Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

The following are Copies of Depositions as to certain charges of witchcraft, made in the county of Somerset, in the year 1664. The originals appear to have been wholly written by the magistrate before whom they were sworn.* Yours, etc., W. L. W. Somerset. Walter Thicke, of Bayford, in the county aforesd, yeoman, examined the […]

On the monument of Francis, sixth Earl of Rutland, in Bottesford Church, Leicestershire, it is recorded, that by his second lady he had ” two sons, both which died in their infancy by wicked practices and sorcery.” The circumstances which gave rise to this supposition were briefly these. ” Joan Flower and her two daughters, […]

In the table for 24 years, prefixed to the “hare intemerate beate marie virginis secundum usum romanum,” printed by Thielman Kerver [see note 7], the first column is ” la date de l’année,” the second ” les brandons,” the third ” pasques,” etc., and so afterwards to explain the table ’tis written, ” Qui veult […]

The murders lately committed at Tring, of which you have given us several new particulars in page 198 of your last magazine, have revived the controversy concerning the reality of witchcraft and enchantment, which appeared to have been determined in the negative by the general consent, to which the sanction of the legislature has been […]

At Tring, in Hertfordshire, one B—d—d, a publican, giving out that he was bewitched by one Osborne and his wife, harmless people above 70, had it cried at several market towns, that they were to be tried by ducking this day, which occasion’d a vast concourse. The parish officers having removed the old couple from […]

London, Aug. 30, the following paragraph appear’d in the newspapers. Middlewich, Aug. 28. There is risen up in this country a great doctress, an old woman, who is resorted to by people of all ranks and degrees, to be cured of all diseases ; she lives four miles from hence, and has been in this […]

Arts and sciences, philosophy and civilization, are well known, generally speaking, to have had their origin in the East. The frequent journeys of the inhabitants of Europe during the latter end of the twelfth, and in the thirteenth centuries, into those distant climes, in the Crusades, gave birth to several species of knowledge then scarcely […]

One of the vain and groundless pretentions of the ancient professors of sorcery and witchcraft was, that they could raise, controul, and dispose of the winds. Thus Medea says, “Ventos abigoque vocoque.” Ov. : Met. vii. [202.] The witches in ” Macbeth” converse to the same effect : 1st Witch. A sailor’s wife had chesnuts […]

Craftsman, Feb. 21, No. 503. RACHEL FORESIGHT TO MR. D’ANVERS. SIRS Since you have already done the fair sex justice, as to their political capacities, and professed your readiness to do it, upon all other occasions, I must put you in mind of one endowrnent, for which they have been famous in all ages; I […]

On the Rise and Progress of Witchcraft. ” Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” Ex. xxii. 18. I HAVE been impressed with an idea that it would be neither uninteresting nor unprofitable to collect from our ancient annals and historical resources some particulars relating to the existence and disappearance of witches. But be […]