Bonnie Effros

HIST 336: Magic, Miracles, and Witchcraft: The Supernatural in Medieval Europe
Fall 2025
Professor Bonnie Effros

This course will assess the social, religious, and political functions of the supernatural in late antique, early medieval, and medieval European society (400-1400 CE). Through primary and secondary readings, lectures, discussions, and films, students will gain an understanding of the role played by magic, witchcraft, and the occult in shaping pre-modern European views of the cosmos. We will study how the condemnation of demonic power existed side by side with miraculous tales of the deeds of saints, alchemical research, and magical Arthurian romances. Another important facet of the course will be to address how accusations of magic and witchcraft and resulting persecutions marginalized particularly vulnerable individuals and social groups in Europe from the fourth to fourteenth century, but particular at the latter end of this era with the advent of the earliest trials directed against the alleged practice of witchcraft.