Chapter 2

In cases where popular fury, unrestrained by the law, worked its own vengeance on individuals, horrible scenes occurred; but these were the exception, and, examining only the legal aspect of the subject, it will be found that witches had a fair trial according to the methods of the period, and that their punishment was according to the law. There was, however, one popular method of dealing with a person accused of witchcraft which is interesting as showing the survival of a legal process, obsolete as regards the law itself, but remaining in full force among the people. This is the ordeal by water. In the Laws of Athelstan the full detail of this ordeal is given: after the person who was to undergo the ordeal had been prepared by prayer and fasting, he was tied, the right thumb to the right big toe, the left thumb to the left big toe, and was then cast into the water with suitable prayers to the Almighty to declare the right; if he sank he was considered innocent, if he floated he was guilty. The witch was 'tried' in the same way, except that she was tied 'crossways', i.e. the right thumb to the left big toe, and the left thumb to the right big toe. So great was the belief in this test that many women accused of witchcraft insisted on undergoing this ordeal, which was often conducted with solemnity and decency under the auspices of the minister of the parish and other grave persons. Unless there was strong feeling against the woman for other reasons, the mere fact of her floating did not rouse the populace against her, and she merely returned home; Widow Coman, for instance, was 'ducked' on three separate occasions at her own request.

The theologians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were greatly exercised by the conclusive evidence which proved that people known to be devout and professing Christians had been present at the Sabbath, joined in the ceremonies, and worshipped the witches' god. The Inquisitors recognized the fact, and devote many pages of their books to the discussion of the course to be followed in the case of Christian priests, coming finally to the conclusion that if a priest merely went to the Sabbath but was not in any way in an official position there his sacred character preserved him from evil. The theologians of the Reformed Churches, who could not accept the sanctity of the priesthood with the same ease and were also desirous of finding some means of accounting for the presence of the devout laity, boldly evolved the theory that the Devil could for his own purposes assume the shape of good Christians in order to mislead the witches. By this plea the accused often succeeded in escaping when the examiners were religious ministers, but it was of no value to them when the trial was in a court of law, and the fact of their presence at an illegal assembly was proved. Lord Coke's definition of a witch summed up the law on the subject: 'A witch is a person who hath conference with the Devil, to consult with him or to do some act', and any person proved to have had such conference was thus convicted of a capital offence and sentenced accordingly. This accounts for the fact, commented on by all students of witch-trials, that a witch was often condemned even though she had invariably used her skill for good and not for evil; for healing the sick, not for casting sickness. If it were proved that she had obtained her knowledge from the 'Devil' she had broken the law and must die.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, 1894, p. 160. The italics are in the original.]

[Footnote 2: See James Crossley's Introduction to Potts's _Discoverie of Witchcraft_, Chetham Society, pp. v-xii.]

I. CONTINUITY OF THE RELIGION

Of the ancient religion of pre-Christian Britain there are few written records, but it is contrary to all experience that a cult should die out and leave no trace immediately on the introduction of a new religion. The so-called conversion of Britain meant the conversion of the rulers only; the mass of the people continued to follow their ancient customs and beliefs with a veneer of Christian rites. The centuries brought a deepening of Christianity which, introduced from above, gradually penetrated downwards through one class after another. During this process the laws against the practice of certain heathen rites became more strict as Christianity grew in power, the Church tried her strength against 'witches' in high places and was victorious, and in the fifteenth century open war was declared against the last remains of heathenism in the famous Bull of Innocent VIII.

This heathenism was practised only in certain places and among certain classes of the community. In other places the ancient ritual was either adopted into, or tolerated by, the Church; and the Maypole dances and other rustic festivities remained as survivals of the rites of the early cult.

Whether the religion which survived as the witch cult was the same as the religion of the Druids, or whether it belonged to a still earlier stratum, is not clear. Though the descriptions of classical authors are rather too vague and scanty to settle such a point, sufficient remains to show that a fertility cult did once exist in these islands, akin to similar cults in the ancient world. Such rites would not be suppressed by the tribes who entered Great Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans; a continuance of the cult may therefore be expected among the people whom the Christian missionaries laboured to convert.

As the early historical records of these islands were made by Christian ecclesiastics, allowance must be made for the religious bias of the writers, which caused them to make Christianity appear as the only religion existing at the time. But though the historical records are silent on the subject the laws and enactments of the different communities, whether lay or ecclesiastical, retain very definite evidence of the continuance of the ancient cults.

In this connexion the dates of the conversion of England are instructive. The following table gives the principal dates:

597-604. Augustine's mission. London still heathen. Conversion of AEthelbert, King of Kent. After AEthelbert's death Christianity suffered a reverse.

604. Conversion of the King of the East Saxons, whose successor lapsed.

627. Conversion of the King of Northumbria.

628. Conversion of the King of East Anglia.

631-651. Aidan's missions.

635. Conversion of the King of Wessex.

653. Conversion of the King of Mercia.

654. Re-conversion of the King of the East Saxons.

681. Conversion of the King of the South Saxons.

An influx of heathenism occurred on two later occasions: in the ninth century there was an invasion by the heathen Danes under Guthrum; and in the eleventh century the heathen king Cnut led his hordes to victory. As in the case of the Saxon kings of the seventh century, Guthrum and Cnut were converted and the tribes followed their leaders' example, professed Christianity, and were baptized.

But it cannot be imagined that these wholesale conversions were more than nominal in most cases, though the king's religion was outwardly the tribe's religion. If, as happened among the East Saxons, the king forsook his old gods, returned to them again, and finally forsook them altogether, the tribe followed his lead, and, in public at least, worshipped Christ, Odin, or any other deity whom the king favoured for the moment; but there can be hardly any doubt that in private the mass of the people adhered to the old religion to which they were accustomed. This tribal conversion is clearly marked when a heathen king married a Christian queen, or vice versa; and it must also be noted that a king never changed his religion without careful consultation with his chief men.[3] An example of the two religions existing side by side is found in the account of Redwald, King of the East Saxons, who 'in the same temple had an altar to sacrifice to Christ, and another small one to offer victims to devils'.[4]

The continuity of the ancient religion is proved by the references to it in the classical authors, the ecclesiastical laws, and other legal and historical records.

1st cent. Strabo, 63 B.C.-A.D. 23.

'In an island close to Britain, Demeter and Persephone are venerated with rites similar to the orgies of Samothrace.'[5]

4th cent. Dionysius says that in islands near Jersey and Guernsey the rites of Bacchus were performed by the women, crowned with leaves; they danced and made an even greater shouting than the Thracians.[6]

7th cent. Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, 668-690.

The _Liber Poenitentialis_[7] of Theodore contains the earliest ecclesiastical laws of England. It consists of a list of offences and the penance due for each offence; one whole section is occupied with details of the ancient religion and of its rites. Such are:

Sacrifice to devils.

Eating and drinking in a heathen temple, (_a_) in ignorance, (_b_) after being told by the [Christian] priest that it is sacrilege and the table of devils, (_c_) as a cult of idols and in honour of idols.

'Not only celebrating feasts in the abominable places of the heathen and offering food there, but also consuming it. Serving this hidden idolatry, having relinquished Christ. If anyone at the kalends of January goes about as a stag or a bull; that is, making himself into a wild animal and dressing in the skin of a herd animal, and putting on the heads of beasts; those who in such wise transform themselves into the appearance of a wild animal, penance for three years because this is devilish.'

_The Laws of Wihtraed_, King of Kent,[8] 690.

Fines inflicted on those who offer to devils.

8th cent. _The Confessionale and Poenitentiale of Ecgberht_, first Archbishop of York,[9] 734-766.

Prohibition of offerings to devils; of witchcraft; of auguries according to the methods of the heathen; of vows paid, loosed, or confirmed at wells, stones, or trees; of the gathering of herbs with any incantation except Christian prayers.

_The Law of the Northumbrian priests._[10]

'If then anyone be found that shall henceforth practise any heathenship, either by sacrifice or by "fyrt", or in any way love witchcraft, or worship idols, if he be a king's thane, let him pay X half-marks; half to Christ, half to the king. We are all to love and worship one God, and strictly hold one Christianity, and totally renounce all heathenship.'

9th cent. _Decree attributed to a General Council of Ancyra._[11]

'Certain wicked women, reverting to Satan, and seduced by the illusions and phantasms of demons, believe and profess that they ride at night with Diana on certain beasts, with an innumerable multitude of women, passing over immense distances, obeying her commands as their mistress, and evoked by her on certain nights.'

10th cent. _Laws of Edward and Guthrum._[12] After 901.

'If anyone violate christianity, or reverence heathenism, by word or by work, let him pay as well _wer_, as _wite_ or _lah-slit_, according as the deed may be.'

_Laws of King Athelstan_,[13] 924-940.

'We have ordained respecting witchcrafts, and _lyblacs_, and _morthdaeds_: if anyone should be thereby killed, and he could not deny it, that he be liable in his life. But if he will deny it, and at the threefold ordeal shall be guilty; that he be cxx days in prison.'

_Ecclesiastical canons of King Edgar_,[14] 959.

'We enjoin, that every priest zealously promote Christianity, and totally extinguish every heathenism; and forbid well worshipings, and necromancies, and divinations, and enchantments, and man worshipings, and the vain practices which are carried on with various spells, and with "frithsplots",[15] and with elders, and also with various other trees, and with stones, and with many various delusions, with which men do much of what they should not.--And we enjoin, that every Christian man zealously accustom his children to Christianity, and teach them the Paternoster and the Creed. And we enjoin, that on feast days heathen songs and devil's games be abstained from.'

_Laws of King Ethelred_,[16] 978-1016.

'Let every Christian man do as is needful to him; let him strictly keep his Christianity.... Let us zealously venerate right Christianity, and totally despise every heathenism.'

11th cent. _Laws of King Cnut_,[17] 1017-1035.

'We earnestly forbid every heathenism: heathenism is, that men worship idols; that is, that they worship heathen gods, and the sun or the moon, fire or rivers, water-wells or stones, or forest trees of any kind; or love witchcraft, or promote _morth-work_ in any wise.'

13th cent. Witchcraft made into a sect and heresy by the Church. The priest of Inverkeithing presented before the bishop in 1282 for leading a fertility dance at Easter round the phallic figure of a god; he was allowed to retain his benefice.[18]

14th cent. In 1303 the Bishop of Coventry was accused before the Pope for doing homage to the Devil.[19]

_Trial of Dame Alice Kyteler_, 1324.

Tried for both operative and ritual witchcraft, and found guilty.

_Nider's Formicarius_, 1337.

A detailed account of witches and their proceedings in Berne, which had been infested by them for more than sixty years.

15th cent. Joan of Arc burnt as a witch, 1431. Gilles de Rais executed as a witch, 1440.

_Bernardo di Bosco_, 1457.

Sent by Pope Calixtus III to suppress the witches in Brescia and its neighbourhood.

_Bull of Pope Innocent VIII_, 1484.

'It has come to our ears that numbers of both sexes do not avoid to have intercourse with demons, Incubi and Succubi; and that by their sorceries, and by their incantations, charms, and conjurations, they suffocate, extinguish, and cause to perish the births of women, the increase of animals, the corn of the ground, the grapes of the vineyard and the fruit of the trees, as well as men, women, flocks, herds, and other various kinds of animals, vines and apple trees, grass, corn and other fruits of the earth; making and procuring that men and women, flocks and herds and other animals shall suffer and be tormented both from within and without, so that men beget not, nor women conceive; and they impede the conjugal action of men and women.'

It will be seen by the foregoing that so far from the Bull of Pope Innocent VIII being the beginning of the 'outbreak of witchcraft', as so many modern writers consider, it is only one of many ordinances against the practices of an earlier cult. It takes no account of the effect of these practices on the morals of the people who believed in them, but lays stress only on their power over fertility; the fertility of human beings, animals, and crops. In short it is exactly the pronouncement which one would expect from a Christian against a heathen form of religion in which the worship of a god of fertility was the central idea. It shows therefore that the witches were considered to deal with fertility only.

Looked upon in the light of a fertility cult, the ritual of the witches becomes comprehensible. Originally for the promotion of fertility, it became gradually degraded into a method for blasting fertility, and thus the witches who had been once the means of bringing prosperity to the people and the land by driving out all evil influences, in process of time were looked upon as being themselves the evil influences, and were held in horror accordingly.

The actual feelings of the witches towards their religion have been recorded in very few cases, but they can be inferred from the few records which remain. The earliest example is from Lorraine in 1408, 'lequel mefait les susdites dames disoient et confessoient avoir endure a leur contentement et saoulement de plaisir que n'avoient eu onc de leur vie en tel pourchas'.[20] De Lancre took a certain amount of trouble to obtain the opinions of the witches, whereby he was obviously scandalized.

'Vne sorciere entre autres fort insigne nous dict qu'elle auoit tousiours creu, que la sorcelerie estoit la meilleure religion.--Ieanne Dibasson aagee de vingt neuf ans nous dict que le sabbat estoit le vray Paradis, ou il y a beaucoup plus de plaisir qu'on ne peut exprimer. Que ceux qui y vont trouuent le temps si court a force de plaisir & de contentem[~e]t, qu'ils n'en peuuent sortir sans vn merveilleux regret, de maniere qu'il leur tarde infiniment qu'ils n'y reuiennent.--Marie de la Ralde, aagee de vingt huict ans, tres belle femme, depose qu'elle auoit vn singulier plaisir d'aller au sabbat, si bien que quand on la venoit semondre d'y aller elle y alloit comme a nopces: non pas tant pour la liberte & licence qu'on a de s'accointer ensemble (ce que par modestie elle dict n'auoir iamais faict ny veu faire) mais parce que le Diable tenoit tellement lies leurs coeurs & leurs volontez qu'a peine y laissoit il entrer nul autre desir.... Au reste elle dict qu'elle ne croyoit faire aucun mal d'aller au sabbat, & qu'elle y auoit beaucoup plus de plaisir & contentement que d'aller a la Messe, parce que le Diable leur faisoit a croire qu'il estoit le vray Dieu, & que la ioye que les sorciers prenoyent au sabbat n'estoit qu'vn commencement d'vne beaucoup plus grande gloire.--Elles disoyent franchement, qu'elles y alloyent & voyoient toutes ces execrations auec vne volupte admirable, & vn desir enrager d'y aller & d'y estre, trouuat les iours trop reculez de la nuict pour faire le voyage si desire, & le poinct ou les heures pour y aller trop lentes, & y estant, trop courtes pour vn si agreable seiour & delicieux amusement.--En fin il a le faux martyre: & se trouue des Sorciers si acharnez a son seruice endiable, qu'il n'y a torture ny supplice qui les estonne, & diriez qu'ils vont au vray martyre & a la mort pour l'amour de luy, aussi gayement que s'ils alloient a vn festin de plaisir & reioueyssance publique.--Quand elles sont preuenues de la Iustice, elles ne pleurent & ne iettent vne seule larme, voire leur faux martyre soit de la torture, soit du gibet leur est si plaisant, qu'il tarde a plusieurs qu'elles ne soi[~e]t executees a mort, & souffr[~e]t fort ioyeusement qu'on leur face le procez, tant il leur tarde qu'elles ne soient auec le Diable. Et ne s'impatientent de rien tant en leur prison, que de ce qu'elles ne lui peuuent tesmoigner c[=o]bi[~e] elles souffrent & desirent souffrir pour luy.'[21]

Bodin says, 'Il y en a d'autres, ausquelles Satan promet qu'elles seront bien heureuses apres cette vie, qui empesche qu'elles ne se repentent, & meurent obstinees en leur mechancete'.[22]

Madame de Bourignon's girls at Lille (1661) 'had not the least design of changing, to quit these abominable Pleasures, as one of them of Twenty-two Years old one day told me. _No_, said she, _I will not be other than I am; I find too much content in my Condition_.'[23] Though the English and Scotch witches' opinions are not reported, it is clear from the evidence that they were the same as those of the Basses-Pyrenees, for not only did they join of their own free will but in many cases there seems to have been no need of persuasion. In a great number of trials, when the witches acknowledged that they had been asked to become members of the society, there follows an expression of this sort, 'ye freely and willingly accepted and granted thereto'. And that they held to their god as firmly as those de Lancre put to death is equally evident in view of the North Berwick witches, of Rebecca West and Rose Hallybread, who 'dyed very Stuburn, and Refractory without any Remorss, or seeming Terror of Conscience for their abominable Witch-craft';[24] Major Weir, who perished as a witch, renouncing all hope of heaven;[25] and the Northampton witches, Agnes Browne and her daughter, who 'were never heard to pray, or to call vppon God, never asking pardon for their offences either of God or the world in this their dangerous, and desperate Resolution, dyed'; Elinor Shaw and Mary Phillips, at their execution 'being desired to say their Prayers, they both set up a very loud Laughter, calling for the Devil to come and help them in such a Blasphemous manner, as is not fit to Mention; so that the Sherif seeing their presumptious Impenitence, caused them to be Executed with all the Expedition possible; even while they were Cursing and raving, and as they liv'd the Devils true Factors, so they resolutely Dyed in his Service': the rest of the Coven also died 'without any confession or contrition'.[26]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 3: Hunt, vol. i]

[Footnote 4: Bede, Bk. II, ch. xv.]

[Footnote 5: Strabo, _Geography_, Bk. IV, c. iv, 6.]

[Footnote 6: Dionysius, _Periegetes_, ll. 1120-5.]

[Footnote 7: Thorpe, ii, pp. 32-4.]

[Footnote 8: Thorpe, i, p. 41.]

[Footnote 9: Id., ii, p. 157 seq.]

[Footnote 10: Id., ii, pp. 299, 303.]

[Footnote 11: Scot, p. 66.--Lea, iii, p. 493.]

[Footnote 12: Thorpe, i, p. 169.]

[Footnote 13: Id., i, p. 203.]

[Footnote 14: Id., ii, p. 249.]

[Footnote 15: Frith = brushwood, splot = plot of ground; sometimes used for 'splotch, splash'.]

[Footnote 16: Thorpe, i, pp. 311, 323, 351.]

[Footnote 17: Id., i, p. 379.]

[Footnote 18: _Chronicles of Lanercost_, p. 109, ed. Stevenson.]

[Footnote 19: Rymer, ii, 934.]

[Footnote 20: Bournon, p. 23.]

[Footnote 21: De Lancre, _Tableau_, pp. 124, 125, 126, 135, 208, 458.]

[Footnote 22: Bodin, _Fleau_, p. 373.]

[Footnote 23: Bourignon, _Parole_, p. 87.--Hale, p. 27.]

[Footnote 24: _Full Tryals of Notorious Witches_, p. 8.]

[Footnote 25: _Records of the Justiciary Court of Edinburgh_, ii, p. 14.--Arnot, p. 359.]

[Footnote 26: _Witches of Northamptonshire_, p. 8.]

II. THE GOD

1. _As God_

It is impossible to understand the witch-cult without first understanding the position of the chief personage of that cult. He was known to the contemporary Christian judges and recorders as the Devil, and was called by them Satan, Lucifer, Beelzebub, the Foul Fiend, the Enemy of Salvation, and similar names appropriate to the Principle of Evil, the Devil of the Scriptures, with whom they identified him.

This was far from the view of the witches themselves. To them this so-called Devil was God, manifest and incarnate; they adored him on their knees, they addressed their prayers to him, they offered thanks to him as the giver of food and the necessities of life, they dedicated their children to him, and there are indications that, like many another god, he was sacrificed for the good of his people.

The contemporary writers state in so many words that the witches believed in the divinity of their Master. Danaeus, writing in 1575, says, 'The Diuell co[~m]aundeth them that they shall acknowledge him for their god, cal vp[~o] him, pray to him, and trust in him.--Then doe they all repeate the othe which they haue geuen vnto him; in acknowledging him to be their God.'[27] Gaule, in 1646, nearly a century later, says that the witches vow 'to take him [the Devil] for their God, worship, invoke, obey him'.[28]