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The Pendle witchcraft case is a compelling human story, and also provides a dramatic insight into the importance of magic in the lives of our ancestors.
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Magic, science and second sight in 17c Scottish Higlands, with new edition of Kirk's Secret Commonwealth.
First published in 1680, A Discovery of the Impostures of Witches and Astrologers by John Brinley is an important example and contemporary account of the establishment's ideas, beliefs and debate surrounding the practices of witchcraft, magic and divination that lay behind the approved persecution of witches and other practitioners. Revealed is an acceptance of the existence of witches, the reality of the Devil and the position of magic as deeply integral to everyday life, alongside a denial of the powers possessed by witches and the abilities claimed by magical practitioners such as the Cunning Folk. Belief in them is asserted to be the product of superstition, and the efficacy of their ope...
The confessions of Isobel Gowdie are widely recognised as the most extraordinary on record in Britain. Using historical, psychological, comparative religious and anthropological perspectives, this book sets out to separate the voice of Isobel Gowdie from that of her interrogators.
Gemma Gary explores modern approaches to ancient practices of witches, charmers, and conjurers of the 18th and 19th centuries. The practices described within this book are rooted in the traditional witchcraft of multiple British streams, making its charms and spells adaptable for practitioners in any land. Topics include fairy faith, the underworld, the Bucca, places of power, magical tools, and more.
The Cultural Construction of Monstrous Children raises important questions at the heart of society and culture, and through an interdisciplinary, trans-cultural analysis presents important findings on socio-cultural representations and embodiments of the child and childhood. At the start of the 21st, new anxieties constellate around the child and childhood, while older concerns have re-emerged, mutated, and grown stronger. But as historical analysis shows, they have been ever-present concerns. This innovative and interdisciplinary collection of essays considers examples of monstrous children since the 16th century to the present, spanning real-life and popular culture, to exhibit the manifestation of the Western cultural anxiety around the problematic, anomalous child as naughty, dangerous, or just plain evil. The book takes an inter- and multidisciplinary approach, drawing upon fields as diverse as sociology, psychology, film, and literature, to study the role of the child and childhood within contemporary Western culture and to see the historic ways in which each discipline intersects and influences the other.
Four hundred years ago, ten convicted witches were hanged on Gallows Hill. Now they are back…for vengeance. Laura Phillips’s grief at her husband’s sudden death shows no sign of passing. Even sleep brings her no peace. She experiences vivid, disturbing dreams of a dark, brooding hill, and a man—somehow out of time—who seems to know her. She discovers that the place she has dreamed about exists. Pendle Hill. And she knows she must go there. But as soon as she arrives, the dream becomes a nightmare. She is caught up in a web of witchcraft and evil…and a curse that will not die.