Skip to content
Libra Esoterica

Witchcraft, Demonology and Magic

by Marina Montesano

  • First published:
  • 21st century
  • Language: English

Description

Description from Directory of Open Access Books (opens in a new tab)

Witchcraft and magic are topics of enduring interest for many reasons. The main one lies in their extraordinary interdisciplinarity: anthropologists, folklorists, historians, and more have contributed to build a body of work of extreme variety and consistence. Of course, this also means that the subjects themselves are not easy to assess. In a very general way, we can define witchcraft as a supernatural means to cause harm, death, or misfortune, while magic also belongs to the field of supernatural, or at least esoteric knowledge, but can be used to less dangerous effects (e.g., divination and astrology). In Western civilization, however, the witch hunt has set a very peculiar perspective in which diabolical witchcraft, the invention of the Sabbat, the persecution of many thousands of (mostly) female and (sometimes) male presumed witches gave way to a phenomenon that is fundamentally different from traditional witchcraft. This Special Issue of Religions dedicated to Witchcraft, Demonology, and Magic features nine articles that deal with four different regions of Europe (England, Germany, Hungary, and Italy) between Late Medieval and Modern times in different contexts and social milieus. Far from pretending to offer a complete picture, they focus on some topics that are central to the research in those fields and fit well in the current “cumulative concept of Western witchcraft” that rules out all mono-causality theories, investigating a plurality of causes.

Provenance

Why this book is in the catalog

Included because retained bibliographic metadata links this work to Astrology, Demonology, angelology, and possession, Divination and oracles, Occultism and esotericism, Ritual magic and grimoires, and Witchcraft and folk magic.

  • Occultism and esotericism

    Retained metadata contains “esoteric” in the description and “supernatural” in the description.

    • “esoteric”· in description
    • “supernatural”· in description
  • Ritual magic and grimoires

    Retained metadata contains “Magic” in the title, “Magic” in the description, “Magic” in the subject metadata, and 3 additional metadata match(es).

    • “Magic”· in title
    • “Magic”· in description
    • “Magic”· in subject
    • “Ritual magic”· in subject
    • “Spells”· in subject
    • “Magic”· in edition title
  • Witchcraft and folk magic

    Controlled discovery queries from crossref and doab matched “witchcraft”. Retained metadata contains “Witchcraft” in the title, “Witchcraft” in the description, “witches” in the description, and 2 additional metadata match(es).

    • “witchcraft”· via Crossref
    • “witchcraft”· via Directory of Open Access Books
    • “Witchcraft”· in title
    • “Witchcraft”· in description
    • “witches”· in description
    • “Witchcraft”· in subject
  • Astrology

    Controlled discovery queries from doab matched “astrology”. Retained metadata contains “Astrology” in the description.

    • “astrology”· via Directory of Open Access Books
    • “Astrology”· in description
  • Divination and oracles

    Retained metadata contains “Divination” in the description and “Divination” in the subject metadata.

    • “Divination”· in description
    • “Divination”· in subject
  • Demonology, angelology, and possession

    Controlled discovery queries from crossref and doab matched “demonology”. Retained metadata contains “Demonology” in the title, “Demonology” in the description, “Demonology” in the subject metadata, and 3 additional metadata match(es).

    • “demonology”· via Crossref
    • “demonology”· via Directory of Open Access Books
    • “Demonology”· in title
    • “Demonology”· in description
    • “Demonology”· in subject
    • “Exorcism”· in subject

Membership records how this book met the catalog’s discovery criteria — relevance to a tradition, not a judgment of the book’s claims.

Read & download

Where a scan or ebook exists, it is listed here.

No public full text is known for this record.

None of our sources reported a scan or ebook. It may exist elsewhere — these searches are a good next step.

Buy or borrow

Links to ISBN 3039289594; other editions may be cheaper. WorldCat shows libraries near you that hold a copy.

Editions

One edition cataloged here.

Crossref publisher-supplied book record

2020-05-20MDPIEnglish
  • 9783039289592
  • 9783039289608
Open access

Subjects

60 subject headings

Identifiers & provenance

How this record was assembled, and the authority identifiers it carries.

Catalog id
crossref:10.3390/books978-3-03928-960-8
Edition coverage
Multi source partial
Retrieved