Arrianna

The question in this case isn't whether witchcraft is real only whether what was being reported and people were executed for was witchcraft (generally). It looks like the answer is likely to be no. Especially during times when there was a surge in accusations.


And yeah, I find the bit about the French revolution to make a great deal of sense myself.

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Sazuka

Yeah, what was the test for being a witch? Being tied to a chair and thrown into a lake. If you float... WITCH. If not... well, not a witch... and you probably die.

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Peach_follows

Its an interesting theory. And, its very impressive how much information you have on the topic. Is quite a concept to think that the notion of werewolves maybe based on mass hallucinations.

However, I believe witches, and witchcraft is very real and powerful. And the practice of spell casting did\does exsist. I dont dobt that there were probably many women falsely accused of being a "Witch". And wouldn't that be sad if witch hunts were induced by a poisoned society?

VERY INTERSTING!

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PsiKnot

Witches, and werewolves, and vampires.... oh my!

They are very real the catholic church was just much better at catching them back then. I think the decline in witch trials can be directly contributed to the diminishing global influence of the chuch.

I bet witches were responsible for infecting the rye to begin with....they got what they deserved.

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Arrianna

You're trying to hard again Psiknot. :lol:

I'm sure they wanted to be poisoned along with everyone else just so they could be burned at the stake.

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PsiKnot

Witchcraft, advanced bioengineering, not all that different if you ask me.

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ska_lives

hmm, ergot, its been a good while since ive heard anything about that mentioned. Thanks for refreshing my memory on the subject. I do believe that is some circumstances that this would have been the cause of supposed witch curses, at the same time you have to note that science today does not have all of the knowledge that was there at that time and of the knowledge lost alot could be related to the occult things like witchcraft. Im sure youve heard of voodoo priests and zombie powder hmm? Be that as it may there could very well have been people versed enough in strange forms of science to create concoctions of varied enough sorts to cause alot of the things associated with witch craft sans the outright absurd(flying etc.) If memory serves I also believe that there is a disease that science has recently begun to associate with the legends of vampirism, its the one where the symptoms involve a pale complexion and extreme sensitivity to sunlight.

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Hassun

I think strange behavior because of the ergot could have certainly been a good reason for many to believe the symptoms were caused by a curse (e.g. from a witch.)
On the other hand, I think most of the witch accusations/hunts had absolutely nothing to do with ergot at all.

From what I've seen/read, the bases on accusing someone of witchcraft were diverse and strange behaviour was usually not even necessary to become a target of inquisition.

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