Source 2 strongly agrees with the question that witchcraft was a female crime. The source is taken from an extract of a sermon made by Martin Luther. Martin Luther was a pioneer and founder of the protestant faith. Although he is a protestant and not a catholic like the monks in source 1, their views are very similar both believing women to be weak creatures. For instance it states that women are “timid and afraid of everything”, this is a vast generalisation but agrees with source 1 which states that women are “fragile”. Luther then goes onto imply that because women are afraid they tend to “busy themselves so much about witchcraft and superstitions”. This source is useful, as is source 1 in showing the way in which the christian church as a whole thought about the subject of witchcraft, and who the perpetraitors were. It is also useful as we know that the church was very influential in people’s lives, and that it had a massive bearing on when witch-hunts occurred, as the church would often create a fear and paranoia in a local area.
Source 3 is perhaps the most strongly agreeging source in relation to the question, “was witchcraft an essentially female crime?”. It states the definition of a witch, “a women that hath a familiar spirit” (I Samuel 28:7). This quote came from the King James translation of the bible. Later it is seen that the quote was a mistranslation and that it did not condenm witchcraft as only a female crime. This is very interesting as it shows that the idea that witchcraft was a female only crime was already deep set inside the minds of the people at the time, and this source exposes the popular prejudice. The source is also another example showing how mysogenistic christian writings were at the time.
Source 4 also agrees with the question that witchcraft was a female crime, however it also shows other prejudices that people associated with witchcraft. The source discusses the arraignment and execution of Mary Barber, written by the famous historian Sharpe as part of “The Northamptonshire Witch Trials”. It states that Mary was of “mean parents” and that she was “monstrous and hideous both in her life and actions” it also says that she was poorly educated, “her education and barbarous nature promising to the world nothing”. This shows the other prejudice concerning poor people, who were accused much more than rich people of the gentry. The source states that Mary was “licentiousness of her passions” which led to her losing reason and turning to the devil and witchcraft. The view in this source is that the devil is working her and corrupting her through passion (sex).
Source 5 is a painting called “The witches” by the popular artist at the time Hans Baldung Grien. This source is useful in some ways however has its limitations. It is very unlikely that anyone ever saw a sabbath take place and it is more likey that they were fictional myths that existed in society. It is very possible that Grien picked up on this idea and panders to the popular prejudice in order to sell paintings. The source does show though that the sabbath was a popular idea, it also agrees with the idea that witchcraft was a female only crime. The painting also shows the idea of wiebermacht (idea of power of women to make men do stupid things”).
Sources 6 and 7 strongly agree with the idea that witchcraft was a female only crime however source 7 goes even further claiming that older women are the most likely culprits. Source 6 is a table of accused witches produced by the French Historian Levack. It is a primary source therefore a piece of research and it clearly shows that witchcraft was mostly a female crime, however there are some exceptions. For example Russia, Estonia which are mentioned in source 10. Source 7 is also an extract from Levack. It states that in Geneva and the County of Essex over 75% of the women accused were over 50. This could be down to many reasons for example, women lived longer than men so there would be more females over 50 in the population compared to males. Also older women are much more likely to act senial compared to younger women and this would lead to accusations.
In conclusion, when looking at all the sources I can fairly confidently state that witchcraft was an essentially female crime. Also it is clear that both the catholic and protestant chruches were very mysogenistic and clearly believed that witchcraft was exclusively a female crime. With exception of Russia and Estonia every other region in source 6 had accusation levels aimed at women at over 50% which strongly agrees with the original question.
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