Recently found an interesting archive about a 1583 witch trial in France : the trial of the sorcerers of the Marlou crossroads. The original transcripts of the trial have been published in 1996 by a small book publisher, the "editions Jerome Millon".
Interestingly, the story begins with a demonic possession case, shortly before evolving into a witch trial :
In december 1582, a teenage peasant from eastern Berry (the area around the wine producing town of Sancerre) claimed to be possessed by demons. When brought to the local priest, he claimed that one of his uncles had cursed him while in the fields. Later on, when walking back home, he had met a small furless black creature, the size of a shoe, who asked him to renounce God. As he refused, the creature jumped on him and entered his left ear. Thereafter, he started to display signs of demonic possession, frequently going into frenzy and speaking in strange voices. The local priest was at loss at what to do to help the young boy, especially since his "demons" claimed that they would accept to leave the boy only if asked to do so by who had put them there in the first place, the boy's uncle, Etienne Girault.
Etienne Girault was immediatly brought to the church to perform the exorcism instead of the hapless priest. But the chief demon possessing the boy, Chevau (meaning "Horses" - the plural is intended), refused to leave, unless Girault asked him to exorcize him in the name of Satan (instead of God). Pressed by he populace and the titular priest, Girault asked the demons to leave his nephew "in the name of Satan", and the boy's fury abated for a while. However, the 12 year's old peasant later had other crisis, and claimed that he was still possessed by a host of demons sporting funny names, such as Cri ("Shout"), Cornemuse ("Bagpipe"), and so on. He also told the villagers that he had been conducted to the witches' sabbath, at the crossroads of Marlou, where he had seen his uncle and a few other locals worshipping the devil.
The affair was therafter brought the the county judge, who incarcerated the uncle, Etienne Girault, and the other people suspected of sorcery, and started to question them. In total, five men and (only) one woman were prosecuted for their alledged participation to the sabbath. They were all peasants. Late in the trials, the possessed teenage boy tried to involve a local notable, accusing him to have participated to the sabbath and to have produced counterfeit coins, but, funnily enough, the judge called this "demonic slandering", and the notable, Mr. Nauldin, was never prosecuted. Such prudence was alas not applied to the six other victims of the trial ...
The transcripts of the trial do not suggest that any torture was used against the prisoners. However, it is very obvious that they were somewhat manipulated by the judge into to admiting their participation to the sabbath, as a key to God's "forgiveness". And likely, at least some of them thought that this "forgiveness" implied being ultimately freed. So most admitted their participation, taking care to remark that, when given "powders" by the devil, they had stubbornly refused to use these poisons to harm their neighbours, wasting them on their own cattle, or burying them in the ground. They did not understand that what was reproached to them was their participation to an alledged anti-christian cult, and that using poisons and malefices was only a secondary crime. In other words, simply going to the sabbath was enough to send them to the stake. And to the stake they finally went, indeed ... None escaped.
The only woman judged in this trial was an old crone whose ugliness was noted in the trial transcripts as an evident proof of her implication. One morning, she was found dead in her cell, strangled by her blankets. The strangulation had been carried out with a piece of wood, used as a lever behind her neck, as a "tourniquet". Even the judge found this method of "suicide" unlikely enough to remain dubious of what had actually happened. Conclusion ? The devil had certainly come to claim her soul, helping her to commit this weird "suicide".
The oldest of the convicted sorcerers, Jehan Cahouet, staunchly refused to admit anything, and defended himself until the end of the trial, three months later. He even made an appeal to the Parliament of Paris, the central judiciary institution of the kingdom. It is said that the Parliament of Paris used to break up to two thirds of the local sorcery verdicts. But this time, it did confirm the sentence, and the unfortunate Cahouet was executed along the 4 other men.
When asked by the judge if he hadn't the reputation of being a sorcerer, Cahouet had this answer : "of course my neighbours call me a sorcerer ! So do I with them when I am angry. I also called some neighbouring ladies as prostitutes. That doesn't mean they are !". Unfortunalely, such common sense did not affect the judge, who replied : "if you weren't a sorcerers, why then did you not sue these neighbours for slander ?". There was no way to escape such rhetorics, and Cahouet was convicted because all the other alledged "sorcerers" had testimonied against him.
The five men were strangled and burned at the Marlou crossroads, west of Sancerre where they supposedly had had their "sabbaths" with the devil.
Nothing is said of the teenager. Although he had participated to the sabbath, he was not considered responsible and was not worried with the consequences of this act. However, it appears he kept suffering from recurrent crisis of "possession" afterwards. The villagers did not take it into account, and did not prosecute anybody else on the basis of his accusations thereafter. It appears the trial was "cathartic" enough to quench everybody's lust for blood and revenge.
It is indeed clear from the audition of the various witnesses that many had charged the 6 convicts as a result of longstanding feuds. For instance, during the wars between the Protestants and the Catholics, a protestant army had pillaged the region, ten years before the trial. On this occasion, a bedblanket had been stolen to Cahouet by the soldiery, only to be sold later on to another peasant of the area. When Cahouet went to claim back his blanket to the peasant, this guy refused. Cahouet cursed him, and as the peasant's wife suddenly had a stroke, they blamed Cahouet for it. Especially since the lady started to feel better only after they had finally accepted to give the blanket back to Cahouet.
So clearly, lots of peasants settled old accounts with the five convicts during this trial. They probably sincerely believed their personal enemies were "witches", and this trial was an opportunity to get rid of these dangerous people. After their execution, the county returned to its sleepy quietness ...
Most local victims of the "sorcerers" made the same kind of claims : after a quarrel, the sorcerer would threaten them, telling them they would soon come to regret what wrong they had done. Immediately, or a few days after the clash, the sorcerer would seize an opportunity to touch them on the shoulder (ideally the left one), and that was enough to cause the victim of the curse to feel strange itching and scratching in the members, until some kind of paralysis took them to remain bedridden. This scenario is described time and again in the trial, although it doesn't really matter to the judge, whose only concern is to demonstrate that the sorcerers took part to a sabbath and kissed the devil's arse ...
For the peasant witnesses, however, the sabbath was not the problem. The problem was the curses the sorcerers inflicted upon them, their family and their cattle. Usually, the neurologic-looking symptoms of the curses would only stop after a reconciliation with the suspected sorcerer. They would ask him to come home to "cure" the bedridden victim. The sorcerer would usually concur, visit the victim, touch him, and take its "evil" into a piece of bread he would later give to geese, chicken or cows. The animal would soon start to deperish and die, but the afflicted peasant's would immediately start to feel better.
It is likely that this description of "curses" is a rather faithful rendition of local beliefs, and not part of the educated judges obsession with a Witch-pizza-gate-Q-anon-conspiracy. So the transcripts of the trial are rather interesting from this "etnographic" perspective. Interesting as well is the fact that the place where this trials took place kept a strong "witch" tradition up to the middle of the 20th century.
My grandmother, who lived there for more than 30 years, often told me that the old people there, still believed very much in curses and witches. And they still enjoyed petty feuds and gossiping.
