye r, Anton Winter was commissioned by und das Eingreifen des Reichshofrates zu ihrer Beendigung. the Holy Roman Em p e ror Fe rdinand III to curb the Hildesheim: Olms. Bamberg witch hunt. Born in a Protestant territory of Kretz, Hans-Jürgen. 1972. ”Der Schöppenstuhl zu Coburg.” Jur. s o u t h western Ge r m a n y, Winter re c e i ved his doctoral diss., Universität Würzburg. d e g ree from the Un i versity of Tübingen in 1605, where Witch and Witchcraft, he later became a professor of law. In 1621, he was Definitions of appointed councillor to the Lutheran duke of Sa xe-Coburg, where he rose to become president of the According to E. E. Evans-Pritchard (1991, 234), “The high court. In 1627, Winter conve rted to Catholicism notion of witchcraft is a function of misfortunes and of and was appointed councillor by the neighboring enmities.” It assigns responsibility for misfortune to prince-bishop of Bamberg, who designated him vice- human agents perceived as enemies by the afflicted c h a n c e l l o r. party. Witchcraft as a concept is universal or nearly so The opponents of witch hunting in Bamberg, part i c- among human societies. As Evans-Pritchard and others ularly the chancellor, Dr. Georg Haan, expected have shown, the notion of witchcraft arises in settled Wi n t e r’s support and we re responsible for his appoint- societies in which people are compelled to live together ment. Howe ve r, the Bamberg witch hunts gained under all circumstances, rather than opting to solve momentum and swallowed up a good number of the conflicts by moving away (Macfarlane 1970; Briggs opponents of witch hunting, including even the 2002). Notions of what precisely witchcraft is and of chancellor and his family. When the Bamberg witch what differentiates it from the related concepts of magic hunts began to attract the attention of a wider public, a and sorcery vary considerably from society to society. formal hearing took place during a meeting of the impe- Evans-Pritchard’s study of the African Azande people rial electors at Regensburg in August 1630. Wi n t e r — t o indicated that they thought of witchcraft as an inherit- the great dismay of his prince-bishop, the bishop’s witch ed tendency, which could even take the physical form commissioners, and the hard-liners in the Bamberg gov- of a substance discoverable by autopsy. One could be a e r n m e n t — t e s t i fied against the illegal persecutions. In witch and perform witchcraft consciously or—so those 1631, he was appointed imperial commissioner to end accused of witchcraft often argued—unconsciously and the Bamberg witchcraft trials and release the re m a i n i n g involuntarily. “A witch performs no rite, utters no spell, detainees. Soon afterw a rd, Swedish troops appro a c h e d and possesses no medicines. An act of witchcraft is a Bamberg. The prince-bishop fled to his estates in p s ychic act” (Eva n s - Pr i t c h a rd 1991, 1, quoted by Carinthia, and the witch commissioners withdrew to Sharpe 1996, 13). the fort ress of Fo rchheim. Winter now became de facto So rc e rers, by contrast, both among the Azande and ruler of the prince-bishopric and advised unconditional in other contexts, employ rites, verbal formulas, and the 1200 Winter, Anton

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1201 Application File manipulation of symbols and substances in order to religious and political dissidents, particularly in w o rk magical effects. Ne c romancers use techniques English-speaking countries, have reclaimed the witch as resembling sorcery in order to consult demons or spirits a positive figure to be imitated and reinterpreted in dai- of the dead. Sorcerers are generally thought to be malef- ly life; this “good witch” expresses a Ne o - Pagan, non- icent, though agents whose actions resemble sorc e ry, monotheistic ideal of nature worship and “holistic spir- often called “w h i t e” or good witches, have in many ituality.” times and places been considered beneficent and been Howe ve r, the definitions of witches and witchcraft sought out as prophets and healers, rather than dreaded that evo l ved in western Eu rope from the early 1400s or avoided. Cunning folk (cunning men and cunning until the end of organized prosecutions around 1700 women) are thought to be able to re m ove witchcrafts, h a ve determined the shape of modern Eu ropean and find lost articles, and perform certain acts of healing; American ideas. Early modern witch mythology was they may be referred to as witches, as witch doctors, or, not medieval but a product of the Renaissance and if male, as wizards (Thomas 1971, 177–252). Enlightenment; it was not ignorant or plebeian but was Most important, the semantic distinctions among produced by the educated elites. Witchcraft was a mis- s o rc e rers, necromancers, cunning folk, and witches cellany of slanders, stereotypes, and paranoid fantasies, (both beneficent and maleficent) are often blurred or mostly inherited from previous ages, but seasoned with obliterated in eve ryday usage and nonspecialist writ- contemporary anxieties. For centuries before 1400, the ings. Both in English and in other modern Eu ro p e a n illiterate and semiliterate strata of society had attributed languages, the term witchis often used indiscriminately paranormal or supernatural powers to certain persons. for all these agents; conve r s e l y, one of the other terms During this period, both secular and ecclesiastical elites may subsume the concept of the witch (for example, had denounced many of the witches’ supposed powers the French sorcier and sorcière).Another shift in seman- as superstitious, sinful, and contrary to re a l i t y. Bu t tic values has occurred since the 1970s, as groups of rather suddenly, about 1400, the skeptical attitude t ow a rd witchcraft in literate culture was replaced by a new attitude of credulity. Be t ween 1430 and 1470, increasing numbers of literate Eu ropean men, both clerical and secular, convinced themselves that such phenomena were actu- ally possible. But the power to perform such wonders (m i ra) could not be inherently human or natural, as common folk believed; rather, it must be demonic. W h e reas illiterate culture had defined witchcraft as either good or evil, the new definition implied that it was always evil in origin, even when its effects seemed beneficent or neutral. Moreover, witches had to be the dupes or slaves of demons, not their masters, as the learned concept of necromancy presupposed. Witches’ p ower was a p ra e s t i g i u m , or demonic illusion: Any actual wonders we re performed by demons, and eve n i l l u s o ry feats derived from demons’ manipulation of reality or human perception. Collective l y, these phenomena we re labeled by a variety of Latin word s (m a l e ficium, ve n e ficium, sort i l e g i u m) and ve r n a c u l a r terms (s o rc e l l e r i e , He xe re i , b ru j e r í a , s t re g o n e r i a , and so forth; often—as in French, German, or Spanish—with m o re than one term per vernacular) that English now translates as w i t c h c ra f t . These labels had major share d aspects. Characteristics of the Witch In a dream, a woman conceptualizes standard elements in diabolical Stereotype witchcraft: flight with a stick to the Sabbat (and hence apostasy) on a goat/devil, a cauldron, maleficium(weather magic), winged demons, Apostasy Learned opponents of witchcraft imagined death, invocation from inside a magic circle, and a serpent. witches as renegade Christians. T h roughout the early (Anonymous, Die Hexenvorstellung als Traum,1716. From Hexen: Analysen, Quellen, Dokumente.Directmedia Publishing GmbH: d e velopment of the learned myth, witchcraft was Berlin, 2003) d e fined as a terrible new here s y, deriving not from a Witch and Witchcraft, Definitions of 1201

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1202 Application File p e r s o n’s ignorance or deception by others but fro m The Devil could take sexual possession of the initiate willful abandonment of orthodoxy.Thus, witches were at initiation or other times. Copulation with Satan or condemned as apostates or defectors from the Church, demons was possible for both male and female witches, who had formally transferred their allegiance fro m but women we re imagined performing this activity God, Jesus, the Virgin, and humanity to Satan, the more often than men. a rc h r i val of God, and his demons, the archenemies of h u m a n i t y. The common goal of witches and demons At t e n d a nce at Mass Meeting s In i t i a t i n g a d e p t s was to overthrow both Church and society. into Sa t a n’s antisociety re q u i red collective gatherings. This stereotype derived from earlier commonplaces M a l e fic i u m Witches subve rted society by infli c t i n g about heretics. Over time, the numbers of participants mysterious harms or destruction on adults, childre n , increased, reaching thousands during the sixteenth cen- livestock, and crops. Whereas folklore attributed myste- t u ry. Religious vo c a b u l a ry designating the imagined rious power for both good and evil to witches or to meetings expressed their anti-Christian nature: Sectfre- their occult rites and words, intellectuals insisted that quently referred to the society of witches, but synagogue such great power, real or illusory, could only come from and Sabbat(sabbath)—terms implying an analogy with a supernatural—and thus demonic—source. In fact, Jewish refusal to accept Christianity—pre vailed for w i t c h e s’ apparent power for good was pre s u m p t i ve describing their meetings. proof of a demonically bestowed power to perform evil. Aside from initiations, mass meetings provided priv- ileged settings for other imagined witch activities. The Femininity A large majority, roughly 80 percent, of most common are described in the following passages. persons tried for witchcraft were women, despite occa- sional majorities of male defendants. This imbalance De s e c r at ion Sabbat mythology imagined witches p a rtly re flected illiterate accusations of m a l e fic i u m , as antithetical Christians, performing rituals that whether spontaneous or solicited by literate judges and i n ve rted Christian ritual interactions with the deity. inquisitors. Ma l e fic i u m largely affected “w o m e n’s Catholics imagined that cru c i fixes and Eu c h a r i s t i c work,” from childbirth and caregiving to food prepara- Hosts we re debased, not exalted—trampled, tion, folk medicine, and many kinds of farm labor. b e s m i rched with exc reta, or insulted verbally rather Prejudice, literate and not, contributed: Maleficium was than elevated and adored. Beginning around 1590, p e rformed secretly and was, there f o re, considere d desecration evolved into the myth of the Black Mass, a a p p ropriate for persons lacking physical or economic systematic inversion of the Roman Catholic Mass per- power. Literate and illiterate stereotypes about women’s formed by or in honor of the Devil. Protestants, who s e c re c y, deviousness, and sexual insatiability we re rejected the sacraments that Catholics imagined being a l ready codified in proverbs and literature, and they desecrated at the Sabbat, frequently denounced the inflected all the characteristics attributed to witches. Catholic sacraments as witchcraft, an imposture invent- ed by Satan. Physical Interaction with Satan and Demons Apostasy implied that a witch did not operate in isola- I n fa n t ic i de and Ca n n i ba l i sm Fo l k l o r i c m y t h o l- tion but had necessarily defected to a rival organization ogy imagined witches causing the death of children. In s t ru c t u red like the Church. But unlike induction into most learned scenarios, dead witches disinterre d the Church, initiation into apostasy happened through c h i l d ren after burial and took their corpses to the personal, even physical contact with the head of the Sabbat to be cooked and eaten. An analogy with the organization: Satan appeared “in person” to wave r i n g Eucharist was usually implied or explicit. Childre n Christians to tempt them. Alternatively, he might order could also be killed at the Sabbat as a sacrifice to Satan, a veteran witch to tempt a prospective initiate (a partic- implying a travesty of the Mass as Eucharistic sacrifice. ularly frequent feature during the fifteenth century). All formal initiations into the organization were personally Ba nq u e t i ng The Sabbat menu could feature dishes conducted by Satan, not delegated to priests or other other than roasted or boiled children, re flecting the re p re s e n t a t i ves. As confirmation, the Devil might fantasies of malnourished accused witches, of their demand body parts or other tokens from the initiate or learned interrogators, or a combination of both. b e s t ow his own tokens or pro p r i e t a ry marks. In Defendants imagined eve ryday or festive cuisine; inter- contexts where literacy was re l a t i vely common, the rogators suggested disgusting or terrible dishes or that Devil supposedly re q u i red initiates to sign a formal normal dishes lacked fla vor: Salt was used to pre p a re holy written contract (or, alternatively, a collective “Book of w a t e r, and both substances supposedly repelled demons. Death”), often in blood, surrendering body and soul in e xchange for initiation and the power to perf o r m Metamorphosis Folkloric witches (and occasionally maleficium. their victims) could become wolves, cats, or other 1202 Witch and Witchcraft, Definitions of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1203 Application File animals. Learned witchcraft writers declared that only put on by devils to deceive simple people, including the God could effect true metamorphosis; witches mere l y s t re g h e. appeared to be transformed, thanks to a diabolical illu- In the fifteenth century, five treatises sketching sion. The illusion was, however, absolutely convincing elements of the witches’ Sabbat, often composed by to anyone besides authorities familiar with demons’ people who had attended the Council of Basel in d e c e p t i ve powe r. Like ord i n a ry people, witch-hunting t h e 1430s, appeared almost simultaneously, alongside advocates imagined that pseudometamorphosis allowed well-documented trials in Dauphiné, the Valais, and witches to disguise their supernatural m a l e ficia ( e v i l the diocese of Lausanne. Such accusations of diabolic acts), particularly infanticide, as the natural destructive- witchcraft may indirectly have re flected anxiety ove r ness of animals. Ignorance of such demonic deceptions actual religious dissent: The Hussite heresy presented a was invoked to refute opponents of witch hunting. major challenge to Western ort h o d oxy in this period and was discussed worriedly by several early witchcraft The Cau l dron Witches we re imagined cooking authors, especially Johannes Nider. Some actual groups disgusting or horrifying ingredients: serpents, toads, we re persecuted under names linking them to major boiled children, and sacramental materials. T h e m e d i e val heresies: for instance, Va u d o i s or Va l d e n s e s c a u l d ron was also essential for preparing the pro d u c t s (Waldensians) or Gazarii(Cathars). discussed in the following sections: Si m u l t a n e o u s l y, in northern and central It a l y, St . Be r n a rdino of Siena popularized similar notions and The Initiates’ Pot ion A kind of anti-Eu c h a r i s t , claimed to have discovered two Roman women in 1424 this potion granted witchcraft knowledge and, in some who had killed numerous children, using an herbal versions, bound the initiate’s soul, preventing reconver- ointment that made them seem to be cats. The women sion to Christianity were burned (Kors and Peters 2001, 133–137). Be t ween 1437 and 1455, two clerics, Johannes Ni d e r Ointments When smeared on witches’ private parts and Alonso Tostado, described the same night-rambling or on brooms, pitchforks, and the like, greasy re s i d u e women as Pa s s a vanti, employing terms (the Ge r m a n f rom the cauldron allegedly signaled demons to trans- Un h o l d a and Latin m a l e fic a) later commonly used for p o rt witches. Alternative l y, it could be smeared on witches. Both writers described the women’s failed victims, summoning demons to attack them. attempts to convince others that their traveling was re a l . Howe ve r, each author claimed or implied elsew h e re P o w de rs Powders struck victims with illness or t h a t magical night traveling was sometimes possible in death. T h e re we re two varieties, one confected by re a l i t y. witches, the other by the Devil or other demons. Like Meanwhile, papal decrees in the first four decades the ointment, powder made by witches summoned o f the 1400s mentioned new “s e c t s” of Jews and demons to harm victims. Powder supplied by devils was demon-worshipping heretics who practiced maleficium apparently lethal in itself. and magic, desecrated sacraments, flew, and caused bad we a t h e r. By mid-century, treatises describing the new F ly i ng or Transv e ct ion Centuries before witch sect and its gatherings multiplied in Germany, Italy, the stereotypes solidified, wise women and herbalists appar- Low Countries, and Spain. Most shared a major strate- ently used hallucinogenic ointments. Fifteenth-century gy of separating modern witches from the dre a m i n g clerics re i n t e r p reted women’s hallucinations of rapid women mentioned by the Ca n o n Ep i s c o p i ( St e p h e n s travel as actual flight. Literate culture found flight ideo- 2002, 20–26, 134–137). logically useful: First, it argued for the reality of demon- From the 1450s through the 1470s, treatises on ic powe r, because it could not have human or natural witchcraft phenomena became increasingly Scholastic. causes; second, it explained the elusiveness of the Alonso de Espina (ca. 1459/1460) classified witchlike Sabbat and precluded skeptics’ empirical investigation. h e retics along with Jews, Muslims, and devils as ene- mies attacking the “Fo rt ress of [Christian] Faith.” He Influential Definitions of the Witch s p e c i fied that demon-worshipping women called x u r- About 1350, the Dominican Jacopo Pa s s a vanti used the g u i n a e or b ru x a e we re deluded about their supposed term s t re g a in a vernacular sermon to designate women powers but were and should be prosecuted. Treatises of who claimed nocturnal rambles with the goddess Di a n a this period defended the reality of witchcraft, the and other godlike females (Kors and Peters 2001, 111). Sabbat, and even demons themselves, by peremptorily St re g a( f rom the Latin s t r i x) became one of the standard refuting pagan and Jewish skepticism about the reality terms for witches over the next century. Pa s s a va n t i’s term of spirits. for nocturnal rambling was t re g e n d a , which later With the 1486 publication of Malleus Ma l e fic a ru m designated the Sabbat in Italian. Howe ve r, Pa s s a va n t i (The Hammer of Witches), witchcraft mythology implied that the t re g e n d amight be an empty masquerade attained systematic theoretical consolidation, despite Witch and Witchcraft, Definitions of 1203

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1204 Application File ignoring the witches’ Sabbat. The Ma l l e u s a r g u e d Be t ween Pi c o’s St r i x and Jean Bodin’s De la démono- formally for a predominance of women among witches, manie des sorc i e r s (On the De m o n - Mania of Wi t c h e s , and it dated the origin of the “s e c t” to around 1400, 1580), witchcraft was little discussed (mainly by critics when, it claimed, women began voluntarily fornicating such as Johann We yer), and persecutions declined, while with incubus demons for pleasure, rather than being Western Christians coped with the ove rt doctrinal con- molested by them; demonic copulation was considered flicts of the Reformation and Counter-Re f o r m a t i o n , w i d e s p read among witches (Stephens 2002, 32–55). with their related social upheavals (Peters 2001, The Ma l l e u s d e voted two books to historical and 2 4 0 – 2 4 3 ) . theoretical treatment, and its entire third book focused The second wave of witchcraft treatises, beginning on practical legal pro c e d u res for discovering, entrap- with Lambert Daneau and Bodin, was more systematic ping, prosecuting, and executing witches, all of which and often even more virulent and extreme in its asser- applied to secular as well as ecclesiastical justice. tions than writings of roughly between 1430 and 1530. Subsequent definitions of witchcraft evo l ved less For example, the Malleus named only four crimes that rapidly in their broad outlines, yet witchcraft pro g re s- we re characteristic of all witches (Kramer 1971, s i vely separated itself from conventional forms of here s y. 20–21), whereas Bodin’s work enumerated fifteen (Kors By the Reformation, witchcraft had become a practical- and Peters 2001, 291–294). Bodin did not imagine ly self-standing phenomenon in the literate imagination, completely new crimes; rather, he exploited rhetorical so socially dangerous as to subsume other varieties of effects, such as lengthy numbered lists. Bodin, a politi- religious deviance. A group of related northern It a l i a n cal theorist, strongly emphasized witchcraft as t reatises from the early 1520s strikingly illustrates this l è s e - m a j e s t é against God, enumerating seven benefit s consolidation. About 1521, Si l ve s t ro Prierias coined the obtained by punishing witches, especially “to appease neologism strigimaga, or “w i t c h - s o rc e ress,” to argue that the anger of God” and obtain his blessing on the state witchcraft was a new phenomenon, inadequately (Kors and Peters 2001, 291). d e fined by the ancient terms s t r i x and m a g u s / m a g a Martín Del Rio’sDisquisitiones Magicae libri sex (Six (child-attacking va m p i re and magician). To define the Books on Investigations into Magic, 1599–1600) relat- s t r i g i m a g a , Si l ve s t ro Ma z zolini explored the origins and ed witchcraft to the history of heresy from Hussitism to meanings of other terms, Latin and popular, pagan and Calvinism, giving five reasons why “magic re g u l a r l y Christian, ancient and modern. Ma g a / m a g u sis a ve r n a c- accompan[ied] here s y” (Kors and Peters 2001, ular synonym of m a l e fic a / m a l e fic u s ;m a s c ais a ve r n a c u l a r 332–334). Del Rio named eleven separate stages in the synonym of l a rva , referring to the ease with which solemnization of the witches’ pact with Satan at the ghosts (and hence witches) evade detection, as if Sabbat; these stages, like much else in Del Rio’s treatise, “masked.” The Latin l a m i a and s t r i x / s t r i g i a and It a l i a n we re copied by Francesco Maria Gu a z zo in his s t re g a / s t r i g a / s t r i a s h ow that witches victimize childre n . C o m p e n d i u m Ma l e fic a ru m (A Su m m a ry of Wi t c h e s , The s t r i x is a scre e c h - owl, believed to suck sleeping 1608, 2nd ed., 1626) and synthesized with information i n f a n t s’ blood, the l a m i a a monstrous humanoid beast f rom Nicolas Rémy’s Da e m o n o l a t r i a e ( De m o n o l a t ry, that devours its own children. All these terms re f e r 1595) and other earlier works. metaphorically to witches’ deeds (Stephens 2002, With Guazzo and Pierre de Lancre (Tableau de l’in- 2 7 9 – 2 8 0 ) . constance des mauvaises anges et démons [Description of In his Quaestio de strigibus (An In vestigation of the Inconstancy of Evil Angels and Demons], 1612), Witches, 1523), Pr i e r i a s’s pupil Ba rtolomeo della Sp i n a the stereotype of the witch reached encyc l o p e d i c maintained that eve rything witches confessed was tru e p ro p o rtions. Not coincidentally, editions of these two and real, though not always in the way that witches and w o rks contained the most complete pictorial illustra- common people thought. Only inquisitors we re qualifie d tions of witches’ activities, especially at the Sa b b a t , to decide in what manner witches’ experiences we re re a l ; found anywhere in witchcraft treatises. most happened “in the body,” but some we re demonic WALTER STEPHENS illusions. Yet all witchcraft phenomena we re enabled and overseen by demons. See also:BASEL,COUNCILOF;BERNARDINOOFSIENA;BLACKMASS; Gianfrancesco Pico della Mirandola, who had per- BODIN,JEAN;CANNIBALISM;CANONEPISCOPI;CATS;CAULDRON; sonal contacts with both Prierias and Spina, extended CONTEMPORARYWITCHCRAFT(POST1800); CUNNINGFOLK; their conclusions in his St r i x (The Witch, 1523). DANEAU,LAMBERT;DELRIO,MARTÍN;DEMONS;DRUGSAND Witchcraft and particularly the Sabbat featured a mix- HALLUCINOGENS;EVANS-PRITCHARD,EDWARD;FLIGHTOF WITCHES;GENDER;GUAZZO,FRANCESCOMARIA;HERESY; t u re of ancient and modern perversions, attested by HUSSITES;INFANTICIDE;LAMIA;LANCRE,PIERREDE;MAGIC, ancient Gre c o - Roman terms such as s t r i x and l a m i a LEARNED;MAGIC,NATURAL;MAGIC,POPULAR;MALEFICIUM; ( Pico gave an even fuller catalog of such terms than MALLEUSMALEFICARUM;METAMORPHOSIS;NECROMANCY;NIDER, Prierias); other abominations, involving here s y, we re JOHANNES;OINTMENTS;ORIGINSOFTHEWITCHHUNTS;PACT new (Elmer, Webb, and Wood 2000, 378–380). WITHTHEDEVIL;PICODELLAMIRANDOLA,GIANFRANCESCO; 1204 Witch and Witchcraft, Definitions of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1205 Application File POISON;POTIONS;PRIERIAS,SILVESTRO;RÉMY,NICOLAS;SABBAT; 1991. Reprint. NewYork: Columbia University Press, 1991. SATANISM;SORCERY;SPINA,BARTOLOMEODELLA;STRIX,STRIGA, The Literate Invention of Witchcraft STRIA;TOSTADO,ALONSO;VAUDOIS(WALDENSIANS). Anglo, Sydney, ed. 1977. The Damned Art: Essays in the Literature References and further reading: of Witchcraft.London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Common Definitions of Witchcraft Ankarloo, Bengt, and Stuart Clark, eds. 2002. The Period of the Briggs, Robin. 2002.Witches and Neighbors: The Social and Witch Trials.Vol. 4 of The Athlone History of Witchcraft and Cultural Context of European Witchcraft.2nd ed. Oxford: Magic in Europe. London and Philadelphia: Athlone and Blackwell. University of Pennsylvania Press. Douglas, Mary, ed. 1970. Witchcraft Confessions and Accusations. Clark, Stuart. 1997. Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft London: Tavistock. in Early Modern Europe.Oxford: Clarendon. Evans-Pritchard, E. E. 1991. Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic Among Kieckhefer, Richard. 1976. European Witch Trials: Their the Azande.1937. Abridged, with an introduction by Eva Foundations in Popular and Learned Culture, 1300–1500. Gillies. 1976. Reprint. Oxford: Clarendon. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Jolly, Karen. 2001. ”Medieval Magic: Definitions, Beliefs, Kramer, Heinrich. 1971. Malleus Maleficarum.Edited by Practices.” Pp. 1–71 in The Middle Ages.Vol. 3 of The Athlone Montague Summers. NewYork: Dover. History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe.Edited by Bengt Stephens, Walter. 2002. Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Athlone Crisis of Belief.Chicago and London: University of Chicago and University of Pennsylvania Press. Press. Luhrmann, T. M. 1989. Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft: Ritual Weyer, Johann. 1991. Witches, Devils, and Doctors in the Magic in Contemporary England.Cambridge, MA: Harvard Renaissance: Johann Weyer, “De praestigiis daemonum.”Edited by University Press. George Mora, Benjamin Kohl, John Shea, John Weber, Erik Macfarlane, Alan. 1970. Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart England: A Midelfort, and Helen Bacon. Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Regional and Comparative Study.NewYork: Harper Renaissance Texts and Studies. Torchbooks. Mair, Lucy. 1969. Witchcraft. NewYork: McGraw-Hill. Witch Craze Marwick, Max. 1970. Witchcraft and Sorcery: Selected Readings. Until the mid-twentieth century, the term witch craze 1975. Reprint. Harmondsworth: Penguin. was a common descriptor for large witchcraft trials and Purkiss, Diane. 1996. The Witch in History: Early Modern and was often applied to the European witch persecution in Twentieth-Century Representations.London: Routledge. general. Subsequent scholarship has preferred to replace Raudvere, Catharina. 2001.“Trolldómr in Early Medieval this value-laden term with the more neutral witch hunt Scandinavia.” Pp. 73–171 in The Middle Ages.Vol. 3 of The or witch panic, defined as “any hunt resulting in 20 or Athlone History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe.Edited by more executions in one year” (Midelfort 1972, 9). Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Athlone and University of Pennsylvania Press. However, in 1980, witch craze was redefined as an Sharpe, James. 1996. Instruments of Darkness: Witchcraft in Early “explosive amplification of witchcraft caused by a tem- Modern England.1997. Reprint. Philadelphia: University of porary syncretism of the traditional witch beliefs of the Pennsylvania Press. common people with those of the more specialized or Thomas, Keith. 1971. Religion and the Decline of Magic.New educated classes” (Henningsen 1980, 391), for York: Scribner’s. instance, the demonological theory of European intel- Learned Heresy and Magic lectuals or the elaborated witchcraft mythology of Elmer, Peter, Nick Webb, and Roberta Wood, eds. 2000. The African witch doctors. The two phenomena may be Renaissance in Europe: An Anthology.New Haven, CT, and distinguished by a series of opposed characteristics: London: Yale University Press and the Open University. Flint, Valerie I. J. 1991. The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval 1. Witch beliefis transmitted by long-term oral Europe.Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Kieckhefer, Richard. 1989. Magic in the Middle Ages.Cambridge: tradition in the local community, uninterrupted Cambridge University Press. and continuous. Witch craze,by contrast, is a Kors, Alan Charles, and Edward Peters. 2001. Witchcraft in short-lived phenomenon and exists only Europe, 400–1700: A Documentary History.2nd ed. Revised by momentarily as local rumors and propaganda. Edward Peters. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 2. Socially, witch beliefhas several functions within the Lambert, Malcolm. 1992. Medieval Heresy: Popular Movements local community. It is part of a cognitive system (for from the Gregorian Reform to the Reformation.2nd ed. Oxford: example, explaining individual misfortune) and of a Blackwell. moral system (most societies do not tolerate envy, Peters, Edward. 2001. “The Medieval Church and State on and envious people are therefore thought to be Superstition, Magic and Witchcraft: From Augustine to the witches). Moreover, belief in witchcraft may Sixteenth Century.” Pp. 173–245 in The Middle Ages.Vol. 3 of function as a safety valve for latent aggression that The Athlone History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe. Edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: cannot be expressed otherwise because society for- Athlone and University of Pennsylvania Press. bids it. For instance, if your mother-in-law lives Wakefield, Walter L., and Austin P. Evans, eds. 1969. Heresies of with you, you must endure her caprices, but if you the High Middle Ages: Selected Sources, Translated and Annotated. can convince your family and your neighbors that Witch Craze 1205

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1206 Application File she is a witch, you can throw her out of your house. ———. 1996. “The Child Witch Syndrome: Satanic Child Abuse Witch craze,by contrast, is totally dysfunctional, of Today and Child Witch Trials of Yesterday.” Journal of both cognitively and morally, and any function as a Forensic Psychiatry7: 581–593. La Fontaine, J. S. 1998. Speak of the Devil: Tales of Satanic Abuse safety valve takes such explosive forms that it tears in Contemporary England.Cambridge: Cambridge University local society into pieces. Press. 3. Witch beliefis characterized by an unsystematic Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1972. Witch Hunting in Southwestern mythology, while witch crazehas an abundant and Germany, 1562–1684: The Social and Intellectual Foundations. elaborated superstructure. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. 4. In witch belief,harm to individuals (maleficium) is necessary for initiating a trial, but in a witch craze, Witch Finders this aspect becomes insignificant; the primary thing is to identify someone as belonging to the witches’ Witchcraft is normally understood as damage of a group because he or she, for instance, was seen at mysterious or supernatural nature caused by another the Sabbat or was found to have a Devil’s mark. p e r s o n’s ill will or evil intent. T h e re is often a funda- 5. In witch belief,the compact with the Devil or other mental uncertainty about the real identity of a witch. supernatural beings is unimportant or even totally T h e re f o re, the belief in witchcraft includes ideas about missing. In a witch craze,it is overwhelmingly h ow the identity of witches can be re vealed. In d i v i d u a l s important, as the accusation is concentrated on this who fulfill this function of re vealing the identity of point. witches are called witch finders. In the same way that 6 . In witch belief,the usual suspects are individuals who witchcraft is, in itself, a multivarious phenomenon, do not fit into the community: old people, widow s , differing types of witch finders display no uniform char- cripples, and beggars. In a witch cra ze, all sorts of acteristics. In the endemic form that witchcraft takes at people may be accused, including even childre n . the village level, the witch finders had their allotted 7 . Fi n a l l y, in witch belief,usually only one or two people place in the system, not just to expose witches but also in each village are accused. In a witch cra ze ,up to half to provide countermagic. Ex t reme forms of fin d i n g the population may be branded as witches. witches appeared in connection with extensive witch hunts, wherein witch finders temporarily played an In other words, the witch craze was not just a i m p o rtant role in initiating and, in a spatial context, re i n f o rced form of witch belief but rather a sort of communicating witchcraft. The appearance of witch mutation, where by witchcraft was prosecuted as a finders may help explain the disparate occurrence of the h e re s y, instead of being treated as an ord i n a ry crime witchcraft trials in the sixteenth and seve n t e e n t h along with theft and homicide. Most trials of the c e n t u r i e s . European witch persecution were maleficium cases and However, in a society where witchcraft has a promi- belonged to the category of witch belief. By contrast, nent place as an explanatory system, it is not always the witch craze was a rather rare phenomenon. T h e necessary (in the case of minor damage, for example) to largest outbreaks occurred in Sweden, Germany, and in disclose the identity of the witch. Si m i l a r l y, in some the Alpine and Py reneean regions. Postcolonial Africa cases, the witch may be seen as an external enemy rather has experienced occasional epidemics of witch craze in than an internal one, as is usually the case, and could the shape of the so-called witch-finder movements. therefore be banished by countermagic, thus dispensing While witch belief has disappeared from most with the need to disclose an identity. In some situa- Western societies, witch craze also tends to return there tions, the need to find the witch through a witch finder in new disguises. An example of this was the wave of is considered unnecessary, for instance, when a conflict trials for satanic child abuse that started in the last arises in which one of the parties is threatened and fears decades of the twentieth century with a sort of immediate reprisal. The occurrence of an accident in demonology developed by psychotherapists and social these circumstances means that a witch is undeniably w o rkers, with obscure techniques for identifying the exposed. The village witch, a classic fig u re who was child victims, and with the same flaws in judicial already surrounded by rumors of witchcraft, had every procedure as in the historical witchcraft trials. reason to be wary of making threats or using a sharp tongue. Si m i l a r l y, in the case of a person perf o r m i n g GUSTAV HENNINGSEN magic or sorc e ry—that is, ritualized, externally o b s e rved behavior—it might seem evident who was See also:AFRICA(SUB-SAHARAN); BASQUECOUNTRY;DEVIL’SMARK; responsible for an accident, even if the person seen PANICS;SATANISM;WITCHHUNTS. carrying out suspicious acts by the victim of the witch- References and further reading: craft was not expressly an enemy of the victim. Henningsen, Gustav. 1980. The Witches’ Advocate: Basque Witchcraft and the Spanish Inquisition.Reno: University of So m ewhat iro n i c a l l y, one could say that when a Nevada Press. traditional witch finder was employed, it was quite 1206 Witch Finders

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1207 Application File likely that the witch would remain anonymous and not movements or witch-cleansing movements, have exist- be exposed before he or she succumbed to the witch ed in various communities with a belief in witchcraft, fin d e r’s countermagic. Na t u r a l l y, the expert in magic in widely differing eras and locations. These move- could claim to know the name of the witch, but equal- ments have the aim of freeing their communities from l y, it was better not to be too explicit re g a rding his or witchcraft once and for all. In this respect, they are not her identity, as this could lead to an outcry or major retrospective, as in the normal case of trying to discover c o n flict between the parties invo l ved and might eve n who is responsible for having caused particular damage, attract the attention of the clergy or the civil authori- but are, on the contrary, more concerned with the ties. In the cases where individuals we re identified, it f u t u re. The witch finder here is not operating in was in the interest of the witch finder to ensure that the the service of an individual but on behalf of the whole accused was at a safe distance and not in direct conflict community, even though the dynamic role of the witch with the victim. finder should not be underestimated. The re c u r re n t The term witch fin d e rdoes not always imply a human nature of this type of movement suggests that it is not agent but can also be used to refer simply to a method. necessarily related to deep social upheavals, which Methods such as beating fuligo septica( b e l i e ved to be the might easily be assumed in the case of African commu- vomit left by witch familiars after stealing milk from the nities in a colonial or postcolonial context or in relation c ows on a farm) or burning straw as a way of forcing the to early modern Europe. The witch finders often show witch to disclose him- or herself are well known in folk- c reativity in adapting new methods to fit traditional l o re. The use of oracles is slightly different in that it conceptions and attitudes. They are entrepreneurs who re q u i res the names of the suspects to be presented to the know how to satisfy demands and take advantage of the oracle. It should be emphasized that certain witch fin d- situation to gain prestige or financial rewards. This, in ers could also operate unconsciously by putting them- turn, makes witch finders dependent on a continuing s e l ves in a trance in order to be able to detect and expose witch hunt. witches. An institution could also act as a witch fin d e r. Witch finders existed all over Eu rope. The most The judicial system supplemented or even competed famous of these was probably Ma t t h ew Ho p k i n s , with the traditional witch finders. Howe ve r, while the “Wi t c h - Finder Generall,” as he is titled on the latter meted out symbolic punishment, the former exe- f rontispiece of his book The Discove ry of Wi t c h e s cuted those found guilty. Thus, the work of the witch (1647). Hopkins was a re l a t i vely insignificant gentle- finder was not exc l u s i ve to magical experts but could man who lived in Ma n n i n g t ree in northeast Essex, equally well be carried out by the victim of witchcraft, England. In the 1644–1645 winter, he appare n t l y an impersonal technique, by an institution, or even by became very concerned about the presence of witches in the witch himself or herself. Antiwitch movements stud- the neighborhood, and it seems likely that 19 witches ied in traditional communities have sometimes been we re put to death in the summer of 1645 as a conse- s h own to produce self-confessed “witches,” but this is a quence of the trials resulting from his fantasies. T h e s e c o n d a ry development in relation to the “n o r m a l” persecution of witches spread rapidly to neighboring witch fin d e r’s initial measures in the process of inducing counties. In total, some 250 suspected witches we re people to refrain from witchcraft. The use of violence to brought before the authorities in the East Anglian trials a c h i e ve these ends should not be overlooked, nor should between 1645 and 1647, the majority in the first inten- the fact that blood has been shed in the grim persecu- s i ve months of the witch hunt (Sharpe 1996, tion of witches in postcolonial contexts. In Eu rope in 237–238). Hopkins and his less we l l - k n own colleague the early modern period, spontaneous confessions we re John Stearne were active in Essex and in other counties. unusual but hardly surprising in view of the punishment They traveled around looking for witches, were paid for i n vo l ved. In the major witch hunt at the beginning of their services, and took part in the trials. Methods such the seventeenth century in northern Spain, howe ve r, as pricking, searching for strange exc rescences, swim- spontaneous confessions we re surprisingly common. ming, and sleep depravation we re included in This finding is probably related to the generous granting Hopkins’s repertoire. Even though no one can deny the of pardons that characterized the In q u i s i t i o n personal importance of Matthew Hopkins, research has ( Henningsen 1980). often focused on the contemporary social climate that C o n c u r rent with the traditional witch finders, a p rovided the necessary conditions for his success as a m o re sensational and dangerous type of witch fin d e r witch finder (Macfarlane 1991; Sharpe 1996). was sometimes seen in connection with major witch T h e re are also re f e rences to witch finders in France in hunts. This fig u re was the witch finder pro p e r. In connection with the outbreak of local witch hunts in the contrast to most of the traditional witch finders, such 1640s and 1670s. It is re p o rted that higher authorities individuals we re not concerned with counteracting f rowned upon their activities. In Ja n u a ry 1644, in the witches but only with exposing them. Si m i l a r vicinity of Toulouse, such a man, who was supposed to w i t c h finders and movements, known as antiwitch be skilled in the art of disclosing “the De v i l’s mark,” was Witch Finders 1207

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1208 Application File summoned to Eauze. He had also previously been oper- who could expose witches was not due to a shortage of ating in Gascogne. It is worth noting that complaints such children in their own parishes. Their value lay in about suspected witches had been made before the their ability as outsiders to distinguish more easily good a r r i val of the witch fin d e r. His investigations, for which people from evil, thereby achieving an apparent objec- he was well remunerated, showed that only two of ten t i v i t y. Howe ve r, bribes and blackmail flourished in elderly women lacked the numb spot that was the dis- these circumstances, and the original aims were thwart- tinguishing mark of a witch. In the spring of 1671, a ed. Central civil authorities condemned these practices, f o u rt e e n - year-old youth named Jean Pa r r a b è re, fro m and the local clergy was censured. The great confidence Chalosse, was operating in the vicinity of Condom, dis- people placed in the evidence given by these children is closing witches by looking them “in the eye.” In Mez i n , demonstrated in a case from the province of Medelpad. the yo u t h’s activities resulted in almost 60 of the 200 When it was proved that one of the boys giving people gathered there being identified as witches. Je a n evidence had contradicted himself, instead of denounc- Pa r r a b è re claimed that he had been taught the art by his ing the use of these children as witnesses a replacement wet nurse, who had taken him with her to a witches’ was sent for.To prove his innocence of any involvement Sabbat as a young child (Ma n d rou 1968, 373, 441). in witchcraft, a man from the same province produced Children made up a special category of witch finders a cert i ficate of denial signed by clairvoyant childre n that gradually increased in significance. As early as the f rom Ljusdal in the neighboring province of first half of the sixteenth century, in fact, children were Hälsingland (Sörlin 1997). re f e r red to as witch finders in Na va r re in Spain. In 1527, two girls, aged eleven and nine, appeared before PER SÖRLIN the councillors of Pamplona and made the follow i n g See also:AFRICA(SUB-SAHARAN); BASQUECOUNTRY;CHILDREN; claim: “Sirs, the truth is that we are witches like many COUNTERMAGIC;DEVIL’SMARK;HOPKINS,MATTHEW; others, who do so much evil. And if you want to punish IDENTIFICATIONOFWITCHES;LIPPE,COUNTYOF; them we will point them out to you, for we have only to MORAWITCHES;ORACLES;PRICKINGOFSUSPECTEDWITCHES; look at their left eyes to be able to recognise them, since STEARNE,JOHN;SWEDEN;SWIMMINGTEST;WITCHHUNTS. we are of their kind. Anyone not of their kind could not References and further reading: do it” (quoted in Caro Baroja 1965, 145). In the perse- Behringer,Wolfgang. 1998. Shaman of Oberstdorf: Chonrad Stoeckhlin and the Phantoms of the Night.Charlottesville: cution that allegedly followed, the girls’ services we re University Press of Virginia. called on to disclose many witches. This story is report- Briggs, Robin. 2002. Witches & Neighbours: The Social and ed from an unreliable source, but it could possibly be Cultural Context of European Witchcraft.2nd ed. Oxford: based on a real witch hunt that took place in 1525 Blackwell. (Monter 1990, 262–263). Caro Baroja, Julio. 1965. The World of the Witches.English In Sweden during the infamous Blåkulla trials, from translation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1668 to 1676, children identified witches in va r i o u s Clark, Stuart. 1997. Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft ways. The abduction of children meant that they could in Early Modern Europe.Oxford: Clarendon. both identify the witch that had carried them off to the Evans-Pritchard, E. E. 1980. Witchcraft, Magic and Oracles Among w i t c h e s’ Sabbat and re c o g n i ze others who had taken the Azande.Abridged, with an introduction by Eva Gillies. part. Other children were acting as witch finders, bas- New ed. Oxford: Clarendon. Favret-Saada, Jeanne. 1980. Deadly Words: Witchcraft in the Bocage. ing their judgments on the physical appearance or Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. clothing of the women. Vanity and pride were abomi- Henningsen, Gustav. 1980. The Witches’ Advocate: Basque nations. In the small town of Söderhamn on the coast Witchcraft and the Spanish Inquisition.Reno: University of of northern Sweden, this was taken so seriously that the Nevada Press. t ownswomen demonstrated their good intentions by Macfarlane, Alan. 1991. Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart England: A ceremonially burning their hats on a fire (Wall 1989). Regional and Comparative Study.Reissued. Prospect Heights, Children with second sight were often involved at a lat- IL: Waveland. er stage of the process than children who had been Mandrou, Robert. 1968. Magistrats et sorciers en France au XVIIe abducted, implying that the witch hunt actually siècle: Une analyse de psychologie historique.Paris: Plon. p receded “witch finding,” which there by acted as a Marwick, Max, ed. 1982.Witchcraft and Sorcery.2nd ed. confirmation of guilt. Harmondsworth: Penguin Education. Monter,William. 1990. Frontiers of Heresy: The Spanish Inquisition Satisfying the need for methods of verifying witch- from the Basque Lands to Sicily.Cambridge: Cambridge craft led to the use of these supposedly clairvoy a n t University Press. children. From a contemporary perspective, identifying Pócs, Éva. 1999. Between the Living and the Dead: A Perspective on witches in return for financial remuneration, which was Witches and Seers in the Early Modern Age.Budapest: Central the role of these children in the witchcraft inve s t i g a- European University Press. tions, appears cynical. That the clergy and parish Sharpe, Jim. 1996. “The Devil in East Anglia: The Matthew administration sent elsew h e re for clairvoyant childre n Hopkins Trials Reconsidered.” Pp. 237–254 in Witchcraft in 1208 Witch Finders

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1209 Application File Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief.Edited by St. Thomas Aquinas. Ancient beliefs about the efficacy Jonathan Barry, Marianne Hester, and Gareth Roberts. of magical and demonic powers, harmful magic, the Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. evil eye, and the ability of certain people to change Sörlin, Per. 1997. “The Blåkulla Story: Absurdity and Rationality.” themselves into animals and to fly at night existed ARV. Nordic Yearbook of Folklore53: 131–152. alongside these learned ideas. Wall, Jan-Inge. 1989. Hon var en gång tagen under jorden... : These ideas converged in the 1430s. The Dominican Visionsdikt och sjukdomsbot i gotländska trolldomsprocesser. Johannes Nider systematically summarized these ideas Uppsala: Institute of Dialect and Folklore Research. Summary in his Fo rm i c a r i u s (The Anthill), written in 1437 and in English. 1438 after he attended the Council of Basel, the nexus Witch Hunts f rom which the previously unknown crime of witch- Witch hunts were an early modern phenomenon. craft spread to a sizable proportion of Europe’s learned Geographically, they occurred most often in some parts elite. The new medium of printing sped this pro c e s s . of the Holy Roman Empire that were extremely frag- Such demonological texts as the infamous Ma l l e u s mented legally: Franconian ecclesiastical territories; the Maleficarum(The Hammer of Witches), first published Saar and Mosel regions; the electorates of Trier and in 1486 by Heinrich Kramer, found their way into Cologne, including the duchy of Westphalia; the Eu ro p e’s universities, court rooms, monastic libraries, duchies of Luxembourg and Lorraine; the prince-bish- and private households, where ver Latin was under- opric of Münster; Schleswig-Holstein; and stood. Uneducated contemporaries learned about the Mecklenburg. Elsewhere, they occurred on the periph- new sect of witches through sermons. eries of France (for example, Navarre and Languedoc), The earliest recorded witch hunts—some with over a in the Swiss Confederation, the Spanish Netherlands, h u n d red executions—come primarily from lands near the Austrian Habsburg patrimonial lands, and western Lake Geneva around 1430: the duchy of Savoy, the Val Poland. Witch hunting was generally less intense in d’Aosta, Dauphiné, and today’s Swiss cantons of Valais both Mediterranean and northern Eu rope, with and Vaud. He re, the belief in an alleged secret sect of Catalonia from 1618 to 1620 as a notable exception in witches and inquisitorial techniques (often applied by the former area and lowland Scotland, eastern England, laymen) mutually re i n f o rced one another to cre a t e in 1645, and northern Sweden from 1668 to 1674 as chains of trials, in which confessions forced from sus- exceptions in the latter area. Even in areas affected by pects under tort u re confirmed the fantasies of court severe witch panics, trials occurred in unequal numbers authorities. Mo re ove r, confessions of weather magic everywhere. There was a great deal of regional variation and other harmful magic appeared to explain genuine in persecution; some areas experienced endemic, others crises (such as harvest failure or illness) affli c t i n g epidemic, episodes of witch hunting. Witch hunts had contemporaries. many different causes: Current witchcraft scholarship Witch hunts soon spread south into the It a l i a n - acknowledges that no single factor explains all early speaking Alps and as far north as the Low Countries, as modern witch hunts. in the trials in Arras in 1459. They also moved north- east into German-speaking Sw i t zerland, the re g i o n s Learned Witchcraft and the b o rdering Lake Constance, and the upper Rhineland, Chronology of Persecution where many people were executed for witchcraft before Witch hunts were clearly not a medieval phenomenon, 1500. The activities of Inquisitor Kramer and the but ideas about witchcraft had roots in medieval belief impact of his particularly misogynistic demonology, the systems. By 1400, it was generally accepted that Malleus Ma l i fic a ru m , p romoted clusters of trials in individuals could work harm (but also effect cures) by Alsace, the city of Metz, and the area between the means of magic. During the fifteenth century, a far Rhine and Mosel Rivers. Witch hunts petered out tem- more terrifying belief developed that a witch sect met porarily in west-central Eu rope after 1520 or 1530, secretly in order to plot harm to the rest of society.This p robably because of the impact of the Pro t e s t a n t new concept was an “invention” of the late medieval Reformation, but they resumed again after 1560, often learned elites, created from several different sources, in conjunction with severe agrarian crises. They contin- including confessions elicited by inquisitors fro m ued (with significant regional variations) until the Cathar and Waldensian heretics, in which fli g h t second half of the eighteenth century, with the worst through the air, devil worship, and the sacrifice of witch hunts occurring between 1580 and 1650. children were already mentioned. Anti-Semitism also played a role, as the witches’ gathering was called a Secular and Ecclesiastical Courts In the early “synagogue” (or Sabbat), where witches, like Jews, sup- phase of the witch hunts before 1500, secular court s posedly desecrated Christian rites and indulged in the rather than inquisitors were already taking the leading ritual murder of infants. Human pacts with the Devil role in persecuting alleged witches. In countries where had been discussed since St. Augustine and renewed by the prosecution of witches remained entirely or largely Witch Hunts 1209

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1210 Application File in the hands of the Inquisition (Spain, Po rtugal, and around 3,000 trials). But the Protestant Pays de Vaud, Italy), witch hunts were largely prevented, and accusa- in French Switzerland, had perhaps the highest known tions of witchcraft made against an alleged “a c c o m- per capita execution rate of any region, with ove r p l i c e” by a confessing witch did not constitute va l i d 50,000 people (at least 1,700 deaths, over 20 per evidence. Death sentences for witchcraft we re ve ry thousand) during the early modern period. i n f requent; in Po rtugal, the Inquisition ord e red only Territories on the periphery of Europe experienced a perhaps ten such executions. Between 1610 and 1614, m o re restrained pattern of witch hunting. T h e re we re the Spanish inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías brought a round 2,000 executions for witchcraft in all of the witch hunts in Spanish Basque lands to an end, Scandinavia (half of them in De n m a rk), although the after secular judges had executed many French Basque region was much less densely populated than we s t - witches. In areas influenced by the Roman Inquisition, central or southern Europe. There were not more than witchcraft trials were also pursued with moderation. In 500 executions—and perhaps even significantly fewe r— Poland, witch hunting was re l a t i vely restrained, while in England; Scotland, by contrast, was less than one- the crime remained under ecclesiastical jurisdiction but f o u rth as populous but executed 1,000 witches. In gradually increased in the sixteenth century when secu- France, the p a rl e m e n t s , or sove reign judicial court s , lar courts, which allowed burning at the stake, took provided a strongly centralized administrative structure control of witchcraft persecution. that exe rcised control over local courts: He re, fewe r than 500 people out of a population of 16 to 20 million N um b e rs Executed and Centers of Pers e c u t ion royal subjects were legally executed as witches. Eastern The idea that 9 million people we re executed during Eu rope also experienced some witch hunts, though the early modern witch hunts has long since been later than in the west. Po l a n d’s witch hunts occurre d refuted (Behringer 1998). Estimates now put the total mostly between the mid-seventeenth and mid- number of executions in Eu rope between 30,000 and eighteenth centuries, but exact statistics are impossible, 60,000. The attempt to arrive at exact statistics for par- and no more than seven witches are ever known to have ticular regions almost invariably fails because of the been executed in one place in one year. incomplete surv i val of sources. Mo re ove r, in order to calculate the intensity of persecution in a part i c u l a r The Role of Religion The religion of the authori- area, one must compare the number of executions with ties in any particular territory played only a subordinate the overall (adult) population. And when counting role in determining the willingness to hunt witches. In “v i c t i m s” of the witch hunts, we must be careful to Ge r m a n y, Calvinist authorities in the Palatine elec- include not just those who we re executed. Su s p e c t e d torate systematically quashed every attempt to instigate witches who were released after refusing to confess were or pursue witch hunts (Schmidt 2000), while the rulers often physically and psychologically seve rely damaged of such Lutheran imperial free cities as Nuremberg also by their ordeal and subsequently led a precarious exis- demonstrated a marked reluctance to persecute witches. tence on the margins of society. Some areas with low Howe ve r, other German Protestant areas (such as “e xecution rates” experienced many lynchings and Mecklenburg or Lemgo) experienced extremely seve re u n o f ficial executions of reputed witches or re l e a s e d episodes of witch hunting. Not the religion but the witch suspects: Hu n d reds of people we re murd e red in degree of political and judicial fragmentation of an area this way in the French Ardennes in the seventeenth cen- had the greatest influence in shaping the severity of t u ry. Our statistics on the total number of exe c u t i o n s witch persecution. Such small ecclesiastical territories as given previously must therefore be adjusted upward to the imperial abbey of St. Maximin or the Mergentheim include other kinds of victims of witch hunts. Chapter of the Teutonic Knights, with only a few thou- Territories that we can categorize as centers of the sand subjects, experienced truly devastating witch most extreme witch hunts include all three of hunts. Similar developments affected some small secu- Germany’s Catholic archbishop-electorates: Trier (with lar lordships, especially where the right to exercise crim- at least 1,000 trials), Mainz (with around 2,000 trials), inal jurisdiction was in dispute, particularly along some and Cologne (with over 2,000 trials). The witch hunts western edges of the German Em p i re such as in Fr a n c o n i a’s Catholic ecclesiastical territories we re Lu xembourg or the Saarland—or in Silesia, near its equally intense: Around 900 witches we re executed in eastern edge, after 1650. Larger, less fragmented territo- the prince-bishopric of Bamberg, while around 1,200 ries, where local courts we re answerable to central met this fate in the prince-bishopric of W ü rz b u r g . courts staffed by professional jurists, as in France or the Mo re than 4,000 trials occurred in Lu t h e r a n duchy of Bavaria, usually avoided witch hunts. Mecklenburg. Overall, Germany probably saw nearly 25,000 executions for witchcraft. On its western edges, The Gender and Social Status of Accused persecution of witches was ve ry seve re in the Catholic Witches A large majority of those who fell victim to duchies of Lorraine and Lu xembourg (both with witch hunts were women, even if in a few regions, such 1210 Witch Hunts

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1211 Application File as Finland or Normandy in France, more men than and only far in the seventeenth century did attendance women we re executed. Kramer focused solely on at Sabbats feature in charges leveled at suspected witch- women as susceptible to the temptations of the Devil in es. Wherever belief in the Sabbat remained weak, mass his misogynistic Malleus Ma l e fic a ru m , and in many persecution was almost impossible because there was no places, popular opinion supported him. Ge n e r a l l y reason to force the names of supposed accomplices speaking, confessionalism affected witch hunting only from alleged witches under interrogation. marginally in comparison with juridico-political issues. In much of Protestant northern Eu rope (Swe d e n , The Con t ext of Crisis From 1400 to 1700, va r i- De n m a rk, the Netherlands, England, and Scotland), ous radical changes and crises affected many differe n t women constituted 80 to 90 percent of those executed, aspects of life. Climatic deterioration—which earned a notably higher rate than in most parts of Catholic for the period the name Little Ice Age—caused long- Germany (Schulte 2001). But in fervently Catholic term inflation in the prices of essential foodstuffs, and Poland, 96 percent of all executed witches—the highest in many regions, intensive witch hunts coincided with rate known in Eu ro p e — we re women, while in periods of bad weather, harvest failure, and rapid infla- Calvinist Vaud, almost 600 men—more than anywhere tion. This “crisis scenario,” emphasized by Wo l f g a n g in Catholic Germany—were executed as witches; more- Behringer (1995), was often made worse by epidemics ove r, Iceland, where more than 90 percent of witches and warf a re. In addition, the Reformation and were men, was Lutheran. Counter-Reformation caused acute uncertainty among The stereotype of the witch as a poor, old, widowed early modern Europeans; religious change also encour- woman was emphasized in the writings of both aged territorial lords and churches to try to impose Protestant and Catholic demonologists and by such e ver-stricter codes of discipline on their subjects. opponents of witch hunting as Johann We yer and Sixteenth- and seve n t e e n t h - c e n t u ry demonologists Friedrich Spee. Howe ve r, this stereotype consistently repeatedly evoked apocalyptic images of the imminent broke down, both in the earliest witch hunts and espe- end of the world in a final battle between good and evil, cially in the large-scale witch hunts of the late sixteenth with the Devil and the witches on the side of evil. and seventeenth centuries. Young, married women; Ordinary people shared this vision as well; as a result, as children and teenagers; and men (including some hold- Behringer has argued, a general “darkening” of people’s ing political or religious office) became incre a s i n g l y worldview occurred. caught up in chain trials during major hunts. Midwives we re not singled out for persecution as witches, eve n Di s c o u rses and Di s s e m i n at ion of though this idea is still emphasized occasionally. De monolo g ical “Ide olo g y” The general short- age of material resources, the struggle for survival, and Factors Influencing the Outbreak of religious uncertainty provided fruitful ground in which Witch Hunts Despite the many reasons behind belief in and fear of the secret powers of a large-scale the witch hunts that struck different parts of Europe at w i t c h e s’ sect could grow. Howe ve r, no simple causal different times, certain common factors increased the connection existed between crisis phenomena and likelihood for multiplying witchcraft trials. Not all witch hunts. Rather, crises helped create a climate of these factors needed to be present at the same time and f e a r, envy, resentment, greed, and anxiety about daily with the same intensity in any particular region to survival, a context in which witchcraft trials were likely trigger witch hunts. to occur. In order for the new beliefs about witchcraft to take root, channels of communication—the most The Accepta nce of the Cumu lative Conc e p t i m p o rtant of which we re sermons and printed litera- of Witc hc r a f t Nearly all cultures believe in the t u re — we re necessary. In late sixteenth-century Tr i e r, efficacy of harmful magic and the existence of individu- for example, popular pre s s u re for witch hunts was als who practice it: These beliefs constitute anthro p o- repeatedly aroused through sermons preached by logical constants. But belief in blasphemous witches, Jesuits. who carry out evil deeds with the De v i l’s help, was Once a personal misfortune or devastating hailstorm s p e c i fic to Latin Eu rope and the Americas. The five (both of which could be blamed on witchcraft) had components of the so-called cumulative concept of t r i g g e red the first witchcraft trials in a region, beliefs witchcraft (the pact with the Devil, sex with the Devil, about witchcraft were disseminated and strengthened as flight, attendance at Sabbats, and the performance of the judges, commissioners, local committees, and harmful magic) were not, however, accepted with equal witnesses invo l ved in the trials traveled to va r i o u s enthusiasm and speed. T h roughout northern Eu ro p e courts, spreading fears as they went. It often happened and Scandinavia, the cumulative concept of witchcraft that witchcraft trials in one area stimulated a desire for was adopted very slowly and imperfectly; most witches witch persecution in a neighboring territory that had we re tried for the traditional crime of harmful magic, experienced no particular misfortunes or crises. Witch Hunts 1211

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1212 Application File Density of population played an important role here: below could translate into an episode of mass persecu- Beliefs about witches spread much more slow l y tion, however, at least one other factor was necessary. t h roughout the thinly populated parts of nort h e r n Europe than they did in west-central Europe. For exam- Elite Willingness to Hunt Witches and the ple, it was probably not until the 1640s that soldiers Use of Tort u r e Witch hunts could occur only returning from the Thirty Years’War took beliefs about when the authorities were willing to make the full appa- the witches’ Sabbat and witches as devil worshippers ratus of the criminal law available for the pursuit of back to Sweden with them. The large-scale Swe d i s h witchcraft trials. Territorial lords seeking greater cen- witch persecution between 1668 and 1676 (which tralization and unity by developing more effic i e n t affected its ve ry thinly populated northern prov i n c e s ) b u reaucracies usually demonstrated little interest in in turn spread to Finland, where severe witchcraft trials hunting witches. The exceptionally severe witch hunts affected the Swedish-speaking population. Fi n l a n d , that took place in the ecclesiastical territories of the where the cumulative concept of witchcraft surfaced for German region of Franconia in the early seve n t e e n t h the first time only in the 1660s, was the last century constitute rare examples of witch persecutions Scandinavian land to be affected by witchcraft trials. instigated, fostered, and condoned by the authorities. The man largely responsible for disseminating it, the Where a territorial government consistently suppressed judge Nils Ps i l a n d e r, had come into contact with popular desires for witch hunts, for example, in the German-influenced ideas about the crime of witchcraft Palatine electorate, no witchcraft trials took place. By while studying at the new University of Turku. contrast, one finds enthusiastic promoters of witch As this example illustrates, the role of universities in hunts among minor secular and ecclesiastical lord s i n fluencing the dynamics of witch hunts should also holding rights to exe rcise criminal jurisdiction at local not be underestimated. In these institutions, genera- courts. tions of jurists and lawyers who became judges and With few exceptions, the crime of witchcraft was assessors in witchcraft trials or provided legal advice in tried before secular courts. However, northern Europe, witchcraft cases re c e i ved their training. These witch- including the British Isles, never adopted inquisitorial craft trial legal specialists could offer their services in legal procedure—which was based on Roman law and s e veral territories or regions, there by playing a signifi- which allowed the use of torture—in criminal cases. In cant role in stimulating the beginning, escalation, or these countries, chains of trials linked by denunciations end of such trials. of so-called accomplices extracted by tort u re we re impossible, and true witch hunts we re accord i n g l y P e rs e c u t ion “from Beneat h ” Witchcraft trials extremely rare. usually began after pressure was exerted by a populace As the example of common-law Eu rope shows, the suffering from one or more of the aforementioned crisis use of tort u re played a decisive role in pre d i c t i n g scenarios and influenced by antiwitch pro p a g a n d a . whether witchcraft trials escalated into large-scale witch Witch hunts were rarely initiated by authorities against hunts. Criminal legal pro c e d u re based on Roman law the wishes and without the cooperation of their sub- accepted tort u re as a legitimate part of the process for jects, because witchcraft trials needed evidence fro m obtaining a confession, which was necessary in order to those supposedly affected by harmful magic, supported convict the accused. The Carolina, the 1532 code of by testimony from witnesses about the allegedly bad criminal-law pro c e d u re for the Holy Roman Em p i re , reputation and suspicious behavior of the accused. This left decisions about the frequency and severity with desire to hunt witches “from below” varied in intensity. which torture was to be applied to the discretion of the In many western parts of the Holy Roman Empire and p residing judge. Almost eve ry area that experienced the duchy of Lu xembourg, witch-hunting committees m a s s i ve witch persecution classified witchcraft as an (He xe n a u s s c h ü s s e) we re organized. These committees “e xcepted crime” (crimen exc e p t u m), where by the were groups of men appointed by the local community restraints of normal legal pro c e d u re could be ignore d , to gather evidence against suspected witches in order to and proceeded to inflict tortures of the most horrifying bring formal charges against them. In other parts of and gruesome type on suspected witches. Germany and the Spanish Netherlands, this type of popular initiative took the form of surprisingly unified W i tch Hunters Witchcraft trials re q u i red input demands for witchcraft trials from entire villages. No f rom a large number of “s p e c i a l i s t s”: jurists, judges, witch-hunting committees existed in most parts of c o u rt scribes and notaries, beadles, and exe c u t i o n e r s . Europe. Here, however, the lower orders could demand All large-scale Eu ropean witch persecutions included, that the authorities take action against witches who had among these specialists, prominent men who sought to allegedly caused bad weather, disease, and harvest fail- p romote witchcraft trials and manipulate them for ure in forms ranging from peaceful petitions to almost personal advantage. In this way, the witch hunts in open re volt. Be f o re the desire to hunt witches fro m Franche-Comté are linked to the judge and demonolo- 1212 Witch Hunts

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1213 Application File gist Henri Boguet, the French Basque witchcraft trials p rocess and in eve ry group who participated in it. with Pierre de Lancre (also a judge and demonologist), Neighbors used suspicions and accusations of witch- and the endemic persecutions in the duchy of Lorraine craft to resolve social conflicts, while local court officials with p ro c u re u r - g é n é ra l (public prosecutor) Ni c o l a s obtained social and financial advantages from witch Rémy (and his son, who inherited his position). hunting. T h e witch hunts that began in the English region of Minor lords with the right to exercise high criminal East Anglia in 1645 we re driven by the ambitious justice used witchcraft trials to exe rt and affirm this “Wi t c h - Finder Ge n e r a l” Ma t t h ew Hopkins (who died right, which helps explain why seve re witchcraft trials in 1647), while trials in Iceland after 1650 were direct- usually occurred in small and middle-sized territories ed by Sheriff p-iorleifur Kortsson. w h e re a climate of persecution, hermetically sealed The number of executions in the prince-bishopric of against external interf e rence, could deve l o p. Su c h Bamberg would certainly have been lower without the minor but independent rulers clung ever more tena- fatal influence on proceedings of its suffragan bishop ciously to their “old” legal right to try serious crimes the and demonologist Friedrich Förner; they abated after m o re this right—and there by their autonomy—was his death in 1630. Other men who exerted a fateful per- challenged by major territorial lords; as part of the early sonal influence on large-scale German trial episodes modern state-building process, they sought to wre s t wereWitch Commissioner Berend Nobis in Schleswig c o n t rol of high criminal justice from local courts and in 1626, his colleague Heinrich von Schultheiss in elec- c e n t r a l i ze it in their own hands. Witchcraft trials toral Cologne, “witches’ judge” Balthasar Nuss or Ross a c q u i red a significant political role against the back- (hanged in 1618) in the prince-abbey of Fulda, and g round of such judicial conflicts: They we re used and jurist Daniel Hauff in Esslingen. All these men claimed sometimes even deliberately staged by the lord s to be crusading against a sect of witches that deserved i n vo l ved in such conflicts. For example, the fif t e e n t h - extermination, and they showed their victims no mercy. c e n t u ry Swiss witchcraft trials that occurred aro u n d They we re also driven by a desire for self-pro m o t i o n Lucerne, Basel, and Fribourg, in the Val Leventina, and and disseminated their witch-hunting experiences in in the Pays de Vaud served political purposes, demon- published form, there by re t ro s p e c t i vely legitimating strating claims to political authority. Around 1600, their actions. Rémy, for example, published his essay on similar political motivations underlay many witchcraft the persecutions in the duchy of Lorraine, trials in parts of Silesia, Mecklenburg, Schleswig- Daemonolatriae ( De m o n o l a t ry), in 1595; Lancre pub- Holstein, and the prince-bishopric of Münster. In par- lished a demonological work, Tableau de l’ i n c o n s t a n c e t i c u l a r, the territory between the Meuse and Rhine des mauvais anges et démons ( Description of the R i vers was characterized by a patchwork of territorial Inconstancy of Evil Angels and Demons) in 1612. In rulers holding different political and legal rights, a the 1620s, Förner published a collection of sermons situation that frequently produced witchcraft trials against witchcraft, with one for eve ry day of the ye a r, resulting from deliberate attempts by local lords to while in 1634, von Schultheiss published a handbook assert their power and authority (Voltmer 2002). on conducting witchcraft trials correctly. Other jurists, commissioners, and court personnel often obtained Opposition to and End of Witch Hunts s i g n i ficant promotions through their invo l vement in Early modern opinion about witchcraft trials was by no witch hunts, which sometimes also brought fin a n c i a l means unanimous. Some regions (for example, Ireland) a d vantages—although increasing social capital was at experienced almost no witchcraft trials, while others least as important to such men as making an economic experienced mass persecutions. Meanwhile, critical profit. voices—from all major religions and from various social groups—were raised against belief in witchcraft and The Pursuit of Witch Hunts in Private and t h e persecution of witches throughout the entire Political Interests Fears of witchcraft occasional- witch-hunting period. Legal records from the highest ly led to genuinely panic-stricken persecutions of courts of appeal show that the individual elements alleged witches in rural areas and sometimes also in comprising the cumulative concept of witchcraft were small towns. Contemporaries were, however, aware that rarely accepted without opposition. Moreover, as the accusations of witchcraft we re not always leveled at example of Ireland shows, people who believed in “re a l” witches but knew that innocent people could witches did not necessarily become hard-line advocates i n a d ve rtently find themselves dragged into witchcraft of persecution. In the supplications and suits brought trials. Early modern people, deeply ensnared in before various appellate courts, such as the Grand c o n t e m p o r a ry witchcraft beliefs, also used witchcraft C o n s e i l ( Great Council) in Malines, the accusations and witchcraft trials in their own interests. Re i c h s k a m m e r g e r i c h t (imperial chamber court) and Such “instru m e n t a l i z a t i o n” of witchcraft accusations Reichshofrat (imperial aulic court) in the Holy Roman and trials can be seen at every level of the persecution Empire, and the parlements in France, we find many Witch Hunts 1213

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1214 Application File individuals who believed themselves innocent of the witchcraft remained ve ry much alive among the lowe r witchcraft accusations brought against them and who orders, although there were some opponents of persecu- described in detail the cruel, often fanatical, and some- tion even at this social level and despite the fact that times cynical behavior of witch hunters pursuing their c o u rts no longer satisfied popular desire for trials. p r i vate social, economic, and political intere s t s . Witchcraft trials did, in fact, continue far into the eigh- Familiarity with such legal records led some contempo- teenth century; the last legal execution for witchcraft in raries to deny the belief in witches completely Europe occurred in the Swiss canton of Glarus in 1782. (although almost never saying so in public); others In the long term, improving economic, political, and called for moderation in—or even stopping entirely— social conditions, together with better levels of educa- the persecution of witches, using arguments resembling tion, medical provision, and state poor re l i e f, con- the criticisms by such opponents of witchcraft trials as tributed to the gradual cessation of witchcraft trials. Johann Weyer, Reginald Scot, Cornelius Loos, and The belief in the ability of certain individuals to work Friedrich Spee. either harmful or helpful magic has nonetheless However, because of official censorship, advocates of remained until today. witchcraft trials held a quasimonopoly on publications during the early modern period. T h e re f o re, most RITA VOLTMER; s u rviving printed sources (pamphlets re c o rding trials, TRANSLATED BY ALISON ROWLANDS demonological tracts, and sermons) re flected the con- ventional line favoring witch hunting, supported alike See also:AGRARIANCRISES;APOCALYPSE;CHRONOLOGYOFWITCH- CRAFTTRIALS;COMMUNALPERSECUTION;COURTS,ECCLESIASTI- by official political power, by faceless public opinion, by CAL;COURTS,SECULAR;CRIMENEXCEPTUM;DECLINEOFTHE those who supported witchcraft trials from self-interest, WITCHHUNTS;ECCLESIASTICALTERRITORIES(HOLYROMAN and by those too frightened to dare criticize witch EMPIRE); FEAR;FEMALEWITCHES;GENDER;GEOGRAPHYOFTHE hunting. The rare examples of people willing to risk WITCHHUNTS;GERMANY;LITTLEICEAGE;LYNCHING;MALLEUS making more or less open criticism of witch hunts are MALEFICARUM;NUMBEROFWITCHES;ORIGINSOFTHEWITCH thus all the more valuable, showing that there we re HUNTS;PANICS;POPULARPERSECUTION;SKEPTICISM;SOCIAL always alternatives to zealous persecution, that fear of ANDECONOMICSTATUSOFWITCHES;TORTURE;UNIVERSITIES; witches was never present with the same degree of WITCHCRAZE. intensity throughout Europe, and that some contempo- References and further reading: Ankarloo, Bengt, and Stuart Clark, eds.2002. The Period of the raries understood and loathed the terrible legal Witch Trials.Vol. 4 of The Athlone History of Witchcraft and mechanisms fostering witch hunts. Magic in Europe. London and Philadelphia: Athlone and Large-scale outbreaks of witch hunting always University of Pennsylvania Press. re q u i red several interrelated factors. Attempts to Ankarloo, Bengt, and Gustav Henningsen, eds. 1990. Early explain why witchcraft trials became fewer and fewer in Modern European Witchcraft: Centres and Peripheries. Oxford: the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries and Clarendon. why they eventually ceased altogether are equally Barry,Jonathan, Marianne Hester, and Gareth Roberts,eds. 1996. complex. Mass witch hunts not only confirmed the Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief. plausibility of belief in witchcraft; they also provo k e d Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. the interest of critics who doubted their legality and Behringer,Wolfgang. 1995. “Weather, Hunger and Fear: The suspected that innocent people were being unjustly exe- Origins of the European Witch Persecution in Climate, Society and Mentality.”German History13: 1–27. cuted as witches. Mass trials also produced all manner ———. 1998. “Neun Millionen Hexen: Entstehung, Tradition of scandals and illegal procedures, causing some people und Kritik eines populären Mythos.” Geschichte in Wissenschaft to rethink their support for witch hunting. Sk e p t i c a l und Unterricht49: 664–685. attitudes became more common in the wake of the Beier-de Haan, Rosmarie, Rita Voltmer, and Franz Irsigler, eds. Enlightenment and increasing religious tolerance. Even 2002. Hexenwahn: Ängste der Neuzeit. Berlin: Deutschen though witchcraft remained a crime in some countries Historischen Museum. into the nineteenth century, trials declined alongside Briggs, Robin. 1989.Communities of Belief: Cultural and Social the gradual abandonment of judicial tort u re, the Tension in Early Modern France.Oxford: Clarendon. i n c reasing subordination of local courts to centralize d C l a rk, St u a rt, ed. 2001. Languages of Wi t c h c raft: Na r ra t i ve, Id e o l o gy systems of justice, and the implementation of territorial and Meaning in Ea rly Mo d e rn Cu l t u re. London: Ma c m i l l a n . d e c rees prohibiting witchcraft trials. In electoral Tr i e r, Kieckhefer, Richard. 1976. European Witch Trials: Their Foundations in Popular and Learned Culture, 1300–1500. for example, witchcraft trials were unofficially prohibit- London: Routledge. ed in 1652; in France, Louis XIV abolished them Klaniczay, Gábor. 1990. The Uses of Supernatural Power: The o f ficially in 1682; in the Habsburg lands, Ma r i a Transformation of Popular Religion in Medieval and Early Theresa effectively prohibited them after 1750. Modern Europe.Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Howe ve r, although many critical voices we re raised Levack, Brian. 1995. The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe. among Eu ro p e’s learned and ruling elites, belief in 2nd ed. London: Longman. 1214 Witch Hunts

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1215 Application File Roper, Lyndal. 1994. Oedipus and the Devil: Witchcraft, Sexuality p rosecution of a British nanny in Massachusetts on and Religion in Early Modern Europe.London and NewYork: charges of murdering an infant in her care, attempts to Routledge. re m ove gay clergy from Australian pulpits, the court - ———. 2004. Witch Craze: Terror and Fantasy in Baroque martial of U.S. military officers engaging in extramari- Germany.New Haven, CT, and London: Yale University Press. tal relations, and proposed antiterrorism legislation in Schmidt, Jürgen Michael. 2000. Glaube und Skepis: Die Kurpfalz Australia—these are just a few of the recent events that und die abendländische Hexenverfolung, 1446–1685.Bielefeld: journalists and other commentators have compared to Verlag für Regionalgeschichte. witch hunts. Yet through this welter of phenomena, Schulte, Rolf. 2001. Hexenmeister: Die Verfolgung von Männern im Rahmen der Hexenverfolgung von 1530–1730 im Alten Reich. s e veral common themes emerge. First and most trans- 2nd ed. Frankfurt: Lang. p a re n t l y, invoking the category is almost inva r i a b l y Voltmer, Rita. 2002. “Hochgerichte und Hexenprozesse: Zur p e j o r a t i ve; to refer to an event as a witch hunt is, by herrschaftlich-politischen Instrumentalisierung von d e finition, to invite moral condemnation by implying Hexenverfolgungen.” Pp. 475–525 in Hexenprozesse und that it is unfair or malicious or both. Second, the Gerichtspraxis.Edited by Herbert Eiden and Rita Voltmer. actions described as witch huntsare almost always those Trier: Spee. of public officials acting under the authority of the state or some other powerful organization, often in the form Witch Hunts, of a prosecution but usually involving some form of Modern Political Usage a g g re s s i ve interf e rence in the lives of private citize n s . One of the more visible legacies of the European witch- Third, the targets of actions defined as witch hunts tend craft prosecutions that ended in the late seventeenth to be persons who are marginal or nonconforming, and mid-eighteenth centuries is the use of the term religiously or politically or behaviorally. Fi n a l l y, the witch hunt as both symbol and metaphor for witch huntis perceived as an intervention that is either persecution and injustice. If the decline of witchcraft grossly disproportional to the wrongdoings that preced- prosecutions after this period is often celebrated as a ed it or a complete miscarriage of justice that results in benchmark of social progress, the invoking of the witch the punishment of the innocent. These features re ve a l huntas a metaphor for comparing the past and the pre- both what witch hunts mean to contemporaries and sent challenges this claim. To refer to contemporary what characteristics contemporaries have come to events as witch hunts is to imply that the same methods associate with witch hunts. and controls once deployed against alleged witches have been and are still, in the twentieth and twenty-first Modern Witch Hunts? centuries, used against different targets with results that For no events in recent history has the metaphor of the can be no less devastating, even if no one is hanged or witch hunt been elaborated quite as vigorously as for burned. It also suggests that the modern secular state the congressional hearings into the presence of and its bureaucracies may be no less susceptible to erup- Communists in the late 1940s and early 1950s in the tions of unjustified official violence against individuals United States and for prosecutions for ritual child and groups than were the societies that flourished abuse that occurred in the late 1980s through to the before the rise of science and before the separation of late 1990s, mostly in the United States but also in church and state. Canada and England. Not surprisingly, given their A survey of the New Yo rk Ti m e s and the Times o f Anglo-American bias, the exemplar for this search for London between 1985 and 2002, using the searc h c o r respondence has been the Salem witchcraft pro s e- index Lexis-Nexis, testifies to the continuing vitality of cutions of 1692. the term witch hunt as a metaphor for contemporary The parallels that have most impressed contempo- social phenomena; more than 1,000 articles appeare d raries are the power of the human imagination to give during this period in each of these major newspapers in human form to its deepest fears and the capacity pre- which the term was invoked to characterize selected sent even in modern states committed to the rule of law c u r rent events. Mo re ove r, a canvassing of world new s- and to empirical science to create conspiracies of their papers (relying on the same source) during the same own making. In particular, commentators have suggest- period revealed a similar usage of the term in Malaysia, ed broad similarities in the process by which suspicions Si n g a p o re, and Thailand, as well as in other countries we re generated and then elaborated into full-fle d g e d throughout the world. There are, in addition, dozens of accusations that in turn generated more accusations published books in English alone that use witch hunt and convictions. Just as the Salem trials were propelled when commenting on present events—further evidence by a form of evidence that placed defendants at an of its widespread cultural significance. impossible disadvantage, so also we re both the allega- The events to which the category is applied are as tions that triggered the House Un-American Activities varied as the societies and the times in which they Committee (HUAC) in the mid-twe n t i e t h - c e n t u ry occur. False accusations of child abuse in England, the United States and the allegations of ritual abuse some Witch Hunts, Modern Political Usage 1215

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1216 Application File forty years later, which could not be refuted no matter evidence as lacking in credibility and as irre vo c a b l y h ow improbable or unfounded. “Spectral evidence” in tainted by the leading questions of adults in authority. 1692 was based on the belief that victims of witchcraft Journalists and academics who have written about these had a special gift to see the specter or otherworldly like- trials have focused on what they identified as parallels ness of the witch who was tormenting them. No matter b e t ween the use of evidence in these cases—child h ow accused persons comported themselves and no witnesses coached by adults with preconceived ideas— matter how they behaved, the testimony of the victim and the use of child witnesses to give spectral evidence p roved their guilt in the eyes of the juries and magis- during the Salem trials and its validation by magis- trates who returned ve rdicts of guilty and imposed trates, clergy, villagers, and others. Just as in the Salem penalties of death according to the law. Only thro u g h trials, when official pre s s u re was re m oved, confessors confession and by implicating others could persons sus- recanted their confessions. pected of witchcraft delay or mitigate the punishment That each of these official initiatives was able to of death by hanging. Persons who criticized the pro- generate evidence to confirm the worst fears of their ceedings were at risk of being accused. The result was a respective communities can be taken as a further point process in which the web of suspicion was rapidly and of similarity. T h rough the testimony of confessors, continuously amplified until its sudden cessation a year members of the Massachusetts Bay colony learned of a later. conspiracy of witches consisting of otherw i s e The congressional investigations into “un-American” respectable members of the church that sought to activities likewise loosened the criteria for active subver- destroy Salem village and to replace it with a kingdom sion of the U.S. government by placing under suspicion p resided over by the Devil. The hearings into not only persons who had been members of the un-American activities produced re velations of a va s t Communist Party at any time but also members of any Communist conspiracy that had penetrated into the organization perc e i ved as sympathetic to the very core of U.S. military and political institutions. The Communist Pa rty; any authorship or participation in mass prosecutions of the 1980s and 1990s resulted in films that endorsed values that we re perc e i ved as confessions that spoke of secret associations of other- compatible with those of the Communist Pa rty; and wise law-abiding adults who engaged in extreme acts of anyone who associated with someone in the preceding sexual violation of young children as part of a satanic or categories. To come under suspicion was to risk severe cultlike ritual. repercussions, especially loss of employment and loss of For some commentators, the use of the witch hunt as reputation. To rehabilitate one’s reputation and to a metaphor is misplaced and anachronistic. For others, protect one’s livelihood, it was necessary to confess one’s it is a sobering reminder of the fragile boundaries misdeeds and to implicate others. Refusal to testify or separating the present from the barbarities of a past that refusal to give the names of one’s confederates was taken was certainly not the “good old days.” But if, as as equivalent to a statement of guilt. To criticize the Norman Cohn (1975, 225) has written, the witch hunt p roceedings was to risk being placed under inve s t i g a- “illustrates vividly the power of the human imagination tion. Just as in the Salem trials, the search for to build up a stereotype and its reluctance to question Communist infiltrators into the core of American insti- the stereotype once it is generally accepted,” then it is tutions generated more and more suspects until it too no wonder that it continues to be useful as a tool of was dismantled. analysis and as a re f e rence point for contemporary The mass prosecutions that resulted in the convic- phenomena. tion and subsequent acquittal or overturning on appeal of hundreds of persons charged with the ritual abuse of RICHARD WEISMAN young children have also been viewed through the See also:MILLER,ARTHUR;SALEM;SPECTRALEVIDENCE;SATANISM; prism of the Salem trials, albeit from a different vantage WITCHCRAZE;WITCHHUNTS. point. Here, what has most struck contemporaries has References and further reading: been the validation of childre n’s testimony no matter Belfrage, Cedric. 1973. The American Inquisition, 1945–1960. how improbable and completely unsupported by phys- NewYork: Bobbs-Merrill. ical evidence, while ignoring the unacknow l e d g e d Cohn, Norman. 1975. Europe’s Inner Demons: An Enquiry Inspired responsibility of therapists, police, social workers, and by the Great Witch Hunt.NewYork: Basic Books. McWilliams, Carey. 1950. Witch Hunt—The Revival of Heresy. others in actively shaping the childre n’s testimony. Boston: Little, Brown. T h rough aggre s s i ve interrogation and fear of worse Miller, Arthur. 2000. “The Crucible in History.” Pp. 274–295 in punishment, many false confessions we re generated Echoes down the Corridor: Collected Essays, 1944–2000. Edited that in turn generated more accusations and convic- by Steven R. Centola. NewYork: Viking. tions. Only after the mounting of costly appeals backed Nathan, Debbie, and Michael R. Snedeker. 1995. Satan’s Silence: by experts who challenged the findings of the courts did Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern American Witch Hunt. appellate courts throw out most of the incriminating NewYork: Basic Books. 1216 Witch Hunts, Modern Political Usage

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1217 Application File Rosenthal, Bernard. 1993. Salem Story: Reading the Witch Trials of Vienna. Fu rt h e r m o re, he ruled a territory of his ow n , 1692. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. the electorate of Mainz (Ku rfürstentum Ma i n z , o r Showalter, Elaine. 1997. Hystories: Hysterical Epidemics and Ku rm a i n z), scattered geographically across the middle Modern Culture. NewYork: Columbia University Press. of the empire, with a large portion in the Rhineland, Weisman, Richard. 1984. Witchcraft, Magic, and Religion in 17th another portion stretching east of Fr a n k f u rt in upper Century Massachusetts. Amherst: University of Massachusetts. Franconia, and a third patch in Thuringia around the town of Erfurt (where Martin Luther received his uni- Witch-Bishops versity education), as well as further tiny particles of (Holy Roman Empire) land elsew h e re. Altogether, his territory encompassed Although it is no longer possible to sustain the assertion about 8,300 square kilometers, held nearly 400,000 that witchcraft persecutions we re extremely seve re people, and generated an annual income of 1 million everywhere in Catholic lands because several Catholic gulden. The archbishops were elected by the cathedral states—for example, Portugal, Spain, Venice, Naples, chapter and usually came from the minor re g i o n a l Austria, and Bavaria—executed relatively few witches, n o b i l i t y. The witch craze in Mainz started during the it remains true that witch hunts in some German short reign of Johann Adam von Bicken (1601–1604), prince-bishoprics were indeed horrifying. The bishops a man of fragile health who saw about 650 burnings. were responsible for these hunts as secular princes in Persecution slowed under his successor, Jo h a n n their territories, but still, there seems to be a striking S c h we i k h a rd von Cronberg (ruled 1604 to 1626), a difference between the sheer numbers of people burned powerful imperial politician, but 361 people were nev- by bishops in contrast to those burned by most secular e rtheless executed as witches. Witch hunting then lords, whether Protestant or Catholic. This situation accelerated rapidly under Archbishop Georg Fr i e d r i c h was partly due to the bishops’ personal qualities as von Greiffenklau (ruled 1626 to 1629), with 768 rulers but also to their role as princes of ecclesiastical witches killed within just four years. Overall, about territories. Although it was usually relatively minor sec- 1,800 people we re legally killed as witches under the ular rulers who permitted witch hunts, it was the most rule of these three prince-bishops (Pohl 1998). prominent archbishops and bishops (except the greatest Recent re s e a rch enables us to provide a ranking of the of all, the pope) who allowed or even supported witch major witch-hunting bishops, as presented in Table 1. hunting. Within the Holy Roman Empire, the core of In many cases, bishops engaged in major episodes of witch-hunting Europe, these bishops were responsible witch hunting had similar personality traits. T h e y for the most terrible witch hunts. belonged to the first generation of bishops educated in The highest-ranking princes of the Holy Ro m a n the spirit of the Counter-Reformation and thus pos- Empire, its three ecclesiastical archbishop-electors, also sessed fanatical severity that could be turned inward or ranked among its worst witch hunters. The archbishop against others. Such a mental hardening resulted from a of Mainz was by far the most powe rful ecclesiastical somber worldview, with occasional chiliastic expecta- prince north of the Alps: His archdiocese extended tions. Their perception of living in an exceptional his- almost from Hamburg to Milan, comprising the dioce- torical situation encouraged exceptional solutions, ses of Hildesheim, Paderborn, Strasbourg, Wo r m s , some of them violent. One cultural historian (vo n Augsburg, Eichstätt, Constance, and Chur. Mo re ove r, Pölnitz 1934, 395) described the reforming bishop of this archbishop was of great political importance. He Würzburg, Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn, a key figure held the first vote among the seven electors; he crowned of the German Counter-Reformation, in terms re m i- e m p e rors and elected kings; and he served as imperial niscent of psychoanalysis: “[His] whole generation . . . c h a n c e l l o r, the most prominent office in the empire , was dominated by a spirit of extreme austerity, directed exercising influence over imperial officials in Prague or p a rtly against religious enemies and partly against Table 1 Witch Bishops Victims State Ruling bishop Persecution dates 2,000 Electoral Cologne Ferdinand von Bayern 1624–1634 900 Bishopric Würzburg Philipp Adolf von Ehrenberg 1626–1630 768 Electoral Mainz Georg Friedrich von Greiffenklau 1626–1629 650 Electoral Mainz Johann Adam von Bicken 1602–1604 600 Bishopric Bamberg Johann Georg II Fuchs von Dornheim 1626–1630 550 Ellwangen/Eichstätt Johann Christoph von Westerstetten 1611–1630 361 Electoral Mainz Johann Schweikhard von Cronberg 1616–1618 350 Electoral Trier Johann VII von Schönenberg 1581–1599 300 Bishopric Würzburg Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn 1616–1618 Witch-Bishops (Holy Roman Empire) 1217

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1218 Application File opponents in their own camp, but foremost against 1612 but stopped in 1618, when politicians utilize d their own ego, and everything that could be perceived the outbreak of the T h i rty Ye a r s’ War as an argument as sinful within themselves.” In his famous Ca u t i o for reducing expenses. The hard-liners lost out until Cr i m i n a l i s (A Warning on Criminal Justice, 1631), the election—organized by suffragan Förner—of Friedrich Spee interpreted the witch hunts as “t h e Bishop Johann Georg II Fuchs von Dornheim (ru l e d disastrous consequence of Germany’s religious zeal.” 1622 to 1633), another candidate of the Catholic It fits neatly with this interpretation that the most League. Chancellor Georg Haan remained in offic e terrible witch hunters of the Holy Roman Em p i re, at while his enemies carefully pre p a red to take ove r. In least of its German-speaking parts, we re prince- 1625, Förner delive red a series of thirt y - five sermons b i s h o p s —He xe n b i s c h o f e , or “witch-bishops,” accord i n g on magic and witchcraft, entitled Panoplia arm a t u ra e to a term first coined for Johann Georg II Fuchs vo n De i (The Splendid Armor of God, Ingolstadt, 1625), Dornheim (von Lamberg 1835, 17). Like his colleague dedicated to the prince-bishop of Eichstätt, Jo h a n n in W ü rzburg, this witch-hunting bishop of Ba m b e r g Christoph von We s t e r s t e t t e n .The most prominent vic- was a nephew of Julius Ec h t e r, who sponsored their tim of Ba m b e r g’s witch hunts, now guided by Förner, education and pre p a red their careers. But witch hunt- was Ba m b e r g’s leading politician, its chancellor Dr. ing was more a matter of education than a family affair. Haan, who had served the bishops of Bamberg and the Many of these zealots had been educated in the same Catholic League for many years; his entire family was institutions and by the same academic teachers at the b u r n e d . Un i versities of Dillingen, Ingolstadt, Fre i b u r g - i m - Bamberg re p resented the “ideal type” of a massive Breisgau, or Dole (Franche-Comté). A study of witch- witch hunt, although its victims were outnumbered by bishops (and their advisers, councillors, and confessors) those in the electorate of Mainz (Kurmainz). Both were as members of the same age group, molded by similar surpassed by the prince-bishopric of Würzburg, where key experiences, moods, or mentalities (Ma n n h e i m about 900 people were burned at the stake during the 1928, 157–158), has not yet been attempted. Religious same five years (1626 to 1631), including a number of fundamentalism was buttressed by confessional strife, noblemen and a good number of clergy (Schwillus and it is no coincidence that Ge r m a n y’s most terrible 1992). This followed an earlier persecution aro u n d witch hunters all belonged to the Catholic League. 1616 or 1618 in the same territory under the famous Their inclination tow a rd violent solutions led in the reforming bishop Julius Echter von Me s p e l b ru n n case of witchcraft trials to the theory of “extraordinary” ( ruled 1573 to 1617), the German counterpart of trials (processus extraordinarius) for an “excepted” crime St. Carlo Borromeo in Milan, when about 300 witches (crimen exceptum) and climaxed before the 1629 Edict were burned during his long reign. of Restitution, the Catholic party’s attempt to regain all The burnings under Philipp Adolf von Eh re n b e r g territories lost to Protestants since the Peace of ( ruled 1623 to 1631) gained a proverbial re p u t a t i o n . Augsburg in 1555. Howe ve r, this was not the offic i a l When persecutions started in the electorate of Cologne policy of the Catholic Church; Pope Urban VIII (ruled (Ku rk ö l n), a town councillor about 500 kilometers 1623 to 1644) looked with contempt upon Germany’s f u rther nort h west pre d i c t e d , “ Es wird Wi rt z b ü r g i s c h religious zealots (Bireley 1975, 226). we rck we rd e n” (“It will work out like in W ü rz b u r g” Ni n e t e e n t h - c e n t u ry scholars we re eager to attribute [Behringer 2001, 265]), and his forecast was anything these persecutions to Counter-Reformation zeal and to but exaggerated. In the duchy of Westphalia, subject to Catholicism in general. Recent re s e a rch has demon- Ferdinand, elector-archbishop of Cologne (ruled 1612 strated that assigning responsibility is more complicat- to 1650), about 2,000 people we re burned for witch- ed. Ne ve rtheless, the attitude of the ruling princes craft between 1626 and 1634. Ferdinand was responsi- p l a yed a decisive role, as the example of the prince- ble for the most terrible witch hunt in the Ge r m a n bishopric of Bamberg illustrates. Under Pr i n c e - Bi s h o p parts of the Holy Roman Empire. This was not due to Johann Philipp von Gebsattel (ruled 1599 to 1609), a any “centrally implemented program of eradication” or p re - Tridentine bishop who indulged in the “War against Wi t c h e s” (Schormann 1991, 169–171) Renaissance joys of loving music and women (he had p re p a red by earlier legislation against witchcraft in half a dozen children), there we re few witchcraft trials 1607, when Ferdinand served as coadjutor for his uncle and executions. After Ge b s a t t e l’s death, the Catholic Ernest of Bavaria, his predecessor as archbishop-elector League installed an ardent reform bishop, Jo h a n n of Cologne. Gottfried von Aschhausen (ruled 1610 to 1622), Describing the prince-elector as a predecessor of the a l ready bishop of W ü rzburg. His new suffragan bish- Nazi “War against the Jews” (Davidowicz 1975) would o p, Friedrich Förner (1568–1630), a theologian whose explain these developments elegantly, and more ove r, v i ews resembled those of the demonologist Pe t e r Ferdinand had been educated in Trier during the great Binsfeld, began forming new alliances and immediate- witch hunt of the 1590s. Howe ve r, evidence for such ly lashed out against witches. A witch hunt started in parallels is surprisingly weak. Fe rdinand had alre a d y 1218 Witch-Bishops (Holy Roman Empire)

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1219 Application File been appointed coadjutor in Cologne in 1594, and imperial free eity of Cologne was a university town full during the first twenty years of his rule, no witchcraft of independent monasteries and printers, these persecu- persecutions occurred. Clearly, Fe rdinand was more tions spawned a number of publications both for and i n t e rested in religion than was his uncle Ernest of against witch hunting. Friedrich Spee published the Ba varia, bishop of Freising, Hildesheim, Liège, and famous Cautio criminalis, the most powerful attack on M ü n s t e r, who had become archbishop of Cologne as illegal pro c e d u res of the arc h b i s h o p - e l e c t o r’s gove r n- the candidate of the Counter-Reformation party to ment, anonymously in 1631. The author, then a replace his heretical predecessor after the Cologne War. member of the Jesuit College at Paderborn, had Although one of the most powe rful Catholic rulers in intimate knowledge of developments in Fe rd i n a n d’s Europe, Ernest was interested primarily in the worldly electorate; although he formally disguised all names, p l e a s u res of an aristocratic life: hunting, music, contemporaries could easily decode his text to under- dancing, and feasting in the company of women. He stand his allusions to particular actors and events. had even terminated the witchcraft trials in his prince- abbey of Stavelot, but obviously, he did not prevent his WOLFGANG BEHRINGER zealous nephew and successor Ferdinand from starting such trials. Even after 1612, the new archbishop saw no See also:AGRARIANCRISES;BAMBERG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF; reason for launching inquisitions in electoral Cologne BAVARIA,DUCHYOF;BINSFELD,PETER;COLOGNE; or Westphalia, nor in any of his other sees— ECCLESIASTICALTERRITORIES(HOLYROMANEMPIRE); EICHSTÄTT, PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;FERDINANDOFCOLOGNE;GERMANY; Hildesheim, Liège, Münster, or Paderborn. HOLYROMANEMPIRE;MAINZ,ELECTORATEOF; S c rutinizing the protocols of the electoral court POPULARPERSECUTION;SPEE,FRIEDRICH;TRIER,ELECTORATE council in Bonn demonstrates that these persecutions OF;WESTERSTETTEN,JOHANNCHRISTOPHVON;WITCHHUNTS; had not started “f rom above,” as Ge r h a rd Schormann WÜRZBURG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF. (1991) claimed, and they we re not at all centrally References and further reading: planned or implemented (Becker 1992). At the root of Becker,Thomas. 1992. “Hexenverfolgung in Kurköln.” Annalen the problem lay the agrarian crisis of the mid-1620s, des Historischen Vereinsfür den Niederrhein195: 202–214. with devastating crop failures, unusual diseases, and an Behringer,Wolfgang. 1995. “Das ‘Reichskhündig Exempel’ von urgent demand “from below” putting pressure to pun- Trier: Zur paradigmatischen Rolle einer Hexenverfolgung in Deutschland.” Pp. 427–439 in Hexenglaube und ish witches on the noblemen in charge of the criminal Hexenverfolgung im Raum Rhein-Mosel-Saar.Edited by Franz c o u rts. Mo re ove r, the elector’s central gove r n m e n t Irsigler and Gunter Franz. Trier: Spee. would have been incapable of launching a witch hunt ———, ed. 2001. Hexenprozesse in Deutcschland.5th ed. Munich: because most of its criminal courts had been pawned to DTV. the nobility and because there was no obligatory system Bireley, Robert. 1975. Maximilian von Bayern, Adam Contzen S.J. of reporting to the court council, unlike such contem- und die Gegenreformation in Deutschland, 1624–1635. p o r a ry secular territories as W ü rttemberg, the Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht. Palatinate, or Ba varia, where court councils (Ho f ra t) Dawidowicz, Lucy S. 1975. The War Against the Jews, 1933–1945. tightly controlled district courts (Landgerichte). In most NewYork: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ecclesiastical territories, central authorities we re only Dillinger, Johannes. 1999. “‘Böse Leute’: Hexenverfolgungen in sporadically informed about cases, when the owners of Schwäbisch-Österreich und Kurtrier im Vergleich.Trier: Spee. Durrant, Jonathan. 2002. “Witchcraft, Gender and Society in the their courts sought advice or when subjects tried to Early Modern Prince-Bishopric of Eichstätt.” PhD diss., appeal to a higher court. Such patchy references enable University of London. us to re c o n s t ruct when and where these persecutions Forster, Marc. 1992. The Counter-Reformation in the Villages: developed in the electorate of Cologne. Religion and Reform in the Bishopric of Speyer, 1560–1720. After the persecution had gained momentum, Ithaca, NY, and London: Cornell University Press. A rc h b i s h o p - Elector Fe rdinand tried to assert contro l Gebhard, Horst Heinrich. 1991.Hexenprozesse im Kurfürstentum over the movement. He appointed witch commission- Mainz des 17. Jahrhunderts.Aschaffenburg: Geschichts- und ers, possibly hoping to re c over some of his pawned Kunstverein Aschaffenburg. criminal courts. Howe ve r, these appointed commis- Gehm, Britta. 2000. Die Hexenverfolgungen des Hochstifts Bamberg sioners soon began implementing their own agendas, und das Eingreifen des Reichshofrates zu ihrer Beendigung. t e r rorizing entire regions in order to gain money and Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Irsigler, Franz, and Gunter Franz, eds. 1995. Hexenglaube und reputation, using their arbitrary power extensively and Hexenverfolgung im Raum Rhein-Mosel-Saar.Trier: Spee. in anarchical fashion, much like the English “Wi t c h - Lamberg, Georg von. 1835. Criminalverfahren vorzüglich bei Finder Ge n e r a l” Ma t t h ew Hopkins during the Civil Hexenprocessen im ehemaligen Bistum Bamberg während der Wa r. The T h i rty Ye a r s’ War had created a similarly Jahre 1624–1630. Nurnberg [p. 17: Zeitgenössischer Begriff a n a rchical environment in central Eu rope, loosening “Hexenbischof” für Johann Georg II Fuchs von Dornheim]. normal legal administrative practices. Due to the sheer Mannheim, Karl. 1928. “Das Problem der Generationen.” Kölner s i ze of the Cologne witch hunts but also because the Vierteljahreshefte fürSoziologie 7: 157–185, 309–330. Witch-Bishops (Holy Roman Empire) 1219

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1220 Application File Pohl, Herbert. 1998. Zauberglaube und Hexenangst im England, accusations against witches were mostly based Kurfürstentum Mainz: Ein Beitrag zur Hexenfrage im 16. und on general fears of evil spells and only in exc e p t i o n a l beginnenden 17. Jahrhundert.Stuttgart: Steiner. cases motivated by the idea of a pact with the De v i l , Pölnitz, Götz, Friherr von. 1934. Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn, which Thomas considered a “continental import” Fürstbischof von Würzburg und Herzog von Franken typical of the elites. (1573–1617).Munich: Verlag der Kommission. The witches’ mark is often confused with the Devil’s Rummel, Walter. 1992. “‘Der Krieg gegen die Hexen’—Ein Krieg m a rk (common in Scotland and on the Eu ro p e a n fanatischer Kirchenfürsten oder ein Angebot zur Realisierung Continent). The belief that the Devil imprinted a mark sozialer Chancen? Sozialgeschichtliche Anmerkungen zu zwei neuen Büchern.” Rheinische Vierteljahresblätter56: 311–324. on his followers has an important foundation in the Schormann, Gerhard. 1991. Der Krieg gegen die Hexen: Das Apocalypse (Rev. 13:16): “And [the Antichrist] causeth Ausrottungs-programm des Kurfürsten von Köln.Göttingen: all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, Vandenhoeck and Rupprecht. to re c e i ve a mark in their right hand or in their fore- Schwillus, Harald. 1992. Kleriker im Hexenprozess: Geistliche als heads.” Tertullian and Irenaeus also spoke of diabolical Opfer der Hexenproxesse des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts in marks. Hence, the idea that there ought to be a tangible Deutschland.Würzburg: Echter. m a rk that would allow human judges to re c o g n i ze witches seemed, in the early modern period, to be Witch’s Mark confirmed by both Scripture and subsequent tradition. The witch’s mark, or English teat, was a protuberance The biblically driven Protestant Reformation was or nipple on a witch’s body that personal demons conducive to searches for the Devil’s mark. (known as imps or familiars) sucked for nourishment. The mark acted as a sinister counterpart to the rites According to British folklore, certain groups of people of baptism, circumcision, or feudal homage; it was could command spirits, goblins, and minor demons, almost the re verse of saintly stigmata, a symbol of which they could induce to perform magical services debasement and submission to the Devil. The searc h for them. These creatures generally took the shape of for the punctum diabolicum (the De v i l’s spot or mark ) animals (cats, dogs, toads, mice, butterflies, insects) and subjected the accused to an ordeal, which many accept- fed like vampires on their masters’ blood, which they ed voluntarily in the hope of proving their innocence. sucked from a bulge or a nipple that was sometimes In fact, it was believed that, when the Devil concluded located in proximity to the genitals. By the time of a pact, he imprinted a mark of varying form and consis- England’s witchcraft trials, the signs left by these vam- tency (a mole, bulge, or mark), perhaps shaped like an p i re-animals we re associated with the continental a s t rological sign or the footprint of an animal, that Devil’s mark, and the possession of a ‘familiar’ was con- could be recognized because it was insensitive and did sequently deemed a sign of a prior pact with the Devil. not bleed (like a piece of dead flesh). Although many (This change is also evident in many English treatises of Catholic demonologists downplayed its importance by the period.) Devils could thus appear in the shape of assuming that not all followers of Satan had such a animals and confirm the pact with the witch by sucking mark, it often provided decisive evidence in witchcraft the witch’s blood. In order to ascertain the presence of trials by 1600. bulges on the bodies of the accused, the judges some- Surgeons participating in the search for these marks times employed special juries of midwives and matrons, s h a ved the entire body of the accused in order to dis- thereby enabling women to participate in witchcraft cover the insensitive spot. According to common belief, trials as legal experts parallel to male surgeons. this spot was often hidden among the most intimate Accusations of possessing a familiar played an impor- p a rts of the human body: breasts, anus, armpits, and tant role in England. Wi t c h e s’ marks we re fir s t genitals. The investigation there f o re proceeded by mentioned in a trial in 1566, and the search for them p robing moles, scars, and birt h m a rks, often with was systematically encouraged by 1579. In 1604, a new needles that we re forced deeply into the body and law against witchcraft explicitly declared the guilt of caused terrible pain. The discovery of the marks did not those who we re found to have fed animals with their p rovide sufficient proof for conviction; rather, it own blood. Su b s e q u e n t l y, witches’ marks became a allowed the trial to proceed and torture to be adminis- c rucial proof in many witchcraft trials and played a trated. In many cases, judges and surgeons cheated and central role in the great witch hunt led by Ma t t h ew e m p l oyed dubious stratagems, which we re seve re l y Hopkins (from 1645 to 1647). Wi t c h e s’ marks we re censured in 1631 by the German Jesuit Friedrich Spee, also considered pertinent in the witchcraft trials that who also denounced their scandalous and shameless took place in the American colonies; one encounters probing of the naked bodies of accused witches. juries of women at the Salem panic of 1692. According Wi t c h e s’ m a rks we re never mentioned in the to James Sharpe, the widespread belief in the existence Malleus Ma l e fic a ru m (The Hammer of Wi t c h e s , of familiars and in witches’ marks challenges the 1486). The situation changed, howe ve r, during the position of Keith Thomas, who assumed that in latter half of the sixteenth century, and by the late 1220 Witch’s Mark

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1221 Application File s e venteenth century in a significant part of Eu ro p e Witekind, Hermann and the New World, the punctum diabolicum w a s (1521/1522–1603) c o n s i d e red a decisive element in witchcraft trials. This Reformed professor at the faculty of arts in Ac c o rding to William Mo n t e r, this early belief in the Heidelberg can be counted among the most import a n t De v i l’s mark was a consequence of the association opponents of the persecution of witchcraft in Ge r m a n y, b e t ween witchcraft and here s y, especially in Re f o r m e d second to Johann We ye r, mostly because of his 1585 regions of Sw i t zerland, which pioneered the search for t reatise Christlich bedencken und erinnerung von Za u b e re y m a rks as a definite proof of a culprit’s guilt. Yet some (Christian Thoughts and Memories About So rc e ry ) . Lutheran theologians such as Johann Brenz ridiculed Born as Hermann Wilcken (Wilchen), he registered the belief in marks, and some Catholics we re no less at the University of Frankfurt an der Oder in 1546 and a rdent than Protestants in the search for the De v i l’s in 1548 at Wittenberg, where he became a friend of signs. During a case of demoniac possession at Aix- Philip Melanchton. Later, Witekind was called to the e n - Provence in 1611, the chief exo rcist, Se b a s t i e n Latin, or cathedral, school at Riga. In 1561, he joined Michaëlis, demanded that tangible proofs of witch- the Un i versity of Rostock, but was soon called to the craft be found on the body of the suspected priest; a University of Heidelberg, where he taught (with a short physician, Jacques Fontaine, who took part in the intermission) from 1563 until his death. trials and wrote a treatise on the subject, supported his Wi t e k i n d’s treatise against witchcraft persecution, p o s i t i o n . published at Heidelberg under the pseudonym As the witch hunts peaked around 1630, Catholic Augustin Lerc h e i m e r, was the first really successful experts were bitterly divided over the issue. In 1629, a attack on persecution ever conceived in the Ge r m a n German Catholic counselor of the archbishop of language. A second, enlarged edition (St r a s b o u r g , Mainz, Peter Ostermann, published an extensive com- 1586) was followed by a third (Basel, 1593); the last m e n t a ry in favor of searching for diabolical stigmata. edition, worked on by the author himself (Sp e ye r, Johannes Jordanaeus immediately rejected this position 1597), included major additions. It was reprinted in in 1630, as did the Roman Paolo Zacchia, an eminent 1627 and probably in 1654 as well. His treatise was also legally trained physician, who in 1635 re f e r red to the included in the T h e a t rum de ve n e fic i s (Theater of Roman Holy Of fic e’s skepticism about the De v i l’s Poisoners, 1586) and other collections. m a rks in order to support his position. Despite this Obv i o u s l y, Witekind witnessed no witchcraft trials in overall tendency, an official of the Roman Inquisition, the Palatinate, but news about persecutions in his native C e s a re Carena, claimed during the same decade that Westphalia motivated him to write his treatise. In addi- the Devil’s mark existed and constituted a proof. Jesuit tion, he wanted to refute We ye r’s most prestigious oppo- theologians we re also divided: While Spee denounced nent, Jean Bodin (who had been translated into Ge r m a n the searches in 1631, a French Jesuit, T h é o p h i l e by Johannes Fi s c h a rt). Deep compassion for the victims Regnault, published a favorable treatise in 1647, and strong resentment against their persecutors bro u g h t entitled On St y g m a t i s m . Eu ro p e’s most pre s t i g i o u s Witekind to demand an end to witch burnings. Hi s Catholic court systems, the great inquisitions and the arguments we re based primarily on the New Te s t a m e n t , major French p a rl e m e n t s ( s ove reign judicial court s ) , which for him was normative in all things. Although the n e ver searched for it, although most Protestant court traditional tone of the confessional age dominated, systems did. Probing for the Devil’s mark became espe- Wi t e k i n d’s arguments included empirical evidence fro m cially frequent in Scotland, Sw i t zerland, and much of natural science, in a way that sometimes resembles the the Holy Roman Empire. early Enlightenment. They also appealed to the common sense of his readers, asking them not to believe the non- VINCENZO LAVENIA sensical accusations against sorc e re r s . See also:AIX-EN-PROVENCENUNS;ANIMALS;BLOOD;BRENZ, Witekind’s book was aimed mainly at rulers and lay JOHANN;DEVIL’SMARK;FAMILIARS;HOPKINS,MATTHEW; judges, who had decisive influence on the trials. For this JORDANAEUS,JOHANNES;PACTWITHTHEDEVIL;PRICKINGOF reason, he chose a style that was decidedly unscientific SUSPECTEDWITCHES. and picturesque and wrote in strong, blunt Ge r m a n . References and further reading: While the number of printings suggest that Wi t e k i n d Holmes, Clive. 1993. “Women: Witnesses and Witches.” Past and reached a larger audience, his language and style meant Present140: 45–78. he was seldom cited in learned discourse. Nevertheless, Monter,William. 1976. Witchcraft in France and Switzerland: The for Johann Georg Goedelmann and Anton Pr ä t o r i u s , Borderlands During the Reformation.Ithaca, NY, and London: Witekind was of crucial importance. Cornell University Press. Witekind was one of those skeptics who attacked the Sharpe, James. 1996. Instruments of Darkness: Witchcraft in Early idea of the witch at its core by emphasizing Go d’s omnipo- Mo d e rn En g l a n d .Philadelphia: Un i versity of Pe n n s y l vania Pre s s . Thomas, Keith. 1971. Religion and the Decline of Magic.London: tence. He believed that eve rything in the world happens Weidenfeld and Nicolson. by divine providence alone. As God’s law is the law of Witekind, Hermann 1221

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1222 Application File n a t u re, witchcraft accusations had to pass the tests of nat- References and further reading: ural science. Harmful magic, the flight of witches, and the Binz, Carl. 1888. Augustin Lercheimer (Prof. H. Witekind in w i t c h e s’ Sabbat we re there f o re usually impossible. Eve n Heidelberg) und seine Schrift wider den Hexenwahn[...]. Strassburg: Heitz. though Witekind occasionally got entangled in contradic- Schmidt, Jürgen Michael. 2000. Glaube und Skepsis: Die Kurpfalz tions, he agreed with Weyer that what female witches und die abendländische Hexenverfolgung, 1446–1685.Bielefeld: experienced were only fantasies created by the Devil. Verlag für Regionalgeschichte. Howe ve r, for Witekind, the witches’ apostasy from Go d ———. 2001. “Witekind, Hermann.” InLexikon der and their pact with the Devil we re real. But not even these Europäischen Hexenverfolgung.Edited by Gudrun Gersmann, major sins could be punished by humans; that was Go d’s Jürgen Michael Schmidt, and Margarete Wittke, right alone. In a way that was radical for his time, http://www.sfn.uni-muenchen.de/hexenforschung (accessed Witekind rejected the persecution of heretics and attrib- August 10, 2002). uted to eve ry Christian the right to turn away from Go d . Schwerhoff, Gerd. 1986. “Rationalität im Wahn, Zum gelehrten The He b rew Bi b l e’s rules for punishment we re set aside in Diskurs über die Hexen in der frühen Neuzeit.” Saeculum f a vor of the New Testament, which explicitly pro h i b i t e d 37: 45–82. Sommer, Benedikt. 1991–1992. Edition und Analyse von Hermann the persecution of heretics. In an age of confessionalization Witekinds Christlich Bedencken von Zauberey, editio princeps. 2 and social discipline, Witekind evicted only those who vols. 1585 (Heidelberg). Reprint, Berlin: Magisterarbeit. would never repent. Even though, in his opinion, criminal Ulbricht, Otto. 1992. “Der sozialkritische unter den Gegnern: justice had no place in treating the offense of witchcraft, he Hermann Witekind und sein Christlich bedencken und erjn- c ove red the topic in the light of current witchcraft trials. nerung von Zauberey von 1585.” Pp. 99–128 in Vom Unfug des He wholeheartedly supported the processus ordinarius Hexen-Processes: Gegner der Hexenverfolgung von Johann Weyer ( o rd i n a ry pro c e d u re) and rejected the opinion that witch- bis Friedrich Spee. Edited by Hartmut Lehmann and Otto craft constituted a crimen exceptum ( e xcepted crime). Ulbricht. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Witekind, who as a rule did not name other authors Witnesses of his time, was obviously influenced by Johann We ye r and doubtless by the opposition to persecuting witch- Witnesses, in the sense of character witnesses rather than craft in electoral Palatinate, whose position re s e m b l e d e yewitnesses, generally played a vital role in formal legal that of We ye r. Obviously hoping to export this rather p roceedings against accused witches that was an extension mild Palatine position to the rest of Ge r m a n y, Wi t e k i n d of the informal role they had played in the formulation of became its most important literary re p re s e n t a t i ve . suspicions that had led to the accusations. Most trials pro- Although deeply rooted in tradition, Wi t e k i n d’s g ressed according to more or less rigorous legal pro c e- t reatise remains original. This assessment holds tru e d u res, and the suspect’s general reputation, together with especially for his critical social approach, which was evidence of past incidents suggesting witchcraft, we re s t ronger than that of any of his predecessors. Ac c o rd i n g i m p o rtant in determining whether to proceed, part i c u l a r- to Witekind, witches we re driven to the De v i l’s embrace ly to tort u re. In a sense, witnesses framed the accusatory not so much through their own faults as by social p rocess: After an accusation was lodged, their role was to c i rcumstances. Proceeding from the pro file of the witch c o n firm it by establishing that the offense was part of a as a poor woman outside society, he mainly blamed pattern of behavior. Trials there f o re invo l ved members of social grievances and failures of the authorities for their the suspect’s community who testified about her or his situation. On the one hand, women lacked the spiritual general reputation or who knew of specific incidents re l a t- armor to resist the Devil because the authorities and the ed to the current charge. Reputation was, by defin i t i o n , C h u rch continually failed in the religious education of a c o l l e c t i ve opinion, built up gradually from numero u s nearly heathen populace. On the other hand, howe ve r, incidents in the small communities where most accusers the social circumstances of a materialistic, egotistical and suspects lived. Both the formal and informal roles of world—their economic misery and their social isola- witnesses have long posed problems of interpretation for t i o n — d rove poor women to seek help from the De v i l . historians, the former because of the difficulty in deter- Sometimes, even simple hunger made them lose contro l , mining the amount of embellishment and re t ro a c t i ve leaving them in a state of unsound mind, ready to accept i n vention their stories contained and the latter because it the De v i l’s pact. In this case, Christian charity was the is difficult to explain why one incident precipitated a c u re. Although accepting the traditional idea of women’s formal accusation while earlier incidents had not. natural weakness for seduction, Witekind twisted this cliché into a different perspective . The Problem of Witnesses in the Legal Process JÜRGEN MICHAEL SCHMIDT The use of character witnesses and evidence of past wrongdoing originated in ancient legal practice. They See also:BODIN,JEAN;CRIMENEXCEPTUM;GOEDELMANN,JOHANN GEORG;PALATINATE,ELECTORATEOF;PRÄTORIUS,ANTON; were important because many proceedings involved SKEPTICISM;WEYER,JOHANN. little hard evidence and came down to deciding which 1222 Witnesses

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1223 Application File of the several accounts to believe based on the credibil- the probability that an accusation would be successful ity of the sources. This problem was part i c u l a r l y increased. acute—and reliance on reputation and past history was People who suspected that someone had manifested particularly pronounced—in judging crimes that were powers related to witchcraft had other reasons to hold s u r reptitious, such as infanticide and burglary. back. Witchcraft was a capital crime, and a person had Witchcraft was doubly obscure, since both maleficium to be convinced that a suspect really deserved death to (harmful magic) and diabolism were necessarily occult bring an accusation. If the spell was not life threatening, offenses. In the case of maleficium, harmful rituals and if the evidence was ambiguous, if the illness had gone malign thoughts were at least as likely to be concealed a w a y, or if there was reason to believe the suspect’s as manifested overtly, and the meaning or intent of actions we re at least partially justified, a potential overt acts was often unclear. In the case of the diaboli- accuser might well be reluctant to bring charges. cal pact, physical evidence was almost never available, Furthermore, many small communities were hesitant to and eyewitness testimony, most frequently to participa- involve the state in local affairs. tion in a witch dance, was generally tainted by coming from tortured suspects or from children. Trials therefore Interest, Memory, and Veracity In addition, one generally focused as much or more on the reputation of must ask why so many witnesses didcome forward once the suspect as on specific evidence about the incident(s) a witchcraft trial began and why they said what they precipitating the investigation. said when they did. Two major differences separate these questions from those raised by the accusations S u s p ic ions and Accusat ion s Long before any that precipitated trials: Unlike the primary accusers, arrest was made, witnesses generally played a vital role most witnesses had no immediate impetus to testify; in solidifying suspicions into a formal accusation. A bad moreover, their testimony usually included a temporal reputation was not absolutely necessary for having an dimension, which raises issues about the nature and accusation lodged, and suspects in mass panics we re functioning of memory. tortured and executed on the basis of coerced testimony T h e re are two possible reasons why witnesses alone. Yet in most instances, accusations, especially would have come forw a rd when a trial was under those likely to lead to convictions, re p resented the w a y. First, they might have seen the proceedings as an culmination of a series of incidents that created a repu- o p p o rtunity to strike at someone they wanted to get tation stretching back many years. Witnesses were, first, rid of for other reasons and then consciously fabricate people who felt they had been victims of witchcraft, their allegations. Second, they might have become who knew people who had been, or who had observed convinced that they “re m e m b e re d” an incident they something suspicious in the past. had, for one reason or another, held back. T h e re is no These witnesses may not have stepped forw a rd question that some witnesses, like some accusers, act- earlier for many reasons. One was the element of risk: If ed cynically, either for personal advantage or in ord e r a prosecution failed, there could be legal or informal to rid their community of an unwanted member. In penalties for the person bringing the charges. In such cases, the issue of memory became irre l e va n t . inquisitorial trials, widely used in Eu rope by the six- But most witnesses, like most accusers, appear to teenth century, the formal accuser was the state rather h a ve spoken sincere l y. Why they came forw a rd would than an individual, so plaintiffs no longer risked an in many cases have been related to why they held automatic penalty if their charge was not sustained, but back: If their evidence had seemed too weak to t h e re was still the legal risk of a countersuit. Pe r h a p s initiate proceedings, the standard was lower for this worse, once the magistrates had gone, accuser and s o rt of testimony; if they did not want to risk con- vindicated suspect would remain neighbors—but in a f rontation with the suspect, someone else had now poisoned atmosphere of heightened tension. taken the major risk; if they had been uncert a i n The power of the accusation did not rest solely on whether the person deserved to be punished, the fact the power of the accuser, however; it also depended on of a trial put a new perspective on their experience or the nature of the allegation. Certain types of perceived i n f o r m a t i o n . harm both called for and had stronger potential than Another reason why a witness might have come for- others to sustain prosecution. Accusations that precipi- w a rd only when a trial had started was because until tated trials we re more likely to concern lethal illnesses then, the person did not “re m e m b e r” the incident or open attacks that injured people or va l u a b l e about which he or she would testify. Discussion of the property, whereas less serious or less tangible suspicions trial may have caused the witness to fabricate the generally remained dormant. A person had to be m e m o ry without realizing it, pasting together some desperate, powe rful, or confident to bring charges, combination of stories she or he had heard with stock otherwise, his or her story faded into the background of elements of local witch beliefs. Or the witness might village suspicions. As such stories accumulated, though, h a ve reshaped her or his memory of an actual eve n t , Witnesses 1223

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1224 Application File transforming it from an inconsequential encounter into Words, Power of a sinister incident. Clearly, this process operated to The idea of the magical power of words—that they can some extent in a considerable number of cases and to a provoke physical effects merely by being uttered or considerable extent in some cases. Memory, like percep- inscribed—is found in many cultures. It has often been tion, is a slippery thing, and there is no doubt that attributed to a belief that language and reality are so people mold what they say to the expectations of their closely related that words have a real bond with the audience. things they signify, so that utterances may be used However, it would be a mistake to proceed, as some instrumentally to affect or exploit the power of those recent historians have, from this realization to the things; as the anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski position that all testimony was shaped by this process; once said: “To know the name of a thing is to get a hold the evidence simply will not support that conclusion. on it” (cited by Clark 1997, 283). Before him, Sir James First, the number of witnesses with old stories generally George Frazer (1978, 321), consistent with the cultur- corresponded to the suspects’ general reputation; it was al evolutionary theory of his time, assumed that “prim- ve ry unusual for a person held in high re g a rd by the itives” were “unable to discriminate clearly between community to have a whole slew of allegations made words and things.” Stanley J. Tambiah dismissed this about the past, even though they had just been assumption in 1968, arguing that, on the contrary, denounced for witchcraft. Second, independent wit- magical rituals demonstrate sophisticated uses of nesses corroborated some of the incidents re c o u n t e d . language and figures of speech. He contended that anal- Third, some incidents had left a public record, possibly ogy and metonymy verbally transfer properties from a e ven a previous trial. A witness’s testimony was not substitute or complement to another thing, and this simply memories constructed to fit one set of circ u m- transfer in thought and word may be given added real- stances, nor was it simply the product of cynical ism by the simultaneous use of action or objects calculation or a simple remembrance of reality. Instead, (Tambiah 1985, 32–37). Both metaphoric and it was generally and in most particular cases a mixture metonymic transfer are expressed, re s p e c t i ve l y, in of all three. Frazer’s categories of “homoeopathic magic” (manipu- lating similarities) and “contagious magic” (exploiting EDWARD BEVER bonds of possession or contact) (1978, 14–63), but See also:ACCUSATIONS;EVIDENCE;IDENTIFICATIONOFWITCHES; these rhetorical strategies are far more complex than a INQUISITORIALPROCEDURE;MALEFICIUM;SLANDER;TRIALS. simple confusion of words and things. References and further reading: Briggs, Robin. 2002. Witches and Neighbors: The Social and Ritual, Rhetoric, and Reality Cultural Context of European Witchcraft.2nd ed. Oxford: Tambiah’s reservations are relevant to the study of Blackwell. Davis, Natalie Zemon. 1987. Fiction in the Archives: Pardon Tales medieval and early modern European charms. Though and Their Tellers in Sixteenth Century France. Stanford, CA: we know little about folk practitioners’ understandings Stanford University Press. of the relationship between ritual words and their Gaskill, Malcolm. 1996. “Witchcraft in Early Modern Kent: effects, surviving texts show much sophistication in the Stereotypes and the Background to Accusations.” Pp. 257–287 use of rhetorical devices. Analogy was commonly in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and employed. In reducing charms, the successive diminu- Belief. Edited by Jonathan Barry, Marianne Hester, and Gareth tion of a phrase or word, such as Abracadabra, was Roberts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. analogous to the ritual’s aim of reducing the patient’s ———. 2001. “Witches and Witnesses in Old and New affliction (Storms 1948, 153). Verbal formulas often England.” Pp. 55–80 in Languages of Witchcraft: Narrative, followed the pattern “just as a is, so let b be” (Roper Ideology, and Meaning in Early Modern Culture. Edited by 1997, 22). Matteuccia di Francesco, executed at Todi in Stuart Clark. London: Macmillan. Gregory, Annabel. 1991. “Witchcraft, Politics, and ‘Good 1428, combined such a formula with manipulation of Neighborhood’ in Early Seventeenth Century Rye.” Past and a metaphoric object in a spell she recommended to a Present133: 31–66. thwarted lover: To inflict impotence on his rival, he was Holmes, Clive. 1993. “Women: Witnesses and Witches.” Past and to bend a lighted holy candle while saying, “As this can- Present140: 45–78. dle bends in this heat, so let the bride and groom never Levack, Brian P. 1995. The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe. come together in this love” (Mammoli 1972, 33). 2nd ed. London: Longman. Metonymy was also widely used. Garments we re Rublack, Ulinka. 1999. The Crimes of Women in Early Modern m e a s u red to diagnose patients’ ailments, and enemies Germany.Oxford: Clarendon. could be harmed through rough handling of items Sharpe, James. 1994. “Women, Witchcraft, and the Legal belonging to them, such as thatch from a witch’s house Process.” Pp. 106–124 in Women, Crime, and the Courts in (Thomas 1971, 184–185, 544). Patients might be pro- Early Modern Europe.Edited by Jennifer Kermode and Garthine Walker. Chapel Hill and London: University of g re s s i vely re p resented by a metonymic list of part s : North Carolina Press. Healing charms often commanded the affliction to 1224 Words, Power of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1225 Application File d e p a rt from each part of the body from head to toe seventeenth century, including Francis Bacon, Thomas (Storms 1948, 222). Whether such figurative utterances Hobbes, John Locke, Daniel Sennert, and many others and gestures we re understood as rhetorical devices (Vickers 1986). But before the eighteenth century, establishing imaginary correspondences or as the cultural accounts of language coexisted with another exploitation of a real bond between things would vary t h e o ry that words and other signs had a natural re l a- from one person to another. As Stuart Clark suggested, tionship to the things they denoted. Early modern the power of ritual words may have been construed dif- occult philosophers considered that the essential nature f e rently by charmers and their patients, as also by of things was embodied in their names, which could be priests and their congregations (Clark 1997, 283). used to perform marvels, and they consistently blurred Modern fie l d w o rk also cautions against assuming the distinction between fig u r a t i ve and literal uses of that performers of spells, charms, and prayers or eve n language, taking analogy for identity, a real connection their clients attributed the efficacy of rituals solely to b e t ween a fig u re and the thing re f e r red to (Vi c k e r s the words, despite the claims of medieval and early 1986, 105–108, 122–130). This natural theory of lan- modern writers that people commonly did so (Clark guage rested primarily on the concept of “Adamic,” the 1997, 284). Though anthropologists have encountered divinely inspired language of Adam, who named all the informants who state that a ritual worked because the animals according to their nature and thus encapsulated w o rds we re spoken, performance analysis usually their essence in words, Go d - g i ven words that we re re veals that other factors we re also essential, especially inherently powerful and would work wonders—if they the context; the simultaneous use of action, substances, could be identified after Babel (Clark 1997, 285–286; or objects; the response of spirits or other entities; and Vickers 1986, 107–108). the faith or will of participants or performers (Tambiah 1985, 18–21, 29–30). What performance details Sacred Words survive of medieval and early modern charms and spells The widespread idea of the creative power of divine indicate that settings, medicines, material objects, and words is often allied to traditions that the language sys- actions accompanying verbal formulas we re no less tem was divinely instituted and transmitted to human i m p o rtant than in modern rituals—for example, in beings to accomplish transitive effects (Tambiah 1985, A n g l o - Sa xon medical charms (Storms 1948) or the 27–28). God’s creative word, affirmed in the Hebrew elaborate spells in a fif t e e n t h - c e n t u ry necro m a n c e r’s Bible, was confirmed in the NewTestament with Jesus manual (Kieckhefer 1997). The difficulty of separating as God’s Word incarnate in the opening verses of St. the communicative and instrumental uses of language John’s Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word and the in rituals has also been emphasized (Clark 1997, 282). Word was with God, and the Word was God.. . . And The words may be addressed to the participants or even the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.” the performers themselves (Roper 1997, 24); many St. John’s words were commonly inscribed on talismans rituals employ intelligible, eve ryday language, and the worn against a variety of evils, including witchcraft effects may be subjective. They might also address gods, (Jolly 2002, 49). Holy names, phrases from the demons, or spirits, invoked to perform the effects. Church’s liturgy, and Christian prayers were employed Fo reign words and nonsense we re commonplace in in both verbal and written formulas for protection and charms and spells, but even unintelligible utterances healing, especially for invisible threats and afflictions might still communicate, since demons could under- attributable to demons or spirits (Jolly 2002, 35–56). stand gibberish (Tambiah 1985, 21). Mo re ove r, extra- An Anglo-Saxon charm against “Elf-Sickness” included o rd i n a ry language (poetic, archaic, and the like) and the words “aius, aius, aius. Dominus deus Sabaoth. unusual modes of speech (such as whispering or chant- Amen. Alleluiah,” to be sung over the patient (Storms ing) are in themselves markers of the transition fro m 1948, 222). Diseases, often personified as intrusive everyday matters to another level of reality, and in ritu- entities, were adjured and banished from the body in als aimed at change, linguistic difference expresses that God’s name, and healing charms often referred to aim by analogy: Just as the words are altered, so let biblical or apocryphal stories of Jesus or the saints per- things be different. forming analogous cures (Kieckhefer 1989, 71–75). Ac c o rding to the cultural theory of language Catholic objections to such uses of sacred words cen- p re valent since the eighteenth century, words are tered on the observances and ceremonies that usually humanmade signs with conventional meanings; they accompanied them, such as a concern with the precise h a ve a purely abstract relationship to the things they recitation of formulas or the shape of inscribed objects signify, serving only to communicate our ideas of those (Kieckhefer 1989, 70), which the Church regarded as things; they cannot provoke physical effects simply by superstitious. The words’ virtue lay in their meaning, being uttered (Clark 1997, 286–287). This separation not in the actual letters. St. Thomas Aquinas accepted b e t ween language and reality has a long history, fro m that passages of Scripture could be worn on talismans, Plato and Aristotle to the empirical scientists of the so long as the words were not expected to work effects Words, Power of 1225

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1226 Application File by themselves (Summa theologica, 2.2.96.4, cited by Because the effects were often evil, they could not come Thomas 1971, 30). Around 1600, the Jesuit Martín f rom God or angels. T h e re f o re, they must have been Del Rio (2000, 59) echoed this opinion: “Provided one caused by demons in response to the signals. Ma g i c a l places no reliance on the written words as such, . . . it words were thus evidence of a tacit pact with demons, is pious and holy to wear round one’s neck, out of sim- the logically necessary intermediary between the re a l ple reverence, the relics of saints, the wax images of the effects of magic and the powerless magician’s words. Agnus Dei, the Gospel of Saint John, [etc.].” Howe ve r, the late medieval Church unintentionally Renaissance Magic and Demonology did much to foster such expectations through many of The Renaissance revival of ancient Hermeticism and its rituals, especially its teaching that sacramental for- Neoplatonism, which promoted the concept that signs mulas worked automatically: By virtue of the priest’s and characters captured the essential nature of things o rdination, the words of consecration Hoc est corpus and had transitive power, renewed intellectual support meum (“This is my body”) transformed bread into the for a natural theory of language. These and the idea of body of Jesus (Jolly 2002, 43; Walker 1958, 151). The Adamic prompted occult philosophers to seek God’s Reformed churches later rejected this doctrine as no less own, powerful words in Hebrew (Kieckhefer 1989, superstitious than charms (Thomas 1971, 51–52). 148–149). Gi ovanni Pico della Mi r a n d o l a (1463–1494) sought them in the Kabbalah, a Jewish Inversion, Strange Signs, and Signals to mystical tradition that held that God created the Demons universe using the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew Inversion is common in magical formulas everywhere. alphabet (Walker 1958, 68–69). The Fl o re n t i n e Reversibility is the key feature of the ancient device Platonist Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499) saw correspon- SATORAREPOTENETOPERAROTAS, usually inscribed as a dences and sympathies everywhere. A cosmic spirit magic square, which had many different uses (Ryan vivified the universe and connected the stars with the 1999, 302–304). St a n d a rd prayers such as the earth, the macrocosm with the harmoniously propor- Paternoster were also recited in reverse for malevolent tioned human microcosm who, like a string vibrating purposes, while many curses were similar in form to in sympathy, was affected by celestial influ e n c e s . charms and blessings but with inverse, harmful intent Ap p ropriate songs could channel these influ e n c e s (Kieckhefer 1989, 19, 82). Curses often sought divine toward the singer or hearer, bestowing the virtues of retribution for a wrong suffered; they were partially jus- particular celestial bodies: Those affected by Jupiter, for tified by the medieval Church’s practice of anathema, example, became more jovial (Walker 1958, 12–16). and a belief (considered blasphemous by many Ficino claimed that his incantations worked through Protestants) long persisted that God heeded the curses the imagination, making people receptive to natural of the poor and innocent (Thomas 1971, 502–512). astral emanations and provoking subjective effects but Necromancers’ spells to conjure demons also borrowed not directly affecting the body or things elsewhere. His heavily from Christian ritual and vocabulary, invoking critics, howe ve r, saw them as dangerous because divine protection and power while summoning danger- demons might overhear them (Walker 1958, 44). ous spirits to perform tasks (Kieckhefer 1989, Early modern writers supporting the prosecution of 167–168). Theologians condemned not only such magicians and witches generally agreed that words had explicit invocations but also, especially from the late no power except as signs; the effects were often real but thirteenth century onward, the use of verbal formulas caused by demons responding to witches’ signals, containing unintelligible words or strange characters, a c c o rding to their pact (Clark 1997, 290). As He n r i for these could also, even unintentionally, send signals Boguet (1929, 79) wrote: “[Words] are no more than a to demons. symbol of the pact between the witch and Satan; for it Ac c o rding to Aquinas, words had no power to is certain that words have no other purpose than to produce the effects of magic; they were only signs com- denote the thing for which they were ordained and to municating thought: “As to the letters that form an express the passions of the soul and the affections of the inscription on an image, and other characters, nothing spirit.” Besides, if words had the power to harm, they else can be said of them, but that they are signs: where- would do so whenever anyone inadve rtently uttere d fore they are directed to an intelligence only” (Summa them. c o n t ra gentiles 3.2.106, in Kors and Peters 2001, 94–95). Such effects as unlocking locked doors or Maleficiumand Loss of the Power of re vealing hidden knowledge, which Aquinas believe d Words were real and unnatural, could only be produced by an Curses and threats we re important in forming witches’ agent able to understand the signs. Magicians we re reputations, providing circumstantial indications of unable to do these things; neither could the stars, nor their guilt, while written spells and objects with the materials on which inscriptions we re written. strange inscriptions provided weighty material 1226 Words, Power of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1227 Application File evidence at law. Wi t c h e s’ intentions and desires, how- Clark, Stuart. 1997. Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft e ve r, we re more important than their words: Their gaze in Early Modern Europe.Oxford: Clarendon. ( “ove r l o o k i n g”) or malevolent thoughts (“ill-wishing” ) , Del Rio, Martín. 2000. Investigations into Magic.Edited and trans- lated by P. G. Maxwell-Stuart. Manchester: Manchester whether ove rtly expressed or not, provoked the same University Press. effects as curses and “f o re s p e a k i n g” (Thomas 1971, Favret-Saada, Jeanne. 1980. Deadly Words: Witchcraft in the Bocage. 187). Nor was it only harsh words that we re harmful. Translated by Catherine Cullen. Cambridge: Cambridge On the contrary, praise could bewitch. Boguet (1929, University Press. 78–79), evidently puzzled, asked: “How are we to Frazer, James George. 1978. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic account for the fact that even when they praise you and and Religion.Abridged ed. 1957. Reprint. London: Macmillan. compliment you, they injure you?” While there is no Jolly, Karen. 2002. “Medieval Magic: Definitions, Beliefs, k n owing how much sarcasm and irony was expre s s e d Practices.” Pp. 1–71 in The Middle Ages.Vol. 3 of The Athlone by (or projected into) bewitching kind words, praise History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe.Edited by Bengt itself was dangerous unless delive red with a blessing Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London and Philadelphia: Athlone because it expressed the speaker’s envy or made some- and University of Pennsylvania Press. Kieckhefer, Richard. 1989. Magic in the Middle Ages.Cambridge: thing stand out, exposed to the envious yearnings of Cambridge University Press. those who would “t a k e” its pro d u c t i ve potential, as the ———. 1997. Forbidden Rites: A Necromancer’s Manual of the evil eye did. Fifteenth Century.Gloucestershire: Sutton. Witches also took their victims’ power of words. Loss Kors, Alan C., and Edward Peters, eds. 2001. Witchcraft in Europe, of voice is a symptom of the nightmare (attributed to a 400–1700: A Documentary History.2nd ed. Revised by Edward witch riding on the sleeper’s chest) and a common Peters. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. motif in witch narratives. In 1672 and 1673, the Mammoli, Domenico. 1972. The Record of the Trial and No rthumbrian witch finder Anne Armstrong claimed Condemnation of a Witch, Matteuccia di Francesco, at Todi, 20 that after the witches abducted her to their meeting and March, 1428.Rome: E. Cossidente. forced her to sing, she could not talk about her experi- Oates, Caroline. 2003. “Cheese Gives You Nightmares: Old Hags ence until her vocal power was restored on St. John the and Heartburn.” Folklore114: 205–225. Roper, Jonathan. 1997. “Traditional Verbal Charms, with Eva n g e l i s t’s day by a piece of cheese, enabling her to Particular Reference to Estonian and English name the witches (Oates 2003, 213–214). In a modern Charm-Traditions.” Master’s thesis, University of Sheffield. French region, the deadly silence of witchcraft resonates Ryan, William Francis. 1999. The Bathhouse at Midnight: An in belligerent verbal acts of witchcraft where “w o rd s Historical Survey of Magic and Divination in Russia. wage war” (Fa v re t - Saada 1980, 10). No one talked of Gloucestershire: Sutton. witchcraft unless implicated in the conflict, and Storms, Godfrid. 1948. Anglo-Saxon Magic.The Hague: Nijhoff. suspects could not talk about it at all. Bewitched people Tambiah, Stanley J. 1985. Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An ve r b a l i zed their misfortunes to an “u n w i t c h e r” who Anthropological Perspective.Cambridge, MA: Harvard i d e n t i fied the witch, usually a neighbor presumed to University Press. have uttered spells learned from bad books or bewitch- Thomas, Keith. 1971. Religion and the Decline of Magic.London: ing words during a crisis, in order to increase his or her Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Vickers, Brian. 1986. “Analogy Versus Identity: The Rejection of p ower at the victim’s expense. Unwitchers engaged in Occult Symbolism, 1580–1680.” Pp. 95–163 in Occult and re t a l i a t o ry magical combat to return the spell to the Scientific Mentalities in the Renaissance.Edited by Brian Vickers. witch, while the bewitched were required to cease com- 1985. Reprint. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. munication with the suspect; failing that, they must Walker, Daniel P. 1958. Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino talk without saying anything and always have the last to Campanella.London: Warburg Institute. word. If witches strengthened their hold over their vic- Zika, Charles. 1976. “Reuchlin’sDe verbo mirificoand the Magic tims by controlling conversation, silence weakened it, Debate of the Late Fifteenth Century.” Journal of the Warburg a l l owing victims to regain some control while the and Courtauld Institutes39: 104–138. unwitchers counterattacked the witches, depriving them in turn of the power of words. Württemberg, Duchy of Between 1497 and 1700, over 350 investigations and CAROLINE OATES trials for witchcraft were conducted in the duchy of See also:AMULETANDTALISMAN;AQUINAS,THOMAS;BOGUET, W ü rttemberg. Over 600 people we re inve s t i g a t e d , HENRI;CHARMS;CURSES;DELRIO,MARTÍN;EVILEYE;FOLKLORE; charged, and imprisoned. At least 197 executions are HERMETICISM;INVOCATIONS;KABBALAH;NECROMANCY; known from trial records, so roughly one-third of those NIGHTMARES;PACTWITHTHEDEVIL;RITUALMAGIC;SPELLS; accused were sentenced to death. In comparison with SUPERSTITION;SYMPATHY;TODI,WITCHOF. other jurisdictions in southwest Germany (the present- References and further reading: day state [Land] of Baden-Württemberg), where over Boguet, Henri. 1929. An Examen of Witches.Translated by E. A. Ashwin, edited by Montague Summers. [London]: John 3,200 people were put to death for witchcraft between Rodker. 1561 and 1670, the duchy of Württemberg conducted Württemberg, Duchy of 1227

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1228 Application File a relatively moderate witch persecution. Its record a c ross the land and quickly spread to neighboring reflected, on the one hand, a smoothly functioning regions. In 1562 and 1563, eleven women accused of judicial apparatus, which kept firm control of witch- witchcraft were executed. In the neighboring Protestant craft trials, and, on the other hand, the attitude of county of Helfenstein, over sixty people were burned at Württemberg’s religious leaders, who opposed popular the stake. In St u t t g a rt, the preachers Matthäus Alber wishes for persecution through sermons and theological and Wilhelm Bidembach spoke against the witch tracts. superstition and opposed the fury of people who had Although the largest realm in territorially fragmented quickly identified the witches responsible for their mis- s o u t h western Ge r m a n y, at around 9,500 square kilo- f o rtune and demanded their rigorous pro s e c u t i o n . meters, the duchy of W ü rttemberg ranked among the Following the position of Württemberg’s great reformer smaller middle-sized states in the Holy Roman Empire. Johann Brenz (1499–1570), the preachers urged the The first Protestant territory in the region following the judicial officials to be cautious and disre g a rd popular Reformation of 1534 under Duke Ulrich, it was forged clamor. by Duke Christoph (1550–1568) into a cohesive After 1590, a new wave of persecutions started, last- Lutheran confessional state. Around 1600, approx i- ing until 1630 and reaching a peak in the period mately 450,000 people lived in its fifty-eight adminis- b e t ween 1626 and 1630. Despite the large volume of t r a t i ve districts. Each district included a town that a c t i v i t y, though, single trials rather than mass panics served as the district seat as well as a number of villages. p redominated. A “witch new s p a p e r” printed in The capital, St u t t g a rt, had around 9,000 inhabitants, Tübingen in 1616 re p o rted that the regent of while the university town of Tübingen had 4,000. Württemberg insisted his officials follow legally correct Most accused witches were women (85 percent); the p ro c e d u res against witches. The most famous witch- men were often herders who practiced incantations and craft trial in W ü rttemberg took place in 1620 and herbal remedies. The women accused of witchcraft were 1621, when Katharina Kepler (1547–1622), mother of most commonly old and from the peasant underc l a s s ; the imperial astronomer Johann Kepler (1571–1630), they we re poor, pro p e rtyless, and often widow s was accused as a witch and tort u red but eve n t u a l l y deprived of familial support. “Honorable” and proper- acquitted. tied women from the urban upper class we re less After the Battle of Nördlingen in 1634, when the f requently suspected of witchcraft and better able to Thirty Years’War swept over the duchy and devastated exploit the judicial possibilities of defense and appeal to it, almost no witchcraft trials took place. Wi t c h c r a f t get through unharmed, to buy better accommodations accusations re v i ved in the 1650s. Now children we re in jail, or even to escape with the help of town officials. often invo l ved, either accusing others or denouncing Eight of the women executed as witches were midwives t h e m s e l ves. In the last great witchcraft trial, which (7 percent, an unusually high percentage). Childre n , occurred in Calw between 1683 and 1684 and resulted who became increasingly involved in witchcraft trials in in two death sentences, over forty children we re the second half of the seventeenth century, were never i n vo l ved. Howe ve r, this trial marked the beginning of sentenced to death in Württemberg; their punishment the end. The ducal government sent a commission to combined a spanking with religious instruction by a stop the “lamentable witch business, which,” it said, minister or schoolmaster. was rooted “mainly in fantastic illusions.” Witch accu- Württemberg’s first recorded witch burning occurred sations continued until the end of the eighteenth centu- in 1497, when “Fiends” (the usual term for witches in ry, but they only led to criminal prosecutions in excep- c o n t e m p o r a ry re c o rds) we re burned to death in the tional circumstances and increasingly we re handled as t own of Brackenheim. In 1505, after a woman was slander. burned at the stake in Tübingen, the theologian Martin Plantsch preached a number of sermons opposing cred- Legal Proceedings ulous and superstitious witch beliefs. A relatively mild The Carolina Code (Constitutio criminalis Carolina), phase ensued until 1560, during which thirty trials for issued in 1532 by Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, magic and witchcraft ended with banishments or contained penalties for magic that included, in article acquittals. In 1529, the widow of a St u t t g a rt citize n 109, death by fire for harmful magic. InWürttemberg, accused of witchcraft even lodged a complaint with the the wave of trials in 1562 gave the impetuous for a legal Re i c h s k a m m e r g e r i c h t (imperial chamber court) against d e finition of the crime in the Sixth Prov i n c i a l the prefect of Stuttgart for excessive torture. Ordinance of 1567. Württemberg was the first territo- After 1560, concern about witchcraft increased. In ry that put a pact with the Devil on par with harmful August 1562, a bad hailstorm, an early symptom of the magic as an essential feature of magic and, diverging Little Ice Age, devastated large areas of W ü rt t e m b e r g , from imperial law, made it punishable by death. The totally destroying the harvest in some districts and law remained on the books without modific a t i o n s p a rking a substantial wave of persecutions that swe p t throughout the seventeenth century. 1228 Württemberg, Duchy of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1229 Application File In W ü rttemberg, witchcraft was considered an instrument in witchcraft trials, for whether and how it offense against the state and, like eve ry other criminal was administered generally determined the outcome. offense, was handled exclusively by secular courts. The W ü rt t e m b e r g’s law provided for tort u re by hoisting prefect, the ducal representative in each district, led the (strappado) for at most a quarter hour, but the honor of i n vestigation and brought charges before the district the executioner and of the court personnel generally seat’s municipal court in what amounted to an inquisi- induced them to compel the suspect to confess by any torial trial. The prosecution tried to determine the means at their disposal, often in violation of the law. material facts and establish the objective truth. Because The needle probe to determine imperviousness to pain i n c o n t rove rtible evidence could be found only in played a limited role in Württemberg witchcraft trials; exceptional circumstances, the proceedings had to rely tests such as “s w i m m i n g” we re unknown. Confessions on circumstantial evidence, and torture was included as extracted by tort u re contained the usual, we l l - k n ow n a means of determining guilt. In general, neither the components: harmful magic, pact and intercourse with p refect nor the judges of the municipal court, who the Devil, and magical flight to a witches’ Sabbat. came from the urban elite, had formal legal training. In Without questioning the basic belief in witchcraft, order to compensate for their limited legal knowledge, the clerical and secular elites in Württemberg conduct- prevent crass miscarriages of justice, and hold the courts ed witchcraft trials on a thoroughly scrupulous basis. to uniform pro c e d u res, prefects could not conduct The fact that only 30 percent of them ended with criminal trials on their own authority but had to report e xecutions is attributable to the moderating influ e n c e to the ducal chancellery. Thus, the decision to start a of the government. W ü rttemberg suffered no “w i t c h - witchcraft trial lay with the central administration, and hunts from above”; instead, the early modern territorial the ducal High Council directed such criminal trials state, with the consolidation of its central administra- a c c o rding to legally correct pro c e d u res. Mu n i c i p a l tion, maintained a certain amount of legal order that c o u rts we re often re q u i red to send trial documents to prevented virulent witch persecutions. the jurists at the University of Tübingen for expert legal counsel. These consultations and the re p o rts to the ANITA RAITH; High Council put a heavy responsibility on the central TRANSLATED BY EDWARD BEVER administrators, who made the actual decisions in witch- craft trials. The High Council also had to approve a See also:BRENZ,JOHANN;CAROLINACODE(CONSTITIOCRIMINALIS death sentence, which, following contemporary crimi- CAROLINA); COURTS,SECULAR;FEMALEWITCHES;GERMANY, SOUTHWESTERN;HOLYROMANEMPIRE;KEPLER,JOHANNES; nal law, meant burning alive. Howe ve r, re p e n t a n t LAWSONWITCHCRAFT(EARLYMODERN); LITTLEICEAGE; witches we re beheaded as an act of merc y, and their MIDWIVES;PLANTSCH,MARTIN;SOCIALANDECONOMICSTATUS corpses were burned afterward. Confiscation of proper- OFWITCHES;SWIMMINGTEST;TORTURE;UNIVERSITIES. ty from convicted offenders was not allowed in References and further reading: Württemberg, so direct financial interests of the prose- Bever, EdwardW. M. 1985. “Witchcraft in Early Modern cuting elite played no role in witchcraft trials. Wuerttemberg.” PhD diss., Princeton University. Witchcraft accusations almost always originated fro m Levack, Brian. 1999. “The Decline and End of Witchcraft o rd i n a ry subjects, and m a l e fic i u m (harmful magic) Prosecutions.” Pp. 1–93 in The Eighteenth and Nineteenth i n variably stood at their center. Poisonings, diseases, and Centuries.Vol. 5 of The Athlone History of Witchcraft and Magic in Europe. Edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark. London the death of people and animals we re supposedly caused and Philadelphia: Athlone and University of Pennsylvania by harmful magic, often after a conflict between perpe- Press. trator and victim that the ducal government was expect- Lorenz, Sönke, ed. 1994. Hexen und Hexenverfolgung im deutschen ed to re s o l ve through a witchcraft trial. In the majority Südwesten: Ausstellung des Badischen Landesmuseums in of cases, charges we re usually not brought on the basis of Zusammenarbeit mit dem Institut für Geschichtliche Landeskunde a confession by the accused but rather on the basis of der Universität Tübingen. Vol. 2. Ostfildern: Volkskundliche c i rcumstantial evidence: rumors, suspicions, and accusa- Veröffentlichungen des Badischen Landesmuseums Karlsruhe. tions. Legally defined (Carolina, art. 44) and re l i a b l e Midelfort, H. C. Erik. 1972. Witch Hunting in Southwestern evidence was needed to justify an indictment, incarc e r a- Germany, 1562–1684. The Social and Intellectual Foundations. tion, or tort u re. W ü rt t e m b e r g’s High Council based a Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. decision to begin a witchcraft trial on concrete and Raith, Anita. 1995. “Hexenprozesse beim württembergischen Oberrat.” Pp. 101–121 in Hexenverfolgung: Beiträge zur demonstrable injury, the corpus delicti, as well as the Forschung—unter besonderer Berücksichtigung des südwest- moral and religious reputation of the suspect, supplied deutschen Raumes.Edited by Sönke Lorenz and Dieter R. by the local clergy. Testimony of witches who had con- Bauer.Würzburg: Königshausen and Neumann. fessed only to a pact and intercourse with the Devil did Rublack, Ulinka. 1999. The Crimes of Women in Early Modern not suffice as grounds for bringing charges. Germany.Oxford: Clarendon. To rt u re could not be undertaken without the Schnabel-Schüle, Helga. 1997. Überwachen und Strafen im approval of the High Council. Torture was the decisive Territorialstaat: Bedingungen und Auswirkungen des Systems Württemberg, Duchy of 1229

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1230 Application File strafrechtlicher Sanktionen im frühneuzeitlichen Württemberg. 1997). Re g a rdless of age and status, no one was safe Cologne: Böhlau. from the witch persecutions under Ehrenberg. Lists of Wegert, Karl. 1994. Popular Culture, Crime, and Social Control in victims of the first twenty-nine of the forty-two mass Eighteenth-CenturyWürttemberg.Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. burnings that occurred in the city of W ü rz b u r g between 1627 and 1629 detailed a total of 160 individ- Würzburg, Prince-Bishopric of uals executed, including a mayor’s wife, the wife of the During the first thirty years of the seventeenth century, former chancellor, a councillor, three councillors’ wives, the Catholic prince-bishopric of W ü rzburg, along with and seventeen children whose ages we re specified as four other Catholic ecclesiastical principalities situated in fifteen and under. Fo rt y - t h ree canons and vicars we re Franconia in southeastern Germany (the upper part of also executed between 1627 and 1629. These persecu- the prince-bishopric of Mainz, the prince-bishoprics of tions we re so savage that Germans coined a new term Bamberg and Eichstätt, and the prince-abbey of Fu l d a ) , for exc e s s i ve witch hunting: w ü rzburgisch We rk experienced some of the most seve re witch hunts eve r (W ü rzburg work). A mandate issued by the seen in the early modern world. These Franconian perse- Reichskammergericht (the imperial chamber court ) , cutions “we re among the worst excesses of Eu ro p e a n p rohibiting Eh renberg from further witch hunting, h i s t o ry,” fulfilling “the sombre dream of unconditional probably stopped the trials in 1630 (Oestmann 1997). persecution, of persecution without re g a rd for political, The mandate was likely triggered by a complaint social or humanitarian obstacles, but only for the logic of b rought before the Reichskammergericht by jurist the persecutions themselve s” (Behringer 1997, 24, 228). Johann Friedrich Bu rc k h a rdt, who had escaped fro m In W ü rzburg, 300 people we re executed as witches in the city’s special “witch prison” after being imprisoned 1616 and 1617 during the rule of Pr i n c e - Bishop Ju l i u s on witchcraft charges in 1628. Ehrenberg may also have Echter von Me s p e l b runn (1544–1617; episcopate deemed it politic to end the persecution after he and his 1573–1617); 900 executions occurred between 1625 chancellor had also been denounced as witches. and 1630 under Pr i n c e - Bishop Philipp Adolf vo n Ec h t e r, Eh renberg, and their advisers doubtless Eh renberg (1583–1631; episcopate 1623–1631). believed in the reality of witches who made pacts with Su rv i val of trial re c o rds from W ü rzburg is incomplete, the Devil, committed acts of m a l e fic i u m ( h a r m f u l and re s e a rch on the witch hunts there has been patchy: magic), and attended witches’ Sabbats: These beliefs No book-length study of these hunts exists. had been Catholic dogma since 1590. They also treated Little evidence of witchcraft trials in Würzburg prior witchcraft as a crimen exceptum (the excepted crime), a to 1590 remains. Scattered trials, some of which ended crime so heinous that normal safeguards on the use of in executions, occurred under Echter between 1590 t o rt u re could be ignored in its pro s e c u t i o n . and 1603. The rate of persecution accelerated markedly C o n s e q u e n t l y, once witch hunts started, they we re b e t ween 1616 and 1617, howe ve r. It is impossible to certain to escalate, as suspects were forced into confess- a s c e rtain the exact numbers of those executed because ing their “guilt” and denouncing others as Sabbat atten- many trial records are missing, but it is clear from con- dees. Moreover, the persecution process was accelerated t e m p o r a ry comment that this witch-hunting episode (particularly under Ehrenberg) by the fact that all trial was severe. On June 11, 1617, for example, Würzburg records were submitted to the episcopal chancellery for cloth shearer Jacob Röder re c o rded in his diary that, examination and advice. a c c o rding to an announcement made on the bishop’s Both Echter and Eh renberg we re also ze a l o u s orders from the cathedral pulpit, 300 witches had been reformers, a factor that contributed significantly to the e xecuted in the prince-bishopric over the past ye a r. enthusiasm with which they eradicated alleged witches. Trials continued under Ec h t e r’s successor, Jo h a n n The son of a councillor of Mainz, Echter was born in Gottfried von Aschhausen (1575–1622; episcopate Mespelbrunn Castle in the Spessart region in 1544; he 1618–1622). Although there is no evidence on the studied law and theology at the Universities of Mainz, number of people executed, it appears that the severity Louvain, Douai, Paris, Angers, Pavia, and Rome. After of the persecution declined. Under Aschhausen’s his election at Würzburg in 1573, he began a vigorous s u c c e s s o r, Eh renberg, trials began in 1625, gained p rogram of Counter-Reformation in 1585, organizing momentum between 1626 and 1628, peaked in 1629, visitations throughout his diocese, forcing many and stopped in 1630. Protestants to conve rt to Catholicism or leave , Some historians have regarded the total of 900 exe- founding new parishes, and disciplining lax priests. He cutions between 1625 and 1630, first publicized in also increased his power at the expense of rival institu- acontemporary pamphlet, as an exaggeration. However, tions by issuing mandates regulating the social, recent work based on witch-trial material gathered by economic, and religious life of W ü rzburg; pursuing the H-Sonderkommando, the special research team orga- legal and administrative reforms; and reducing the n i zed during the Nazi regime by Heinrich Hi m m l e r, i n fluence of the W ü rzburg cathedral chapter. T h e suggests that this total is reasonably accurate (Behringer witchcraft trials of 1616 and 1617—some of which 1230 Würzburg, Prince-Bishopric of

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1231 Application File he oversaw personally—can thus be seen as a product of and intolerant than his uncle; one historian described his Counter-Reformation zeal to eradicate heresy and him as “an energetic person, who could not be shaken ungodliness while increasing his own power. Echter also in his intentions, who knew exactly what he wanted to founded a hospital for the sick, aged, and orphaned in do and who pursued all of his goals with immense W ü rzburg in 1576 and a university in 1582, both d o g g e d n e s s” (Dürr 1931, 65). T h e re may even have named after him. Echter’s charitable acts and his perse- been a financial motive in Ehrenberg’s sustained witch cution of witches we re all motivated by a desire to do persecution. In 1627, he issued an ordinance allowing what he believed improved his subjects’ physical and him to confiscate the pro p e rty of executed witches, a spiritual well-being, even if this meant burning some of m e a s u re that generated around 79,000 Gulden by them at the stake for the good of their eternal souls. 1629, helping to offset the great indebtedness into Philipp Adolf von Eh renberg was Echter vo n which his prince-bishopric had fallen since 1623. Me s p e l b ru n n’s nephew. Born into the family of the W ü rzburg experienced no mass witch hunts after Imperial Knights of Eh renberg near Heinsheim am 1630. T h e re we re no witchcraft trials during the Neckar in 1583, Eh renberg may never have become Swedish occupation of W ü rzburg (from 1631 to bishop of W ü rzburg had his Protestant father, Ha n s 1634) during the T h i rty Ye a r s’ War and only a few tri- Heinrich, not died in 1584. Hans Heinrich had wanted als during the latter part of the episcopate of his son to be raised a Lutheran, but after his early death, Eh re n b e r g’s successor, Franz von Ha t z f e l d t his widow’s brother, Julius Echter, took over his young (1596–1642; episcopate 1632–1642). Ha t z f e l d t’s suc- nephew’s guardianship and (Catholic) education. After c e s s o r, the enlightened Johann Philipp von Schönborn studying theology at the Un i versities of Ro m e , (1605–1673; episcopate 1642–1673), refused to bow Salamanca, Valladolid, and Paris, Ehrenberg was elected to popular pre s s u re for further hunts. In 1669, he bishop of Würzburg in 1623. He continued his uncle’s issued an ordinance for W ü rzburg and his other terri- C o u n t e r - Reformation efforts, reforming a further 200 tories of Mainz and Worms that re n d e red furt h e r villages according to the principles of post-Tr i d e n t i n e witch persecution almost impossible by thre a t e n i n g Catholicism. In overseeing the persecution of so many those who spread “s u p e r s t i t i o u s” belief in witchcraft witches in his prince-bishopric between 1625 and with punishment. Schönborn’s moderation stemmed 1630, Ehrenberg doubtless acted on impulses similar to f rom the influence of Friedrich Spee, the Jesuit critic those of his uncle in 1616 and 1617: first and foremost of exc e s s i ve witch hunting, and from close contacts godly zeal but also a desire to affirm his own power as with Paris, where the Pa rl e m e n t of Paris (sove re i g n territorial ruler. judicial court, with jurisdiction over approx i m a t e l y It seems, howe ve r, that there was greater popular one-half of France) in 1624 implemented automatic pressure on Ehrenberg to hunt witches than there had appeal in all witchcraft cases and in effect ended death been on Echter.The prince-bishopric’s inhabitants had sentences for witchcraft. s u f f e red from periodic plague epidemics and cre e p i n g A late burst of anxiety about witchcraft resulted in i n flation between 1606 and 1617; these misfort u n e s the execution for witchcraft of Maria Renata Si n g e r, almost certainly helped create a climate of anxiety con- s u b p r i o ress of the convent of Un t e rzell bei d u c i ve to the persecution of witches under Echter in W ü rzburg, in 1749. This was the last execution for 1616 and 1617. But conditions deteriorated markedly witchcraft in Franconia and one of the last in during Eh re n b e r g’s episcopate. As a result of harve s t Ge r m a n y. f a i l u res, coinage devaluation, and increasing tro o p m ovements through the area, the years between 1624 ALISON ROWLANDS and 1629 constituted a high point of dearth, inflation, See also:AGRARIANCRISES;BAMBERG,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF; and plague in W ü rzburg. In 1626, unseasonal fro s t s CRIMENEXCEPTUM;ECCLESIASTICALTERRITORIES(HOLYROMAN destroyed harvests and prompted popular demands for EMPIRE); EICHSTÄTT,PRINCE-BISHOPRICOF;FULDA, action against those believed responsible for the bad PRINCE-ABBEYOF;GERMANY;GERMANY,SOUTHEASTERN;MAINZ, weather: witches. Two women suspected as witches ELECTORATEOF;NAZIINTERESTINWITCHPERSECUTION; were stoned—one to death—in rural Würzburg. In this NUMBEROFWITCHES;PARLEMENTOFPARIS;REICHSKAMMER- context, Eh renberg probably re g a rded witch persecu- GERICHT(IMPERIALCHAMBERCOURT); SPEE,FRIEDRICH; tion as a way of quelling potential popular unrest and of TORTURE;WEATHERMAGIC;WITCHHUNTS. References and further reading: appeasing the wrath of God, who was visiting such Job- Behringer,Wolfgang. 1997. Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: like disasters on his territory. In his confiscation man- Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early date of 1627, Ehrenberg pointed out that God wanted Modern Europe.Translated by J. C. Grayson and David Lederer. to scorch W ü rzburg as he had Sodom and Go m o r r a h Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. with sulfur, fire, war, hunger, and pestilence because of Dürr, Otto. 1931. “Philipp Adolf von Ehrenberg: Fürstbischof the number of witches it contained (Dürr 1931). von Würzburg, 1623–1631.” Zeitschrift für bayerische Eh renberg seems also to have been even more ze a l o u s Kirchengeschichte6: 65–74. Würzburg, Prince-Bishopric of 1231

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46049 Golden Chap.W av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1232 Application File Merzbacher, Friedrich. 1950. “Geschichte des Hexenprozesses im Schwillus, Harald. 1987. “‘Der bischoff lässt nicht nach, bis er die Hochstifte Würzburg.” Mainfränkisches Jahrbuch für Geschichte gantze statt verbrennt hat’: Bemerkungen zu der 1745 veröf- und Kunst2: 162–185. fentlichten Liste der unter Fürstbischof Philipp Adolf von ———. 1970. Die Hexenprozesse in Franken.2nd ed. Munich: Ehrenberg wegen angeblicher Hexerei hingerichteten Beck. Menschen.” Würzburger Diözesan-Geschichtsblätter ———. 1974. “Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn Fürstbischof von 49: 145–154. Würzburg.” Blätter für deutsche Landesgeschichte110: 155–180. ———. 1989. Die Hexenprozesse gegen Würzburger Geistliche unter Oestmann, Peter. 1997. Hexenprozesse am Reichskammergericht. Fürstbischof Philipp Adolf von Ehrenberg (1623–1631). Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna: Böhlau. Würzburg: Echter. Pohl, Herbert. 1995. “Kurfürst Johann Philipp von Schönborn Walinski-Kiehl, Robert. 1988. “‘Godly States’: Confessional (1647–1673) und das Ende der Hexenprozesse im Conflict and Witch-Hunting in Early Modern Germany.” Kurfürstentum Main.” Pp. 19–36 in Das Ende der Mentalities5, no. 2: 13–24. Hexenverfolgung.Edited by Sönke Lorenz and Dieter R. Bauer. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. 1232 Würzburg, Prince-Bishopric of

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46049 Golden Chap.Y av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1233 Application File Y Yates, Frances Amelia publication in 1964 of her single most famous book, (1899–1981) Gi o rdano Bruno and the He rmetic Tra d i t i o n , s u b s e- One of the greatest Renaissance scholars of her time, quently translated into several languages. Frances Yates wrote numerous valuable studies on the Yates wrote another acknowledged classic, The Art of history and culture of the Renaissance that shed light Me m o ry (1966), in which she tackled an original sub- on many obscure aspects of the period, especially in the ject. Together with The Theatre of the World (1969) and field of Hermeticism, magic, and other occult beliefs. her book on Bruno, her trilogy on the Sh a k e s p e a re a n Yates was certainly aware of witchcraft’s negative associ- world in Elizabethan England was complete. She tried ations with research interests. For example, her last to investigate how a new cultural tradition took root in work, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age England. Although her books we re sometimes harshly (1979), employed the example of Jean Bodin’s attack in c r i t i c i zed, the significance of her work was re c o g n i ze d his De la démonomanie des sorciers (On the Demon- by eve ryone in her field and gave rise to new areas of Mania of Witches, 1580) on Heinrich Cornelius re s e a rch. Yates also turned to the French Wars of Agrippa von Nettesheim and Johann Weyer for using Religion in order to underline the importance of cere- Kabbalah in defense of witches to show how witch monial rites in such works as The French Academies of hunts could be useful in the destruction of one’s the Sixteenth Ce n t u ry (1947) and The Valois Ta p e s t r i e s cultural enemies. (1959). InThe Rosicrucian Enlightenment (1971), Yates Born in Southsea, England, Yates graduated fro m e x p l o red the same theme, the adaptation of the Un i versity College, London, in 1924. She continued her Renaissance Hermetic heritage, this time amid the re s e a rch privately while doing some teaching at the turmoil of central Europe during the Thirty Years’War. No rth London Collegiate School from 1926 to 1939. A collection of essays, As t raea: The Imperial Theme of Her intellectual biography is best traced in her the Sixteenth Ce n t u ry (1975), developed her icono- Au t o b i o g raphical Fra g m e n t s , in which she sought to graphic approach to the idea of power and kingship. In examine herself and her re s e a rch through intense and her last work, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan c o l o rful self-scru t i n y. Her academic isolation was always Ag e (1979), she investigated what Eugenio Garin has e x p ressed with feelings of pride and sometimes re g re t . called the “d a rk face” of Renaissance culture and Yates published her first book, John Florio, in 1934; combined two important themes of her works, which like her subsequent works, it was widely reviewed. She she herself outlined at its end: the story of the Hermetic received a prize from the British Academy and in 1941 and Kabbalistic movements and the iconographic joined the staff of the Warburg Institute. Although approach. Wa r b u r g’s method of reading images and symbols as Yates, along with Garin in Italy, ultimately managed historical events shaped her interd i s c i p l i n a ry appro a c h to create a new field of specialization. Hermeticism and to research, she preferred to be considered independent magic, finally freed from the rationalist paradigm, were of any institutional tradition: Indeed, Sir Er n s t considered important and noncontradictory features of Gombrich defined her attitude as lying outside the aca- Renaissance culture. The great enthusiasm for and demic mill, although she was elected a Fe l l ow of the fie rce criticism of her books re vealed her enormous British Academy in 1967 and awarded an Order of the impact on academic culture. Ya t e s’s interest in British Empire in 1972. Association with the Warburg Renaissance magic was often misunderstood. Eve n Institute encouraged her to go beyond conve n t i o n a l though she declared that her work on Bruno did not academic boundaries; as Sidney Anglo re m a rked, “No deal with the history of science, some scholars reduced b o u n d a r i e s . . . we re allowed to limit [her] re s e a rc h” her claim to consider Renaissance magic as an early (cited in Gombrich 1982, 26). The main outcome of phase of science. An Italian scholar, Patrizia De l p i a n o this bre a k d own of traditional subject barriers was her (1993) has shed fresh light on Ya t e s’s cultural plan to decision to study Giordano Bruno, whose Supper of the detect some mysterious features of the Renaissance and As h e s she started to translate. This interest led to the reassessed how successful her attempt was. According to Yates, Frances Amelia 1233

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.Y av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1234 Application File Delpiano, Ya t e s’s adherence to the history of ideas References and further reading: appears in contrast with the historiographic revolution Delpiano, Patrizia. 1993. “Il teatro del mondo: Per un profilo di of the French Annales school; her works reflect the fall Frances Amelia Yates.” Rivista Storica Italiana105: 180–246. ———. 2000.“‘Dal Rinascimento ai Lumi: Per un profilo intel- of illusions typical of her era and demonstrate that any lettuale di Frances Amelia Yates.” Pp. 1–55 in La reinvenzione historical reconstruction is relative, a personal result of dei Lumi: Percorsi storiografici del Novecento.Edited by G. reading R. G. Collingwood’s idea of history. Ricuperati. Florence: Olschki. MICHAELA VALENTE Gombrich, E. H., et al. 1982. Frances A. Yates, 1899–1981. London: Warburg Institute. See also:AGRIPPAVONNETTESHEIM,HEINRICHCORNELIUS;BODIN, Yates, Frances Amelia. 1999. Selected Works. 10 vols. London and JEAN;HERMETICISM;KABBALAH;MAGIC,LEARNED;OCCULT; NewYork: Routledge. SCIENCEANDMAGIC;WEYER,JOHANN. 1234 Yates, Frances Amelia

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.Z av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1235 Application File Z Ziarnko, Jan paramours enjoy flesh from those who have been (ca. 1575–ca. 1628) hanged, the hearts of unbaptized children, and the Jan Ziarnko (“Jean Le Grain” in French) was a Polish meat of unclean animals. Reinvigorated, the key engraver and painter who spent most of his career in claims, they continue their disgusting rites with lasciv- Paris; his importance for European witchcraft is a large ious dancing around a cursed tree. At middle left, etching of 1613 providing a ve ry detailed visual another group of younger and naked women indulge account of the Sabbat. After completing his apprentice- in back-to-back dancing to the sounds of a musical ship in Cracow, he spent a short time as a painter in his c o n s o rt, which de Lancre compares to the lewd and native Lwow, traveled to Italy, and reached France per- obscene movements of various current dances. Be l ow haps as early as 1601. All his surviving works are them are members of the wealthy and powe rful nobili- engravings, many reflecting his close association with ty who also participate, masked to ensure their the courts of Henry IV and Louis XIII. a n o n y m i t y. Ziarnko created his etching to illustrate the descrip- Cutting through the whole scene is a vast swirl of tion of the Sabbat by the French magistrate Pi e r re de smoke, in which can be seen witches on sticks, brooms, Lancre in his Tableau de l’inconstance des mauvais anges and dragons; bones and body parts; winged devils; and et demons ( Description of the Inconstancy of Ev i l o b s c u re shapes. A wild, disheveled, and naked witch Angels and Demons). Originally published in two Paris rides a goat with two infants, while below her, a phan- editions in 1612, the book was based on Lancre’s four- tom passes through an imaginary fire. Smoke belches month experience in 1609 with a royally appointed f rom a huge cauldron in which witches boil up their commission investigating the activities of witches in the poisonous ointments and liquids; two of them prepare Pays de Labourd, the Basque region of southwe s t e r n its main ingredients—snakes and skinned, decapitated France, enriched by materials from witch hunts on toads—while a third fans a fire in which bones and a the Spanish side of the bord e r. One of Lancre’s col- skull are visible. At bottom left is a scene peculiar to leagues attended, in disguise, the famous 1610 auto de Basque witchcraft. A group of children use rods and f e (act of faith) at Logroño (Henningsen 1980, switches to prevent toads escaping from a small stream. 174–175). Zi a r n k o’s etching, accompanied by a As alluded to by the toads that adorn the thrones of the detailed key, appeared in a slightly revised 1613 edition Devil’s two consorts, these animals played a key role in by Nicolas Buon, at the head of book 2, chapter 4, Basque witchcraft: They not only provided a critical which describes the Sabbat; it has been re p ro d u c e d i n g redient for witches’ poisons but also doubled as with an English translation of its key (Robbins 1959, witches’ familiars. 300–301). Ziarnko’s iconography drew especially on Jacques de At top right, Ziarnko’s Devil sits on a golden throne Gheyn the Younger and was later ridiculed in Je a n in the form of a “stinking and bearded” goat with five Crépy’s illustration to Laurent Bordelon’s 1711 parody horns, the central one a light from which all the black of witchcraft. The only other of Zi a r n k o’s works with pitch candles and false fires of the Sabbat will be lit. On demonological themes were his engravings of St. James his right sits the crowned Queen of the Sabbat, his spe- and Hermogenes. cial consort, with the next in charge on his left, each CHARLES ZIKA holding a fistful of snakes. A young witch and devil kneel before them, presenting a child as part of their See also:ARTANDVISUALIMAGES;BASQUECOUNTRY;BORDELON, admission ceremony into this infernal society. LAURENT;CANNIBALISM;CAULDRON;GHEYNII,JACQUESDE; GOAT;HERMOGENES;LANCRE,PIERREDE;OINTMENTS;SABBAT; L a n c re’s text describes the scene as a counterliturgy, SALAZARFRÍAS,ALONSODE;TOADS. adding many features from Labourd’s wild and raucous References and further reading: fairs, through which pass crowds of disorderly and Henningsen, Gustav. 1980. The Witches’ Advocate: Basque d i s h e veled people, plying their wares and depravities. Witchcraft and the Spanish Inquisition, 1609–1614.Reno: At bottom right, a group of witches with their demon University of Nevada Press. Ziarnko, Jan 1235

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Richard M.Golden - Encyclopedia of Witchcraft - The Western Tradition

46049 Golden Chap.Z av First Pages 10/17/2005 p.1236 Application File McGowan, Margaret. 1977. “Pierre de Lancre’sTableau de f a r m e r’s widow, Estevanía de Na va rc o rena; and the l’Inconstance des Mauvais Anges et Démons:The Sabbat third-ranking witch was a fifty-two-year-old carpenter’s Sensationalised.”Pp. 182–201 in The Damned Art: Essays in the wife, María Chipía de Ba r renechea. She was also the Literature of Witchcraft.Edited by Sydney Anglo. London: aunt of the young María de Jureteguía, the inquisition’s Routledge and Kegan Paul. star witness, who during the trial incriminated both Robbins, Russell Hope. 1959. The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and herself and her re l a t i ves. Gr a c i a n a’s “c o - f a t h e r - i n - l a w” Demonology.NewYork: Bookplan. (c o n s u e g ro), the shepherd Miguel de Go i b u ru, was Sawicka, Stanislawa. 1936. “Jan Ziarnko: A Polish Painter-Etcher “King of the Sabbat,” and he and another old man also of the First Quarter of the 17th Century.” Print Collector’s Quarterly23: 276–299. held the office of “the De v i l’s ro b e - b e a re r.” Mi g u e l’s ———. 1938. “Jan Ziarnko: Peintre-graveur polonais, et son son, Juanes de Go i b u ru, who was married to one of activité à Paris au premier quart du XVIIe siècle.” La France et Graciana’s daughters, Estevanía, was “bass drummer at La Pologne dans Leurs Relations Artistiques1, no. 2–3: 103–257. the Sabbat,” while his cousin, Juanes de Sansín, who Stoga, Andrew. 1996. “Ziarnki, Jana.” Pp. 668–669 in The was a basket we a ver and unmarried, was the “s i d e Dictionary of Art.Vol. 33. Edited by Jane Turner. London: drummer.” As drummer, Miguel had to join the proces- Macmillan; NewYork: Grove. sion whenever his mother-in-law led his wife, Williams, Gerhild Scholz. 1995. Defining Dominion: The E s t e vanía, to the Devil and be present with the band Discourses of Magic and Witchcraft in Early Modern France and and play while the Devil enjoyed her. The inner circle Germany.Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. also included two priests who assisted the Devil at the Black Mass. These men we re a thirt y - f o u r - ye a r - o l d Zugurramurdi, Witches of curate in Fuenterrabía, Juan de la Borda, the son of a The trial of the witches of Zu g a r r a m u rdi is, beyond all rich farmer in Zu g a r r a m u rdi, and his slightly older comparison, the most famous in Spanish history and cousin, Fray Pe d ro de Arburu, a monk in the Urd a x was already a “media eve n t” at the time. Its ve rdicts we re m o n a s t e ry and the son of the monastery’s hospital p ronounced at an auto de fe(act of faith) at Logroño on superintendent. November 7–8, 1610, in the presence of 30,000 people The description of the rituals of these witches sur- f rom all over northern Spain. Soon afterw a rd, one could passed most other Sabbat accounts in its inventiveness read about the sensational re velations in the Logro ñ o and wealth of detail. It is therefore surprising that ordi- printer Juan de Mo n g a s t ó n’s pamphlet, which was trans- n a ry people in Zu g a r r a m u rdi did not appear to have lated into French and incorporated in Pi e r re de Lancre’s heard of the witches’ Sabbat before the panic broke out. Tableau de l’ i n c o n s t a n c e des mauvais anges et demons T h e re had been occasional instances of bew i t c h m e n t , ( Description of the Inconstancy of Evil Angels and and it appears from their confessions that the accused Demons, 1612, chap. 5.3). Mo n g a s t ó n’s account was we re considered responsible for several deaths among later reprinted by Francisco de Goy a’s friend Leandro de infants, illnesses among adults, losses of cattle, and Moratín (in 1811 and 1824). Not until the twe n t i e t h destruction of crops. However, there had been no open c e n t u ry did the whole truth about the trial come out. accusations; people preferred to keep their suspicions to Zugarramurdi and Urdax are two Basque villages on themselves or blame their misfortunes on “the witches” the northern side of the Py renees, close to the Fre n c h g e n e r a l l y. The result was an atmosphere rife with old b o rd e r. In those days, Zu g a r r a m u rdi was a daughter- and unre s o l ved suspicions. To spark an explosion in parish of Urdax, and its church was served by a such a community, it was only necessary for someone to Premonstratensian monk from the convent at Urd a x . succeed in convincing people that he or she had proof. The combined population of the two villages hard l y This happened at Zugarramurdi. exceeded 600. The abbot at Urdax had jurisdiction over At the beginning of December 1608, a young village the spiritual and secular affairs of both villages; the girl returned after living for some years in Ciboure, a inhabitants of Zu g a r r a m u rdi we re peasants and shep- n e a r by coastal town on the French side of the bord e r. herds, while those of Urdax were farm laborers working María de Ximildegui, who was now twenty, told inter- on the abbey’s lands. esting things about her stay in France. For eighteen Twenty-six of the thirty-one witches on trial in 1610 months, she had belonged to a witch gro u p, but an (ten men and sixteen women, from twenty to eighty experience during Lent in 1608 had reconverted her to years of age) came from these two villages. To g e t h e r, Christianity. After a profound crisis and seven weeks of they must have comprised a substantial part of the illness, she visited a learned priest in He n d a ye, who adult population. At the auto de fe,they were presented h e a rd her confession and gave her powe rful re m e d i e s as the inner circle of the witch group that the with which to resist the Devil until he could obtain Inquisition had exposed in these remote mountain permission from the bishop to absolve her. At the end communities. An eighty-year-old shepherd’s wife, of July, the priest finally gave her Communion. María Graciana de Ba r renechea, was “Queen of the Sa b b a t” ; (who in many respects resembles the so-called survivors the second most senior witch was an octogenarian in twentieth-century trials for satanic child abuse) was 1236 Zugurramurdi, Witches of