The European Witch-Hunts reached their peak in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Betweeen 1590 and 1661, approximately 1500 women and men were accused of, and executed for, the crime of witchcraft in Scotland. England suffered the largest witch-hunt in its history during the Civil Wars of the 1640s, which produced the majority of the 500 women and men executed in England for witchcraft. Evidence indicates, however, that only three women were executed in Ireland between 1533 and 1670. Given the presence of both English and Scottish settlers in Ireland during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the dramatic discrepancy of these statistics indicate that conditions existed in early modern Ireland that tended to suppress the mechanisms that produced witchcraft accusations and larger scale witch-hunts. In broad terms those conditions in Ireland were the persistence of Gaelic culture and the ongoing conditions of open, inter-religious conflict. In particular, two artifacts of Gaelic Irish culture had distinct impact upon Irish witchcraft beliefs. The office of the Poet, or fili (singular for filid), seems to have had a similar impact upon Gaelic culture and society as the shaman has on Siberian witchcraft beliefs. The Gaelic/Celtic Poet was believed to have magical powers, which were actually regulated by the Brehon Law codes of Ireland. The codification of the Poet’s harmful magic seems to have eliminated some of the mystique and menace of magic within Gaelic culture. Additionally, the persistent belief in fairies as the source of harmful magic remained untainted by Christianity throughout most of Ireland. Faeries were never successfully demonized in Ireland as they were in Scotland. The Gaelic Irish attributed to fairies most of the misfortunes that were otherwise blamed on witchcraft, including the sudden wasting away and death of children. Faerie faith in Ireland has, in fact, endured into the twentieth century. The ongoing ethno-religious conflict between the Gaelic, Catholic Irish and the Protestant “New English” settlers also undermined the need for witches in Ireland. The enemy, or “other” was always readily identifiable as a member of the opposing religious or ethnic group. The process of dual confessionalisation, as described by Ute Lotz-Huemann, facilitated the entrenchment of Catholic resistence to encroaching Protestantism that both perpetuated the ethno-religious conflict and prevented the penetration of Protestant ideology into Gaelic culture. This second effect is one of the reasons why fairies were never successfully associated with demons in Ireland. Witch-hunts were complex events that were produced and influenced by multiple causative factors. The same is true of those factors that suppressed witchcraft accusations. Enduring Gaelic cultural artifacts and open ethno-religious conflict were not the only factors that suppressed witchcraft accusations and witch-hunts in Ireland; they were, however, the primary factors.

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Aim: The aim of this thesis is to elucidate the effects of gender, age, and class in witch hunts in the sixteenth and seventeenth century in Western Europe from a feminist perspective. It also aims to understand the perception of these witch hunts in our present society. It centers poor, old, women who were accused of witchcraft. Methods: a literature review will be performed to collect literature on witch hunts. Secondary analysis of this literature will be performed using an intersectional theoretical framework. Results: the spread of christianity through Europe brought a new political ideology that divided labour into sexes. The role of women was reduced to childbearing and household tasks. Medicine became institutionalised. There was no protection for poor people or aged people in the new political ideology. Conclusion: the new political ideology affected poor, old women most: they were no longer able to fulfil childbearing duties, could no longer practice as healers or midwives, and were not protected by the state. Due to the misogynistic, ageist and classist values at the time, their expressions of frustration could then be interpreted as witchery. Moreover, lookism could have been a factor in witch accusations.

As the era of Christianity is taking a firm foothold of Europe and Scandinavia during the late 1500s and early 1600s. The prosecution, accusations, and pure terror against anyone who did not fit the mold of a true Christian was faced with doubt, suspicion, and allegations of being in a pact with the Devil. Even if Christianity was becoming the main religion in the regions. It was common among townsfolk when in great doubt, sickness and worries to pay a visit to the old lady, the shaman, or the local healer. Some of these shamans depending on where you lived could also be a part of the Indigenous people of Scandinavia, the Sami. Whether you where that local old lady, that local shaman or one of the many regional Sami’s roaming the north of Scandinavia during this period of history, it was extremely dangerous to express local beliefs, superstitions, and an alternative faith then Christianity. The goal of this essay is to take a closer look at some of these cases, analyze the trials and prosecutions of these witches and Sami Shamans within Swedish courts, to see the similarities and discuss six cases in greater details. The conclusion of this essay is that we see some similarities between Swedish witches and Sami people who used magic, however the use and/or blame off alcohol may vary, the methods on how these witches would inflict “hurtful magic” was different and so too the trials. There is a “clearer mentioning” of torture on “Swedish witches” then Sami witches. The Swedish witches would use “totems” and items to cast spells, while Sami witches would use vocal incantations to hurt their victims.

LLM / Department of Public Law

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