Anna Göldi
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Anna Göldi
Anna Göldi (also Anna Göldin, October 24, 1734 – June 13, 1782[1]) is known as the "last witch" in Switzerland. She was executed for murder in June 1782 in Glarus.
A native of Sennwald, Anna Göldi arrived in Glarus in 1765. For seventeen years, she worked as a maidservant for Johann Jakob Tschudi, a physician. Tschudi reported her for having put needles in the bread and milk of one of his daughters, apparently through supernatural means. Göldi at first escaped arrest, but the authorities of the Canton of Glarus advertised a reward for her capture in the Zürcher Zeitung on February 9, 1782. Göldi was arrested and under torture, admitted to entering in a pact with the Devil, who had appeared to her as a black dog. She withdrew her confession after the torture ended, but was sentenced on June 18, 1782 to execution by decapitation. The charges were officially of "poisoning" rather than witchcraft, even though the law at the time did not impose the death penalty for non-lethal poisoning.[2]
During her trial, official allegations of witchcraft were avoided, and the court protocols were destroyed. The sentence does therefore not strictly qualify as that of a witch trial. Still, because of the apparent witchhunt that led to the sentence, the execution sparked outrage throughout Switzerland and the Holy Roman Empire.
Exoneration
On September 20, 2007, the Swiss parliament decided to acknowledge Anna Göldi's case as a miscarriage of justice. Fritz Schiesser, as the representative for Glarus in the Swiss parliament, called for Anna Göldi's exoneration, which was granted on August 27, 2008 on the grounds that she had been subjected to an "illegal trial".[2] Apparently, Göldi's married employer abused his power after she had threatened to reveal their affair.[2][3]
A museum in Glarus is dedicated to her.[3]
See also
References
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Anna Göldi |
- ^ Swiss Historic Lexicon article about Anna Göldi (not available in English) "Göldi [Göldin, Anna"]. hls-dhs-dss.ch. 23 September2005. http://www.hls-dhs-dss.ch/textes/d/D43539.php.
- ^ a b c "Last witch in Europe cleared". August 27, 2008. http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/news_digest/Last_witch_in_Europe_cleared.html?siteSect=104&sid=9619759&cKey=1219843577000&ty=nd.
- ^ a b "Anna Goeldi's story and exoneration". Online edition of the BBC News. September 20, 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7003128.stm. Retrieved 2007-09-20.
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