Halloween Countdown - 4 & 3

(Eek)
Sorry to my little pumpkins out there for falling behind on my Halloween posts, but I do have a life you know ...
(not really, I just want you to think that I do).

Origin Of The Werewolf Legend

During the middle ages, especially from the 15th to 17th century, Europe was under the dark shadow of ignorance and superstitions. Towns were underdeveloped and always surrounded by woods. The fear of wolves was like a nightmare. Their attacks were so frequent and atrocious in nature that people even feared to travel from one place to another. Every morning, countryside people would find half-eaten human limbs scattered on their fields.

The first recorded Werewolf sighting took place around the countryside of German town Colongne and Bedburg in 1591. An age-old pamphlet describes those shivering moments vividly. A few people had cornered a large wolf and set their dogs upon it. They started to pierce it with sharp sticks and spears. Surprisingly the ferocious wolf did not run away or try to protect itself, rather it stood up and turned out to be a middle-aged man. His name was Peter Stubbe
(also known as Stumpp) and he was from the same village.

Stubbe was put on a torture wheel where he confessed to sixteen murders including two pregnant women and thirteen children. The history behind his downfall was rather bizarre. He had started to practice sorcery when he was only 12 and was so obsessed with it that he even tried to make a pact with the Devil. Wearing a magic girdle he started to attack his enemies, real or imaginary. After several months he took the guise of a wolf and continued his evil acts with more brutality. In the wolf form he use to tear up his victims’ throats and suck warm blood from veins. Gradually his thirst for blood grew and he roamed around the fields in search of prey.

The savagery of his crimes was beyond imagination.
The trial record mentioned a few of them.

• Once, two men and a woman were walking along a road that went through the forest that Stubbe used to hide in. He called one of them into the forest. When the first man did not return, the second one followed his trail and also disappeared into the forest - the woman ran for her life. Later, two mangled male corpses were recovered from the forest, but the woman’s body never reappeared. It was believed that Stubbe had devoured her.
• Young girls playing together or milking the cows in the fields were his frequent victims. He use to chase them down like a hound. He would catch the slowest one, rape and kill her, then he would drink her hot blood and eat the tender flesh from her body.
• However; the most gruesome sin he committed was upon his own son. He took him to a nearby forest, cracked the poor child’s skull open and ate the brain from it.

No punishment could match the magnitude of Stubbe’s crime. His flesh was pulled off with red-hot pincers, his arms and legs were broken and he was finally decapitated. His carcass was burned to ashes.

The Magistrate of Bedburg built a grim monument to remember the ghastly incident. Workmen put the torture wheel atop of a tall pole with Stubbe’s head above it, structured with the likeliness of a wolf. Sixteen pieces of yard-long wood cuts were hung from the rim of the wheel to commemorate the poor souls of all his victims. Word of Stubbe’s trial and execution spread across the land.

His brutality, atrocity and savagery were beyond human comprehension and was readily related with the behavior of a wolf. People started to believe that such individuals were living among them in the shadows ... They named them Werewolves.

Read more about Werewolves
Read more about Peter Stubbe





Witches

One of the more enduring symbols of Halloween, horror and folklore is that of the Witch. Ugly and evil, they are shown flying on their broomsticks, or stirring their cauldrons. Witches were thought of as ugly because evil is ugly.

The focus of witchcraft on medieval women can be seen in what have become the symbols of witchcraft: the broom, the cauldron and the cat. All of these are associated with the household and women's work.

Witchcraft is defined in dictionaries as the human exercise of alleged supernatural powers (sorcery). A woman believed to have such powers may be called a witch or sorceress. Although the man should be called a male witch, some people use the names: wizard, sorcerer or warlock.
Witches were not always thought of as evil or ugly. In ancient times, witches could be healers or wise women of the community. But as Christianity spread, they were often condemned because their power supposedly came from somewhere other than God.

Later, accusations of witchcraft often were used as a way to keep talented, intelligent women from threatening the male supremacy. They also could be used to make people toe the line with regard to community standards. Anyone who was thought of as different or rebellious could be accused.
Thus men were often accused as much as women.

Following the advice in the witch hunting manual Malleus Maleficarum - The Hammer of Witches - witch hunters used a variety of tests to try the accused. Believing that a witch wouldn't bleed when cut, they employed a variety of instruments to test this theory.
The book was written by two monks and it was a text that instructed Inquisitors how to question suspected witches and how to force a confession from them. So intense was the power of the Malleus Maleficarum that it is believed that over six million people died in Europe due to its teachings; many such individuals being women and children. Further, many deaths were from the result of torture; suspected witches were tortured with a number of implements and techniques including being drawn and quartered, and being burned alive. This period came to be known as the burning times.

Confession under torture was another favorite. Using a variety of grisly devices, the witch hunter would try to extract a confession from the victim. Although torture was sometimes held in secret, it often was a public spectacle, providing entertainment for the masses.

Birthmarks were often seen as the mark of the Devil. In a voyeuristic show, hunters would strip their victims before the crowd to inspect for the Devil's marks.

Another test, often shown in medieval woodcuts, involved dunking - or worse, throwing - women into a pond or well. If they floated , it was thought that they had been rejected by the water of baptism and thus were witches. If they sunk, it indicated that they were innocent. Of course, this could also involve drowning, but at least they were innocent and their soul was saved.

While witch-hunts are thought of as a medieval phenomenon, the height of the atrocities actually occurred between the 15th and 18th centuries. In fact, it was not until 1320 that the Church officially declared witchcraft as a heresy.

One of the most famous women to be condemned to death for witchcraft was
Joan of Arc; in 1431, Joan of Arc, who was continually accused of being a witch because of her ability to hear voices speaking to her, was burned at the stake. By 1486 however, the witch hunt craze had been born with the writing of the Malleus Maleficarum.

While there is no definitive answer as to the number of people tried for witchcraft, it seems safe to say that tens of thousands - perhaps as many as hundreds of thousands were victimized.

United States History: The Witches of Salem

Currently, individuals who practice the earth-based religion of Wicca are called witches. Wiccans practice the philosophy of harming none and believe in the karmic principles of universal balance. Additionally, Wiccans believe in the inherent right to have free will.

Witchcraft increased in popularity around the time that witches like Gerald Gardner and Doreen Valiente began writing about pagan practices and principles in the 1950’s. At last count, there were over 250,000 Wiccans globally and the number increases each year. Further, such individuals claim their origins as being that of a pre-Christian origin and view the burning times as emblematic of ignorance.