The Burning Times: fascinating docu on women's power before Christianity

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ANd why women are feared to the extent that they are accused of witchcraft and killed for it

Well briefly, they are incorrect about the time period that it happened in, who were the victims, who were the perpetrators, where it happened, what the victims believed, what the victims lives were like, why the victims were accused and what happened to the accused.

You are right that the witch trials did happen and that most of the victims were women.

claig Mon 30-May-11 14:21:46

According to some of those articles, it seems that a guy called Gerald Gardner in the 1950s was instrumental in creating what is now known as the Wiccan religion, and that he had links with the ubiquitous Alesiter Crowley. Is that true or wide of the mark?
claig Mon 30-May-11 14:21:46

Among others, not least Crowley himself, T. Allen Greenfield has written on this in "The secret history of modern witchcraft" which is a decent introductory text for anyone interested in this aspect of the issue Crowley was almost certainly involved in the writing of many of the rituals, although the extent of his involvement is disputed by Wiccan authors, keen to downplay his involvement.
The remnants of various aspects of folk belief would not have been recorded or codified, other than through the fantastical and delusional polemics of christian persecutors.
Crowley sought a religion for the masses that would displace christianity; he found a willing channael for its promulgation through Gardner who was already, by all accounts, a member of Crowley's O.T.O.
Despite later attempts at revisionism, the rites as recorded, bear an uncanny resemblance to invocations written by Crowley for his own order.
As for christianity arriving in the twelfth century, the only part of the western world this might refer to is Iceland, which was the last of the Norse cultures to succumb to the new faith.
It is rather pointless to revise or view gender roles in pre-christian Europe through a feminist lens; these roles were defined by nature and necessity, not ideology. Similarly, the persecution of heretics cannot be viewed solely as part of a perceived history of the oppression of women per se.
As I remember from reading some of the accounts, the victims were often accused by female neighbours, possibly out of spite or jealousy.

Lots of work is done on gender in pre-Christian Europe.

Thanks, Tyr. Interesting about Crowley and the gang.

This is bizarre, I don't know anyone who doesn't know about the Witch Trials

Most people have read/watched The Crucible, or studied history at GCSE/Alevel/Degree/Post or even just from Tony Robinson documentaries on Sky! Or the episode of the Simpsons where they think Marge is a witch. Its not hidden at all.

I did not know until a couple of years ago. I am pretty well educated and a swot

I was aware of the whole if dunking, if you drown you weren't a witch, if you don't you are thing. And I do recall a play where a woman got burnt for being a witch. But I did not know there was a huge big thing going on with masses of women (or even people before anyone quibbles that bit) being killed. If you don't know that bit, then all the 'obvious' references don't have a frame to fit together in.

Dittany,

The Malleus Maleficarum may indeed have proved a popular read. I have a paperback copy somewhere so it may well still be in print.
You are wrong to decribe it as the "inquisitors handbook." It was immediately dismissed by the Holy Inqusition and at least one of the authors fell foul of that institution himself.
It did find favour with secular courts who, contrary to popular belief about the Catholic church, were responsible for the majority of capital sentences handed down to so-called "witches."
The analogy with the holocaust is rather inapt.

This film is about the promotion of no-paganism, which deliberately presents non-Christian beliefs as a mono-culture over thousands of years. In doing so it denies the multiculturism of Christian and Pre-Christian Europe, or the extent of non-Christian cultural change. It also denies the misogyny of Iron Age culture in Europe and of the Roman Empire. It also engages in North American exceptionalism by making out that witch trials are some kind of entirely European problem.

When looked at within the wider context of Neo-Pagan belief, it fits into a general pattern of undermining multi-culturalism and of minimising the treatment of Native people in North America. They make the the claim that Europeans in North America are somehow an innocent group of people who represent some kind of pure ethnic mono-cultural group who were oppressed by some kind of 'other' (in this case Christianity) and are consequently equal in their status as an oppressed minority to Native people, rather than being part of the white majority. This kind of belief is now becoming increasingly common in the UK as well, with various pagans (including people in the BNP) making out that they are oppressed group because they are white, pagan and the UK is their indigenous, ancestral and spiritual home.

If these people were really concerned with feminism, why on earth aren't they reporting what really happened to these women, and why are they making out that the Roman Empire, one of the most patiarchal societies on earth, was some kind of spiritual feminist experience for women?

Just asked my husband, 'yeh something to do with Pendle, don't know really'. Also pretty well educated but not a swot. So everyone doesn't know.

I'm not sure how people don't know about the witch trials. It is taught in English, History and Drama. DS has done it in both English and History and he hasn't started on GCSEs yet.

I suppose it is possible for people to not know of it is their school didn't cover it. They may also live in an area of the country where witch trials were uncommon, so it may be possible that there is no local folk tradition around it, or local place associations. It might also be possible that their parents didn't bring them up within any kind of English or Scottish tradition.

But even so, it is so much part of popular culture. People generally understand that the term 'witch hunt' in common speech refers to an unjust and irrational persecution of people, and that the term 'witch' refers to women. People also understand what the term 'inquisition' means.

Yes, women were persecuted, tortured and murdered. But describing women being persecuted, tortured and murdered can be done for a wide number of reasons, for a number of political and social ends, and in a number of inaccurate ways.

Describing the torture of women does not make the film one that supports women. It isn't as if we don't have the testimony needed to tell these women's real stories.