THE WITCH A HISTORY OF FEAR, FROM ANCIENT TIMES TO THE PRESENT 1ST EDITION PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Ronald Hutton | 9780300229042 | | | | | The Witch A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present 1st edition PDF Book Unfortunately, that means the writing occasionally feels a bit like a glorified list. The audio worked really well, however. In any case this is an excellent book. My only issue with the book is he seemed to have a set number of pages he wanted to write so he tried to shove quite a bit of information into these pages. Re-read I went on a bit of a Ronald Hutton kick after the new year. A magisterial survey of the whole complex of witch beliefs, which pays particular attention to the area of special interest in the West — the early modern witch craze — while making sure to acknowledge also their relation to the diverse variations on the theme found in much though crucially, not all of the world. He argues that the Middle Ages was an important time for Europeans to meld different aspects of these traditions into the image of a witch, which then started to spread through Europe in the early modern period as it gained popularity. I expected a book written by a scholar and published by a scholarly press to be scholarly, but at least of interest to an avid reader of nonfiction with a MA in history. Hence the 4 s I enjoyed this book. Many negative attitudes towards the figure of the witch come from the Roman era. It also means they were more readily suspected of witchcraft, because magic was regarded as inherent in them and could be used spontaneously. You are well-known and greatly appreciated for the series of books in which you explore all manner of different aspects of the Pagan world, from Druidry to King Arthur, shamanism, and now witches. Before its modern incarnation of predictive horoscopy, Astrology was in centuries past integrated with science, magic, mysticism and philosophy. A beautiful tarot card deck with guidebook boxed set by Rachel True, best known as the costar of the cult classic movie The Craft Rachel True, an.. Description Reviews "The witch came to prominence--and often a painful death--in early modern Europe, yet her origins are much more geographically diverse and historically deep. To those who have studied the witch you will have images of women dancing naked in the forest, serving the devil and his minions. Pride Tarot. My progress in my profession — which had initially been unusually rapid — resumed, and I received its highest honours, such as election to the British Academy, to both history and archaeology sections, in the end. I mean, reading my review back I at once feel like I've waffled at great length, and that I've done Hutton no justice at all. It's interesting to see how much of the rites of Ancient Egypt passed down into modern early Europe. His fresh anthropological and ethnographical approach focuses on cultural inheritance and change while considering shamanism, folk religion, the range of witch trials, and how the fear of witchcraft might be eradicated" Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC. My conclusion: this is a fascinating book for people with some background in medieval and early modern history, especially with some knowledge of the history of witchcraft, but not a great choice if you are new to this topic. I particularly enjoyed the way Hutton moves from a very wide range of beliefs to a very narrow one, and then back again, moving with ease through cultural and historical continuities and disruptions. This book was kindly sent to me by Yale University Press for review There was a lot in here that was new to me, since even the familiar material is being approached from strange new perspectives — the debt owed by Germanic folklore to Egyptian ceremonial magic, for instance, or the way the scientific method is still meshing with witchcraft as it did during the European witch hunts in present-day South Africa. Sources that do survive, such as inquisitor's manuals and court records, tend to reflect an ecclesiastical bias. In Persia practicing magic outside the official religion was akin to Worshipping the dark one. Witches no matter where they are in the world seem to have a lot in common. Within their community they are viewed as a threat to only those within. There are two key points of interest, though. Become twenty-five devils Enter into the body, into the blood, into the soul. For my personal enjoyment this book was too academic and somewhat heavy going. It is a work that makes a lot of interesting points, but one that I wish had been a little more vibrant in terms of the prose and the presentation of the material. In fact the Romans had two points in their history. Hushour rated it really liked it. I enjoyed reading the arguments for and against equating witches and witch hunts with different aspects of pagan and shamanistic beliefs and practices; however, I did feel bogged down at times in all the 'he said-- she said' as Hutton quoted different sources. In our minds eye she flies across the nighttime sky on her broomstick. Hutton certainly knows his shtick, having written numerous works on witchcraft and its place especially in contemporary times. This book sets the notorious European witch trials in the widest and deepest possible perspective and traces the major historiographical developments of witchcraft. His fresh anthropological and ethnographical approach focuses on cultural inheritance and change while considering shamanism, folk religion, the range of witch trials, and how the fear of witchcraft might be eradicated. As such, it was taken overtime as a form of social disruption which should be resisted and, sometimes, purged. Hutton's motivating interest in writing the book is to see whether evidence of belief in witchcraft, magic, and the supernatural from ethnography, ancient history, and folklore can provide some answers to historians' questions about why witchcraft trials in early modern Europe took the form that they did. The student newspaper at my own university denounced me as a satanic witch and warned people against me. I found it dull and I was soon bored. It brings you the answers you need, although not always what you wanted. Minor niggles about the style notwithstanding, then, this is a huge achievement, even if it can't easily be recommended for those looking for a pop-historical overview of witchcraft. He also examines Christianity and its impact on the perception and later persecution of witches, and points out to the advent of early modern witch hunts as a symptom of the crisis in European post-Reformation Christianity. The Witch A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present 1st edition Writer Twenty years ago, Ronald Hutton literally wrote the book on modern witchcraft The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft , in which he was generous and open-minded about the value of Wiccan religions, while also making clear that their claims to represent the survival of an ancient heritage of European paganism were nonsense. We have bad ideologies in the twentieth and twenty first century but your neighbor can't get you killed for casting spells on his iPhone which bricked him out. You can tell he's an academic and that's who the book seems to be written for. Ronald Hutton, scholar par excellence on the subject, has analyzed the image of the witch throughout history. A professor of history at the University of Bristol, Hutton has published fourteen books and has appeared on British television and radio. Pride Tarot. I expected a book written by a scholar and published by a scholarly press to be scholarly, but at least of interest to an avid reader of nonfiction with a MA in history. I do feel that this will be a hard one to get through if you don't have any background knowledge of history of witchcraft or basic cultural history backgrounds of medieval and early modern periods. I've read a few other books of his and enjoyed them just as much. Anyone interested in approaches to studying the history of folk beliefs, including appreciation of methodological difficulties, will likely be interested in reading The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present. For instance, the notion that it would be the harmless village midwife or cunning man on whom everyone suddenly turned? The parallels he draws between worldwide traditions provide us with a better understanding of the early modern witch trials as defensive measures set in the context of a wide range of ancient traditions Mesopotamian demonology; Persian cosmic dualism; a Graeco- Roman fear of magic as intrinsically impious; Roman images of the evil witch; and the Germanic concept of night- roaming cannibal women , and established by Christianity to cope with the challenges to its public credibility during the post-Reformation times. Eventually after the 15th century these witch trials Came to an end. Hutton covers a lot of ground, and assumes a certain amount of knowledge, not only of history, but also of historiography. I'm not sure how much Book received from NetGalley. The Egyptian were rather cool with magic and it was ok to bind deities to your will or other entities. Hutton's motivating interest in writing the book is to see whether evidence of belief in witchcraft, magic, and the supernatural from ethnography, ancient history, and folklore can provide some answers to historians' questions about why witchcraft trials in early modern Europe took the form that they did.