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

A groundbreaking study of witchcraft in modern-day Bavaria between 1300 and 1800.

Wolfgang Behringer (Author), J. C. Grayson (Translated by), David Lederer (Translated by)

9780521482585, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 11 December 1997

504 pages, 17 b/w illus. 3 maps 15 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 3.2 cm, 0.93 kg

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

This is a major study by a leading scholar in the field of continental witchcraft studies. Based on an intensive search through central and local legal records for south-eastern Germany, an area extending well beyond but including present-day Bavaria, the author has compiled a thorough overview of all known prosecutions for witchcraft in the period 1300–1800. He shows conclusively that witch-hunting was not a constant or uniform phenomenon, and that three-quarters of all known executions for witchcraft were concentrated in the years 1586–1630, years of particular dearth and famine. The book investigates the social and political implications of witchcraft, and how the mechanisms of persecution served as a rallying cry for partisan factionalism at court. The author also explores the mentalities behind witch-hunting, emphasizing the complex religious debates between believers and sceptics, and Catholics and Protestants.

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.

Subject Areas: Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH], European history [HBJD]