The "witch hunt" - the church-inspired witch trials that shook Europe and its colonies in the 15th-18th centuries, are undoubtedly one of the most shameful pages in the history of Western European civilization. More than one hundred and fifty thousand innocent people were executed on completely absurd accusations not supported by any facts, millions of their relatives and close friends were ruined and doomed to a miserable existence. The Catholic "witch hunt" was described in the article The Holy Inquisition.
Recall that it all began in 1484, when the Pope recognized the reality of witchcraft, which was previously officially considered a deception that the devil sows. Already in 1486, Heinrich Institoris and Jacob Sprenger published the book "The Hammer of the Witches": it was this book that became the desktop for religious fanatics of all European countries, who respectfully wrote tens of thousands of pages of additions and commentaries to it. It may seem strange, but the persecution of "witches" and "witch trials" were not at all uncommon in the Protestant world, where, it would seem, the instructions of the popes were not supposed to be a guide to action. However, humans, with all their merits and demerits, were the same on both sides of the Great Schism. The texts of the Holy Scriptures were the same (like "Do not leave the sorcerers alive" - Exodus 22:18). And Martin Luther, who so successfully “grabbed the Pope by the tiara, and the monks by the belly,” who categorically called Christian relics and holy relics “damn toys,” had no doubt about the reality of witches, considering them “evil damn whores,” and argued, that he himself would have willingly burned them.
Lucas Cranach the Elder, portrait of Martin Luther
True, Martin Luther also very cleverly declared the Pope himself an accomplice of Satan. The whole point was in the formula for excommunication from the church, which arose in the XII century:
“I appeal to you Satan, with all the messengers, may they not accept rest until they bring this sinner to eternal shame, until the water or the rope destroy him … I command you, Satan, with all the messengers, so that, as I extinguish these lamps, so you extinguished the light of his eyes."
This "injunction to Satan" allowed Luther to declare the Pope the Antichrist and the devil's ally. And, from the point of view of the great reformer of the Church, burning the Pope would be no less useful than some old witch from Wittenberg or Cologne. Perhaps even much more useful - if you burn John XII, who drank to the health of Satan and turned into a brothel the Lateran Basilica or Boniface VIII, who argued that sexual intercourse with boys is no more sinful than rubbing palms. Moreover, real witches who know a lot about medicinal herbs (witch-herbalists, and not those from the "Battle of Psychics") were very rare even then. A small example: digitalis preparations (on their basis digoxin and strophanthin were created) began to be used in official medicine after 1543, when this plant was introduced into the European pharmacopoeia by the German physician Fuchs, while in the folk - starting from the V century in Rome, and from IX - in "barbarian" Europe. And against the background of the then European doctors, who considered bloodletting as a universal therapeutic manipulation, some witches looked very progressive. Another thing is that, as in our days, there were a lot of all kinds of swindlers among them, which caused the legitimate indignation of consumers and customers (who came for a normal digitalis decoction, and they slip some nasty stuff from the dung of bats and frog bones).
It should be said that in relation to witches and witchcraft, Catholics and Protestants, nevertheless, had significant differences. Catholics tried to unify the approach to the investigation of witchcraft cases, to make it standard in all cities and countries controlled by them. The Protestants acted, as they say, in every way. And each margrave or bishop independently determined which of the neighboring residents was a witch, also independently choosing the methods of investigation and punishment. In the Lutheran lands of Saxony, Palatinate, Württemberg, for example, in 1567-1582. there were own laws against witches - no less bloody and cruel than the Catholic ones. And Frederick I of Prussia did not approve of the "witch hunt", and even punished one of the barons who burned a 15-year-old girl accused of witchcraft.
Frederick I of Prussia
The Germans in this regard generally turned out to be great entertainers: not only did they become the record holders for the number of tortures applied to the accused (in some lands - 56 types), they also came up with a number of innovative tools for them. For example, the "maiden of Nuremberg": an iron cabinet with sharp nails inside, a feature of which was the additional torment of an enclosed space. People prone to claustrophobia could not stand even a couple of minutes in this terrible box.
Maiden of nuremberg
And in the city of Neisse, they even built a special oven for burning witches, in which 22 women were burned only in 1651 (after all, the Heinrichs Himmlers do not come just like that - out of nowhere).
Modern historians estimate the total number of victims of witchcraft trials at 150-200 thousand people, at least hundreds of thousands of them died in Germany. For a whole century Germany (both Catholic and Protestant parts of it) writhed in the fire of Wedic processes. Areas ruled not by secular rulers, but by bishops, became especially famous in the fight against witchcraft. Moreover, the Catholic hierarchs of Germany did not turn to the Vatican inquisitors for help, and committed atrocities on their own in the territory under their control. Thus, the bishop of Würzburg, Philip-Adolph von Ehrenberg, burned 209 people, including 25 children. Among those executed by him were the most beautiful girl in the city and a student who knew too many foreign languages. Prince-Bishop Gottfried von Dornheim (cousin of Würzburg) executed 600 people in Bamberg in 10 years (1623-1633). Among those who were burned in this city in 1628 were even the burgomaster Johann Junius and the vice-chancellor Georg Haan. In Fulda, Judge Balthasar Voss burned 700 "witches and sorcerers", and only regretted that he could not bring this number to 1000. The world record for the simultaneous burning of "witches" was also set in Germany, and precisely by the Protestants: in the Saxon city of Quedlinburg in In 1589, 133 people were executed.
Statue of a witch in Herschlitz (North Saxony), memorial to the victims of the witch hunt between 1560-1640.
The horror that reigned in Bonn at the beginning of the 17th century is known from a letter sent by one of the priests to Count Werner von Salm:
“It seems that half the city is involved: professors, students, pastors, canons, vicars and monks have already been arrested and burned … The chancellor with his wife and the wife of his personal secretary have already been captured and executed. On Christmas Day of the Most Holy Theotokos, the pupil of the prince-bishop, a nineteen-year-old girl known for her piety and piety, was executed … Three-four-year-old children are declared lovers of the Devil. Students and boys of noble birth 9-14 years old are burned. In conclusion, I will say that things are in such a terrible state that no one knows with whom to talk and cooperate."
The apogee of the "witch hunt" in Germany came during the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) - the warring parties liked to accuse opponents of witchcraft. The Vedic processes began to decline after the army of the Swedish king Gustav II entered Germany, who in a sharp form demanded from both Catholics and Protestants to stop this near-church lawlessness. At that time they tried not to get involved with hot Swedish guys in military uniform, so the opinion of the "Lion of the North" was heard by many. In addition, for natural reasons, the most odious, frenzied and irreconcilable ideologues of Wedic processes were gradually dying, leaving behind them literally a desert. All the fires did not go out at once, and continued to light up in one or another German city, but, slowly and painfully, Germany nevertheless began to come to its senses.
In the Netherlands, the identification of "witches" was approached more rationally - by weighing: it was believed that a broomstick could lift a woman weighing no more than 50 kg into the air (the unfortunate woman thus had a chance to drop at least some of the charges). "Witch scales" in the Dutch city of Oudwater were considered the most accurate in Europe, local officials were distinguished by their honesty, the certificates of this weighing chamber were highly valued and brought the city considerable income.
Witch trial by weighing
Such a certificate did not help everyone, as evidenced by this engraving by the Dutch artist Jan Lucain depicting the execution of the "witch" Anna Hendrix - 1571, Amsterdam:
But the British in Aylesbury openly cheated when weighing the "witches": they used a cast-iron Bible as a counterweight - if the scales turned out to be unbalanced (in any direction), the suspect was declared a witch.
The black year in the history of the Netherlands was 1613, when, after an epidemic that ended in the death of hundreds of children, 63 "witches" were burned at once.
In Calvinist Geneva, the eradication of "witchcraft contrary to the Lord" was declared a task of national importance. Calvin said bluntly:
“The Bible teaches us that witches exist and that they must be exterminated. God directly commands that all witches and sorceresses be put to death, and the law of God is a universal law."
So that the death of a witch or a heretic was not too quick and easy, Calvin ordered them to be burned on damp wood.
Jean Calvin, portrait of an unknown artist of the 17th century
In all the cantons of Switzerland, in 1542 alone, about 500 "witches" were burned.
In Protestant Sweden (and Finland, vassal to it), located on the other end of Europe, torture of suspects in witchcraft was prohibited, and there was no particular fanaticism in the persecution of witches for a long time. The only woman burnt alive in this country (a common thing in Germany, Holland or Austria) was Malin Matsdotter, who did not plead guilty and did not even cry at the stake, which, by the way, frightened the "audience" very much. But in the middle of the 17th century, the paroxysm of common European madness suddenly shook this country too. The main event and apogee of the "witch hunt" there was the process of 1669. Then 86 women and 15 children were sentenced to death for witchcraft. Another 56 children at the same trial were sentenced to punishment with canes: 36 were chased through a soldier's line with rods, and then during the year they were beaten with a whip on the hands once a week. Twenty others beat their hands with rods on three consecutive Sundays. In the Swedish churches, then for a long time on this occasion, thanksgiving prayers were raised for the salvation of the country from the Devil. After that, the persecution of "witches" sharply declined. But it was not until 1779 that King Gustav III of Sweden removed witchcraft orders from the country's code of laws.
In Denmark and Norway, the situation was more complicated. Firstly, closeness and closer contacts with Germany, blazing in the fires of witchcraft trials, had their significance. Secondly, it was allowed to torture suspects in witchcraft. The king of Denmark and Norway, Christian IV, who is considered to be quite “positive” and progressive, was especially noted in the field of the fight against "witches". Suffice it to say that during his reign, 91 women were burned to death in the Norwegian city of Vardø with a population of about 2,000. Currently, in this city you can see a monument to the victims of the "witch hunters".
Christian IV, King of Denmark and Norway, under which over 90 women were burned to death in the Norwegian city of Vardø
Burning chair at the memorial to the burned witches in Vard, Norway
In Britain, King James I (aka the King of Scotland, James VI Stuart) was not too lazy to write a treatise on demonology (1597). This monarch considered the fight against demons and witches his own business, and even imagined that the Devil was persecuting him for his zeal in serving the Church. In 1603 he passed a law making witchcraft a criminal offense. It is interesting that the storm, in which the ship of this king (the groom of the Danish princess) once fell, was officially recognized as an act of hostile witches - in Denmark, "confessions" were obtained. The customer was recognized as a distant relative of the king - Francis Stewart, 5th Earl of Boswell. This "investigation" significantly strengthened Jacob's hatred of the "devil", which, according to some sources, could have resulted in a total of about 4,000 women in Scotland.
King James I
Monument to Alice Nutter, one of the women burned under James I in England
Jacob I was not alone in his zeal. At the end of the 17th century, theologian Richard Baxter (who was called "the greatest of the Puritans") in his book "Proof of the existence of the world of spirits" called for a crusade against the "sect of Satan." This work was published in 1691 - a year before the tragic events in American Salem.
Since burning was the standard punishment for high treason in Britain, witches and sorcerers in Britain were executed by hanging. And the most common torture was sleep deprivation.
The persecution of sorcerers and witches in Britain continued during the Republic period. These prejudices and superstitions were, unfortunately, transferred by the English colonists to the territory of the New World. In the US state of Massachusetts, 28 people were executed on charges of witchcraft. The first in Boston in 1688 was arrested, convicted and hanged on charges of witchcraft, the washerwoman Goody Glover. Her sad fate did not in any way affect the state of the children allegedly bewitched by her. Nevertheless, using the materials of this process, a certain Cotton Mather published a book about witches and witchcraft. But the most terrible and shameful witch trial in the United States took place in 1692-1693. in the small town of Salem, founded by the Puritans in 1626. About 200 people were arrested on completely absurd charges. Of these, 19 were hanged, 1 was stoned, four died in prison, seven were convicted, but received a suspended sentence, one woman, who was held in prison for a long time without trial, was eventually sold into slavery for debts, one girl went crazy … Two dogs were killed as henchmen of witches. In principle, nothing special and beyond the scope of Salem happened at that time: Old woman Europe could hardly be surprised or, even more so, frightened by such a rather "modest" Wedish process. In Germany or Austria, executions of witches happened both much more massive and no less brutal. And in good old England, lawyer Matthew Hopkins in just one year (1645-1646) achieved the execution of 68 "witches".
Matthew Hopkins. Discovery of Witches
However, the color of time had already changed irreversibly, and at the end of the 17th century, the American Puritans, who considered themselves quite decent, cultured and educated, looked in the mirror and were suddenly horrified when they saw an animal grin on their faces. And therefore today the descendants of witch hunters live in the city they renamed Danvers - this happened in 1752. But there is another Salem Town - the city where the "witches" trial took place.
House of witches in Salem, where the trials of 1692-1693 were held.
This city is not at all shy about its dubious fame: everywhere there are black crows and cats, fake spiders, bats, owls. In advertising brochures for tourists, Salem is called "the city where Halloween lasts all year round." It is proudly stated that out of 40 thousand people living in the city, a third are pagans, and about 2,5 thousand more consider themselves to be sorcerers and witches. For tourists there is a museum of "Salem witches" and "underground dungeon of Salem witches" (the building of a former church, the ground part of which was used as a courtroom, and the underground - as a prison). And many now, looking in the mirror of this Salem, and in fact, see in him not the faces of innocent victims distorted by pain, but funny masks for Halloween.
Salem Witch Museum
At the Salem Witch Museum
The rehabilitation of "witch hunters" by modern cinema greatly contributes to this: from the American film "Hocus Pocus" (about the merry adventures of witches burned in 1693 in a modern American city - with good vocal parts I put a spell on you and Come little children) to discredit the honor of the great writer of mediocre Russian handicrafts "about Gogol".
More than a transparent allusion to the Salem witches in the film "Hocus Pocus" - the action takes place in 1693.
These same witches in 1993 "entertain" the American audience in a nightclub: I put a spell on you, I said! Bette Middler, Katie Najimi and Sarah Jessica Parker as Anatoly Kashpirovsky
Thanks to the wide publicity and huge resonance, the Salem witchcraft process was of great importance, discrediting "witch hunters" not only in the United States, but throughout the world. After the shame of Salem, which was obvious to all more or less adequate people, to organize their own "witch hunt" has become somehow noncomilfo: not fashionable, not modern and not prestigious. Separate excesses still took place, but, as a rule, they were condemned and did not meet with universal approval in society. Therefore, we will consider the events in the American state of Massachusetts in more detail.
Researchers are still lost in conjectures why the inhabitants of Salem, who are quite sane in everyday life, are not mystics "turned" to theosophy, not religious fanatics, and not Bedlam's patients, so amicably and all at once believed the strange and ridiculous stories of some children? Why did these unsubstantiated accusations make such an impression on the seemingly completely rational and respectable society of American Puritans? Why, on the basis of these slips, did they destroy so many of their neighbors, friends and relatives?
No matter how trite it may seem, the most reliable version should still be recognized as the hysteria of adults and the collusion of children. Of course, there have been attempts to obtain another explanation. So, in 1976, the journal Science conducted its own investigation, during which it was suggested that the "visions" of children were hallucinations caused by poisoning with rye bread infected with an ergot fungus. According to the third version, the so-called “lethargic encephalitis”, the symptoms of which are similar to those described in the Salem case, could become the cause of the inappropriate behavior of children. Finally, there are supporters of the fourth version, who believe that a rare disease called Huntington's disease is to blame. But the fact remains: the children were “sick” as long as the adults allowed them to “get sick,” and instantly “recovered” as soon as the authorities began a serious investigation of their activities.
But back to the winter Salem of 1692, when the girls gathered in the kitchen at the parish priest's house, out of nothing to do, listened to the stories of Tituba, a black slave, a native of the island of Barbados. Children are always and everywhere the same, all kinds of "horror stories" are invariably very popular among them, and stories about the cult of voodoo, witches, black magic, as they say, "went with a bang." But these “bedtime stories” were of no use to anyone. The first victims of the seemingly innocent "horror stories" were 9-year-old Elizabeth Paris and 11-year-old Abigail Williams (one was the daughter, the other was the niece of Pastor Samuel Paris), whose behavior changed dramatically. At first, everyone noticed frequent swings in their mood, then sudden falls to the floor and convulsions began. Then 12-year-old Anna Putnam and other girls developed the same symptoms. The doctors were at a loss and could not say anything definite, and then, unfortunately, Tituba again took the initiative, who decided to "knock out a wedge with a wedge": she baked a "witch's pie" of rye flour and urine and fed it to the dog. According to another version, she poured the girls' urine over a piece of meat, burned it and gave it to the dog. As a result, Elizabeth suddenly turned blue and began to wheeze loudly: "Tituba." The rest of the girls also fell into a trance, but other women were chosen as victims: Sarah Good and Sapa Osborne. The latter two did not have the slightest idea, neither about the exotic cult of Voodoo, nor about any local witchcraft practices, but this did not prevent local judges from ordering their arrest. The frightened 4-year-old daughter of Sarah Good, Dorothy, in order not to be separated from her mother, also called herself a witch - and the judges willingly believed her: the girl was placed in prison, where she spent 8 months. As a result, Sarah was sentenced to be hanged, to the call to repent before being executed, she answered the steward: "I am no more a witch than you are a clown, and if you take my life, God will make you drink your own blood." As it sometimes happens, the words spoken by chance turned out to be prophetic: in 1717, the executioner died of internal hemorrhage - literally choking on his own blood.
The "witches" trial, Salem
Then everything went on increasing. Enjoying unexpected fame, juvenile slanderers put forward more and more new accusations. The names of other "witches" were escaped from the women arrested at their slander under torture.
Salem Witches Trial, drawing 1876
Formally, the Salem judges were not at all engaged in amateur performances - they acted on the basis of the old British "Law on Witchcraft", adopted back in 1542. For the so-called "witch signs", the judges were ready to accept anything: a relatively large nipple, a wart or a mole.
Hermann Knopf, "The Sign of the Witch"
If there were no special marks on the body of the accused, the evidence of their conspiracy with the devil was the absence of such "signs" - Satan, because he may well avert the eyes of the interrogators. “Excessive beauty” was also very suspicious (“Because one cannot be so beautiful in the world” - we have already heard that). A dream in which the accused was one of the “victims” while he himself was in another place could have gone as proof: the devil is strong enough to send the ghost of his servant to embarrass the spirit of a “pure” person. For example, the already mentioned Anna Putnam accused the priest George Burroughs of appearing to her as a ghost, frightening and strangling her. Further, he was accused of organizing witches' sabbaths and targeting damage to soldiers. Trying to escape, already standing at the gallows, Burroughs without hesitation read the prayer "Our Father", which, according to traditional ideas, could never have been done by a man who sold his soul to the devil. This did not help him, but one of the slanderers (Margaret Jacobs is the priest's granddaughter!), In a fit of belated remorse after the execution, recanted her testimony.
Interrogation of the witch, Salem
It was impossible to help the unfortunate women: any person - father, son, husband, trying to obstruct the investigation, or simply doubting the competence of the court, was himself declared a sorcerer and almost the head of Salem's witch community. The first of these men was the husband of Elizabeth Proctor. A similar fate awaited John Willard, who had previously participated in the arrests, and then the local judge of Saltonstall, as well as the former city priest of Barrafs. There were also real heroes among the accused. So, 82-year-old Gilles Corey, in order to preserve the farm for his family, withstood 5 months of imprisonment and torture. His death was terrible: on September 19, 1692, the so-called peine forte ex dure procedure was applied to him - heavy stones were placed on his chest, covered with a board. Thus, a confession of guilt was literally “squeezed out” of the accused. Without confessing anything, he died after two days of continuous torment. And the young slanderers said on this occasion that Corey signed the "book of the devil" in exchange for a promise that he would never go to the gallows. And therefore, the devil kept his word. Corey did not learn that his wife Martha, who was declared guilty of the smallpox epidemic that happened shortly before all these events, would be hanged the day after his death. Together with her, 7 more people will be executed.
Meanwhile, the girls who had become famous from Salem began to be invited "on tour" to the surrounding towns and villages: if at the gates of a house one of the klikush began to beat in a fit, it was considered proven that a witch lived in the family. As a result, witchcraft trials went beyond Salem and also took place in the city of Andover. And in Boston, Captain John Alden was declared a sorcerer, a participant in the wars with the Indians, practically a national hero, and even a character in Longfellow's poem "The Marriage of Miles Stayndish." Alden managed to escape from prison after 5 weeks of imprisonment.
By the way, the famous American science fiction writer Ray Bradbury told in one of his interviews about the legend in his family about the great-grandmother-witch, who was allegedly burned during the witch hunt in Salem. An appeal to the documents confirmed: among the dead, indeed, there is a certain Mary Bradbury.
Ray Bradbury
As time went on, more and more people began to realize that the situation with the "witches" in Massachusetts was becoming absurd and clearly out of control. However, the fear of being accused of aiding the Devil was still stronger than the voice of common sense. It is difficult to say how long this shameful action would have lasted, and how many victims it would have cost if the presumptuous girls had not accused the wife of Massachusetts Governor William Phipps of witchcraft.
William Phipps, Governor of Massachusetts
The angry "head of administration" finally remembered his responsibilities to protect the rights of the population of the state entrusted to him. The judges who dared to support the accusation were immediately dismissed, and the Supreme Court of Massachusetts was established to replace it (which is still in force). The new judicial officials acted decisively and without sentimentality: the girls, subjected to serious interrogations, quickly confessed that they had slandered people “for fun” (!). In 1702, all decisions of the previous composition of the court were declared illegal. The slanderers were subjected to universal condemnation and ostracism, but went unpunished. Only in 1706, one of the main accusers, Anna Putnam, tried to justify herself before her victims and their relatives, claiming that she herself had been deceived by the devil, who forced her to testify against innocent people. In 1711, the state authorities decided to pay compensation to the relatives of the victims. And in 1752, the inhabitants of Salem changed the name of their city to Danvers. In 1992, it was decided to erect a monument to the victims of the witch hunt there. Since the exact place of burial of the executed is unknown, the memorial to the "Salem witches" was made to look like gravestones.
Salem witches memorial
Monument to the Victims of the Salem Witch Trials
In 2001, Massachusetts Governor Jane Swift reaffirmed the innocence of the accused. But even here, exceptions to the rules were found: at the official review of the case, which took place in 1957, not all the victims of this process were rehabilitated, and 5 executed women are still legally considered witches. Their descendants are demanding (so far unsuccessfully) a second review of this case and the complete rehabilitation of their ancestors.
