Witchcraft Persecutions in Bavaria: Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of State in Early Modern Europe

ISBN-13: 9780521482585 / Angielski / Twarda / 1997 / 504 str.

Wolfgang Behringer

Opis

This is a major, groundbreaking study by a leading scholar of continental witchcraft studies, now made available to an English-speaking audience for the first time. The author has compiled a thorough overview of all known prosecutions for witchcraft in the period 1300-1800, and shows conclusively that witch hunting was not a constant or uniform phenomenon: three-quarters of all known executions for witchcraft were concentrated in the years 1586-1630. The book also investigates the social and political implications of witchcraft, and the complex religious debates between believers and skeptics.

Recenzje

'… a tour de force of historical research and writing …'. Journal for the Academic Study of Magic

Spis treści

Foreword; 1. Introduction; 2. Moving toward a social history of witchcraft; 3. The wave of persecutions around 1590; 4. The struggle for restraint, 1600–30; 5. Perpetuation through domestication, 1630–1775; 6. The final Catholic debate; 7. Conclusions; 8. Sources and literature.