Overview

This collection of 16 essays deals with the role of magic, religion and witchcraft in European culture, 1450-1650, and the critical role of the visual in that culture. It covers the relationship of humanism and magic, the intersection of religious ritual, orthodoxy and power, the discursive links between the visual language of witchcraft and contemporary anxieties about sexuality and savagery. The introductory chapter urges us to exorcise our tendency to reduce historical experiences of the demonic to forms of unreason created in a distant past. Only then can we understand the role of the demonic in our historical definition of the self and the other.

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9789004125605

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Reviews

'Z.'s reading of visual images is exceptionally precise and a useful model for cultural historians and art historians alike. Equally compelling is Z.'s approach to religion, for him a category embracing belief, thought, doctrine, practice, rite, and institution.' Virginia Reinburg, Theological Studies, 2004. 'The essays are brimful of original ideas interesting questions and thought-provoking statements. They convincingly demonstrate that for early modern people magic and witchcraft were no mere flights of fance, but yet another mirror through which to look at their society. These studies contribute to an important discussion about significant developments in the history of late medieval and early modern European culture.' Maria Craciun, Sehepunkte, 2005. 'The extraordinary breadth and high quality of the scholarship united in this volume is sure to be of great interest and use to scholars across the humanities and social sciences...The text itself is beatifully presented ad richly illustrated with 112 high quality reproductions.' Katherine Dauge-Roth, Sixteenth Century Journal, 2005.

'Z.'s reading of visual images is exceptionally precise and a useful model for cultural historians and art historians alike. Equally compelling is Z.'s approach to religion, for him a category embracing belief, thought, doctrine, practice, rite, and institution.' Virginia Reinburg, Theological Studies, 2004. 'The essays are brimful of original ideas interesting questions and thought-provoking statements. They convincingly demonstrate that for early modern people magic and witchcraft were no mere flights of fance, but yet another mirror through which to look at their society. These studies contribute to an important discussion about significant developments in the history of late medieval and early modern European culture.' Maria Craciun, Sehepunkte, 2005. 'The extraordinary breadth and high quality of the scholarship united in this volume is sure to be of great interest and use to scholars across the humanities and social sciences...The text itself is beatifully presented ad richly illustrated with 112 high quality reproductions.' Katherine Dauge-Roth, Sixteenth Century Journal, 2005.

"'Z.'s ""reading"" of visual images is exceptionally precise and a useful model for cultural historians and art historians alike. Equally compelling is Z.'s approach to religion, for him a category embracing belief, thought, doctrine, practice, rite, and institution.' Virginia Reinburg, Theological Studies, 2004. 'The essays are brimful of original ideas interesting questions and thought-provoking statements. They convincingly demonstrate that for early modern people magic and witchcraft were no mere flights of fance, but yet another mirror through which to look at their society. These studies contribute to an important discussion about significant developments in the history of late medieval and early modern European culture.' Maria Craciun, Sehepunkte, 2005. 'The extraordinary breadth and high quality of the scholarship united in this volume is sure to be of great interest and use to scholars across the humanities and social sciences...The text itself is beatifully presented ad richly illustrated with 112 high quality reproductions.' Katherine Dauge-Roth, Sixteenth Century Journal, 2005."

Author Information

Charles Zika is Associate Professor of History at the University of Melbourne. He has published widely on magic, religion, witchcraft and visual culture in the sixteenth century, which includes Johannes Reuchlin und die okkulte Tradition der Renaissance (Thorbecke, 1998) and edited Dürer and his culture (Cambridge, 1998).

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