1st Edition
Johann Wier Debating the Devil and Witches in Early Modern Europe
By Michaela Valente
Copyright 2022
264 Pages
by
Routledge
264 Pages
by
Routledge
264 Pages
by
Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
This book deals with a fascinating and original claim in 16th-century Europe. Witches should be cured, not executed. It was the physician and scholar Johann Wier (1515-1588) who challenged the dominant idea. For his defense of witches, more than three centuries later, Sigmund Freud chose to put Wier's work among the ten books to be read. According to Wier, Satan seduced witches, thus they did not... Read more
Introduction, 1. History and historiography: Wier and the witch-hunts, 2. Wier's early years and apprenticeship (1515-1557), 1. Agrippa and the French apprenticeship, 2. Working in Gelderland and Cleves, 3. Wier's faith, 3. Inside the labyrinth of spells: The origin and development of the De Praestigiis Daemonum (1557-1568), 1. The De praestigiis , 2. The theologian and the physician: on the punishment for witches, 3. Translations of the De praestigiis, 4. Between magic and science, 1. The circle of Oporinus and Basel, 2. Against Paracelsus, 5. Vince te ipsum: Towards the twilight: from 1569 to 1588, 1. The twilight, 2. Against Scalichius, 3. The physician Wier, 6. Demons, sorcerers, and witches, 1. Satan and his army, 2. Magicians, 3. Witches, 4. The distinction between magicians and witches, 7. Scepticism and toleration, 1. Erasmus between scepticism and toleration, 2. Erasmus and Wier, 8. Reading and refuting Wier, 1. Appreciations and critics, 2. The Debate with Erastus, 3. Bodin against Wier, 4. Wier's legacy in English and Germanic debates, 5. Wier in the XVIIth century, 6. After Descartes: the disenchantment of the world, Conclusion, Bibliography (primary sources), Bibliography (secondary sources), Index
Biography
Michaela Valente (Ph.D. 2000) is Professore Associato of Early Modern History at Università del Molise and since 2021 at “La Sapienza”, Università di Roma. She has published essays and books on Jean Bodin, on the demonological debate, and on the Roman Inquisition.
