Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe is a must read for Advanced Placement European History teachers and students alike

As a part of the new series "Problems in European Civilization," published by Houghton Mifflin under the general editorship of Merry E. Wiesner, Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe (edited by Wiesner) is very appropriate for my AP European History students. Inserting it in the first week in October will prepare the students for the "The Witch DBQ," just in time for Halloween. Brief student oral reports on the scholarly articles allow you to guide the student-centered class discussion through the various types of history dealt with in each article. Other activities include simulations of a witch trial from existing records (researched in small groups); a debate about the denomination guiltiest for the witch craze (Protestants or Catholics); the social class and gender findings of the tribunals; and a comparative essay of state legal codes with the verdicts of the juries/officials of each country. This volume edifies and energizes students with readable (approximately 10 pages each) scholarly articles.

The book is divided into four main parts ("The Intellectual Foundations and Demonology," "The Political, Economic, and Social Context," "Accusations, Trials, and Panics," and "Gender and Witchcraft"), a chronology of witchcraft, a reference map, and an annotated bibliography. "Suggestions for Further Reading" discusses publications after 1980 dealing with European witch hunts in survey form; various collections of articles on witchcraft and demonology; collections of primary sources; studies according to European regions, cities, countries; case studies of witchcraft; studies which link witchcraft to other intellectual and cultural issues; and witchcraft and gender issues.

That the first part of this book is framed in the methodology of intellectual history is intriguing--especially regarding the inherently social history category of the topic, witchcraft. Stuart Clark’s "Thinking with Demons: the Idea of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe" notes that witchcraft was part of a rational belief system held by many well-educated men. Charles Zika’s "The Devil’s Hoodwink" argues that folklore from the sixteenth century helped preachers and politicians to consolidate their power, since only experts were qualified to decipher who was really a witch. Literary scholar Gerhild Scholz Williams focused on the south of France and on one Catholic Church official, Pierre de Lancre. Were those whose language he could not even understand with interpreters, witches? Probably, especially since they had just returned from voyages to the New World where most likely Satan lurked. Walter Stevens, in "Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the Crisis of Belief," argues that the ruling elites’ questioning of their faith or skepticism resulted in witchcraft, not the other way around.

The last three parts overlap despite the discrete categories of their titles. Particularly interesting to the students were "State Building and Witch Hunting in Early Modern Europe" in part two, "The Devil’s Children: Child Witch-trials in Early Modern Germany" in Part III, and "Marriage or a Career? Witchcraft as an Alternative in Seventeenth-Century Venice."