Europe's inner demons
- Автор: Кон Норман
- Год: 1975
- Язык: английский
- Год: BASIC BOOKS,.INC., PUBLISHERS
- ISBN: 465-0131-X
- Жанр: История
Электронная книга - «Europe's inner demons». Краткое содержание книги:
Who were these “witches” and “devils” and why did so many people believe in their terrifying powers? What explains the trials, tortures, and executions that reached their peak in the Great Persecutions of the sixteenth century? In this unique and absorbing volume, Norman Cohn, author of the widely acclaimed Pursuit of the Millennium, tracks down the facts behind the European witch craze and explores the historical origins and psychological manifestations of the stereotype of the witch.
Professor Cohn regards the concept of the witch as a collective fantasy, the origins of which date back to Roman times. In Europe's Inner Demons, he explores the rumors that circulated about the early Christians, who were believed by some contemporaries to be participants in secret orgies. He then traces the history of similar allegations made about successive groups of medieval heretics, all of whom were believed to take part in nocturnal orgies, where sexual promiscuity was practised, children eaten, and devils worshipped.
By identifying' and examining the traditional myths — the myth of the maleficion of evil men, the myth of the pact with the devil, the myth of night-flying women, the myth of the witches' Sabbath — the author provides an excellent account of why many historians came to believe that there really were sects of witches. Through countless chilling episodes, he reveals how and why fears turned into crushing accusation finally, he shows how the forbidden desires and unconscious give a new — and frighteningly real meaning to the ancient idea of the witch.
As so often in the past, I am greatly indebted to the staff of what is now the British Library, but which I still think of as the Reading Room and the North Library of the British Museum; and to the staffs of the Warburg Institute, the Bodleian, the Cambridge University Library and the Bibliotheque Nationale. But on this occasion I must also express my special thanks to the Librarian of the University of Glasgow, Mr R. Ogilvie McKenna, and his staff. Moreover, one particular riddle — the true nature of the witch of Orta (see the third section of Chapter 7) — could not have been unravelled without the collaboration of the libraries of the Middle Temple, of three Cambridge colleges— Trinity, Magdalene and Trinity Hall — and (yet again) Glasgow. For this assistance too I am most grateful.
I am indebted to the boards of the British Library, the Bibliotheque royale Albert Ier, the Museo Lázaro Galdiano and the Prado for permission to reproduce pictorial material in their keeping. Particulars are given in the list of illustrations.
I am also indebted to the following publishers for permission to quote from the works listed: Basil Blackwell, Oxford, and the New York University Press, Martyrdom and persecution in the early Church, by W. H. C. Frend; the Cornell University Press, Witchcraft in the middle ages, by Jeffrey B. Russell; the Oxford University Press and the International African Institute, Witchcraft and sorcery in Rhodesia, by J. R. Crawford; Routledge & Kegan Paul, The history of witchcraft and demonology, by Montague Summers; the Stanford University Press, Witch hunting in southwestern Germany, 1562–1684, by H. C. Erik Midelfort; the Toronto University Press, A razor for a goat, by Elliot Rose; Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, and Scribner, New York, Religion and the decline of magic, by Keith Thomas.
The work has been generously financed throughout by the Columbus Trust, particulars of which are given in the Editorial Foreword.