Witchcraft Out of the Shadows: A Complete History [Hardcover]

This complete history of witchcraft from Ancient Greece to the present day charts the rise and development of witchcraft and the modern witchcraft religion of Wicca. Today witchcraft is on everyone's lips, on television, film and in literature, but few know, or are even able to guess at, its shadowy history. This in-depth investigation discovers how the ideas we have about witchcraft took shape thousands of years ago in the myths and religions of the ancient world. It looks at why these ideas were expressed so violently during the era of the witch trials. Finally, it reveals how witchcraft has been transformed into one of the most radical and fastest growing religions of our age - a religion of equality and compassion that still has the power to unsettle even the bravest amongst us. With new analyses, fresh insights and previously unpublished material drawn from the author's doctoral research into the mysticism, magic and social meaning of Wicca, this is the first book to bring witchcraft fully out of the shadows.

I have written Witchcraft Out of the Shadows to do just that: bring witchcraft out of the shadows of misunderstanding and confusion, to explain its real history and development.

My PhD work at King's College, London, took modern witchcraft as a test case for analysing Max Weber's sociological theory of disenchantment and developing a counter theory of re-enchantment. My findings on the nature of magic, mystical experience, ritual activity, conceptualization of deity and the demographics of those involved refuted many of the existing stereotypes and provided new insights into scientifically uncharted areas. It was these important findings that I wanted to take from the narrow academic world to a wider audience, to share what I had found.

But this was only part of the story. The history and sociology of witchcraft has tended to concentrate on the late Medieval and Early Modern period, the so-called Witch-Craze - the age of burnings, hangings, trials and torture. It is an important period, but this over-emphasis has produced a distorted picture of the phenomenon of witchcraft.

With Witchcraft Out of the Shadows I have re-analysed and re-interpreted the history of witchcraft, recovering long ignored material from Ancient Greece and Northern Europe, and have placed my PhD research findings in a broader historical context.

So it was with a sense of discovery, of finding a new place in that 'other country' of history, that I started writing the book and with the enthusiasm of an explorer back from exotic lands that I want now to tell what I have found.

Leo Ruickbie is the founder and director of WICA, the Witchcraft Information Centre & Archive, an educational and research orientated website specializing in witchcraft and Wicca. He has been actively engaged in research into witchcraft and Wicca since 1994. His MA dissertation on ‘The Re-Enchantment of the World’ earned him a distinction from one of the UK’s top-rated research departments at Lancaster University. He is currently working on a doctorate at King’s College, London, in the sociology of modern witchcraft with a special emphasis on the theory of re-enchantment.