Witchcraft

Number of people executed

40-60,000

Reasons

Reformation, economic, beliefs, legal, women, political, local

Critic - Paganism

Margaret Murray

Spain and Italy, under pressure from inquisition - belief in folk tales

Carlo Ginzberg

True belief in unseen forces, prosecutions were unjust

Briggs and Goodare

sacraments - superstition

Candles, holy water, eulogia, relics, ringing bells against storms

Catholicism aligned w wc - transactional, ritualistic, unreliable

Protestantism - high minded, clear theological basis

stress about living in a godly community

Judgement

High magic

Alchemy, astrology, interpretation of dreams

Scepticism and fear of natural science

Papal ban on astrology 1586

Sub-branch of scientific investigation

Demonology

Characteristics of wc

Pact, conspiracy, sabbat

Pope Gregory IX vs Devil Heresy

1233

Lady Alice Kyteler - pact w devil

1324

Milan - earliest known trials for night flying

1384-90

Papal states 1st example of confession w maleficium, pact, flying to sabbat

1428

Types of interactions w devil/ unseen forces

Possession, conjuration, heresy

Luther and Calvin

Luther - believed, Calvin - encouraged witch hunting in Geneva

ursuline nuns possessed by tutor

1634

Women and devil’s cult

Contractual, sexual fulfilment, devil’s mark

North Berwick - accused of causing storm to sink James VI ship

1590

Ginzburg - diabolisation

Benadanti - good wlakers, Fruili -N Italy

inquisitor manuals

Nider 1476

Malleus Maleficarum

1486 Kramer and Sprenger

craze - intensity, shallow - implies derangement, takes away from underlying rationals

Lyndall Ropers - wc as imagined crime, view of women not grounded in reality

Hunt

The - homogenises, scapegoating, doesn’t capture complexity of courts and legal machinery - each trial inc 100 people, top down vs chain reactions and coincidences

confessionalisation

pressure to conform, search for evil

Religious enthusiasm

Millenarianism - enthusiastic Protestantism - prepare for 2nd coming by cleansing

Legal change

Lex talionis, revival of roman law, religious → conspiracy against society, increase in wc statutes