Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Feb 2009
384 pages
Genre: History, Current Affairs and Religion
Publication Information
On the night of the festive holiday of Shrove Tuesday in 1672 Anna Fessler died after eating one of her neighbor's buttery cakes. Could it have been poisoned? Drawing on vivid court documents, eyewitness accounts, and an early autopsy report, historian Thomas Robisheaux brings the story to life. Exploring one of Europe's last witch panics, he unravels why neighbors and the court magistrates became convinced that Fessler's neighbor Anna Schmieg was a witch—one of several in the area—ensnared by the devil.
Once arrested, Schmieg, the wife of the local miller, and her daughter were caught up in a high-stakes drama that led to charges of sorcery and witchcraft against the entire family. Robisheaux shows how ordinary events became diabolical ones, leading magistrates to torture and turn a daughter against her mother. In so doing he portrays an entire world caught between superstition and modernity.
"Starred Review. Drawing on rich records of the trials of Schmeig and her family, Robisheaux finely crafts a vivid glimpse of a time, place and state of mind that, though remote, is all too familiar." - Publishers Weekly.
"The reader might wish for a modern medical opinion on why Anna's supposed victim died, but this is only a minor omission from a superb work." - Library Journal.
"Robisheaux's work offers a fascinating way of understanding witchcraft 'at the level where real life was lived.' Compelling social and legal history." - Kirkus Reviews.
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Thomas Robisheaux, a professor of history at Duke University, is also the author of Rural Society and the Search for Order in Early Modern Germany. He lives in Durham, North Carolina.
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