The Enemy Within: 2,000 Years of Witch-hunting in the Western World

Noted Yale historian Demos has devoted almost half a century to studying the European and American witch crazes, and his new book distills all he has learned. The book focuses from roughly A.D. 500 through 1700, with a concluding section on the characteristically modern phenomenon of “witch-hunts without witches”—such as McCarthyism. What all witch hunts have in common is a targeting of “the enemy within”—a member of the community who is identified as disloyal. Such fears coalesced: toward the turbulent end of the Middle Ages, when one was expected to adhere to Christian beliefs; in late 18th- and 19th-century America, when Masons' loyalty to republican principles was questioned; and in the late 20th century, when threats real and imagined to the family culminated in the day-care satanic cult allegations. Succinct and lucid in his analysis, Demos offers vivid examples of the accuseds' travails as well as probing the mindsets of their tormentors. This should appeal to a wide array of general readers and specialists alike. (Oct.)