Not A Historian Reading List
Theatre of Horror: Crime and Punishment in Early Modern Germany
The witch trials, tortures of criminals, and public executions in the Middle Ages were not mad frenzy, says van Dulmen (history, U. of Saarland, Germany) but a systematic and elaborate exhibition of religious and political symbolism, first designed to expiate the crime from the community, and later adapted for social control. Translated from the German (1988). Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.
