the head, and exposure. The pagan Saxons burned witches and sorcerers, and even ate them. The Anglo-Saxons placed them under penalty of death; the ancient law of Scotland burned them at the stake. In Hungary they were first handed over to the bishop, then branded on the forehead, neck, and back in the form of a cross.
The accusation of witchcraft was frequently used against societies, such as the Templars, from 1307 to 1313. It was on this charge that Joan of Arc was burned to death. Thus in 1429 the Stedinger, who had fought for nearly thirty years against the Archbishop of Bremen and the Count of Oldenburg, were, with the help of the Pope, suppressed.
In 1488 Pope Innocent VIII. issued a bull establishing commissions of inquisitors, and succeeding popes appointed other commissions. Sometimes the suspects were accused of heresy aggravated by witchcraft, and again of witchcraft leading to heresy. But witchcraft was the charge that especially inflamed the populace, and was pursued with the greatest zeal by the inquisitors. The epidemic raged in France so that by the end of 1320 fires for the execution of witches blazed in nearly every town. The more fires the more witches, accusations, and trials: the priests began to despair, wondering how it could be explained that it was impossible to commit "so great a number of the Devil's slaves to the flames, but that there shall arise from their ashes a sufficient number to supply their places." Seldom were there acquittals.
Luther and the reformers believed as firmly in the existence of witchcraft as the Roman Catholics, though the latter charged that the Hussites in Bohemia, and the followers of Luther, deceived the people by magic and witchcraft. A Jesuit theological professor declared that Albert of Brandenburg was the king of
