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The Discoverie of Witchcraft: wherein the Lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, in sixteen books ... whereunto is added a Treatise upon the Nature and Substance of Spirits and Devils
The Discoverie of Witchcraft: wherein the Lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, in sixteen books ... whereunto is added a Treatise upon the Nature and Substance of Spirits and Devils
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This 16th-century classic debunks witchcraft but offers remarkable primary source of information on witchcraft, witch trials, practice of the black arts.
The Discoverie of Witchcraft
The Discoverie of Witchcraft is a book published by the English gentleman Reginald Scot in 1584, intended as an exposé of early modern witchcraft. It contains a small section intended to show how the public was fooled by charlatans, which is considered the first published material on illusionary or stage magic.
Scot believed that the prosecution of those accused of witchcraft was irrational and not Christian, and he held the Roman Church responsible. Popular belief held that all obtainable copies were burned on the accession of James I in 1603.[1]
Scot's book appeared entitled "The Discoverie of Witchcraft, wherein the Lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, in sixteen books ... whereunto is added a Treatise upon the Nature and Substance of Spirits and Devils", 1584. At the end of the volume the printer gives his name as William Brome.
There are four dedications: to Sir Roger Manwood, chief baron of the exchequer; another to Scot's cousin, Sir Thomas Scot; a third jointly to John Coldwell, then dean of Rochester, and to William Redman, then Archdeacon of Canterbury; and a fourth "to the readers". Scott enumerates 212 authors whose works in Latin he had consulted, and twenty-three authors who wrote in English. The names in the first list include many Greek and Arabic writers; among those in the second are John Bale, John Foxe, Sir Thomas More, John Record, Barnabe Googe, Abraham Fleming, and William Lambarde. But Scot's information was not only from books. He had studied superstitions respecting witchcraft in courts of law in country districts, where the prosecution of witches was unceasing, and in village life, where the belief in witchcraft flourished in many forms.
Scot's diagram explaining the "Decollation of John Baptist" illusion, in which the performer appears "to cut off ones head, and to laie it in a platter": the table has two holes, and one person raises their head through the rightmost while a second person lies on the table with their head in the leftmost hole. The second person's neck is dressed with "a little dough kneded with bul/locks bloud".
He set himself to prove that the belief in witchcraft and magic was rejected by reason and by religion and that spiritualistic manifestations were wilful impostures or illusions due to mental disturbance in the observers. His aim was to prevent the persecution of poor, aged, and simple persons, who were popularly credited with being witches. The maintenance of the superstition he blamed largely on the Roman Catholic Church, and he attacked writers including Jean Bodin (1530–1596), author of Démonomanie des Sorciers (Paris, 1580), and Jacobus Sprenger, supposed joint author of Malleus Maleficarum (Nuremberg, 1494).
Of Cornelius Agrippa and Johann Weyer, author of De Præstigiis Demonum (Basle, 1566), whose views he adopted, he spoke with respect. Scot did adopt contemporary superstition in his references to medicine and astrology. He believed in the medicinal value of the unicorn's horn, and thought that precious stones owed their origin to the influence of the heavenly bodies. The book also narrates stories of strange phenomena in the context of religious convictions. The devil is related with such stories and his ability to absorb people's souls. The book also gives stories of magicians with supernatural powers performing in front of courts of kings.
The Discoverie of Witchcraft
The Discoverie of Witchcraft is a book published by the English gentleman Reginald Scot in 1584, intended as an exposé of early modern witchcraft. It contains a small section intended to show how the public was fooled by charlatans, which is considered the first published material on illusionary or stage magic.
Scot believed that the prosecution of those accused of witchcraft was irrational and not Christian, and he held the Roman Church responsible. Popular belief held that all obtainable copies were burned on the accession of James I in 1603.[1]
Scot's book appeared entitled "The Discoverie of Witchcraft, wherein the Lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, in sixteen books ... whereunto is added a Treatise upon the Nature and Substance of Spirits and Devils", 1584. At the end of the volume the printer gives his name as William Brome.
There are four dedications: to Sir Roger Manwood, chief baron of the exchequer; another to Scot's cousin, Sir Thomas Scot; a third jointly to John Coldwell, then dean of Rochester, and to William Redman, then Archdeacon of Canterbury; and a fourth "to the readers". Scott enumerates 212 authors whose works in Latin he had consulted, and twenty-three authors who wrote in English. The names in the first list include many Greek and Arabic writers; among those in the second are John Bale, John Foxe, Sir Thomas More, John Record, Barnabe Googe, Abraham Fleming, and William Lambarde. But Scot's information was not only from books. He had studied superstitions respecting witchcraft in courts of law in country districts, where the prosecution of witches was unceasing, and in village life, where the belief in witchcraft flourished in many forms.
Scot's diagram explaining the "Decollation of John Baptist" illusion, in which the performer appears "to cut off ones head, and to laie it in a platter": the table has two holes, and one person raises their head through the rightmost while a second person lies on the table with their head in the leftmost hole. The second person's neck is dressed with "a little dough kneded with bul/locks bloud".
He set himself to prove that the belief in witchcraft and magic was rejected by reason and by religion and that spiritualistic manifestations were wilful impostures or illusions due to mental disturbance in the observers. His aim was to prevent the persecution of poor, aged, and simple persons, who were popularly credited with being witches. The maintenance of the superstition he blamed largely on the Roman Catholic Church, and he attacked writers including Jean Bodin (1530–1596), author of Démonomanie des Sorciers (Paris, 1580), and Jacobus Sprenger, supposed joint author of Malleus Maleficarum (Nuremberg, 1494).
Of Cornelius Agrippa and Johann Weyer, author of De Præstigiis Demonum (Basle, 1566), whose views he adopted, he spoke with respect. Scot did adopt contemporary superstition in his references to medicine and astrology. He believed in the medicinal value of the unicorn's horn, and thought that precious stones owed their origin to the influence of the heavenly bodies. The book also narrates stories of strange phenomena in the context of religious convictions. The devil is related with such stories and his ability to absorb people's souls. The book also gives stories of magicians with supernatural powers performing in front of courts of kings.
