[PDF] Heresy Magic And Witchcraft In Early Modern Europe eBook

Author : Gary K Waite
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 284 pages
File Size : 13,76 MB
Release : 2019-10-10
Category : History
ISBN : 0230629121

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In the fifteenth century many authorities did not believe Inquisitors' stories of a supposed Satanic witch sect. However, the religious conflict of the sixteenth-century Reformation - especially popular movements of reform and revolt - helped to create an atmosphere in which diabolical conspiracies (which swept up religious dissidents, Jews and magicians into their nets) were believed to pose a very real threat. Fear of the Devil and his followers inspired horrific incidents of judicially-approved terror in early modern Europe, leading after 1560 to the infamous witch hunts. Bringing together the fields of Reformation and witchcraft studies, this fascinating book reveals how the early modern period's religious conflicts led to widespread confusion and uncertainty. Gary K. Waite examines in-depth how church leaders dispelled rising religious doubt by persecuting heretics, and how alleged infernal plots, and witches who confessed to making a pact with the Devil, helped the authorities to reaffirm orthodoxy. Waite argues that it was only when the authorities came to terms with pluralism that there was a corresponding decline in witch panics.

Author : Geoffrey Scarre
Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan
Page : 150 pages
File Size : 19,82 MB
Release : 1996-08-15
Category : History
ISBN : 9780333399330

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In his study of witchcraft and magic in 16th and 17th century Europe, Geoffrey Scarre provides an examination of the theoretical and intellectual rationales which made prosecution for the crime acceptable to the continent's judiciaries.

Author : Helen L. Parish
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 409 pages
File Size : 21,68 MB
Release : 2014-11-20
Category : History
ISBN : 1441149740

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Superstition and Magic in Early Modern Europe brings together a rich selection of essays which represent the most important historical research on religion, magic and superstition in early modern Europe. Each essay makes a significant contribution to the history of magic and religion in its own right, while together they demonstrate how debates over the topic have evolved over time, providing invaluable intellectual, historical, and socio-political context for readers approaching the subject for the first time. The essays are organised around five key themes and areas of controversy. Part One tackles superstition; Part Two, the tension between miracles and magic; Part Three, ghosts and apparitions; Part Four, witchcraft and witch trials; and Part Five, the gradual disintegration of the 'magical universe' in the face of scientific, religious and practical opposition. Each part is prefaced by an introduction that provides an outline of the historiography and engages with recent scholarship and debate, setting the context for the essays that follow and providing a foundation for further study. This collection is an invaluable toolkit for students of early modern Europe, providing both a focused overview and a springboard for broader thinking about the underlying continuities and discontinuities that make the study of magic and superstition a perennially fascinating topic.

Author : Louise Nyholm Kallestrup
Publisher : Springer
Page : 354 pages
File Size : 15,4 MB
Release : 2017-02-04
Category : History
ISBN : 3319323857

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This book breaks with three common scholarly barriers of periodization, discipline and geography in its exploration of the related themes of heresy, magic and witchcraft. It sets aside constructed chronological boundaries, and in doing so aims to achieve a clearer picture of what ‘went before’, as well as what ‘came after’. Thus the volume demonstrates continuity as well as change in the concepts and understandings of magic, heresy and witchcraft. In addition, the geographical pattern of similarities and diversities suggests a comparative approach, transcending confessional as well as national borders. Throughout the medieval and early modern period, the orthodoxy of the Christian Church was continuously contested. The challenge of heterodoxy, especially as expressed in various kinds of heresy, magic and witchcraft, was constantly present during the period 1200-1650. Neither contesters nor followers of orthodoxy were homogeneous groups or fractions. They themselves and their ideas changed from one century to the next, from region to region, even from city to city, but within a common framework of interpretation. This collection of essays focuses on this complex.

Author : Brian P. Levack
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 645 pages
File Size : 33,8 MB
Release : 2013-03-28
Category : History
ISBN : 0191648833

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The essays in this Handbook, written by leading scholars working in the rapidly developing field of witchcraft studies, explore the historical literature regarding witch beliefs and witch trials in Europe and colonial America between the early fifteenth and early eighteenth centuries. During these years witches were thought to be evil people who used magical power to inflict physical harm or misfortune on their neighbours. Witches were also believed to have made pacts with the devil and sometimes to have worshipped him at nocturnal assemblies known as sabbaths. These beliefs provided the basis for defining witchcraft as a secular and ecclesiastical crime and prosecuting tens of thousands of women and men for this offence. The trials resulted in as many as fifty thousand executions. These essays study the rise and fall of witchcraft prosecutions in the various kingdoms and territories of Europe and in English, Spanish, and Portuguese colonies in the Americas. They also relate these prosecutions to the Catholic and Protestant reformations, the introduction of new forms of criminal procedure, medical and scientific thought, the process of state-building, profound social and economic change, early modern patterns of gender relations, and the wave of demonic possessions that occurred in Europe at the same time. The essays survey the current state of knowledge in the field, explore the academic controversies that have arisen regarding witch beliefs and witch trials, propose new ways of studying the subject, and identify areas for future research.

Author : Brian P. Levack
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 508 pages
File Size : 36,79 MB
Release : 2013-11-05
Category : History
ISBN : 1317875591

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Between 1450 and 1750 thousands of people – most of them women – were accused, prosecuted and executed for the crime of witchcraft. The witch-hunt was not a single event; it comprised thousands of individual prosecutions, each shaped by the religious and social dimensions of the particular area as well as political and legal factors. Brian Levack sorts through the proliferation of theories to provide a coherent introduction to the subject, as well as contributing to the scholarly debate. The book: Examines why witchcraft prosecutions took place, how many trials and victims there were, and why witch-hunting eventually came to an end. Explores the beliefs of both educated and illiterate people regarding witchcraft. Uses regional and local studies to give a more detailed analysis of the chronological and geographical distribution of witch-trials. Emphasises the legal context of witchcraft prosecutions. Illuminates the social, economic and political history of early modern Europe, and in particular the position of women within it. In this fully updated third edition of his exceptional study, Levack incorporates the vast amount of literature that has emerged since the last edition. He substantially extends his consideration of the decline of the witch-hunt and goes further in his exploration of witch-hunting after the trials, especially in contemporary Africa. New illustrations vividly depict beliefs about witchcraft in early modern Europe.

Author : Mark A. Waddell
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 231 pages
File Size : 14,88 MB
Release : 2021-01-28
Category : Technology & Engineering
ISBN : 1108591167

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From the recovery of ancient ritual magic at the height of the Renaissance to the ignominious demise of alchemy at the dawn of the Enlightenment, Mark A. Waddell explores the rich and complex ways that premodern people made sense of their world. He describes a time when witches flew through the dark of night to feast on the flesh of unbaptized infants, magicians conversed with angels or struck pacts with demons, and astrologers cast the horoscopes of royalty. Ground-breaking discoveries changed the way that people understood the universe while, in laboratories and coffee houses, philosophers discussed how to reconcile the scientific method with the veneration of God. This engaging, illustrated new study introduces readers to the vibrant history behind the emergence of the modern world.

Author : William Monter
Publisher : A&C Black
Page : 208 pages
File Size : 23,60 MB
Release : 2002-01-01
Category : History
ISBN : 0485891042

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The fifteenth to eighteenth centuries was a period of witchcraft prosecutions throughout Europe and modern scholars have now devoted a huge amount of research to these episodes. This volume will attempt to bring this work together by summarising the history of the trials in a new way - according to the types of legal systems involved. Other topics covered will be the continued practical use made of magic, the elaboration of demonological theories about witchcraft and magic, and the further development of scientific interests in natural magic through the 'Neoplatonic' and 'Hermetic' period.Amongst the topics included here are Superstition and Belief in high and popular culture, the place of Medicine, Witchcraft survivals in art and literature, and the survival of Persecution.>

Author : John Ashton
Publisher : e-artnow
Page : 4005 pages
File Size : 24,5 MB
Release : 2019-12-18
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN :

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Witchcraft in Europe was believed to be a combination of sorcery and heresy. While sorcery attempts to produce negative supernatural effects through formulas and rituals, heresy is the Christian contribution to witchcraft in which an individual makes a pact with the Devil. In addition, heresy denies witches the recognition of important Christian values such as baptism, salvation, Christ and sacraments. In Early Modern European tradition, witches were stereotypically, though not exclusively, women. European pagan belief in witchcraft was associated with the goddess Diana and dismissed as "diabolical fantasies" by medieval Christian authors. Witch-hunts first appeared in large numbers during the 14th and 15th centuries. It was commonly believed that individuals with power and prestige were involved in acts of witchcraft and even cannibalism. Table of Contents: The Superstitions of Witchcraft by Howard Williams The Devil in Britain and America by John Ashton Lives of the Necromancers by William Godwin Witch, Warlock, and Magician by W. H. Davenport Adams The Witch Mania by Charles Mackay Magic and Witchcraft by George Moir Witchcraft & Second Sight in the Highlands & Islands of Scotland by John G. Campbell Witchcraft and Superstitious Record in the South-Western District of Scotland by John Maxwell Wood Practitioners of Magic & Witchcraft and Clairvoyance by Bram Stoker Witch Stories by E. Lynn Linton Mary Schweidler, the Amber Witch by Wilhelm Meinhold Sidonia, the Sorceress by Wilhelm Meinhold Glimpses of the Supernatural – Witchcraft and Necromancy by Frederick George Lee Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft by Sir Walter Scott La Sorcière: The Witch of the Middle Ages by Jules Michelet Modern Magic by M. Schele de Vere

Author : Bengt Ankarloo
Publisher : University of Pennsylvania Press
Page : 214 pages
File Size : 33,16 MB
Release : 2002-12-23
Category : History
ISBN : 9780812217872

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A compact survey of the European witch craze of the early modern period—a craze that later spilled over to America.