A Typical Day's Torture For A Witch

[AnjelWolf]

You can view the page at http://www.traditionalwitch.net/forums/topic/960-a-typical-days-torture-for-a-witch/

Edited August 13, 2011 by Droghon
edited o new link on new software

[ValarieAnne]

Thanks for posting that. It's something about our ancestors and ourselves that too many forget.

[admin]

Verbatim report of the first days of torture of a woman accused of witchcraft at Prossneck, Germany, in 1629.

 

1. The hangman bound the hands, cut her hair, and placed her on the ladder. He threw alcohol over her head and set fire to it so as to burn her hair to the roots.

 

2. He placed strips of sulphur under her arms and around her back and set fire to them.

 

3. He tied her hands behind her back and pulled her up to the ceiling.

 

4. He left her hanging there from three to four hours, while the torturer went to breakfast.

 

5. On his return, he threw alcohol on her back and set fire to it.

 

6. He attached very heavy weights on her body and drew her up again to the ceiling. After that he put her back on the ladder and placed a very rough plank full of sharp points against her body.

 

7. Then he squeezed her thumbs and big toe in the vise, and he trussed her arms with a stick, and in this position kept her hanging about a quarter of an hour, until she would faint away several times.

 

8. Then he squeezed the calves and the legs in the vise, always alternating the torture with questioning.

 

9. Then he whipped her with a rawhide whip to cause blood to flow out over her shift.

 

10. Once again, he placed her thumbs and big toes in the vise, and left her in this agony on the torture stool from 10:00 a.m. till 1:00 p.m., while the hangman and the court officials went out to get a bite to eat. In the afternoon a functionary came who disapproved this pitiless procedure. But then they whipped her again in a frightful manner. This concluded the first day of torture. The next day they start all over again, but without pushing things quite as far as the day before.

 

-Wilhelm Pressel, Hexen and Hexenmeister (1860)

 

 

 

 

I posted this word per word from one of my rare books "The Encyclopedia Of Witchcraft and Demonology", By Rossell Hope Robbins, Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, Second Printing, 1960, first printing, 1959.

 

My reason to post this is to share a bit of our history with many who are new here. You see...it does not matter if you come from a family line of witches or come to the craft through way of seeking a different spirituality. Once you accept this path as your own, you then become bonded with our history. These ancestors are now YOUR ancestors. And there will be a time when WE will become someones ancestors as well.

 

Our traditional witchcraft history is rich and filled with so much knowledge. I guess that's why sometimes when I hear or see someone tossing fairy dust and singing love blessings like some fool at a freak show, I get alittle miffed and roll my eyes.

 

The ancestors didn't throw Fairy dust and sing love blessings. They used herbs to cure, many were mid wives, or older people who learned things from their ancestors. Many were actual witches who belonged to covens and practised in secret.

 

I am really not trying to come off as preachy....please do not think or sense that. I just wanted to share a bit of your new history with you :)

[Eon]

:c link isn't working. Or, I'm not working.

[Tana]

Link slipped out of synch when forum software changed.

Here is current Link

[Gloogal]

Strange for me to come across this book-it was the first book on witchcraft I ever read at the age of around 14 (on my mothers top shelf). I found it absorbing, and disturbing in equal measure.

Had no idea it was now a rare book.

It would be interesting to read it again-I may have to have a look around.

[star]

Heartbreaking. To think so many people suffered for only ever trying to help people

 

So many people think it's fashionable to dress in black, wear a pentacle and dabble in the odd spell and call themselves a witch. But have no care, concern or understanding of the suffering of our ancestors, it's insulting. We have the right to practice without fear of torture now, we ought to remember and be respectful of all those who were less fortunate.

 

Oh I'm in the beginnings of a rant, I shall stop now

[Verin]

It's heartbreaking... Reading about these terrible things always fills me with anger and pain, but also with determination. We are powerful, we were then and we will be in the future, that's the problem. When you get your power from an infinte well (nature) and know how to make yourself independent from commercial products to sustain health, manifest desires and direct energies the way you want without ANYONES help or providing of resources, only by interacting with the forces of nature, that's when you yourself become a force to be reckoned with. It irks me, too, when I see people calling themselves witches without ever understanding our heritage, our collective memories and our often terrible fates, when the term Witch becomes a fashion item. Thank you for sharing the link. I live in Germany and the witch-hunts still linger in so many places around here. 

[FooeynJomy]

An interesting book that I read that is sort of related is 'Witches and Neighbours' by Robin Briggs

[Tricycle]

I can't remember what it's called, but there is a two part documentary about this on Netflix at the moment. Pretty awful stuff. It also talks a lot about how they tortured people so badly to get more names of witches, that these poor people made names up just to stop the torture.

 

It also talked about this evil guy who made a lot of money 'cleansing' towns of witches. Well worth a watch.

 

It disturbs me that there are still many cruel practices in the world on adults and children who are accused of being a witch.

[Steriki]

Indigenous witchcraft in South Africa might be quite different from what we practice, but the cruel practices against so-called "witch doctors" still happen. In the township communities witch doctors are often accused of trading in human and rare animal body parts, and ritual murders or "muti murders" are not unheard of. People are scared of the witches, and I know of a few incidents where witches were accused of some crime and mob justice happened. Of course it isn't systematic torture but setting a person on fire is just as cruel and crazy. These things still happen around us.

[Tricycle]

I agree, Steriki. There are still people accused of witchcraft if a miscarriage occurs; an old lady in the village might get blamed for it. And there are small children being thrown onto the streets by families, if they believe they have a 'witch child'

[Steriki]

For interest sake I'm including a link to a website that documents "witch hunts" in South Africa. http://www.paganrightsalliance.org/remember-their-names/

It is still happening, tragically most often to innocent people who don't know a thing about witchcraft!

[Onyx]

I laugh when I hear President Trump says "It's a Witch Hunt"! He has no idea.

I am a distant relative of one of the Pittenweem Witchs, She was pressed under a door, that was driven over by a horse and cart.

Scotland was notorious for Witches in Fifeshire, it's on the East Coast of Scotland, especially in Pittenweem and Berick where witches were accused of trying to kill King James, by brewing up a storm.