DB Graves’s Reviews > Witchcraft: A History in Thirteen Trials > Status Update
DB Graves
is on page 170 of 320
..[M]any were horrified that modern-day [1929] Americans believed in witchcraft at all. The New York novelist Theda Kenyon wrote with astonishment of Nelson's murder: it "startled most of the country out of the complacent belief that witches were as dead as Macbeth, and left bankers and housewives and truck drivers shaking their heads in amazement."
— Apr 14, 2026 03:17PM
..[M]any were horrified that modern-day [1929] Americans believed in witchcraft at all. The New York novelist Theda Kenyon wrote with astonishment of Nelson's murder: it "startled most of the country out of the complacent belief that witches were as dead as Macbeth, and left bankers and housewives and truck drivers shaking their heads in amazement."
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DB Graves
is on page 260 of 320
But what is clear is that being a male, heterosexual, wealthy, white, able-bodied man at the pinnacle of state or church power is not the regular profile of a witch. That's a witch hunter.
— Apr 14, 2026 03:31PM
But what is clear is that being a male, heterosexual, wealthy, white, able-bodied man at the pinnacle of state or church power is not the regular profile of a witch. That's a witch hunter.
DB Graves
is on page 219 of 320
[1949]
Bereng wrote: .."The Government [of British Imperial controlled Basutoland] has found a trick by which the chiefs can be taken by surprise and killed under the pretext of law." He called it "genocide."
pg 244: "Christianity's focus on loving empathy"
— Apr 14, 2026 03:30PM
Bereng wrote: .."The Government [of British Imperial controlled Basutoland] has found a trick by which the chiefs can be taken by surprise and killed under the pretext of law." He called it "genocide."
pg 244: "Christianity's focus on loving empathy"
DB Graves
is on page 186 of 320
[Nelson murder trial, 1928-29]
It was not just the old witchcraft beliefs of Europe that were on the rise. So too were the beliefs in Eastern, indigenous, and alternative Christian spiritualities, which also appealed to a deep human need for magic--and were also on trial.
— Apr 14, 2026 03:21PM
It was not just the old witchcraft beliefs of Europe that were on the rise. So too were the beliefs in Eastern, indigenous, and alternative Christian spiritualities, which also appealed to a deep human need for magic--and were also on trial.
DB Graves
is on page 148 of 320
[France, 1731]
Crowds gathered outside Marie-Catherine's cell, ...to show their support. They did not believe [she] had committed sacrilege or blasphemy or had lied, so why should she be executed? ...
With a mob running through the streets, Parlement was under great strain. ...They had to appear just, or revolution might follow.
— Apr 14, 2026 02:46PM
Crowds gathered outside Marie-Catherine's cell, ...to show their support. They did not believe [she] had committed sacrilege or blasphemy or had lied, so why should she be executed? ...
With a mob running through the streets, Parlement was under great strain. ...They had to appear just, or revolution might follow.
DB Graves
is on page 143 of 320
Among many methods of bewitchment, blowing into a person's mouth could be a magical act. It was a flexible spell, depending on the intention of the blower: it might bewitch someone, or grant them occult powers. It could force unwilling people into an infatuation with their bewitcher or render them vulnerable to attack.
— Apr 14, 2026 02:41PM
Among many methods of bewitchment, blowing into a person's mouth could be a magical act. It was a flexible spell, depending on the intention of the blower: it might bewitch someone, or grant them occult powers. It could force unwilling people into an infatuation with their bewitcher or render them vulnerable to attack.
DB Graves
is on page 111 of 320
[Barbados ~1690s]
Some settlers were Catholics, Puritans, Quakers, or Jews. But increasingly the dominant religious culture as a severe Anglicanism. There were attacks on the Quakers and Jews, with greater accompanying oppression of enslaved people.
— Apr 14, 2026 02:39PM
Some settlers were Catholics, Puritans, Quakers, or Jews. But increasingly the dominant religious culture as a severe Anglicanism. There were attacks on the Quakers and Jews, with greater accompanying oppression of enslaved people.
DB Graves
is on page 109 of 320
Although Arawak men had multiple wives, there was a balance of power in the extended household since husbands joined the extended families of their wives rather than the reverse. A husband became a subject of his wife's father, so daughters were prized as bringing new workers into the family.
Note to self: do more research about the logistics of this.
— Apr 14, 2026 02:36PM
Note to self: do more research about the logistics of this.
DB Graves
is on page 93 of 320
pg 63: Witch trials were not just misogynistic festivals of torture and hatred; they also directly facilitated the building of empire.
pg 93: In England, familiar spirits were thought to suck blood from witches with whom they'd made a Satanic pact, both as a sign of that agreement and as payment for doing harm. They would report their evil deeds to the witch and get as sip of blood as a reward.
— Apr 14, 2026 02:33PM
pg 93: In England, familiar spirits were thought to suck blood from witches with whom they'd made a Satanic pact, both as a sign of that agreement and as payment for doing harm. They would report their evil deeds to the witch and get as sip of blood as a reward.