Würzburg witch trial
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The Würzburg witch trial, which took place in 1627–1629, is one of the biggest mass-trials and mass-executions seen in Europe during peace time; 157 men, women and children in the city of Würzburg were burned alive at the stake; 900 where burnt altogether, counting the territory around the city. They were judged for sorcery and witchcraft and for having made a pact with the Devil.
[edit] The trial
The persecutions started with the consent of Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn, Prince bishop of Würzburg, and Neffen Philipp Adolf von Ehrenberg. They started in the territory around the city in 1626 and evapourated in 1630. As so often with the mass trials of sorcery, the victims soon counted people from all society; also nobles, councilmen and mayors. This was during a witch hysteria wich caused a series of with trials in South Germany, such as in Bamberg, Eichstätt, Mainz and Ellwangen.
In August, 1629, the Chancellor of the Prince-Bishop of Würzburg thus wrote (in German) to a friend:
As to the affair of the witches, which Your Grace thinks brought to an end before this, it has started up afresh, and no words can do justice to it. Ah, the woe and the misery of it--there are still four hundred in the city, high and low, of every rank and sex, nay, even clerics, so strongly accused that they may be arrested at any hour. It is true that, of the people of my Gracious Prince here, some out of all offices and faculties must be executed: clerics, electoral councilors and doctors, city officials, court assessors, several of whom Your Grace knows. There are law students to be arrested. The Prince-Bishop has over forty students who are soon to be pastors; among them thirteen or fourteen are said to be witches. A few days ago a Dean was arrested; two others who were summoned have fled. The notary of our Church consistory, a very learned man, was yesterday arrested and put to the torture. In a word, a third part of the city is surely involved. The richest, most attractive, most prominent, of the clergy are already executed. A week ago a maiden of nineteen was executed, of whom it is everywhere said that she was the fairest in the whole city, and was held by everybody a girl of singular modesty and purity. She will be followed by seven or eight others of the best and most attractive persons. . . . And thus many are put to death for renouncing God and being at the witch-dances, against whom nobody has ever else spoken a word. To conclude this wretched matter, there are children of three and four years, to the number of three hundred, who are said to have had intercourse with the Devil. I have seen put to death children of seven, promising students of ten, twelve, fourteen, and fifteen. Of the nobles--but I cannot and must not write more of this misery. There are persons of yet higher rank, whom you know, and would marvel to hear of, nay, would scarcely believe it; let justice be done . . . P. S.--Though there are many wonderful and terrible things happening, it is beyond doubt that, at a place called the Fraw-Rengberg, the Devil in person, with eight thousand of his followers, held an assembly and celebrated mass before them all, administering to his audience (that is, the witches) turnip-rinds and parings in place of the Holy Eucharist. There took place not only foul but most horrible and hideous blasphemies, whereof I shudder to write. It is also true that they all vowed not to be enrolled in the Book of Life, but all agreed to be inscribed by a notary who is well known to me and my colleagues. We hope, too, that the book in which they are enrolled will yet be found, and there is no little search being made for it.
At least 157 people were executed in the city. The actual number was in fact larger, as Hauber, who preserved the list in Acta et Scripta Magica, adds that the list is far from complete and that there were a great many other burnings too many to specify. In the territory outside the city, several hundreds of people were burned also, and the total number is estimated to have ben about 900.
This was not the biggest recorded execution of witches; in the Fulda witch trials in 1603–1605, 205 people were burned, and in the Trier witch trials in 1587–1593, 368 people were executed, but it is an example of the many great witch trials that were held in primarily Germany, France and Switzerland.
These witch trials seem to have been a phenomenon resulting from a great mass hysteria; people from all walks of life were arrested and charged, regardless of age, profession or sex, for reasons ranging from murder and satanism to humming a song with the Devil, or simply for being vagrants and unable to give a satisfactory explanation of why they were passing through town. Thirty-two of them appear to have been vagrants, and many others themselves believed they were witches and worshipped Satan.[citation needed]
[edit] The alleged witches
Many victims are not mentioned by name; below follows some names to give an example of the variety of people being burned.
- "Three play-actors".
- "Four innkeepers".
- "Three common councilmen of Wurszburg".
- "Fourteen vicars of the Cathedral".
- "The burgomasters lady" (The wife of the mayor).
- "The apothecarys wife and daughter".
- "Two choristers of the cathedral".
- Gobel Babelin, "The prettiest girl in town".
- "The wife, the two little sons and the daughter of councillor Stolzenberg."
- Baunach, "The fattest burgher (merchant) in Wurzburg".
- Steinacher, "The richest burgher in Wurzburg".
The seventh burning
- "A wandering boy, twelve years of age".
- "Four strange men and women, found sleeping in the market-place".
The thirteenth/fourteenth burning
- " A little maiden nine years of age".
- " A maiden still less (than nine)".
- " Her (The little girl's) sister, their mother and their aunt".
- " A pretty young woman of twenty-four".
The eighteenth burning
- "Two boys of twelve".
- "A girl of fifteen".
The nineteenth burning
- " The young heir of the house of Rotenhahn", aged nine.
- A boy of ten.
- A boy, twelve years old.
[edit] References
- http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/relg/socialeccltheology/MemoirsofPopularDelusionsV2/chap16.html
- http://www.the-night.net/witches/chronology.htm
- http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~kmparker/gen/Historical%20Narratives/marwel.html
- http://fraktali.849pm.com/text/archive/eso/burning.htm
- http://history.hanover.edu/texts/wurz.html
- http://www.controverscial.com/Friedrich%20von%20Spee.htm
- http://ftp.fortunaty.net/com/sacred-texts/pag/twp/twp09.htm
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