Warming up
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Write down everything you know or think you
know about witches.
Essential Questions
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What is a “witch”
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When did witches emerge as monsters?
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What makes them monsters?
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How have perceptions of witches changed
over time?
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How were our notions of witches formed?
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So what? Why should we care about witches
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http://www.history.com/videos/history-of-witches#history-of-witches
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Instructions
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Read pages 6-9 from the history of witches:
“Witches and Powers of Satan”
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Using the highlighting tool, Critically read
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How did views of Satan change?
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Determine what the various powers attributed to
Satan and witches were.
Review
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With the person next to you, take one minute
to think of and review everything we have
learned so far in our monsters of the Middle
ages unit – especially about Satan / witches.
A Quick Timeline
• (560 BC) Exodus/Leviticus: Kill witches, witches = bad
• (420) St. Augustine: magic was for pagans, However, demons and satan were real threats. Satan was powerless over devout/pious christians.
• (1208) Peoples view of Satan shifts from that as trickster to the source of all evil (he becomes a threat)
• 1273 Thomas Aquinas: Argues demons exist, and that they spread quite often
through intercourse.
• 1400’s witchtrials begin to errupt all over Europe
• 1484 Malleus Maleficarum (Hammer of Witches) defined witchcraft
• Early 1500’s: Reformation sends kill rates up. (1500-1640) somewere between
50,000-80,000 suspected witches were killed.
• Enlightenment late 1680’s-onward: Was the begining of the end for witch
Pope Innocent VIII and
Malleus Maleficarum
• 1484
Pope Innocent announced that satanists in Germany were meeting with demons, casting spells that destroyed crops, and aborting infants. The pope asked two friars, Heinrich Kramer (a papal inquisitor of sorcerers from Innsbruck) and Jacob
The Church’s Take
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During the late Middle Ages, the church took up the position
that witches were in fact real. This began with the shift in
perceptions of Satan, and with the testimony of Thomas
Aquinas.
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Witches were essentially vessels or puppets that demons
worked through to do Satan’s dirty work.
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One of the primary beliefs was that demonic possession was
spread through sexual interactions.
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Another common belief was that witches knowingly engaged
Church’s take cont.…
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Witches were believed to cause / spread
disease, cause crop failure, be a source of
impotence, and be guilty of idolatry (worship
of Satan)
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One common belief was that witches would
Fears
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One of the primary fears associated with witches was their power
over the male reproductive organ. Many accounts in the (Malleus
Maleficarum) involve the disapearance or percieved disapearance
of the male reproductive organ.
• How should we react to this:
– We can speculate that in some instances, witchcraft was to blame for male impotence. (convenient for the man, not so much for his partner)
– In some ways we could also percieve this as an attack or condemnation of the entire female gender. The fact that 80% of those accused and put to death were women is troubling.
– Why were women seen to be the primary vessel for Satan to do his dirty work?
Fear 2
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The other primary goal of every witch was to interupt the
holy act of procreation.
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Witches stole babies, caused miscarriages, and often
midwives.
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Why do you think so many midwives were accused of
being witches ? What purpose could that serve?
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We might assume that the midwife made for a handy
Important thought…
The church acknowledged there were demons throughout the world, and that it was the churches job to seek out and destroy these demons.
-Problem: You can’t see demons
However: if you identify a witch or a person possessed, you can physically see/ fight them.
Conclusion: The belief and attack on witches, gave the Church something real to point at, and served as a way of reinforcing their power. Not only were
