“We are the heiresses of witches and healers. There is an evolution: today they call us feminazis..”
El Periódico Barcelona 26 de enero del 2022 42 Comentario
The Catalan parliament has passed a resolution to pardon up to 1,000 people – the majority of them women – condemned for the crime of witchcraft in the region 400 years ago.
The resolution “repairs” the memory of the women convicted of witchcraft in Catalonia and condemnss the “misogynistic persecution”.
It calls on the town councils to review the gazetteer of their streets to incorporate the names of these women.
Thousands of women were condemned during witch-hunts that persisted well into 18th century
The move follows similar gestures in Scotland, Switzerland and Norway after more than 100 European historians signed a manifesto titled: They weren’t witches, they were women.
The resolution, which follows a campaign in the local history journal Sapiens, was supported by the leftwing and nationalist parties in the parliament. But the Socialists refused to sign, the right wing PP abstained and the fascist VOX voted against.
Commenting on a TV3 documentary entitled Witches, the Big Lie, the Catalan president, Pere Aragonès, described the witch-hunts as “institutionalised femicide”.
It is estimated that between 1580 and 1630 about 50,000 people were condemned to death for witchcraft across Europe, of whom about 80% were women.
While witch-hunts raged across northern Europe, in Spain the Inquisition had its hands full rooting out heresy among Jews and Muslims who had been forcibly converted to Christianity. The Inquisition was sceptical about allegations of witchcraft.
We Are The Grandaughters of the Witches you couldn’t Burn
Catalonia was the exception, however, and witch-hunts persisted well into the 18th century there. What is thought to be the first European law against witchcraft was passed in Lleida in 1424.
Continue reading “Catalonia pardons up to 1,000 accused of Witchcraft -‘There is a connection between witch hunts and femicides’”
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