Martha's HIST04b - Part II: Life and Times

`LIFE AND TIMES`

WITCHCRAFT - A COLLECTION OF REMARKABLE SITES

Witchcraft Documents [15th Century]: Intense period of persecution of witches in the late 16th and 17th centuries. "Witches and witchcraft, were very real to the writers of the 15th century and later. Their writing tells us much about their thought worlds, and also their attitudes towards women. . . Whether or not there were real groups of witches, many women and a few men, suffered intense persecution and death as a result of intolerance."
Documents of the Witchcraze: "Fair is foul, and foul is fair. Hover through the fog and the filthy air!" - - Macbeth
Links to folklore, actual individual experiences during this era, misogyny and why women shed sexuality in order to survive, as well as fictional look at what could happen if a witch-hunter was "alive and well" today. Check them out and see for yourself.
The People of the Witchcraze: "Learn the tragic fate of 13th century German freedom fighters; Judaism and Conspiracy Theories; Edmond Robinson - a lazy little boy turned story-teller and witch-hunter; From the Mouths of Babes - sometimes Hansel and Gretel were the wicked witches; The Witch-Hunters - Matthew Hopkins, Cotton Mather, and other nice friendly chaps (plus one woman)
Punishment, Torture, and Ordeal: "Before the opinions of philanthropists held sway, torture was a necessary part of most trials. The witchcraft trials were no exception." Ordeal By Water, Stoning, The Shin-Vice, The Spider, The Heretic's Fork, to only name a few. Truly unbelievable! Amazing what could happen to anyone alleged to be a witch, not to mention it was all justified by the Church. Definite eye-opener!
Traits of the Witches: "How to identify a witch - Jesus Christ himself couldn't pass all these tests." How witches sold their souls; lists fo alternate terminology for witchcraft; Cannibalism and witchcraft; lists of gods and goddesses believed to lead the Wild Hunt - "group of witches, demons, and souls flying through the air and the streets at night terrorising the people below." Wow! Truly hard-to-believe information!
The Witch Hunts: The End of Magic and Miracles: "And do you not know that you are an Eve? The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives in this age: the guilt must of necessity live too. You are the devil's gateway: you are the unsealer of that tree: you are the first deserter of the divine law: you are she who persuaded him whom the devil was not valiant enough to attack. You destroyed so easily God's image, man. On account of your desert that is, death even the Son of God had to die" - Tertullian, Church Father. Teeming with quotes reflecting the mindset and popular opinion that instigated the witch-hunts. Provides overview of history of witchcraft in relation to Christianity and implicates the usefulness of heresy and witchcraft as a viable method of profit for the Church. And a "ton" of resources on the Hunt in Early Modern Europe.

ANOTHER NASTY BUSINESS

African Slave Trade and European Imperialism: Critical site, put up by a Central Oregon Community College student, tracks through a detailed timeline the progress of the African Slave Trade throughout history and offers links for more information on specific events. Don't miss it!

THE BAROQUE

Welcome to the Baroque: "The Baroque was a time of a great intensification of past forms in all the arts: painting saw the works of Vermeer, Rubens, Rembrandt, and El Greco -- in literature it was the time of Molière, Cervantes, Milton, and Racine -- modern science came into its own during this period with the work of Galileo and Newton. In music, the age began with the trail-blazing works of Claudio Monteverdi, continued with the phenomenally popular music of Antonio Vivaldi and the keyboard works of such composers as Fran&cced;ois Couperin and Domenico Scarlatti, and came to a close with the masterworks of two of the veritable giants of music history, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel."
Web Museum - Baroque: "Baroque period, era in the history of the Western arts roughly coinciding with the 17th century. Its earliest manifestations, which occurred in Italy, date from the latter decades of the 16th century, while in some regions, notably Germany and colonial South America, certain of its culminating achievements did not occur until the 18th century. The work that distinguishes the Baroque period is stylistically complex, even contradictory. In general, however, the desire to evoke emotional states by appealing to the senses, often in dramatic ways, underlies its manifestations. Some of the qualities most frequently associated with the Baroque are grandeur, sensuous richness, drama, vitality, movement, tension, emotional exuberance, and a tendency to blur distinctions between the various arts."
Renaissance and Baroque Architecture: Architectural History: Put yourself in Europe during the Late Middle Ages with the fabulous gallery of Renaissance and Baroque Architecture! Don't miss the links on "Italy in the 17th Century--The Baroque's Beginnings," "Some Baroque Projects and Masters," and "Buildings in the Land and a Land of Buildings." Much aesthetic appeal. Covers 15th-18th centuries.
Johann Sebastian Bach FAQ: Questions from :What's so great about J. S. Bach? to What do you mean, "It may not be by Bach"? Questions that get to the point about interesting facts about Bach and his music?
The Mozart Project: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is often referred to as the most brilliant composer ever known. Not only is his work highly regarded today, but was admired by his contemporary peers, like the eloquent Ludwig van Beethoven, who once summed it up concisely, saying, "Mozart is good and admirable." Biography, compositions, essays.

THE WAY IT WAS

Gallery of Mannerism 1525 to 1600: "The Italian Renaissance had run its course, artists were looking for a new style, and...No one style dominated art...Sometimes this period is called the Late Renaissance." Thorough gallery with a good deal of space dedicated to El Greco. Click on images to enlarge them for detail. View closeups of Paolo Veronese's works. Incredible detail!
Mannerism: Mannerist movement began in 1520 and lasted through the 16th century. While preceding movements of the Renaissance looked to nature to find their style, Mannerists looked to the styles of the High Renaissance and Roman sculpture to find their manner of working.Excellent examples of this art form with informational descriptions.
Tyburn Tree: Public Executions in Early Modern England: Part deterrent, part entertainment, public executions a part of the European cultural fabric in the recent past. Take trip into the late 16th/early 17th C., read dying speeches, eyewitness accounts. See contemporaneous engravings and woodcuts. Fleshes out a macabre tradition that ended not so long ago.