One of the most intriguing, and disturbing, aspects of history is that most people in early modern Europe believed in the reality and dangers of witchcraft. Most historians have described the witchcraft phenomenon as one of tremendous violence. In France, dozens of books, pamphets and tracts, depicting witchcraft as the most horrible of crimes, were published and widely distributed.

Yet, in his new book, "The Crime of Crimes: Demonology and Politics in France, 1560-1620," Jonathan Pearl shows that France carried out relatively few executions for witchcraft. Through careful research he...