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Article
Witchraft Historiography (review)
Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft
  • Michael D. Bailey, Iowa State University
Document Type
Book Review
Publication Version
Published Version
Publication Date
7-1-2008
DOI
10.1353/mrw.0.0098
Abstract

This important collection should be of interest to almost all readers of this journal. There have been countless book-length studies, and no few general surveys, of the history of European witchcraft and witch-hunting from the fifteenth through eighteenth centuries. The historiography of witchcraft, however, has received much less attention, and always in journal or encyclopedia articles, or as sections within books. This is hardly unusual. Book-length historiographies are rare. Yet the historiography of witchcraft is exceptionally fascinating. As the editors note, few other topics have engaged so directly with so many different methods and approaches to doing history. Especially given that much of the work in witchcraft studies is relatively recent (the field really came alive in the 1970s), the number of major methodological problems confronted (and contested) is impressive.

Comments

This is a book review from Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft 3 (2008): 81, doi:10.1353/mrw.0.0098. Posted with permission.

Rights
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of scholarly citation, none of this work may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher. For information address the University of Pennsylvania Press, 3905 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112.
Copyright Owner
University of Pennsylvania Press
Language
en
File Format
application/pdf
Citation Information
Michael D. Bailey. "Witchraft Historiography (review)" Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft Vol. 3 Iss. 1 (2008) p. 81 - 85
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/michael_bailey/18/