Witches and Devil’s Magic in Austrian Demonological Legends

Abstract

Although Austrian witch legends are very similar to the legends of other European countries, motifs bound to Alpine figures like the Percht, Trud, Schrätel and the Wild Women (either helping or often also punishing) are transferred to the later witch legends, facilitated by their similar attributes. There are also traces of the so-called hunting culture in the witch legends of the low regions like the Burgenland, with obvious traces of shamanistic motifs to be found at the boundaries between Austrian Alpine and Hungarian lowland culture. In some details the peculiar Austrian Alpine witch merges with the historical figure of the witch trials, and one can observe how history and tales overlap.

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Introduction and Short Outline of Academic Debate Concerning the Definition of a Folk Legend

Witches are a constituent part not only of Austrian folklore but of Austrian folk legend. Therefore, it is necessary to not only give the term ‘legend’ some thought but discuss the boundaries and intersections of the main topics involved. Legends of witches and demonological crimes touch the general question of how historical crime reports become legendary tales and can be testimonies for a history of mentality. This question was raised by the founder of German philology (and subsequently European ethnology and folklore studies), Jacob Grimm. If we look at the definition of those texts that deal with witches and demonological crimes, German Sagen and its English translation ‘legend’, we must go back to Grimm. Grimm’s Wörterbuch defines legend as kunde von ereignissen der vergangenheit, welche einer historischen beglaubigung entbehrt ¹ (‘stories of the past that lack historical accreditation’). He further speaks of naive storytelling and the transmission that has undergone changes while being passed down from generation to generation.

In German narratology, the terms Sage (translated into English by the term ‘legend’) and Legende (in German Folklore research normally used to categorise religious tales) are distinguished from each other.² It is known that sacrilege and crime are an integral part of the stories commonly known as folk legends (German Sagen). Following Grimm’s principles, three kinds of folk legends have been identified: historical, defined as those related to an event or a personality of historical significance; mythological or demonological, or those having to do with human encounters with the supernatural world and endowment with supernatural power³ and knowledge; and etiological or explanatory, about the nature and origins of animate and inanimate things. The practice with legends showed that this threefold classification proved to be too limited because legends may be simultaneously historical, mythological and explanatory. Nevertheless, most folk-legend anthologies follow these distinctions and classify witch legends under the category demonological. Although I agree with other researchers that such categories, being restrictive and inaccurate,⁴ can only show rough tendencies, I would still propose the term demonological legend, especially for witch and witchcraft legends.

On some topics, the onset of legend creation began rather early: for example, the famous case of the Salzburgian Zauberer Jackl⁵ might even have started in his lifetime, whereas other stories show less evidence of being public during the period to which they relate. The witch figure also consolidates neighbouring concepts of similar or related figures like ghost and revenant, but also older mythological figures like Percht,⁶ Wild Women, giantess and Schrätel or Bilwis.⁷ The latter stem from the Middle Ages or even Antiquity and are surely not reflections of witch trials and their ensuing narratives. Consequently, Lutz Röhrich and, with some restrictions, Claude Lecouteux have⁸ argued for the tunrida or hagazussa as being more or less a demon of the woods. The typical motifs of the witch legends, riding on home appliances and flying to a mountain, appear as early as the Middle Ages. In medieval German literature, the Lower Austrian medieval author Stricker (first half of the thirteenth century) describes the Unholden as riding on a broomstick (1230), and the flight to a mountain is mentioned in the Münchner Nachtsegen of the fourteenth century.⁹

Within three years, two German scholars published a thesis and type index of witch legends. Alfred Wittmann in Mannheim defended a dissertation with the title Die Gestalt der Hexe in der deutschen Sage (1933), and in 1936 the folklorist and folk-song expert Johannes Künzig issued a type index: Typensystem der deutschen Volkssage with the subcategory witch legends.¹⁰ Both favour nearly the same topics: how to recognise a witch¹¹; metamorphosis; witch ride; witch assembly and witch dance; different kinds of witches (cattle, milk, butter, and egg witches).¹² A chapter about maleficium and the specific magic arts of the witch concludes the index. Wittmann begins with the witch in the witch trials, thereby incorporating the witchcraft research and discourse of his time. After the war Will-Erich Peuckert’s Handwörterbuch der Sage attempted to establish an international legend codification of similar functions like the acknowledged Aarne/Thompson Type Index and Stith Thompson’s Motif-Index. Unfortunately, Peuckert’s handbook ended with the first volume with letter A and was never continued.¹³ So researchers should still turn to Stith Thompsons’s Motif Index of Folk Literature of 1956 and all the follow-up indices, that display the entry G200-G299 witches. Ernest Baughman offered an elaboration of certain witch motifs in his Type and Motif Index of the Folktales of England and North America in 1966.¹⁴

In 1987 the historian Walter Brunner self-published the anthology Steirische Sagen von Hexen und Zauberern, which, unfortunately, did not get the attention it deserved, but I have used it here. Finally, the Enzyklopädie des Märchens, a German reference work on folktales and legends (begun by Kurt Ranke in the 1960s and continued by chief editor Rolf Brednich), contains several articles on the topics of justice, injustice, punishment, legend and witch.¹⁵

The witch figure of the folktale and the witch of the legend are rightfully distinguished from each other as two different contextual types, although they sometimes overlap. Whereas not only historical but also demonological legend is factual, folktales are considered fictional. This alleged dichotomy or opposition is often erroneous because legends are just as fictional as folktales, while the latter often mirror, if not historical occurrences, then historical lawsuits and punishments. Another point of intersection is that both concern magical practice and the devil. Although the witch seems well connected with the devil, the figure of the devil itself tends to be in the tradition of the folktale villain figures like the ogre.¹⁶ The witch of legends shows many similarities with the demonological witch of demonologists, yet also fundamental differences. The functional classification of my paper follows the well-established classification-order of the legend editions.¹⁷

In what follows, I will present a survey of Austrian witch legends by concentrating on their essential motifs and analysing their historical, pseudo-historical or mythological background.

Life and Deeds of the Witch

How to Become a Witch

Numerous accounts claim that witchcraft is a matrilineal trade passed down from mother to daughter—the daughter of a witch is born a witch.¹⁸ This assumption is also reflected in the witch trials: judges would condemn children to death¹⁹ alongside their mothers. It was also assumed that ungodly godparents could turn a child into a witch: During the child’s baptism (which is, of course, an exorcism), the godparents had to say certain words and lines.

Witchcraft is also taught by the mother, and since each witch is bound to have trained at least one other witch by the time of her death, they turned to educating their own daughters. If the girl refuses, the mother will pursue her until she gives in. Folktales from Tyrol mention witches only passing on their gifts, chief among them stealing milk (Milchdiebstahl), to her eldest daughter.²⁰ Witches keep wooden udders in their shrines. Whenever they desire milk, they take the udders to the stables and ‘milk’ them while muttering the name of the farmer whose milk they want to steal. Milk starts to flow from the wooden udders just as it mysteriously disappears from the named farmer’s cows. A witch will only ever share her art, especially milk stealing (Passeier), with her eldest daughter.²¹

Should the mother not be the one to teach the child, a relative is most likely to take on the role of teacher. There is an age limit on learning this trade (the child cannot be less than seven years old), and people in countries with a Protestant majority believed that the day before the child’s confirmation was especially suited for the child to start learning the trade, whereas in Catholic countries like Austria it was the night before Holy Communion. However, most folktales concerning witches do not include a clear age reference. Children who have decided to learn the witch’s trade must undergo a formal apprenticeship with an elderly witch. In most cases the first lesson that is taught is the creation of mice without tails—once the apprenticeship is finished, the mice will have grown tails. Most children will not enter such an apprenticeship voluntarily; this is where adult apprentices differ from children. It is said that a witch must turn away from God and everything that is holy and godly (which, in predominantly Catholic Austria, refers to saints). The witch then commences devil worship.

In the Paznaun Valley a legend reports of a couple that the wife wanted to convert her husband to devil worship, and upon formally renouncing God, she must utter certain fixed words:

‘I step upon this heap of dung and renounce the Lord Jesus Christ.’ But instead he said: ‘I step upon this heap of dung, and will bury you in it, you being the minx that you are.’

And he took the closest club, killed the witch and buried her as she was in the heap of dung.²²

The Assembly: Witches’ Ride, Flight, Dance

As mentioned earlier, the flight motif is surely not a unique characteristic of witch tales but a constituent of different tale types. Nevertheless, it can be considered one of the most well-known of the witch concepts. While in other tales it is just the preferred mode of transport, the flight is of great significance both in legends and in trial records. While discourses and counter-discourses on witches’ flights had a prominent role among demonologists, folktales and legends linked it with several international motifs. It can be a favourite way of travelling to mountains where gatherings take place, but most interesting is the story of the beholder that nearly formed a tale type of its own.

The gathering story in Austria (and in many European countries) reads as follows. On certain nights of a ritual, witches meet to celebrate. Their congregations are held at crossroads or at remote places, in caverns beneath trees, and most especially on mountains or hills, which are frequently referred to as Blocksberg. The most famous mountain is the Brocken is located in Sachsen-Anhalt. Witches from all around Germany come here for Walpurgisnacht.²³ Austria, too, has several so-called witch-mountains²⁴ (Hexenberge).

Apart from the Walpurgisnacht, other nights are important as well, such as St. Bartholomew’s Day, St. Jacob’s Night, Michaelmas and New Year’s Eve, as well as Christian holidays like Christmas, Easter and Pentecost. In general, congregations gather on Friday night,²⁵ but in Tyrol, they do so on Thursday night.²⁶ While witches usually attend the main feasts in human form, they change their shape for smaller local feasts.²⁷

The journey to the congregation is—most of the time—extraordinary. In demonological discourse, the issue of flight ointment plays a rather prominent role, while in legendary tales it is just one required flight among others. Often the witches will apply a specially mixed salve²⁸ or anointing oil to either their entire body or just their legs and feet²⁹ or their face.³⁰ Then they will shed their clothes and either remain unclothed or dress festively and go on their journey. Sometimes they undertake such a journey on the proverbial broomstick, but more often on pitchforks or oven forks, logs of wood or even fragile objects like straw or butter tubs—all in all, farmer’s equipment. To travel, they must recite a spell and leave their house via the chimney.³¹ Stories often tell of animals which carry witches to meeting places. These animals are often black: a buck, a calf, a cat, a pig, a wolf a toad.³² The more distinguished witches make use of a carriage drawn by cats.³³ To be able to leave without her husband or any other relative taking notice of the fact, the witch will place a broom, straw, brushwood or a log of wood, for example, in her bed and make it take her shape.³⁴

Outsiders have the chance to spy on witches if they sit at a crossroads³⁵ (which the witches must pass by) at night, especially if it is Walpurgisnacht.³⁶ This undertaking poses quite a danger to the witches’ secret audience: should they be caught, the witches will punish them accordingly.³⁷ Protective circles³⁸ can be created, and farmers’ instruments, for instance harrows, can be strategically placed. However, the watcher must take care to be completely covered by the harrow, for if even a small piece of his or her clothing is not covered, the witches have the chance to steal the person away forever. It is fair to conclude that the observation of the witch’s journey always bears grave danger for the watcher.³⁹ The legend in the Felberau can serve as a vivid example (see Fig. 1 for a 1925 image of witches from Felberau in a tree):

Fig. 1

Source Josef Pöttinger, Niederösterreichische Volkssagen (Vienna: Österreichischer Bundesverlag, 1925), 45. [Tuczay after n. 40]

Norbertine Bressler-Roth, ‘Five witches from the Felberau in a tree’.

Once upon a time, a poor musician lived in Baden. His journey home from villages where he had played at dances and weddings would lead him through the great Felberau auf der Braiten. There he saw, whenever the moon was out, witches conversing beneath the great willow tree and feasting. One night, as the witches were once again dancing beneath the tree and he, consumed by fear, sought to sneak by, the sinister group suddenly came running towards him, gripped him deftly, and suddenly he, without having any knowledge of how it came to happen, was perched in the willow tree, where he was then forced to play cheery songs. In exchange, he was given fried and baked goods to his heart’s desire, and the witches would play this little game with him quite often.

Once, having had quite enough, he decided he did not want to play the fiddle for the witches without any pay any longer. They, however, seemed especially friendly and each gave to him a thaler, and whatever food he could not eat right there, they cheerfully put into his bags. He rushed home from this profitable witches’ dance full of joy, and when he reached for his treasures the next morning, he found in his bags shards of glass instead of coins and toads’ legs and snakes’ heads instead of food.

After a long time, when the musician had to pass the fateful willow tree once again, he decided not to play for these spawns of hell, because he was still sorely plagued by the trick they had played on him. But as soon as he had laid eyes on the witches, he found himself sitting in the damned tree once again and was asked to play a dancing tune, which he firmly refused. The angry witches then descended on him, almost beating him to death, and then threw him into the brook, and as he rose rather miserably from his wet resting place, the witches screamed after him that he would do well to remember not to leave the house after the evening bells, otherwise his life would be forfeit.⁴⁰

Besides the eavesdropping on the witches’ journey, the gathering of witches⁴¹ also plays an important role in Austrian legends. Eyewitness accounts are quite possibly used to stress the tales’ authenticity. Many of the witnesses are tempted by their own curiosity, and some pay for their bravery and courage with their lives. The body is found the next morning: its neck is twisted and its skin damaged by claw marks. If a spectator should step into the witches’ circle uninvited, he is torn apart, thrown into the fire or tortured and punished in a different way, the most harmless case of such punishment being the witches playing mean tricks on the eavesdropper. Witches will also punish those who have become involuntary witnesses to their gatherings. If the one caught red-handed should be carrying a protective spell or something of great value or should he utter a hallowed name, he will be able to escape unharmed. If not, he will be scratched with claws or forced to dance to his death. Here also we can refer to the much older tales of the Wild Hunt, where onlookers are transported to a remote place through the air, and their senses are confounded.⁴²

The reason for the mentioned punishments may very well be the witches’ understandable fear of betrayal or denunciation. It is only logical, then, that some tales report that witches made the mischievous intruder promise not to reveal their secret—and subsequently treated him well. Should he break the promise, he would be punished severely.⁴³ At times the intruder is advised to join the witches’ community, so as to make sure that he will never betray them. This, however, rarely succeeds. The clever intruder might pretend to become a witch, but he writes a hallowed name in the book⁴⁴ using his blood as ink or thrice makes the sign of the cross. This act is crowned with immediate success: the witches will disappear. Christian names and symbols are endowed with the greatest protective power; the sign of the cross is of special importance. The meals served at such gatherings have one very characteristic fault: they are prepared without salt and no bread is served. Both items are repellent to witches, and at times the mere mention of these foods will make the witches’ congregation dissolve.

The witches’ gatherings are heady festivities with lots of dancing, and, as we noticed with the previously related folk legend, music is a must, too. Oftentimes the devil himself will appear as a musician, but a human one is just as welcome. Once the next day dawns, he is rewarded and paid in gold, which, however, will turn into unpleasant objects like horse droppings later on.

The protocols of the witch trials make frequent mention of orgies being celebrated with the devil (where the witch places a kiss on the devil’s buttocks, for example). In folk legends, such a thing is rarely if ever mentioned. The witches’ deeds during such gatherings change, too: While isolated tales make mention of witches plotting atrocities,⁴⁵ one may conclude that in general their meetings are hardly worth all the fuss being made about them since they are simply chances for people to enjoy themselves, eat, drink, dance and do everything their hard day-to-day lives do not give them the chance to do.

Should the witness remain unnoticed, he will, like Lucius in the Golden Ass, attempt to fly like a witch himself—and will, like Lucius, be confronted with a few nasty surprises. The watchers don’t know what to do with the witches’ salve, and they will also fail at carrying out the second part—the spell which must be recited without failure and without any mistakes upon taking to the air. Even a slight twist on the words will make the whole experience inevitably end in tragedy for the curious imitator.⁴⁶

Should an eavesdropper be clever enough not to make any mistakes before arriving at the place of the festivities, he must again follow several important rules. He must remain quiet, not utter a sound of disgust or admiration, and not, under any circumstances, pronounce a hallowed name. Should he do so involuntarily, the spell will be broken, and he will be alone at the top of a mountain and have to find his way back on his own.⁴⁷ This could mean that he must walk a long way, or, if the gathering takes place in a wine cellar, he must find his way out of the cellar he had been locked in. Should the witches decide to provide him with an animal to ride home on, he is not allowed to speak during the entire journey. This is a condition the witches impose on the watcher because they know he will fail. Oftentimes the fast pace of the journey will scare him—and make him call upon God. He will fall from the sky immediately. The site of his crash will rarely be close to his home.

Tales from Tyrol⁴⁸ mention that a witch changed a man from the village into an ass because he dared to reveal the witches’ secret to a companion.

The Ass

Once upon a time, the Sternwirth in Merano employed a manservant who was able to tell witches apart from other human beings. One morning, this manservant stood upon the doorstep conversing with a traveller from the Passeier Valley, and as the villagers made their way home from the Rorate mass, he pointed out several witches among them to the traveller. As he himself was travelling beyond the walls a few days later, he was seen by a witch with a taste for revenge—and turned into an ass. He returned to the Sternwirth as he was, but was promptly chased away. Home- and masterless he roamed the Sandplatz and grazed there until the English miller took pity on the lost animal and took it in. The bewitched manservant had to perform all the duties of a miller’s donkey and in turn was given straw and beatings. This went on for quite a while. One day he had to take the flour bags out beyond the walls, and the very same witch who had cursed⁴⁹ him stood there chattering with another. As she laid eyes on the donkey she said to her friend: ‘Look there—I let this fool have it. Because he was cheeky, he now is an ass.’

‘And he must stay one forever?’ the second woman asked.

‘Yes’, replied the first. “If he only knew, he could help himself quite easily. All he has to do is catch a hallowed wreath on Corpus Christi and eat it, and all my powers would be to no avail.’

The donkey had been listening keenly and heard their entire conversation. As the procession was held the next Corpus Christi, he managed to flee from his stable and snatch a candle and a wreath from its bearer and to eat the wreath. As soon as he had achieved this, the spell was lifted and the lost manservant was returned to his human form. The witch was arrested and was burned on the Sinig. (Merano)⁵⁰

There are, however, certain clusters of folktales which make mention of the witch herself taking a companion with her on her journey. Usually it is her lover who discovers the secret by accident and subsequently wants to learn what happens at the gatherings. Here, too, the journey to the gathering seldom has a happy ending. Another reason for taking along a companion is the hope of making the person one of them. It is, as mentioned earlier, a witch’s duty to make sure the guild grows in numbers. This is, however, an aspiration which hardly ever comes to pass in folktales. While the desire for riches and a comfortable life might seem alluring, most aspirants ultimately do not take the final step—unless they are forced to do so.

Shape Shifting

One of the essential gifts the witch acquires as a follower of Satan is the ability to change shape. Often, she will acquire the gift of turning into an animal; as for which animal she turns into, there are numerous possibilities. Only animals like the lamb or the dove,⁵¹ which are rich in Christian symbolism, are not mentioned in this context. The witch’s favoured animal is the cat.⁵² That this animal has been declared the ‘witch’s animal’ is unsurprising since its nocturnal way of living makes it easy to make this connection. These ‘false’ cats can be identified using certain signs—they have either very long or very thick tails. In the folktales from the Alps it is often said that old witches turn into black cats and remain in this shape.⁵³ The owners of the animals will know nothing of this until they, once again by accident, stumble upon a congregation of cats and discover their own amongst them.⁵⁴

If the cat notices that her secret has been discovered, she will not remain with her owners but will disappear forever—but not without leaving behind an evil memento. Tales of congregations of cats are, however, small in numbers. These witch-cats cannot be killed with regular bullets. Should one attempt this, the shooter himself may be hit by the bullet.

The functions and purposes of shape-shifting are numerous. The cat, for example, will be given milk, bacon and many other food items during the day. Should the witch be the farmer’s wife, her shape-shifting may have the purpose and benefit of enabling her to monitor the servants: in the shape of a cat she can easily discover lazy or thieving staff. As a cat, she can also uncover secret or illicit love relationships.

A witch may also choose the shape of a hare,⁵⁵ which is far less menacing. These witch-rabbits are easy to make out as they have only three legs. Here, too, the folktales make mention of gatherings of hares. These animals, however, are far more likely to be encountered on their own. The witch uses this shape for a similar purpose: She steals food, spies on servants and other villagers and, motivated by jealousy, on her husband or lover. As a hare, the witch’s main enemy is the hunter. He is her preferred victim when it comes to playing tricks. When he shoots at her, she will not move a hair and will then, once he has fired, disappear into a house. Should the hunter follow her, he will find the mistress of the house at the table, drenched in sweat. The hunter can prepare himself for encounters with these very special hares by loading his gun with a penny of St. Matthew, a thaler of St. Mary or a silver bullet. Throwing a rosary at the animal is also quite useful.

Another so-called witch’s animal is the toad.⁵⁶ If this animal is harmed, the injuries can be observed on a witch’s body.⁵⁷ The fox, too, is an animal often associated with witches; it is the shape assumed when cattle is harmed.

Tales that mix together tales of werewolves⁵⁸ and those of witches are worth special mention. While werewolves certainly have their own set of complex ideas and tales, tales of witches and tales of werewolves have been blended over time. Once in the shape of a werewolf, a witch will do great harm to herds of cattle, will steal and murder, even harm humans. The transformation happens once the witch puts on a ring, bracelet or belt made of either human skin or a wolf’s pelt.

The So-called Weather Witch

People were especially afraid of witches inferring things from the weather because this act could be particularly harmful. If a farmer out in the fields suddenly confronted a whirlwind or bales of hay suddenly rising into the air, this was usually a witch’s doing.⁵⁹ These whirlwinds caused by witches are mostly harmless (although terrifying), but they have the potential to grow into dangerous tempests. For protection, one must throw either a left shoe or a sacred object into the gale. This will immediately reveal the witch. Folktales also mention how witches create those fateful clouds.⁶⁰ They whip the water from brooks using a switch taken from a hazel tree, stir wells with a staff, throw a handful of water in the air, dig a hole in the ground into which they then urinate, make signs of magic, or take a sieve and place a cat’s head, a crab and rotten eggs in it and say a spell over it. They might also place pebbles in a jar and shake it, hatch eggs or simply comb their hair. Consecrated bells⁶¹ will, especially in the countries surrounding the Alps, put an end to the bad weather and stop avalanches or landslides caused by witches and therefore also serve as a way to distinguish so-called normal rain from a witch’s spell. An example of this kind of story is the bell called Marlingerin:

It is said that witches and even the devil himself feared the big church bell in the parish of Marling (which can be found just an hour outside of Merano on the right-hand bank of the Etsch). It was called ‘Marlingerin’, and whenever it was heard during especially bad weather, no one but the devil’s kin was afraid. The bell was engraved with the following words:

Verse

Verse Anna Maria hoaß ich, (My name is Anna Maria) Alle Wetter verstoaß ich, (I repel all kinds of weather) Alle Wetter vertreib ich, (I chase away all kinds of weather) In Marling, da verbleib ich. (I will forever remain in Marling.)

It cracked many years ago and had to be cast anew; the bell founder, however, forgot the old inscription and with it the bell’s powers and all the trust that had been placed in it was lost forever.⁶²

It is said that once two of the womenfolk went down to the Valsertal. They had been visiting a number of specific places on the mountain. A man who did not trust these women went to St Jodok and asked for the weather bells to be rung. The two women then had to leave without having done their evil deeds. They said: ‘If not for the Joaser Schellen [the weather bells], we would have flooded the Valsertal by now.’

Another time the curate, Mr Jörgele, saw two strange women coming towards him from Widum. Since Mr Jörgele was a particularly pious priest who had the ability to see more than ordinary folk did, he knew well that these two women were up to no good. So he ran as fast as he could towards the valley to reach it before the women did. At the point where the railway curves today, a bridge used to connect one part of the valley to the other. It was there that he confronted the two women and forced them to turn back. But later, they would say: ‘If not for the black one, we would have flooded the valley by now.’

The Maleficium

Both witches who take the form of an animal and weather-witches attack not only cattle⁶³ but humans, too. The associated curse will result in consumption, extreme weight loss, St Vitus’ dance (Huntington’s Chorea), ulcers and, of course the Hexenschuss, lumbago. Often it is children,⁶⁴ particularly unbaptised ones, who fall victim to witches’ evil magic. For protection, a Bible or a lug wrench (which, naturally, takes the shape of a cross) were placed beneath children’s pillows; small pieces of paper with prayers written on them were quite popular as well. A sure sign of enchantment are never-ending screams; therefore, another word for a special kind of bewitchment is Beschreien. A witch will get close to a child, often while it is being nursed, and praise the mother’s abundant milk. The child will soon refuse to be nursed. For this reason, children who have not yet been baptised are usually kept away from strangers. This spell requires bodily contact.

On 27 September 1583, seventy-year-old Maria Pleinacher from Mank in Lower Austria was dragged from the city of Vienna to the Gänseweide (today’s Weißgerberlände by the Franzensbrücke Bridge) and, once there, was burned to death under the watchful eyes of the bishop of Vienna, all required judicial staff, other honourable officials, and a large and fascinated crowd. She was charged with the following crimes (she finally ‘confessed’ to the following repeated acts of gruesome torture): murdering her husband and several of her children (by magic), being in league with the devil and having lain with him, participating in witch dances (on the Ötscher), performing weather magic, and desecrating altar bread. The most severe charge, however, was her supposedly having bewitched her then sixteen-year-old granddaughter Anna Schlutterbauer,⁶⁵ who had been raised by her grandmother after her mother’s death and who had for many years been suffering from seizures (most likely psychological in origin). She was subsequently healed on Ascension Day in 1593 by means of an exorcism (which was of course used as propaganda against the accused).

Villagers worked counter-magic if they suspected witchcraft. Specialists like witch banishers were alerted to ward off witches’ evil influence and magic. In some places where a whole settlement of witches threatened villagers, they often brought in somebody from outside, as the following example from Carinthia illustrates.⁶⁶

In the mountains, just beyond Eisentratten, the farmer Gautschenbacher used to dwell. At the same time an old woman lived in the nearby town of Gmünd. She possessed powers to do harm to others, so people feared and avoided her. The farmer knew nothing of the old woman’s magic. Once, the old crone dropped an object on the ground in front of the farmer: he picked it up and was suddenly struck by severe pain in one knee. He made his way home with great difficulty and had to stay in bed, and no one knew how to bring him relief. Then he remembered a man who lived in Feldkirchen and owned a Bergspiegel (mountain mirror). His name was Schnabel. The farmer called for him and received partial relief: he now could at least leave his bed. This was all Schnabel could do for him because he had no further control over the evil spirit.⁶⁷

Whatever one may find on one’s doorstep one should never take into the home; oftentimes a witch will place it there as bait and use the object to gain control over the person once the object has been picked up and carried over the threshold.⁶⁸ Again, children are the preferred victims. This is also related to changelings being placed in a cradle. Witches can send diseases to animals and villagers alike. They have snakes, maggots or worms invade villagers’ houses and food.⁶⁹

That witches find lost objects or even animals is rarely a subject of legends. In a Cainthian legend of the witch in the Loibl⁷⁰ Valley, an old woman possessed by the devil was able to find objects or cattle, and a peasant who had lost two oxen asked her about them. She told him to come back the next day. When he hid near her house, he observed a black figure that had obviously come to inform her about the lost oxen. Because he knew it was the devil, he never dared come back. This obviously social aspect of the village diviner is suppressed by her relation to the devil and therefore stigmatised as evil.

The Witch as Alp or Trud or Drud

An exceptional position is held by legends dealing with an Alp or Trud,⁷¹ who rides or presses villagers in their sleep.⁷² The so-called fidler Hans once said: ‘If there is a Trud, then I do not fear her.’ The Trud came to his house; he could hear her come in through the window. She held him tight until he could move no more. It is said that she whispered something to him as well, but whatever it was, he took it to the grave with him.

This relates to the cluster of folktales regarding the witch’s journey in which the witch rides a human⁷³; the witch in these tales takes the shape of a Drud or a Trud⁷⁴ or a Mare, an Alp, or the Austrian-Vorarlbergian variant or ecotype of the Schrätel,⁷⁵ a goblin of the woods. A magical bridle is used, and the human is turned into a horse. If he succeeds in throwing off his rider, he regains his human shape, and if he manages to throw the bridle over her, the witch herself is turned into a horse. The farm hand, or whoever it was the witch had chosen as her mount, takes the horse to the smith and has the animal shod.⁷⁶ The next day the farmer’s wife will be lying in bed severely ill, bearing horseshoes on her hands and feet. Tales like these are widespread in Austria and Germany; moreover, a blending of witch tales and tales of the Trud is evident.

It is said that a Trud held Micheler under close watch in his old house. He promised her something if she would only leave him be. The next day an old woman well known to him came to visit. He did not give her anything, for he did not think badly of her. After having waited for a while, she said: ‘Since you will not give me anything, I have to take my leave.’ It was then that he knew who the Trud was.⁷⁷

The End of the Witch

The motif of the gruesome death⁷⁸ of an evil person can also be found in folktales of the witch. Village witches are not always outsiders, sometimes they are ordinary members of the community with husbands, children, relatives and acquaintances who are not always informed about their wrongdoings. It is often only when the witch meets her end (in nearly all cases a terrible one at the hands of the devil) that the husband is aware that he had been married to a witch. In Upper Austria, a farmer’s wife had bewitched her son’s cattle. When she was condemned to die, her husband wanted her to have the last sacraments, but the village priest said that she had already found her own way. A farmer in Oberpuch had unwittingly married a witch, and one night he found a broom in his bed: the devil had thrown the witch down a well,⁷⁹ where she could be heard screaming and wailing at night. A brave knight exhumed her corpse, which had been buried outside the cemetery, but the devil always dug it up. So they buried it in a swamp, but she haunted the area. Often the devil punishes a witch’s body by tearing it into tiny pieces. Or the witch lives unrecognised her entire life in the community, and only when her end is near does she try to save herself. In one variant, she asks a hunter for 3 twenty-schilling bills but does not say why she wants the money, so he refuses to give it to her. When the devil hunts her down, it is said that the money would have saved her. In a village near Engelharszell, an unrecognised witch died, and after her death a black cat with horseshoes sat on her corpse: the devil.

Male and female witches who had a pact with the devil are also the subject of curious incidents when they die. At their funeral, horses cannot not pull the wagon carrying them until the minister says his prayers. Often this happens at the cross-roads where the witch had summoned the devil. Chapels are also places horses refuse to pass, so they have to bypass them. In Kefermarkt, a witch appeared as a ghost demanding that the minister bury her in the Weinberger Moos. When he gave in, eleven horses were needed to carry her corpse there.⁸⁰

The motif of the evil death of the great sinner—and if anyone is a great sinner it is somebody who has an agreement with the devil—can be traced back to medieval times. Caesarius of Heisterbach gives an example of the evil death of a gambling knight to inform posterity of the devil’s treachery.⁸¹ The devil has the function of God’s executioner. Caesarius emphasises that by God’s fiat, the devil approaches the knight and takes him over the roof where his entrails get stuck in the roof tiles. As his body is nowhere to be found, his entrails are buried instead. The story’s moral: Although the devil grants his followers prosperity, at the end they are always cheated.⁸²

An evil death has the character of a warning for marginalised groups, but especially those in league with the devil. Beneath the gentry such as nobles and clerics, all marginalised groups are predestined for an evil death. In the prototypical medieval story that serves as a precursor to the well-known Faust narrative, Theophilus can only avoid his evil death because he has not renounced Mary, who even takes his contract with the devil out of hell.

Traces of Ancient or Shamanistic Materials

As the most ancient layer of the legend corpus, Röhrich mentions the legend of the resurrection of bones.⁸³ The oldest record is the story of Thor and his rams. In the alpine legend tradition, the motif is evident in several different demonological legends, for example as a meal of ghosts where a cow is slaughtered and a shepherd who witnesses the act shares their meal. Afterwards the ghosts put together the bones on the cow hide. On the following morning, the cow has returned to life, but the piece the herdsman ate is missing. The story demonstrates its livestock-peasant background. The same legend is also recorded as a tale of huntsmen, in which the demons involved are easily identified as the famous lords of the animals. Often it is the wild hunt or figures of the wild hunt who perform the resuscitation. In the hunting version the alpine legends preserve the ancient representation of the motif compared to the North German Thor ram story, which is set in a rural peasant context.⁸⁴

The hunting culture was identified in Mircea Eliade’s ground-breaking study, and many scholars began to track down evidence in the anthropological and historical literature supporting the thesis that traces of shamanism are to be found in several archaic legends; they also argued that historical European-style witchcraft might have included a form of shamanism.⁸⁵ There are essentially two lines of argument here: one, espoused by Éva Pócs⁸⁶ and Carlo Ginzburg⁸⁷ and their followers, connects ancient,⁸⁸ medieval and early modern practices to pre-Christian religious beliefs, mostly in eastern Europe, where conversion happened later and the lines of connection are easier to trace (but with implications for other regions). The second, presented by Claude Lecouteux in his book Witches, Werewolves, and Fairies,⁸⁹ compares accounts of supernatural experiences during the medieval period (including transcripts from witchcraft and werewolf trials) in Germany to the relatively undisturbed shamanic practices further north.

Traces of so-called shamanic motifs can be found predominantly in tales from Burgenland, since they are influenced by Hungarian folk culture. In those tales, witches tear apart one of their own, who then comes back to life. The legends around the so-called hazel-witch⁹⁰ have been analysed by the well-known Austrian folklorist Leopold Schmidt.⁹¹ In short, the legend tells of a farm-hand who comes to know that every Thursday evening, the farmer’s wife goes to her kitchen, placing herself under the chimney hole. Then she anoints herself while murmuring a spell⁹² and removes her own entrails. Afterwards she disappears up the chimney on a broom. When she comes back, she puts the entrails back in her body and is as healthy as ever. One Thursday the farm-hand goes to see the entrails and cuts them with his knife. On the following day, the farmer’s wife lies dead in her bed, and only the farm-hand knows what happened.⁹³

In the legend of the hazel-witch the clandestine spectator or observer is a farm-hand from Seis who follows the farm-girl on horseback. He comes to the Schlern, a famous witches’ mountain. After the dance the farm-girl is butchered, fried and eaten. The farm-hand gets a fried rib but does not eat it; he just puts it in his pocket. Afterwards the witches pull together the bones and bring the girl back to life, but instead of the missing rib, they substitute a piece of hazel wood. Then they say that if someone calls the girl hazel-witch, she will die. On the next day, the farm-hand reveals the girl’s secret and she drops dead.⁹⁴ The German legends of the brothers Grimm only know the motif from a Christian variant of the drowned child, whose bones are collected by the child’s mother, who carries it to the church: The child comes back to life.⁹⁵ The Christian context classifies the resurrection as a Christian miracle, while in the culture of the North Asiatic hunting peoples, this would have been imagined as a resuscitation ritual.

Famous Tales Related to Witch Trials and Historic Tales of Witches

The Zaubererjackl trial⁹⁶ (1675–90) in Salzburg concerned, not a witch, but a sorcerer and was one of the last major trials in the Holy Roman Empire. Jack or Jackl was the most notorious sorcerer in Salzburg in the seventeenth century, well known because of his magic, and rumours about him and his deeds began during his lifetime. Many claimed to have seen him cut off from a piece of wood shavings that immediately turned into mice. Hence, he was given the name Mäusemacher—mouse maker.⁹⁷ He also knew how to prepare salves, which he would use to turn himself into a wolf for twenty-four hours. He was in league with many other sorcerers and witches in the country, and he commanded them all. One could join his coven at night during gatherings of sorcerers and witches on the Speiereck, where witch dances and other hellish revelries were held. Joining required a special ceremony; in imitation of the Christian ritual, it took the form of a baptism. An applicant to the coven had the old Christian baptism scraped (abgeripelt or abgekratzt) from his forehead and was given a new name, often that of an animal such as Kräratz, Hirschenhorn, Kröte or Hasenfuß.⁹⁸

According to legend, the Salzburgian Staudinger witch had been apprenticed to Jackl. He visited her quite often and taught her the black arts. She was well known to all practitioners of magic throughout the country and gathered with them at the Speiereck. Her mother once asked her whether the rumours were true that she had become a witch. She answered that while her mother was cooking mush she could ride on her broom to Salzburg and be back before the mush was cooked. She anointed an old broomstick, demonstrating her art to her mother. She was later accused of sorcery and burnt.⁹⁹

A peasant woman, Magdalena Grillenberger, nicknamed Wagenlehnerin, had been denounced by her granddaughter, who had been accused of arson. This was the last witch trial in Mühlviertel.¹⁰⁰ The legend described the witch as being part of a clan with her family. At the age of twelve, her daughter stole a large quantity of milk from a cow. On Christmas Eve, the witch wedded the devil near Zell near the Ofnerkreuz and came back with her daughters at two o’clock in the morning. She told her husband that she had attended Christmas Eve Midnight Mass. One night the witch rode on her broom through the chimney to St Stephen’s in Vienna. She and her daughters were burned at the stake. Once in the fire, she called to the devil that he should shoot her, but he refused, replying that he had no gunpowder.¹⁰¹

Conclusion

A comparison of just the motifs reveals a similarity of Austrian witch legends to the legends of Germany or other European countries. What makes it nevertheless remarkable are the Alpine relations between the older mythological figures and the witch figure on the one hand and traces of the so-called hunting culture in the witch legends of the low regions like the Burgenland on the other hand. Thus, the motifs bound to Alpine figures like the Percht, Trud, Schrätel and, in some cases, the Wild Women (either helping or often also punishing) are transferred to the latter witch legends, which is facilitated by their similar attributes.

Main motifs, like the witches’ ride to high mountains, are very often combined with the witness motif: The witch is unwittingly or deliberately accompanied by clumsy witnesses who get the flying spell wrong or is often not even known to be a witch by her own husband but is a teacher to her female offspring. The old motif of the competition between magicians recurs in the fighting between witches and witch banishers. Her end is always terrible and the devil proves to be the greatest cheater of all. Other magical personae, such as the historical Zauberer Jackl, who became legendary, seem to be higher in rank than the village witches, thereby serving as their teacher.

Ancient elements or obvious traces of shamanistic motifs are to be found at the boundaries between Austrian Alpine and Hungarian lowland culture. In some details, the peculiar Austrian Alpine witch merges with the historic figure of the witch trials, and one sees how history and tales overlap.