The following is a timeline of the Salem Witch Trials: Parliament passes the Witchcraft Act of 1542 which is England's first witchcraft law and makes the crime punishable by death. Most people also became skeptical about cases where witches were supposed to have used magic to kill people. Even in other cultures, witchcraft accusations have been more likely to be directed at women. The Salem Witch Trials. Envy lay behind much maleficia, and envy is not sex-linked: Although women were much more likely than men to use diabolical magic in order to harm other women's young children, men were equally inclined to resort to harmful magic (as well as non-magical techniques) in order to harm their neighbor's property. As long as there have been written records, there have been records of those who had abilities or magic that went beyond those of ordinary people. Eventually people with magical skills came to be known as witches. Witches purportedly practiced various socially harmful forms of magic, directed primarily against young children but also raising storms that damaged crops. "Male Witches and Gendered Categories in Seventeenth-Century Russia." . Most of the accusations took place in parts of what are now Germany, France, the Netherlands, and Switzerland, then the Holy Roman Empire. Men comprised half or even more of Europe's numerous "white" witches who specialized in countering the effects of harmful witchcraft (so-called "cunning folk," curadores, Hexenbanner, Benandanti, etc.) Many theories have been put forward but probably a number of different factors came together at the same time. (Although they might accidentally drown!). In Western Europe, witch trials reached a peak in the late 16th century and early 17th century then declined. The witch trials at Fulda in Germany in the years from 1603 to 1606, which led to the death of about 205 people, many of them burnt alive at the stake, was one of the biggest witch trials in Europe and one of the biggest mass-executions in peace time. While Jane Wenhamw was sentenced to hang in 1712, she was pardoned by Queen Anne. The witch hunts resulted in a wide variety of executions, ranging from "hanging, burning at the stake, boiling in oil or water," and being "stoned to death." Jan 1, 800. Let's look at some significant dates throughout the Salem Witch Trials and consider some explanations for the largest witch-hunt in American history. Killing livestockthe second most frequent accusation in European witch trials after killing babieswas practiced by both women and men. Therefore, be sure to refer to those guidelines when editing your bibliography or works cited list. The European witch hunts have a long timeline, gaining momentum during the 16th century and continuing for more than 200 years. The Salem Witch Trials Memorial was dedicated on August 5, 1992, by Elie Wiesel. Parliament passes a new Witchcraft Act of 1562. Some people were given lesser punishments such as banishment or imprisonment. Throughout the 16th and 17th century, witch trials and the persecution and punishment of suspected witches were common in Europe. Journal of Women's History 7: 77-101. One of the periods of frequent witchcraft trials in England. Wrzburg (1629), The Devils at Loudun (Urban Grandier) Holmes, Clive. She worked openly as a 'white witch' or 'cunning woman' in Salisbury, England. Witch prosecutions reached their climax during the Italian Wars (1494-1530). This opened the possibility of the Inquisition, concerned with heresy, being involved with witchcraft investigations. In May 1558, Agnes Fergusson was put in the 'pit' for being a witch. According to Mark Podvia (see Timeline, PDF), the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony adopted the following statute in 1641: "If any man or woman be a WITCH, that is, hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit, they shall be put to death. Witchcraft has survived so long despite barbaric persecution because it is not concerned with global domination and wealth but instead the ability to look within and be happy and grateful for what we currently have. Many people believed in swimming witches. Here we share the details of this dark period of history. The hunts were most severe from 1580 to 1630, and the last known execution for witchcraft was in Switzerland in 1782. Britain, Trial of Marie Cornu (1611) in the Spanish Netherlands, Witch-Finder General Matthew Hopkins (1644-1646), Trial of Suzanne Gaudry (1652) in the Spanish Netherlands, Fall of Constantinople to Ottoman Turks (1453). New York: Viking. Here are 6 of the most important witchcraft cases of the second half of the 17th century. "Witch City"becomes a major . The three women were thrown in jail to await trial for practicing witchcraft. mid 1600s Ninety-three people are accused of witchcraft fifty in Massachusetts and forty-three in Connecticut. However, the date of retrieval is often important. In England, the last execution for witchcraft was in 1684. The kingdom of France (excluding Alsace and Lorraine) executed even fewer witches per thousand inhabitants than England or Scandinavia. This was a time when England justices were replaced in Scotland, a historic event which can be interpreted as temporary vacuum of authority in the judiciary (10). Hundreds of people were executed for witchcraft in England. During this period, the biggest witch trials were held in Europe, notably the Trier witch trials (1581-1593), the Fulda witch trials (1603-1606), the Basque witch trials (1609-1611), the Wrzburg . Popular culture continued to see witches primarily as people performing certain kinds of harmful actions called maleficia. In November 1590, after being tortured, the initial testimony she gave initiated the North Berwick witch trials Series of Scottish witch trials held between 1590 and 1593 .She went on to name several others involved in magical practices, including some of the . They claimed to be the victims of Father Urbain Grandier, who was convicted of sorcery despite refusing to confess, even under torture. French Historical Studies 20(4): 563-595. In England, witches were hanged not burned. ." In Scotland, the last execution for witchcraft was in 1727. Many historians consider this period, especially the years 16101630, as the one with the largest number of witchcraft cases. Many people believed witches existed but did not believe the more ludicrous stories about them. by Richard Golden. Many are familiar with the witch hysteria of the 17th century because of the witch trials that took place in Salem, Massachusetts. Altogether, it's believed that 140 witch trials were held across Finnmark in the 17th century. From the late 15th century to the late 18th century a wave of persecution washed across parts of Europe. Furthermore, the frequency of witch trials varied over time. The 1692 Salem Witch Trials. 1580-1660 The war against witches reaches a peak in Europe. "Errores Gazaziorum," a papal bull, or decree, identified witchcraft and heresy with the Cathars. Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window), Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window), Histories of British towns, villages and cities, Histories of countries and key towns and cities around the world, Brief histories of famous people across the world and ages, Articles of the key dark historical events across the world. As the example of Portugal suggests, the great Mediterranean inquisitions in Spain and Italy also proved reluctant to execute witches. This was one of several assassination plots around that time against the pope or a king. In a few other placesfor example, seventeenth-century Muscovy and Normandy in northwestern Francemen comprised a clear majority of accused witches; in Finland and Estonia, along Muscovy's western borders, and in northern France around Normandy, men represented approximately half of accused witches. By the time the hunts and trials finally ended in Europe, it's estimated that somewhere between 40,000 and 50,000 people had been . The women's movement looks at the witchcraft persecutions through a feminist lens. On the basis of such admittedly imperfect statistics, a reasonable estimate might be approximately forty thousand people executed for witchcraft within both Protestant and Catholic regions of Latin Christendom. The term "witch" has been traced to Old Teutonic (Germanic) words like wik (meaning to bend) or Old English words such as wiccian (to cast spells) and witan (wise person). According to some authorities when a witch made a pact with the Devil he touched them and left a mark (which was not necessarily visible) on their body. (Both the English and Scottish parliaments passed laws against witchcraft in 1563). Elie Wiesel, a Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor, spoke: "If I can't stop all of the hate all over the world in all of the people, I can stop it in one place within me.". A witness testifies against an accused witch during one of the many witchcraft trials of the 1690s. Medieval Timeline: European Witches. Within the Cite this article tool, pick a style to see how all available information looks when formatted according to that style. However torture was not used in England and after 1594 it was not used in Holland, (which is probably one reason why there were fewer executions for witchcraft there). During this time 80,000 people were accused of witchcraft and, of them, 40,000 were killed as punishment. An estimated three million witch trials took place between 1450 to 1750. Regino's treatise reinforces the Church's existing stance on witchcraft, which is that it doesn't exist. Between the years 1500 and 1660, up to 80,000 suspected witches were put to death in Europe. The majority were female but a significant minority were men. A handbook for English judges on pursuing witches was published. Most were women - many of them old, vulnerable and poor. You can find out more about our use, change your default settings, and withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future by visiting Cookies Settings, which can also be found in the footer of the site. Extra Visualisations Types of Torture at Different Residence Locations The Story of Isobel Young Ordeal Bubble Chart Social Bubble Chart. Others considered witchcraft to be a social construct that revealed how different societies create and shape gender and class expectations. Some people confessed without torture but that does not mean they were guilty. About 80% of those killed were women. Majority of the witch hunts took place in Germany (witch trials in Germany had the highest execution rate), Belgium, Netherlands, France, Italy, Switzerland, and England. ." During the period of most intense witch-hunts between 1570 and 1660, women usually comprised between 71 and 92 percent of those tried and executed, including about 80 percent in present-day Germany, where more than half of all deaths occurred. GENERAL HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE * FRANCE * BRITAIN England * and Scotland * (2021, February 16). In Encyclopedia of Witchcraft: The Western Tradition, 4 vols., ed. In the 16th century, the witch mania spread to England and Scotland. Witch trials in Europe continued for many centuries. A Swiss woman named Anna Goeldi was beheaded. The Basque Witch Trials began in the fifteenth century, potentially fueling the Spanish Inquisition, when the Basques were accused of witchcraft and causing harm in Northern Spain. For further explanations, click In France, a bishop was executed for using witchcraft in an attempt to kill Pope John XXII. The charges included the murder of 10 by witchcraft. People Associated with the Witch Trials: Residence A Witch-Prickers Journey. Good and evil coexisted. The initial accusers were Betty Parris (age 9) and . Statistically, men were more likely to be burned as witches in early modern Europe than executed for heresy (an overwhelmingly male crime) during the Protestant Reformation. Individuals that allowed their bodies and souls to be lured into this dark side were called witches. Besides illustrating that European colonists executed people for witchcraft in North America almost three centuries before the Salem outbreak, the episode also suggests that the peculiarly western phenomenon of witch trials was sex-linked but never sex-specific. Finally, some scholars take an anthropological look at witchcraft accusations,beliefs, and executions. "The Crucible" Character Study: Reverend John Hale, Biography of Martha Corey, Last Woman Hung in the Salem Witch Trials, Tituba and The Salem Witch Trials of 1692. Degrees and Programs . The English Witchcraft Act was repealed, formally ending witch hunts and trials. The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England. The European witch trials were also known as the Great Witch Hunt, and began with a series of priest-led purges. Mater Gratian's compiled canon law, including writings from Hrabanus Maurus and excerpts from Augustine. (1628) Fear of witchcraft still lingered throughout the country. The burning of a witch in Vienna, Austria in 1538 by Ullstein Bild (from Little, 2018). (Both the English and Scottish parliaments passed laws against witchcraft in 1563). Prior To The Trials. While the legal prosecution of witchcraft came to an end in the eighteenth century, the pattern of behavior that caused witch-hunts can be identified throughout history and in the. The European witch hunts have a long timeline, gaining momentum during the 16th century and continuing for more than 200 years. Eventually, however, educated people gradually stopped believing in witches and magic. . In Western Europe, the first witch hunts (in which large numbers of people were tried and convicted of witchcraft) were held in France and Germany in the 15th century. Witch trials in the early modern period saw that between 1400 to 1782, around 40,000 to 60,000 were killed due to suspicion that they were practicing witchcraft, with some other sources estimating that a total of 100,000 deaths occurred at its maximum for a similar period. This surge in witch trials coincided with some of the most bitter phases of the, Cohen, J. Witches supposedly congregated at so-called "Sabbaths" where they worshipped the Devil, feasted on bland foods, engaged in diabolical sexuality, and occasionally ate children. The Canon Episcopi is written by a young abbot named Regino of Treves. The most notorious is the Malleus Maleficarum (Hammer of Witches), which was first published in 1486 and was written by two Dominicans, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger. Obviously, if you were tortured you would probably confess to anything to stop the torture. In the mid-twentieth century, the subject of "cleanliness" was a footnote to the triumphant history of the British, European, and Amer, The religion of Zoroastrianism arose from the preaching of a devotional poet named Zarathushtra (one who leads old camels), who lived around 1750 to, Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft zur Frderung der Parapsychologie, Witchcraft International Craft Association (WICA), Witchcraft Trials in Salem Village (16921693), Sex, Race and Power: An Intersectional Study, https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe. In the 16th century, the witch mania spread to England and Scotland. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press. As Jared Diamond notes in his bestselling Collapse (2005), the last preserved European report about the doomed Norse colony in Greenland indicates that a man named Kolgrim was burned at the stake in 1407 for using witchcraft to seduce the married daughter of a local notable; the woman soon went insane and died. By 1563, witchcraft had been made a capital offence in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Comparative Studies in Society and History, 45(3): 606-631. Witchcraft Understood Through the Eyes of Religion. Between the 16th and 18th centuries, tens of thousands of people were executed for witchcraft in Europe. The Pendle witch trials in Lancashire, England, accused 12 witches. Here are 5 of the most infamous cases of witch trials in Britain. "A Timeline of Witch Hunts in Europe." Encyclopedias almanacs transcripts and maps, Encyclopedia of Sex and Gender: Culture Society History. Act of James I expanded punishable offenses related to witchcraft. Pope Alexander IV accepted that sorcery and communication with demons amounted to a kind of heresy. Some of the earliest histories of the European witch hunts used the trials to characterize the present as "more enlightened" than the past. In the early twenty-first century there is considerable scholarly consensus that witches invariably were considered to possess magical powers that they used for nefarious purposes, but before the late fifteenth century they were not identified predominantly as women. The Witch trials in England were conducted from the 15th century until the 18th century. To be condemned, a person had to have at least three neighbors publicly state that they were a witch. Between 1560 and 1630, there was a surge in the number of accusations of witchcraft and witch trials called the Great Hunt . A famous example from the North American colonies is the Salem Witch Trials. Because each style has its own formatting nuances that evolve over time and not all information is available for every reference entry or article, Encyclopedia.com cannot guarantee each citation it generates. Encyclopedia of Sex and Gender: Culture Society History. Encyclopedia.com. Germany's Protestant rulers conducted most of the early witch-hunts, but Germany's Catholic prince-bishops committed the worst witch-hunting excesses. Roper, Lyndal. In many parts of Europe people accused of witchcraft were tortured until they confessed. Although the fully developed crime of witchcraft, including Sabbaths, emerged in fifteenth-century Europe, the vast majority of Europe's witch trials occurred long after the Protestant Reformation. ." Lewis, Jone Johnson. The number of trials and executions varied widely according to time and place, but in fact no more than about 110,000 persons in all were tried for witchcraft, and no more than 40,000 to 60,000 executed. "Women and Witchcraft." About 3,500 witches were executed throughout northern Europe, including a few hundred in England (the separate kingdom of Scotland also saw many executions of witches). They were arrested for witchcraft according to the widely believed notion that "whoever knows how to heal also knows how to harm.". Lewis, Jone Johnson. They are estimated to have resulted in the death of between 500 and 1000 people, 90 percent of whom were women. masculine domains Scottish Witch Trials Between 1560 and 1590 Between 1560 and 1590, there was a slow trickle of witchcraft cases. Photo via Wikimedia. ThoughtCo, Feb. 16, 2021, thoughtco.com/european-witch-hunts-timeline-3530786. The witch trials in both Spain and Salem took place in the 17th century, albeit on opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean. We've updated our Privacy Policy, which will go in to effect on September 1, 2022. John Dee, Trial of Anna About References Resources Contact. They were priests and priestesses who were very important in magical rituals. However, extremely few witches were condemned to death in regions populated by Orthodox Christians, and none in Balkan regions controlled by the Ottoman Empire. They also believed that witches could make humans or animals ill or even kill them by magic. Past and Present 140: 45-78. Professor Pavlac's Timeline of the Witch Hunts to 1800 This timeline includes a selection of events, people, books and more directly and indirectly related to the Witch Hunts. People also became skeptical about so-called spectral evidence. The biggest witch hunt in Scotland's history spread like wildfire. If a witch was thrown into water the water would reject them and they would float. Cite this article Pick a style below, and copy the text for your bibliography. September 22- Martha Corey, Margaret Scott, Mary Easty (sister of Rebecca Nurse and Sarah Cloyce), Alice Parker, Ann Pudeator, Wilmott Redd, Samuel Wardwell, and Mary Parker are hanged. Alongside Hecate, there were the Oracles of Delphi. Kivelson, Valerie. Sometimes, they were linked with a female witch. The day of fasting takes place the following day. Encyclopedia.com. Witchcraft accusations were easy ways to remove the obstacle. However, witch trials are not a thing of the past. masculinity and imperialism Hungary escaped witch trials and executions until the early 18th century. Some (but not all) people who believed in witches believed that they held nocturnal meetings called sabbats. Therefore, that information is unavailable for most Encyclopedia.com content. . Many historians point to this period as one in which witchcraft trials, and Protestantism, were rising. Hecate (or Hekate), the goddess of witchcraft, magic, the night, moon, ghosts and necromancy was one of the most common goddesses worshipped by witches and the general public in regards to witchcraft and magical usage. Greenland's Kolgrim was no isolated incident: men were well-represented in Europe's earliest known witch hunts, forming 28 percent of the 250-plus witches tried in the Alpine valleys of Dauphin between 1424 and 1448. bibliography Many people believed that there were fifth columnists who were out to cause harm. It started in the small areas near Edinburgh, where over 200 people were accused of witchcraft in just nine months. The height of the European witch trials was between 1560 and 1630, with the large hunts first beginning in 1609. european witch trials timeline european witch trials timelinefamily health center kalamazoo covid vaccine. 706 Words3 Pages. Some supposed victims of witchcraft claimed they were being tormented by the specters of the people who bewitched them. Groundwork on the concept of witchcraft (a person's collaboration with the devil through the use of magic) was developed . Over the 160 years from 1500 to 1660, Europe saw between 50,000 and 80,000 suspected witches executed. . Particularly in Germany, Protestant and Catholic scholars have waged a long and inconclusive struggle over which religious group prosecuted witches more ferociously.
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