To be fair, I should provide warning that this is a current research project in progress, and you're getting it as I write it. I'm planning on exploring the use of and impact of torture during the witch trials, particularly the relationship between torture and gender in Germany.
Scholars have focused a great deal of attention on the so-called "witchcraze" of early modern Europe. During the late fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, men women, and children were tried, and frequently convicted and put to death for witchcraft. The charges leveled against these individuals varied, but were typically centered on and around devil-worship. Women, particularly older women, were, by and large, the victims of these trials, and they were more frequently executed than their male counterparts. There has been no substantiated evidence to indicate that organized devil worship or similar rites existed in Europe.
While the witchcraze spread throughout all of Europe, it perhaps reached its most disturbing heights in Germany. Germany alone put to death approximately 30,000 people. While the accusation and trial of witches was reasonably controlled and regulated in some areas, this was not true of Germany. The witch trials in Germany were, essentially, cases of mass hysteria. The impact of the witch hunts in Germany may be seen throughout the culture, including its art and literature.
Gender is a predominant factor in witchtrials throughout Europe; however, it seems a particularly disturbing factor in Germany. Germany tried and executed women at the same rate as the rest of Europe (82%), but women were, nonetheless, the center of the German witch hunts. While women accused of witchcraft were never well treated, the use of torture, particularly gender specific torture, in Germany, both to incite confession, and as punishment, reached new extremes of horror. The use of gender specific torture in the witch trials of Germany is worthy of examination, and will be a large portion of this paper.
While torture used to incite confession occurred behind closed doors, torture used a punishment was a public spectacle. This paper will examine not only the patterns of torture apparent in the German witch trials, but also the impact that these public spectacles must have had on the community, and particularly upon the women of the community.
Both gender and social class played a major role in the witch hunts and trials of Germany. In Southwestern Germany, approximately 82% of those accused and executed for witchcraft were women. While specific data is not available for other regions of Germany, it seems fairly likely that the statistics are similar. In the early phases of a witch hunt, the victims were typically of the lowest social classes, and were most often older, post-menopausal women. These women often posed an economic burden to their communities, and became the unfortunate scapegoats during difficult times. As the witch hunt spread, and mass hysteria developed, the accusations spread, and, particularly in Germany, women of all ages, men and even children could be victims of the witchcraze. Even the upper classes were not spared during the worst of the hysteria.
