Beyond All Human Reason
Part of the broader witch hunts that swept across Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Basque witch trials unfolded much like their counterparts elsewhere. However, these witch trials were halted by an unlikely hero: a member of the Spanish Inquisition. In this episode, I bring you the story of the Basque witch trials and the inquisitor who put a stop to them.
Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben, with original music by Purple Planet.
Music
Purple Planet - Chimera
Purple Planet - Seventh Curse
Purple Planet - Tormented
Purple Planet - Sense of Loss
Purple Planet - Shadowlands
Sources
Primary
The Salazar Documents: Inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frias and Others on the Basque Witch Persecution. Edited by Gustav Henningsen. Cultures, Beliefs, and Traditions: Medieval and Early Modern Peoples, 21. Boston: Brill, 2004.
Secondary
Barandiarán Irízar, Luis de, ed. A View from The Witch's Cave: Folktales of The Pyrenees. Reno: University of Nevada Press, 1991.
Barandiarán, J. M. Selected Writings of José Miguel de Barandiarán: Basque Prehistory and Ethnography. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies, 2007.
Baroja, Julio Caro. Las brujas y su mundo. Madrid: Alianza, 1990.
Briggs, Robin. Witches and Neighbours: The Social and Cultural Context of European Witchcraft. New York: Harper Collins, 2002.
Gibbons, J. Recent Developments in the Study of the Great European Witch Hunt. Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies 13, no. 5 (1998): 2-16.
Henningsen, Gustav. “The Greatest Witch-Trial of All: Navarre, 1609-14.” History Today 30, no. 11 (November 1980): 36–39.
Henningsen, Gustav. The Witches' Advocate: Basque Witchcraft and the Spanish Inquisition (1609-1614). Reno: University of Nevada Press, 1980.
Homza, Lu Ann. Village Infernos and Witches' Advocates: Witch-Hunting in Navarre, 1608-1614. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2022.
Levack, Brian P. “The Decline and End of Witchcraft Prosecutions.” In Witchcraft and Magic in Europe: Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Vol 5, edited by M. Gijswijt-Hofstra, Brian P. Levack and Roy Porter, 3–93. London: Athlone Press, 1999.
Levack, Brian P. The Witchcraft Sourcebook. New York: Routledge, 2005.
Lovig, Heather M. “Healing through Remembrance: An Embodied Exploration of the Basque Witch Burning Times.” Dissertation. Order No. 10742947, Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2017.
Kamen, Henry. “Notas sobre brujería y sexualidad y la Inquisición,” In Inquisición española y mentalidad inquisitorial, edited by A. Alcalá, 226–36. Barcelona, 1983.
Kieckhefer, Richard. European Witch Trials: Their Foundations in Popular and Learned Culture, 1300-1500. Berkley, CA: University of California Press, 1976.
Kurlansky, M. The Basque History of the World. Toronto: Knopf, 1999.
Maxwell-Stuart, P. G. Witch Hunters: Professional Prickers, Unwitchers and Witch Finders of the Renaissance. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Tempus, 2003.
Pearl, Jonathan L. The Crime of Crimes: Demonology and Politics in France 1560–1620. Waterloo, Ont: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1999.
Pearl, Jonathan L. “French Catholic Demonologists and their Enemies in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries.” Church History 52, no. 4 (1983): 457-467.
Sanders, Andrew. A Deed Without a Name: The Witch in Society and History. Oxford: Berg, 1995.
Scholz Williams, Gerhild. Defining Dominion: The Discourses of Magic and Witchcraft in Early Modern France and Germany. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995.
Summers, Montague. The Geography of Witchcraft. Evanston, IL: University Books, 1958.
Summers, Montague. The History of Witchcraft and Demonology. London: Routledge, 1996.
Wilby, Emma. Invoking the Akelarre: Voices of the Accused in the Basque Witch-Craze, 1609-1614. Eastbourne: Sussex Academic Press, 2019.
