Malleus maleficarum
"Malleus Maleficarum," also known as the "Hammer of the Witches," is a significant historical text authored by Heinrich Kramer and possibly Jakob Sprenger, published in 1487 in Speyer, Germany. This 256-page manual was created to assert the reality of witchcraft and its perceived threat to society, particularly within the context of the Roman Catholic Church's efforts to combat heresy. The book emerged shortly after a papal bull from Pope Innocent VIII granted authority to prosecute witches, reflecting growing anxieties about witchcraft during the late medieval period.
Divided into three parts, "Malleus Maleficarum" outlines the practices and supposed dangers of witchcraft, identifies the harm caused by witches, and provides interrogation techniques for extracting confessions, including the endorsement of torture. This text played a pivotal role in shaping public perception of witchcraft, legitimizing widespread witch hunts and executions across Europe and North America, with estimates suggesting tens of thousands of accused witches faced capital punishment as a result of its influence.
Despite being condemned by the Catholic Church shortly after its publication, the book saw numerous editions printed over the centuries, making it a cornerstone in the history of witchcraft persecution. Its legacy serves as a cautionary tale about the potential consequences of misinformation and societal fears, as well as a reflection on historical gender-based discrimination. Today, it is often examined within discussions of how institutional biases can lead to tragic outcomes.
Malleus maleficarum
Malleus Maleficarum is a 256-page book written entirely in Latin and first published in 1487 in Speyer, Germany. The title is often translated into English as Hammer of the Witches. A persecution of witches, the book was written by Heinrich Kramer (c. 1430 – 1505) and possibly Jakob Sprenger (c. 1436 – 1495), two priests of the Dominican order of the Roman Catholic Church. Malleus Maleficarum aims to convince that witchcraft is real, and its practice presents a threat to the public. The book became the manual used by legal authorities to seek out and punish witches. Malleus Maleficarum was at least in part responsible for witch hunts and killings over several centuries.
Background
The Malleus Maleficarum came into being shortly after a papal bull, or a proclamation made by the pope, was issued against witchcraft in 1484. Pope Innocent VIII, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church at that time, issued the bull that gave Kramer and Sprenger the authority to prosecute witches. Kramer wanted witches included as part of the Inquisition, an attempt by the Catholic Church to eliminate heretics (those who spoke out or acted against Church policies and doctrines). Inquisitors used torture in many forms to force confessions of heresies from non-Catholics in an attempt to convert them, force them to leave, or provide justification for killing them.
While the Inquisition was originally aimed at Jews and Muslims—non-believers in Christianity—some, like Kramer, felt that witches posed a specific threat. However, they found that local churches did not share their belief that witchcraft and its practitioners were a danger to the Church. Kramer, in particular, encountered problems with local church authorities in the Innsbruck area of Austria. The bishop in the area declared Kramer senile and threw him out of the city, which led to people having to seek papal authority to seek out and question witches.
The first draft of Malleus Maleficarum was written in 1486, most likely to convince others to assist in hunting down and persecuting people suspected of witchcraft. The first edition bore Kramer's name alone as an author, though subsequent printings listed Sprenger as a contributor and later as a coauthor.
The Malleus Maleficarum cast a negative light on much of the contemporary folklore of the time associated with witches and took a much stronger stand against witchcraft than the Church. While the Church had long held that witchcraft was the devil's work and those who practiced it needed correction, this correction was usually handled by the Church or with relatively minor punishments such as securing the accused witch in the stocks in the public square for the day. The Malleus Maleficarum emphasized the dangers posed by witches and used a verse in the Old Testament of the Bible, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," (Exodus 22:18, KJV), to advocate hunting down, torturing, and killing witches.
Parts of the Book
The Malleus Maleficarum is divided into three parts. The first explains the practices of witchcraft, outlines the witch's alleged relationship to evil, including the renouncement of God and the Church and the connection to Satan, and accuses witches of sacrificing children to the devil. This part of the book also claims that because the Bible mentions witches, as in the verse from Exodus, not believing in witches was in itself heresy.
The second part of the book describes the damage the world has suffered because of witchcraft. It explains some of the practices, rituals, and spells used by witches and how to identify situations caused by witchcraft. It is believed that many of the stories included in this section stemmed from witches' "confessions" during interrogations.
The final part of the book lays out the techniques that should be used by those questioning witches. It advocates lying to those being interrogated and torture. According to the book, such actions are justified because of the danger witches posed to the community.
Historical Implications
The Malleus Maleficarum was the first book to both comprehensively define and condemn witchcraft. As a result, it became the basis for many future works on the subject and served to persuade people of the dangers posed by witches. While witchcraft and its practitioners had been the subject of disdain, fear, and persecution in the past, the book's publication led to witchcraft being widely seen as an offense to Christianity, which made it more acceptable to persecute, harm, and even kill people suspected of being witches. At many points in history, people who did something as harmless as applying herbs or other natural treatments to combat illnesses were suspected of witchcraft. The Malleus Maleficarum encouraged the persecution and murder of such people and others who used spells with alleged evil intent.
Even though the Catholic Church officially condemned the book three years after its first publication, at least thirty-six editions were printed between 1487 and 1669. While there is some debate as to how influential the book was in its earliest days, its enduring popularity made it partly responsible for the witch trials during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Historians estimate that as many as fifty to sixty thousand people may have been executed on charges of witchcraft in Europe and North America from the time when the book was written to the 1800s.
Although it was written over 500 years ago, Malleus Maleficarum remains relevant to contemporary society because it explains the dangers of spreading misinformation and provides a historical view of gender-based discrimination. Because of the book's influence on what became state-sanctioned persecution, it can serve as a warning against biased beliefs becoming integrated into institutions.
Bibliography
Birks, Arran. “The 'Hammer of Witches': An Earthquake in the Early Witch Craze – The Historian.” QMUL History Projects, 24 Jan. 2020, projects.history.qmul.ac.uk/thehistorian/2020/01/24/the-malleus-maleficarum-an-earthquake-in-the-early-witch-craze. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Brand, Cassie. “The Malleus Maleficarum: A 15th Century Treatise on Witchcraft.” WashU Libraries, 19 Oct. 2022, library.wustl.edu/news/the-malleus-maleficarum-a-15th-century-treatise-on-witchcraft. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Durrant, Jonathan. "Review of the Malleus Maleficarum." Reviews in History, www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/672. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Herzig, Tamar. “Witches, Saints, and Heretics.” Magic, Ritual & Witchcraft, vol. 1, no. 1, Summer 2006, pp. 24–55. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lkh&AN=21277734&site=ehost-live. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Linder, Douglas. "A Brief History of Witchcraft Persecutions before Salem." University of Missouri-Kansas City, 2005, law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/salem/witchhistory.html. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Mack, Elizabeth. "The Malleus Maleficarum and King James: Defining Witchcraft." Voces Novae, Chapman University Historical Review, vol. 1, no. 1, 2009, digitalcommons.chapman.edu/vocesnovae/vol1/iss1/9. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Macullough, Diarmand. Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years. Penguin, 2010.
Pavlac, Brian A. "Review of 'Witch Beliefs and Witch Trials in the Middle Ages: Documents and Readings' by P. G. Maxwell-Stuart." Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft, vol. 9, no. 1, 2014, pp. 104–107, Project MUSE, dx.doi.org/10.1353/mrw.2014.0010. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.
Raiswell, Richard. “The Hammer of Witches: A Complete Translation of the Malleus Maleficarum.” Renaissance & Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme, vol. 34, no. 1/2, 2011, pp. 279–81. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lkh&AN=74427899&site=ehost-live. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.