Old Thiess, a Livonian werewolf : a classic case in comparative perspective / Carlo Ginzburg and Bruce Lincoln.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Ginzburg, Carlo, author.

Lincoln, Bruce, author, translator.

Contributor:

Höfler, Otto, 1901-1987.

Language:

English

German

Subjects (All):

Old Thiess, active 17th century--Trials, litigation, etc.

Old Thiess.

Werewolves--Livonia--History--17th century.

Werewolves.

Werewolves--Livonia--Religious aspects.

Trials (Witchcraft)--Livonia.

Trials (Witchcraft).

Trials.

Werewolves--Religious aspects.

History.

Europe--Livonia.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

vi, 289 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2020.

Summary:

"The topic of werewolves has flared in the popular imagination in recent years, but the case of Thiess-a self-admitted werewolf who claimed that, thrice yearly, he transformed and battled Satan and his witches as a protector of humanity and the forest-is as baffling today as it was in seventeenth-century Livonia. At first, the judges in 1691 dismissed the 80-year-old was just a senile old man. But after protracted questioning and the testimonies of witnesses who knew Thiess as a werewolf, the judges delivered a guilty verdict a year-and-a-half later on Halloween. The sentence: flogging and banishment for stealing livestock. Even at the end, Thiess maintained that he "and a few other" werewolves were not servants of the Devil and refuted the inquisitors' accusations. This unusual and entertaining book is an attempt by two distinguished scholars from different methodological perspectives to wrestle with the case over the years. It is a hybrid work, at once a source text of the trial (reproduced in full in English for the first time); a glimpse at Nazi appropriation of the werewolf tale prior to WWII; a summary of Carlo Ginzburg's thoughts on the case (which he first encountered in the 1960s) using microhistorical analytic methods; Bruce Lincoln's analysis (from the 1970s), which he viewed from the perspective of comparative religion; their subsequent exchange of ideas and differing conclusions; and ending with an informal conversation. The result is a rare opportunity for students to attain an insight into the "modus operandi" of scholars who have left a great impact on the field, the merits and pitfalls of different interpretive approaches to the same historical materials, and an example of how scholarly exchange happens in the academic world, a debate not solely restricted to the exchange of formal articles in journals and conference papers"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. The Trial

Transcript from the Hearings at the Provincial Court of Venden (April 28, 1691)

Verdict Pronounced by the High Court of Dorpat [Tartu] (October 31, 1692)

2. Comparison Of Old Thiess To Germanic Cult Groups, Folklore, And Persephone Myths / Otto Hofler

3. Comparison Of Old Thiess To Friulian Benandanti, Russian Werewolves, And Shamanic Others / Carlo Ginzburg

From The Night Battles: Witchcraft and Agrarian Cults in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (1980)

From "Germanic Mythology and Nazism: Thoughts on an Old Book by Georges Dumezilin Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method (1989)

"Freud, the Wolf-Man, and the Werewolves" in Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method (1989)

From Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches' Sabbath (1989)

4. Comparison Of Old Thiess To Learned Descriptions And Stereotypes Of Livonian Werewolves And To The Benandanti: A Seventeenth-Century Werewolf And The Drama Of Religious Resistance / Bruce Lincoln

5. Ginzburg Responds To Lincoln: Conjunctive Anomalies

-A Reflection On Werewolves

6. Lincoln Responds To Ginzburg: Letter Of February 8, 2017

7. The Case Of Old Thiess: A Comparative Perspective

A Conversation: Saturday, September 30, 2017

The Conversation Continues: Monday, October 2, 2017.

Notes:

Some text translated from German.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

ebook version :

ISBN:

9780226674384

022667438X

9780226674414

022667441X

OCLC:

1110125178