This book describes the fascinating Johannes Wier and his views on witchcraft. Wier was born in Grave, the Netherlands, in 1515, the son of a hop merchant, and died in 1578 in Tecklenburg, Germany. At around the age of fourteen he became a pupil of Agrippa von Nettesheim in Antwerp, Renaissance scholar and friend of Erasmus. In 1534 Wier went to Paris to study medicine. As a physician, he came into contact with a large number of people affected by witchcraft. In 1551 he became the personal physician of Duke Wilhelm iv of Gulik in Kleve. At this court a tolerant Erasmian spirit prevailed. Wier advocated a rational approach to medicine, based on facts, purged of all unscientific practices. While preparing a medical work providing guidelines to purge medicine of many unscientific practices, he decided to focus on witchcraft. His book, De praestigiis daemonum et incantationibus ac veneficiis (On the deceptions of the devil and on enchantments and poisons) (Basel 1563) combined the latest scholarly results in philosophy, medicine and law, and received wide circulation. This book – chosen by Sigmund Freud as one of the ten books a person should read – is at the centre of Michaela Valente's great book. The first chapter gives a very insightful overview of the historiography of Wier and the witch-hunts, after which follows a concise biography up until the year 1557, the year of publication of Wier's chief work. Chapter iii describes the background to Wier's De praestigiis and how he arrived at a different approach towards witchcraft, which he sees as a means of Satan to destroy people's lives. So Wier's position is not that of science – and in this case medicine – against theology; but rather he provides the more scientific approach of a Christian physician who is convinced of the tricks of the devil. Here the author summarises the debate Wier had with the Lutheran theologian Johannes Brenz as Wier is against punishing those that are labelled as witches. According to Wier, Satan seduces witches, and thus they do not deserve to be executed, but they must be cured from what he saw as their melancholy. The fourth chapter focuses on the sixteenth-century innovations in medicine and the way Paracelsus questioned the Galenic tradition of explaining illnesses. Wier does not choose sides but in a way tries to combine the best of both. Chapter v deals with the last stage of Wier's life and the publications of that period. Wier's views on demons, sorcerers and witches are extensively presented in chapter vi. Wier made a distinction between magicians who had responsibility for their own actions and witches whom he saw as victims of demonic influences. Here Wier's new approach and its consequences are clearly demonstrated. The influence of Erasmus and his ideas of toleration are the topic of chapter vii and the last chapter provides insight into the highly interesting debates with, and reception of Weir's standpoint, during his lifetime as well as later in the seventeenth century. ‘That is what I tried to achieve’ is the last sentence (p. 212) in this book and as reviewer I can say that the author certainly and convincingly managed to achieve her goal: to describe the view of Johannes Wier on witches, to clarify his context and to describe his long-term influence. Valente proffers clear and very accessible insights into the background, contents, context and reception of Wier's position as he laid it down in various works. Valente's book is an important contribution to early modern studies as it demonstrates its renewed relation between theology and medicine, but also that many non-theological academics did not take a confessional stand but just wanted to be evangelical Christians and practise their faith with an openness to new insights.
No CrossRef data available.