The Protestant Reformation: Witchcraft and Gender Roles in Western Europe

by Morgan Milhollen

The witch crazes of Early Modern Europe continue to hold our fascination to this day. We question how people could turn on their neighbor’s friends and family members. Why were women the predominant targets of these crazes? What would make someone determine that another was a witch? Why were all forms of witchcraft considered evil? Beyond this, one questions why only some parts of Europe experienced witch crazes. Many parts of Europe experienced similar conditions, and neighboring towns could have drastically differed when it came to prosecuting witchcraft.[i] One possible answer is the aftermath and changes in European society associated with the Protestant Reformation. This is not to deny that Catholic theology influenced the belief in witches, as both Catholics and Protestants produced works meant to help define witchcraft. Witches were persecuted in Catholic countries and had been prosecuted well before the Reformation. However, these persecutions were widespread between 1560 and 1630 after the Protestant Reformation began and as Europe was feeling the effects of the upheaval it caused.[ii] The religious and political instability associated with the Protestant Reformation helped to create the political and social conditions that fueled the witch craze within Western Europe. These included new or competing religious orders, the need for legitimacy of nobility and religious leaders, changing gender roles, and evolving ideas of women, coupled with famine and everyday hardships such as the death of livestock and children left many Europeans looking for a scapegoat. Nobility, religious leaders, and everyday citizens found this in the witch. This can be seen through the study of treatises on witchcraft, in addition to Protestant writings on women, marriage, and sexuality.

Modern scholarship on the witch trials looks at several things, including conceptions of gender, the uncertainties of everyday life such as famine and death, popular rhetoric and writing about witches, and differences in the conceptions of and persecutions of witchcraft. Depictions of the witch varied across time and space in Early Modern Europe. Similarly, concepts about the nature of witchcraft. Demonology versus superstition, catholic stability versus Protestant instability, and tensions between Catholics and Protestants. To add to this conversation, I am exploring some popular Protestant rhetoric surrounding women, marriage, and sexuality and comparing it to both Protestant and Catholic rhetoric about witchcraft.

Many of the complaints leveled by reforms centered around abuses of the Catholic Church and changing theology; these grievances included disbelief in the idea of good works, belief that everyone should have access to the Bible, and the Catholic practice of indulgences or donations to the church to reduce one’s time in purgatory.[iii] The celibacy of priests and nuns was also criticized, as Protestants felt that it was unnatural and against the will of God.[iv] They felt that it was so unnatural that it was actually impossible as sexual urges were divinely implanted.[v] With Luther stating that “neither does God Command human beings to multiply but forms them so that they are driven to do so. Therefore celibacy is a vain attempt to reverse the tide and a dishonoring of God’s created order.”[vi] This belief drove their emphasis on marriage as marriage provided an outlet for sexual desire that did not involve sin.[vii] This belief is important for several reasons, as it is this belief which drove changing gender roles, and it is through this charge that we begin to see an overlap between Protestant criticisms of the Catholic Church and rhetoric on witches.

One reason the emphasis on marriage was important is that it made marriage a basis of a Protestant society, thus making marriage the norm, and in doing so, othered anyone who was unmarried. Their further belief that sexual desire was natural and that celibacy was impossible would further other those who were not married as it meant that they must have been indulging in these desires in a sinful manner. The claim was used to delegitimize the clergy by associating them with the Devil in several ways. The first was to criticize them for not being married as Luther writes that “the devil has a vested interest in defaming marriage.”[viii] Therefore Catholic clergy could be seen as working for the Devil by not marrying. Another criticism portrayed them as being preying on married women, castrated men, or whores of the Devil, with the Pope being the arch-whore.[ix] It is through this type of rhetoric that we see a connection to demonology and charges leveled against witches as it was believed that the women or others who engaged in witchcraft were having sex with demons, and this is how they derived their powers.[x] While demonology existed before similar criticisms were leveled at the clergy, the charge did not gain traction until after the Reformation began. Nor did securely Catholic areas experience witch trials to the same degree as contested countries.[xi]

Several treatises on identifying witches rely upon the idea that witches derived their powers from having sexual relations with demons. Famous treatises such as that of Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus Maleficarum, published in 1486, are responsible for this idea. Kramer is largely focused upon the sexual nature of witchcraft and writes that one of four elements of being a witch is “to indulge in every kind of carnal lust with incubi and succubi and all manner of filthy delights…”[xii] Kramer goes beyond this though to note that not only do witches derive their power but attaches sexual and reproductive significance to witches deeds. Not only can women cause storms, famine, and the death of children, they can also cause sterility and impotence in men.[xiii] This is important as it ties witchcraft not only to sexual deviance but it also provides a scapegoat for a man or couple’s inability to reproduce. Luther later touches on a similar subject in regards to marriage as he feels that the marriages between impotent persons “ are not truly marriages.”[xiv] Other prominent works take a similar focus. Petrus Mamoris’s Flagellum Maleficorum, written in 1462, also touches on the idea noting that witches’ evil deeds include killing infants, destruction of property, and intercourse with incubi.[xv] These early works influenced Western European ideas about witchcraft, and their ideas would be found in later treatises on witchcraft during the height of persecutions.

Later works fell in line with earlier writings. One such work is the book The Discovery of the Mystery of Witch Craft written by Thomas Cooper in 1626. It details many aspects of witchcraft, including how to identify a witch and the type of work that witches perform. It notes that the Devil can control diseases that appear natural.[xvi] Like Kramer and Mamori’s work the book also details that in order for a witch to obtain her powers, she must renounce God and have yield her body to the Devil.[xvii] Another work on witchcraft follows a similar pattern. The Discovery of the Damned Art of Witchcraft, by William Perkins also examines the work of witches and how they gain their power. Perkins relies upon scripture and lived experiences in his work. He believes that in all forms of witchcraft that the witch has consented to the help of the Devil and in order to undermine God’s work and terrorize people. Perkins also believes that because women are weaker than men, they are more susceptible to the influence of the Devil and would be unable to renounce him, and as such, women found guilty of witchcraft must be put to death.[xviii] Both works fall in line with that of more famous works detailing how to identify witches. The reliance of a witch's power on having sex with the Devil also shows how new ideas surrounding the importance of marriage and the natural evil and lustful nature of women show that changing ideas in society regarding women stemming from the Protestant Reformation influenced the witch crazes.

A further overlap is seen in the Protestant emphasis on marriage was also based on societal beliefs in the inferiority of women. This included the idea that women’s bodies were “cool and moist,” making them both mentally and physically more passive and where, therefore, mentally and physically weaker than men, particularly if they did not have children.[xix] Thus making them more susceptible to the influence of the Devil. This idea was established by Catholics like Kramer, who wrote that “since they are feebler both in mind and body, it is not surprising that they should come more under the spell of witchcraft.”[xx] They further enforced ideas of women’s inferiority by citing it as a natural and divinely intended hierarchy that made men more rational and virtuous.[xxi] In a letter to Leonard Koppe, Luther not only comments on women’s inferiority but also criticizes those who attempt to “make herself better” through chastity, as they were meant to be mothers.[xxii] This belief in the moral superiority of men can be seen in their views on prostitution, which they used to other women and delegitimize the Catholic Church as they tied prostitution to the Catholic Church that tolerated it. As such when Protestants came to power, they criminalized it and depicted the whore as the female representative of all things evil.[xxiii] This idea was further used to demonize women as it was believed that it was impossible to distinguish a prostitute from a respectable woman, which means that any woman could be a prostitute.[xxiv] This belief in the moral inferiority of women left all women susceptible to witchcraft charges. In this way, Protestants reaffirmed that their views were natural, and those who lived outside of them were unnatural.

While many parts of Europe believed in witchcraft, not all Europeans felt that witchcraft was inherently evil and would instead consider the intent of the “witch.” The countries included Spain, Italy, and Portugal. It was these securely Catholic countries that experienced inquisitions, or the hunt and conversation or execution of all non-Catholics; this included Protestants, Jews, and Muslims.[xxv] However, it was in the areas that Catholicism and Protestantism fought for superiority that carried out the majority of trials. Leeson and Russ write that more than half of the witch trials were carried out within a 300-mile radius of Strasbourg, France. They further the idea that witch trials gained traction in instability by comparing them to the show trials of the modern world.[xxvi] In this way, people who were outside the idea of the good Catholic or good Protestant could be prosecuted, and secular and religious leaders could obtain legitimacy through spectacles of power.

The witch crazes in Western Europe took place across Western Europe. Accusations of witchcraft often occurred in times of famine, disease, or tragedy. In this way, it seemed that it was people’s way of coping with the natural world. Women who were accused of witchcraft were often considered on the fringes of society as they were old and could no longer bear children.[xxvii] The height of the witch crazes corresponded with the growth of the Protestant Reformation created political and social unrest people became more likely to turn to accusations of witchcraft to explain the world around them by making scapegoats of their neighbors. Changing ideas about women also likely made them more vulnerable to such accusations. As secular rulers sought legitimacy and Protestants and Catholics fought for control of Western Europe, old ideas and rhetoric surrounding marriage, gender, women, religion, and demonology resurfaced and merged with new ones that served to other women and used “witches” as scapegoats to explain the problems of society—ultimately leading to the horrific torture and death of thousands of women.

[i] Lyndal Roper, Witch Craze: Terror and Fantasy in Baroque Germany (New Haven, UNITED STATES: Yale University Press, 2003), 8.

[ii] Gerhild Scholz Williams, “Demonologies,” The Oxford Handbook of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America, March 1, 2013, 74, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199578160.013.0005.

[iii] Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks, Women and Gender in Early Modern Europe (United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2019), 237–38.

[iv] Kathleen Crowther, “Sexual Difference,” The Oxford Handbook of the Protestant Reformations, December 15, 2016, 670, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199646920.013.19.

[v] Crowther, 670-71.

[vi] Jane Strohl, “Luther on Marriage, Sexuality, and the Family,” in The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology, ed. Robert Kolb (New York, New York: Oxford University Press, 2014), 374.

[vii] Crowther, “Sexual Difference,” 670–71.

[viii] Strohl, “Luther on Marriage, Sexuality, and the Family,” 374.

[ix] Lyndal Roper, “Was There a Crisis in Gender Relations in Sixteenth-Centruy German?,” in Oedipus and the Devil: Witchcraft, Sexuality, and Religion in Early Modern Europe (Routledge, 1994), 43.

[x] Williams, “Demonologies,” 70–71.

[xi] Peter T. Leeson and Jacob W. Russ, “Witch Trials,” The Economic Journal 128, no. 613 (August 1, 2018): 2066–2105, https://doi.org/10.1111/ecoj.12498.

[xii] Heinrich Kramer, “Heinrich Kramer Malleus Maleficarum,” in Medieval Witch-Hunting, 1486, 61.

[xiii] Kramer, 65–67.

[xiv] Susan C. Karant-Nunn and Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks, Luther on Women: A Sourcebook (Cambridge, UNITED KINGDOM: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 137, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/wfu/detail.action?docID=218148.

[xv] Henry Charles, “Treatises on Witchcraft to 1550:,” in Materials Toward a History of Witchcraft, vol. 1 (New York, New York: T.Yoseloff, 1957), 298.

[xvi] “The Mystery of Witch-Craft Discouering, the Truth, Nature, Occasions, Growth and Power Thereof. Together with the Detection and Punishment of the Same. As Also, the Seuerall Stratagems of Sathan, Ensnaring the Poore Soule by This Desperate Practize of Annoying the Bodie: With the Seuerall Vses Therof to the Church of Christ. Very Necessary for the Redeeming of These Atheisticall and Secure Times. By Thomas Cooper. - Early English Books Online - ProQuest,” 86, accessed November 22, 2020, https://www.proquest.com/eebo/docview/2240915397/99844322/10901A309CD64C2EPQ/6?accountid=14868.

[xvii] “The Mystery of Witch-Craft Discouering, the Truth, Nature, Occasions, Growth and Power Thereof. Together with the Detection and Punishment of the Same. As Also, the Seuerall Stratagems of Sathan, Ensnaring the Poore Soule by This Desperate Practize of Annoying the Bodie,” 87–91.

[xviii] William Perkins, “A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft so Farre Forth as It Is Reuealed in the Scriptures, and Manifest by True Experience. Framed and Deliuered by M. William Perkins, in His Ordinarie Course of Preaching, and Now Published by Tho. Pickering Batchelour of Diuinitie, and Minister of Finchingfield in Essex. Whereunto Is Adioyned a Twofold Table; One of the Order and Heades of the Treatise; Another of the Texts of Scripture Explaned, or Vindicated from the Corrupt Interpretation of the Aduersarie. - Early English Books Online - ProQuest,” 168–75, accessed November 22, 2020, https://www.proquest.com/eebo/docview/2240874082/99849752/10901A309CD64C2EPQ/2?accountid=14868.

[xix] Crowther, 670-672.

[xx] Kramer, “Heinrich Kramer Malleus Maleficarum,” 62.

[xxi] Crowther, “Sexual Difference,” 670–71.

[xxii] Martin Luther, Susan C. Karant-Nunn, and Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks, “An Open Letter to Leonard Koppe, ‘Why Virgins Are Allowed to Leave the Convent in a Godly Way’, 1523,” in Luther on Women: A Sourcebook (Cambridge, UNITED KINGDOM: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 140, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/wfu/detail.action?docID=218148.

[xxiii] Crowther, “Sexual Difference,” 672.

[xxiv] Crowther, 672.

[xxv] Leeson and Russ, “Witch Trials.”

[xxvi] Leeson and Russ.

[xxvii] Williams, “Demonologies,” 72.