CHAPTER VII

The Power of Witches over External Things.
Argument.
i is one of the obligations that witches owe to the devil that, when they assemble
at the Sabbat, they must § showthat they | have wrought some fresh §\S8 evil since the § 48:4 last meeting; | and if they | cannot do so they do not } escape with | impunity. And that they | may not be able to plead ignorance as AD) EXCUSE, Hemet :
their evil Master instructs them in all those activities which he demands from them: as in infesting the trees and fruits with locusts, caterpillars, slugs, butterflies, canker-worms, and such pestilent vermin which devour everything, seeds, leaves and fruit; or in bewitching cattle; or in casting a spell on the crops so that they are destroyed by leeches or wasted in some other way; or in the use of poisons, and in working as far as in them lies for the destruction of the whole human race. For all this we
* “Martin de Arles.’ Martin de Arles y Andosilla, author of the rare “‘ Tractatus insig- ms de Superstitionibus, contra Maleficia, seu Sortilegia quae hodie uigent in Orbe terrarum,” Paris, 1517. Another edition, Rome, 1559.
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BK. I. CH. VII.
know from their own confessions; as, for example, those of Helena of Ar- mentiéres at Douzy on the goth Sep- tember, 1586; of Anna Ruffa at the same place and time; of Jean the Fisher at Gerbeviller on the 13th May, 1585; of his wife Colette; and of several others whom we pass over for the sake of brevity. For these, see Remy, Book I, chap. 22, and else- where.
They can also destroy the flocks and herds, either by scattering poison or by sending into their bodies a demon which throws them down and strangles
, them or tears themin pieces. They can re- move a man’s crops and fruits to an- other place, as is told by Servius (In. Eclog. Verg.) and Apuleius (In Apologia), and ») by) ic, Augustine (Ciu. Det, VIII). They can cause
RTT m). HOUSES’ | tomas consumed by fire, as was done in a certain town of Suabia in the year 1533 by a certain witch, as we shall tell in the proper place.
They can conjure up feasts: and these are either sheerly fantastic like those of Scotot of Parma, from whose
t “‘Scoto.’? There ts an allusion to Scoto of Parma, a notorious Italian necromancer and adept in the black art, in the ‘‘Defensative against Supposed Prophecies’’ of Henry How- ard, Earl of Northampton, 1583: ‘‘I was pre- sent my selfe when diuers Gentlemen & noble men, which vndertooke to descry the finest sleights, that Scotto the Italian was able to play by Leger du main before the Queene, were notwithstanding no lesse beguiled then the rest: that presumed lesse vppon theyr owne dexteritie and skyll in those matters.’ In F. Harvey’s “Discoursive Problem concerning Prophecies,”
BK. I. CH. VIII.
banquets the guests departed appar- ently satisfied, but soon they were tor- tured by hunger; or else they may be composed of true food, but bad tasting and of an evil odour, since God does
not permit them to conjure savoury food. Generally salt is lacking, and often bread; perhaps because salt is used in Baptism, and in the Eucharist we are fed with the life-giving flesh of our Lord Christ veiled under the form or accident of bread. But with God’s permission they can also produce bread and salt and savoury foods, as the witches themselves have confessed to their Judges; but this is rarely the case. Again when God wills they can by mere local motion free captives from their prisons and fet- ters: but this does but re- quire the breaking of some- thing; and since this can be done by men, why not by a devil? Trithemius narrates a story worth re- *
cording, which we shall tell later.
1588, Scoto is named together with the well- known juggler Feates as a member of the ““foisting crue.”” Also in Nash’s ‘The Unfor- tunate Traveller, 1594, mention is made of Cornelius Agrippa, who is said to bear “‘the
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23 Examples.
There was put to death at Treves some years ago a very famous witch who had inserted a pipe into the wall wus Of her house, through which she charmed all the milk of her neighbours’ cows: that is to say, the demon milked the cows and instantly car- ried the milk to her house.
Remy tells (I, 23) of a certain peasant named De- siré Finance, who dwelt among the Vosges moun- tains, and who, whenever he sat down to eat in company, had a dog lying at his feet from which he used secretly to take poison which he then administered to whomever he wished: and by him a considerable number of men were killed before any suspicion rested upon him as being the cause of it.
The same author tells that Antoine Welsch was asked to lend the garden of his house for the approaching cele-
Sabbat. At
bration of the witches’ first he said that he could not do so
fame to be the greatest coniurer in Christen- dome, ‘Scoto,’ that dyd the iugling tricks be- fore the Queene, neuer came neere him one quarter in magicke reputation.”
24 because he had to go out that night: but when they still continued to press him and insist upon it as their right, he knew that he was overpersuaded ; yet, as he had said, he himself went out. When he came home in the morn- ing and happened to go into his gar- den, he found it all devoured by cater- pillars and slugs, and the whole garden filled with such animals: but he bore all in silence, recognising the usual traces of that ungodly Assembly.
In the year 1323 Frederick Duke of Austria marched against the Emperor Louis of Bavaria, and was defeated in a great battle between Ottingen and Moldova, and was captured by Louis, who placed him under guard in his fortified citadel. Meanwhile a witch promised his brother Leopold in Austria that he would by his art bring back Frederick within an hour if he should have a sufficient reward; and the Prince made liberal promises. The demon then flew to Frederick in Ba- varia, and entered his prison in the form of a pilgrim, saying: “If you wish to be freed from captivity, mount this horse, and I will take you safe into Austria to your brother Leopold.” The Duke asked: “Who are you?” But he answered: ‘‘Do not ask who I am, for that does not concern you; but mount this horse which I bring you.” But when even this most valiant Duke was seized with horror and protected himself with the sign of the cross, the evil spirit disappeared together with his black horse, and went back empty to him who had sent him; in reply to whose complaints that he had not brought the captive home, he told all that had happened.
Among the Swedes Ollerus attained to such fame in arms by means of his magic art that, as Saxo Grammaticus (Hist. Dan. 3) says, he was thought to be divine. The same author writes as follows (Book 5) of the Danish pirate Oddo: “He sailed the seas without any ship, and by raising up storms often wrecked his enemies’ fleets. He was a foe to merchants and a friend to
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BK. I. CH. VIII.
barbarians. He embarked upon a war with the Normans; and by his spells so deluded his enemies’ eyes that they thought they could see the flashing of the Danish swords at a distance, so that when it came to hand to hand fighting they were so dazzled that they could not see to fight, and were thus defeated by magic.”
Bishop Martin Kromer* writes as follows of the memorable victory of the Tartars over the Poles: “In the year 1240 the Poles joined battle with the Tartars near Legnitz and pressed them strongly and were putting them to rout. In the extreme rear of the ‘Tartar army there was, among other banners, a notable one bearing a picture of the letter X, while at the top was a hideous bearded black head. As the standard bearer strongly waved this banner, it exhaled a dense and horribly stinking cloud of smoke, which not only hid the barbarians from the Poles, but even killed the Poles with its overpowering stench. The Tartars had done this by their spells; for they were much addicted to consultation with soothsayers and diviners, especially in war but also in peace, in order to foreknow the future. When they saw that the Poles were in a panic, the barbarians roused them- selves and charged them, and put them to rout with great slaughter. So great a number of Christians was killed in that battle that nine huge sacks were filled with the ears that were cut off, one from each dead man.
The Chinese, according to Juan Gonzales de Mendoza,} worship the
* “Kromer.”? The famous Polish bishop of Ermland and historian. Born, 1512; died 1589. His “De origine et rebus gestis Polonorum,” a vast work in thirty books treating of the history of Poland from the earliest times until 1506, was published at Basle in 1555. It has been twice translated into Polish, and also into Ger- man, 1562. Walewski, ‘‘Martin Kromer,”’ Warsaw, 1874. The reference here is to Book VIII of the ‘‘De origine . . . Polonorum.”
t “Mendoza.”? This eminent early geo- grapher was of the Order of Augustinian
BK. I. CH. IX.
Virgin Noema as sacred; and he says that she owed her cult to magic art. For when a certain captain named Compo had, by order of the King, taken the fleet to a certain island, he could by no force weigh anchor to sail away again; but at last he suddenly saw Noema sitting in the stern of his ship. He approached reverently and begged her for help and advice; and she replied that the Chinese would never win the victory except under her leadership. She set out with the fleet therefore; and though the enemy relied upon their magic spells she defeated them with more potent charms. For the enemy threw their god into the sea and made the Chinese fleet appear to be burning and every- thing to be consumed in the false flames: but Noema put the flames out and, by her more powerful art, sent a similar spell upon the enemy who, finding that all their efforts were un- availing, surrendered themselves to Compo as beaten.
The people of Pergamus also once tried to raise a siege of the town by means of magic, but without success, as Paul the Deacon* tells (Rerum Romanarum, XX).
In the time of Leo Isaurus, Masal- mas the Saracen chief occupied Per- gamus with no difficulty, although the citizens, trusting to a witch, had offered up a terrible sacrifice to the devil by cutting open a pregnant woman and taking out the living foetus, which they boiled in a pot, and all the soldiers defiled their right sleeves with this abominable sacrifice. Theophanes is our authority for this.
Duke Wratislaw, the founder of Breslau (says Aeneas Silvius), went to war with his grandson Gremozislav, Duke of Bohemia. There was a woman
Hermits. It was he who made the first really intelligible map of China, 1585.
* °Paul the Deacon.” c. 720-799. The Benedictine historian also known as Casinen- sis, Levita, Warnefridi. His “‘Historia Ro- mana,’ an amplified and extended version of Eutropius, was formerly much esteemed.
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25 who foretold that her own son-in-law, together with Wratislaw and the greater part of the people, would fall in that war; but that the young man could escape if he would obey her. When the youth answered that he would obey her commands, she told him to kill the first man he met, then to make the sign of the cross with his sword on the ground between his horse’s forefeet, then to cut off both the dead man’s ears and put them in a bag and make haste to flee. The battle was fought in a plain near Tuscus; and when Wratislaw had been killed, the young man, having done as the old woman bade him, returned safe to his home; but he found his dearly loved wife killed and with her ears cut off and her breast pierced, and was amazed and grieved to find that the ears he had cut off from his enemy were those of his wife. This was indeed a fit reward for consulting with a witch: and it may be that the wife also was a witch and had joined in the battle after the manner of Bohemian women; or else the demon set some deadly image in the battle and trans- ferred the wounds which it received to the wretched woman in the house.
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