CLIMATIC CHANGE AND WITCH-HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLE ICE AGE ON MENTALITIES WOLFGANG BEHRINGER Professor of Early Modern History, University of York, York, England: Professor, Institut fur Neuere Geschichte der Universitae Munchen, Wagmslerstrasce 234, D- ‘80538 Munieh, Germany Abstract. In addition to objective climatic data, subjective or social reactions can also serve as indicators in the assessment of climatic changes. Conceming the Litle foe Age the conception of \witcheraft is of enormous importance. Weather-making counts among the traditional abilities of witches. During the late 14" and 13! centuries the traditional conception of witchcraft was transformed into the idea of a great conspiracy of witches, to explain “unnatural” climatic phenomena, Because of their dangerous nature particularly their ability to generate halstorms, the very idea of witches was the subject of controversial discussion around 1500, The beginnings of meteorology and its emphasis of “natural” reasons in relationship to the development of weather raust be seen against the hackground of this demoniacal discussion, The resurgence of the Lite Toe Age revealed the susceptibility of society. Scapegoat reactions may be observed by the early 1560s ‘even though climatologists, thus fa, lave been of the opinion that the cooling period did not begin until 1565. Despite attempts of containment, such as the calvinstic doctrine of predestination, ‘extended witch-hunts took place atthe variaus peaks ofthe Little Ice Age because a part of society held the witches directly responsible forthe high frequency of climatic anomelies andthe impacts thereof The enormons tensions created in society as a result of the persecution of witches demonstrate how dangerous itis to discuss climatic change under the aspects of morality. On 3 August 1562 a thunderstorm hit central Europe. The sky darkened at noontime as if it were night and a severe storm began, destroying roofs and windows. Some hours later the thunderstorm turned into a hailstorm which lasted until midnight. The hailstorm destroyed crops and vineyards, killed birds and other animals, including some unprotected horses and cows. The next day trees stripped of their leaves and branches were observed and the fields were a picture of devastation (Wahrhafftiger und gruendlicher Bericht, 1562). Travellers recognized the unusual strength of the hailstorm. A nobleman on a journey from Vienna to Brussels reported seeing severe storm damage whilst travelling the postal route (Weyer, 1586). The meteorological front must have covered an area, of several hundred kilometers in diameter. A printed newsletter reported that many people feared the beginning of the Last Judgement. Since observers of the period had no recollection of similar climatic disasters “for a 100 years,” many considered this thunderstorm as “unnatural” and looked for explanations. Three possible interpretations arose: the hailstorm could be @ sign from God, the work of the Devil or a result of witchcraft. Although « Climatic Change 48: 335-351, 1999. (©1999 Kluover Academie Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands,336 WOLFGANG BEHRINGER number of official councils’ decisions since the early Middle Ages had anathemized the idea of weather-making by human beings, there had always been reluctance to accept this negation of human influence on climate. This article proposes that it was the influence of the climatic deterioration known as the Little Ice Age which contributed decisively to the development of a new category of crime, previously only rately accepted by the authorities: witchcraft Unfortunately, the concept of the Little Ice Age seems not yet well defined, Since being coined by F. E. Matthes in 1939, its estimated duration has shrunk to aan epoch between 1300 and 1860 (Le Roy Ladurie, 1971; Lamb, 1981). Some scholars suggested that the beginning of the Little Ice Age occurred around 1430 (Webb, 1980) and ended about 1770 (Le Roy Ladurie, 1971), well aware of the fact that the period of more than 550 years of coldness was interrupted several times by warmer periods. Pfister (1980) identified a core phase of the Little Toe Age between 1570 and 1630 (“Grindelwald Fluctuation”). Inasmuch as scientists and scholars have previously based their periodizations upon indicators drawn from the physical environment (dendrochronology, glaciology, ete.), this essay proposes another approach. I suggest taking into account the subjective factor and to consider human reactions to climatic changes as an important indicator for an assessment of the beginning, the duration and the end of the Little Ice Age. “Though persecutions for heresy were known already in high medieval Europe (Moore, 1987), persecutions of inner enemies for their supposed influence on the physical environment began around 1300 (Pfister et al., 1996). Lepers and Jews were colletively made responsible for the return of the Black Death, especially after the Europe-wide epidemics of 1348-1350 and subsequent epidemics of the later 14th century (Graus, 1987). During these decades, when a sequence of cold and long winters indicated the retum of Little Iee Age conditions, the interdependence between climatic factors, crop failure, the outbreak of epidemics, hunger, rising prices and the classical pattem of subsistence crises of Old Europe became more visible. Attention thus shifted fiom epidemics to ‘weather, and it is striking to see that the gradual emergence of a new crime was closely connected to the waves of climatic hardship during the earlier phases of the Little Ice Age (Pfister et al, 1996).. Although in popular imagination witcheraft has traditionally been seen as one of the major causes for hailstorms (Gesemann, 1913; Fiedler, 1931; Blicker, 1982), Christian ecclesiastical authorities in the early and high Middle Ages refused to accept such accusations (Agobard of Lyon; Hoffmann, 1907). It was, only in the 1380s that magic and weather-making became increasingly prominent in inquisitorial trials. During the 1430s the first systematical witch-hunts occured in some of the Alpine valleys of the Duchy of Savoy under the jurisdiction of papal inquisitors and secular judges in the Dauphiné and parts of Switzerland ‘Blauert, 1989). During the 1480s the image of the weather-making witch was finally accepted by the Church. Urged by the Alsatian Dominican friar Heinrich Kramer, Pope Innocence VIII (1432-1492) acknowledged weather-making as a\WITCH.HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLE ICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 337 reality in his bull Summis desiderantes affectibus of § December 1484. Kramer himself tried to incite witch-hunts for religious purposes by using the popular demands for eradication of the suspected witches who were made responsible for the destruction of the harvests. Kramer summarized these ideas in his notorious Malleus maleficarwn, The Witches’ Hammer (Hansen, 1900). Between the 1480s and the 1520s there were endemic witch-hunts in parts of central and southern Europe, but still confined to Italian, French and Swiss Alpine valleys, parts of the French and Spanish Pyrenees, southwestern Germany and the Rhine ‘Valley down to the Netherlands. Harsh criticism of the practice of the Inquisition by humanists like Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam (1469-1536), Andrea Alciati (1492-1550) or Heinrich, Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim (1486-1535), and the beginning Reformation, stopped inquisitorial witcheraft persecution. Even the Spanish Inquisition forbid the use of the Witches’ Hammer (Malleus maleficarum) as an authority and suppressed local witch trials. Imperial Law, the Constitutio Criminalis Carolina of 1532, ignored the supposed crime of witchcraft (“Hexerei”) altogether, imposing sanctions only against the traditional crime of sorcery (“Zauberei”) and strictly limiting the judicial procedure to ordinary measures (processus ordinarius), thereby making accusations of weather-making almost unprovable. ‘Many contemporaries therefore considered the times of witchcraft persecutions as being over, part of the past or dark, pre-reformatory times (Weyer, 1563). ‘This was the situation when the impact of the Little Ice Age began to be felt again, Contemporary chroniclers like Johann Jakob Wick (1522-1588) from Ziirich reported the summer of 1560 to be unusually wet. The following winter was the coldest and longest winter since 1515/16, For the first time in generations large Alpine lakes like Lake Constance froze (“Seegfrémi”) and the vegetation period shortened decisively (Pfister, 1988). The following winter of 1561/62 was not only similarly cold but also surprising because of the immense snowfall, as mentioned in a broadsheet printed in Leipzig in 1562. According to ‘one orthodoxy of Lutheran theology these events were interpreted as signs from. God, thought to be furious due to the sins of the people (Uber die grossem wid erschrecklichen Zeichen am Himmel, 1562). The coincidence of coldness and ‘wetness struck agrarian-based society and damaged the harvest. An increase in prices resulted in the deterioration of the living conditions of poorer people (Pfister, 1988). During the spring and summer of 1562, thaw and heavy rainfall in several parts of Germany caused inundations which poisoned the fields, thereby causing cattle diseases, rising infant mortality and the outbreak of ‘epidemics. The unusually severe thunderstorm of 3 August 1562 hit central Europe during a time of increased sensibility to meteorological events. Though most theologians - Lutheran as well as Catholic or Calvinist - still blamed the sinful people for having caused God's fury, this traditional bulwark began to collapse under the pressure of meteorological disaster (Midelfort, 1972). While larger territories and Imperial cities remained stable, small political entities turned out338 WOLFGANG BEHRINGER to be more susceptible to the popular demands for witchcraft persecution. In the little Barony of Illeraichen the count, who never before had tried a case of witchcraft, was made to feel uncertain by means of demonstrations and petitions of the peasants, Finally, Count Hans von Rechberg (d. 1574) conceded to imprison some women suspected of weather-making and having caused crop failure, inundations and cattle disease, Here and elsewhere the mechanism of Figure 1, Hailstorm over a city, husuation in Uber die grossen wid erschrecklichen Zeichen am Himmel und auf Erden/ so in kurizer Zeit gescheken sind (Concerning the immense and terible signs in the heavens and on eacth’ which have occured so recently], Leipzig, 1562 torture, confession and denunciation led to an expansion from singular cases to all-out witch-hunts. The most exhaustive hunt in Germany occurred in the small territory of Wiesensteig, owned by the Lutheran counts of Helfenstein, where 63 ‘women were burned as witches within a year. Since a contemporary newsletter reported the event, the witch-hunt became well-known throughout the Empire (Warhafftige und Erschreckhenliche Thatten, 1563),WITCH HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLEICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 339 ‘The Wiesensteig witch-hunt served as an example of thorough eradication of “the evil,” and between 1562 and 1565 an interesting debate on the possibilities of weather-making emerged. In the small Imperial city of Esslingen, mainstream evangelical preacher Thomas Naogeorg (1508-1563) supported the popular demands for witch-hunts and urged the magistrate to extend the persecutions already in process to include a kind of regulation of the weather (Jerouschek, 1992). At the same time, orthodox Lutheran authorities in Stuttgart, the capital of the Duchy of Wiirttemberg, had managed to stop the local witchcraft persecutions after one burning. The leading theologians of the territory, Matthiius Alber (1495-1570) and Wilhelm Bidembach (1538-1572), bitterly attacked Naogeorg and his idea that witches could be responsible for hailstorms or other meteorological events. In accordance with Wirttemberg’s reformer Johannes Brenz. (1499-1570), who had earlier preached a similar sermon on hailstorms, they insisted that only God was responsible for the weather, not human beings. On the other hand, they agreed in principle that witches should be condemned to death due to their pact with the Devil as a spiritual crime of ‘utmost severity (Alber and Bidembach, 1562). ‘The debate of weather-making witches escalated when Johannes Weyer (1515-1588), the Erasmian court physician (1550-78) of Duke William V of Cleves (1516-1592), attacked Brenz and his followers for their ineonsequence, Writien as a response to the resumption of witch-burning, Weyer argued in his famous volume De praestigiis daemonum that witchcraft as a crime was physically impossible and the process of witch-trials in general and such trials for weather magic in particular was a bad mistake (Weyer, 1563, 1586). He agreed with Brenz that it was impossible for witches to change the course of nature. However, he countered, if witches, by definition, could in no way be responsible for hailstorms, as Brenz and the Lutherans had conceded, then why should they be punished? Even if they wanted to do harm, it was impossible to impose capital punishment in according to the Imperial Law Code because there was no article which defined spiritual deviance as a capital erime. Weyer therefore asked Brenz as figurehead of the orthodox Lutherans to change hi attitude. After a negative reply by Brenz, whose sermon on hailstorms was reprinted twice in 1564 and 1565 (Predigt vom Hagel, Donner und allem Ungewitier, 1565), Weyer published their correspondence in the 1565 edition of his book and accused the famous reformer of injustice and bloodthirsty cruelty, a reproach usually uttered against Dominican inquisitors (Weyer, 1586). ‘The resumption of witch-hunting in the 1560s was accompanied by a debate on weather-making, because this was the most important charge against suspected witches. Though witches were certainly made responsible for all kinds of bad Iuck, weather is especially important in an agrarian society. Crop failure caused increases in prices, malnutrition, rising infant mortality and, finally, epidemics. Historical sources show while individual “unnatural” accidents resulted in individual accusations of witchcraft, in cases of “unnatural” weather and collective damage whole peasant communities demanded persecution. In340 WOLFGANG BEHRINGER comparison to individual accusations, which tended to lead to trials against individual suspects, collective demands for persecution - when accepted by the authorities - regularly resulted in large-scale witch-hunts (Behringer, 1995). Without going into too much detail, the fundamental interdependence of meteorological disaster, crop failure and a popular demand for witch-hunts can be demonstrated by two further examples: the largest witch-hunt of the sixteenth century and the largest witch-hunt of the seventeenth century; the latter, between 1626-30, being the climax of European witchcraft persecutions. The mechanisms detected in the background of these persecutions can be applied to all large witcheraft persecutions in traditional Europe. Starting in the 1560s, a series of witch panics shook European societies and were followed by attempts to legalize witcheraft persecutions (e.g., the English and Scottish witchcraft statutes of 1563). After the initial witch-hunts of 1562/63 a wave of persecutions followed the hunger crisis of 1570 (Bidembach, 1570) which was a result of the catastrophic coldness of the previous two years (Pfister, 1988), But a totally new persecutory zeal can be observed during the 1580s, At the end of the 1570s crop failure and higher prices caused another hunger crisis in parts of central Europe (Rhode, 1580). The result was the burning of witches in many places (Zivo Newe Zeittung, was man fiir Hexen und Unholden verbrendt hat, 1580). During the following years, persect reased to a previously unknown extent. Bepween 1580 and 1620 more than 1000 persons were burned for witchcraft in the Vaudois region of the reformed oligarchical state of the Republic of Bem (Kamber, 1982). Between 1580 and 1595 more than 800 witches were bumed in the Duchy of Lorraine, which was ruled by the Catholic dukes so heavily involved in the struggle for power in the French religious wars. Based on recent estimations that by 1620 some 2700 persons had been executed afier being condemned as witches, the Lorraine witch-hunts become the most exhaustive in European history in any one territory (Briggs, 1989; Behringer, 1998). Persecution for witeheraft in Lorraine was closely connected to that in the neighbouring Prince-Archbishopric of Trier, where 350 witch-burnings occured between 1581 and 1595. A local chronicle gives an account of the reasons for the witch-hunt there, the largest one in German-speaking territories in the sixteenth century. In his Gesta Treverorum Johannes Linden, canon at St. Simeon in Trier, described the extensive persecutions under Prince-Archbishop Johannes VII von Schénenberg (reigned 1581-99) as follows: “Hardly any of the [prince-Jarchbishops governed their diocese with such hardship, such sorrows and such extreme difficulties as Johannes During the whole period he had to endure a continuous lack of grain, the rigours of climate and crop failure with his subjects. Only two of the nineteen years were fertile, the years 1584 and 1590 [...]. Since everybody thought that the continuous crop failure was caused by witches of devilish|WITCH- HUNTING: THE IMPACT )F THE LITTLEICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 341 hate, the whole country stood up for their cradicatio 1988). Until recently this explanation was not taken seriously, but new research demonstrates that the persecution was indeed not only demanded but also organized by the population. Since the legal administration of the territory was rather inefficient and the officials were reluctant to persecute, village committees began to extend their powers and organized the witch-hunts themselves. Elected committees collected information, captured and tried the suspected persons and. delivered them to the authorities, but only after they had already confessed. The persecution thus resembled a popular uprising where the people usurpated functions usually reserved for state authorities. It was not until 1591, when popular acceptance of the persection in the prince-archbishopric had declined, that the electoral prince-archbishop tried to deprive the local committees of their power and recover authority (Rummel, 1991). A woodcut on a contemporary broadsheet gives an impression of the reason for the persecution. It shows @ panorama landscape with three tremendous thunderstorms coming down on villages and fields while witches are flying through the air casting their spells, (Sigfriedus, ca, 1590). Similarly, a broadsheet published in southern Germany at, the same time reads like a collection of meteorological disasters and their consequences on physical and mental health (Erweytterte Unholden Zeyttung, 1590), Traditional historical explanations certainly drew on the impact of the Counter-Reformation during these years. However, it is important to note that since 1586 the long, cold winters were complemented by cold, wet springs and summers that caused hunger and epidemics and created enormous psychological stress among contemporaries. In 1586 the famous Fugger newspaper reported explicitly about a “great fear” among the people, a term which recalls “la grand peur” that preceded the French Revolution. ‘The initial witch-hunts indeed grew into revolutionary dimensions and for the first time involved members of the ruling oligarchies, i.c., magistrates as well as clerics or noblemen (Behringer, 1988). Unlike the hunger crisis of 1570, the crisis in the 1580s carried on for a decade or more, Socio-economic explanations, of the crises point out that, since the 1560s, a general decline of living standards was due to a conflict between the demographic movement, continuous population growth on the one hand, and the narrowing of the food supply, caused by ecological crisis, on the other hand (Pfister, 1988). In addition, the income from central European vineyards - from Hungary, Austria, Switzerland, Germany into northern France - permanently declined due to the deterioration of wine harvests (see Landsteiner, this volume). Baskets-of-goods-caleulations on the basis of statistical data from the Imperial city of Augsburg show that since 1586 an average craftsman with a family of four was no longer able to meet the necessary living costs without help from other members of his family (Saalfeld, 1971). .” (Behringer,342, WOLFGANG BEHRINGER ‘The socio-economic disaster affected the society as a whole. But meteorological disfavour was hardest felt in disadvantaged areas like the Bernese Oberland, the Scottish highlands, the mountaineous regions of Lorraine, the Prince-Archbishopric of Trier, the Alsatian Vosges or the Ardennes in northern, France, It was mainly in these regions that grain and wine production was endangered through increasing wetness, decreasing temperature, shortening, vegetation periods and the increased frequency of hailstorms. The impact of a series of cold and prolonged winters was sharpened as of 1586 when a period of wet and cold springs and summers began. In 1587 snow covered the ground in Switzerland until late spring and snowfall retumed to the Swiss midlands down to an altitude of 400 meters on 4 July and again in mid-September. The year 1588, when the invincible Spanish Armada failed in heavy storms, was one of the most rainy years in history. Swiss chronicler Renward Cysat (1545-1613) reports that there were severe thunderstorms almost every day starting in June (Pfister, 1988). It was during these two years that witcheraft accusations reached their climax in England and France, while the large-scale witch-hunts in Scotland and Germany were just gaining momentum (Behringer, 1998). ‘The synchronicity of accusations and persecutions in these far-away countries, not connected by dynastic, confessional, economic or other finks, demonstrates the importance of the climatic factor as an explanation. It can be shown from many individual witeh-trials that meteorological events contributed decisively to many individual suspicions and accusations, and as is now known from climatic history, these events often had super-local, super-regional or “super-national” character. Low pressure areas could cover large regions; the advance of Arctic air could harm at least vast regions of the northern part of the continent or even the northern hemisphere. Important is the fact that contemporary lamentation about decreasing fruitfulness of the fields, the cattle, and even mankind, were far from being just rhetoric devices, they were based on empirical observations (Lehmann, 1986). The rising tide of demonological literature, which in no way ridiculed such lamentations, was written by the contemporary élite, such as the famous French jurist Jean Bodin (1529-1596), Peter Binsfeld (1545/46-1598), Suffragan Bishop of Trier; Nicolas Rémy, the chief public prosecutor of Lorraine; or, the Stuart king of Scotland, James VI (1566-1625), who was about to become James of England. They all shared the idea that having obtained power through their pact with the Devil, witches could exercise diabolic wants and, therefore, indeed be responsible for the weather (Clark, 1996). According to the status of scientific theory, however. these demonologists did not draw their theories from dogma but from experience. King James had suffered severe storms while returning from Denmark in 1590 and interpreted such “unnatural” dangers as an attack by evil powers. In his Daemonologie, in (forme of a diatoge, the Calvinist monarch claimed that witches “can raise storms and tempests in the air either upon the sea or land, though not universally, but in such a particular place and prescribed\WITCH.HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLEICE AGE ON MENTALITIBS 343, bounds, as God will permit them so to trouble, which likewise is very easy to be discerned from any other natural tempests that are not nature’s, in respect to the sudden and violent raising thereof, together with the short enduring of the same. And this is likewise very possible to their master to do” (James VI, 1597; Larner, 1984), Rémy, like an ethnographer, reported detailed weather magic from Lorraine witch trials, trials which he himself had performed (Rémy, 1595). Binsfeld undoubtedly accentuated theological reasons but his best arguments were the empirical data from his persecution in the Prince-Archbishopric of ‘Trier (Binsfeld, 1589). Figure 2. Witches doings. Mlustrstion on the tile page of Suffragan Bishop Peter Binsfeld’s Tractat von Bekannimass der Zauberer und Hexen (Tract on the confessions of sorcerers and witches], Munich, 1592. At the end of the sixteenth century, some European countries managed to escape the circle of belief in witches and witchcraft persecution because the élite of consolidated territorial states stopped feeling endangered and were strong enough to suppress popular demands for witch-hunts (Behringer, 1998) However in central Europe, where demographic pressure and economic depression lingered on, unstable governments were prone to new demands for persecution with every change due to the Little Ie Age. Large-scale witch-hunts, ‘were conducted, for instance, in Burgundy and in some ecclesiastical territories in Germany around 1600 (Ein warhaffte Zeittung, 1603; Schopff, 1603), in the Basque region and parts of Germany between 1608 and 1612 (Hossmann, 1612) and in Franconia between 1616 and 1618. Contemporary court records and344 WOLFGANG BEHRINGER broadsheets tell about the importance of meteorological events as triggering factors in the background of the persecutions in these areas (Zo Hexenzeitung. Die erste aus dem Bisthumb Wirzburg, 1616; Hossmann, 1618). During the third decade of the seventeenth century when the Thirty Years War occupied the governing élite, organized witch-hunts in the ecclesiastical territories of the Holy Roman Empire reached their peak. The climax of witch-hunting coincided with some extraordinarily dramatic meteorological events. Again, it becomes necessary to accept accounts from contemporary reports in which the pogroms were hardly ever connected with war, confessional strife, state-building, changes in medical or judicial systems, gender relations or whatever else historians might imagine. Instead, court records dwell upon disease and the deaths of children and cattle and the destruction of crops and vineyards. Chroniclers relate these jual_ misfortunes to more general meteorological developments. And climatic historians must confirm those observations in general as well as specifically. ‘The 1620s were characterized by long, cold winters, late springs, cold, wet summers and autumns that brought crop failure and an increase in prices. It was into this atmosphere of etthanced tension that a climatic event of unusual severity broke in 1626. During the last week of May, in the midst of the vegetation period, winter retumed. Temperatures dropped severely, lakes and ivers froze and trees and bushes lost their leaves. Severe frost destroyed grain and grapes and in some areas even grapevines. It was an unparalleled event within the last 500 years (Pfister, 1988). This uniqueness and, of course, the devastating effect of the climatic anomaly, affirmed contemporaries in their impression that it was an “unnatural” event caused by evil human agents in alliance with some demonic power. Diaries allow introspection into the subjective perception of this particular climax of the Little Ice Age. The unexpected retum of winter caused panic and anxiety among peasants who could not remember ever experiencing such destruction of their fields. Once again the interpretation of an “unnatural” climate emerged. And again, the consequence was the search for scapegoats. A chronicler in the Franconian town Zeil reported: “Anno 1626 the 27th of May, all the vineyards were totally destroyed by frost within the Prince-Bishopries of Bamberg and Warzburg, the same with the precious grain which had already flourished. [...] Everything froze, [something] which had not happened as long as one could remember, causing a big rise in prices [...J. As a result, pleading and begging began among the rabble, [who] questioned why the authorities continued to tolerate the witches and sorcerers destruction of the crops. ‘Thus the prince-bishop punished these crimes, and the persecution began [anew] in this year [..]” (Denzinger, 1850). Broadsheets of the following years demonstrate the supposed responsibility of the witches for the particularly severe frosts in May 1626, adding later events like hailstorms, cattle diseases and epidemics (Hesselbach, 1627; Druten\WITCH-HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLEICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 345, Zeitung, 1627). Confessions obtained under torture claimed to have detected the devilish plan to destroy vineyards and grain for several years in order to create hunger and disease to such an extent that people would be forced to cannibalize each other. Only the authorities’ drastic measures stopped such beliefs; and the measures were indeed dramatic. In the tiny Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg, 600 persons were burned for suspected witchcraft (Kurtzer und wakrhafftiger Bericht und erschreckliche Newe Zeitung vonsechshundert Hexen, 1629), in the neighbouring Prince-Bishopric of Wurzburg 900, in Electorate of Mainz 900 and in Rhineland and Westphalia, under the rule of Prince-Archbishop and Elector Ferdinand of Cologne, nearly 2000 (Behringer, 1998). Al these prince-bishoprics were rather weak political structures. The Prince- Archbishop of Cologne, for instance, had mortgaged almost all his high courts to local noblemen as compensation for debts. Like the previous two generations, they were still prone to the persecutory demands of their peasant communities. Large towns, like Amsterdam, Hamburg, Venice or Vienna, never developed any persecutory zeal against witches. Similarly, large and relatively stable territories with their complex administrative structures, like France, or Imperial territories Jike the Palatinate, Wiirttemberg, Bavaria, Saxony, Austria, etc., refuused to participate in the big witch-killing. However, many independent feudal lords, ‘counts, prince-abbots or small, rural towns supported the persecutions, sharing the superstitious beliefs of their peasants. The agrarian segment of society which was most directly affected by climatic deterioration could decide through self administered justice about the procedure of scapegoating, The relationship between climate and witch-hunting remained intact in large regions, throughout Europe until the era of the Enlightenment. During the well- known climax of the Little Ice Age-witcheraft in the late seventeenth century, persecutions peaked in Austria, the Baltic region and Scandinavia; in eastern European countries like Poland and Hungary, high points were reached in the first decades of the eighteenth century (see statistics in: Ankarloo/Henningsen, 1987/1990). In parts of central Europe every Little Ice Age-year led to an increase of witch trials or even waves of persecution. It is therefore more than a mere metaphor that the sun of the Enlightenment ended the era of witch-hunting ‘Gebringer, 1995). As of the 1730s, the climate, though cold, was indeed more stable than during the previous decades. Witch trials were only conducted on into the 1740s in some of the remote areas of Germany, France and Austria, and as late as the 1770s in southwestern Germany, Switzerland, Hungary and Poland. ‘Thus, the Age of Witch-Hunting seems fairly congruent with the era known as the Little Ice Age. Peaks of persecution coincided with ctitical points of climatic deterioration. Witches, traditionally, were held responsible for the bad weather so dangerous to the precarious agriculture of the pre-industrial period. But it was only in the fifteenth century that church and government officials acknowledged the reality of that crime. The 1420s, the 1450s and the last two decades of the fifteenth century - well-known in the history of climate - were decisive years in which secular and ecclesiastical authorities increasingly346 WOLFGANG BEHRINGER accepted the existence of weather-making witches. During the “cumulative sequences of coldness” in the years 1560-1574, 1583-1589 and 1623-1630, and again 1678-1698 (Pfister, 1988), people demanded the eradication of the witches whom they held responsible for climatic aberrations. Obviously, it was the impact of the Little Ice Age which increased the pressure from below and made part of the intellectual élite believe in the existence of witchcraft. So it possible to say: witchcraft was the unique crime of the Little Ice Age. The witch-hunts of the early modem period were continuously accompanied by discussions about theological interpretations and natural reasons of meteorological events (Alber/Bidembach, 1562; Weyer, 1563; Sigwart, 1602; Schopff, 1603; Hossmann, 1612; Sigwart, 1613). Although the theological discussions followed their own logic, it will be suggested here that the discussion of witchcraft influenced the emerging science of meteorology. During the last three decades of the fifteenth century, the question regarding the possibility of influencing the weather by means of witchcraft counted among the most prominent topies of demonology. The Malleus maleficarum propagated the idea that hailstorms could be caused by witches though only with the help of a Brae Yosd »® o K No: Figure 3, Witches onuse a halstorm, Illustration from the ttle page of Ulrich Moliteris' De lanis et phitontts mulieribus [Concerning Witties and Sorceresses), Cologne, 1489,\WITCH.HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLE ICE AGE ON MENTALITIBS 347 demons and the permission of God. Opponents of such ideas, like Ulrich Molitoris in his famous and often reprinted De laniis et phitonicis mulieribus, though containing the first woodcuts of weather-making witches, flatly denied the possibility of artificial influence on the weather. Since this topic was the centre of Molitoris’ argumentation, his treatise could be seen as one of the first printed books about weather. It is important to notice that the new science of meteorology emerged in the context of an ardent theological and demonological debate about the origins of the weather, At the beginning of the sixteenth century this debate was shaped by the Opusculum de sagis maleficis by Martin Plantsch, the nominalist theologian at the University of Tubingen, who excluded demons from meteorology (Plantsch, 1507). Early meteorotogi es often abstained from any allusion to witchcraft and the demonological debate; the Nuremberg book Von warer erkantnus des Wetters {Of True Knowledge About the Weather] is a good example. However, the avoidance of even a passing reference to the influences of witchcraft automatically provided an implicit comment on the ongoing demonological debate. This publication of an otherwise little-known author, Leonhard Reynmann, and its 17 reprints since 1505, contributed enormously to the secularization and rationalization of the topic. Nuremberg and its strong humanist patriciate traditionally ridiculed the possibility of weather-making witches. Although the Imperial city, like Swiss or Italian city-republics, owned considerable rural territory, nobody was burned there for suspected witchcraft during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Town councilor Willibald Pirckheimer (1470-1530) ridiculed Dominican inquisitors and witch-beliefs in his satires. His friend, Albrecht Dier (1471-1528), produced woodcuts treating, the topic as a secularized subject for presenting attractive women in the nude. Even the poet Hans Sachs (1494-1576) exposed belief in witches as a bad dream or demonic illusion without material reality (Kunstmann, 1970). ‘Two of thirteen chapters in Reynmann’s book, simply entitled Werterbiichlein [Weather Booklet} since 1514, exclusively discuss the natural causes of thunderstorms and hailstorms. While preachers of all denominations talked about demonic causes of climate as late as the eighteenth century, they mostly denied the possibility of witchcraft (Ganshorn, 1672; Stoeltzlin, 1692). After the Age of the Witches” Hammer, a tradition of exclusively secular explanations tried to find an escape from the dangerous paradigm of scapegoating by simply neglecting demonological items. The lesson to be learned from the sixteenth century - that only God or nature is responsible for major changes of the climate - still seems to be actual in our own time when in the eyes of many, ecological sins substitute the moral sins of the confessional ages. From what we know about the Little Ice Age, we should leam the danger of agitating eschatological fears related to climatic changes.348, WOLFGANG BEHRINGER References ‘Agobard of Lyons: ‘Contra insulsam vali opinionem de grandine et tonitruis’, in Migne, J. P. (6d), Patrologiae cursus completas, Series Latina, Paris, 104, cls. 187-158 Alber, M, and Bidembach, W.: 1362, Bin Summa etlicher Predigen vom Hagel und Unkolden, ‘gethon in der Pfarvrch suo Stottgarton im Monae Augusto, Anno MCLXII [..] sehr natlich und traslichzuo diser Zeit :uo lesen, TObingea. Angelis, A: 1598, Pheuerungs-Spiege, Hambure ‘Aukarloo, B. and Hemningsen, G. (ds 1987, Haxornas Eurgpa 1400-1700, Historska ock antropologiska stuier, Nowiska Bokhandein, Lund (and 1990, Barty Modern European Witcheraft Centres and Peripheries, Oxford University Press, Oxfoe). {Anon.|: 1562a, Uber die grossen wd erschrecKichen Zeichen am Himmel und auff Brden / so in artser Zeit geschehon sind, Leipzig, [Anon] 15626, Ersolveetiche Niwe Znng. Warhaffiger und grindlicher berck, wie das Wetter im Wirtenborger Land so grossen Schade getan [Text edition in Bohringer, 1988}. [Anon]: 1563, Warhapiige und Ersclveethenliche Thatten and Handlungen der 63 Hexen und Cnholden, s0 zu Wiesenteig mit dem Brandt gerichet worden seind [Text edition in Behringer, 1988) [Anon 1580, Zo Newe Zerg was man fir Hexen und Unholden verbrendt hat [Tex edition in Beringer, 1988} [Anon]: 1583, Warhaftige und glaubwirdige Zevtung. Von Hundert und vier und dreyssig ‘Unholden / so umb trer Zaubereyhalben /verbrennet worden. Strasbourg [Tex eon i bringer, 1988 [Anon : 1590, Brweyterte Unholden Zettung [Text edition in Behringer, 1988). [Anon : 1603, Ein Warhagte Zetune vo lichen Hexen oder Unholden, welehe man karl tm Sift Main, zu Acheburg, Dipperck, Ou, ROnshofen auch andern Orton verbrend, waas Utes sie gst und belannd haben, Frankfurt ams Main. [Anon,|: 1616, Zo Hexenseing. Die ers aus dem Bisthumb Wirsburg, das ist: Grandliche Exzehlurg, wie der Bischoff zu Warcburg das Hexenbrennen in Franckenlande angefargen wie er ase for treibon wid das ungeife gentslich ausroten wil [., Tabiagen. [Anon.|: 1627, Draten Zeinung. Verlouff/ was sich hin und wieder im Frankenand / Bambers und ‘Wirtzburg mit den Unkolden / and denen / so sich auts Eh und Galt its muhtwillig dem teufel ergeben / denechuirdiges zugetragen / auch wie sie zulett ihren Lok empfangen haben / Gesangweissgestellet/Im Thon ie man die Dorothea sing, Schmalkalden [acually Nuremberg} (Anon: 1629, Kurtcer und walrhaffiger Bericht und ersehveckliche Neue Zeitung vor sechshundert Hexen, Zauberern und Teufelsbannern, welche der Bischof von Bamberg hat ‘erbrennon lassen /was sien gilicher sad peinlicher Froge bekannt. Auch hat der Bischof im Sit Warburg ber die mun hunder verbrenren lassen, Baber Appleby, A. B: 1980, “Epidemies and Famine Inthe Lite Tee Age’, Journal of Interascipinary History 10, 643-663 Bader, G.: 1945, Die Hexengrozese in der Schwvis Affe. Behringer, W.: 1987 (1988, 1997), Hesenverfolgung in Bayern. Volksmagle, Gloubonseljer und Staatsrason in der frdhen Neuzet, Okéenbourg, Monich (and 1997, Witcheraft Persecutions in Bavaria, Popular Magic, Religious Zealotry and Reason of Sate in Early Modern Europe, Cambridge University Press, Combridge. Behinger, W.(,): 1988 (1995), Hexen und Hesenprozese in Deutschland, dv, Munich. Behvingce. W.: 1995, “Weather, Hunger and Fear. The Origins of the European Witch Persecution is Climate, Society ané Mentality German History 18,127 Behringer, W.: 1998, Hexen. Glaube- Verolgung - Vermarknung, C. H. Beck, Munich Bidenbach (si), W.: [1570] ‘Wie zar Zeit der Theweung und Hungersnoth die einfatige Pfarer und Kirchendiener das Volk ermahnen, lehren und tostensolle’, in Bidembach, F. (€4,), 1608, Consliorum theolagicorum deeas, Frankfurt am Main, HI, pp. 168-175.(WITCH -HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLEICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 349. Binsfeld, P.: 1589, Tractotus ce confessionibus maleficarum et sagarum, Teer. Binsfeld, P: 1392, Tractat von Bekanntnuss der Zauberer und Hexen, Munich Blauert, A: 1989, Frithe Hexenverfolgungen. Ketzer, Zauberel- und Hexenprocesse des 15. “Jahrhunderts, Junius, Fambur. Blocker, M.: 1982, “Wetterzauber. Zu einem Glaubenskomplex des frhen Mittelalters', Franeta, 117-131 Bodin, 1: 1580, De la Démonomanie des Soreiers, Paris, and 1581, De Magorum Daemonomania, Strasbourg, Brauner, D. 1377, Vom Donner / Blitz / Hagel und andern grossen Ungewittern [.J, Ext. Brenz, 1: 1557, “Homilia de Grandine’, in Pericopiae evangeliorum quae usitato more in raecipuis Fesislegisolent, Frankfurt ar Main, and 1538, ‘Ein Predig von dem Hagel und Ungewitter’, in Evangelion der firnembsten Fest- und Feyertagen [..J, Prankfurt am Main, and 1565, Predigt vom Hagel, Donner und allem Ungewiter, Strasbourg and Eislsbea, Briggs, R: 1989, Communities of Belief Cultural and Social Tension in Barly Modern France, (Oxford University Press, Oxford. (Clark, $.: 1996, Thinking with Demons. The Idea of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe, Oxford ‘University Press, Oxford Denzinger, I: 1850, “Ausaige aus einer Chronik der Familie Langhans in Zeil’, Arekiv des Historischen Vereins fr Unterranken 40, 143-145, Duhr, B. 1900, Die Sillung der Jesutten in den deutschen Hexenprozessen, Cologne. Elsas, M. J: 1936/49, Umriss einer Geschichte der Preise und Lohne vom cuutgehenden Mittelalter bis sum Beginn des 19, Jahrhunderts, 2 vols, Leiden Fiedler, W.: 1930, ‘Stadien zum antiken Wetterzauber’ (PhD. Diss, University of Worzburg), Bamberg. Flin, V. LJ: 1991, The Rise of Magic in Karly Medieval Europe, Oxford University Press, Oxford Foster, G. M: 1968, ‘Peasant Society and the Image of Limited Good’, American Anthropologist 67, 203-315. Frenzel, B., Pfister, C. and Gliser, B. (eds): 1994, Climatic Trends and Anomalies ix Europe 1675-1713: High Resolution Spatio-Temporal Recensirvctions from Direct Meteorological Observations and Proxy Data; Mothods and Reeults, Placociimate Research, 13, Special Issue 8: European Palacoclimate and Man, Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart. Gaene, W.: 1952, ‘Wetterzauber im spiten Mittclater nach gleichzeitigen bildlichen arstellungen’, Rheinisches Jahrbuch fir Volkskunde 3, 226-273. Ganshom, G. Cs 1672, Donnernder Weter-Knall und auffsteigender Himmels-Schall. Das ist / Richiige Erklaerung / was von Donner-Wettern zu halten(..]. Norember. Gesemann, G: 1913, “Reyenzauber in Deutschland” (PhD. Diss, University of Kiel), Braunschweig. Graus, F: 1987, Pest - Geissler -Juclenmorde, Das 14. Jahrhundert als Krisencet, Vanden Ruprecht, Gastingen Grove, J. M: 1988, The Little ce Age, Methuen, London Hansen, 1: 1900, Zauberwtahn, Inquisition und Hexenprozess im Minelalter und die Enstehung ‘der grossen Hexonverfalgung, Oldenbourg, Munich. Hesselbach, J: 1627, Thewrungs Spiegel Darinnen war kurtelich / aber dock eygentlich und inutclich berichtet wird: Erstlichen was Thewrung. sey darnach woher Thewrung rire und kone /sum drtten wile man sich zu thewrer Zettverhoiten sol, Worzburg. Hoffinann, [: 1907, ‘Die Anschamungen der Kicchenviter Ober Meteorologie” (Ph.D. Diss. University of Tobingea), Tubingen. Hossmana, A.: 1612, De Tonitru et Tempestate, Das ist: Nothwendiger Bericht /Vor Donnern und Hagel-Wettern‘ wanen und woher sich deselben verursachen / Ob sie natirlich: item / Ob Teufel und Zauberer auch Wetter machen kinnen / Durch was mittels sie gestllet und abgewendet werden / Auch was man sich dabey erinnern / und in grossen Ungewittern 20 trosten hat /So wol was von denen zu halten sey / 20 durch solche ungestime Wetter mb itr Leben kommen, Leipzig (and 1618, Magdeburg). ka350 \WOLFGANO BEHRINGER Jams VI of Sctlend: 1597, Daenonalgi inform ofa dialog, Eainbrph Terovecck, G: 1992, Die Hexen nd tir Prozse. Die Hesemerfolgung in der Reichstadt Esslingen (Vabi. Thesi, University of Hannover), Thorbece, Sigmarnge. Kanter, Ps 1992, “La chase aim forces et atx sorlres dans fe pays de Vand, Aspects ua (1581-1620), Rem tors vende 0, 21.33 Kamen, HL: 1971, The ron Coney. Social Change is Europ, 1350-1680, London. Kory A.C and Peters F (ede) 1972 1992"), chr in Europe, 1200-700 4 Dacmentary History, Universi of Pennslvania Pres, Philadelphia Kutna, I. Hs 197, “Zaubertanund Hescaprozess in der Reichstat Nambere ir, D. Diss, University of Main), Schiemene des Stahrcivs Nurnberg 1. Rian, Noremer Lamb 14: 197277, Climate, Present, Past and Future, 2 vols, Mtnaen, London, Lamb, HHL: 1982, Climate History and the Modern Word, Roiledge, London. Lames, C198, cheat and Religion The Potites of Popular Bele, Oxerd Universi Press Onfrd Lchmana, 1986, Twoomighetageschchiche Auswikungen der ‘Kleinen Fist Shieder, W. (el), Volseliiostn im der modemen Sevialgehihte, Vandenhosk & Ruprecht, Govingen, pp. 31:30, Le Roy Ladue: 1967, L's de clint depuis Van mil, Pais and 1971, Times of Feast, Times of Famine: A History of Climate Since the Yeor 1000, Doubleday, New Yor!) Levack, 8. 1987, The Wich Hunt n Barly Moder Ewope, Longman, London Lents, 1615, Grindicher und rethendiger Boi, mas von denen wngestimen tPettrn ‘erderlchen Hagin nd schadlchon Waserfisen mit welchenTetshtand ans een tenn dem 1613 lor erestch heimecacht wor ton sve, St. Mietors Es 1972, Wiel Thing tn Sous Western Gommarg, 1382-1084, The Social and Inlectual Foundations, Stanford University Pres, Stnord (Califor) Molots, U.: 1489, De lone phitniis muloribus,Tevtonie unholden vel heen, [Strasbourg and Catogre Monee, W.: 1976, Wichorjt in France ond Swizerland. The Rordertnds during the Reformation, Corel University Press, isa. Moore, I, R.: 1987, The Formation of a Persecuting Society: Power and Deviance in Western Europe 950-1280, Oxford University Press, Oxford Matte: and Freygang,G: 1676, Dapuatio pen de maps tempesites clenibus, Witenberg Marner, T1512, “Ein age sede’, n [Anon] De Nrron Becoverang [1]. Stasboir. Pfister, C.: 1980, ‘The Little Ice Age: Thermal and Wetness Indices for Central Europe’, Journal of Tntrasipinary Fstory 1, 665-696, Piste, 2 1988, Rimageshiht der Sceiz 125-1860. Dos Klima der Sele von 1525-1860 und seine Bedeutung in der Geschichte von Bevdikerung und Landwirtschaft, Paul Haupt, Bem Pity C. SshwarzZaneti, G. and Wepmion, M1996, “Winter Severity in rope: The Fourteenth Century’, Climate Change 34 91-108 Plansth, M1507, Opuscuon de saps moles, TUbinge. Pot He 1988, Hevenglanbe and Hesenerfoang it Krfirstentam Main, Ein Beir cur Hesenfrage im Ie. und beginenden 17. Jahrhundert, Geschichiche Landeskands 32, VeriagStelner, Wiesbaden. Preinig. J: 1585, Wot loci, TUbingen, Rémy, N. 1595, aemonoar Lyons Reynmann, Ls 1510, Yon warererkanms des Weter, Also das ain jeder, er sey glert oder ungelor, durch alle aurliche anzaiging die Anderung des Wetors aygeniich nd trgenschcintcherkemnare mag, Mich (1510 and 1515, Augsburg and 1517, Nurenbers also 1514, Wetterbachlein, Von warern erkantnus des wetters, Augsburg). Rode, 1: 1580, Craton Bodenken one was Crsacen vergangen Jord itn Thenerang nstanden, Erfurt(WITCH HUNTING: THE IMPACT OF THE LITTLE ICE AGE ON MENTALITIES 351 Robock, A: 1979, “The “Little lee Age”: Northern Hemisphere Average Observations and Model Calealations’, Science 206, 1402-1404. von Rochlitz, M.: 1589, Wettersplegel, Leipzig Rummel, W.: 1991, Bouern, Herren und Hexen. Studien zur Sozialgeschicite sponkeimischer und Iurtrierischer Hesenprocesse, 1574-1664, Vandenhock & Rupeecht, Gottingen, Sealfeld, D.: 1971, ‘Die Wandlungen der Preis- und Lohnstruktur waren des 16, Jarnunderts in Deutschland”, in Fischer, W. (ed), Betrage =u Wirtschajtswackstum und Wirtschaftsstruktur im 16. und 19, Jahrhundert, Berlin, pp. 9-28. Schopil, D.: 1603, Wetter Glicklin, dos ist Erinnerung und Auffimunderung, Wie jetsiger zeit villatige schwere Wetter zubetrachien [..J. Auch werden unter andern digjenige hierinn Widerlegt, £0 solche Wetter den Hexen wid Unholden sroventich und wnbedachtig -zuschretben, Tabingen, Schormann, G.: 1991, Der Krieg gegen die Hexen. Das Ausrotungsprogramm des Kurfursten von Koln, Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, Gottingen Sieftiedus, T.: fea. 1590/94], Hore an new schreckhtich abentheuer Von den Unholden ungehewer: Jn Bisthumb Trier und ander stett [J [facsiaile edition in Henningsen, G, (ed), Fra heksefagt tl heksetult, 1484-1984, Gyldendal, Copenhagen}, Sigwar, J. Gs, 1602, Ein Predigt Vor Reiffen und Gefrost, den 25, Aprits [..) 1602 (als die indchste Tag zuvor, nemblich den 21.,22., und 23. gemelien Mondts das Rebwerck exfroren), EJ, Tobingen. Sigwart, 1G: 1613, Fin Predigt Vom Hagel und Ungewitte, Im Jahr Christt 1613, den 30 May fo] als am Sambstag Abends zwor Nachnittag vor $ Uhven ein schrdcHlicher Hagel ‘gefaen [..}, Tubingen. Spee, F.] 1631, Cautio Criminals seu de processibus contra sagas liber, Rinteln. Stimpfli, P: 1992, Nasses Korn, saurer Wein. Witterungsrekonsirutsion far Witrtemberg 1625- 1633 anhand des Tagebuehs von Friedrich Rutel und der Einfluss der Witerung auf Wirtschaft und Bevélkerung, Lic. Thesis, Univesity of Ber, Stocltalin, B.: 1653, ‘Christiche Erinnerung vom Hagel’, in Geistickes Donner- und Wetter Buechlin[..], Nuremberg, chap. VI (and 1692, Ulm, pp. 238-247). Tschaikner, M.: 1992, ‘Damit das Base ausgerostet werd’. Hexenverfoigungen in Vorarlberg. im 16, nnd I7. Jahrhundert, Voralberger Autorengesellschaf, Bregenz. Weyer, J: 1563, De praestigiis daemonum et incantationibus ae venefcits Libri sex, Basel (1564, 1368, 1377 and 1383, Basel and 1586 Frankfur am Min), Lenz, E. (04. 1964, Die Taten der Trier. Gesta Treverorum, Teer Ziegelet, Ws 1973, Moglichteiten der Krtik am Zauber~ wd Hesenwesen im ausgehenden Mintelalter, BOblau, Cologne. (Received 29 Apel 1998; in revised form 17 May 1999)