Supernatural
Hail the Viking Wizard-Pirate
“Therefore, to avoid stooping to a trial of strength with pirates at sea, he would cause the waves and winds to rage by means of his sorcery and induce them to wreck his foes.” […]
16th Century AD
Supernatural
The Place is Packed with Wizards
“The wizard then enters a room, satisfied to have with him his wife and one other companion, and strikes over an anvil a prescribed number of blows with a hammer on a copper frog or serpent.” […]
Supernatural
What Shall We Do About All this Magic?
” There was a time when the Finns, among other pagan delusions, would offer wind for sale to traders who were detained on their coasts by offshore gales, and when payment had been brought would given them in return three magic knots tied in a strap not likely to break.” […]
Medieval Mentality
Wisdom of the Snake
“A Norwegian woman, intending to provide for the future good fortune of her son Roller, prepared a dish of food, into which she let drip the putrid saliva of three vipers hanging above it from a slender cord.” […]
Human Affairs
Race and Color in the 16th Century
“How many there are in the world who run from others because they do not see themselves in them.” […]
Britons and Celts
A Dirty Rotten Prank
“He took a lozenge, put it in his mouth, and chewed it apace, by means whereof when the fume ascended he began to spattle and spit, saying by Gods bones it is a Cat’s turd.” […]
Human Affairs
#BeggarHacks
“Speaking of the good there was in my blind man, your Honour must know that since God created the world He has not made a being more astute and sagacious.” […]
Britons and Celts
Please Do Not Read This Post
“My mouth and my nose purged exceedingly, such yellow, white and tawny fluids as I never saw before, nor thought that any such had been in man’s body. ” […]
Medieval Mentality
Tricks of a Charlatan Priest
“My master raised his hands to heaven, and turned his eyes up until scarcely anything could be seen but the whites. He prayed to the Lord not to require the death of the sinner, but rather to give his life back.” […]
Britons and Celts
Fear and Loathing in the Church
“And as I was there about, a crow which belike was by nodding asleep on the chimney top, fell down into the chimney over my head, whose flittering in the fall made such a noise, that when I felt his feet upon my head I thought that the devil had been come indeed and seized upon me. And when I cast up my hand to save me and therewith touched him, he called me knave in his language after such a sort that I swooned for fear.” […]