Marion Gibson, the expert leading our new HistoryExtra Academy course, shares surprising facts about the wild accusations and witch trials that spread across the early modern era <\/p>

Witchcraft | A short course from HistoryExtra<\/em> Academy<\/h4>\n
Member exclusive |<\/strong> In this four-week course, you\u2019ll discover everything you need to know about the history of witchcraft, guided by historian Professor Marion Gibson<\/p>\n
Explore the course now<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n
<\/p><\/div>

$\"HEXA$ <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/section>
\n
Most witches were devout Christians<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
Although people who identify as witches or Wiccans today<\/a> follow a pagan religion, accused medieval and early modern witches were often fervent churchgoers. They lived in a European world in which Christianity saturated daily life. Many accused people explained to their interrogators that they used Christian prayers in healing spells, calling on God, the saints and the Holy Ghost.<\/p>\n
Some suspects belonged to fundamentalist Christian sects. At Salem in 1692<\/a>, the convicted witches Rebecca Nurse and Martha Corey were among the most pious worshippers at their Congregational church. Joan Balls, accused in Suffolk in 1645, \u201cprofessed Anabaptism\u201d and was a \u201crunner after the new sects\u201d of Puritanism. Christian ministers in both Suffolk and Salem were accused of witchcraft. The vicar of Brandeston, John Lowis, was deemed to be insufficiently puritanical and was charged with only reading state-approved lessons in church. He recited his own burial service before he was hanged.<\/p>\n
\n
Quiz | Would you have been accused of witchcraft?<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
At Salem, Reverend George Burroughs repeated the text of the Lord\u2019s Prayer \u2013 something thought impossible for witches \u2013 when he, too, was hanged. These good Christians were accused largely because they didn\u2019t follow the same religious teachings as those who suspected them.<\/p>\n
$\"Rebecca$ \n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n<\/div>
Thousands of those accused of witchcraft were men<\/h2>\n
Ask someone to imagine a witch, and the chances are that that witch will be a woman. However, a significant minority \u2013 an estimated one in four \u2013 of those put on trial for witchcraft were men. Men were sometimes the target of witchhunts because they were related to accused women, or romantically involved with them. In Innsbruck, Austria, in the mid-1480s, a male potter was suspected primarily because he was allegedly the lover of an accused witch, Barbara Selachin.<\/p>\n

A significant minority \u2013 an estimated one in four \u2013 of those put on trial for witchcraft were men <\/blockquote> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n<\/div>
Other men fell under suspicion because they were thought to have turned their godly learning to bad ends. In late 16th-century East Lothian, the schoolmaster John Fian was said to have studied magical texts so that he could unlock doors without a key, and light candles with his breath. He was also accused of learning love spells and using his literacy skills to serve as a minute-taker at satanic meetings.<\/p>\n
In some countries, men actually accounted for the majority of those put on trial for witchcraft. In Iceland, for example, they were often accused of acting as priest-like shamans and seers.<\/p>\n
$\"The$ \n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n<\/div>