Malleus Maleficarum Latin for “The Hammer of Witches” – Hexenhammer in German. A witch-hunt manual in 1486 was written by Heinrich Kramer. He was one of the (inquisitor of the Catholic Church) along with Jacob Sprenger. Sprenger is also often attributed as an author basically saying that witchcraft did exist. It was submitted to the University on May 9, 1487 for endorsement. In 1490 this book was banned by Pope Paul IV.…
For hundreds of years, the word “witch” has been associated with innumerable negative images. Witches were considered devil worshipers who committed scores of evil deeds toward society. By the 14th Century, a law was passed outlawing any practice of witchcraft or sorcery; anyone in Europe accused of witchcraft was subject to the torture and execution. In the 1450’s there was a breakout of violent persecutions against people accused of being witches. “During this time more than 100,000 people (mostly woman) were killed for allegedly practicing witchcraft” (Kallen 33) . Witches were viewed by the public as dangerous and uncontrollable menaces to society. They were believed to have relationships with the devil, this relationship was developed because of the church demonizing the witches in the 1450’s. During this time, people lacked medical knowledge about sickness and disease. When the witches were healthy during many of these wide spread diseases, the people believed they were the ones that cursed everyone with it. The people believed that witches could curse people that they did not like. In the city, It was common for old beggars to be on the side of the street asking for change but when people refused to give the beggars coins, they would angrily curse at the passersby. If the people that the…
During on a time when the Church was in control of everything with Europe and where people are a superstitious cowardly lot, the idea of magic and witchcraft was something the Church have condemned as the influential work of the devil. During the 15th century, accusation of witchcraft started to rise and some within or related to the Church were jumping on the chance to prosecute any accused witches. One of these early prosecutors was Heinrich Kramer, an inquisitor who as expelled due to his senile actions. He would later be joined by German bishop Jacob Sprenger to prosecute those in question of dealing in witchcraft. And in 1487, Kramer wrote a treatise called the Malleus Maleficarum which was about his belief in witchcraft and how to refute any claims against its existence. While many sections of the Bible and other written work are featured, many of these sections are missing key parts or were manipulated to generate more evidence in favor of the…
(Many of the people who were persecuted as witches from the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries were those of a seemingly inferior mindset, those who are blamed for problems in the community and those who were social outcasts.) This time period occurred throughout the Protestant, Catholic and Scientific revolutions. The victims of the witch trials were usually persecuted in Europe as a whole however focused on areas like South Western Europe.…
During this period religious reformation was at large in Europe. Protestant and Catholics reforms were on the rise. Moreover, the Scientific Revolution spawned in the midst of it all. With all this occurring, a demonic figure was created named witch for all those against or just not with God. Specific factors determined who would be persecuted for witchcraft. Those who forsake their religion or God, were females of certain age, and belonged to a poor social class, were sought out to be persecuted for witchcraft.…
First of all, while magic could be used for either benevolent or malevolent purposes, general public were very afraid of harmful low magic and this fear was one of the factors leading to the popularity of witchcraft. This fear was a result of a linking of two distinct understandings of witchcraft – “maleficium” and “diabolism”. Maleficium refers to harmful magic, which is part of God’s natural creation, while diabolism, as a real crime of witchcraft, means gaining powers through a pact with the Devil. The linking of diabolism to maleficium defined the identity of a witch – a harmful sorcerer and devil worshippers – and led the legal authority to conduct investigations and prosecutions to those accused of witchcraft (Morton, xxiv-xxvi). Considering the fact that Brunswick was part of the Holy Roman Empire at this time, and Christianity played an important role in everyone’s lives, the notion of the witch as an agent of the Devil caused the fear from the general public as well as the proliferation of witch trials.…
Indeed, child-witches were almost universally characterized as puerile evil, unmoored from any anchorage to proper behavior. This unruly disposition, emblematic of a typical child-witch, was evidenced in a plethora of allegedly demonic behaviors. First, child-witches were caught sullying their parents bed with occult powder that prevented them from having children. Second, ritualized blood-drawing was de rigueur among child-witches as it was among one of the prerequisites needed to join the Devil’s clan. Third, licentious and lewd behavior was indicative of child-witches as they became notorious for premature sexual activity. For instance, a case arose once of a ten year old boy who sexually violated his sixteen month old sister; oddly enough, one’s introduction into this fraternity of child-witches, Roper claims, is often described as a “seduction”. In conjunction with the aforementioned louche identifiers of a child-witch, are the no less debauched “anal themes”, as Roper calls it, that characterized the typical child-witch. According to Roper, child-witches were known to unload a potpourri of filth that plagued whoever came within range of the grime, which was often an ill-made concoction of excrement and dirt. For these reasons, Protestants and Catholics…
This investigation will focus on the question “To what extent did gender roles have an effect on the Salem witch trials?” and will analyze to what extent gender roles affected the Salem witch trials. The first key source is “Salem Witchcraft Trials: The Perception of Women in History, Literature and Culture” by Ana Kocić, which is useful to this investigation because Kocić’s main focus is on female roles and she does great research to back up her statements. The second key source is “The Diary of Samuel Sewall, 1674-1729” which is particularly useful to this investigation as it was written by somebody who was not only present during the trials, but took part in them.…
Demonized glares, cackling laughs, pointy hats, curling claw-like fingernails, warts perched on their noses, pale sickly skin that contrasts to their black or deep purple clothing: this is the typical description of what most witches are perceived as today. Witchcraft officially began in England in the mid 1400’s. Christianity was the dominant religion at this time in England. To be a witch, one had to sign a pact with the devil, often to worship him, which was heresy and meant damnation. As society became more literate, increasing numbers of books and tracts fueled the witch fears. The Malleus Maleficarum, written by Kramer and Sprenger, was one of the most influential books used by secular witch-hunting courts. Thousands of people (primarily women) were judicially murdered as a result of the procedures described in this book, for no reason than a strange birthmark, cultivation of medicinal herbs, or simply because they were falsely accused (often for financial gain by the accuser). The Malleus Maleficarum serves as a horrible warning about what happens when intolerance takes over a society. During the Reformation, from 1500 to 1660, Europe saw between 50,000 and 80,000 suspected witches executed, 80% of those killed were women. One of these women was Isobel Gowdie, who admitted to transmuting herself into a hare and confessed involvement with the Devil for 15 years. In the 1640’s, witch-hunting, after a major outbreak in France, began to decrease. England executed its last witch in 1682 and the world was changing along with new ideals brought about by the Enlightenment. It wasn’t until the 19th century that people began to see witches as healers. In Year of Wonders, the outbreak of deaths is blamed on a widow, Mem Gowdie, and her niece, Anys Gowdie, who are the village's herbalists and midwives. To test Mem Gowdie for being a witch, they throw her into a flooded mine shaft. Once she drowns, they immediately…
As the Nurse at the beginning of the story tells, Medea gave up everything she had to be with Jason. She left her family, and even killed her own brother to be able to run away with him. Medea, who has been dishonestly betrayed by her husband, uses revenge to punish him for his deeds and to seek the rewards which it offers to ones pride. The reader begins to feel pity for the main character and even excuse her actions. That is a result of identification with Medea, as a cheated spouse. In any kind of relationship during life, people expect fidelity, so they clearly understand why she wanted revenge.…
In this paper, I will explore many aspects of the outbreaks of the witch accusations and witch trials which plagued England and the rest of Europe from approximately 1450 to 1750. Though numerous theories have been provided as to the reasons for these hunts and trials, there are three which are the most prevalent, and able to support themselves. These three theories are the topics of: gender, as a stepping stone towards the oppression of women; social class, as a relief of tension and stress formed by the socio-economic gaps between the wealthy and the poor; and finally religion, as a result of the encouragement to conform more steadily towards one religion. I chose to argue towards the third theory I have stated, that of the religious changes facing England at the time. Throughout the three hundred years that the perceived problems of witchcraft haunted this nation, the religious momentum swayed back and forth many times. My decision to support the religious theories attached to witchcraft may not be as traditional as most student's. It was a decision based more upon the motives and not so hidden agendas that the theorists who were (obviously) not present at the times of the trials. Historical fact has been in debate for as long as history has been recorded, because everything written or spoken is rhetoric, and this impossible to escape from. Therefore, in order to defend my decision to choose religion, I will be adopting a new historicist point of view for the first few paragraphs of this paper.…
Accompanying and following the Renaissance “rebirth” during the fourteenth through sixteenth centuries and supplementing the Protestant and Catholic Reformations, the persecution of individuals as witches in Europe reached its zenith during the sixteenth century. Countless people, women and men alike, were accused of witchcraft, although this scale was tipped significantly toward poor, old women whose husbands’ had low wage work. The notion of witchcraft appealed to and was possible at the time to the general public because such occurrences as “mysterious disappearances” or “Satanic luck” necessitated explanations. These events were thus attributed to “servants of the Devil,” or witches, who were supposedly possessed to bend to Satan’s will as stated my Luther. Luther’s bias was towards the bible because he was a religious leader; therefor he believed what it said, which was that witches existed. Many accused witches were tortured until they either admitted, like Walpurga Hausmannin, or were killed from torture. Hausmannin’s bias was towards women because she was one, and she was very skeptical towards all the women being killed. No one was safe, as even mayors councilors and associate judges were persecuted. The witch-hunting excitement of the period resulted from religious, individual, societal, and sociological fears and interests prevalent during the time frame.…
Ideas from the Malleus Maleficarum shaped the gender bias of the witch hunts. This book was written in 1487…
In this essay I will be exploring the actual significance of the gender imbalance in accusations during the witch craze of the 17th century. To do this I must first locate these incidents within the social context of the time and discover attitudes towards the 17th century European woman in general. I shall then look at what kinds of people were most likely to be accused of witchcraft, including the plight of men, and whether or not gender emerges as the overriding factor. I shall conclude by taking an overview of theorised psychologies behind the witch-hunts and come to a decision about whether or not this harrowing time was driven by genuine fear for the soul or simply a misogynistic grasp on power.…
The key elements of plot in Medea: the philandering husband, the woman scorned, revenge, attempts at bribery, and the death of the children, can all be related to events that have occurred throughout history and continue to occur in the present day. Though Medea was written in 431 BC, Euripides depicts natural responses of people to the situation in which the characters operate. These responses are universal in that the reader can parallel various thoughts and actions with modern versions of the same thing. For instance, Medea exclaims, “If only I were dead!” in response to her husband leaving her (20). This exclamation is like the reaction that any modern female may have in response to a sudden break-up with a significant other. Other examples of universality include Jason’s attempts at pacifying his former wife - a common theme in male-female relationships today and the mother murdering the children as a parallel to tragedies such as the Andrea Yeats incident of the recent past.…