Origins of the Witches' Sabbath

While the perception of magic as harmful is age-old, the notion of witches gathering together in large numbers, overtly worshiping demons, and receiving instruction in how to work harmful magic as part of a conspiratorial plot against Christian society was an innovation of the early fifteenth century. The sources collected in this book reveal this concept in its formative stages.

The idea that witches were members of organized heretical sects or part of a vast diabolical conspiracy crystaliz...