The death penalty by burning alive was not an invention of the medieval European Inquisition. IN old testament it is mentioned repeatedly as a legal way of punishing some serious crimes against family morality. The Carthaginian commander Hannibal, fighting in Italy, was noted for burning the inhabitants of recalcitrant cities taken prisoner. Celtic druids made human sacrifices, burning people alive in rod cages. Burned in ancient india, in China, in Byzantium ...

The first reliably known case of execution by burning in Rus' occurred in 1227 in Novgorod. Then four "wizards" were burned. It is usually believed that the Magi here meant the pagans of some Finnish tribe. In 1411, in Pskov, during an epidemic, twelve “witches” were burned, who were suspected of causing damage and poisoning wells. It is assumed that the death penalty by burning was borrowed by the Russians from Western Europe and therefore was used first of all in Novgorod and Pskov.

Russian legislation for a long time did not establish clear types of the death penalty for certain crimes. This was within the competence of the judges, usually the courts of the sovereign himself. In Novgorod and Pskov during independence, such a sovereign was the entire civil community, in whose name the court was decided. In Moscow, it was the sovereign. In the name of the Grand Duke of Moscow, two Lithuanian subjects were sentenced to be burned in an iron cage in 1493 for intent on his life.

In the winter of 1504/05, the first burning of people for heresy took place in the history of Russia. On charges of "Jewish heresy", several high-ranking officials of the state apparatus were burned in log cabins. The initiator of drastic measures in relation to the "Judaizers" was the former Novgorod archbishop Gennady. Supporting the cruel punishment, Joseph Volotsky directly referred to the example of the Spanish Inquisition.

Bonfires are burning

Since the middle of the 16th century, execution by burning in Russia has been prescribed more and more often. The circle of acts punished by a fire is expanding: blasphemy against Jesus Christ, apostasy from Orthodoxy, storage and reading of “renounced” (forbidden) heretical books, deliberate poisoning, witchcraft, sorcery, and even eating veal ... Church circles were usually the initiators of burnings, while the kings doubted the piety of such executions and sometimes refused to approve them. So, for example, in 1623, Tsar Mikhail Romanov refused this to his father, Patriarch Filaret.

For the first time, burning alive at the stake was legally approved in Russia as a type of execution in the Cathedral Code of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich of 1649. “There will be someone of other faiths, no matter what faith, or a Russian person, will lay blasphemy on the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ, or on His Most Pure Lady Our Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary, or on honest cross, or on his saints, ... and that blasphemer, denouncing, executing, burning, ”the very first article of the Code read.

In addition, burning was supposed to be deliberate arsonists of buildings, as well as non-Christians who converted the Orthodox to their faith and performed the rite of circumcision over them. The “seduced” himself was subject to spiritual judgment: “Send that Russian person to the patriarch or to another authority and order him to issue a decree according to the rule of the holy apostles and holy fathers.” However, burning could be found among the mentioned rules. Further, as we will see, this article of the Code was interpreted by the judges very broadly.

Be that as it may, the arbitrariness in the appointment of such a punishment was eliminated. However, since then, the trend of criminal law in Russia has been to expand the list of crimes for which burning could not only be prescribed, but was inevitably prescribed by law.

Peak and trough of burns

Second half of the 17th century - Church Schism in Russia. Secular and ecclesiastical authorities unleashed mass terror against the Old Believers. The article of the Council Code fell "to the point". Fiery executions reached a particularly fierce scope during the reign of the enlightened Princess Sophia and her favorite, the Westerner Prince Vasily Golitsyn. According to historians, during these seven years (1682-1689) about 7 thousand schismatics were burned.

According to the decree of Peter I in 1716, burning was also supposed for practicing magic, for counterfeiting money, and for the military for setting fire to buildings without an order and outside the battlefield.

An analysis of individual cases in Russia in the 18th century, in which the accused were sentenced to be burned, shows that the following were regarded as blasphemy: magical actions with the aim of inducing fornication, the destruction of an icon with an ax, witchcraft, spitting bread for communion, the device of an imaginary "miracle" in order to receive donations to the temple.

Two cases of "seduction" to another faith deserve special consideration.

Last fire executions

In 1738, Captain-Lieutenant Alexander Voznitsyn, two years earlier dismissed from service due to mental illness, was burned alive on the Admiralty Island in St. Petersburg, along with the Jew Borokh Leibov, who persuaded him to Judaism. The act provided for by the Code was evident here, since the rite of circumcision was performed on Voznitsyn. It is curious that the case against him was initiated on the basis of a denunciation by his wife.

In 1739, in Yekaterinburg, a 60-year-old Bashkir Kisyakbika (Ekaterina in baptism) Bairasova was burned alive at the stake for falling away from Orthodoxy into Islam. A year earlier, her compatriot Tolgiydy Zhulyakov was burned for the same crime. In this case, there was a clear arbitrariness of the authorities, since the sentenced were not Russian people. Moreover, the article of the Code demanded first a spiritual trial of traitors to Orthodoxy.

The essence of the matter was that at that time the Demidovs and other Ural mining workers were engaged in the full sense of the word in hunting for slaves for their factories. Military teams captured entire Bashkir villages and resettled their inhabitants to factories, simultaneously performing forced baptism. The real "guilt" of the unfortunate old woman was that she had previously fled from the factory ghetto to her native places three times, but she was caught every time. Her execution was a means of intimidating the indigenous population.

It is worth mentioning that the first Russian historian Vasily Tatishchev was the governor of the Ural factory district at that time. Soon he was dismissed and was under investigation for abuse of power, but the case did not reach the court, and Tatishchev was released. The execution of a Bashkir woman turned out to be the last burning alive in Russia.

The last fiery execution in England took place almost half a century later, in 1783, when the 30-year-old counterfeiter Phoebe Harris was burned, who, for humane reasons, was first hanged before burning.

Witches, medieval and modern. History of torture and punishment.

Burning alive

	This type of death penalty - one of the most painful, was very popular in the Middle Ages. He was sentenced for heresy, witchcraft, women for adultery or treason (men were supposed to "qualified execution"). There were two main methods of this execution: in the first, more common, the convict was placed on top of a pile of firewood, bundles of brushwood and tied with ropes or chains to a post, so that the flame slowly rose to him, gradually covering his entire body. This technique was very loved by the Spanish Inquisition, as it made it possible to clearly see the suffering of the unfortunate.
	Another technique commonly used for witches was to tie the condemned woman to a post and surround her with firewood and brushwood so that she burned within the flames. It seems that Joan of Arc was burned in this way, although it is customary to depict her burning on top of the fire.
It was believed that the flame cleanses the soul of the victims from the "filth" accumulated on it. Sometimes women and girls were burned naked so that the crowd could make sure that their body was really destroyed by the flames and, therefore, witches could be dealt with. (Or maybe they did it to attract even larger crowds to the sadistic spectacle). So, when Jeanne d'Arc suffocated from hot smoke (her fire was lined with wet brushwood), the executioner moved the burning firewood to show the charred body in the burnt shirt, "so that everyone could see that the damned heretic was a woman, really died and the flame devoured her body." This type of execution was indeed very popular because of its spectacle; in the ancient world (in Rome), it was often combined with a preliminary crucifixion. So Seneca reported how during the persecution of Christians, "Nero stopped the chariot and in an emerald (Nero was short-sighted and used a polished transparent stone, like a kind of lorgnette) for a long time examined a naked girl, whose chest began to hiss from the flames." All these are types of so-called "rapid fire burning". But there was also an extremely barbarous burning on a "slow fire". The convict was tied to a pole and around it, at some distance from the pole a circle of firewood was laid out, so that the person was inside the circle of fire and was actually roasted, avoiding direct contact with the flame. Such a death was doomed especially to hardened heretics.
Preliminary strangulation of the convict	It has been actively used in many countries. For example, the Persian king Darius II burned his mother alive. There is other evidence from the pre-Christian era about this type of execution. But its real heyday came in the Middle Ages. This is due to the fact that the Inquisition chose burning as a priority type of execution for heretics. The death penalty threatened people for especially severe cases of heresy. Moreover, if the convict repented, then he was first strangled, after which the dead body was burned. If the heretic persisted, he was supposed to be burned alive.
Burning of Joan of Arc	Particular zeal in the "fiery" fight against heretics was shown by the English Queen Mary Tudor, who received the nickname Bloody, and the Supreme Inquisitor of Spain, Torquemada. According to the historian J.A. Llorente, during the 18 years of Torquemada's activity, 8,800 people climbed the fire. The first auto-da-fé on charges of witchcraft in Spain took place in 1507, the last in 1826. In 1481, in Seville alone, 2,000 people were burned alive. The bonfires of the Inquisition were burning all over Europe in such numbers, as if the holy tribunals had decided for several centuries to fire non-stop signal lights for some aircraft.
	The German historian I. Scherr writes: “Executions carried out at once on whole masses begin in Germany around 1580 and last for almost a century. While the whole of Lorraine was smoking from the fires in Padeborn, in Brandenburg, in Leipzig and its environs, many executions were also carried out. 1590 - 1600 years burned so many witches (daily 10-12 people) that their pillory stood " dense forest"in front of the gate".
	In the small county of Genneberg, 22 witches were burned in one year in 1612, 197 in 1597-1876 ... In Lindheim, with 540 inhabitants, 30 people were burned from 1661 to 1664. The judge of Fulda, Balthasar Foss, boasted that he alone burned 700 sorcerers of both sexes and hoped to bring the number of his victims to a thousand.
Sometimes, very rarely, the convicts were laid on the fire, tied to the wheel, so they could finish the wheel	In the county of Neisse (belonging to the Bishopric of Breslau) from 1640 to 1651 about a thousand witches were burned; we have descriptions of more than 242 executions; among the victims come across children from 1 to 6 years. At the same time, several hundred witches were murdered in the bishopric of Olmütz. In Osnabrück, 80 witches were burned in 1640. A certain Mr. Rantsov burned 18 witches in one day in 1686 in Holstein. According to documents, in the Bishopric of Bamberg, with a population of 100 thousand people, 285 people were burned in the years 1627-1630, and in the Bishopric of Würzburg over three years (1727-1729) - more than 200; among them there are people of all ages, ranks and sex.
	The last burning on a huge scale was arranged by the Archbishop of Salzburg in 1678; at the same time, 97 people fell victim to holy fury. To all these executions known to us from documents, we must add at least the same number of executions, the acts of which are lost to history. Then it will turn out that every city, every town, every prelacy, every noble estate in Germany lit bonfires, on which thousands of people accused of witchcraft died.
The last journey of the condemned	In England, the Inquisition killed “only” about a thousand people (such a “small” number is due to the fact that no torture was used there during the interrogation). I have already mentioned that under Henry VIII Lutherans were the first to be burned; Catholics were "lucky" - they were hanged. However, sometimes, for a change, a Lutheran and a Catholic were tied with their backs to each other and, in this form, they were erected on a fire. In Italy, after the publication in 1523 of the bull on witches by Pope Adrian VI, addressed to the inquisitor of the Como region, more than 100 witches were burned annually in this region.
	In France, the first known burning took place in Toulouse in 1285, when a woman was accused of cohabiting with the devil, from which she allegedly gave birth to a cross between a wolf, a snake and a man. In the years 1320-1350, 200 women climbed the fires in Carcassonne, more than 400 in Toulouse. In the same Toulouse, on February 9, 1619, the famous Italian atheist philosopher Giulio Vanini was burned. The execution procedure was regulated in the verdict as follows: “The executioner will have to drag him in one shirt on a mat, with a slingshot around his neck and a board on his shoulders, on which the following words should be written: “Atheist and blasphemer.”
The executioner must deliver him to the main gates of the city's cathedral of Saint Etienne, where he should be put on his knees, barefoot, with his head bare. In his hands he must hold a lit wax candle and will have to beg for the forgiveness of God, the king and the court. Then the executioner will take him to the Place de Salene, tie him to a stake erected there, rip out his tongue and strangle him. After that, his body will be burned on a fire prepared for this purpose and the ashes will be scattered to the wind.
	The historian of the Inquisition testifies to the madness that gripped christianity in the XV-XVII centuries: “Witches were no longer burned singly or in pairs, but in tens and hundreds. It is said that one Bishop of Geneva burned 500 witches in three months; Bishop of Wamberg - 600, Bishop of Würzburg - 900 In 1586, summer was late in the Rhine provinces and the cold lasted until June; this could only be the work of witchcraft, and the Bishop of Trier burned 118 women and 2 men whose consciousness was torn out, 410 this continuation of the cold was the work of their spells.
	About Philipp Adolf Ehrenberg, who was Bishop of Würzburg in 1623-1631, it should be said especially. In Würzburg alone, he organized 42 bonfires, on which 209 people were burned, including 25 children aged four to fourteen. Among those executed were the most beautiful girl, the most fat woman and the fattest man - a deviation from the norm seemed to the bishop a direct evidence of connections with the devil. Tried to keep up with Europe, and distant mysterious Russia. In 1227, as the chronicle says, in Novgorod, “four wise men were burned out.” When a plague epidemic broke out in Pskov in 1411, 12 women were immediately burned on charges of spreading the disease. The next year, mass burning of people took place in Novgorod. For the famous tyrant of medieval Rus', Ivan the Terrible, burning was one of the favorite types of execution.
	Under Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich (XVII century), “they burn the living for blasphemy, for sorcery, for witchcraft.” Under him, the old woman Olena is burned in a log house, like a heretic, with magical papers and roots. The most famous in Russia is the burning of Archpriest Avvakum, an ascetic of schismatics. Execution at the stake in Russia was more painful than in Europe, since it was rather not burning, but smoking alive on a slow fire.
“In 1701, this method of burning was applied to a certain Grishka Talitsky and his accomplice Savin for distributing outrageous “notebooks” (leaflets) about Peter 1. Both convicts were fumigated for eight hours with a caustic composition, from which all the hair on their head and beard came out and the whole body slowly smoldered like wax. In the end, their mutilated bodies were burned along with the scaffold.” There were also cases of burning alive during the reign of Anna Ioannovna.
As you can see, almost all of Europe competed in the number of those burned at the stake. The pan-European scale of this type of execution is easiest to imagine if we recall that a certain Trois Echelle in 1576 told the Inquisition that he could tell her the names of 300 thousand sorcerers and witches. And finally, another amazing fact: the last witch in the history of mankind was burned in Camargo (Mexico) in 1860! Among the European celebrities who died at the stake are Joan of Arc, Giordano Bruno, Savanarola, Jan Hus, Jerome of Prague, Miguel Servet. It is worth noting that even in the face of such a terrible execution, none of them renounced their beliefs. In the 20th century, burning as a form of execution was used in Russia during the civil war. captain Novatsky, whom the sailors considered the soul of the uprising in Evpatoria. He, already badly wounded, was brought to his senses, bandaged and then thrown into the furnace of the ship's transport. Opponents of the Bolsheviks sometimes used the same methods. So, in 1920, the leaders of the military revolutionary organizations of the Far East S. Lazo, A. Lutsky and V, Sibirtsev were burned in a locomotive furnace.
	During the Second World War, burning alive was used by the German Nazis. Thus, a case was described when a group of convicts were brought to the crematorium of a concentration camp and ordered to undress. “One of the women resisted, not allowing herself to be undressed. Then they tied her up, laid her on an iron stretcher and, thus, pushed her into the oven. A strangled cry was heard and the doors slammed shut.” This was not the only such case. During the Pacific War, the Japanese captured 18-year-old American nurse Diana Winter, accused her of espionage and burned her alive.
One must think that even today this type of execution has not gone into oblivion.

Based on materials torturesru.org

11 alleged witches in Kenya burned at the stake (May 2008)

A witch hunt is underway in Kenya. 11 women were burned alive on charges of witchcraft in the west of the country. Relatives of those killed are hiding, as they are afraid for their lives.

Local residents are suspected of the murder, Kenyan police say, according to the BBC.

What exactly was the fault of the "witches" is not reported.

Local officials condemned the killing. According to one of the officials, people do not have the right to administer justice on their own just because they have some suspicions.

Similar crimes, when unknown people tried to burn people suspected of witchcraft, were recorded in the country before.

At the same time, in developed countries, for example, in Great Britain, witches regularly pay taxes and even take part in demonstrations, and in the Netherlands they are even given government grants for business development.

At the same time, for example, in South Africa, a law has been in force for 50 years, according to which the activities of witches can be prosecuted.

Haitians lynched 45 "witches" and "witches" because of the cholera epidemic (2010)

Residents of the province of Grand Anse in Haiti because of the cholera epidemic over the past two weeks staged lynching and executed at least 45 "sorcerers" and "witches". This is reported by the American media. Representatives of "alternative medicine" were charged with insufficient perseverance in the fight against infection, and some were accused of organizing the epidemic.

Belgian authorities rehabilitate witches burned in the 17th century

Between 1602 and 1652, 15 "witches" and two "sorcerers" were burned alive in Newpoort.

To commemorate the victims of the "historical mistake", Newport authorities erected a stele in the city hall, which lists the names of all the executed followers of the occult, including the city's most famous "sorceress" Jeanne pan de Deyster.

The Newport administration announced next week a "sorcerer's holiday", which until now has been organized here every two years.

Why were women burned at the stake?
With envy, I think maybe
They did not know that on a righteous bed
And death is purer and more expensive.

Maybe they didn't want to know?
There the arrogance of men ruled and beat,
In the eyes that kept me awake at night
Did he dream of the devil's power?!

And if that knight caught fire,
By the fire of living captivating delight,
He pursued her all year round,
And he sang, after all, endlessly, serenades!

Beauty did not dare to refuse!
Otherwise, at the stake, burned alive,
I had to appease the arrogant,
Destroyed not only the soul, but also the body.

And worst of all was the cunning womanizer!
Is it a monk, an aged inquisitor,
There is a sinner, for a sincere refusal,
Like a sliver in a bright red flame.

Sometimes already - he can not cope,
And there is no strength, because a weak body,
Then - did not get to anyone,
With fire, the soul flew to the Almighty.

And worse is the envy of girlfriends,
Mistresses of the elderly womanizers,
They shouted: "Witch", each, suddenly,
Who is more beautiful or sincere, for an hour.

And then she went to the flame, breathing a little,
But proudly, did not bow before a lie,
Your soul, like the sun, is good,
After all, in the heart it carried away the spark of God.

Why were women burned at the stake?
For the soul that comprehended life's a mystery,
For the face of the saint on the sinner-Earth,
What attracted all men unusually.

FURTHER...

Thought-crime and punishment in the Russian Empire. "Code of punishments" Entered into force on May 1, 1846

"On Crimes Against Faith".

Chapter first. About blasphemy and censure of faith.

Article 182: Deliberate public blasphemy in the church: Deprivation of all rights and mines from 12 to 15 years. To commoners, in the appendage, a stigma and 70-80 lashes.
Blasphemy in a public place: deprivation of all rights, from 6 to 8 years hard labor in factories, commoners, in addition to 40-50 lashes and a brand.

Article 183: One who committed blasphemy not in a public place, but in front of witnesses, in order to shake their faith or lead them into temptation: exile to far Siberia. Commoners, in addition, 20-30 lashes.

Article 186: Unintentional blasphemy (“words that look like blasphemy”) in a public place due to unreason, ignorance or drunkenness: imprisonment in a strait-house from six months to two years. Due to circumstances, a person could be deprived of some rights, such as the right to vote, the right to be elected, the right to hold leadership positions

Article 190: For distraction from any Christian denomination into any non-Christian faith, persuasion and seduction: deprivation of all rights and exile "to hard labor in fortresses" for 8-10 years. Commoners, in addition to the stigma and 50-60 lashes.
For distraction, with the use of violence: deprivation of all rights, 12-15 years in the mines. commoners, in addition to the stigma and 70-80 lashes.

Article 191: Apostate from any Christian denomination to any non-Christian faith: reference to the "spiritual authorities" of the former confession, with the deprivation of all rights until the return to the faith. All their property at this time is "taken into custody"

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Books

• Hard years. Valley of Silent Ghosts. Where the River Begins by James Curwood. New France, 1760s, war. After the attack of the Indians and the British, the houses of the settlers were destroyed, the heads of the families died defending their families, and the young Jim Bulin and Antoinette Tonter…
• Johannes Kepler (1571-1630). At the origins of modern astronomy, Bely Yu.A. Johannes Kepler. The scientist lived a difficult life - almost constantly he was accompanied by persecution of ...

Why were witches burned and not executed in some other way? History itself provides the answer to this question. In the article we will try to figure out who was considered a witch, and why exactly burning was the most radical way to get rid of witchcraft spells.

Who is this witch

Witches have been burned and persecuted since Roman times. The fight against witchcraft reached its apogee in the XV-XVII centuries.

What had to be done so that a person was accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake? It turns out that during the Middle Ages, in order to get accused of practicing witchcraft, it was enough just to be a beautiful girl. Any woman could be accused, and on completely legal grounds.

Witches were considered those who had a special mark on their body in the form of a wart, a huge mole, or just a bruise. If a cat, an owl or a mouse lived with a woman, she was also considered a witch.

A sign of involvement in the witching world was both the beauty of the girl and the presence of any bodily deformity.

The most important reason to end up in the dungeons of the Holy Inquisition could be the usual denunciation of blasphemy, bad words about power, or behavior that arouses suspicion.

The representatives arranged interrogations so skillfully that people confessed to everything that was demanded of them.

Witch burning: the geography of executions

When and where did the executions take place? In what century were witches burned? The avalanche of atrocities falls on the Middle Ages, and the countries in which there was a Catholic faith were mainly involved. For about 300 years, witches have been actively exterminated and persecuted. Historians claim that about 50,000 people were convicted of witchcraft.

Inquisitorial bonfires burned throughout Europe. Spain, Germany, France and England - these are the countries where witches were burned en masse, by the thousands.

Even little girls under the age of 10 were classified as witches. Children died with curses on their lips: they cursed their own mothers, who supposedly taught them the skill of witchcraft.

The legal proceedings themselves were carried out very quickly. Those accused of witchcraft were interrogated quickly, but with the use of sophisticated torture. Sometimes people were condemned in batches and mass witches were burned at the stake.

Torture prior to execution

The torture applied to women who were accused of witchcraft was very cruel. There are cases in history when suspects were forced to sit for days on a chair studded with sharp spikes. Sometimes the witch was put on large shoes - boiling water was poured into it.

In history, the test of a witch with water is also known. The suspect was simply drowned, it was believed that it was impossible to drown a witch. If a woman, after being tortured with water, turned out to be dead, she was justified, but who was it easier for?

Why was burning preferred?

Execution by burning was considered a "Christian type of execution", because it took place without the shedding of blood. Witches were considered criminals worthy of death, but since they repented, the judges asked to be “merciful” to them, that is, to kill without bloodshed.

In the Middle Ages, witches were also burned because the Holy Inquisition was afraid of the resurrection of a condemned woman. And if the body is burned, then what is the resurrection without the body?

The very first case of burning a witch was recorded in 1128. The event took place in Flanders. The woman, who was considered an ally of the devil, was accused that, after she poured water on one of the rich men, he soon fell ill and died.

At first, cases of executions were rare, but gradually acquired a massive character.

Execution procedure

It should be noted that the acquittal of the victims was also inherent. There are statistics indicating that the number of acquittals of the accused corresponded to half of the trials. A tortured woman could even receive redress for her suffering.

The condemned woman was to be executed. It should be noted that the execution has always been a public spectacle, the purpose of which is to frighten and intimidate the public. The townspeople hurried to the execution in festive clothes. This event attracted even those who lived far away.

Mandatory during the procedure was the presence of priests and government officials.

When everyone was assembled, a cart appeared with the executioner and future victims. The public had no sympathy for the witch, they laughed at her and made fun of her.

The unfortunate were chained to a pole, covered with dry branches. After the preparatory procedures, a sermon was obligatory, where the priest warned the public against communication with the devil and engaging in witchcraft. The role of the executioner was to light the fire. Servants watched the fire until there was no trace of the victim.

Sometimes the bishops even competed among themselves, which of them will be able to produce more of which are accused of witchcraft. This type of execution according to the torment experienced by the victim is equated with crucifixion. The last burnt witch was recorded in history in 1860. The execution took place in Mexico.

Horror movie fans know perfectly well that dealing with evil spirits is not so easy. Someone can be stopped only by a silver bullet or a cross cast from the same metal, someone only Aspen stake can calm down for ever and ever, not giving the opportunity to leave the grave every night, well, and only the fire of a sacred fire can kill a witch. “Witch at the stake”, yes, perhaps, this is the image imprinted in the minds of many of us since childhood.

In Slavic, and not only in Slavic tradition Fire (one of the Primordial Elements) has been attributed and is being attributed a lot of properties, some of them are actively used both in magic and against it. At the time of the activity of the Inquisition, witches were put on fire. Why? Why, for example, were they not drowned or beheaded? Why were they not hung or wheeled? However, even if such executions happened, the body of the witch was still burned.

Why were witches burned at the stake?

Let's figure everything out. In the gray-haired Middle Ages, there were many things from which the blood of a modern person literally runs cold in the veins. Here you have the lack of elementary hygiene, and constant civil strife, and, of course, the witch hunt, which lasted for more than one century, literally mowed down thousands of the most beautiful women(and sometimes quite a courageous men). The fact that modern Europeans (especially the female half), frankly, do not differ in beauty, one must (including) say “thank you” to the holy fathers from the Inquisition.

The witch trials happened so often, and so much recorded evidence has survived to this day that the terrible action can be imagined to the nearest minute. There is no need to think of something, no need to pump paint. Again, there is plenty of evidence.

They judged "witches" (for the most part they were ordinary women, girls, and sometimes girls) not always at all because they really were. Someone decided to “squeal” on a neighbor, and then move to her house, someone wanted to get rid of a rival, in a word, everyone had their own reasons. It would seem that a secular court (often judgments were held there) should have been guided by reason, but alas, it was unnecessary to rely on this. There was no talk of any mind in those days. And in our times, many decisions made by the courts make you think about whether representatives of the judicial system have a brain. However, we are not talking about that now.

secular court, where without fail representatives of the holy church were present, urging the victim to confess everything herself, thereby softening her fate. More obstinate had to be tortured. The victim understood that there was no point in dooming herself to unnecessary torment, because anyway she was found guilty. So why prolong the agony?!

Judgments ended with public burning at the stake. After all, "humane" Christians considered it cruel to shed blood, even the blood of a witch or a sorcerer. But to put them on fire, and - alive - this is really the apotheosis of humanity.

According to the canons established by the advent of Christianity, it was believed that only fire could prevent a sinful soul from reincarnating. But in the same paganism the situation is exactly the opposite! The pagans believed that "a person came from nowhere and after the end of earthly life, must go nowhere." And the sooner there is no trace left of the earthly bodily shell, the sooner the soul will be able to incarnate again.

Most fires blazed on the territory of present-day Germany, France and Spain. Not a single week went by without someone being "roasted" alive. Guilty or not guilty - what's the difference? There are “witnesses” who saw something there and in all details and details can tell about how “the witch communicated with the devil himself”, or how “the witch flew to the Sabbath”, or how “she turned into a cat or a pig”. It is also noteworthy that very often such witnesses were close relatives of the condemned victim.

After "checking" the evidence, the court ruled that there were enough "facts" or, on the contrary - which was extremely rare - said that something was missing. Even those who dabbled in cards stomped on the fire.

In the year one thousand five hundred and thirty-two, sending to the fire was enshrined in law. The then code of laws was called "Caroline". Its author and ideological inspirer was the notorious Charles V. In “Caroline” it was stated: “Everyone who has caused harm and losses to his people by divination should be punished by death, and this punishment should be done by fire.”

Witchfire has always been indulged in public. Probably, it is not necessary to explain why this was done. The best motivator is fear! Here, they say, look what will happen to those who dare to be at least a millimeter different from everyone else! The bonfire is waiting for anyone who ...

For local residents, oddly enough, such actions were a real show. When is it still possible to go to the village? How else can you entertain yourself in the Middle Ages? Of course, to the village square to see with your own eyes how the witch will burn! For such an occasion, it will not be superfluous to even dress up!

The local "beau monde" in the person of all kinds of bishops, holy fathers from the church, judges and others looked with pleasure at how the executioner, with an unwavering hand, sent witches and sorcerers to hellfire. Chained with heavy chains to poles, they died a terrible painful death, often to the loud hooting of the crowd. After only a pile of ashes remained from the victim, the executioners considered their duty fulfilled. The ashes dispersed and now it was possible to relax, because the burnt witch would never be able to incarnate again.