The Spanish Inquisition and Witchcraft — Presentation Detail — Celebration of Scholars

Instructions

Student presentations must have a faculty sponsor.

Abstracts must include a title and a description of the research, scholarship, or creative work. The description should be 150-225 words in length and constructed in a format or style appropriate for the presenter’s discipline.

The following points should be addressed within the selected format or style for the abstract:

A clear statement of the problem or question you pursued, or the scholarly goal or creative theme achieved in your work.
A brief comment about the significance or uniqueness of the work.
A clear description of the methods used to achieve the purpose or goals for the work.
A statement of the conclusions, results, outcomes, or recommendations, or if the work is still in progress, the results you expect to report at the event.

Presenter photographs should be head and shoulder shots comparable to passport photos.

Additional Information

More information is available at carthage.edu/celebration-scholars/. The following are members of the Research, Scholarship, and Creativity Committee who are eager to listen to ideas and answer questions:

Jun Wang
Kim Instenes
John Kirk
Nora Nickels
Andrew Pustina
James Ripley

The Spanish Inquisition and Witchcraft

Name: Andrew Martin
Major: History
Hometown: Chicago
Faculty Sponsor: Stephen Udry
Other Sponsors:
Type of research: Senior thesis

Abstract

Why was the Spanish Inquisition relatively tolerant to witches and the practice of witchcraft? To answer this question I plan to look at people like Inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías, who did not believe that witchcraft was a serious threat to the Catholic faith, in order to understand the approach taken by the Spanish Inquisition. Witch hunts and their trials where a major part of life in medieval world, people were scared and in witch accusations they found a scapegoat for unexplained losses and diseases, in the uneasy times of the Middle Ages. Malleus Maleficarum or The Hammer of Witches, was published in 1486 added to this witch craze but the Inquisition was firmly against it. The use of transcripts from court cases and from the proceedings of the Inquisition will help build this argument. Looking at the well-kept Inquisition records will help as well in the answering of these questions of why the Spanish Inquisition was not as brutal as other organizations in the hunts of witches.

Poster file