Our records of witches in the Middle Ages are a bit different from what one might imagine.
Witches were people who practiced sorcery of various types, including anything from speaking to departed spirits, prophesying, or healing, to actually worshiping some spirit other than God. They were punished according to prevailing laws of different times and places. For most of the medieval time, witch burnings were not widely practiced.
During the Early Middle Ages (476-1000), the old laws, derived from Germanic laws, punished people who practiced witchcraft with fines. Those derived from Roman law punished with fines, or, if it could be proven a witch had actually killed someone with a curse, with death.
Charlemagne's law, actually protecting witches to some extent, prescribed death for anyone who punished witches by burning them, and so did Lombardic law.
During the High Middle Ages (1000-1300), the numbers of witches executed was rather low, because Christians were more focused on heretics within their own ranks.
During the Late Middle Ages (1300-1500), the Christians began to focus on the problem of witches, burning people, particularly women, who were suspect at the stake. Things got really bad in some places where men claimed to be experts on the subject and convinced local lords to pay them for each person they killed. The witch burnings, however, increased during the Renaissance.
See the link to a Wikipedia article below.
The Enlightenment gave people a reason to believe in their own thoughts and not have the king or monarchy tell them what to think. The began to use their own reason. The Enlightenment however was after the middle ages.
The Renaissance means "rebirth" because learning, reading, thinking and growth was taking place after a 1000 years of the middle ages or "dark ages" where people didn't read, write, or think about the world.
The Pope did! Many people think the Lords did, but they didn't.
well we are middle ages people! so how do we live with our animals?
What I find is that there were insane asylums in the Middle Ages, but only people who were otherwise unmanageable were put in them. The Priory of St. Mary of Bethlehem started giving care for insane people in 1357, but there were very few patients until the after the Middle Ages ended. Long after the Middle Ages, the common name of this hospital provided the English language with the word "Bedlam," as it gained a reputation for brutal treatment of inmates during the 17th century. I was unable to find any reference that supported the idea of insane people being killed. I also checked about babies being killed, and it is true that in some legal codes of Germanic groups of the Early Middle Ages, a mother who killed a newborn infant could not be prosecuted, but I suspect this had more to do with post partum disorders and less with special needs infants had. The legal codes were unspecific about reasons, but the law only applied to the mothers. There is a link below to the medieval section of an article on the history of psychiatric institutions.
Because one of witches done something to one of the people so that's when they started hating witches
Early historians estimated that 9-10 million died as witches, but modern historians now think that it is more like 50,000 to 200, 000 died.
Different world views, "wrong" religion, witches - mostly everything that didn't fit the current worldview
they were like thAT THEY WERE not guilty of anything that people think that they were guilty of
I think it was to follow the rules and show respect to the King
NO
The Enlightenment gave people a reason to believe in their own thoughts and not have the king or monarchy tell them what to think. The began to use their own reason. The Enlightenment however was after the middle ages.
A belief held widely in England in the middle ages was that a witch would not sink in water but people who weren't witches would sink. It was supposed to be a test to see who was a witch and who wasn't.
The Renaissance means "rebirth" because learning, reading, thinking and growth was taking place after a 1000 years of the middle ages or "dark ages" where people didn't read, write, or think about the world.
None. They were against magic. That's why they went after witches.
The Pope did! Many people think the Lords did, but they didn't.
well we are middle ages people! so how do we live with our animals?