The Real Reason Witch Hunters Accused Women of Witchcraft
Let this be a lesson to ladies who hide penises in trees.
If you think modern relationship advice is ridiculous, you should have read the malarky in the fifteenth-century self-help books. If a medieval man chose the wrong girl, his penis could end up dangling from a tree. Or so it was believed.
The myth of the “phallic tree” was popularized in the weirdest and undeniably most hateful book ever written — the Malleus Maleficarum or Hammer of Witches (1486). Its authors were Heinrich Kramer and Johann Sprenger, but most historians credit Kramer as the progenitor of this witch-hunting nonsense.
Before its printing, witchcraft was not solely connected to women. In Iceland and other areas, the witch hunts targeted men (warlocks) and women (witches) with equal ferocity.
But Kramer needed an outlet for his unbridled misogyny, so the Malleus became the female extermination manual that validated centuries of fear and superstition.
Like most women haters, Kramer didn’t have much luck with the ladies. He especially botched a trial where he tried to convince a judge that some local women were practicing witchcraft. The women were all released, and the judge thought that Kramer was a tad daffy.
