Witchcraft, Healing, and Popular Diseases

New Perspectives on Witchcraft, Magic, and Demonology

Brian P. Levack

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN:
  9780815336747
• eBook ISBN:
  9781136539398
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Latin American & Caribbean History

Witchcraft and magical beliefs have captivated historians and artists for millennia, and stimulated an extraordinary amount of research among scholars in a wide range of disciplines. This new collection, from the editor of the highly acclaimed 1992 set, Articles onWitchcraft, Magic, and Demonology, extends the earlier volumes by bringing together the most important articles of the past twenty years and covering the profound changes in scholarly perspective over the past two decades. Featuring thematically organized papers from a broad spectrum of publications, the volumes in this set encompass the key issues and approaches to witchcraft research in fields such as gender studies, anthropology, sociology, literature, history, psychology, and law. This new collection provides students and researchers with an invaluable resource, comprising the most important and influential discussions on this topic. A useful introductory essay written by the editor precedes each volume.

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Series Content
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Folk Medicine as Part of a Larger Concept Complex
• Healing Charms in Use in England and Wales, 1700-1950
• From Cunning Man to Natural Healer
• Historians as Demonologists: The Myth of the Midwife Witch
• Witch Doctors, Soothsayers, and Priests. On Cunning Folk in European Historiography and Tradition
• On the Trail of the Witches: Wise Women, Midwives and the European Witch Hunts
• The Rational Witchfinder: Conscience, Demonological Naturalism, and Popular Superstitions
• Witchcraft and Popular Religion in Early Modern Rothenburg ob der Tauber
• Magical Healing, Love Magic, and the Inquisition in Late Sixteenth-Century Modena
• The Church, the Devil and the Healing Activities of Living Saints in the Kingdom of Naples after the Council of Trent
• Witchcraft Beliefs and Social Control in Seventeenth-Century Malta
• Magic, Popular Medicine, and Gender in Seventeenth-Century Mexico: The Case of Isabel de Montoya
• Witchcraft in Portugal during the Eighteenth Century, Analysed through the Accusations of the Tribunal do Santo Oficio de Evora
• Shamanistic Elements in Central European Witchcraft
• Indian Shamans and English Witches in Seventeenth-Century New England
• Shaman, Healer, Witch. Comparing Shamanism with Franconian Folk Magic
• Acknowledgments