Author Description

Scholars estimate that between 30,000 to 100,000 executions occurred in early Modern Europe. What was the crime? The treason of Witchcraft. Historians also estimate that between 75 and 85 percent of those accused, tried, and executed for Witchcraft after the 16th Century were women. Questions of gender are raised in light of these figures; why over this period in European history, particularly during the theological upsurge in the Protestant Reformation, were most charges in the practice of Witchcraft brought against women? The three areas that need to be evaluated in order to answer this question are sex, gender and fear in early modern Europe.