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Witches's Ointment-Broomstick-Masturbation Myth

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User7597

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I've been looking into the history of Witches and their supposed use of mind altering ointments that enabled them to fly or turn themselves into animals. An internet search brings up many articles with the unfounded suggestion that witches would apply the ointment to a broom handle and insert it into the vagina so that the chemicals in the ointment could be absorbed through the mucous membrane more easily. The ointment was thought to contain plants of the Solanaceae family such as belladonna, henbane and mandrake.

I wrote some notes a few years back that I found on the internet claiming that henbane essential oil can blister the mucous membrane so that it would be doubtful that a stick would be inserted into the vagina. I can't find the reference anymore so don't know how true that is. Does anybody have any medical knowledge that could verify that claim?
 
Matt said:
henbane essential oil can blister the mucous membrane so that it would be doubtful that a stick would be inserted into the vagina
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It's a non-sequitur. There are male analogues, such as the Spanish Fly, which was an irritant, causing horrid damage to the whole urinary system, in pursuit of thrills.

Blunt assertions that the broomstick was inserted may be hard to find but the witch-lore was rampantly sexual in its implications.

Much more recently, we had the spectacle of the vibrating Harry Potter broomstick, which seems to have been a real product, removed from sale, when kiddies enjoyed it rather too much! No need to insert it. :rcard:
 
Matt said:
... I wrote some notes a few years back that I found on the internet claiming that henbane essential oil can blister the mucous membrane so that it would be doubtful that a stick would be inserted into the vagina. I can't find the reference anymore so don't know how true that is. Does anybody have any medical knowledge that could verify that claim?
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Here's one source that supports the notion ...
A classic witching herb and plant of Saturn, henbane is said to have been a component in witches' flying ointments, but this seems strange, since it is sedating and causes feelings of heaviness. Also, oil of henbane can blister the skin, so this herb is not a good candidate for inclusion in a salve or ointment (fat will generally extract essential oils). Perhaps henbane worked against the side-effects of other components in the salves (which fits with at least one theory of flying ointments).
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SOURCE: https://www.alchemy-works.com/hyoscyamus_niger.html
(Emphasis Added)
 
Here's another ...
Hyoscyamus niger L. ...
Black Henbane, Henbane, Stinking Nightshade

... Inunction of the skin with Oil of Henbane can cause painful blistering (Schwartz et al. 1957) ...
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SOURCE: https://www.botanical-dermatology-database.info/BotDermFolder/SOLA.html

Cited Reference:
Schwartz, L., Tulipan, L. and Birmingham, D.J. (1957) Occupational Diseases of the Skin. 3rd edn. Philadelphia. Lea and Febiger. pp. 637-672.
 
So as not to confuse any Americans, a fanny is something you stick a jam rag up, not your backside.
 
Matt said:
So as not to confuse any Americans, a fanny is something you stick a jam rag up, not your backside.
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What's a jam rag?
 
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maximus otter
 
It may take longer of course, but rubbing anything on using the hands is going to cause absorbtion through the skin of the fingers. So you could rub it on a broomstick and have effects, but without inserting said broomstick anywhere that the sun don't shine.
 
Most of the weirdness in the Middle Ages/Medieval period (and Norwich) used to be attributed to ergot poisoning from infected rye flour. Is that no longer the case ?

"The symptoms of hallucination, cramps and convulsions may have led many to believe that they were victims of witchcraft. Again, witch trials were most prevalent in areas where rye consumption was highest"

https://microbiologysociety.org/pub...obes/article/the-highs-and-lows-of-ergot.html
 
Bad Bungle said:
Most of the weirdness in the Middle Ages/Medieval period (and Norwich) used to be attributed to ergot poisoning from infected rye flour. Is that no longer the case ?

"The symptoms of hallucination, cramps and convulsions may have led many to believe that they were victims of witchcraft. Again, witch trials were most prevalent in areas where rye consumption was highest"

https://microbiologysociety.org/pub...obes/article/the-highs-and-lows-of-ergot.html
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I've read this too. But I think much has been dismissed now, because people living in the Middle Ages weren't stupid - they would have known the symptoms of poisoning and ergotism. They may have attributed the actual poisoning to witches 'turning' the rye, but they would have had experience of it without witchcraft being mentioned too.

I think it would be more likely to be viral illnesses - ie, something with no visible or attributal cause - or mental illness that would have been put down to 'witchcraft'.
 
catseye said:
I've read this too. But I think much has been dismissed now, because people living in the Middle Ages weren't stupid - they would have known the symptoms of poisoning and ergotism. They may have attributed the actual poisoning to witches 'turning' the rye, but they would have had experience of it without witchcraft being mentioned too.

I think it would be more likely to be viral illnesses - ie, something with no visible or attributal cause - or mental illness that would have been put down to 'witchcraft'.
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Bit of 'just world' in there as well. "We're all worshipping God OK, and shit still happens. So must be a witch. There's one..."
 
It seems like the flying ointment and broomstick masterbation are equally mythic at the moment. Use of mood and perception-altering drugs likely happened, and using objects for self-gratification also likely happened, but I don't know that we'll ever be able to connect a specific concoction of drug, application site, and household object as gratification for use during ritual.

I know that classic Werewolf claims usually mention an ointmen or salve, along with a hair belt, but I don't know that we've ever gotten an actual example of these.

Does anybody know what is the oldest reference to witches flying on a broom?

Are there any examplrs of flying ointment that was confiscated and kept from the multitudinous witch trials?
 
MrRING said:
Are there any examplrs of flying ointment that was confiscated and kept from the multitudinous witch trials?
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It is a good question but they had no forensic labs in those days and no faith in them to come.

They were buoyed-up with their own faith that anything irregular was bad enough to hang a person! :(
 
JamesWhitehead said:
It is a good question but they had no forensic labs in those days and no faith in them to come.

They were buoyed-up with their own faith that anything irregular was bad enough to hang a person! :(
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And I suspect that any 'relics' of the witchcraft will have been burned or otherwise disposed of. So as not to be used by any 'other' witches.
 
Perhaps an interesting bit here:
https://guides.library.uab.edu/c.php?g=1048546&p=7609204

One of the most persistent ideas about witches was that they flew on broomsticks, pitchforks, or animals’ backs to midnight meetings in far-off lands with the devil, demons, and other witches, an event known as the “Witches’ Sabbath.” At these sabbaths, all kinds of offensive, perverse and inhumane activities were said to take place. But what was really going on?
In 1458, a man called Abraham the Jew published an account of an interesting experience. He met a witch in Linz, Austria, who gave him an unguent, or ointment, and told him to spread it over his pulse points, as she did the same. Abraham had the sensation of flying through the air to a place he wanted to visit. When he awoke, the witch told him a different tale of her travels, which inspired him to investigate further. He then asked her to take the ointment while he watched. Instead of flying, he observed the witch fall to the floor and remain immobilized for hours; she woke with further tales. He concluded the unguent induced hallucinations of flying and other fantasies (Lois Martin, A Brief History of Witchcraft, pp. 49-50).
Recipes for the witches’ flying ointment can be found in works of 16th century physicians/scholars Jerome Cardan and Giovanni Battista della Porta, in which the fat of infants is mixed with many various ingredients, including herbs known to have hallucinogenic and paralyzing effects, deadly nightshade and aconitum (Forbes, pp. 268-270).
So why the fat of infants? According to pharmacological studies, mixing the flying concoction with fat allowed it to become an ointment that could be absorbed into the skin (Forbes, p. 269). The use of infants, and more specifically, unbaptized infants, was based on the belief that before baptism, the soul of the child is in limbo and not yet protected by the Church. In the popular imagination, midwives took on a significant role in obtaining infants for this purpose.
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Also this paper:
https://akjournals.com/view/journals/2054/3/2/article-p164.xml
A commonly misunderstood area of Western psychedelic history involves psychoactive ointments that have become part of popular lore during the early modern and Renaissance eras. These substances amorphously considered as “flying ointments” have various histories. This paper addresses four separate histories regarding these beliefs: (a) one conveyed in the writings of anthropologist Michael Harner in his Hallucinogens and Shamanism (Harner, 1973); (b) an early modern reconceptualization of witches’ ointments history that began 600 years ago as a theological misconstrual of the nature of these magical unguents that fueled popular ideas about witches; (c) a probable historical reality of transvection ointments (referring to their alleged ability to make the person fly in some form) containing powerful tropane alkaloids (henbane, mandrake, and belladonna) that informed other traditions; and (d) a “post modern ointment” derived by contemporary scholars who doubted the reality of any actual flying ointments, instead ascribing them to literary traditions and the product of overworked and fearful religious minds. This article presents the evidence for these varying conceptions that early modern “flying ointments” have taken throughout the centuries and relates them to the broader cultural trends that have shaped these ointments in popular imagination. Careful adjudication of primary and secondary sources suggests that only the transvection ointment had an actual basis in historical fact.
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