ABSTRACT
This introduction provides an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores the development of witchcraft prosecution in Denmark after the Reformation in 1536. She finds an early, hesitant period, characterised by legal initiatives to secure fair trials. It describes how this was followed by a formative period, where the king and the king's council took the lead in some spectacular witchcraft cases. The book continues the theme of the state's religious influence on crime and crime control—up to the eighteenth century. In an analysis of the motives that led to the king's approval or pardoning of death penalties for religious crimes, sexual crimes and homicide, it finds comprehensive use of counselling by the Faculty of Theology at the University of Copenhagen. The book traces the implementation in Danish legislation of the fourth commandment, and the sixth commandment, not to commit adultery.
