 |
Return Create A Forum - Home |
 |
--------------------------------------------------------- |
|
The Raeburne Tradition |
 |
https://raeburne.createaforum.com |
|
--------------------------------------------------------- |
|
***************************************************** |
|
Return to: Dream Craft |
|
***************************************************** |
|
#Post#: 27-------------------------------------------------- |
|
The Night Battles : Witchcraft and Agrarian Cults in the 16th an |
|
d 17th Century |
|
By: Alfred Raeburne Date: October 27, 2014, 11:20 am |
|
--------------------------------------------------------- |
|
"Based on research in the Inquisitorial archives of Northern |
|
Italy, The Night Battles recounts the story of a peasant |
|
fertility cult centered on the benandanti, literally, "good |
|
walkers." These men and women described fighting extraordinary |
|
ritual battles against witches and wizards in order to protect |
|
their harvests. While their bodies slept, the souls of the |
|
benandanti were able to fly into the night sky to engage in epic |
|
spiritual combat for the good of the village. Carlo Ginzburg |
|
looks at how the Inquisition's officers interpreted these tales |
|
to support their world view that the peasants were in fact |
|
practicing sorcery. The result of this cultural clash, which |
|
lasted for more than a century, was the slow metamorphosis of |
|
the benandanti into the Inquisition's mortal enemies�witches. |
|
Relying upon this exceptionally well-documented case study, |
|
Ginzburg argues that a similar transformation of |
|
attitudes�perceiving folk beliefs as diabolical witchcraft�took |
|
place all over Europe and spread to the New World. In his new |
|
preface, Ginzburg reflects on the interplay of chance and |
|
discovery, as well as on the relationship between anomalous |
|
cultural notions and historical generalizations."~Amazon Review |
|
http://www.amazon.com/The-Night-Battles-Witchcraft-Seventeenth/dp/1421409925/re… |
|
***************************************************** |
