Let me preface this by saying I have no idea why some of this is blocked off in white and every time I try to fix it I just cause more damage so I am washing my hands of it and you all get it the way it is. Hope it is not too distracting! So reading Hamlet (I know that was forever ago) got me curious about ghost stories in the Elizabethan period. Doing research on ghost brought up the issue of witches. So here are my findings on Ghosts and Witches!
GHOSTS
This picture is of Hamlet and his father’s ghost by Henry Fuseli – It is a 1780’s drawing.
(Via Wikipedia)
Ghosts were feared. There were believed to be one of two things; there were either the spirits or demons. Spirits were the souls of dead people, they were beings with issues left in life that did not allow them peace. Demons took on the shape of loved ones they appeared to in order to mislead them.
Demons leading away an individual in a dream.
There were three types of ghosts. One was visio corporalis which meant that the ghost was perceived through the sense, so sight, hearing and touch. Then there was visio spiritualis which was seen in visions or dreams. They were not seen while awake or while conscious of being awake. The final one was visio intellectuals there is less about this one but this one is perceived neither through the sense or the imagination. This for example there is a story of a place where if you leave a pen and paper on a table, leave it, and come back fifteen minutes later your name will be written on the paper.
In drama ghosts were used to set the stage, imply the mood and arouse curiosity in the beginning of a play (i.e. the guards seeing Hamlet Sr. in the beginning of the play). (Ghost Stories in the Late Renaissance France: Walking By Night, by: Timothy Chesters, via google books) This is the function of the witches in Macbeth as well.
Today it is said that there are ghost of the following people at the following locations (The Borgias Wiki):
-The "Princes in the Tower": are said to haunt the Tower of London. It is said that the ghost of Anne Boleyn also haunts the Tower of London.
-The ghost of Anne Boleyn: haunts her childhood home Hever Castle and every Christmas Eve she is seen walking along the bridge which crosses the river Even within the castle grounds.
-The ghost of Catherine Howard: haunted Henry VIII at Hampton Court. Dudley Castle in England is famous for having several ghosts in residence.
WITCHES
The introduction of the printing press into the distribution of literature served to perpetuate and educate people in the matter of witch craft. This was something to be feared and therefore any information on them was to be greatly circulated. So much so that in 1562 Queen Elizabeth passed the act ‘agaynst Conjuracions Inchaunmentes and Witchecraftes.’
This picture is terrifying but at the same time I love it!
I mean I know they are probably about to eat a little kid but it is a very well done picture.
Unexplainable events like the plague, death of people and animals, bad harvests, houses burning down, and food going bad was often blamed on witches. These event were devastating and had a huge impact on the lives of those they happened to because there was not much medical knowledge and no insurance so they simply had to make do as best they could with what they had left after a these events and usually there was nothing they could do. They were angry and wanted to blame someone so they blamed witches. The old, and poor were targeted as witches. The accused were also primarily women. Out of the 270 Elizabethan witch trials only 23 were men. This is where the stereotype of witches being ugly comes from, because the accused were old, poor and not able to take care of themselves very well so they were easy targets.
Macbeth meeting the weird sisters.
Punishment for witches who “committed murder” in England was hanging, in other countries the punishment was as generally understood death. For minor acts of witchcraft pillory was the most common punishment. There are many stories circulated about Anne Boleyn, one of these stories is that she had a sixth finger on one hand and a mole on her neck, gross features that surely, in the opinion of those who did not like her, identified her as a witch.
Shakespeare’s plays with Ghosts: Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Richard III, Cymbeline.
Shakespeare’s plays with witches: Macbeth, A Winter’s Tale, King Lear, A Mid Summers Night Dream, The Tempest
I haven't read them all s I might have missed some this is just what a quick search yielded!
