“Who knows why we were taught to fear the witches, and not those who burned them, or those who stood by, watching?”
–Affinity Soul
Nothing unites a distressed population like a common enemy. In 1563, when Scotland suffered a major crop failure and subsequent famine, people died and somebody had to be to blame. In How to Kill a Witch: The Patriarchy’s Guide to Silencing Women, Witches of Scotland campaigners Zoe Venditozzi and Claire Mitchell explain why a combination of patriarchy and fear made women the prime targets. Over the next 150 years, more than 4000 people, 85 percent of whom were female and almost all Christian. would be strangled and/or burned.
How to Kill a Witch is structured as a satirical handbook for the would-be witch hunter, outlining the chilling and sometimes ridiculous process of identifying and ultimately eliminating witches. It explains how to conduct oneself as a professional “witch pricker” and outlines the ways of disposing of the witch’s body so the Devil can’t bring it back to life. The authors rely on historical documents, such as King James VI’s Demonology and the forced confession of Isobel Gowdie, along with interviews and fictionalized reconstructions from the victims’ point of view.
Needless to say, some of the details of state-sanctioned torture and murder are pretty gruesome, but the conversational writing style and wry humour help bring the material to life. The most poignant stories are the portraits of the accused, most of whom were poor women who had become troublesome or inconvenient to those around them. In general, women were “viewed as difficult, foolish, and sexually dangerous,” making them “perfect targets for… society’s fears.”
Even in the 21st century, hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people—predominantly single and elderly women–face torture, banishment, or vigilante execution annually due to witchcraft allegations. Although the prime hot spots are in sub-Saharan Africa, south Asia, and Papua New Guinea, one of the most chilling passages in the book is the one describing a US pastor’s viral sermon in which he called out the “witches” in his congregation.
Could it happen to our society? Well, as Venditozzi told the BBC when the book was released in 2025, “the belief system and social anxiety of the time created a perfect storm to find scapegoats and deal with them harshly.”
Sound familiar?