The Renaissance Era
Kimberly White
English IV
Ms. Keeney
12 January 2010
To Be, or Not to Be…A Renaissance Witch Indescribable is the atrocity that people created during the time period of 1485-1603, that would lead them to the witch-hunting times (also known as the burning times). The Renaissance Era was a time of rebirth, of new thoughts, knowledge, philosophy, and so on. However, dark histories, stories, and tales lie within this bountiful time. The belief in witches and witchcraft was supposed to have been an accepted truth of life in Shakespeare’s era but instead they were executed. Many people, intellectual and commoner alike, spoke for the existence of witchcraft seeing its demonic ways as something palpable. Yet others opposed it, saying that it was a mere fancy and fantasy of man’s imagination. Life for mostly women of that time was questionable, and sometimes even short. There have been many varying reports of how many woman (and an even smaller amount of men) were accused and executed of being witches or doing witchcraft. Apparently, there were supposed to be signs of how to spot such witches and heretics of the Church. A myriad of questions can be asked about witches and witchcraft such as: what was the difference between a white and black witch, were most witches women, and so on. Many people made it famous over the witch-hunt craze by writing books or manuals to hunt witches while others wrote books showing how the existence of witches was preposterous. No matter where one went during this time, however, there was always someone’s accusation or opinion to be heard. There is much controversy over the subject of witchcraft in the time period of the English Renaissance of whether or not it truly existed. So it would make the worthwhile of those who have a curious nature to know if witches and witchcraft between the time period of 1485-1603 can truly be validated with the given knowledge. To begin this excavation back into the history of witches and
English IV
Ms. Keeney
12 January 2010
To Be, or Not to Be…A Renaissance Witch Indescribable is the atrocity that people created during the time period of 1485-1603, that would lead them to the witch-hunting times (also known as the burning times). The Renaissance Era was a time of rebirth, of new thoughts, knowledge, philosophy, and so on. However, dark histories, stories, and tales lie within this bountiful time. The belief in witches and witchcraft was supposed to have been an accepted truth of life in Shakespeare’s era but instead they were executed. Many people, intellectual and commoner alike, spoke for the existence of witchcraft seeing its demonic ways as something palpable. Yet others opposed it, saying that it was a mere fancy and fantasy of man’s imagination. Life for mostly women of that time was questionable, and sometimes even short. There have been many varying reports of how many woman (and an even smaller amount of men) were accused and executed of being witches or doing witchcraft. Apparently, there were supposed to be signs of how to spot such witches and heretics of the Church. A myriad of questions can be asked about witches and witchcraft such as: what was the difference between a white and black witch, were most witches women, and so on. Many people made it famous over the witch-hunt craze by writing books or manuals to hunt witches while others wrote books showing how the existence of witches was preposterous. No matter where one went during this time, however, there was always someone’s accusation or opinion to be heard. There is much controversy over the subject of witchcraft in the time period of the English Renaissance of whether or not it truly existed. So it would make the worthwhile of those who have a curious nature to know if witches and witchcraft between the time period of 1485-1603 can truly be validated with the given knowledge. To begin this excavation back into the history of witches and
Cited: Kramer, Heinrich, and James Sprenger. Malleus Maleficarum. New York: Cosimo, Inc, 1928. Levack, Brian. The Witchcraft Sourcebook. New York: Routledge, 2004. Scot, Reginald. The Discoverie of Witchcraft. Mineola: Dover, 1972. Shakespeare, William. Macbeth. Logan: Perfect Learning, 2004. Stearns, Peter. "Early Modern Europe 1479-1675". The Encyclopedia of World History. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001.