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An End to Witch Trials in Austria: Reconsidering the Enlightened State

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2009

Edmund M. Kern
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Extract

For a Long time, scholars of witch-hunting presented Enlightenment political reforms as a kind of ”cure” for the “craze” of witchcraft, but despite these efforts, relatively little attention was truly paid to the end of witch-hunting. Without were formulated, historians attributed changes in state policy to an emerging skepticism and rationalism within the judicial and political elites of Europe.1 At times, scholars focus upon specific, local trials in which a loss of confidence emerged among those hearing witchcraft cases, but somewhat more frequently, they examine specific regions in which, they claim, scientific values and attitudes fostered skepticism among the elites formulating policies on the crime of witchcraft.2 Although there is an undeniable validity to both approaches, their conclusions are not without controversy. Several scholars have pointed out that judicial skepticism toward the crime of witchcraft emerged even before widespread intellectual change, and they have noted that the centralization of judicial administrations led to a decrease in the number and intensity of trials well in advance of enlightened thinking.

Type
Forum: Counter-Reformation, Reform Catholicism, and the Enlightenment
Information
Austrian History Yearbook , Volume 30 , January 1999 , pp. 159 - 185
Copyright
Copyright © Center for Austrian Studies, University of Minnesota 1999

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References

1 See, in particular,Robert, Mandrou's Magistrats et sorciers en France au 17e siècle (Paris,1968), which presents a well-researched and nuanced version of this thesis.Google Scholar Two recent surveys by American scholars advance it in general terms: Joseph, Klaits, Servants of Satan (Bloomington, Ind., 1985), 156–76Google Scholar, and Brian, Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe, 2n ed. (NewYork, 1995), 239–46.Google Scholar See also Monter, E. William, Ritual, Myth, and Magic in Early Modern Europe (Athens, Ohio, 1983), 114–29;Google ScholarBrian, Easlea, Witch Hunting, Magic, and the New Philosophy: An Introduction to Debates of the Scientific Revolution, 1450–1750 (Atlantic Highlands, N.J., 1980);Google ScholarEdward, Peters, The Magician, the Witch, and the Law (Philadelphia, 1978), 202–12;Google ScholarKeith, Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York, 1971);Google Scholar and Trevor-Rober, H. R., “The European Witch-Craze” in The European Witch-Craze of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (New York, 1967), 90–192.Google Scholar What we would recognize as blunter examples of this approach can also be seen in the work of earlier generations of historians: George, Lincolon Burr, Joseph, Hansen, Henry, Charles Lea, Soldan, W. G. and Heinrich, Heppe, and Lynn, Throndike. An important recent exception to the trend is Ian Bostridge's examination of England, “Witchcraft Repealed”, in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief, ed. Jonathan, Barry, Marianne, Hester, AND Gareth, Roberts (Cambridge, Eng., 1996), 309–34.Google Scholar

2 SeeLevack, 's discussion in “The Great Witch-Hunt”, in Handbook of European History, 1400–1600, vol. 2: Late Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Reformation, ed. Brady, Thomas A. Jr., Oberman, Heiko A., and Tracy, James D. (Leiden, 1995), 631–33,Google Scholar as well as Alfred, Soman's contributions in “Decriminalizing Witchcraft: Does the French Experience Furnish a European Model?” Acta Ethnographica Hungarica 37, nos.1–4 (1991/1992): 379–400.Google Scholar Recent works describing a local loss of confidence include Eva, Labouvie, Zauberei und Hexenwerk. Ländlicher Hexenglaube in der frühen Neuzeit (Frankfurt am Main, 1993)Google Scholar, and Robin, Briggs, Witches and Neighbors: The Social and Cultural Context of European Witchcraft (New York, 1996).Google Scholar Both Wolfgang, Behringer, Hexenverfolgung in Bayern. Volksmagie, Glaubenseifer und Staatsräson in der Frühen Neuzeit (Munich, 1998)Google Scholar, and Hans de, Waardt, Toverij en Samenleving. Holland, 1500–1800 (The Hague, 1991), attempt to balance discussions of local resistance and skeptical elite discourses. For works emphasizing elite formulations,Google Scholar see note 1 above, as well as Hartmut, Lehmann, “Hexenverfolgungen und Hexenprozesse in Alten Reich zwischen Reformation und Aufklärung,” Jahrbuch des Instituts für deutsche Geschichte der Universitäts Tel-Aviv 7 (1978): 13–70;Google ScholarBernd, Roeck, “Christlicher Idealstaat und Hexenwahn. Zum Ende der europäischen Verfolgungen,” Historisches Jahrbuch 108, no. 2 (1988): 379–405Google Scholar; Hartmut, Lehmann and Otto, Ulbricht, eds., Vom Unfug des Hexenprocesses. Gegner der Hexenverfolgungen von Johann Weyer bis Friedrich Spee (Wiesbaden, 1992)Google Scholar; and Sönke, Lorenz, Bauer, Dieter R., AND Gerald, Maier, eds., Das Ende der Hexenverfolgung (Stuttgart, 1995).Google Scholar

3 For an example of scholarly debate on this topic, see the important works on France byAlfred, Soman, “Les Procès de sorcellerie au Parlement de Paris(1565–1640),” Annales 32 (1977): 790–814Google Scholar“The Parliament of Paris and the Great Witch Hunt (1565–1640),” Sixteenth Century Journal 9, no 2 (1978): 31–44;Google Scholar and “Decriminalizing Witchcraft”; as well as those by Robin, Briggs, Communities of Belief: Cultural and Social Tension in Early Modern France (New York, 1989), 13–14, and Witches and Neighbors, 331–37.Google Scholar Soman doubts that the decline of witchcraft trials in France resulted from any intellectual revolution, as Mandrou suggests (see note 1); instead he emphasizes political centralization and details how magistrates in Paris pushed for restrictionson regional courts as early as 1588–thirty-six years earlier than Mandrou's “turning point.” Briggs makes fruitful use of Soman's research. John Tedeschi has made a similar point about the Roman Inquisition in Italy, whose centralized and bureaucratic procedures reduced the prosecution of witches; see his “Inquisitorial Law and the Witch,” in Early Modern European Witchcraft, Bengt, Ankarloo and Gustav, Henningsen (New York, 1990), 83–118Google Scholar. Both Behringer, Hexenver-folgung in Bayern, and de Waardt, Toverji en Samenleving, chart the lack of interest (among some intellectual elites) in prosecuting witches in Bavaria and Holland before the spread of enlightened values.

4 Artikel von der Zauberey, Hexerey, Wahrsagerey, und dergleichen. I have used throughout a copy available in the Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv (hereafter SLA) in Graz, cataloged under Patente und Kurrenden (hereafter PK) 1766-XI-5. Since the document is unpaginated, I have added page numbers in order to clarify some references, but in order to avoid an undue number of footnotes, I have not cited every direct reference when context alone makes clear its location within the document. This patent was drawn up initially for inclusion in a new compilation of penal law, but was issued before the completed document; it is thus also reprinted as Artikel 58 in the Constitutio Criminalis Theresiana (Oder der römish-kaiserl. zu Hungarn und Bohaim.u.u.königl. apost.Majestät Mariä Theresiä Erzherzogin zu Oesterreich u.u. peinliche Gerichtsordnung) (Vienna, 1769), 167–73, presented to the empress on Dec.31, 1766, and published for the first time in 1768.Google Scholar

5 Fritz, Byloff, Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung in den österreichischen Alpenländern (Berlin, 1934),22, 44Google Scholar; Das Verbrechen der Zauberei (crimen magiae). Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Strafrechtspflege in der Steiermark (Graz, 1902), 95–98.Google Scholar

6 Zauberin und Wahrsagerin (Patent of Ferdinand I, Sept. 18, 1544), cited from a 1704 reprint contained in Codicis Austriaci (Vienna, 1704), pt. 2, 520.Google Scholar

7 Deβ Loblichen Fürstenthumbs Steyer Landt-und peinliche Gerichts Ordnung (Graz, 1574); Ordnung güter Policey (Augsburg, 1577).Google Scholar

8 Tugendsambe Lebens-Führung (Patent of Ferdinand II, Dec. 5, 1633), cited from a 1704 reprint contained in Codicis Austriaci, pt. 2, 354–55;Google ScholarLand-Gerichts-Ordnung deβ Herzogthums Oesterreich unter der Ennβ (Ferdinand III, Dec. 30, 1656), cited from a 1704 reprint contained in Codicis Austriaci, pt. 1, secs. 60 (688–90) and 85 (719–20). For a brief outline of the treatment of sorcery and witchcraft in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Habsburg OrdnungenGoogle Scholar see Heide, Dienst's article, “Magische Vorstellungen und Hexenverfolgungen in den österreichischen Länder (15. bis 18. Jahrhundert),” in Wellen der Verfolgung der österreichischen Geschichte, ed. Erich, Zöllner (Vienna, 1986), 73. Only one of the earliest cdecrees mentions sorcery (Lower Austria, 1514), and of the later ones that do, all treat the crime exclusively as maleficium.Google Scholar

9 Gerichts Ordnung, pt 1., art. 26, fol. 10v; art. 47, fol. 14v; art. 75, fol. 18v; art. 36, fol. 12v.Google Scholar

10 See Byloff's extensive comparisons in Das Verbrechen der Zauberei, 114–51.Google Scholar

11 Ordnung güter Policey, fols. 1r–2v.Google Scholar

12 Tugendsambe Lebens-Führung, 353–58.Google Scholar

13 Land-Gerichts-Ordnung, 688–90.Google Scholar

14 Kern, Edmund M., “The Styrian Witch Trials: Secular Authority and Religious Orthodoxy in the Early Modern Period” (Ph.D. diss., University of Minnesota, 1995), 140–41, 156–61, 196–203.Google Scholar

15 See the patent itself and Gabor, Klaniczay, “The Decline of Witches and the Rise of Vampires under the Eighteenth-Century Habsburg Monarchy,” trans. Susan Singerman, in The Uses of Supernatural Power (Princeton, N.J., 1990), 168–88.Google Scholar

16 16PK 1766-XI-5, pp. 4–5.Google Scholar

17 Dienst, , “Hexenprozesse auf dem Gebiet der heutigen Bundesländer Vorarlberg, Tirol (mit Südtirol), Salzburg, Nieder- und Oberösterreich sowie des Burgenlandes,” in Hexen und Zauberer, ed. Helfried, Valentinitsch, vol. 1: Die grosse Verfolgung, ein europäisches Phänomen in der Steiermark (Graz, 1987), 286–88;Google Scholaridem. “Magische Vorstellungen und Hexenverfolgungen,” 74; Dorothea, Rasser, “Zauberei- und Hexenprozesse in Niederösterreich,” Unsere Heimat 60 (1989): 17–24Google Scholar; Gabor, Klaniczay, “Hungary: The Accusations and the Universe of Popular Magic,” in Early Modern European Witchcraft, ed. Ankarloo, and Henningsen, 222Google Scholar; Evans, R. J. W., The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy (New York, 1985), 403–4, 406Google Scholar; Kern, , “SyrianWitch Trials,” 123–126, 165.Google Scholar

18 Schick, Peter J., “Die Hexenverfolgung aus der Sicht des modernen Strafrechts,” in Hexen und Zauberer, ed. Valentinitsch, , 400–401.Google Scholar

19 On the topic of Catholic orthodoxy, which still holds open the possibility of what can be termed magical or demonic occurrences, see Bauer, Johannes B., “Abschied von Hexenwahn und Teufelsglauben. Die Hexenverfolgungen aus der Sicht der heutigen Kirche,” in Hexen und Zauberer, ed. Valentinitsch, , 407–412Google Scholar; see also the discussion of Julio Caro, Baroja, “Witchcraft and Catholic Theology,–1–43, which traces the developments in Catholic demonology into the seventeenth century; Baroja's coverage of Catholic skeptics is left seriously underdeveloped.Google Scholar

20 James Van, Horn Melton, Absolutism and the Eighteenth-Century Origins of Compulsory Schooling in Prussia and Austria (New York, 1988), 60–83, esp. 76–77Google Scholar; Franz, Szabo, Kaunitz and Enlightened Absolutism, 1753–1780 (New York, 1994), 209–257, esp. 209, 212–213.Google Scholar

21 Klaniczay, “Decline of Witches,” 168–188, and “Hungary.”Google Scholar

22 For a discussion of these episodes, see Klaniczay, , “Decline of Witches,–175, and Byloff, Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung, 160–161 (from which the direct quotation is taken). The authors do not entirely agree on the details of these cases: Klaniczay identifies the corpse in Moravia as that of a woman named Rosina Polakin, while Byloff names the cattle herder Johan Polak as the accused in the Tabor case. Is the similarity of names merely a coincidence? Or is one of the authors mistaken? On van SwietenGoogle Scholar, see Grete, Klingenstein, Staatsverwaltung und kirchliche Autorität im 18. Jahrhundert. Das Problem der Zensur in der Theresianischen Reform (Vienna, 1970), 158–202, esp.172–73, 177f. For more detailed discussions of France, Germany, and England, see Mandrou, Magistrats et sorciers, 425–486; Behringer, Hexenverfolgung in Bayern, 355–365; and Bostridge, “Witchcraft Repealed,”309–34.Google Scholar

23 PK 1766-XI-5, pp. 1–3.Google Scholar

24 The German term Zauberey is highly ambiguous, often used to denote both “magic,” a more generic term that suggests the invocation of supernatural powers, and “sorcery,” a term that usually connotes the invocation of specifically evil powers. (English usage of “magic” and “sorcery” is also not entirely free of ambiguity.) The Latin gloss provided in the margins of the “Article” reads “De Crimine Magiae, vel Sortilegii,” which suggests the conflation of all magical practices under the more generic rubric of magic. Despite this,Zauberey is used within the document itself at times to mean “sorcery.” I have chosen to indicate the more generic meaning with “magic” and the more specific meaning with “sorcery” There does not seem to be any ambiguity in the document's usage of Hexerey, at this late date, more easily translated as diabolically inspired “witchcraft.”Google Scholar See Siegfried, Leutenbauer, Hexerei- und Zaubereidelikt in der Literatur von 1450 bis 1550 (Berlin, 1972), who discusses contemporary terminology. Hans de Waardt' s Toverij en Samenleving, 14–19, does an excellent job of analyzing the problem of drawing too close a distinction between toverij (sorcery) and hekserij (witchcraft).Google Scholar Several general works are also helpful: Richard, Kieckhefer, Magic in the Middle Ages (New York, 1990), esp.8–17, 56–94, 151–201; Klaits, Servants of Satan, 32–42; and Levack, Witch-Hunt, 4–20, 29–64.Google Scholar

25 PK 1766-XI-5, p 6: “Wie weit aber der Wahn von Zauber- und Hexen-Weesen bey vorigen Zeiten bis zur Ungebühr angewachsen seye, ist nunmehro eine allbekannte Sach. Die Neigung des einfältig-gemeinen Pöbels zu aberglaubischen Dingen hat hierzu den Grund geleget, die Dumm- und Unwissenheit, als eine Mutter der Verwunderung, und des Aberglaubens, hat solchen befördert, woraus dann, ohne das Wahre von dem Falsche zu unterscheiden, bey dem gemeinen Volk die Leichtglaubigkeit entsprungen, all-solche Begebenheiten, die selbes nicht leicht begreifen kann, und doch nur aus natiirlichem Zufall, Kunst, oder Geschwindigkeit herühren, ja sogar solche Zufälle, so ganz natärlich seynd, als Ungewitter, Vieh-Umfall, Leibs-Krankheiten, u. dem Teufel, und seinen Werkzeugen, nemlich den Zauberem, und Hexen u. zuzuschreiben. Diese Begriffe von zahlreichen Zauber- und Hexen-Geschmeiß wurden von Alter zu Alter fortgepflanzet, ja den Kindern fast in der Wiegen mit fürchterlichen Geschichten, und Mährlein eingepräget, und andurch solcher Wahn allgemein verbreitet, und immer mehr und mehr bestärket, auch selbst in Abführung dergleichen Processen ist von denen ächten Rechts-Reguln grossen Theils abgewichen worden.“ This passage is also reproduced in Byloff, Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung, 161–162; a much abbreviated English translation is given in Klaniczay, “Decline of Witches,” 171–172.Google Scholar

26 Although the term is not specifically stated in the text, the legal concept of corpus delicti, which requires sufficient evidence that an actual crime has occurred, is employed throughout these sections. Similar provisions were made in most early modern legal codes, including Charles V's Constitutio Criminalis Carolina, but article 44 loosens the indicia required to proceed with torture in witchcraft cases. This was often true throughout the rest of Europe, and it was also true of the Landt- und Peinliche Gerichts Ordnung for Styria, which was based upon the Carolina. In general, see Klaits, Servants of Satan, 133, and Langbein, John H., Torture and the Law of Proof: Europe and England in the Ancien Régime (Chicago,1977),13–16; for Styria, see Kern, “Styrian Witch Trials,” 93, 105–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

27 Torture was outlawed by Maria Theresa herself in 1776; see Dienst, “Magische Vorstellungen und Hexenverfolgungen,” 75–76.Google Scholar

28 Hermann, Baltl, Österreichische Rechtsgeschichte, 6th ed. (Graz, 1986),Google Scholar 200.1 am following the argument made by Robert, Wuthnow in Communities of Discourse: Ideology and Social Structure in the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and European Socialism (Cambridge, Mass., 1989), which posits an important distinction between the religious discourse of early modern religious reformers, who located ultimate authority in divine scriptures, and Enlightenment writers, who increasingly located it in nature.Google Scholar On changing conceptions of nature, also see Stephen, Toulmin, Costnopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity (Chicago, 1990), 105–17. It must be noted that some ancient, medieval, and early modern conceptions of “nature” or “the natural” coexisted quite easily (from contemporary perspectives) with divinely inspired sources ultimate authority.Google ScholarStuart, Clark has recently written a definitive account in Thinking with Demons: The Idea of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe (Oxford, 1997), 161–178, 186–187, 299–306, 479. As I have argued above, I think the tension between religious truth and natural truth in Maria Theresa's witchcraft patent is palpable.Google Scholar

29 On the earlier triumph of this standard in France and the role of medical doctors and physical scientists in it, see Mandrou's still suggestive Magistrat et sorciers, 277–291, 325–331, and esp. 557–564.Google Scholar

30 The phrase “assault on superstition” is Monter's in Ritual, Myth, and Magic, 114–129, and is applied for the most part to disputes in learned discourse, a much narrower “assault” than I imply.Google Scholar I am closer to supporting, with reservations, Robert, Muchembled's notion of a “repression of popular culture” presented in Popular Culture and Elite Culture in France, trans. Lydia, Cochran (Baton Rouge, La., 1985), 183–320, than I am to the limited “Sieg der Aufklärung” or “Bekämpfung des Aberglaubens” following the eighteenth-century Bavarian trials described in Behringer's Hexenverfolgung in Bayern, 371–399, or the “beschavingsoffensief van het Nut” culminating in late-eighteenth-century Holland in de Waardt's Toverij en Samenleving, 274–275. Each author is concerned almost exclusively with learned debates.Google Scholar

31 For general treatments of these thinkers and skepticism, see Klaits, , Servants of Satan, 159–176, and Levack, Witch-Hunt, 212–237. For more detailed analyses,Google Scholar see Monter, E. William, “Law, Medicine, and the Acceptance of Witchcraft, 1560–1580,” in European Witchcraft, ed. Monter, (New York, 1969), 55–71Google Scholar; Midelfort, H. C. Erik, “Johann Weyer and the Transformation of the Insanity Defense,” in The German People and the Reformation, ed. Hsia, R.Po-Chia (Ithaca, N.Y., 1988), 234–261Google Scholar; Stuart, Clark “Protestant Demonology” in Early Modern European Witchcraft, ed. Ankarloo, and Henningsen, , 45–81Google Scholar; Alan, Boase, “Montaigne et les sorciers: Une mise au point,” in Culture et politique en France à l'époque de l'humanisme et de la Renaissance (Turin, 1974), 375–386Google Scholar; Sydney, Anglo, “Reginald Scot's Discoverie of Witchcraft: Scepticism and Sadduceeism,” in The Damned Art: Essays in the Literature of Witchcraft, ed. Anglo, (London, 1977), 106–139Google Scholar; and Bernhard, Duhr, , S.J., Die StellungDie Stellung der jesuiten in den deutschen Hexenprozessen (Cologne, 1900).Google Scholar Also see the articles in Lorenz, , Bauer, , AND Maier, , eds., Das Ende der HexenverfolgungGoogle Scholar, and Lehmann, and Ulbricht, , eds., Vom Unfug des Hexen-Processes.Google Scholar

32 Walter, Brunner, “Hexen und Zaubereiprozesse im Bezirk Murau,” Zeitschrift des Historischen Vereins für Steiermark 67 (1987): 193–194 (Murau); SLA, Sonder-Archiv Seckau, Schub 852/219 (Seckau);Google ScholarByloff, , Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung, 49 (Maribor); SLA, Landesarchiv, Landprofosenakten, Nov. 14, 1582 (Jahring)Google Scholar; and Kern, Edmund M., ” Sixteenth Century Journal 25, no. 2 (1994): 337–338 (Oberwölz), 338–339 (Graz).Google Scholar

33 See, for example,SLA, Sonder-Archiv Aussee, Schub 193/287, no. 11 1/8 (Aussee); Byloff, Das Verbrechen der Zauberei, doc. 5, pp. 387–394 (Rein); doc. 6, p. 394 (Rein); doc. 12, pp. 402 (Feldbach).Google ScholarOn Rotenfels, see SLA, Sonder-Archiv Rotenfels, Schub. 97, Dec. 29, 1666; Oct. 24–25, 1693; and June 7, 1694. On the Inner Austrian Government, see SLA, Archiv der Innerösterreichischen Regierung, Copeyen, 1746-VII-22, fol. 1. See also Kern, “Styrian Witch Trials,” 196–203.Google Scholar

34 Clark, Thinking with Demons, 142–146 (quote at 145), 146–147, 195–213.Google Scholar

35 Letter to Maria Theresa, Apr 21,1767, as cited in Szabo, Kaunitz and Enlightened Absolutism, 351–352.Google Scholar

36 Melton, Absolutism and Eighteenth-Century Origins, esp. xix- xxii, 239.Google Scholar

37 Although this is not the place to rehearse all the disputes found in the vibrant literature on Austrian absolutism, three review articles recently published in the Austrian History Yearbook make the case that the nature of the Habsburg state and its relationship with Catholicism during the early modern period is anything but a closed matter; see Grete, Klingenstein, “Modes of Religious Tolerance and Intolerance in Eighteenth-Century Habsburg Politics,” Austrian History Yearbook 24 (1993): 1–16Google Scholar; Paula Sutter, Fichtner, “Habsburg State-Building in the Early Modern Era: The Incomplete Sixteenth Century,” AHY 25 (1994): 139–57;Google Scholar and Mueller, Christine L., “Enlightened Absolutism,” AHY 25 (1994): 159–83. In particular, the concepts of “absolutism” and “Enlightened Absolutism” have come under attack as too simplistic. Likewise, “confessional absolutism” and the “success” (all too frequently assumed) of baroque Catholicism has been subjected to increasing scrutiny.Google Scholar Despite very real differences in their approaches, the following works all employ the concepts in ways that call into question their shortcomings: Jean, Berenger, Finances et absolutistne autrichien dans la seconde moitié du XVIIe siècle (Paris, 1975); Evans, Making of the Habsburg Monarchy;Google ScholarDickson, P. G. M.,Finance and Government under Maria Theresa, 1740–1780, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1987)Google Scholar; Greta, Klingenstein, Der Aufstieg des Hauses Kaunitz. Studien zur Herkunft und Bildung des Staatskanzlers Wenzel Anton (Göttingen, 1975); Szabo, Kaunitz and Enlightened AbsolutismGoogle Scholar; Charles, Ingrao, The Habsburg Monarchy, 1618–1815 (New York, 1994)Google Scholar; Peter, Tropper, Staatliche Kirchenpolitik, Geheimprotestantismus und katholische Mission in Karnten (1752–1780) (Klagenfurt, 1989)Google Scholar; and Michael, Pammer, Glaubensabfall und Wahre Andacht. Barockreligiösität, Reformkatholizismus und Laizismus in Oberösterreich, 1700–1820 (Munich, 1994)Google Scholar. Also see the essays contained in Ingrao, Charles W., ed., State and Society in Early Modern Austria (West Lafayette, Ind., 1994)Google Scholar, and Evans, R. J. W. and Thomas, T. V., eds., Crown, Church, and Estates: Central European Politics in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (New York, 1991).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38 On social discipline and state-building, see, for example, Muchembled, Popular Culture and Elite Culture; Christina, Lamer, Enemies of God: The Witch-Hunt in Scotland (London, 1981)Google Scholar; Klaits, Servants of Satan, 131–47; and Levack, Witch-Hunt, 613–16, 624, 630. It is important to note that Levack would be somewhat skeptical of the version of the “state thesis” that I am advancing, since he prefers to speak of “aspects of state-building” as “necessary preconditions of the great witch-hunt” (630). He elaborates upon his position in “State-Building and Witch Hunting in Early Modern Europe,” in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe, ed. Barry, , Hester, , AND Roberts, , 96–115Google Scholar. Two works calling into question any formulation of the state thesis and emphasizing local dynamics above all else are Briggs, Witches and Neighbors, and Labouvie, Zauberei und Hexenwerk.

39 See Byloff's works, Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung and Das Verbrechen der Zauberei; the more recent articles in Valentinitsch's Hexen und Zauberer, vol. 1, esp. Dienst, “Hexenprozesse auf dem Gebiet,” 265–90; and Valentinitsch, “Die Verfolgung von Hexen und Zauberern im Herzogtum Steiermark—Eine Zwischenbilanz,” 297–316; as well as Dienst's “Magische Vorstellungen und Hexenverfolgungen,” 70–94, and Evans's Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, 400–417.Google Scholar

40 Kern, , “Styrian Witch Trials,” 23–27, 38–41,116–22,127–61.Google Scholar

41 Anton, Schindling and Walter, Ziegler, eds, Die Territorien des Reichs im Zeitalter der Reformation und Konfessionalisierung: Land und Konfession, 1500–1650, 6 vols. (Münster, 1989–1996)Google Scholar, 1:7. Most articles in this publication rely upon this basic tenet. Also see the important works on “confessionalism” and “confessionalization”: Wolfgang, Reinhard, “Zwang zur Konfessionalisierung? Prolegomena zu einer Theorie des konfessionellen Zeitalters,” Zeitschrift für historische Forschung 10 (1983): 257–77;Google Scholar and Heinz, Schilling, “Die Konfessionalisierung im Reich: Religiöser und gesellschaftlicher Wandel in Deutschland zwischen 1555 und 1620,” Historische Zeitschrift 246, no. 1 (1988): 1–45.Google ScholarHsia, R. Po-chia's Social Discipline in the Reformation: Central Europe, 1550–1750 (New York, 1989) is most helpful.Google Scholar

42 Robert, Bireley SJ., “Ferdinand II: Founder of the Habsburg Monarchy,” in Crown, Church, and Estates, ed. Evans, and Thomas, , 232, 234–36.Google Scholar For a general treatment, see Scribner, Robert W., “Paradigms of Urban Reform: Gemeindereformation or Erastian Reformation” in Die dänische Reformation vor ihrem internationalen Hintergrund, ed. Leif, Grane and Kai, Herby (Göttingen, 1990), 111–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

43 See, for instance, Robert Bireley, SJ., “Confessional Absolutism in the Habsburg Lands in the Seventeenth Century,” and Karl Vocelka, “Public Opinion and the Phenomenon of Sozialdisziplinierung in the Habsburg Monarchy,” in State and Society in Early Modern Austria, ed. Ingrao, , 36–53, 119–38,Google Scholar as well as Thomas, Winkelbauer, “Sozialdisziplinierung und Konfessionalisierung durch Grundherren in den österreichischen und böhmischen Ländern im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert,” Zeitschrift für historische Forschung 19 (1992): 317–24Google Scholar. Also see Evans, , Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, for a more general treatment, and Tropper, Staatliche Kirchenpolitik, and Pammer, Glaubensabfall und Wahre Andacht, for more doubtful, if not pessimistic, assessments of confessional absolutism.Google Scholar

44 See Baltl, , Österreichische Rechtsgeschichte, 201–2, and Byloff, Hexenglaube und Hexenverfolgung, 156, 163–64.Google Scholar

45 Michel, Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan, Sheridan (New York: Vintage Books, 1979), esp. 195–228Google Scholar; see also Foucault, 's Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, trans. Richard, Howard (New York: Vintage Books, 1988), for similar critique of “reason” and another argument about the transformation of physical restraint into psychological control.Google Scholar

46 Foucault, Discipline and Punish, 209.Google Scholar

47 Melton, , Absolutism and Eighteenth-Century Origins, esp. 239;Google Scholar and Charles, Ingrao, “The Problem of ‘Enlightened Absolutism’ and the German States,” Journal of Modern History 58, suppl. (1986), Politics and Society in the Holy Roman Empire, 1500–1806, S161–80.Google Scholar