Perugian Witch, 1908 April 8, 2016
Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern , trackback
Perugia is a marvelous medieval city in Umbria, about half way between Rome and Florence. The following account of early twentieth-century witchcraft there was not, in itself, remarkable, but Perugia has a special place in Beach’s heart and so he hoped vainly perhaps, that someone could fill in the blanks. The great problem with Italian libraries is that there is not as yet (and there is no sign of anything changing) a good scanned database of Italian newspapers. Perhaps someone in Perugia can get in touch and add something to this tale: drbeachcombing AT yahoo DOT com
The Perugia Daily Telegraph correspondent writes, under Monday’s date: in a modest house hidden in a maze of alleys in a suburb of this city, strange ceremonies, it is reported, take place there, and mysterious rites are celebrated. The house was frequented by women of the suburb, and now and again by some damsel who had been crossed in love, or some wife who was jealous of her husband. The police heard vague rumours of the proceedings, but had not until now succeeded in probing the mystery. Today a chauffeur, who was accompanied by a groom carrying under his arm a bundle of papers, stopped his automobile opposite the mysterious house, the doors of which were closed. The car had apparently broken down. The chauffeur and the groom, who were actually police agents in disguise, left their machine and knocked on the door to ask for a pair of pliers. The door was opened by woman who, suspecting nothing, was going to search for the desired implement, when the two men held her back, entered the house, and shut the door in her face. [Dirty….] Strange and terrible was the aspect of the interior. The walls were hung with mysterious symbols, human skulls and crossed bones, bottles, large and small, swords of strange shapes, heads of dogs, and other animals, and, in fact, all the traditional implements of medieval witchcraft. A thorough search was made and several books were found containing a quantity of various invocations of the Evil One. The sorceress, a woman of 50 years of age, who possesses vast property, purchased with the money she had wheedled from her credulous clients was arrested and carried away in the motor-car. Her trial will give rise to some interesting revelations with regard to the dark doings of witchcraft in Perugia. Lut Times, Friday 19 June 1908, 3
30 April 2016, Sorry I can’t help with the Perugian witch, but here are two other Italian witch cases, one from 1904; the other from 1928. The persistence…
CURIOUS THINGS AT BOTTOM OF WELL
Evidence of Old-Fashioned Methods of Witchcrafts
A Jilted Lover Suspected.
Florence, July 19. The cabdrivers of Leghorn, who nightly stable their horses in a large courtyard situated in the suburb of San Jacopo, have been perturbed by mysterious noises proceeding from an old well nearby. The well, they maintained, was bewitched, notwithstanding that the police explained that the noises were caused by escaping carbonic gas. To reassure the men, however, it was decided to make an investigation. Yesterday the well was emptied, and to the astonishment of those present a number of very curious articles were discovered. Among them was a heart-shaped leather cushion inside which was a lamb’s heart pierced with 50 needles. The heart was wrapped in a stamped addressed envelope, upon which the address of a young girl living in the neighborhood was written.
Further, they found a fragment of a marble tombstone, bearing the inscription, “here repose the ashes,” and a small glass cylinder, with a parchment stopper, and containing a dead toad, which was also pierced with 50 needles, the toad being tied with a lock of woman’s hair. To all appearances the matter resolved itself into an old-fashioned method of witchcraft employed against the girl whose name appeared on the envelope. A curious point about the affair is that two days before the discovery was made the girl’s relatives received a letter from San Francisco, whither the girl had recently emigrated, stating that she was on her deathbed.
A jilted lover of the girl is suspected of being the originator of the affair, which has created a considerable sensation in the neighborhood. Baltimore [MD] American 20 July 1904: p. 4
While the jilted lover used the envelope to direct malign magic to the young woman, the careless protagonist of this next story was directed to use a photograph along with the lamb’s heart to retrieve her lost lover.
ITALIANS HOLD TO WITCHCRAFT
Some of Lower Class Believe Charms Will Work Wonders in Magic.
Rome, March. 20 Witchcraft still has a strong hold over Italians of the lower classes, and cases in proof of this are continually coming to light. Last week in Genoa a young woman lost her hand-bag in a ‘bus, where it was found later by another passenger, who handed it over to the driver, and he, in his turn, took it to the offices of the company. Here it was opened by the director, and inside it, among a variety of objects of no importance, there was found a small cardboard box containing a bleeding heart pierced with a number of pins.
SCENT MURDER
The horrified employe, scenting a crime, hastily conveyed the handbag to the nearest police-station. An address in the bag enabled the police to identify the owner, and she was promptly invited to explain why she traveled about with bleeding hearts stuck with pins. For a long time the girl refused to give any information, but at last she confessed that, having been abandoned by her lover, she had consulted a witch, who told her to get the heart of a lamb freshly killed, pierce it with pins, and bury it in a corner of the cemetery at Staglieno, together with the unfaithful lover’s photograph: this would infallibly ensure his return. The girl was on her way to perform this rite when she lost her hand-bag, which was now being returned to her with much more publicity than she cared for.
AGED GOSSIP SHOT
Not all witchcraft stories are so harmless, or so free from tragedy. Only a few days ago at a little village near Prato, not far from Florence, a poor old woman of over 60 was shot within a few yards of her own home, because the death of a neighbor, a young girl who had just died of some wasting disease, was laid at her door. The victim was unpopular, being of a backbiting, gossiping disposition, and public opinion branded her as a witch and attributed everything that went wrong in the village to her dealings in the black art. She was murdered by the brother of the girl who had died. Charlotte [NC] Observer 20 March 1928: p. 23
