Fifteenth Century Witchcraft Essay

The era of early modern Europe witnessed great uncertainty, anxiety, and violence, which contributed to the massive religious, cultural, political, and economic changes that transpired among the European populace. In addition to prominent religious and intellectual movements such as the Reformation and the Enlightenment, there was also a noticeable shift in the way in which witches and witchcraft, a significant issue of the time, were perceived. Pre-established beliefs began to lose their legitimacy, while new ideas rapidly spread and quickly dominated the conversation surrounding the lore of witches and witchcraft. The year 1400 CE is often depicted as the date in which Europe witnessed the most extensive change in beliefs about witchcraft

Particularly significant was the claim that witches would secretly gather in groups and perform an assortment of disturbing and harmful acts at meetings known as a witches’ sabbat. A prominent source for this was a group of five writers from the western Alps (Johannes Nider, Ponce Feugeyron, Claude Tholosan, Hans Fründ, and Martin Le Franc) who described new sects of heretics, or witches, in the 1430s. Notably, these writers claimed that “witches met the Devil at night and kissed him or made sacrifices to him in a witches’ sabbat” or synagogue (Goodare, 95). There were a variety of horrific acts that were said to occur at these mysterious sabbats, including infanticide, cannibalism, and orgies, to name a few (Goodare, 95). Both the elite and the religious were especially afraid of the demonic activity that supposedly transpired at the witches’ sabbat, and many prominent figures attempted to warn others of the pressing

This concept of the witches’ sabbat, a terrifying meeting in which witches proclaimed their allegiance with the Devil and performed disturbing acts with demons, was an incredibly influential belief that lasted throughout the entirety of the era of the witch hunts. For example, Nicholas Remy, the man known as the “scourge of witches,” wrote in 1595 that it was very common for witches to attend their nocturnal synagogues and “present themselves at the notorious evil assemblies of demons,” both in dreams and in person (Levack, 17, 90). Although Remy’s Demonolatry was published over 150 years after the idea of the witches’ sabbat first gained traction, it is evident that these nefarious meetings (as well as demonic dealings) became a central aspect of the European belief of witchcraft as well as the witch