50 Fun Facts About Witchcraft History

Roughly how many people were executed for witchcraft in Europe and its colonies, 1400–1775?

About 100,000 were prosecuted; the nine million figure is a 19th-century invention.

Roughly what share of those convicted of witchcraft in early modern Europe were women?

Most were over 40, and the accusers were usually neighbours of both sexes.

Witch prosecutions in Europe peaked during which period?

That coincided with the Counter-Reformation and the wars of religion, hitting the Holy Roman Empire hardest.

The Malleus Maleficarum is usually translated into English as what?

It is the best-known treatise on witchcraft and was first printed in Speyer in 1486.

Who wrote the Malleus Maleficarum?

The German Dominican published under the Latin name Henricus Institor and claimed to speak for the Church.

Which body condemned the Malleus Maleficarum for recommending illegal procedures?

Kramer was never removed and went on enjoying considerable prestige.

Which pope issued the 1484 bull Summis desiderantes affectibus at Kramer's request?

It ratified powers Kramer and Sprenger already held and named the dioceses of Mainz, Cologne, Trier, Salzburg and Bremen.

The 10th-century Canon Episcopi dismissed night rides with which pagan goddess as delusion?

It entered canon law through Gratian's Decretum and was a problem for later demonologists who wanted witches to be real.

Who was the first recorded person condemned for witchcraft in Ireland, in 1324?

Dame Alice fled; her servant Petronilla de Meath was flogged and burned at the stake in Kilkenny.

Joan of Arc was executed at Rouen in 1431 after a trial on what charge?

The counts included wearing men's clothes and acting on demonic visions; a 1456 retrial overturned the verdict.

The Trier witch trials of 1581–1593 were held in which present-day country?

Some 368 people were burned in 22 villages, possibly Europe's largest peacetime mass execution.

Which Trier university rector and chief judge was executed for opposing the persecutions?

He had doubted the use of torture and treated the accused mildly, so he was tortured and burned himself.

Around how many people were executed in the Bamberg witch trials of 1626–1632?

A May frost that destroyed the vines of Franconia helped trigger the panic.

Johannes Junius, who wrote to his daughter from jail before his 1628 execution, held what office?

After thumbscrews and leg vises he confessed to seeing 27 colleagues at a sabbat, and told Veronica it was all lies.

Which prince-bishop was particularly active in the Würzburg witch trials?

An estimated 900 people were executed or died in custody in the prince-bishopric, children among them.

Which Jesuit's 1631 Cautio Criminalis argued that torture creates witches where none exist?

He had served as confessor to the condemned along the Rhine and published anonymously at Rinteln.

The Basque witch trials, which examined some 7,000 cases, began in 1609 in which town?

The junior inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías later concluded the whole thing rested on fantasy.

Which Scottish king attended the North Berwick witch trials of 1590?

Storms on his voyage home from marrying Anne of Denmark were blamed on witches; he wrote Daemonologie in 1597.

James VI's Daemonologie is believed to be a main source for which Shakespeare play?

Many of the Weird Sisters' rituals and quotes come straight from the king's book.

James VI wrote Daemonologie largely in response to which sceptical 1584 book?

Reginald Scot's book also gave the first detailed English description of sleight of hand.

In which year were the Pendle witches tried at Lancaster Assizes?

Ten were hanged, nine at Lancaster and one at York; the clerk Thomas Potts wrote it all up.

The Pendle witches were charged with murdering how many people by witchcraft?

Twelve were accused from the area around Pendle Hill in Lancashire; one died in prison before trial.

Matthew Hopkins claimed which title, never actually granted by Parliament?

He and John Stearne sent more people to the gallows than all English witch-hunters of the previous 160 years.

Matthew Hopkins was mainly active in which region of England?

His career ran from March 1644 to 1647, during the Civil War.

Because torture was unlawful in England, which technique did Hopkins use to extract confessions?

His book The Discovery of Witches cited James I's Daemonologie directly.

In the water ordeal used in witch-hunts, what did it mean if the accused floated?

Sinking meant innocence, which was not much comfort; the test has precedents in the Code of Ur-Nammu.

A 'witch's teat' was believed to be used to feed what?

Witch-prickers hunted for insensitive marks with pins; a third nipple was reported on Bridget Bishop at Salem.

Convicted witches in England were usually executed how?

Burning was reserved for those who had also committed petty treason, such as killing a husband.

About how many people are estimated to have been executed for witchcraft in England?

Around 90 per cent were women; Scotland, with a far smaller population, executed more than 1,500.

In Scotland, convicted witches were usually strangled at the stake and then what?

Modern estimates put Scottish executions above 1,500 under the Witchcraft Act 1563.

Who was the last person executed for witchcraft in Great Britain, in 1727?

Her trial at Dornoch was of questionable legality; the British parliament repealed the Scottish act in 1736.

The Witchcraft Act 1735 made it a crime to do what?

It turned witchcraft from a capital crime into a fraud offence, reflecting the collapse of trials after 1700.

Which Scottish medium was the last person imprisoned under the Witchcraft Act 1735?

Her ectoplasm turned out to be cheesecloth; Churchill called her 1944 prosecution obsolete tomfoolery.

The medium jailed in 1944 drew naval attention by claiming to reveal the sinking of which warship?

Its loss in November 1941 had been kept from the public; she got nine months in 1944.

The Salem witch trials took place between February 1692 and May of which year?

They began in Salem Village, now Danvers, and spread to Andover, Topsfield and beyond.

How many people were executed on the gallows at Salem?

Fourteen women and five men; Giles Corey was pressed to death and at least five died in jail.

Giles Corey died at Salem after refusing to enter a plea; what was done to him?

Because he never pleaded, his estate passed to his sons instead of the colony; he was 80.

Who was the first person put to death in the Salem witch trials, on 10 June 1692?

The midwife was accused of bewitching five young women including Abigail Williams and Ann Putnam Jr.

Tituba, one of the first accused at Salem, was enslaved by which minister?

Her confession gave the accusations credence; a grand jury dismissed her case in May 1693.

What kind of testimony did doubting clergymen finally discredit, ending the Salem trials?

Testimony that a victim saw the accused's spirit had justified many convictions.

Which Boston minister defended the Salem trials in Wonders of the Invisible World?

He later championed smallpox inoculation, which he learned of from an enslaved man named Onesimus.

In which year was the last convicted Salem witch, Elizabeth Johnson Jr., officially exonerated?

That came 329 years after her conviction; acts of 1957 and 2001 had cleared others.

In 1675, 71 people were beheaded in a single day in which Swedish parish?

Sixty-five were women, about a fifth of all the women in the region; boys at the church door picked them out.

The Steilneset Memorial commemorates the victims of witch trials in which Norwegian region?

About 140 trials were held there in the 17th century, the Vardø mass trials among them.

Anna Göldi, called Switzerland's last witch, was executed in 1782 in which canton?

A housemaid accused of putting needles in a child's food, she was beheaded and exonerated in 2008.

Who is widely considered the last person condemned to death for witchcraft in England, in 1712?

Her conviction was set aside; the Bideford witches of 1682 were the last actually executed.

Which 18th-century BCE law let an accused sorcerer prove innocence by jumping into a holy river?

The 18th-century BCE Babylonian code is among the earliest mentions of a witchcraft ordeal.

In 331 BCE, at least 170 women were executed in which city for causing an epidemic by poison-magic?

A later Italian epidemic in 184–180 BCE saw about 5,000 executed for veneficium.

The Old English word for a male witch, wicca, was largely replaced by what?

Wizard was the other replacement; the feminine wicce survived as witch, spelt with a t from the 16th century.

Which country's six 'witch camps' shelter around 1,000 women accused of witchcraft?

The camps exist only there; a WHO report estimated 500 older women a year are killed as witches in Tanzania.