This 1595 Lyon edition brings the Malleus Maleficarum, or Hammer of Witches, together with a companion collection of writings on demonology and exorcism. The two volumes are bound in one contemporary parchment binding. In the second, a treatise on exorcism has been removed and its entry struck from the contents: a conspicuous absence in a book devoted to the proper handling of demons.
First published in 1486/7, Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus sets out an argument for the reality of witchcraft and a procedure for prosecuting those accused of it. Its three parts move from theology to alleged acts of sorcery, then to investigation and trial. Its hostility toward women reaches even into its etymology. Femina, it claims, combines fides and minus, “faith” and “less,” as though women’s supposed deficiency in faith were built into the Latin word. Disbelief in the witch sect is itself presented as assistance to it.
The procedural instructions show how difficult it could become for an accused person to answer a charge. The Malleus describes a supposed “sorcery of silence,” by which the Devil could prevent a suspect from crying out under torture. It also warns interrogators to distinguish real tears from moisture smeared on the face. The same text that authorized torture supplied reasons to distrust the victim’s response.
Johannes Nider’s Formicarius appears with the Malleus in the first volume. The second extends the collection with Ulrich Molitor on witches, Girolamo Menghi on exorcism, and writings on the testing of spirits and demonic pacts. The contents below identify each work. Together they show the range of authorities a reader could consult on witchcraft and the attempted control of spirits.
Felix Hemmerlin’s Tractatus duo Exorcismorum is the absent text. In this copy, leaf 2S4 is glued to 2X3, suppressing pages 280–325 of the second volume, and the chapter is crossed out in both the index and table of contents. The removal is visible in both the list of what the volume should contain and the surviving book. Who made the intervention, and when, remain unestablished.
Contents:
Volume I
Institoris (Kramer), Heinrich [attr. also to Sprenger, Jacob]. Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches).
Nider, Johannes. Formicarius (The Anthill; selections on witchcraft).
Volume II
Basin, Bernhard. De Artibus Magicis, ac Magorum Maleficiis (On the Magical Arts and the Sorcery of Magicians).
Molitor, Ulrich. De Lamiis et Pythonicis Mulieribus (On Witches and Diviner Women).
Menghi, Girolamo. Flagellum Daemonum (Scourge of Demons).
Gerson, Johannes. De Probatione Spirituum (On the Testing of Spirits).
Murner, Thomas. De Pythonico Contractu (On Pacts with Diviners).
Malleolus (Hemmerlin), Felix. Tractatus duo Exorcismorum (Two Treatises on Exorcisms).
CENSORED AND ABSENT: suppressed at printing, leaves glued, chapter struck from index.
Spina, Bartholomeo de. Quaestio de Strigibus (Questions on Witches); with Apologia Quadruplex de Lamiis (The Fourfold Defense of [the Existence of] Witches).
INSTITORIS (KRAMER), Heinrich. Malleus Maleficarum [The Hammer of Witches]. With: Mallei Maleficarum... Tomus Secundus [a companion compendium of demonological and exorcistic treatises]. Lyon: Apud Petrum Landry, 1595.
Physical Description: Two volumes in one. 8vo (169 × 110 mm). Vol. I: [48], 544 pp. Vol. II: [24], 9–496 pp. Title pages printed in red and black with woodcut printer’s device; woodcut initials and decorations throughout.
Binding: Contemporary full parchment with handwritten author’s name on spine and title on the lower edge. Modern parchment dust jacket with titles on a tag on the spine.
Condition: Leaves uniformly aged, some palely browned, with sporadic foxing. Fascicle 2Z shows light stains. Small woodworm hole on the internal margin of the colophon and on the rear flyleaves. In Vol. II, chapter VI (Malleolus, Tractatus duo Exorcismorum, pp. 280–325) is censored and absent: leaf 2S4 is glued to 2X3 to suppress the contents at printing; the chapter is also crossed out in the index and table of contents.
Censorship: A significant feature of this copy: Felix Malleolus’s (Felix Hemmerlin’s) Tractatus duo Exorcismorum seu Adiurationum (pp. 280–325 of Vol. II) has been physically suppressed at the time of printing. The leaves have been glued together and the chapter struck from both the index and table of contents. The text was considered to cross the line from legitimate exorcism into criminal necromancy, a pointed reminder that the line between commanding demons in Christ’s name and binding them for other purposes was, even for contemporary authorities, perilously thin.
This 1595 Lyon edition brings the Malleus Maleficarum, or Hammer of Witches, together with a companion collection of writings on demonology and exorcism. The two volumes are bound in one contemporary parchment binding. In the second, a treatise on exorcism has been removed and its entry struck from the contents: a conspicuous absence in a book devoted to the proper handling of demons.
First published in 1486/7, Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus sets out an argument for the reality of witchcraft and a procedure for prosecuting those accused of it. Its three parts move from theology to alleged acts of sorcery, then to investigation and trial. Its hostility toward women reaches even into its etymology. Femina, it claims, combines fides and minus, “faith” and “less,” as though women’s supposed deficiency in faith were built into the Latin word. Disbelief in the witch sect is itself presented as assistance to it.
The procedural instructions show how difficult it could become for an accused person to answer a charge. The Malleus describes a supposed “sorcery of silence,” by which the Devil could prevent a suspect from crying out under torture. It also warns interrogators to distinguish real tears from moisture smeared on the face. The same text that authorized torture supplied reasons to distrust the victim’s response.
Johannes Nider’s Formicarius appears with the Malleus in the first volume. The second extends the collection with Ulrich Molitor on witches, Girolamo Menghi on exorcism, and writings on the testing of spirits and demonic pacts. The contents below identify each work. Together they show the range of authorities a reader could consult on witchcraft and the attempted control of spirits.
Felix Hemmerlin’s Tractatus duo Exorcismorum is the absent text. In this copy, leaf 2S4 is glued to 2X3, suppressing pages 280–325 of the second volume, and the chapter is crossed out in both the index and table of contents. The removal is visible in both the list of what the volume should contain and the surviving book. Who made the intervention, and when, remain unestablished.
Contents:
Volume I
Institoris (Kramer), Heinrich [attr. also to Sprenger, Jacob]. Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches).
Nider, Johannes. Formicarius (The Anthill; selections on witchcraft).
Volume II
Basin, Bernhard. De Artibus Magicis, ac Magorum Maleficiis (On the Magical Arts and the Sorcery of Magicians).
Molitor, Ulrich. De Lamiis et Pythonicis Mulieribus (On Witches and Diviner Women).
Menghi, Girolamo. Flagellum Daemonum (Scourge of Demons).
Gerson, Johannes. De Probatione Spirituum (On the Testing of Spirits).
Murner, Thomas. De Pythonico Contractu (On Pacts with Diviners).
Malleolus (Hemmerlin), Felix. Tractatus duo Exorcismorum (Two Treatises on Exorcisms).
CENSORED AND ABSENT: suppressed at printing, leaves glued, chapter struck from index.
Spina, Bartholomeo de. Quaestio de Strigibus (Questions on Witches); with Apologia Quadruplex de Lamiis (The Fourfold Defense of [the Existence of] Witches).
INSTITORIS (KRAMER), Heinrich. Malleus Maleficarum [The Hammer of Witches]. With: Mallei Maleficarum... Tomus Secundus [a companion compendium of demonological and exorcistic treatises]. Lyon: Apud Petrum Landry, 1595.
Physical Description: Two volumes in one. 8vo (169 × 110 mm). Vol. I: [48], 544 pp. Vol. II: [24], 9–496 pp. Title pages printed in red and black with woodcut printer’s device; woodcut initials and decorations throughout.
Binding: Contemporary full parchment with handwritten author’s name on spine and title on the lower edge. Modern parchment dust jacket with titles on a tag on the spine.
Condition: Leaves uniformly aged, some palely browned, with sporadic foxing. Fascicle 2Z shows light stains. Small woodworm hole on the internal margin of the colophon and on the rear flyleaves. In Vol. II, chapter VI (Malleolus, Tractatus duo Exorcismorum, pp. 280–325) is censored and absent: leaf 2S4 is glued to 2X3 to suppress the contents at printing; the chapter is also crossed out in the index and table of contents.
Censorship: A significant feature of this copy: Felix Malleolus’s (Felix Hemmerlin’s) Tractatus duo Exorcismorum seu Adiurationum (pp. 280–325 of Vol. II) has been physically suppressed at the time of printing. The leaves have been glued together and the chapter struck from both the index and table of contents. The text was considered to cross the line from legitimate exorcism into criminal necromancy, a pointed reminder that the line between commanding demons in Christ’s name and binding them for other purposes was, even for contemporary authorities, perilously thin.
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