The Witches' Ointment: The Secret History of Psychedelic Magic

by Thomas Hatsis

An exploration of the historical origins of the “witches’ ointment” and medieval hallucinogenic drug practices based on the earliest sources • Details how early modern theologians demonized psychedelic folk magic into “witches’ ointments” • Shares dozens of psychoactive formulas and recipes gleaned from rare manuscripts from university collections all over the world as well as the practices and magical incantations necessary for their preparation • Examines the practices of medieval witches like Matteuccia di Francisco, who used hallucinogenic drugs in her love potions and herbal preparations In the medieval period preparations with hallucinogenic herbs were part of the practice of veneficium, or poison magic. This collection of magical arts used poisons, herbs, and rituals to bewitch, heal, prophesy, infect, and murder. In the form of psyche-magical ointments, poison magic could trigger powerful hallucinations and surrealistic dreams that enabled direct experience of the Divine. Smeared on the skin, these entheogenic ointments were said to enable witches to commune with various local goddesses, bastardized by the Church as trips to the Sabbat--clandestine meetings with Satan to learn magic and participate in demonic orgies. Examining trial records and the pharmacopoeia of witches, alchemists, folk healers, and heretics of the 15th century, Thomas Hatsis details how a range of ideas from folk drugs to ecclesiastical fears over medicine women merged to form the classical “witch” stereotype and what history has called the “witches’ ointment.” He shares dozens of psychoactive formulas and recipes gleaned from rare manuscripts from university collections from all over the world as well as the practices and magical incantations necessary for their preparation. He explores the connections between witches’ ointments and spells for shape shifting, spirit travel, and bewitching magic. He examines the practices of some Renaissance magicians, who inhaled powerful drugs to communicate with spirits, and of Italian folk-witches, such as Matteuccia di Francisco, who used hallucinogenic drugs in her love potions and herbal preparations, and Finicella, who used drug ointments to imagine herself transformed into a cat. Exploring the untold history of the witches’ ointment and medieval hallucinogen use, Hatsis reveals how the Church transformed folk drug practices, specifically entheogenic ones, into satanic experiences.

Genres: History, Witchcraft, Nonfiction, Occult, Magic, Paganism, Spirituality

310 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 17, 2015

Reviews

[Datura Bombs · Rating 5 out of 5]

I highly recommended this to anybody interested in the use of flying ointments and witching herbs. It puts their use into a historical perspective.

[Steve Cran · Rating 4 out of 5]

Modern witchcraft is replete with legends of witches and warlock flying through the nighttime sky enroute to a Witches Sabbat. THey would fly an any number of assorted items ranging from their spouse to animals and finally broomstick. One of the key features of this legend is the uswe of flying ointment . The witch would smear this ointment on her broomstick or anoint herself with it then would fly to Blocksburg to join the devil in his revel. Usually it was kissing hs buttocks and swearing allegiance to his design.

This book carefully examines the phenomena of the Flying ointment. Going all the way back to Greco Roman times an ointment of sorts was used in Apollius's "The Ass" where in an unwitting hero is given an ointment and is changed into a donkey. Healers in Europe would have specially made philters to help for others to fall in love. Other preparation wre used as poison and insanity inducing agents. WItches at first could be charged and penalized if the agents would kill someone or make them mad. On the whole history does not alway mention flying ointment in connection to witches. Witches could be charged with using their chemicals for negative consequences.

Inquisitors often added things to the suspected withces story like flying in the air and the devils sabbat, the witch would agree to it only under torture. Some factors could be pulled from traditional legend or folkways. One of those is flying to witches sabbat. THe flying train lead by a deity on certain times of the year derives from earlier European legend. In Southern Europe the Goddess Diana would lead a wild procession through the sky picking up people to join her. In the North it was the Goddess Holda. Some thought that demons were part of hewr cavalcade and others thought the Devil was mimicking the Goddess to lure gullible women.

Witches were also accused of kidnapping children and eating their fat and blood. The witch was also alleged to fly at night in spirit form and seduce men. During the seduction they would either drink his blood or drain his energy the precedence was set with the so called Lamia who were female demons who seduced men and drank babies bloood. THe witch was the strix owl who flew about doing such things. Strega was an Italian name for witch.

THe Christian Church was power hungry and despised any competing ideologies. One of the Christian tactics was to bash the witches by accusing them of having orgies, drinking human blood and doing all sort off fowl magic. THis persecution had a precedence. Back in the day the Romans were very antagonistic towards Christianity, they spread these exact same epithets against them. The Catholic Church also despised rival Christian sects like the Waldensians and others who found CHrist or God through means other than the Catholic Church.

Later on the use of flying ointment would be associated with all of these activities. THe accusation were that the witches would boil down baby fat and throw in such foul items as animal parts and poisonous herbs. At first this did not feature in the inquisition but it would come up later. Such ointments may have been used outside the witchcraft community for such maladies as headache, insomnia etc. Besides shamans would use ethneogen to access higher states of being. THey would often intercede on behalf of the community sometime even fighting negative spiritual entities.

THe effect and usage of the ointment has been subject to debate. What ingredient were in it? Did witches really fly? Was it a hallucination ?
At first flying through the night and shapeshifting was not really associated with flying ointment. Later on it came ot be associated with them especially as the inquisition motored through entire populations. THe ointment became associated with witchcraft even it became a crime to use it.

As the Victorian Era neared fferent theorist came to the conclusion that the flying ointment only gave the illusion of flying. It effected the mind. Not all church oficials liked this but word was getting out. Many scholars would experiment with flying ointment and yes they had the experiencen of flying but in reality all they did was fall into a deep sleep or stupor.

Flying ointment did not contain baby fat or any other foul elements.. In fact iot contained slonaceous herbs like henbane,  mandrake root, hellebore, belladona and damona stratura. Opium was contained sometimes as well.
In the end it boils down to a spiritual experience inside the witches head.

[Isham Cook · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough, academically grounded, entertainingly narrated investigation of the origin and history of the fallacious idea that magical ointments were the main culprit in the alleged and unfounded claims by the Church and Inquisition that witches murdered babies in their sabbaths. Psychoactive ointments (typically infused with plants of the nightshade variety) have been used around world since time immemorial in vision-inducing and shamanistic ceremonies, but never for the purpose of infanticide. My only complaint is that Hatsis abruptly ends his study without going into more detail about how the plants were efficaciously chosen, extracted and employed in the various ointments, as there are few modern studies or practical recipes for these possibly beneficial substances.

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though far from definitive, a fun read nonetheless, especially for the broomstick sodomy peeps out there.
Part rehash of the evolution of the stereotype of witches and satanic orgies, part account of the nebulous mentions of weird potions and things, Hatsis tries to delve into the primary source material to see if, in fact, our well-intentioned magical ancestors were, well, tripping balls. Walking a thin line between individual (read: recreational) drug use and sheer, orgy-hopping, demonic analingus diabolery, the extant documents paint a hazy picture, but Hatsis does his best to steer through the murk.
It would seem there were a ripe number of botanical sources for medieval trips and Hatsis details these nicely, showing how knowledge of them might have persisted, perhaps even originating in some obscure shamanic past, and detailing how they came to be associated with witchcraft during that craze. Where he falls short, and needn't have, was trying to wrap all this up with a new overarching way of thinking of potions, ointments and unguents. If folks weren't covering broomsticks with satanic goo and the masturbating with them, then what were they doing with these things? There are certainly enough other sources indicating that they might very well have been some sort of ritual holdover and it would've been nice to see Hatsis go into that a little more.
Anyway, overall an often funny and interesting book, singular for the theme.

[Ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I recommend this book to anyone interested in the historical use of mind-altering plants. I read it at the same time that I attended a 'poisonous plants' meditation workshop and it was the perfect time to explore the concept of people 'journeying' with the use of 'psyche-magical drugs', as Hatsis refers to these substances.

Although the author has some academic background in this subject, the book is clearly the product of his personal fascination with the concept of the witches' ointment. Regardless, it seems thoroughly researched - and that might be my highest praise of the book! Hatsis shares a myriad of sources from archaic documents, which makes me feel like I can trust the content, but this also makes for kind of an overwhelming read, at least through the first half. By the second half he does finally begin to draw conclusions and make his point.

I wasn't entirely a fan of his writing style - I don't know if I enjoyed or hated the occasional alliterated sentences. But I'll make my final point: I believe this book was a thorough study of ancient documents that may hint at the use of psychedelic ointments, and therefore I recommend it to those interested in that specific subject.

[C · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thomas Hatsis takes you on a roller coaster ride through history in search for the mysterious origins of the legend of the witches' flying ointment. Through story telling and by using primary historical sources, Hatsis presents the way in which the village healers and folk medicine practitioners of the Middle Ages became the most hated and feared of creatures to Christian Europe--witches! This book explores the historical use of psychoactive substances in both medicine and magic, and sheds much light on the Inquisitors who reacted to these practices with fear. Thomas Hatsis' academic work, shown expertly in this book, is truly, truly impressive. Did he find the fabled recipe for magical flight? You will have to read to find out!

[Emily Fortuna · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had very high hopes to learn more about the historical origins of witches’ ointment and psychedelics in Europe. The book sort of does this, but I feel like it gets distracted talking about the church (which is connected for sure, but not the *main* topic) and some connected but not directly related topics and disappointingly I fails to name the extent of gender dynamics at play (as one example, the author describes a historical sexual assault that takes place as a result of drugging a victim but fails to call it as such). Perhaps the books still feels thin on the actual details because historical information is so sparse.
Having said that, there IS good content in here, and some humorous turns of phrase; it’s just the core content is buried amongst a lot of other stuff.

[Dolkar · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ultimately disappointing

While the sources and references relating very specifically to witch trials and flying ointments are extensive and thoroughly cited, Hatsis has only a very superficial knowledge of shamanism, ancient mystery cults, paganism, and psychedelics in general. So this book does provide an indepth look at a very narrow topic, but because of the limited scope, the summaries and conclusions are weak and incomplete. An interesting read but ultimately very disappointing.

[Coby Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most in depth modern studies on the origins of the infamous witches’ flying ointment and poison magic. Hatsis is well read in the sucker of entheogens and psyche-spiritual experiences, and discusses the roots of these magical formulas in the ancient world and their evolution into veneficium and role in diabolical witchcraft.

[Mephistopheles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent historical investigation in the reality of psychedelic ointments throughout history, and its conflation with the fictional Witch's Sabbat that was invented during the witch trials. Parts are dark and involve accounts of torture, but this is thankfully brief. There is a deep investigation into the types of herbs known to have psychedelic properties, the history of their use, the accounts where psychedelic ointments were documented, among other things.

My one quibble is that the author could not help using bad puns and other terribly overdone literary devices. It was as if he could not help himself. These are brief, but annoying, when they show up; most of the book is clearly and lucidly written. However, since they annoyed me so much, I will share the worst of them for your viewing pleasure:

"By now the psyche-magical ointment's role in validating the vetlua's visions vis-a-vis Venus's venery veers"

"Whether there is a kernel of truth to the cornstalk broom rite remains to be historically harvested."

"We can therefore end this study knowing that both positions – that of the skeptic and that of the romantic – simply do not fly.
With or without magical ointments."

Thanks, but no thanks.

Other than this, the book is highly recommended.

[Christian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well... My opinion about this book went up a bit in the second half. This is certainly no "scientific" or "academic" account, since it obviously is written for a broader audience. Fair enough, since the research seems somewhat thorough and not specifically educated people might profit from it. However, I found the historical structure a bit too far reaching at times in terms of content and relating to the title. Since the accounts for using ointments are not especially widespread, shortening "to the point" would have done only good in the first third/half of the book. Also his "narrative accounts" in almost every new chapter introduction were annoying since they don't eludicate much beyond the then following accounts.

[Blair Hodgkinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating to listen as the author peels back the mysteries of the witches' ointment, a wide variety of mixtures of psychotropic and hallucinogenic drugs that helped fuel both the legend of the witches' sabbat. Hatsis compares countless case studies to shed light on the recipes for the unguents and reviews the effects of these natural plant derivatives and how they were delivered to their users. Very interesting.

[Nicole Bergen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite what I expected, but it’s an interesting history of the church, the people they considered heretics and witches, ideas they shoehorned into their “god or the devil” binary, and the plants people used to kill, heal, and wander into hallucinations in Europe in the last 2000 years. Very academic, which I didn’t mind, but might not be for everyone.

[Peffs+ · Rating 3 out of 5]

a bit repetitive as you read on

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️

From the Preface —

The following pages demonstrate how some Western ecclesiastical writers demonized the psyche-magic experiences produced by drugs as the “witches’ ointment” of the early modern period.

——

I was curious about the premise of this book after finding it in a PNW store. I enjoyed Thomas Hatsis’s deep dive into medieval and early modern history, and the origins of the witches ointment. It’s a short (albeit dense) read.

It helps to have a working knowledge of the witch stereotype before reading, and if possible, have read medieval/early modern history books before.

The final chapter summarizes the book nicely. The ending was the most academic mic drop I’ve read in a minute, which gave me a chuckle.

The book fails to meaningfully highlight the importance of patriarchal structures when reviewing the history of the witches ointment (although social class is discussed at length).

This is an important omission from context, and it is impossible to understand the demonization of “witches ointment” without it.

[Jera Em · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent book that is especially useful for anyone curious about flying ointments both in the modern sense and the historical. It pays to be knowledgeable about such things and this gives all kinds of insight.