Bengt Ankarloo

The Malleus Maleficarum, usually translated as the Hammer of Witches, is the best known treatise about witchcraft. It was written by the German Catholic clergyman Heinrich Kramer (under his Latinized name Henricus Institor) and first published in the German city of Speyer in 1486. Some characterize it as the compendium of preexisting demonological literature of the 15th century. Kramer presented his text as an official position of the Catholic Church. The book was condemned by top theologians of…